Happiness | Catalyst Quotes

Archive for the category “Happiness”

29 Jun 2015

“Dogs, Angels and Heaven”

“I heard somebody define heaven once,” she said, looking at Pearl, “as a place where, when you get there, all the dogs you ever loved run to greet you.” (Robert B. Parker)

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“Dogs are minor angels, and I don’t mean that facetiously. They love unconditionally, forgive immediately, are the truest of friends, willing to do anything that makes us happy, et cetera. If we attributed some of those qualities to a person we would say they are special. If they had ALL of them, we would call them angelic. But because it’s “only” a dog, we dismiss them as sweet or funny but little more. However when you think about it, what are the things that we most like in another human being? Many times those qualities are seen in our dogs every single day — we’re just so used to them that we pay no attention.” (Jonathan Carroll)

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“Heaven goes by favor. If it went by merit, you would stay out and your dog would go in.” (Mark Twain)

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“My grandfather used to say that if God did not allow a man to be reunited with his dogs in the next life He was no God worth worshipping; that if a dog did not have a soul, then nothing had.” (John Connolly, The Wrath of Angels: A Charlie Parker Thriller)

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“Dogs and angels are not very far apart.” (Charles Bukowski)

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“Having a dog or cat will open your heart. Reading a book will open your mind. Having both a pet & a book … absolute heaven.” (Mark Rubinstein)

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24 Dec 2014

“Make This Christmas Thing Last”

Once again, I present to you the song, “Old City Bar” by the Trans-Siberian Orchestra. Every time I hear it, I get a bit teary-eyed and I am sure you will also. As you read the lyrics below, the words will hit you hard but try to listen to the song and get the full effect of it. You can then understand that miracles do happen and that we all have goodness in our hearts. After the video, is a quote that I find useful during the holiday period. – Alex Pena

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“Here are a few suggestions for special gifts: a firm handshake to a shaky soul, a kind word to a lonely person, a warm smile to the disheartened, a sincere concern for someone troubled, a feeling of compassion for the neglected, a comforting thought for the bereaved, a respect for the dignity of others, a defense of the rights of individuals, a word of witness to help a seeking soul, a Merry Christmas to all.” (Source Unknown)

Posted in Attitude, Challenges, Change, Children, Courage, Family, Gratitude, Happiness, Inspiration, Life, Love, Quotes | Leave a comment

19 Oct 2013

Funny Thoughts for Today – “A Few Cocktails and a Box of Crayons”

“If you want an interesting party sometime, combine a few cocktails and a box of crayons.” (Robert Fulghum)

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“Everyone, at some point in their lives, wakes up in the middle of the night with the feeling that they are all alone in the world, and that nobody loves them now and that nobody will ever love them, and that they will never have a decent night’s sleep again and will spend their lives wandering blearily around a loveless landscape, hoping desperately that their circumstances will improve, but suspecting, in their heart of hearts, that they will remain unloved forever.

The best thing to do in these circumstances is to wake somebody else, so that they can feel this way, too.” (Lemony Snicket)

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“Next time my analyst says, ‘If you’re unhappy, whose fault do you suppose that is?’ — I got a list of names in my hip pocket.” (Robert Brault)

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“’You’re judged by the company you keep,’ said my father. ‘Your father hangs out with jackasses and drunks,’ said my mother.” (Author Unknown)

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“’He was his own best friend – always alone, but never lonely,’ said a sad widow of her dead ex-husband at his memorial service. ‘But I always thought when he was alone he was in bad company.’” (Anonymous)

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“God writes a lot of comedy … the trouble is, he’s stuck with so many bad actors who don’t know how to play funny.” (Garrison Keillor)

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“Laughter is the shortest distance between two people.” (Victor Borge)

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“You only live once, but if you do it right, once is enough.” (Mae West)

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14 May 2013

“Friends / Just the Way You Are”

“No matter where life takes you – big cities, small towns, you will inevitably run across small minds; people who think they are better than you, people who think that being pretty or popular automatically makes you a worthwhile human. None of these things matter as long as you have strengths of character, integrity, sense of pride. So when you meet someone for the first time, don’t judge them by their situation in life, because you never know, they may end up being your very best friend.” (Dawson’s Creek)

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“A true friend knows your weaknesses but shows you your strengths; feels your fears but fortifies your faith; sees your anxieties but frees your spirit; recognizes your disabilities but emphasizes your possibilities.” (William Arthur Ward)

