There are many find things which you mean to do some day, under what you think will be more favorable circumstances. But the only time that is surely yours is the present, hence this is the time to speak the word of appreciation and sympathy, to do the generous deed, to forgive the fault of a thoughtless friend, to sacrifice self a little more for others. Today is the day in which to express your noblest qualities of mind and heart, to do at least one worthy thing which you have long postponed, and to use your God-given abilities for the enrichment of some less fortunate fellow traveler. Today you can make your life...significant and worthwhile. The present is yours to do with it as you will.
Grenville Kleiser Light from Many Lamps
Categories: intentions action today life circumstances present past future time appreciation sympathy generosity appreciation forgiveness self-sacrifice giving sharing talents gifts abilities

The applause of a single human being is of great consequence.
Samuel Johnson The Forbes Book of Business Quotations
Categories: appreciation gratitude

Better bad than without.
English proverb The Prentice-Hall Encyclopedia of World Proverbs
Categories: appreciation gratitude

He that is stricken blind cannot forget
The precious treasure of his eyesight lost.
William Shakespeare [Titus Andronicus] Bartlett's Familiar Quotations
Categories: perspective appreciation gratitude

Praise, like gold diamonds, owes its value to scarcity.
Samuel Johnson The Forbes Book of Business Quotations
Categories: praise appreciation gratitude

Gratitude is a fruit of great cultivation; you do not find it among gross people.
Samuel Johnson Bartlett's Familiar Quotations
Categories: gratitude appreciation character

We should write an elegy for every day that has slipped through our lives unnoticed and unappreciated. Better still, we should write a song of thanksgiving for all the days that remain.
Sarah Ban Breathnach Simple Abundance: A Daybook of Comfort and Joy
Categories: gratitude attitude appreciation joy

When I first open my eyes upon the morning meadows and look out upon the beautiful world, I thank God I am alive.
Ralph Waldo Emerson The Book of Positive Quotations
Categories: nature beauty appreciation

A man should hear a little music, read a little poetry, and see a fine picture every day of his life, in order that worldly cares may not obliterate the sense of the beautiful which God has implanted in the human soul.
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe The Forbes Book of Business Quotations: 14,266 Thoughts on the Business of Life
Categories: balance beauty appreciation

Each day offers us the gift of being a special occasion if we can simply learn that as well as giving, it is blessed to receive with grace and a grateful heart.
Sarah Ban Breathnach The 13 Secrets of Power Performance
Categories: blessings openness gratitude appreciation

Nothing flows faster than the years, daughters
Leonardo da Vinci Leonardo: Discovering the Life of Leonardo Da Vinci
Categories: time aging present appreciation

If the only prayer you say in your life is "thank you," that would suffice.
Meister Eckhart Body, Mind and Spirit
Categories: gratitude thankfulness appreciation thanksgiving

A single sunbeam is enough to drive away many shadows.
St. Francis of Assisi Alexandra Stoddard's Book of Days
Categories: attitude joy happiness gratitude appreciation

Whoever has bitten a sour apple will enjoy a sweet one all the more.
German proverb The Prentice-Hall Encyclopedia of World Proverbs
Categories: bittersweet experiences perspective appreciation

A friend may well be reckoned the masterpiece of nature.
Ralph Waldo Emerson The Book of Positive Quotations
Categories: friendship relationships love appreciation

This is the precious moment, but strangely, sadly, few people know it.
Timothy Ray Miller How to Want What You Have
Categories: time appreciation life now present

He who praises everybody praises nobody.
Samuel Johnson The Forbes Book of Business Quotations
Categories: praise appreciation gratitude sincerity

There is a great man who makes every man feels small. But the real great man is the man who makes every man feel great.
G. K. Chesterton The Penguin Dictionary of Twentieth-Century Quotations
Categories: relationships leadership mentoring encouragement appreciation

Who is the happiest of men? He who values the merits of others, and in their pleasure takes joy, even as though t'were his own.
Johann von Goethe The Book of Positive Quotations
Categories: relationships mentoring teaching education joy appreciation

