349 Quotes by Henry Cloud

The law of sowing and reaping is the most trustworthy law of behavior.

Many times to set boundaries with someone is to risk losing the love that you have craved for a long time. To start to say no to a controlling parent is to get in touch with the sadness of what you do not have with them instead of still working hard to get it. This working hard keeps you away from the grief and keeps you stuck. But accepting the reality of who they are and letting go of the wish for them to be different is the essence of grief. And that is sad indeed.

One of the most powerful, though difficult, lessons we all need to learn on our spiritual pilgrimage is that even when bad things happen and we do not understand why, we can trust God to be present and working on our behalf.

Do not let an out-of-control person be the cue for you to change your course. Just allow him to be angry and decide for yourself what you need to do.

Part of being made in God’s image is having a need to be in relationship.

Denial of one’s need for others is the most common type of defense against bonding. If people come from a situation, whether growing up or later in life, where good, safe relationships were not available to them, they learn to deny that they even want them. Why want what you can’t have? They slowly get rid of their awareness of the need.

You know you’re around a safe, adult person by the following characteristics: She is not threatened by your differences. She has standards, values, and convictions she’s worked out for herself. At the same time, she doesn’t have a “right way” and a “wrong way” for everything. She functions at least on the same level of maturity as her same-age peers. She appreciates mystery and the unknown. She encourages me to develop my own values.

We are all deceivers to some degree. The difference between safe and unsafe “liars” is that safe people own their lies and see them as a problem to change as they become aware of their deception.

You can’t prune toward anything if you don’t know what you want. You have to figure out what you are trying to be or build and then define what the pruning standards are going to be. That definition and those standards will bring you to the pruning moments, wherein you either own the vision or you don’t.