Quotes from Donald Miller

God sat over the dark nothing and wrote you and me specifically into the story, and He put us in specifically with the sunsets in the rainstorms as though to say, Enjoy your place in My story, the very beauty of it means it's not about you, and in time that will give you comfort.

We don't think much about how our love stories will affect the world, but they do. Children learn what's worth living for and what's worth dying for by the stories they watch us live. I want to teach our children how to get scary close, and more, how to be brave. I want to teach them that love is worth what it costs.

THE STUFF IT TAKES TO BE INTIMATE IS AUTHENTICITY, vulnerability, and a belief that other people are about as good and bad as we are.

Relationships are teleological. They're all going somewhere and they're turning us into something, hopefully something better, something new.

I want to be with people who are humble and hungry, have healthy relationships, and are working to create new and better realities in the world.

Never assume people understand how your brand can change their lives. Tell them.

I listened so hard because it felt like, while she was telling me stories, she was massaging my soul, letting me know that I was not alone, that I will never have to be alone, that there are friends and family and churches and coffee shops. I was not going to be cast into space.

I'd learned my default mode was to perform. Even in small groups I feel like I have to be "on." But when I'm alone my energy comes back. When I'm alone I don't have to perform for anybody.

And once you know what it takes to live a better story, you don't have a choice. Not living a better story would be like deciding to die, deciding to walk around numb until you die, and it's not natural to want to die.

You're right," he finally said. "You aren't living a good story." "That's what I was saying." "I see," he said. "What do I do about that?" "You're a writer. You know what to do." "No, I don't." Jordan looked at me with his furrowed brow again. "You put something on the page," he said. "Your life is a blank page. You write on it.

If love is conditional, it's just some sort of manipulation masquerading as love.

there is a force in the world that doesn't want us to live good stories. It doesn't want us to face our issues, to face our fear and bring something beautiful into the world... I believe God wants us to create beautiful stories, and whatever it is that isn't God wants us to create meaningless stories, teaching the world around us that life just isn't worth living.

There's truth in the idea we're never going to be perfect in love but we can get close. And the closer we get, the healthier we will be. Love is not a game any of us can win, it's just a story we can live and enjoy.

The devil tries so hard to get Christians to be religious. If he can sink a man's mind into habit, he will prevent his heart from engaging God.

But true intimacy is just like that: it's the food you grow from well-tilled ground. And like most things good for us, it's an acquired taste.

It is a pretty good idea to make some noises when you are at a play.

And that's the tricky thing about life, really, that the things we want most will kill us.

alone, lonely, and loneliness are three of the most powerful words in the English language... Those words say that we are human; they are like the words hunger and thirst. But they are not words about the body, they are words about the soul.

I have a pastor friend who says the root of sin is the desire for control. I think there's some truth to that. And I'd add the root of control is fear.

I had always suspected language was quite limited in its ability to communicate the intricate mysteries of truth.

Here is nearly every story you see or hear in a nutshell: A CHARACTER who wants something encounters a PROBLEM before they can get it. At the peak of their despair, a GUIDE steps into their lives, gives them a PLAN, and CALLS THEM TO ACTION. That action helps them avoid FAILURE and ends in a SUCCESS.

Simply put, we must show people the cost of not doing business with us.

And once you know what it takes to live a better story, you don't have a choice. Not living a better story would be like deciding to die, deciding to walk around numb until you die, and it's not natural to want to die.

You get a feeling when you look back on life that all God really wants from us is to live inside a body He made, and enjoy the story, and to bond with Him through the experience.