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“When we honestly ask ourselves which persons in our lives mean the most to us, we often find that it is those who, instead of giving advice, solutions, or cures, have chosen rather to share our pain and touch our wounds with a warm and tender hand. The friend who can be silent with us in a moment of despair or confusion, who can stay with us in an hour of grief and bereavement, who can tolerate now knowing, not curing, not healing and face with us the reality of our powerlessness, that is a friend who cares.” (Henri Nouwen)

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Just The Way You Are

“Don’t go changing, to try and please me
You never let me down before
Don’t imagine you’re too familiar
And I don’t see you anymore

I would not leave you in times of trouble
We never could have come this far
I took the good times, I’ll take the bad times
I’ll take you just the way you are

Don’t go trying some new fashion
Don’t change the color of your hair
You always have my unspoken passion
Although I might not seem to care

I don’t want clever conversation
I never want to work that hard
I just want someone that I can talk to
I want you just the way you are.

I need to know that you will always be
The same old someone that I knew
What will it take till you believe in me
The way that I believe in you.

I said I love you and that’s forever
And this I promise from the heart
I couldn’t love you any better
I love you just the way you are.” (Billy Joel)

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“All life is an experiment. The more experiments you make the better.” (Ralph Waldo Emerson)

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12 May 2013

“When God Created Mothers”

When the Good Lord was creating mothers, He was into His sixth day of “overtime” when the angel appeared and said. “You’re doing a lot of fiddling around on this one.”

And God said, “Have you read the specs on this order?” She has to be completely washable, but not plastic. Have 180 moveable parts … all replaceable. Run on black coffee and leftovers. Have a lap that disappears when she stands up. A kiss that can cure anything from a broken leg to a disappointed love affair. And six pairs of hands.”

The angel shook her head slowly and said. “Six pairs of hands …. no way.”

“It’s not the hands that are causing me problems,” God remarked, “it’s the three pairs of eyes that mothers have to have.”

“That’s on the standard model?” asked the angel. God nodded.

One pair that sees through closed doors when she asks, ‘What are you kids doing in there?’ when she already knows. Another here in the back of her head that sees what she shouldn’t but what she has to know, and of course the ones here in front that can look at a child when he goofs up and say. ‘I understand and I love you’ without so much as uttering a word.”

“God,” said the angel touching his sleeve gently, “Get some rest, tomorrow….”

“I can’t,” said God, “I’m so close to creating something so close to myself. Already I have one who heals herself when she is sick … can feed a family of six on one pound of hamburger … and can get a nine year old to stand under a shower.”

The angel circled the model of a mother very slowly. “It’s too soft,” she sighed.

“But tough!” said God excitedly. “You can imagine what this mother can do or endure.”

“Can it think?”

Not only can it think, but it can reason and compromise,” said the Creator.

Finally, the angel bent over and ran her finger across the cheek.

“There’s a leak,” she pronounced. “I told You that You were trying to put too much into this model.”

“It’s not a leak,” said the Lord, “It’s a tear.”

“What’s it for?”

“It’s for joy, sadness, disappointment, pain, loneliness, and pride.”

“You are a genius,” said the angel.

Somberly, God said, … “I didn’t put it there.” (Erma Bombeck, ‘When God Created Mothers)

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“Mother is the name for God in the lips and hearts of little children.” (William Thackeray)

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Happy Mother’s Day Mom!

As you look on us from Heaven, know that we miss you and love you.

(Your Loving Son)

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08 May 2013

“I Resign”

“I Resign

I am hereby officially tendering my resignation as an adult.
I have decided I would like to accept the responsibilities of an 8-year-old again.
I want to go to McDonald’s and think that it’s a four-star restaurant.
I want to sail sticks across a fresh mud puddle and make ripples with rocks.
I want to think M&Ms are better than money because you can eat them.
I want to lie under a big oak tree and run a lemonade stand with my friends on a hot summer day.
I want to return to a time when life was simple.
When all you knew were colors, multiplication tables, and nursery rhymes, but that didn’t bother you, because you didn’t know what you didn’t know and you didn’t care.

All you knew was to be happy because you were blissfully unaware of all the things that should make you worried or upset.
I want to think the world is fair. That everyone is honest and good.
I want to believe that anything is possible.
I want to be oblivious to the complexities of life and be overly excited by the little things again.
I want to live simple again.
I don’t want my day to consist of computer crashes, mountains of paperwork, depressing news, how to survive more days in the month than there is money in the bank, doctor bills, gossip, illness, and loss of loved ones.

I want to believe in the power of smiles, hugs, a kind word, truth, justice, peace, dreams, the imagination, mankind, and making angels in the snow.

