“Our circumstances define the playing field, not the outcome.”
— Jonathan Lockwood Huie
“Life consists not in holding good cards but in playing those you hold well.”
— Josh Billings
“Customs form us all. Our thoughts, our morals, our most fixed beliefs, are consequences of our place of birth.”
— Aaron Hill
“Yet within these quite extreme constraints, progress, success, and happiness are still possible.You play the hand you’re dealt.I think the game’s worthwhile.”
— Christopher Reeve
“All men and women are born, live, suffer and die;what distinguishes us one from another is our dreams,whether they be dreams about worldly or unworldly things,and what we do to make them come about.We do not choose to be born.We do not choose our parents.We do not choose our historical epoch,the country of our birth,or the immediate circumstances of our upbringing.We do not, most of us, choose to die; nor do we choose the time and conditions of our death. But within this realm of choicelessness, we do choose how we live.”
— Joseph Epstein
“We all have free will, but only within the harsh constraints of predestination. Within the limits placed upon our lives by the circumstances of our genes, our place and condition of birth, the parenting we receive, and other events beyond our control, we are defined by the free will we can still exercise.”
— Jonathan Lockwood Huie
“Of all knowledge, the wise and good seek most to know themselves.”
— William Shakespeare
“Nourishing the soul is the process of drinking at the life stream, coming back to one’s true self, embracing the whole of one’s experience – good, bad, or ugly; painful or exalted; dull or boring.”
— Jon Kabat-Zinn
“How do we nurture the soul? By revering our own life. By treating it as supremely important. By reaching for the best within ourselves. By learning to love it all, not only the joys and the victories, but also the pain and the struggles.”
— Nathaniel Branden