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Parenting Forces Us To Get To Know Ourselves Better Than We Ever Might Have Imagined We Could--and In Many New Ways. . . . We'll Discover Talents We Never Dreamed We Had And Fervently Wish For Others At Moments We Feel We Desperately Need Them. As Time Goes On, We'll Probably Discover That We Have More To Give And Can Give More Than We Ever Imagined. But We'll Also Find That There Are Limits To Our Giving, And That May Be Hard For Us To Accept.

-Fred Rogers

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Parenting Forces Us To

Fred Rogers

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Parenting Forces Us To Get To Know Ourselves Better Than We Ever Might Have Imagined We Could--and In Many New Ways. . . . We'll Discover Talents We Never Dreamed We Had And Fervently Wish For Others At Moments We Feel We Desperately Need Them. As Time Goes On, We'll Probably Discover That We Have More To Give And Can Give More Than We Ever Imagined. But We'll Also Find That There Are Limits To Our Giving, And That May Be Hard For Us To Accept.

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It's A Mistake To Think That We Have To Be Lovely To Be Loved By Human Beings Or By God

It Is One Of The Paradoxes Of Parenting, And Often A Painful Paradox, That Even As Our Children Need Us For Love And Trust, They Also Need Us For Honest Differing. It's Not Only Over Limits And Rules...[but Also] About What We Represent In The Way Of Culture, Traditions, And Values. We Owe It To Our Children To Let Them Know What We Believe, And If They Differ With Us, We Owe It To Them To Be Honest Adversaries, For It Is Through This Honest Confrontation That Children Can Grow Into Adults Who Have A Firm Sense Of Their Place In The Sequence Of The Generations.

Parents Are Like Shuttles On A Loom. They Join The Threads Of The Past With Threads Of The Future And Leave Their Own Bright Patterns As They Go.

The World Needs A Sense Of Worth, And It Will Achieve It Only By Its People Feeling That They Are Worthwhile.

Listening Is A Very Active Awareness Of The Coming Together Of At Least Two Lives. Listening, As Far As I'm Concerned, Is Certainly A Prerequisite Of Love. One Of The Most Essential Ways Of Saying 'i Love You' Is Being A Receptive Listener.

When We Treat Children's Play As Seriously As It Deserves, We Are Helping Them Feel The Joy That's To Be Found In The Creative Spirit. We're Helping Ourselves Stay In Touch With That Spirit, Too. It's The Things We Play Withand The People Who Help Us Play That Make A Great Difference In Our Lives.

Whether We're A Preschooler Or A Young Teen, A Graduating College Senior Or A Retired Person, We Human Beings All Want To Know That We're Acceptable, That Our Being Alive Somehow Makes A Difference In The Lives Of Others.

Love Isn't A Perfect State Of Caring.

We Don't Always Succeed In What We Try, Certainly Not By The World's Standards, But I Think You'll Find It's The Willingness To Keep Trying That Matters Most.

Play Is Really The Work Of Childhood.

Children Playing

Of Course, I Get Angry. Of Course, I Get Sad. I Have A Full Range Of Emotions. I Also Have A Whole Smorgasbord Of Ways Of Dealing With My Feelings. That Is What We Should Give Children. Give Them ... Ways To Express Their Rage Without Hurting Themselves Or Somebody Else. That's What The World Needs.

There's No "should" Or "should Not" When It Comes To Having Feelings. They're Part Of Who We Are And Their Origins Are Beyond Our Control. When We Can Believe That, We May Find It Easier To Make Constructive Choices About What To Do With Those Feelings.

The Best Teacher In The World Is Someone Who Loves What He Or She Does, And Just Loves It In Front Of You.

Our Children Are Extensions Of Ourselves In Ways Our Parents Are Not, Nor Our Brothers And Sisters, Nor Our Spouses.

It's Our Insides That Make Us Who We Are, That Allow Us To Dream And Wonder And Feel For Others. That's What's Essential. That's What Will Always Make The Biggest Difference In Our World.

The Greatest Gift That You Can Give Another Person Is To Gracefully Receive Whatever It Is That They Want To Give Us.

Very Early In Our Children's Lives We Will Be Forced To Realize That The "perfect" Untroubled Life We'd Like For Them Is Just A Fantasy. In Daily Living, Tears And Fights And Doing Things We Don't Want To Do Are All Part Of Our Human Ways Of Developing Into Adults.

In Times Of Stress, The Best Thing We Can Do For Each Other Is To Listen With Our Ears And Our Hearts And To Be Assured That Our Questions Are Just As Important As Our Answers.

We're All On A Journey - Each One Of Us. And If We Can Be Sensitive To The Person Who Happens To Be Our Neighbor, That, To Me, Is The Greatest Challenge As Well As The Greatest Pleasure.

Anything Mentionable Is Manageable.

The Only Thing Evil Can’t Stand Is Forgiveness.

Hopefully Your Choices Can Come From A Deep Sense Of Who You Are.

