Quotes from The Blessing Of A Skinned Knee: Using Timeless Teachings to Raise Self-Reliant Children

“The sages advise us to study Torah lishma-"for its own sake" rather than to impress others with our scholarship. A paradox of parenting is that if we love our children for their own sake rather than for their achievements, it's more likely that they will reach their true potential.”
― Wendy Mogel, quote from The Blessing Of A Skinned Knee: Using Timeless Teachings to Raise Self-Reliant Children

“If we want to give our children what they need to thrive, we must honor their basic nature- boyish or girlish, introverted or extroverted, wild or mellow.”
― Wendy Mogel, quote from The Blessing Of A Skinned Knee: Using Timeless Teachings to Raise Self-Reliant Children

“A Hasidic teaching says, "If your child has a talent to be a baker, don't tell him to be a doctor." Judaism holds that every child is made in the divine image. When we ignore a child's intrinsic strengths in an effort to push him toward our notion of extraordinary achievement, we are undermining God's plan.”
― Wendy Mogel, quote from The Blessing Of A Skinned Knee: Using Timeless Teachings to Raise Self-Reliant Children

“No one is born feeling grateful; it’s an acquired skill. That’s why traditional Jewish law forbids spending money on the Sabbath. God commands us to stop shopping and count our blessings on that one day because he knows that left on our own, we wouldn’t be so inclined.”
― Wendy Mogel, quote from The Blessing Of A Skinned Knee: Using Timeless Teachings to Raise Self-Reliant Children

“Unsure how to find grace and security in the complex world we’ve inherited, we try to fill up the spaces in our children’s lives with stuff: birthday entertainments, lessons, rooms full of toys and equipment, tutors and therapists. But material pleasures can’t buy peace of mind, and all the excess leads to more anxiety—parents fear that their children will not be able to sustain this rarefied lifestyle and will fall off the mountain the parents have built for them.”
― Wendy Mogel, quote from The Blessing Of A Skinned Knee: Using Timeless Teachings to Raise Self-Reliant Children

“Real protection means teaching children to manage risks on their own, not shielding them from every hazard.”
― Wendy Mogel, quote from The Blessing Of A Skinned Knee: Using Timeless Teachings to Raise Self-Reliant Children

“One of the most generous gifts you can give your child is to study her temperament, and once you've learned it, work to accept it.”
― Wendy Mogel, quote from The Blessing Of A Skinned Knee: Using Timeless Teachings to Raise Self-Reliant Children

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“Printing dollars at home means higher inflation in China, higher food prices in Egypt and stock bubbles in Brazil. Printing money means that U.S. debt is devalued so foreign creditors get paid back in cheaper dollars. The devaluation means higher unemployment in developing economies as their exports become more expensive for Americans. The resulting inflation also means higher prices for inputs needed in developing economies like copper, corn, oil and wheat. Foreign countries have begun to fight back against U.S.-caused inflation through subsidies, tariffs and capital controls; the currency war is expanding fast.”
― James Rickards, quote from Currency Wars: The Making of the Next Global Crisis

“She talks and talks because whenever she is silent she finds herself looking at him and her breath grows a little short.”
― Chris Bohjalian, quote from The Sandcastle Girls

“McMansions in sprawling suburbs, without mountains of unnecessary packaging, without giant mechanized monofarms, without energy-hogging big-box stores, without electronic billboards, without endless piles of throwaway junk, without the overconsumption of consumer goods no one really needs is not an impoverished world. I disagree with those environmentalists who say we are going to have to make do with less. In fact, we are going to make do with more: more beauty, more community, more fulfillment, more art, more music, and material objects that are fewer in number but superior in utility and aesthetics. The cheap stuff that fills our lives today, however great its quantity, can only cheapen life.”
― Charles Eisenstein, quote from Sacred Economics: Money, Gift, and Society in the Age of Transition

“Emily Dickinson’s words filled the chapel. “ ‘Hope is the thing with feathers”
― Jennifer Bernard, quote from The Fireman Who Loved Me

“Wilt thou be daunted at a woman's sight? Aye, beauty's princely majesty is such, Confounds the tongue and makes the senses rough.”
― William Shakespeare, quote from Henry VI, Part 1

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About BookQuoters

BookQuoters is a community of passionate readers who enjoy sharing the most meaningful, memorable and interesting quotes from great books. As the world communicates more and more via texts, memes and sound bytes, short but profound quotes from books have become more relevant and important. For some of us a quote becomes a mantra, a goal or a philosophy by which we live. For all of us, quotes are a great way to remember a book and to carry with us the author’s best ideas.

We thoughtfully gather quotes from our favorite books, both classic and current, and choose the ones that are most thought-provoking. Each quote represents a book that is interesting, well written and has potential to enhance the reader’s life. We also accept submissions from our visitors and will select the quotes we feel are most appealing to the BookQuoters community.

Founded in 2023, BookQuoters has quickly become a large and vibrant community of people who share an affinity for books. Books are seen by some as a throwback to a previous world; conversely, gleaning the main ideas of a book via a quote or a quick summary is typical of the Information Age but is a habit disdained by some diehard readers. We feel that we have the best of both worlds at BookQuoters; we read books cover-to-cover but offer you some of the highlights. We hope you’ll join us.