For Strong Women, by Marge Piercy

A strong woman is a woman who loves
strongly and weeps strongly and is strongly
terrified and has strong needs. A strong woman is strong
in words, in action, in connection, in feeling;
she is not strong as a stone but as a wolf
suckling her young. Strength is not in her, but she
enacts it as the wind fills a sail.
What comforts her is others loving
her equally for the strength and for the weakness
from which it issues, lightning from a cloud.

~Marge Piercy, "For Strong Women"

It's the only compass you've been given.

See original on Flickr

 "Whatever you do, make sure you're doing it out of desire. It's the only compass you've been given in this world, and you can trust it. It may not lead you where you thought you were going, but it will never lead you astray." Nicole Daedone

burnout

Photo by Amy Veeninga (original at Flickr)

"Everytime you say “YES” to something you don’t want to do, you will resent people, you will do a bad job, you will have less energy for the things you were doing a good job on. ... Every time you say “Yes” to something you don’t want, your fire starts to go away. You will get burnt out. ... Instead, igniting the fire on the inside burns a light so fierce it can’t be burnt out. You will become a beacon, a light that attracts abundance, instead of a flickering fame that is eventually smothered." James Altucher

Love the questions themselves

“Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books that are now written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer.”
― Rainer Maria Rilke

Use the gift of sadness to help people.

Photo by Robert Grove (click to see original on Flickr)

"Give. Immense sadness and misery is unfortunately also a valuable teacher. Your sadness has given you the unfortunate gift of greater empathy than most people have towards those who are suffering. Wake up every day and say, “Whose life can I save today.” Your sadness is beyond that of mere mortals. So the unfortunate gift it has given you is also beyond that of a mere mortal. Use that gift to help people. Every day you will save life. The first thing you do in the morning say, “I will save a life today.” It might be small. Walking a blind person across a street. Helping a co-worker. Recognizing sadness in others and listening to them. But you will give and it will be returned to you. That’s the best way to accept the horrible sadness of a lost child. That’s what your child would want you to do with that sadness." ~ James Altucher