So … here’s my checkbook and my car keys, my credit cards and all my responsibility.

I am officially resigning from adulthood. And if you want to discuss this further, you’ll have to catch me first, ’cause …

‘Tag! You’re it.’” (Author Unknown)

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“Children are true believers, and some of us are lucky enough to make the transition to adulthood without losing the ability to see through young eyes.” (Anne Geddes)

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“One of the most responsible things you can do as an adult is become more of a child.” (Wayne Dyer)

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“In every man (woman) there is a child hidden – it wants to come out.” (Friedrich Nietzche)

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05 May 2013

“It’s The Music We Make That Counts”

“Music is … A higher revelation than all Wisdom & Philosophy” (Ludwig van Beethoven)

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“Music is the universal language of mankind.” (Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

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“Music is the wine that fills the cup of silence.” (Robert Fripp)

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“The music is not in the notes, but in the silence between.” (Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart)

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“We are the music makers, and we are the dreamers of dreams.” (Roald Dahl)

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“Music touches us emotionally, where words alone can’t.” (Johnny Depp)

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“Music . . . can name the un-nameable and communicate the unknowable.” (Leonard Bernstein)

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“To stop the flow of music would be like the stopping of time itself, incredible and inconceivable.” (Aaron Copland)

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“As one old gentleman put it, ” Son, I don’t care if you’re stark nekkid and wear a bone in your nose. If you kin fiddle, you’re all right with me. It’s the music we make that counts.” (Robert Fulghum, All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten)

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31 Mar 2013

“Fall in Love, Change Our Habits. Because Time Vanishes”

“To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment.” (Ralph Waldo Emerson)

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“How easily we can forget how precious life is! So long as we can remember, we’ve just been here, being alive. Unlike other things for which we have a comparison – black to white, day to night, good to bad – we’re so utterly immersed in life that usually we can see it only in the context of itself. We don’t see life as compared to anything, to not-being-alive, for example, to never having been born. Life just is.

But life itself is a gift. It’s a compliment just being born: to feel, breathe, think, play, dance, sing, work, and make love, for this particular lifetime.

Today give thanks for life. For life itself! For simply being born!” (365 Days of Love, Daphne Rose Kingma, Conari Press)

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“We cannot tell the precise moment when friendship is formed. As in filling a vessel drop by drop, there is at least a drop which makes it run over; so in a series of kindnesses there is, at last, one which makes the heart run over.” (James Boswell)

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“We don’t have forever – to fall in love, to change our habits, to solve our problems, to figure out what we want to do with our lives. In just the same manner, we don’t have an unlimited amount of time to say, do, feel, offer, deliver, share or enjoy all the things we can imagine saying, doing, feeling, sharing, or offering to the person we love.

So love the person you love right now, in the time you’ve been given to love her, in the ways you’ve been give to love him. Whatever you have in mind to do, whatever you’ve always imagine doing, do it now.

Because time vanishes. Things change, Stories end.” (365 Days of Love, Daphne Rose Kingma, Conari Press)

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28 Mar 2013

“Seize This Day and Smile”

“Why Not You?

Today, many will awaken with a fresh sense of inspiration. Why not you?

Today, many will open their eyes to the beauty that surrounds them. Why not you?

Today, many will choose to leave the ghost of yesterday behind and seize the immeasurable power of today. Why not you?

Today, many will break through the barriers of the past by looking at the blessings of the present. Why not you?

Today, for many the burden of self doubt and insecurity will be lifted by the security and confidence of empowerment. Why not you?

Today, many will rise above their believed limitations and make contact with their powerful innate strength. Why not you?

Today, many will choose to live in such a manner that they will be a positive role model for their children. Why not you?

Today, many will choose to free themselves from the personal imprisonment of their bad habits. Why not you?

Today, many will choose to live free of conditions and rules governing their own happiness. Why not you?

Today, many will find abundance in simplicity. Why not you?

Today, many will be confronted by difficult moral choices and they will choose to do what is right instead of what is beneficial. Why not you?

Today, many will decide to no longer sit back with a victim mentality, but to take charge of their lives and make positive changes. Why not you?

Today, many will take the action necessary to make a difference. Why not you?

Today, many will make the commitment to be a better mother, father, son, daughter, student, teacher, worker, boss, brother, sister, & so much more. Why not you?

Today is a new day!

Many will seize this day.

Many will live it to the fullest.

Why not you?” (Steve Maraboli, Life, the Truth, and Being Free)

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“I’ve got nothing to do today but smile.” (Paul Simon)

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