Shannon L. Alder

"Allowing a person or thing to leave your life, without further pain is the basis of humanity. Everything else is the reason (theology)."

"A man of worth is a man that sees the worth in others more than himself."

"You will never let go of the one thing that God keeps prompting you to fix."

"All we have is "One Life", so go for IT!"

"Kindness is love in action, not feeling emotions or thoughts of empathy only. Kindness is doing!"

"If you can't see the sun then too many things stand in your way. Sometimes, you have to climb to the top of all your fears to see any horizon, such is life. God needs to you rise higher before you will ever "see" something different."

"Fearlessness is not what you do to win, but what you don't do. When you love yourself as much as your God, you won't see other people as the source of your pain. Rather, you will see who you have become because you honestly believed that your chains would be broken through hatred, instead of kindness."

"Christ's version of kindness: I know you are hurt. I contributed to that. Maybe, I should have said more. Done more. Listened. I am sorry for my part in the situation. I am sorry if I caused you any pain or confused you with my actions or words. How can I help you move on? I want you to have peace in your life. Let's end this by communicating. The world's perverted version of kindness: You caused your own pain. You get what you get. Get over it and move on. Maybe, one day you will figure out what happiness really means. By the way, I am not responsible for giving it to you. Nor, do I have to put up with people that don't bring me joy or who I can't trust. I am only responsible for myself. I will pray for you because I am a good Christian."

"It is not the number of prayers that will give you happiness, but the number you answer for another person."

"In order to master compassion, you have to spend time getting to know monsters. When you can do that you will see that there are no monsters, only people that acted like monsters because no one gave them the time or compassion to hear their story."

"If you’re treating people poorly then you're not emulating God’s love. God always resides with the broken hearted."

"It is a strange thing that the human species can only go three days without water and three weeks without food, before the body dies. Yet, so many people can go years hanging onto pain and feeling emotionally dead inside. I suppose if it was the other way around more people would go to school to be morticians because of the booming business, or pastors would have to hand out Valium with the sacrament, just to keep the census high."

"Before you call yourself a Christian, Buddhist, Muslim, Hindu or any other theology, learn to be human first."

"If it were true love, he would never make you sacrifice your dignity to be with him. He would respect you and treat you as if you were sacred to his heart. If he loved you as dearly as he professes to love Christ, then he would never let anyone that loved him suffer or lower their self worth to be with him. True love is compassion, respect and honorable acts that prove love."

"Nowhere in the bible did it say, “Only show compassion and empathy to those you can trust.” If we did that, we would be burying homeless people every day."

"If you want to help someone move on, you don’t label people as good, bad, worst or best. This categorizes people, rather than experiences with that person. People are not all evil or all good. You don’t teach compassion by categorizing people. Empathy and honest open communication are the only way to live your life. If you’re blaming someone then you haven’t let go of your pain long enough to really try on theirs. However, if you must believe that the only type of person that brings you difficult lessons or experiences in life are those that are bad or worse, then take the time to read the bible a little closer. Christ, put a few people in their place, in order to make point."

"Never let the principle of what you believe in become more important than the person."

"What people can get you or do for you will never replace a person that will influence you to be a better person."

"Kindness is as simple as being grateful for the love anyone has shown you, by not destroying them because it isn't on your terms."

"If only you could be yourself." they shouted. So, she did. "You are not like me or anyone I have met!" they screamed. So, she blended. "You are so fake." they laughed. So, the caterpillar retreated to her cocoon to find peace alone. One day, they came to find her gone. She left a message, “God knew I was different and gave me these beautiful wings because he meant for me to fly. You see... I wasn’t meant to be like you. I was meant to be me--better."