“Sometimes a book about other people’s problems is way better than your own.”
―
Kelly Harms,
The Overdue Life of Amy Byler
“It is a generous gift to do something you don’t necessarily want to do, at great expense of time and money, because you know it will make someone else very happy.” ― Kelly Harms, The Overdue Life of Amy Byler
“Carpe somnum!” calls Daniel. “Seize the naps!” ― Kelly Harms, The Overdue Life of Amy Byler
“My house makes it so I never, ever have any extra money. If my house starts to notice I’ve been squirreling away a hundred dollars here or there to try to get my kids to a national park for a week, the house breaks something. I think it has abandonment issues.” ― Kelly Harms, The Overdue Life of Amy Byler
“They are part of his imagination, part of his story, and so, part of him. If he would not hurt you, then it only makes sense that they would not be able to do so either. They are the deepest parts of his subconscious. Shrapnel of his inner self. As you might have learned, they have the same desires and conflicts as their maker. As separate pieces, freed from the soul and from the confines of a human conscious, however, they develop minds of their own. And, as demons created in the dreamworld, they are compelled by law to answer to its queen. That is why they attempted to harm you but in the end could not.” ― Kelly Creagh, Nevermore
“Mindset 1: Stress Is Harmful. Experiencing stress depletes my health and vitality. Experiencing stress debilitates my performance and productivity. Experiencing stress inhibits my learning and growth. The effects of stress are negative and should be avoided. Mindset 2: Stress Is Enhancing. Experiencing stress enhances my performance and productivity. Experiencing stress improves my health and vitality. Experiencing stress facilitates my learning and growth. The effects of stress are positive and should be utilized.” ― Kelly McGonigal, The Upside of Stress: Why Stress Is Good for You and How to Get Good at It
“Everyone has an Everest. Whether it’s a climb you chose, or a circumstance you find yourself in, you’re in the middle of an important journey. Can you imagine a climber scaling the wall of ice at Everest’s Lhotse Face and saying, “This is such a hassle”? Or spending the first night in the mountain’s “death zone” and thinking, “I don’t need this stress”? The climber knows the context of his stress. It has personal meaning to him; he has chosen it. You are most liable to feel like a victim of the stress in your life when you forget the context the stress is unfolding in. “Just another cold, dark night on the side of Everest” is a way to remember the paradox of stress. The most meaningful challenges in your life will come with a few dark nights.The biggest problem with trying to avoid stress is how it changes the way we view our lives, and ourselves. Anything in life that causes stress starts to look like a problem. If you experience stress at work, you think there’s something wrong with your job. If you experience stress in your marriage, you think there’s something wrong with your relationship. If you experience stress as a parent, you think there’s something wrong with your parenting (or your kids). If trying to make a change is stressful, you think there’s something wrong with your goal.When you think life should be less stressful, feeling stressed can also seem like a sign that you are inadequate: If you were strong enough, smart enough, or good enough, then you wouldn’t be stressed. Stress becomes a sign of personal failure rather than evidence that you are human. This kind of thinking explains, in part, why viewing stress as harmful increases the risk of depression. When you’re in this mindset, you’re more likely to feel overwhelmed and hopeless.Choosing to see the connection between stress and meaning can free you from the nagging sense that there is something wrong with your life or that you are inadequate to the challenges you face. Even if not every frustrating moment feels full of purpose, stress and meaning are inextricably connected in the larger context of your life. When you take this view, life doesn’t become less stressful, but it can become more meaningful.” ― Kelly McGonigal, The Upside of Stress: Why Stress Is Good for You, and How to Get Good at It
“The moment we’re born, we start dying. We spend our lives dying.” ― Kelly Parsons, Doing Harm
“Sometimes a book about other people’s problems is way better than your own. I guess that’s what you’ve been onto with this reading thing all along?” ― Kelly Harms, The Overdue Life of Amy Byler
“Dad says people walk away from their families when they are trying to escape themselves,” she tells me. “He says we have to have compassion, because they may lose their loved ones, but they’ll never outrun themselves.” ― Kelly Harms, The Overdue Life of Amy Byler
“I get this now. I get now that you can love what you have, love your kids and your life and your friends, and still want more. I get that it’s ok to go out and get more—more love, more friendship, more fulfillment—and still be a wonderful mom.” ― Kelly Harms, The Overdue Life of Amy Byler