When We Choose To Be Parents, We Accept Another Human Being As Part Of Ourselves, And A Large Part Of Our Emotional Selves Will Stay With That Person As Long As We Live. From That Time On, There Will Be Another Person On This Earth Whose Orbit Around Us Will Affect Us As Surely As The Moon Affects The Tides, And Affect Us In Some Ways More Deeply Than Anyone Else Can. Our Children Are Extensions Of Ourselves.

Parents Who Expect Change In Themselves As Well As In Their Children, Who Accept It And Find In It The Joy As Well As The Pains Ofgrowth, Are Likely To Be The Happiest And Most Confident Parents.

Transitions Are Almost Always Signs Of Growth, But They Can Bring Feelings Of Loss. To Get Somewhere New, We May Have To Leave Somewhere Else Behind.

Children Who Have Learned To Be Comfortably Dependent Can Become Not Only Comfortably Independent But Also Comfortable With Having People Depend On Them. They Can Lean, Stand, And Be Leaned Upon, Because They Know What A Good Feeling It Can Be To Feel Needed.

It Would Have Been Sad For Me To Spend My Life Just Trying To Superimpose Stuff On People Rather Than Trying To Encourage Them To Look Within Themselves For What's Of Value.

There's Always Someone Who Is Trying To Help.

It May Take Months Or Years For A Wish To Come True, But It's Far More Likely To Happen When You Care So Much About A Wish That You'll Do All You Can To Make It Happen.

I Went Into Television Because I Hated It So, And I Thought There's Some Way Of Using This Fabulous Instrument To Nurture Those Who Would Watch And Listen.

Feeling Good About Ourselves Is Essential In Our Being Able To Love Others.

Attitudes Are Caught, Not Taught.

When I Was Very Young, Most Of My Childhood Heroes Wore Capes, Flew Through The Air, Or Picked Up Buildings With One Arm. They Were Spectacular And Got A Lot Of Attention. But As I Grew, My Heroes Changed, So That Now I Can Honestly Say That Anyone Who Does Anything To Help A Child Is A Hero To Me.

There Is No Normal Life That Is Free Of Pain. It's The Very Wrestling With Our Problems That Can Be The Impetus For Our Growth.

Try Your Best To Make Goodness Attractive. That's One Of The Toughest Assignments You'll Ever Be Given.

Anyone Who Does Anything To Help A Child In His Life Is A Hero To Me.

I'm Proud Of You For The Times You Came In Second, Or Third, Or Fourth, But What You Did Was The Best You Have Ever Done

I Wonder What Memories Of Yours Will Persist As You Go On In Life. My Hunch Is That The Most Important Will Have To Do With Feelings Of Loving And Being Loved - Friends, Family, Teachers, Shopkeepers - Whoever's Been Close To You. As You Continue To Grow, You'll Find Many Ways Of Expressing Your Love And You'll Discover More And More Ways In Which Others Express Their Love For You.

Most Of Us, I Believe, Admire Strength. It's Something We Tend To Respect In Others, Desire For Ourselves, And Wish For Our Children. Sometimes, Though, I Wonder If We Confuse Strength With Other Words—like 'aggression' And Even 'violence'. Real Strength Is Neither Male Nor Female; But It Is, Quite Simply, One Of The Finest Characteristics That A Human Being Can Possess.

We All Have Different Gifts, So We All Have Different Ways Of Saying To The World Who We Are.

I Believe That Appreciation Is A Holy Thing--that When We Look For What's Best In A Person We Happen To Be With At The Moment, We're Doing What God Does All The Time. So In Loving And Appreciating Our Neighbor, We're Participating In Something Sacred.

Mutual Caring Relationships Require Kindness And Patience, Tolerance, Optimism, Joy In The Other's Achievements, Confidence In Oneself, And The Ability To Give Without Undue Thought Of Gain.

If The Grain Of Wheat Could Know Fear, It Would Be Paralyzed With Anxiety At The Thought Of Being Dropped In The Ground, Covered Over, Put Out Of Sight, Doomed To Inactivity, Yet What A Glorious Harvest Awaits It!

It's Not The Honors And Not The Titles And Not The Power That Is Of Ultimate Importance. It's What Resides Inside.

I Like To Compare The Holiday Season With The Way A Child Listens To A Favorite Story. The Pleasure Is In The Familiar Way The Story Begins, The Anticipation Of Familiar Turns It Takes, The Familiar Moments Of Suspense, And The Familiar Climax And Ending.

For Children, Play Is Exceedingly Seriously & Important

Often, Problems Are Knots With Many Strands, And Looking At Those Strands Can Make A Problem Seem Different.

It Is Our Continuing Love For Our Children That Makes Us Want Them To Become All They Can Be, And Their Continuing Love For Us That Helps Them Accept Healthy Discipline--from Us And Eventually From Themselves.

Deep Within Us-no Matter Who We Are-there Lives A Feeling Of Wanting To Be Lovable, Of Wanting To Be The Kind Of Person That Others Like To Be With. And The Greatest Thing We Can Do Is To Let People Know That They Are Loved And Capable Of Loving.

Honesty Is Often Very Hard. The Truth Is Often Painful. But The Freedom It Can Bring Is Worth The Trying.

