Cultivate sage!

I read a quote today--

"However mean your life is, meet it and live it: do not shun it and call it hard names. Cultivate poverty like a garden herb, like sage. Do not trouble yourself much to get new things, whether clothes or friends. Things do not change, we change. Sell your clothes and keep your thoughts." Henry David Thoreau

For some reason I have been thinking about this quote since I first read it earlier today. I think it's because of something someone recently said about me. Someone I was very close to in the past said "I don't like the new Jessica. I don't even know you." I don't feel different at all. I want to say things are just different between us. But the quote is right. Things don't change, people change. Things are not the same because I have changed, they have change. We all go through change, good or bad. Something one person views as a positive change, others view as a negative. But in the end we must preserve our self. Not change because others want us to. "Sell your clothes, but keep your thoughts."

Something else has struck me about the quote, though. "However mean your life is, meet it and live it." There are a lot of things we can say to complain about our lives. Even the most priveliged people find something wrong with theirs. But Henry has some sound advice. Meet it and live it. Stop complaining and do something.

I'm just inspired today. I can only hope this jolt of motivation can last.