“Inertia is so easy—don't fix what's not broken. Leave well enough alone. So we end up accepting what is broken, mistaking complaining for action, procrastinating for deliberation.”

“Maybe we don't have the same definition of about what's beautiful. So define it. Define true beauty.”

“Beauty—real everlasting beauty—lives not on our faces, but in our attitude and our actions. It lives in what we do for ourselves and for others.”

“What would it be like to look in the mirror and actually accept what you see? Not loathe the reflection, or despise it, or be resigned to it? But to like it?”

“I didn't have the language to communicate that to this little girl -- or to communicate that beauty -- real everlasting beauty -- lives not on our faces, but in our attitude and our actions. It lives in what we do for ourselves and for others.”

“The look he gave me...My stomach quivered in that exact same way when I watched Before Sunset, yearning for a guy to know me so deeply and truly, we were only really complete when we were together. That I could talk, go on wild tangents, make obtuse references, and he would divine my meaning before I knew what I was trying to say myself. Erik had fallen asleep next to me on the couch, complaining later that the movie was "just people talking." He had no idea that this movie could have been a love letter written for me.”

“What was so miraculous about a relationship that was based more on my gratitude than on mutual self respect?”