It Always Helps To Have People We Love Beside Us When We Have To Do Difficult Things In Life.

Look For The Helpers. You Will Always Find People Who Are Helping.

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Love Isn't A State Of Perfect Caring. It Is An Active Noun Like Struggle. To Love Someone Is To Strive To Accept That Person Exactly The Way He Or She Is, Right Here And Now.

Children Long To Know That They Are Lovable. And There Are Ways That Technology Can Help With That. But Ultimately It's Their Relationships With Their Parents, Their Grandparents, Their Peers, And Their Teachers That Help Them To Know That For Sure. A Child Can Learn The Word "hug" And The Letters H-u-g Through A Computer, But A Computer Can Never Give The Child A Hug.

How Great It Is When We Come To Know That Times Of Disappointment Can Be Followed By Joy; That Guilt Over Falling Short Of Our Ideals Can Be Replaced By Pride In Doing All That We Can; And That Anger Can Be Channeled Into Creative Achievements... And Into Dreams That We Can Make Come True.

You Bring All You Ever Were And Are To Any Relationship You Have Today.

Love Is Like Infinity: You Can't Have More Or Less Infinity, And You Can't Compare Two Things To See If They're "equally Infinite." Infinity Just Is, And That's The Way I Think Love Is, Too.

I Have Really Never Considered Myself A Tv Star. I Always Thought I Was A Neighbor Who Just Came In For A Visit.

Discovering The Truth About Ourselves Is A Lifetime’s Work, But It’s Worth The Effort.

All Of Us Have Special Ones Who Have Loved Us Into Being

When We Leave Our Child In Nursery School For The First Time, It Won't Be Just Our Child's Feelings About Separation That We Will Have To Cope With, But Our Own Feelings As Well-from Our Present And From Our Past, Parents Are Extra Vulnerable To New Tremors From Old Earthquakes.

The Greatest Gift You Ever Give Is Your Honest Self.

Propel, Propel, Propel Your Craft Softly Down Liquid Solution. Ecstatically, Ecstatically, Ecstatically, Ecstatically, Existence Is Simply Illusion.

The Roots Of A Child's Ability To Cope And Thrive, Regardless Of Circumstance, Lie In That Child's Having Had At Least A Small, Safe Place (an Apartment? A Room? A Lap?) In Which, In The Companionship Of A Loving Person, That Child Could Discover That He Or She Was Lovable And Capable Of Loving In Return. If A Child Finds This During The First Years Of Life, He Or She Can Grow Up To Be A Competent, Healthy Person.

The Connections We Make In The Course Of A Life--maybe That's What Heaven Is.

One Way To Think About Play, Is As The Process Of Finding New Combinations For Known Things--combinations That May Yield New Formsof Expression, New Inventions, New Discoveries, And New Solutions....it's Exactly What Children's Play Seems To Be About And Explains Why So Many People Have Come To Think That Children's Play Is So Important A Part Of Childhood--and Beyond.

I Feel The Greatest Gift We Can Give To Anybody Is The Gift Of Our Honest Self.

The Thing I Remember Best About Successful People I've Met All Through The Years Is Their Obvious Delight In What They're Doing And It Seems To Have Very Little To Do With Worldly Success. They Just Love What They're Doing, And They Love It In Front Of Others.

What Really Matters Is Not Just Our Own Winning But Helping Other People To Win, Too.

If You Like To Make Things Out Of Wood, Or Sew, Or Dance, Or Style People's Hair, Or Dream Up Stories And Act Them Out, Or Play The Trumpet, Or Jump Rope, Or Whatever You Really Love To Do, And You Love That In Front Of Your Children, That's Going To Be A Far More Important Gift Than Anything You Could Ever Give Them Wrapped Up In A Box With Ribbons.

I Recently Learned That In An Average Lifetime A Person Walks About Sixty-five Thousand Miles. That's Two And A Half Times Around The World. I Wonder Where Your Steps Will Take You. I Wonder How You'll Use The Rest Of The Miles You're Given.

When We Love A Person, We Accept Him Or Her Exactly As Is: The Lovely With The Unlovely, The Strong With The Fearful, The True Mixed In With The Façade, And Of Course, The Only Way We Can Do It Is By Accepting Ourselves That Way.

I Am Always Comforted By Realizing That There Are Still So Many Helpers - So Many Caring People In This World.

Love Isn't A State Of Perfect Caring, It Is An Active Noun Like Struggle.

Very Frankly, I Am Opposed To People Being Programmed By Others. My Whole Approach In Broadcasting Has Always Been 'you Are An Important Person Just The Way You Are. You Can Make Healthy Decisions.' Maybe I'm Going On Too Long, But I Just Feel That Anything That Allows A Person To Be More Active In The Control Of His Or Her Life, In A Healthy Way, Is Important.

It's The People We Love The Most Who Can Make Us Feel The Gladdest ... And The Maddest! Love And Anger Are Such A Puzzle!

