The Bodyguard

I think just because you can't keep something doesn't mean it wasn't worth it. Nothing lasts forever. What matters is what we take with us.

You can't make people love you. But you can give the love you long for out to the world. You can be the love you wish you had. That's the way to be okay. Because giving love to other people is a way of giving it to yourself.

I wondered if having faith in yourself was just deciding you could do it - whatever it was and then making yourself follow through.

It doesn't hurt to spend your life with people who see what's great about you - in a way that you maybe never would have on your own. The people we love to teach us who we are.

Maybe love isn't a judgment you render - but a chance you take. Maybe it's something you choose to do over and over. For yourself and everyone else.

When you’re not around, even for a little while, I feel like I have to go find you. I just feel this pull to be near you. I want to know what you’re thinking, and what you’re up to, and how you feel. I want to take you places and show you things. I want to memorize you—to learn you like a song. And that nightgown, and the way you get so cranky when I leave my stuff all over the place, and the way you tie your hair back in that crazy bun. You make me laugh every single day—and nobody makes me laugh. I feel like I’ve been lost all my life until now—and somehow with you I’m just … found.

And loving other people really does turn out, in the end, to be a genuine way of loving yourself.

People who want to be famous think it’s the same thing as being loved, but it’s not. Strangers can only ever love a version of you. People loving you for your best qualities is not the same as people loving you despite your worst.

Every chance you take is a choice. A choice to decide who you are.

And in the end, do you ever truly know for sure if you’re lovable? What a question. You don’t. You can’t. Of course not. Life never hands out the answers like that. But maybe that’s not even the right question. Maybe love isn’t the judgment you render—but a chance you take. Maybe it’s something you choose to do—over and over. For yourself. And everyone else. Because love isn’t fame. It’s not something other people bestow on you. It’s not something that comes from the outside. Love is something you do. Love is something you generate. And loving other people really does turn out, in the end, to be a genuine way of loving yourself,

And I guess there really is something profoundly healing about letting somebody love you.

But you don’t have to be perfect to be lovable.

You can’t control the world—or other people. You can’t make them love you, either. They will or they won’t, and that’s the truth. But what you can do is decide who you want to be in the face of it all. Do you want to be a person who helps—or hurts? Do you want to be a person who burns with anger—or shines with compassion? Do you want to be hopeful or hopeless? Give up or keep going? Live or die?

We're very dismissive, as a culture, about heartbreak. We talk about it like it's funny, or silly, or cute. As if it can be cured by a pint of Haagen-Dazs and a set of flannel pajamas. But of course, a breakup is a type of grief, it's the death of not just any relationship - but the most important one in your life, There's nothing cute about it. "Dumped" is also a word that falls short of its true meaning. It sounds so quick - like a moment in time. But getting dumped lasts forever. Because a person who loved you decided not to love you anymore. Does that ever really go away?

The people we love help teach us who we are. The best versions of who we are, if we’re lucky.

People loving you for your best qualities is not the same as people loving you despite your worst.

I mean, sure, we should all just know our own inherent worth, and see our own particular beauty, and root for ourselves wherever we go. But does anybody really do that? It doesn't have to hurt to have a little help, right? It doesn't hurt to spend your life with people who see what's great about you—in a way that you maybe never would have on your own. The people we love help teach us who we are. The best versions of who we are, if we're lucky.

That was me, apparently: scared of cows, and scared of love.

I didn’t like her, but I loved her. And he’d underestimated me, as well. Because it’s so much harder to love someone who’s difficult than to love someone who’s easy.

Love is something you do. Love is something you generate. And loving other people really does turn out, in the end, to be a genuine way of loving yourself.

And here, right here, is the trouble with being close to other people. The better they know you, the better they can hurt you.

I think just because you can’t keep something doesn’t mean it wasn’t worth it. Nothing lasts forever. What matters is what we take with us.

- I just hate myself so much for not being loved. -- You can't make people love you. But you can give the love you long for out to the world. You can be the love you wish you had. That's the way to be okay. Because giving love to other people is a way of giving it to yourself.

Every now and then, something really, genuinely true cuts through all the chaos of life and just gets your full attention.

It’s not all that often that people who’ve wronged you actually apologize. Usually, in my experience, they go on and on maintaining their innocence. Insisting that they weren’t so bad, or they had their reasons, or you were somehow partly to blame.

And it’s like you’re in your life and flying above it at the same time. Like you are both on earth and in the heavens. Like you are all heartbeat and rushing pulse and warmth and softness—but you are also the wind and the clouds. You’re just everything, all at once. It’s as if loving somebody—really, bravely, just all-in loving somebody—is a doorway to something divine.

There’s nothing like the mutuality of a hug—the way you’re giving comfort but you’re getting it, too.

Usually, when you see people for the last time, you don’t know it’s the last time.

All we can do is put away our anger, and our blame, and our guns”—see what I did there?—“and try to make things better instead of worse. That’s the only answer there is.