Quotes About Respect

Cultures of gratitude must also be cultures of reciprocity. Each person, human or no, is bound to every other in a reciprocal relationship. Just as all beings have a duty to me, I have a duty to them.

It is not the land that has been broken, but our relationship to it.

incorporating respect for animacy. In English, you are either a human or a thing. Our grammar boxes us in by the choice of reducing a nonhuman being to an it, or it must be gendered, inappropriately, as a he or a she. Where are our words for the simple existence of another living being?

I hope I am also teaching them to know the world as a neighborhood of nonhuman residents, to know that, as ecotheologian Thomas Berry has written, "we must say of the universe that it is a communion of subjects, not a collection of objects.

In the indigenous view, humans are viewed as somewhat lesser beings in the democracy of species

Robin Wall Kimmerer

By those (ceremonial) words we said "Here we are," and I imagined that the land heard us—murmured to itself, "Ohh, here are the ones who know how to say thank you.

Today we have gathered and when we look upon the faces around us we see that the cycles of life continue. We have been given the duty to live in balance and harmony with each other and all living things. So now let us bring our minds together as one as we give greetings and thanks

A species and a culture that treat the natural world with respect and reciprocity will surely pass on genes to ensuing generations with a higher frequency than the people who destroy it. The stories we choose to shape our behaviors have adaptive consequences

We have now arrived at the place where we end our words. Of all the things we have named, it is not our intention to leave anything out. If something was forgotten, we leave it to each individual to send such greetings and thanks in their own way. And now our minds are one.

What would it be like, I wondered, to live with that heightened sensitivity to the lives given for ours? To consider the tree in the Kleenex, the algae in the toothpaste, the oaks in the floor, the grapes in the wine; to follow back the thread of life in everything and pay it respect? Once you start, it's hard to stop, and you begin to feel yourself awash in gifts.

For the first time in my life, I realized that a man doesn't need to yell to be heard. A man doesn't have to throw a punch to make a point. And a man who is comfortable in his own skin doesn't need to constantly prove his worth to the world.

For your mother and mine." -Alec

Now Preacher might manage a bar and hang out with men primarily, but he was unaccustomed to fathers who pushed their children out of sight. Rudely, at that. In his crowd, families were appreciated. Most of his friends were married with children, and the children were a part of everything. The women were nearly worshiped.

It's rude to discuss your wife with your girlfriend

here is something you should probably know about women without being told. We don't want to have to tell a man we need to be wanted. We'd really like that to come naturally. We'd like a man to pursue us because he wants us, not because he's out of options.

You know. I can call my husband an idiot and asshole but no one else can. It's a rule. It's almost a law.

To pry would involve being told an answer I didn't want to hear. So I didn't pry.

when it came to training animals. Part horse

Life isn't about love and heaven forbid marriage be. It's about getting along.

If you're worried I'll bite, I promise to tell you first.

Likewise, I would never be so rude as to not interrupt a friend. How else would she know I was listening?

I don't want to be less than, so some guy can feel more than. Capisce?

Alfredo felt a pang, having learned long ago that not everybody saw animals for who they truly were, and all lives were poorer as a result.