And Those Handmade Presents That Children Often Bring Home From School: They Have So Much Value! The Value Is That The Child Put Whatever He Or She Could Into Making Them. The Way We Parents Respond To The Giving Of Such Gifts Is Very Important. To The Child The Gift Is Really Self, And They Want So Much For Their Selves To Be Acceptable, To Be Loved.

If Your Trusted And People Will Allow You To Share Their Inner Gardern...what Better Gift?

I Don't Believe That Children Can Develop In A Healthy Way Unless They Feel That They Have Value Apart From Anything They Own Or Any Skill That They Learn. They Need To Feel They Enhance The Life Of Someone Else, That They Are Needed. Who, Better Than Parents, Can Let Them Know That?

Call Them Rules Or Call Them Limits, Good Ones, I Believe, Have This In Common: They Serve Reasonable Purposes; They Are Practical And Within A Child's Capability; They Are Consistent; And They Are An Expression Of Loving Concern.

It's A Beautiful Day In This Neighborhood, A Beautiful Day For A Neighbor. Would You Be Mine? Could You Be Mine?... It's A Neighborly Day In This Beauty Wood, A Neighborly Day For A Beauty. Would You Be Mine? Could You Be Mine?... I've Always Wanted To Have A Neighbor Just Like You. I've Always Wanted To Live In A Neighborhood With You. So, Let's Make The Most Of This Beautiful Day. Since We're Together We Might As Well Say: Would You Be Mine? Could You Be Mine? Won't You Be My Neighbor? Won't You Please, Won't You Please? Please Won't You Be My Neighbor?

I Wonder If We Might Pledge Ourselves To Remember What Life Is Really All About—not To Be Afraid That We're Less Flashy Than The Next, Not To Worry That Our Influence Is Not That Of A Tornado, But Rather That Of A Grain Of Sand In An Oyster! Do We Have That Kind Of Patience?

Parents Find Many Different Ways To Work Their Way Through The Assertiveness Of Their Two-year-olds, But Seeing That Assertiveness As Positive Energy Being Directed Toward Growth As A Competent Individual May Open Up Some New Possibilities.

It's The Things We Play With And The People Who Help Us Play That Make A Great Difference In Our Lives.

We Need To Help People To Discover The True Meaning Of Love. Love Is Generally Confused With Dependence. Those Of Us Who Have Grown In True Love Know That We Can Love Only In Proportion To Our Capacity For Independence.

When We're Able To Resign Ourselves To The Wishes That Will Never Come True, There Can Be Enormous Energies Available Within Us For Whatever We Can Do.

As Human Beings, Our Job In Life Is To Help People Realize How Rare And Valuable Each One Of Us Really Is, That Each Of Us Has Something That No One Else Has-or Ever Will Have-something Inside That Is Unique To All Time.

I Think Of Discipline As The Continual Everyday Process Of Helping A Child Learn Self-discipline.

Part Of The Problem With The Word 'disabilities' Is That It Immediately Suggests An Inability To See Or Hear Or Walk Or Do Other Things That Many Of Us Take For Granted. But What Of People Who Can't Feel? Or Talk About Their Feelings? Or Manage Their Feelings In Constructive Ways? What Of People Who Aren't Able To Form Close And Strong Relationships? And People Who Cannot Find Fulfillment In Their Lives, Or Those Who Have Lost Hope, Who Live In Disappointment And Bitterness And Find In Life No Joy, No Love? These, It Seems To Me, Are The Real Disabilities.

I Like You Just The Way You Are.

Knowing That We Can Be Loved Exactly As We Are Gives Us All The Best Opportunity For Growing Into The Healthiest Of People.

When I Say It's You I Like, I'm Talking About That Part Of You That Knows That Life Is Far More Than Anything You Can Ever See Or Hear Or Touch. That Deep Part Of You That Allows You To Stand For Those Things Without Which Humankind Cannot Survive. Love That Conquers Hate, Peace That Rises Triumphant Over War, And Justice That Proves More Powerful Than Greed.

Whatever We Choose To Imagine Can Be As Private As We Want It To Be. Nobody Knows What You're Thinking Or Feeling Unless You Share It.

If It's Mentionable, It's Manageable.

Silence Is So Powerful, So Important. There Is So Much To Be Learned From It.

Life Is Deep And Simple, And What Our Society Gives Us Is Shallow And Complicated.

Music Is The One Art We All Have Inside. We May Not Be Able To Play An Instrument, But We Can Sing Along Or Clap Or Tap Our Feet. Have You Ever Seen A Baby Bouncing Up And Down In The Crib In Time To Some Music? When You Think Of It, Some Of That Baby's First Messages From His Or Her Parents May Have Been Lullabies, Or At Least The Music Of Their Speaking Voices. All Of Us Have Had The Experience Of Hearing A Tune From Childhood And Having That Melody Evoke A Memory Or A Feeling. The Music We Hear Early On Tends To Stay With Us All Our Lives.

I've Always Wanted To Have A Neighbor Just Like You. I've Always Wanted To Live In A Neighborhood With You.

I'm Fairly Convinced That The Kingdom Of God Is For The Broken-hearted. You Write Of 'powerlessness.' Join The Club, We Are Not In Control. God Is.

