Quotes About Acceptance

How could she expect ever to find a man who would want to marry her just because she was? It was absurd. And she would have to return the compliment, would she not? She could not expect any man to love her that deeply if she did not also understand that he simply was, and that his wasness or isness made him forever the love of her heart. The love of her life.

One look at her had brought on that familiar sensation of homecoming.

And I am to smile benevolently at all these happy couples?

Can we accept reality now and move on?

She had given him all she had to give. She would not feel guilty for that.

For God's sake if you must hate me, do so wholeheartedly.

I wish I had realized that before. But it is true. And now I may hate you with my whole heart.

Nem sempre podemos esconder-nos da vida. (…) É melhor nem sequer tentar e encarar simplesmente o que precisa de ser encarado.

A great deal of good had happened. The past had been explained and forgiven. The bitterness of years had been purged. There could be some peace now for two people because he had come home.

I thought I had forgotten . . . But maybe I just pushed it deep and denied it and let it fester.

At the present, she said, you are here holding my hands. Your past has nothing to do with me. Just as mine has nothing to do with you.

And her beauty could be vibrant if she was allowed to be spontaneously herself and if she was secure in the love of those around her.

She had loved him mindlessly, passionately, for the following five years, until he had told her that he was going away and never coming back. And even beyond that she had loved him, painfully and against her will, until she had finally forced herself to forget. Or to tell herself that she had forgotten.

She had not got over him at all, in fact, and she was disgusted with herself when forced to admit the truth.

He was as he was, and she would live with him and love him until her dying day—or his—and be ever thankful for the idealist she was about to marry, the man who wanted to be perfect but was gradually learning the painful lesson that nobody was. That nothing was. Everyone and everything was in a state of becoming. That was the terror and the wonder of life.

She was feeling almost happy. She allowed herself the qualifier of almost because she had accepted the fact that self-deception was also self-destructive. She would not deceive herself any more or hide behind any mask in an attempt to shield herself from the reality of her life.

He was no dream lover. He was Jack. And she loved him. And would no longer believe that it was a misplaced love. She loved him. No matter what. For always.

Her feelings for him were purely regrets for a past that might have been. He was not now the sort of man whom she would wish to captivate even if that were possible.

You see now why I cannot marry you? I would never be able to rid myself of the shame of my past. And you would not be able to forget, either.

Then I thought that once my year of mourning was over and I put off my blacks, I would also put off the worst of my grief. And perhaps that has happened. But sometimes I think that grief is preferable to emptiness. At least grief is something. I have come to realize, I suppose, that they are not just dead. They are gone. There is nothing there where they were.

Is it really possible that you can love me enough to forgive me?

Why do you hate yourself so much? He laughed harshly. You ask me that? he said. You know what I am, Diana. You know that I have nothing of any goodness or worth to offer you. And you don't even know the worst about me. I think I know the best about you, though, she said. You have a strong sense of decency and honor. Otherwise you would not be protecting me more than I am protecting myself.

Ah, don't lie to me, he said. Believe me, I want to understand, I want to forgive. When I see you and when I hold you, I cannot believe that you are capable of the villainy that I have accepted all these years. I want you, Elizabeth.

She must never allow herself to feel either regret or remorse.