It’s surprising how many persons go through life without ever recognizing that their feelings toward other people are largely determined by their feelings toward themselves, and if you’re not comfortable within yourself, you can’t be comfortable with others. --Sydney J. Harris

More than kisses, letters mingle souls. --John Donne

No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the Continent, a part of the main; if a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as if a promontory were, as if a manor of the friends or of thine own were; any man’s death diminishes me, because I am involved in Mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee. --John Donne, Meditation XVII

A broken bone can heal, but the wound a word opens can fester forever. --Jessamyn West

Some people come into our lives and quickly go. Some stay for a while and leave footprints on our hearts. And we are never, ever the same. --Anon

Listening is a magnetic and strange thing, a creative force. When we really listen to people there is an alternating current, and this recharges us so that we never get tired of each other. --Brenda Ueland

Relationships -- of all kinds -- are like sand held in your hand. Held loosely, with an open hand, the sand remains where it is. The minute you close your hand and squeeze tightly to hold on, the sand trickles through your fingers. You may hold on to some of it, but most will be spilled. A relationship is like that. Held loosely, with respect and freedom for the other person, it is likely to remain intact. But hold too tightly, too possessively, and the relationship slips away and is lost. --Kaleel Jamison

If you hate a person, you hate something in him that is a part of yourself, What isn’t a part of ourselves doesn’t disturb us. --Herman Hesse

The ultimate test of a relationship is to disagree but hold hands. --Alexander Penney

Praise is like sunlight to the human spirit: we cannot flower and grow without it. --Jess Lair

Too many of us stay walled in because we are afraid of being hurt. We are afraid to care too much, for fear that the other person does not care as much or not at all. --Eleanor Roosevelt