I Believe That At The Center Of The Universe There Dwells A Loving Spirit Who Longs For All That’s Best In All Of Creation, A Spirit Who Knows The Great Potential Of Each Planet As Well As Each Person, And Little By Little Will Love Us Into Being More Than We Ever Dreamed Possible. That Loving Spirit Would Rather Die Than Give Up On Any One Of Us.

Parents Don't Come Full Bloom At The Birth Of The First Baby. In Fact Parenting Is About Growing. It's About Our Own Growing As Much As It Is About Our Children's Growing And That Kind Of Growing Happens Little By Little.

Our Worlds Needs More Time To Wonder And Reflect But There Is Too Much Fast Paced Constant Distraction.

I Hope You're Proud Of Yourself For The Times You've Said "yes," When All It Meant Was Extra Work For You And Was Seemingly Helpful Only To Someone Else.

It's Not Always Easy For A Father To Understand The Interests And Ways Of His Son. It Seems The Songs Of Our Children May Be In Keys We've Never Tried. The Melody Of Each Generation Emerges From All That's Gone Before. Each One Of Us Contributes In Some Unique Way To The Composition Of Life.

When Our Children See Us Expressing Our Emotions, They Can Learn That Their Own Feelings Are Natural And Permissible, Can Be Expressed, And Can Be Talked About. That's An Important Thing For Our Children To Learn.

I Hope That You're Learning How Important You Are, How Important Each Person You See Can Be. Discovering Each One's Specialty Is The Most Important Learning.

Love And Trust, In The Space Between What’s Said And What’s Heard In Our Life, Can Make All The Difference In The World.

Anyone Who Has Ever Been Able To Sustain Good Work Has Had At Least One Person--and Often Many--who Have Believed In Him Or Her. We Just Don't Get To Be Competent Human Beings Without A Lot Of Different Investments From Others.

In The External Scheme Of Things, Shining Moments Are As Brief As The Twinkling Of An Eye, Yet Such Twinklings Are What Eternity Is Made Of -- Moments When We Human Beings Can Say "i Love You," "i'm Proud Of You," "i Forgive You," "i'm Grateful For You." That's What Eternity Is Made Of: Invisible Imperishable Good Stuff.

There Are Many Things Children Accept As "grown-up Things" Over When They Have No Control And For Which They Have No Responsibility--for Instance, Weddings, Having Babies, Buying Houses, And Driving Cars. Parents Who Are Separating Really Need To Help Their Children Put Divorce On That Grown-up List, So That Children Do Not See Themselves As The Cause Of Their Parents' Decision To Live Apart.

I Don't Think Anyone Can Grow Unless He's Loved Exactly As He Is Now, Appreciated For What He Is Rather Than What He Will Be.

We've Forgotten What It's Like Not To Be Able To Reach The Light Switch. We've Forgotten A Lot Of The Monsters That Seemed To Livein Our Room At Night. Nevertheless, Those Memories Are Still There, Somewhere Inside Us, And Can Sometimes Be Brought To The Surface By Events, Sights, Sounds, Or Smells. Children, Though, Can Never Have Grown-up Feelings Until They've Been Allowed To Do The Growing.

All I Know To Do Is To Light The Candle That Has Been Given To Me.

What Interests Me So Much About The Characters Of The Bible Is That They Make Mistakes But God Uses Them Anyway, In Important Ways. Nobody's Perfect, But God Can Even Use Our Imperfection.

My Hunch Is That If We Allow Ourselves To Give Who We Really Are To The Children In Our Care, We Will In Some Way Inspire Cartwheels In Their Hearts.

We Live In A World In Which We Need To Share Responsibility. It's Easy To Say "it's Not My Child, Not My Community, Not My World, Not My Problem." Then There Are Those Who See The Need And Respond. I Consider Those People My Heroes.

Kids Can Spot A Phony A Mile Away.

You Rarely Have Time For Everything You Want In This Life, So You Need To Make Choices. And Hopefully Your Choices Can Come From A Deep Sense Of Who You Are.

As Different As We Are From One Another, As Unique As Each One Of Us Is, We Are Much More The Same Than We Are Different. That May Be The Most Essential Message Of All, As We Help Our Children Grow Toward Being Caring, Compassionate, And Charitable Adults.

Listening Is Where Love Begins: Listening To Ourselves And Then To Our Neighbors.

You Know, You Don't Have To Look Like Everybody Else To Be Acceptable And To Feel Acceptable.

All Life Events Are Formative. All Contribute To What We Become, Year By Year, As We Go On Growing. As My Friend The Poet Kenneth Koch Once Said, You Aren't Just The Age You Are. You Are All The Ages You Ever Have Been!

I Feel So Strongly That Deep And Simple Is Far More Essential Than Shallow And Complex.

Love Begins With Listening.

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It's Very Dramatic When Two People Come Together To Work Something Out. It's Easy To Take A Gun And Annihilate Your Opposition, But What Is Really Exciting To Me Is To See People With Differing Views Come Together And Finally Respect Each Other.

