Welcome to Litsy!

“Love is a thousand things, but at the center is a choice. It is a choice to love people.” - Jamie Tworkowski.

Both pages are written so beautifully, I couuuuld quote it all, but that one & a pic should do 💕 Re-reading some ol gems in the stock pile🤗

Hope is echoed through each story. This drew me towards TWLOHA.

For any or all of you who may need a little encouragement and a shift in mindset heading into 2017:

https://twloha.com/blog/welcome-midnight/

Happy New Year 🎆🎈🎊🎉

Good words.

We are all a people in need. We are not perfect. We are not machines. We make mistakes. We need grace. We need compassion. We need help at times. We need other people. And that's okay.

We are all a people in need. We are not perfect. We are not machines. We make mistakes. We need grace. We need compassion. We need help at times. We need other people. And that's okay.

A quick and emotional read. Chapters are short, which makes it easy to stop and start up again. Raw, emotional and full of depth. Highly recommend.

“You are still alive, and today is the most interesting day. Today is the best place to live.”

"I‘m trying to get back to someplace true, to someone i knew and liked a lot. i‘m trying to make sense of my story, trying to make peace with it, perhaps so i can tell it, but more so i can smile.”

"Though the price will be the heartache of loss,for we can‘t control when or how an ending comes,what a privilege that God allows us to connect with other people in this life.To be known & to be loved so we do not walk alone. Perhaps friendship,the deep kind, the best kind,perhaps it is a miracle.”

"Beyond that, maybe it‘s better not to fake it, not to offer something cheap. For the rest of us still here, with air in our lungs and tears in our eyes, perhaps we are meant to simply meet one another in the questions."

"Fall suggests it‘s possible to change, that things can still be new, alive, and bright again, alive and bright like Brooklyn.”

"We have to fight to not get lost in our own pain. We have to fight to remember the good, the thing we love around us, the things that we are thankful for. Don't buy the lie that your story is just a tragedy. And don't buy the lie that you are the only character in your story.”

"Our job now, those of us simply observing today, shocked by this awful news, our job is to love people. When it hurts. When it's awkward. When it's uncool and embarrassing. Our job is to stand together, to carry the burdens of one another, and to meet one another in our questions.”

“A shouted 'You're going to Hell' is an awful introduction to a God who desires to love and know His children.”

"I believe in a God who places a great emphasis on love, a God who loves people and asks His followers to do the same.”

"But I believe in a God who maybe doesn't scream at people the first time he meets them.”

"Don Miller says we're called to hold our hands against the wounds of a broken world, to stop the bleeding. I agree so greatly.”

"Love is a thousand things, but at the center is a choice.It is a choice to love people.Left to myself, I get quiet and bitter and critical.I get angry.I feel sorry for myself.It is a choice to love people. It is a choice to be kind. It is a choice to be patient, to be honest, to live with grace.”

“We need one another. There‘s no reason to judge. People are more fragile than you could possibly imagine.”

"Time has a way of putting things back where they belong. Love has a way of breaking the silence.”

“We are only asked to love, to offer hope to the many hopeless. We don‘t get to choose all the endings, but we are asked to play the rescuers. We won‘t solve all mysteries and our hearts will certainly break in such a vulnerable life, but it is the best way."

“Maybe we begin to help our friends become unhaunted when we let them know we're not afraid of their pain. When we ask to really know them. When we ask to see inside. When we do our part to go beyond the distance and the smile, deeper, to "Who are you?" and "How are you?" and "Are you okay?”

"These things deserve your attention: your family, your friends, the people you will meet today, the strangers with their stories. They say 'We are all in this together.' It is absolutely true.”

And God must be a pretty big fan of today, because you keep waking up to it. You have made known your request for a hundred different yesterdays, but the sun keeps rising on this thing that has never been known. Yesterday is dead and over.....You are still alive...today is the best place to live.

"Do not be like some broken lawyer making the same argument over and over again, always reaching for rewind. Guilt and regret, those are awful places. You know that. So don't live there. Do not despair. Do not be afraid. Grace is the interesting thing. Hope."

