Top 113 Quotes & Sayings by Regina Brett - Page 2

When I turned 45, I lay in bed reflecting on all life had taught me. My soul sprang a leak and ideas flowed out. My pen simply caught them and set the words on paper. I typed them up and turned them into a newspaper column of the 45 lessons life taught me. When I hit 50, I added five more lessons and the paper ran the column again.

Even if you have nothing in your wallet, nothing can keep you from having a great summer. You can listen to crickets sing you to sleep, trace the Big Dipper, breathe in the stars, run through a sprinkler, host a cartwheel contest in the front yard.

If we want our daughters to honor their bodies, they need to hear us honor ours, no matter what size or shape we are, no matter what scars or sags we see in that mirror.

How do you know someone is a grandparent? They've got milk stains on every shirt from burping babies. Their pants are worn out at the knees from crawling around giving pony rides. They have 2,842 pictures of the grandkids on their smart phone and not one photo of their spouse.

Going through chemo is like investing money in a retirement account. You feel the hit right now, but later in life you get to reap the benefits - by still being alive.

Summer is the annual permission slip to be lazy. To do nothing and have it count for something. To lie in the grass and count the stars. To sit on a branch and study the clouds.

For me, being Catholic was who I was and who I am, just like I'm Irish and Slovak. It's just so ingrained in us.

We need to be smarter than our smart phones and realize the people we are with are more important than the people we aren't with, and way more important than the strangers we hope will tweet and like and share and Instagram whatever we're sending out into the cybersphere.

It takes tough love to order kids to step away from the iPhone or iPad during dinner or to take the devices away if they're interrupting and interfering with everyone else's pleasure at a movie, concert or other public event.

Cancer taught me to live only in the day I'm in. In the moment I'm in. Some moments, I simply ground myself by touching the desk, the table, the wall wherever I am and say, 'You're right here. Stay put in this moment.'

'Star Trek' never grabbed me. Every time I hear about Klingons, I think of those little lint balls that stick to your clothes in the dryer.

I usually give a book 40 pages. If it doesn't grab me by then, adios. With young adult books, you can usually tell by Page 4 if it's worth the time. The author establishes the conflict early, sometimes in the first sentence. The themes of hope, family, friendship and overcoming hardship appeal to most everyone.

We've come a long way from having one land line that was forbidden to be answered during dinner. We had no answering machine, just a dad who barked, 'Who calls during dinner? If it's important, they'll call back.' He was right.

Frame every so-called disaster with these words: In five years, will this matter?

Life is too short to waste time hating anyone.

Get rid of anything that isn’t useful, beautiful or joyful.

Forgive everyone everything.

Whatever doesn't kill you really does make you stronger.

Take a deep breath. It calms the mind.

Baking happens with ingredients that last for months and come to life inside a warm oven. Baking is slow and leisurely.

Cry with someone. It's more healing than crying alone.

Don't take yourself so seriously. No one else does.

To celebrate growing older, I once wrote the 45 lessons life taught me. It is the most-requested column I've ever written.

Choice, not chance, determines your destiny. It's up to you to decide what you are worth, how you matter, and how you make meaning in the world. No one else has your gifts--your set of talents, ideas, interests. You are an original. A masterpiece.

God never gives us more than what we can carry.

No one is in charge of your happiness except you.

From now on, I pray like I mean it. No more hitting SEND over and over. It's changed my life. It has freed me from fear and opened up endless avenues for me as a writer, radio host, parent, wife, and friend. It has enhanced every relationship I'm in, starting with the most important one: my relationship with God. Real faith isn't praying without ceasing. It's believing that God heard you the first time.

I think of her every time I judge myself or someone else too harshly. How do we really know the worth of our work? It's not our job to judge the worth of what we offer the world, but to keep offering it regardless. You might never know the true worth of your efforts. Or it could simply be too soon to tell.

If we threw our problems in a pile and saw everyone else's, we'd grab ours back.

Choas will come, calm will follow, and then it will start up all over again. The secret is to savor the ride.

You don't have to win every argument. Agree to disagree.

God loves you because of who God is, not because of anything you did or didn't do.

Don't audit life. Show up and make the most of it now.

Each day is a precious gift to be savored and used, not left unopened and hoarded for a future that may never come.

However good or bad a situation is, it will change.

There were two kinds of women: those who wear nail polish and those who don't. Which do you prefer?

When it comes to going after what you love in life, don't take no for an answer.

Envy is a waste of time. You already have all you need.

Time heals almost everything. Give time time.

I once heard someone say that prayer is more than words. It's a stance you take, a position you claim. You throw your body against the door to keep the demons from advancing and stay put until they go away.

Life isn't tied with a bow, but it's still a gift.

Your children get only one childhood.

I say we all take the pledge and stay home. Thanksgiving is a day to give thanks for what you have, not to save a few dollars to get more.

It's OK to get angry with God. He can take it.

Growing old beats the alternative - dying young.

It's scary to make major changes, but we usually have enough courage to take the next right step. One small step and then another. That's what it takes to raise a child, to get a degree, to write a book, to do whatever it is your heart desires.

We want someone else to act. But miracles aren't what other people do. They're what each of us does. They're what happens when ordinary people take extraordinary action. To be a miracle doesn't mean you have to tackle problems across the globe. It means making a difference in your own living room, cubicle, neighborhood, community.

Get outside every day. Miracles are waiting everywhere.

Life is too short for long pity parties. Get busy living, or get busy dying.

When in doubt, take the next step.

Writer's block.. when one curses the blinking cursor on the blank page.

There's so much living to be squeeze into the cracks of one little day. You can make someone laugh, smile, hope, sing, think.

Over prepare, then go with the flow.