Often Out Of Periods Of Losing Come The Greatest Strivings Toward A New Winning Streak.

[i]f We Can Bring Our Children Understanding, Comfort, And Hopefulness When They Need This Kind Of Support, Then They Are More Likely To Grow Into Adults Who Can Find These Resources Within Themselves Later On. (from The Introduction)

I Don't Want To Eat Anything That Has A Mother

The Kingdom Of God Is For The Broken Hearted

When I Was A Boy I Used To Think That Strong Meant Having Big Muscles, Great Physical Power; But The Longer I Live, The More I Realize That Real Strength Has Much More To Do With What Is Not Seen. Real Strength Has To Do With Helping Others.

All Of Us Have Special Ones Who Have Loved Us Into Being. Would You Just Take, Along With Me, Ten Seconds To Think Of The People Who Have Helped You Become Who You Are....ten Seconds Of Silence.

Some Days, Doing "the Best We Can" May Still Fall Short Of What We Would Like To Be Able To Do, But Life Isn't Perfect On Any Front-and Doing What We Can With What We Have Is The Most We Should Expect Of Ourselves Or Anyone Else.

Often When You Think You're At The End Of Something, You're At The Beginning Of Something Else.

One Of The Most Important Things A Person Can Learn To Do Is To Make Something Out Of Whatever He Or She Happens To Have At The Moment.

Peace Means Far More Than The Opposite Of War.

What Matters In This Life Is More Than Winning For Ourselves. What Really Matters Is Helping Others Win Too. Even If It Means Slowing Down And Changing Our Course Now And Then.

The Very Best Reason Parents Are So Special . . . Is Because We Are The Holders Of A Priceless Gift, A Gift We Received From Countless Generations We Never Knew, A Gift That Only We Now Possess And Only We Can Give To Our Children. That Unique Gift, Of Course, Is The Gift Of Ourselves. Whatever We Can Do To Give That Gift, And To Help Others Receive It, Is Worth The Challenge Of All Our Human Endeavor.

It's Really Easy To Fall Into The Trap Of Believing That What We Do Is More Important Than What We Are. Of Course, It's The Opposite That's True: What We Are Ultimately Determines What We Do!

The Values We Care About The Deepest, And The Movements Within Society That Support Those Values, Command Our Love. When Those Things That We Care About So Deeply Become Endangered, We Become Enraged. And What A Healthy Thing That Is! Without It, We Would Never Stand Up And Speak Out For What We Believe.

The Older I Get, The More Convinced I Am That The Space Between People Who Are Trying Their Best To Understand Each Other Is Hallowed Ground.

Imagining May Be The First Step In Making It Happen, But It Takes The Real Time And Real Efforts Of Real People To Learn Things, Make Things, Turn Thoughts Into Deeds Or Visions Into Inventions.

Love Is At The Root Of All Healthy Discipline. The Desire To Be Loved Is A Powerful Motivation For Children To Behave In Ways Thatgive Their Parents Pleasure Rather Than Displeasure. It May Even Be Our Own Long-ago Fear Of Losing Our Parents' Love That Now Sometimes Makes Us Uneasy About Setting And Maintaining Limits. We're Afraid We'll Lose The Love Of Our Children When We Don't Let Them Have Their Way.

Human Relationships Are Primary In All Of Living. When The Gusty Winds Blow And Shake Our Lives, If We Know That People Care About Us, We May Bend With The Wind ... But We Won’t Break.

Anything That’s Human Is Mentionable, And Anything That Is Mentionable Can Be More Manageable. When We Can Talk About Our Feelings, They Become Less Overwhelming, Less Upsetting, And Less Scary. The People We Trust With That Important Talk Can Help Us Know That We Are Not Alone.

Development Comes From Within. Nature Does Not Hurry But Advances Slowly.

Who You Are Inside Is What Helps You Make And Do Everything In Life.

I Think It's Very Important - No Matter What You May Do Professionally - To Keep Alive Some Of The Healthy Interests Of Your Youth. Children's Play Is Not Just Kids' Stuff. Children's Play Is Rather The Stuff Of Most Future Inventions.

The World Is Not Always A Kind Place. That's Something All Children Learn For Themselves, Whether We Want Them To Or Not, But It's Something They Really Need Our Help To Understand.

When I Was A Boy And I Would See Scary Things In The News, My Mother Would Say To Me, "look For The Helpers. You Will Always Find People Who Are Helping." To This Day, Especially In Times Of "disaster," I Remember My Mother's Words And I Am Always Comforted By Realizing That There Are Still So Many Helpers – So Many Caring People In This World.

We All Have Only One Life To Live On Earth, And Through Television We Have The Choice Of Encouraging Others To Demean This Life Or To Cherish It In Creative, Imaginative Ways.

I Doubt That We Can Ever Successfully Impose Values Or Attitudes Or Behaviors On Our Children Certainly Not By Threat, Guilt, Or Punishment. But I Do Believe They Can Be Induced Through Relationships Where Parents And Children Are Growing Together. Such Relationships Are, I Believe, Build On Trust, Example, Talk, And Caring.