"Nobody gets to name you. Find your identity in the one true place. If someone gives you something, and then takes it back - that's okay. If someone says something or sees something, and then they don't - that's okay."

“The only justice is love. Just let it go. You don't have to explain. This is not about being right. There is something true inside the song you can't stop listening to....Someone calling you a criminal does not make you a criminal, just as someone calling you a hero does not make you a hero."

"I‘m gonna keep getting out of bed. I‘m gonna keep living my story. I‘m gonna believe that there is reason and purpose, and power in my life. I‘m gonna believe that I‘m alive inside a story bigger than my pain, bigger than everything missing.”

"I don't write much about faith because i feel like almost all the words have been abused. i've become embarrassed by most things called "Christian," but i still believe in a God who loves people.”

"If I have learned anything in the last couple of years, i have learned that it's a lot easier to talk about loving people than it is to actually love people.”

" l might be simple, but more and more, I believe God works in love, speaks in love, is revealed in our love.”

"Acting may get us the applause we want, but taking a risk on being ourselves is the only path toward true intimacy. And true intimacy, the exchange of affection between two people who are not lying,is transforming.”

"We often ask God to show up. We pray prayers of rescue. Perhaps God would ask us to be that rescue, to be His body, to move for things that matter. He is not invisible when we come alive.”

"What does it look like to love someone who lives in a place you‘ve never been? When there are no words? Or what about allowing someone to love you when you feel completely alone, like no one can relate?”

"Much is mystery but God asks us to love, not just when it‘s easy and not just when a certain Scripture fits."

"The world is broken. Our bodies break eventually. Our minds and hearts can break as well. We lose things in this life. We lose relationships. We lose people. And so a lot of folks live with a lot of pain."

"We will all know ghosts from time to time. But if our life is like a building, then we should open our foors to let some people see inside. Into our darkest places, into those rooms that hold our fears and dreams, we will begin to go together. Friends with hope like candles, telling ghosts to go.”

"Reality is the best place to live. Reality is where healing happens. In the honest light and by the voices of our friends."

“I have been a haunted house.I have had things die but stay & I didn‘t know how to make them leave. There were certainly times I didn‘t want them to leave because they were beautiful.They were no longer real but they were beautiful.They were bridges to brighter days.I thought they were my dreams."

"The stars are always there but we miss them in the dirt and clouds. We miss them in the storms. Tell them to remember hope. We have hope.”

"I‘m starting to believe those things.The best is yet to be,that life comes back,the dreams that live inside me are there for a reason,life is not just a tragedy,not just a story about losing.It is also a story of surprises, grace & redemptions...of conversations & moments that feel like miracles.”

“What if the things that ended ,the things that broke and break your heart,what if it was the end of a chapter but the story keeps going?What it life comes back? What if love comes back? What if you would not be who you are and you would now know what you know it not for all those sleepless nights?

"There is much not missing. We choose to stay, because we are all stories still going. Because there is still some time for things to turn around, time to be surprised and time for change. We stay because no one else can play your part.Life is worth living. We‘ll see you tomorrow"

"Above all else, we choose to stay. We choose to fight the darkness,the sadness, to fight the questions,the lies and the myth of all that‘s missing."

"None of this ends tonight. This was a taste. This was a start. We keep going and we go together. We lean on people and we invite people to lean on us. We ask honest questions and we give honest answers. We ask for help, because we know that it‘s okay to ask for help."

“What an amazing thing to feel known and loved, to feel understood, to walk through life with another person.”

“If you love somebody, tell them. If there is conflict, let it go and fight instead for peace. Break the numb false silence and break the distance too. Laugh and cry and apologize and start again. This life is short and fragile but friendship is among the greatest miracles.”

"And maybe hope and wonder are somehow related. Maybe wonder feeds hope and hope feeds wonder. You see something beautiful and it reminds you that it‘s possible to see something beautiful.”