Favorite Quotes

The ability to simplify means to eliminate the unnecessary
so that the necessary may speak.

~Hans Hofmann

Life is really simple, but we insist on making it complicated.

~Confucius

People love chopping wood.  In this activity
one immediately sees results.

~Albert Einstein

Live simply that others might simply live.

~Elizabeth Seaton

Besides the noble art of getting things done,
there is the noble art of leaving things undone.
The wisdom of life consists in the
elimination of non-essentials.

~Lin Yutang

It is the sweet, simple things of life which
are the real ones after all.

~Laura Ingalls Wilder

(Little House in the Ozarks by Hines)

To find the universal elements enough;
to find the air and the water exhilarating; to

be refreshed by a morning walk or an evening saunter…
to be thrilled by the stars at night;
to be elated over a bird’s nest or a wildflower in spring –

these are some of the rewards of the simple life.

~John Burroughs

Have patience with everything unresolved in your heart and

try to love the questions themselves as if they were locked rooms or

books written in a very foreign language. Don’t search for the

answers, which could not be given to you now, because you would

not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live

the questions now. Perhaps then, someday far in the future, you will

gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answer.

~Rainer Maria Rilke

Have nothing in your houses that you do not know
to be useful or believe to be beautiful.

~William Morris

As you simplify your life,
the laws of the universe will be simpler;
solitude will not be solitude,

poverty will not be poverty,
nor weakness weakness.

~Henry David Thoreau

Any intelligent fool can make things bigger,
more complex, and more violent.

It takes a touch of genius—and a lot of courage—
to move in the opposite direction.

~E. F. Schumacker

The great spiritual battle begins – and never ends –
with the reclaiming of our chosenness.

Long before any human being saw us,
we are seen by Gods loving eyes.

Long before anyone heard us cry or laugh,
we are heard by our God who is all ears for us.

Long before any person spoke to us in this world,
we are spoken to by the voice of eternal love.

Our preciousness, uniqueness, and individuality are
not given to us by those who meet us in clock-time…

our brief chronological existence..but by the one
who has chosen us with an everlasting love,

a love that existed from all eternity
and will last through all eternity.

~Henri Nouwen

We don’t need to increase our goods nearly as
much as we need to scale down our wants.

Not wanting something is as good as possessing it.

~Donald Horban

The sculptor produces the beautiful statue
by chipping away such parts of the

marble block as are not needed -
it is a process of elimination.

~Elbert Hubbard