Home > Work > Until I Knew Myself (Bentwood #1)
1 " When life spirals out of control, you start to grab onto everything you can. Eventually, you stop spinning, but it's hard to say what finally grounded you. Was it the many things you experienced during the trial or just the last thing you held onto? "
― Tammy L. Gray , Until I Knew Myself (Bentwood #1)
2 " There are moments when your heart breaks an swells at the same time. When there is so much love flooding in and out of your soul that you wonder if the tide will whisk you along with it. "
3 " Sometimes people wear indifference because it's easier than facing the truth. "
4 " If we are sons and daughters of a mighty God, why do we live our life as orphans? "
5 " Complaining is the front door to self-pity, which is a horribly unattractive quality, even for someone as beautiful as you. "
6 " . . . Tyler felt the hole widen in his chest. A niggling sense that he was stepping off into a deep, dark hole. He had no history. No legacy to aspire to . . . Isolation pressed on every side as he tried to fight the horrifying truth: He was a twenty-five year old orphan with no idea who he was supposed to be. "
7 " She’d spent her whole life needing others to validate her, and while that hadn’t completely disappeared, she did feel her own voice rising above the others, guiding her, telling her it was okay to be on her own. "
8 " Helping Ty meant being vulnerable. It meant exposing a past she was determined to keep hidden. But conviction came a heartbeat later, as powerful and pressing as April’s plea. How could she keep the truth from Ty when it had been the very thing to set her free? "
9 " He stared across the vast water, his mind filled with all the broken pieces of his life: Journey, Caroline, Dustin, the Kinders, his job, his future. They somehow all fit together, he just had no idea how. "
10 " What if the feeling stayed exactly the same? What if it was better? What if all the hurt she’d been through these last couple of years could be turned into something beautiful? "
11 " They’d been given a gift, healing to both of their souls. The secret that plotted to ruin them ended up being their salvation. It forced them to move forward. Forced them to both face things within themselves they didn’t have the courage to see. "
12 " Sometimes in life, we tell ourselves things that are lies. We look at a situation and believe we’re forced to remain trapped, even when doors fly open around us. "
13 " He turned, pulled down the rolling door, and hid the terrifying proof that he’d given up everything to chase after a lie. "
14 " There’d always been an invisible wall separating them, reminding Tyler over and over again that he didn’t really belong. But maybe he’d been the one to put that wall there, because now it seemed to be missing. Now all he could feel was the tender embrace of a father. "
15 " Within the painting, there was darkness, but also light. It wasn’t what she used to created before her dad left or even the ugliness that remained after his abandonment. It was a blend of both. An acceptance that sometimes things didn’t work out the way she thought they would. "
16 " A freedom she hadn’t felt in years pulled the image from her mind. Not just the loss of herself, but of them, the unit, the forever that would likely never be. Time continued to disappear. Finally, the last piece . . . a spark, barely visible to the eye. Despite all this picture was, there was no way she could paint anything of her and Ty without a glimmer of hope inside the sadness. "
17 " I never cared about your last name, Ty. Only the character of the man who wore it. "
18 " back to the front door. "
19 " Over ten years had passed since he’d come through this door carrying one suitcase and a chip on his shoulder And here he was again, as empty and lost as he’d been that night. "
20 " Journey without art was like a field without flowers. Functional, but so much less than she could be. "