Harold S. Kushner Quotes

• What cannot be achieved in one lifetime will happen when one lifetime is joined to another.

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  Harold S. Kushner

  Harold S Kushner (2011). “When All You've Ever Wanted Isn't Enough: The Search For a Life That Matters”, p.187, Pan Macmillan

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• Children need parents who will let them grow up to be themselves, but parents often have personal agendas they try to impose on their children.

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• Our awareness of God starts where self-sufficiency ends.

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• When you carry out acts of kindness you get a wonderful feeling inside. It is as though something inside your body responds and says, yes, this is how I ought to feel.

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  Harold S. Kushner

  Thank You  

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• Our society puts too much emphasis on finding someone who will love you; our culture focuses too much on being loved and not enough on being a loving person.

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• Integrity is not something that grownups have and adolescents can aspire to. Integrity is something that all of us, at all ages, are constantly striving for.

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• God is the One who is with us when we have to do something we don't think we are capable of doing.

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  Harold S. Kushner

  Harold S. Kushner (2006). “Overcoming Life's Disappointments”, p.15, Anchor

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• Good people will do good things, lots of them, because they are good people. They will do bad things because they are human.

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• One of the basic needs of every human being is the need to be loved, to have our wishes and feelings taken seriously, to be validated as people who matter.

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• The small choices and decisions we make a hundred times a day add up to determining the kind of world we live in.

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  Harold S. Kushner

  Harold S. Kushner (2003). “Living a Life that Matters”, p.150, Anchor

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• When I talk to people who feel this emptiness and lack of fulfillment, I recommend they find a source of balance in their lives. I suggest they find a way to "give back" to the world in order to feel a sense of completeness.

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  Harold S. Kushner

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• God does not cause our misfortunes. Some are caused by bad luck, some are caused by bad people, and some are simply an inevitable consequence of our being human and being mortal. living in a world of inflexible natural laws. The painful things that happen to us are not punishments for our misbehavior, nor are they in any way part of some grand design on God's part. Because the tragedy is not God's will, we need not feel hurt or betrayed by God when tragedy strikes. We can turn to Him for help in overcoming it, precisely because we can tell ourselves that God is as outraged by it as we are.

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  Harold S. Kushner

  Harold S Kushner (2011). “When Bad Things Happen to Good People: 20th Anniversary Edition”, p.159, Pan Macmillan

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• Pain is a part of being alive, and we need to learn that. Pain does not last forever, nor is it necessarily unbeatable, and we need to be taught that.

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  Harold S. Kushner

  Life  

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• When facing a dilemma, choose the more morally demanding alternative.

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• Life is like the baseball season, where even the best team loses at least a third of its games, and even the worst team has its days of brilliance. The goal is not to win every game but to win more than you lose, and if you do that often enough, in the end you may find you have won it all.

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• There are some things we should feel guilty about, but the guilt feelings should attach to the deed, not to the doer.

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• We can endure much more than we think we can; all human experience testifies to that. All we need to do is learn not to be afraid of pain. Grit your teeth and let it hurt. Don't deny it, don't be overwhelmed by it. It will not last forever. One day, the pain will be gone and you will still be there.

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  Harold S. Kushner

  Harold S Kushner (2011). “When All You've Ever Wanted Isn't Enough: The Search For a Life That Matters”, p.170, Pan Macmillan

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• We have confused God with Santa Claus. And we believe that prayer means making a list of everything you don't have but want and trying to persuade God you deserve it. Now I'm sorry, that's not God, that's Santa Claus.

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  Harold S. Kushner

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• The soul is not a physical entity, but instead refers to everything about us that is not physical - our values, memories, identity, sense of humor. Since the soul represents the parts of the human being that are not physical, it cannot get sick, it cannot die, it cannot disappear. In short, the soul is immortal.

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• Our human bodies are miracles, not because they defy laws of nature, but precisely because they obey them.

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  Harold S. Kushner

  Harold S Kushner (2011). “When Bad Things Happen to Good People: 20th Anniversary Edition”, p.66, Pan Macmillan

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• People who pray for miracles usually don't get miracles. But people who pray for courage, for strength to bear the unbearable, for the grace to remember what they have left instead of what they have lost, very often find their prayers answered. Their prayers help them tap hidden reserves of faith and courage that were not available to them before.

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• We pray to you, O God ... for strength, determination, and willpower, to do instead of just to pray, to become instead of merely to wish.

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  Harold S. Kushner

  Harold S. Kushner (2007). “When Bad Things Happen to Good People”, p.159, Anchor

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• God is the light shining in the midst of darkness, not to deny that there is darkness in the world but to reassure us that we do not have to be afraid of the darkness because darkness will always yield to light. As theologian David Griffin puts in, God is all-powerful, His power enables people to deal with events beyond their control and He gives us the strength to do those things because He is with us.

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  Harold S. Kushner

  Harold S. Kushner (2006). “Overcoming Life's Disappointments”, p.15, Anchor

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• If you concentrate on finding whatever is good in every situation, you will discover that your life will suddenly be filled with gratitude, a feeling that nurtures the soul

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  Harold S. Kushner

  Life   Thank You   Thankful  

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• Our inability to see the beauty doesn't suggest in the slightest that beauty is not there. Rather, it suggests that we are not looking carefully enough or with broad enough perspective to see the beauty.

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• At some of the darkest moments in my life, some people I thought of as friends deserted me-some because they cared about me and it hurt them to see me in pain; others because I reminded them of their own vulnerability, and that was more than they could handle. But real friends overcame their discomfort and came to sit with me. If they had not words to make me feel better, they sat in silence (much better than saying, "You'll get over it," or "It's not so bad; others have it worse") and I loved them for it.

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  Harold S. Kushner

  "Living a Life That Matters: Resolving the Conflict Between Conscience and Success". Book by Harold Kushner, www.huffingtonpost.com. 2001.

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• Our responding to life's unfairness with sympathy... may be the surest proof of all of God's reality.

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  Harold S. Kushner

  Life  

  Harold S Kushner (2011). “When Bad Things Happen to Good People: 20th Anniversary Edition”, p.168, Pan Macmillan

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• The God I believe in is not so fragile that you hurt Him by being angry at him, or so petty that He will hold it against you for being upset with Him.

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• . . .We are here to finish God's labors. . .so that we could be His partners in completing the work of creation.

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• Never attribute to malice or other deliberate decision what can be explained by human frailty, imperfection, or ignorance.

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