Quotes from Mitch Albom

Time is not something you give back

The distance between death and life is not as great as you imagine." "Really?" Yannis turned his way. "Then why don't people come back to Earth after they die?" The stranger smiled. "Why would they want to?

It's not just other people we need to forgive. We also need to forgive ourselves. For all the things we didn't do. All the things we should have done. You can't get stuck on the regrets of what should have happened. I always wished I had done more with my work; I wished I had written more books. I used to beat myself up over it. Now I see that never did any good. Make peace. You need to make peace with yourself and everyone around you.

All parents damage their children. This was their life together. Neglect. Violence. Silence.

He wrote bite-sized philosophies about living with death's shadow: Accept what you are able to do and what you are not able to do; Accept the past as past, without denying it or discarding it; Learn to forgive yourself and to forgive others; Don't assume that it's too late to get involved.

Dor came from a time before the written word, a time when if you wished to speak with someone, you walked to see them. This time was different. The tools of this era—phones, computers—enabled people to move at a blurring pace. Yet despite all they accomplished, they were never at peace. They constantly checked their devices to see what time it was— the very thing Dor had tried to determine once with a stick, a stone, and a shadow.

Do what the Buddhists do. Every day, have a little bird on your shoulder that asks, 'Is today the day? Am I read? Am I doing all I need to do? Am I being the person i want to be?' He turned his head to his shoulder as if the bird were there now. Is today the day I die? he said.

When love dries in a marriage, the children become mortar for the bricks. When the children leave, the bricks just sit atop each other. When the children die, the bricks tumble.

Do I wither up and disappear, or do I make the best of my time left?

Holding anger is a poison. It eats you from inside.

I HAVE A HEARTBURN AND DIAHREA AT THE MOMENT--LIFE'S ABITCH. CHAT LATER? [signed] SORE TUSH

I hope you can find the healing power in grieving.

Taking just makes me feel like I'm dying. Giving makes me feel like I'm living.

The possibilities of another person. Is there any anticipation on this earth quite like that one? Is there anything lonelier than being without it?

Die as a sacrifice is more worthy then a suicide

His body had been weakened, the ocen had left him vulnerable, pneumonia took ahold of him, and in time, he died.' Because of Mickey?' Eddie said. Because of loyalty,' she said. People don't die because of loyalty.' They don't?' She smiled. 'Religion? Government? Are we not loyal to such things, sometimes to the death?... Better,... to be loyal to one another.' ~pg 138

when you most need it, neither money nor power will give you the feeling you're looking for, no matter how much of them you have.

Don't assume that it's too late to get involved

Life is a series of pulls back and forth.

Look. I know what I believe. It's in my soul. But I constantly tell our people: you should be convinced of the authenticity of what you have, but you must also be humble enough to say that we don't know everything. And since we don't know everything, we must accept that another person may believe something else.

with a little faith, people can fix things, and they truly can change, because at that moment, you could not believe otherwise.

The slightest human contact was immediate joy.

will share a secret: this is how talents are bestowed. Before newborns open their eyes, we circle them, appearing as brilliant colors, and when they clench their tiny hands for the first time, they are actually grabbing the colors they find most appealing. Those talents are with them for life. The lucky ones (well, in my opinion, the lucky ones) choose me. Music.

I begin to call Morrie "Coach," the way I used to address my high school track coach. Morrie likes the nickname. "Coach," he says. "All right, I'll be your coach. And you can be my player. You can play all the lovely parts of life that I'm too old for now.