That man is happiest who lives from day to day and asks no more, garnering the simple goodness of a life.
Euripides The Book of Positive Quotations
Categories: simple pleasures joy happiness appreciation gratitude

Nine-tenths of wisdom is appreciation. Go find somebody's hand and squeeze it, while there's time.
Dale Dauten His nationally syndicated column which appeared in the 4/16/98 Arizona Republic.
Categories: gratitude appreciation love friendship wisdom

I consider my ability to arouse enthusiasm among my people the greatest asset I possess, and the way to develop the best in a person is by appreciation and encouragement. I believe in giving people incentive to work. So I am anxious to praise but loath to find fault. I am hearty in my approbation and lavish in my praise.
Charles Schwab "Encouragement more forceful than criticism" by Harvey Mackay, Arizona Republic, 12/6/2000
Categories: leadership encouragement praise appreciation morale

Life, even in the hardest times, is full of moments to savor. They will not come this way again, not in this way.
Paula Rinehart "Living in the Present Tense" by Paula Rinehart. Discipleship Journal, Jan/Feb 1999.
Categories: gratitude awareness life appreciation savor appreciate

When someone does something good, applaud! You will make two people happy.
Samuel Goldwyn The Book of Positive Quotations
Categories: happiness joy caring sharing appreciation gratitude relationships

You agree--I'm sure you agree, that beauty is the only thing worth living for.
Agatha Christie Simple Abundance
Categories: beauty nature art appreciation music meaning life

The greatest humiliation in life is to work hard on something from which you expect appreciation, and then fail to get it.
Edgar Watson Howe Words for All Occasions
Categories: appreciation gratitude leadership relationships work effort

Slow down and enjoy life. It's not only the scenery you miss by going to fast -- you also miss the sense of where you are going and why.
Eddie Cantor
Categories: leisure attention appreciation gratitude purpose fulfillment

The child's sense of awe and wonder is too often replaced by a preoccupation with how we look, and whether we're making enough money, and what will the neighbors think, and what do our parents think, and what did our schoolteachers tell us, and what does our religion say. In other words, our intellect controls us.
Bernie Siegel, MD Handbook for the Soul
Categories: wonder appreciation worry appearances self-esteem self-confidence judgementalism

... success or failure, the truth of a life really has little to do with its quality. The quality of life is in proportion, always, to the capacity for delight. The capacity for delight is the gift of paying attention.
Julie Cameron
Categories: delight joy happiness focus gratitude appreciation awareness

Develop interest in life as you see it; in people, things, literature, music -- the world is so rich, simply throbbing with rich treasures, beautiful souls and interesting people. Forget yourself.
Henry Miller
Categories: focus awareness growth appreciation gratitude happiness creativity joy

I move through my day-to-day life with a sense of appreciation and gratitude that comes from knowing how fortunate I truly am and how unearned all that I am thankful for really is. To have this perspective in my everyday consciousness is in itself a gift, for it leads to feeling "graced," or blessed, each time.
Jean Shinoda Bolen A Grateful Heart: Daily Blessings for the Evening Meal from Buddha to the Beatles
Categories: gratitude attitude thankfulness appreciation blessings grace humility

This time, like all times, is a very good one if we but know what to do with it.
Ralph Waldo Emerson The Book of Positive Quotations
Categories: time life appreciation purpose meaning opportunity action

The world is a mirror of infinite beauty, yet no man sees it. It is a temple of majesty, yet no man regards it. It is a region of Light and Peace, did not men disquiet it. It is the paradise of God.
Thomas Traherne How to Want What You Have
Categories: world nature beauty paradise perception appreciation peace

The fast pace of our lives makes it difficult for us to find grace in the present moment, and when the simple gifts at our fingertips cease to nourish us, we have a tendency to crave the sensational.
Macrina Wiederkehr A Tree Full of Angels
Categories: life stress grace present appreciation nurture miracles

