Barbara Johnson Quotes

We cannot protect ourselves from trouble, but we can dance through the puddles of life with a rainbow smile, twirling the only umbrella we need -- the umbrella of God's love.

Never let a problem to be solved become more important than a person to be loved.

Live for today, but hold your hands open to tomorrow. Anticipate the future and its changes with joy. There is a seed of God's love in every event, every unpleasant situation in which you may find yourself.

The attitude of kindness is everyday stuff like a great pair of sneakers. Not frilly. Not fancy. Just plain and comfortable.

Life is a refining process. Our response to it determines whether we'll be ground down or polished up. On a piano, one person sits down and plays sonatas, while another merely bangs away at "Chopsticks." The piano is not responsible. It's how you touch the keys that makes the difference. It's how you play what life gives you that determines your joy and shine.

If you can forgive the person you were, accept the person you are, and believe in the person you will become, you are headed for joy. So celebrate your life.

Attitude is the mind's paintbrush; it can color any situation.

Love is what makes two people sit in the middle of a bench when there is plenty of room at both ends.

Always remember that better days are ahead - if not in this life, in the next.

Whatever it is probably won't go away, so we might as well live and laugh through it. When we double over laughing, we're bending so we won't break. If you think your particular troubles are too heavy and too traumatic to laugh about, remember that laughing is like changing a baby's diaper. It doesn't solve any problems permanently, but it makes things more acceptable for awhile.

Patience is the ability to idle your motor when you feel like stripping your gears.

If things are tough, remember that every flower that ever bloomed had to go through a whole lot of dirt to get there. The almighty Father will use life's reverses to move you forward. So do not keep grieving about a bitter experience. The present is slipping by while you are regretting the past and worrying about the future. Regret will not prevent tomorrow's sorrows; it will only rob today of its strength.

Faith is seeing light with your heart when all your eyes see is darkness.

Prayer is asking for rain and faith is carrying the umbrella.

A balanced diet is a cookie in each hand.

When you live in the present moment, time stands still. Accept your circumstances and live them. If there is an experience ahead of you, have it! But if worries stand in your way, put them off until tomorrow. Give yourself a day off from worry. You deserve it. Some people live with a low-grade anxiety tugging at their spirit all day long. They go to sleep with it, wake up with it, carry it around at home, in town, to church, and with friends. Here's a remedy: Take the present moment and find something to laugh at. People who laugh, last.

Laughter is to life what shock absorbers are to automobiles. It won't take the potholes out of the road, but it sure makes the ride smoother

Live every day to fulfill your personal mission. God has a reason for whatever season you are living through right now. A season of loss or blessing? A season of activity or hibernation? A season of growth or incubation? You may think you're on a detour, but God knows the best way for you to reach your destination.

Motherhood: if it were going to be easy, it never would have started with something called labor.

We can never untangle all the woes in other people's lives. We can't produce miracles overnight. But we can bring a cup of cool water to a thirsty soul, or a scoop of laughter to a lonely heart.

True love doesn't have a happy ending, because true love never ends. Letting go is one way of saying I love you.

Life can be wonderful. Do your best not to miss it!” Enjoy what it is before it isn't anymore. Dare to slip on a pair of bunny slippers once in a while! Surprise yourself! Enjoy the little things because one day you'll look back and realize they were the big things!

You have to look for the joy. Look for the light of God that is hitting your life, and you will find sparkles you didn't know were there.

It never hurts your eyesight to look on the bright side of things.

I'm glad God has all the answers, 'cause I barely understand the questions.

How will you use the years God gives you? Will you be remembered for being a fault-finder? Or will you be known for your quick smile, the laugh lines around your eyes, and the twinkle deep within? After all, God gives you your face, but you provide the expression!

Growing is a lifetime job, and we grow most when we're down in the valleys, where the fertilizer is.

Stop what you are doing long enough to enjoy the sunset, listen to a special song that lifts you up, or pick up the phone and share some special thought with a caring friend.

We are Easter people living in a Good Friday world.

Being codependent means that when you die, someone else's life passes before your eyes.

We can choose to gather to our hearts the thorns of disappointment, failure, loneliness, and dismay in our present situation. Or we can gather the flowers of God's grace, boundless love, abiding presence, and unmatched joy. I choose to gather the flowers.

Winners see an answer for every problem; losers see a problem in every answer!

Grudges are like hand grenades: it is wise to release them before they destroy you.

I don't have to figure out why or how or when. God has a plan, and I'm committed to it. That commitment frees me from having to worry about the details.

Laughter dulls the sharpest pain and flattens out the greatest stress. To share it is to give a gift of health.

A lot of kneeling keeps one in good standing.

A thin line separates laughter and pain, comedy and tragedy, humor and hurt. Our lives constantly walk that line. When we slip off on one side or the other, we're taken by surprise. But who said there wouldn't be surprises? Knowing God just means that all the rules will be fair; at the end of our life drama, we'll see that. We never know how things will turn out, but if we know with certainty they will make sense regardless of how they turn out, we're on to something.

No one likes change... but babies in diapers.

Change is a process not an event.

If we give someone a piece of bread and butter, that's kindness, but if we put jelly or peanut butter on it, then it's Loving Kindness.

Worry is the senseless process of cluttering up tomorrows opportunities with leftover problems from today

Don’t let your life speed out of control. Live intentionally. Do something today that will last beyond your lifetime.

The joy of motherhood: what a mother experiences when all her children are in bed

Forgiveness is a stunning principle, your ticket out of hate and fear and chaos. ... I know what regret feels like; I've earned my credentials. But I also know what forgiveness feels like, because God has so graciously forgiven me.

The secret of growing younger is counting blessings, not birthdays.

The most important things in your home are people.

As you're rushing through life, take time to stop a moment, look into people's eyes, say something kind, and try to make them laugh!

Are our ways of teaching students to ask some questions always correlative with our ways of teaching them not to ask - indeed, to be unconscious of - others? Does the educational system exist in order to promulgate knowledge, or is its main function rather to universalize a society’s tacit agreement about what it has decided it does not and cannot know?

All we can take with us to heaven is what we leave behind in the lives we touch.

God never gives up on us no matter how hard we try to get ourselves loose. God does not let go. That doesn't mean he controls everything we do. It doesn't mean he puts a bridle on us and leads us by the nose. He gives each one of us free will and common sense and a spirit that can communicate with his. When we go through afflictions, he allows us to choose our response. But no matter what our response may be, he sticks around to the bitter end.