“but like in all long-term partnerships, what first drove me wild came to drive me nuts.” ― Kelly Harms, The Overdue Life of Amy Byler
“the cold, hard truth is that exercise will not reverse the potentially harmful and irrefutable effects that too much sitting has on our bodies.” ― Kelly Starrett, Deskbound: Standing Up to a Sitting World
“the painful realization that your children need other people in their lives besides you, that soon you’ll be relegated to the sidelines of their adult lives and have no idea who you are anymore.” ― Kelly Harms, The Overdue Life of Amy Byler
“You cannot argue with me, because this is a journal, not a text.” ― Kelly Harms, The Overdue Life of Amy Byler
“It turns out that how you think about stress is also one of those core beliefs that can affect your health, happiness, and success. As we’ll see, your stress mindset shapes everything from the emotions you feel during a stressful situation to the way you cope with stressful events. That, in turn, can determine whether you thrive under stress or end up burned out and depressed. The good news is, even if you are firmly convinced that stress is harmful, you can still cultivate a mindset that helps you thrive.” ― Kelly McGonigal, The Upside of Stress: Why Stress Is Good for You and How to Get Good at It
“Dear God in Heaven, I've been a good woman. When I die, all I want is Humphrey Bogart and Matt Damon feeding me grapes, all day long.” ― Kelly Harms, The Good Luck Girls of Shipwreck Lane
“But guys who come home and ‘babysit’ their kids once in a while so you can see your friends for the first time in weeks, or expect you to thank them when they do a load of laundry? Nope. They don’t need dadspringas. They need reality checks.” ― Kelly Harms, The Overdue Life of Amy Byler
“Yes,” says Lena, in her way. “Some people have to practice forgiveness and will never be naturals. They’ll either do the work and get awesome at it but always have to think it over—or never do the work and die with a sack of hurts the size of an elephant. I know, because I’m in danger of being one of those people whenever I stop paying attention.” Then she nods at me. “Some people, like your mother, forgive so naturally they don’t notice it happening. They’ll get hurt twice as often because they are so quick to forgive but feel it half as much because of their ability to let things go.” ― Kelly Harms, The Overdue Life of Amy Byler
“It is a generous gift to do something you don’t necessarily want to do, at great expense of time and money, because you know it will make someone else very happy.” ― Kelly Harms, The Overdue Life of Amy Byler
“Carpe somnum!” calls Daniel. “Seize the naps!” ― Kelly Harms, The Overdue Life of Amy Byler
“My house makes it so I never, ever have any extra money. If my house starts to notice I’ve been squirreling away a hundred dollars here or there to try to get my kids to a national park for a week, the house breaks something. I think it has abandonment issues.” ― Kelly Harms, The Overdue Life of Amy Byler
“They are part of his imagination, part of his story, and so, part of him. If he would not hurt you, then it only makes sense that they would not be able to do so either. They are the deepest parts of his subconscious. Shrapnel of his inner self. As you might have learned, they have the same desires and conflicts as their maker. As separate pieces, freed from the soul and from the confines of a human conscious, however, they develop minds of their own. And, as demons created in the dreamworld, they are compelled by law to answer to its queen. That is why they attempted to harm you but in the end could not.” ― Kelly Creagh, Nevermore
“Mindset 1: Stress Is Harmful. Experiencing stress depletes my health and vitality. Experiencing stress debilitates my performance and productivity. Experiencing stress inhibits my learning and growth. The effects of stress are negative and should be avoided. Mindset 2: Stress Is Enhancing. Experiencing stress enhances my performance and productivity. Experiencing stress improves my health and vitality. Experiencing stress facilitates my learning and growth. The effects of stress are positive and should be utilized.” ― Kelly McGonigal, The Upside of Stress: Why Stress Is Good for You and How to Get Good at It