Vermont Is A Small State Which Makes An Enormous Difference.

Fame Is A Four-letter Word; And Like Tape Or Zoom Or Face Or Pain Or Life Or Love, What Ultimately Matters Is What We Do With It.

It's Important To Know When We Need To Stop, Reflect, And Receive. In Our Competitive World, That Might Be Called A Waste Of Time.

I Feel That The Real Drama Of Life Is Never Center Stage, It's Always In The Wings. It's Never With The Spotlight On, It's Usually Something That You Don't Expect At All.

Imagine What Our Real Neighborhoods Would Be Like If Each Of Us Offered . . . Just One Kind Word To Another Person.

My Friendship With Mitzi Was Like The Friendship That Many Children Have With Their Pets. My Mother And Father Thought It Was "good For Me" To Have A Dog For A Companion. Well It Was Good For Me, But It Was Only Many Years After She Died That I Began To Understand How Good It Was, And Why.

The Real Drama Of Life Is Never Centerstage. It's Always In The Wings.

It's A Miracle When We Finally Discover Whom We're Best Equipped To Serve.

When I Was A Boy And I Would See Scary Things In The News, My Mother Would Say To Me, "look For The Helpers. You Will Always Find People Who Are Helping.

Those Of Us Who Are In This World To Educate-to Care For-young Children Have A Special Calling: A Calling That Has Very Little To Do With The Collection Of Expensive Possessions But Has A Lot To Do With Worth Inside Of Heads And Hearts.

One Of The Greatest Dignities Of Humankind Is That Each Successive Generation Is Invested In The Welfare Of Each New Generation.

Perhaps We Think That We Won't Find Another Human Being Inside That Person. Perhaps We Think That There Are Some People In This World Who I Can't Ever Communicate With, And So I'll Just Give Up Before I Try. And How Sad It Is To Think That We Would Give Up On Any Other Creature Who's Just Like Us.

The Gifts We Treasure Most Over The Years Are Often Small And Simple. In Easy Times And Tough Times, What Seems To Matter Most Is The Way We Show Those Nearest Us That We've Been Listening To Their Needs, To Their Joys, And To Their Challenges.

To Say That You Are Being Carried Is A Declaration Of Enormous Faith And Hope.

Play Gives Children A Chance To Practice What They Are Learning...they Have To Play With What They Know To Be True In Order To Find Out More, And Then They Can Use What They Learn In New Forms Of Play.

I Got Into Television Because I Hated It So. And I Thought There's Some Way Of Using This Fabulous Instrument To Nurture Those Who Would Watch And Listen.

Forgiveness Is A Strange Thing. It Can Sometimes Be Easier To Forgive Our Enemies Than Our Friends. It Can Be Hardest Of All To Forgive People We Love. Like All Of Life's Important Coping Skills, The Ability To Forgive And The Capacity To Let Go Of Resentments Most Likely Take Root Very Early In Our Lives.

Feelings About Money -- Saving And Spending, Holding Back And Letting Go -- Start Very Early In Our Lives. Stingy People Have Often Been Forced To Give When They Were Very, Very Young, When They Weren't Ready. And Generous People Have Often Been Really Appreciated When They Were Very Young.

The Presence Of A Grandparent Confirms That Parents Were, Indeed, Little Once, Too, And That People Who Are Little Can Grow To Be Big, Can Become Parents, And One Day Even Have Grandchildren Of Their Own. So Often We Think Of Grandparents As Belonging To The Past; But In This Important Way, Grandparents, For Young Children, Belong To The Future.

I've Often Hesitated In Beginning A Project Because I've Thought, 'it'll Never Turn Out To Be Even Remotely Like The Good Idea I Have As I Start.' I Could Just 'feel' How Good It Could Be. But I Decided That, For The Present, I Would Create The Best Way I Know How And Accept The Ambiguities.

People Have Said, 'don't Cry' To Other People For Years And Years, And All It Has Ever Meant Is, 'i'm Too Uncomfortable When You Show Your Feelings. Don't Cry.' I'd Rather Have Them Say, 'go Ahead And Cry. I'm Here To Be With You.'

Who We Are In The Present Includes Who We Were In The Past.

It's A Beautiful Day In The Neighborhood, A Beautiful Day For A Neighbor. Would You Be Mine; Could You Be Mine?

Parenting Forces Us To Get To Know Ourselves Better Than We Ever Might Have Imagined We Could--and In Many New Ways. . . . We'll Discover Talents We Never Dreamed We Had And Fervently Wish For Others At Moments We Feel We Desperately Need Them. As Time Goes On, We'll Probably Discover That We Have More To Give And Can Give More Than We Ever Imagined. But We'll Also Find That There Are Limits To Our Giving, And That May Be Hard For Us To Accept.

How Sad It Is That We Give Up On People Who Are Just Like Us.

What Do You Think It Is That Drives People To Want Far More Than They Could Ever Use Or Need? I Frankly Think It's Insecurity. How Do We Let The World Know That The Trappings Of This Life Are Not The Things That Are Ultimately Important For Being Accepted?