What is the value of a meteor shower, a symphony, a good belly laugh, a poem, a bird's song, an act of selfless kindness, or a child's smile? These things are valuable because they quietly, persistently give life meaning. Not everyone can perceive the significance of a meteor shower or a symphony; not everyone is capable of appreciating acts of selfless kindness or good belly laughs. People who are capable of appreciating these things are blessed. Those who are not capable of appreciating such experiences would be better off if they could learn how. If they cannot learn how, or do not try to learn how, then they are cursed in ways that they cannot comprehend.
Timothy Ray Miller How to Want What You Have
Categories: joy living life meaning gratitude appreciation everyday blessings

Don't wait for a funeral to pay a compliment. You may not make it in time.
Harvey Mackay Harvey Mackay's United Features syndicated column
Categories: life appreciation gratitude compliment relationships friendship love

Let us resolve: First to attain the grace
Harriet Beecher Stowe A Grateful Heart: Daily Blessings for the Evening Meal from Buddha to the Beatles
Categories: character gossip criticism praise appreciation meditation prayer

As the traveler who has once been from home is wiser than he who has never left his own doorstep, so a knowledge of one other culture should sharpen our ability to scrutinize more steadily, to appreciate lovingly, our own.
Margaret Mead Treasury of Women's Quotations
Categories: learning education appreciation gratitude flexibility cultural exchange experience

The best things are nearest: breath in your nostrils, light in your eyes, flowers at your feet, duties at your hand, the path of God just before you. Then do not grasp at the stars, but do life's plain, common work as it comes, certain that daily duties and daily bread are the sweetest things of life.
Robert Louis Stevenson The Book of Positive Quotations
Categories: happiness joy work effort fulfillment meaning daily routine appreciation gratitude

If there is a sin against life, it consists perhaps not so much in despairing of life as in hoping for another life and in eluding the implacable grandeur of this life.
Albert Camus How to Want What You Have:
Categories: life sin mistake failure despair depression suicide appreciation gratitude meaning wishing focus

To laugh often and love much; to win the respect of intelligent persons and the affection of children, to earn the approbation of honest critics; to appreciate beauty; to give of one's self, to leave the world a bit better, whether by a healthy child, a garden patch or a redeemed social condition; to have played and laughed with enthusiasm and sung with exultation; to know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived--that is to have succeeded.
Ralph Waldo Emerson The Book of Positive Quotations
Categories: laughter love friendship respect children beauty appreciation volunteer play enthusiasm life living success

He who has not tasted bitter, knows not what sweet is.
German proverb The Prentice-Hall Encyclopedia of World Proverbs
Categories: adversity challenges problems difficulties appreciation difficulties perspective

...you get appreciation by giving it.
Dr. Rick Brinkman and Dr. Rick Kirschner Dealing with People You Can't Stand:
Categories: appreciation gratitude thankfulness love communication relationships friendships listening appreciate grateful listening golden rule

This is the precious present, regardless of what yesterday was like, regardless of what tomorrow may bring. When your inner eyes open, you can find immense beauty hidden within the inconsequential details of daily life. When your inner ears open, you can hear the subtle, lovely music of the universe everywhere you go. When the heart of your heart opens, you can take deep pleasure in the company of the people around you--family, friends, acquaintances, or strangers--including those whose characters are less than perfect, just as your character is less than perfect. When you are open to the beauty, mystery, and grandeur of ordinary existence, you "get it" that it always has been beautiful, mysterious, and grand and always will be.
This is the precious present.
Timothy Ray Miller How to Want What You Have
Categories: present now today yesterday past tomorrow future awareness appreciation beauty routine love joy relationships family friends perfection acceptance mystery grandeur

To live content with small means; to seek elegance rather than luxury, and refinement rather than fashion; to be worthy, not respectable, and wealthy not rich; to study hard, think quietly, talk gently, act frankly; to listen to the stars and birds, to babes and sages, with open heart; to bear on cheerfully, do all bravely, awaiting occasions, worry never; in a word to, like the spiritual, unbidden and unconscious, grow up through the common.
William Ellery Channing The Book of Positive Quotations
Categories: necessities moderation authenticity character integrity work effort thought demeanor kindness honesty actions nature appreciation learning growth wisdom courage bravery stress anxiety self-improvement