“Everyone has an Everest. Whether it’s a climb you chose, or a circumstance you find yourself in, you’re in the middle of an important journey. Can you imagine a climber scaling the wall of ice at Everest’s Lhotse Face and saying, “This is such a hassle”? Or spending the first night in the mountain’s “death zone” and thinking, “I don’t need this stress”? The climber knows the context of his stress. It has personal meaning to him; he has chosen it. You are most liable to feel like a victim of the stress in your life when you forget the context the stress is unfolding in. “Just another cold, dark night on the side of Everest” is a way to remember the paradox of stress. The most meaningful challenges in your life will come with a few dark nights.The biggest problem with trying to avoid stress is how it changes the way we view our lives, and ourselves. Anything in life that causes stress starts to look like a problem. If you experience stress at work, you think there’s something wrong with your job. If you experience stress in your marriage, you think there’s something wrong with your relationship. If you experience stress as a parent, you think there’s something wrong with your parenting (or your kids). If trying to make a change is stressful, you think there’s something wrong with your goal.When you think life should be less stressful, feeling stressed can also seem like a sign that you are inadequate: If you were strong enough, smart enough, or good enough, then you wouldn’t be stressed. Stress becomes a sign of personal failure rather than evidence that you are human. This kind of thinking explains, in part, why viewing stress as harmful increases the risk of depression. When you’re in this mindset, you’re more likely to feel overwhelmed and hopeless.Choosing to see the connection between stress and meaning can free you from the nagging sense that there is something wrong with your life or that you are inadequate to the challenges you face. Even if not every frustrating moment feels full of purpose, stress and meaning are inextricably connected in the larger context of your life. When you take this view, life doesn’t become less stressful, but it can become more meaningful.” ― Kelly McGonigal, The Upside of Stress: Why Stress Is Good for You, and How to Get Good at It
“The moment we’re born, we start dying. We spend our lives dying.” ― Kelly Parsons, Doing Harm
“Sometimes a book about other people’s problems is way better than your own. I guess that’s what you’ve been onto with this reading thing all along?” ― Kelly Harms, The Overdue Life of Amy Byler
“Dad says people walk away from their families when they are trying to escape themselves,” she tells me. “He says we have to have compassion, because they may lose their loved ones, but they’ll never outrun themselves.” ― Kelly Harms, The Overdue Life of Amy Byler
“I get this now. I get now that you can love what you have, love your kids and your life and your friends, and still want more. I get that it’s ok to go out and get more—more love, more friendship, more fulfillment—and still be a wonderful mom.” ― Kelly Harms, The Overdue Life of Amy Byler
“but like in all long-term partnerships, what first drove me wild came to drive me nuts.” ― Kelly Harms, The Overdue Life of Amy Byler
“the cold, hard truth is that exercise will not reverse the potentially harmful and irrefutable effects that too much sitting has on our bodies.” ― Kelly Starrett, Deskbound: Standing Up to a Sitting World
“the painful realization that your children need other people in their lives besides you, that soon you’ll be relegated to the sidelines of their adult lives and have no idea who you are anymore.” ― Kelly Harms, The Overdue Life of Amy Byler
“You cannot argue with me, because this is a journal, not a text.” ― Kelly Harms, The Overdue Life of Amy Byler
“It turns out that how you think about stress is also one of those core beliefs that can affect your health, happiness, and success. As we’ll see, your stress mindset shapes everything from the emotions you feel during a stressful situation to the way you cope with stressful events. That, in turn, can determine whether you thrive under stress or end up burned out and depressed. The good news is, even if you are firmly convinced that stress is harmful, you can still cultivate a mindset that helps you thrive.” ― Kelly McGonigal, The Upside of Stress: Why Stress Is Good for You and How to Get Good at It
“Dear God in Heaven, I've been a good woman. When I die, all I want is Humphrey Bogart and Matt Damon feeding me grapes, all day long.” ― Kelly Harms, The Good Luck Girls of Shipwreck Lane
“But guys who come home and ‘babysit’ their kids once in a while so you can see your friends for the first time in weeks, or expect you to thank them when they do a load of laundry? Nope. They don’t need dadspringas. They need reality checks.” ― Kelly Harms, The Overdue Life of Amy Byler
“Yes,” says Lena, in her way. “Some people have to practice forgiveness and will never be naturals. They’ll either do the work and get awesome at it but always have to think it over—or never do the work and die with a sack of hurts the size of an elephant. I know, because I’m in danger of being one of those people whenever I stop paying attention.” Then she nods at me. “Some people, like your mother, forgive so naturally they don’t notice it happening. They’ll get hurt twice as often because they are so quick to forgive but feel it half as much because of their ability to let things go.” ― Kelly Harms, The Overdue Life of Amy Byler