For A Couple With Young Children, Divorce Seldom Comes As A "solution" To Stress, Only As A Way To End One Form Of Pain And Accept Another.

There's A World Of Difference Between Insisting On Someone's Doing Something And Establishing An Atmosphere In Which That Person Can Grow Into Wanting To Do It.

If You Could Only Sense How Important You Are To The Lives Of Those You Meet; How Important You Can Be To The People You May Never Even Dream Of. There Is Something Of Yourself That You Leave At Every Meeting With Another Person.

Little By Little We Human Beings Are Confronted With Situations That Give Us More And More Clues That We Are Not Perfect.

A Young Apprentice Applied To A Master Carpenter For A Job. The Older Man Asked Him, "do You Know Your Trade?" "yes, Sir!" The Young Man Replied Proudly. "have You Ever Made A Mistake?" The Older Man Inquired. "no, Sir!" The Young Man Answered, Feeling Certain He Would Get The Job. "then There's No Way I'm Going To Hire You," Said The Master Carpenter, "because When You Make One, You Won't Know How To Fix It.

It's Not The Honors And The Prizes And The Fancy Outsides Of Life Which Ultimately Nourish Our Souls. It's The Knowing That We Can Be Trusted, That We Never Have To Fear The Truth, That The Bedrock Of Our Very Being Is Good Stuff.

Solitude Is Different From Loneliness, And It Doesn't Have To Be A Lonely Kind Of Thing.

Play Is Often Talked About As If It Were A Relief From Serious Learning. But For Children Play Is Serious Learning. Play Is Really The Work Of Childhood.

The Purpose Of Life Is To Listen - To Yourself, To Your Neighbor, To Your World And To God And, When The Time Comes, To Respond In As Helpful A Way As You Can Find ... From Within And Without.

We Want To Raise Our Children So That They Can Take A Sense Of Pleasure In Both Their Own Heritage And The Diversity Of Others.

Most Of Us, I Believe, Admire Strength... Sometimes, Though, I Wonder If We Confuse Strength With Other Words Like Aggression Or Even Violence.

At The Center Of The Universe Is A Loving Heart That Continues To Beat And That Wants The Best For Every Person. Anything That We Can Do To Help Foster The Intellect And Spirit And Emotional Growth Of Our Fellow Human Beings, That Is Our Job. Those Of Us Who Have This Particular Vision Must Continue Against All Odds. Life Is For Service.

More And More I've Come To Understand That Listening Is One Of The Most Important Things We Can Do For One Another. Whether The Other Be An Adult Or A Child, Our Engagement In Listening To Who That Person Is Can Often Be Our Greatest Gift. Whether That Person Is Speaking Or Playing Or Dancing, Building Or Singing Or Painting, If We Care, We Can Listen.

A Love Of Learning Has A Lot To Do With Learning That We Are Loved.

Love Of Learning

We Speak With More Than Our Mouths. We Listen With More Than Our Ears.

There Is Something Of Yourself That You Leave At Every Meeting With Another Person.

Self Confidence

Real Strength Has To Do With Helping Others.

Confronting Our Feelings And Giving Them Appropriate Expression Always Takes Strength, Not Weakness. It Takes Strength To Acknowledge Our Anger, And Sometimes More Strength Yet To Curb The Aggressive Urges Anger May Bring And To Channel Them Into Nonviolent Outlets. It Takes Strength To Face Our Sadness And To Grieve And To Let Our Grief And Our Anger Flow In Tears When They Need To. It Takes Strength To Talk About Our Feelings And To Reach Out For Help And Comfort When We Need It.

Sometimes People Are Good, And They Do Just What They Should. But The Very Same People Who Are Good Sometimes Are The Very Same People Who Are Bad Sometimes. It's Funny But It's True. Its The Same Isn't It, For Me And . . .

This Is What I Give. I Give An Expression Of Care Every Day To Each Child, To Help Him Realize That He Is Unique. I End Each Program By Saying, 'you've Made This Day A Special Day By Just Your Being You. There's No Person In The Whole World Like You. And I Like You Just The Way You Are.' And I Feel That If We In Public Television Can Only Make It Clear That Feelings Are Mentionable And Manageable, We Will Have Done A Great Service.

In The External Scheme Of Things, Shining Moments Are As Brief As The Twinkling Of An Eye, Yet Such Twinklings Are What Eternity Is Made Of — Moments When We Human Beings Can Say, “i Love You” ... “i'm Proud Of You” ... “i Forgive You” ... “i'm Grateful For You” ... “whether You Win Anything Or Not, You Still Have Great Value.” That's What Eternity Is Made Of: Invisible, Imperishable Good Stuff.

I Think Everybody Longs To Be Loved And Longs To Know That He Or She Is Lovable And, Consequently, The Greatest Thing That We Can Do Is To Help Somebody Know That They Are Loved And Capable Of Loving.

Our World Hangs Like A Magnificent Jewel In The Vastness Of Space. Every One Of Us Is A Part Of That Jewel. A Facet Of That Jewel. And In The Perspective Of Infinity, Our Differences Are Infinitesimal.

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Walter Anderson

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