Sarah Jakes Roberts
  • It’s foolish to keep clothes that don’t fit
  • Is what you wanted then, what you need now?
  • Life brings us all to a fork in the road when we must choose to grow up into the unknown or grow cold by staying the same
  • You’ll never know who you can become if you create a life that requires you to pretend you’re already comfortable with who you are
  • We choose to say we’re okay, when we’re actually just numb
  • You cannot point the finger at other people’s shortcomings to justify their own
  • Excuses are comfort zones
  • Maybe you convinced yourself that staying the same meant you’d never hurt again either
  • You cannot change a past you won’t confront
  • You have to understand how your previous pattern was birthed
  • When your mind becomes cluttered with the possibilities of “what if” there is no room for faith
  • Keep the promises you make to yourself
  • The word “try” leaves room for failure
  • Instant gratification often results in long-term disappointment
  • The many broken promises I have made to myself have created wounds I am still discovering
  • You can create a new pattern and move forward with determination like never before, but you must learn what’s stopped you in the past
  • Areas in our lives that we know are present but choose to ignore
  • Surviving painful experiences are good, but the danger comes when we don’t take time to recover
  • Pull out the weeds
  • You are strong enough to confront your history
  • You’ve already survived the trauma
  • Think about the time you knew you should have walked away but convinced yourself to stay – How did you get to that place?
  • Maybe you have set boundaries for the people you’ve allowed into your life but haven’t set boundaries for yourself
  • Are you making a decision from a place or fear and insecurity or from the strength necessary to maintain your esteem?
  • Are you surrounded by people who constantly take from you but add very little to your life? Ever wonder why these types of people are attracted to you? Better yet, have you wondered why you continue to attract those types of people? Many people feel a sense of value when they are needed by other people, even if that turns into codependency. It may be because you once felt indispensable and now only feel comfortable in relationships where someone cannot survive without you
  • Have you ever taken time to consider your own emotional patterns? We must begin to ask ourselves: Why did this happen to me? What did it teach me? How do I keep it from ever happening again?
  • The patterns in your life will determine the difference between the destruction of your life or the construction of it – Its up to you to choose
  • When you notice a shift in your mood, take a moment to truly take inventory of what led to that shift – Find out the root of what’s blocking you from having complete joy
  • If you haven’t talked into the system that is available to you, you spend more time loss than necessary (not putting an address in your navigation)
  • Have you ever taken the time to examine the patterns that exist in your life because of the culture you grew up in? Our environments shape us, but what we observe fills us and creates the pattern in which we begin to understand life and people
  • My heart wanted to believe one thing, but the patterns of my environment made me settle for another
  • Expecting pain in the future takes away your joy in the present – Worrying steals joy that is already yours
  • If we don’t confront our patterns, they will multiply in our families
  • Insecurities create patterns that effect our relationships
  • Always remember you can’t force something to change
  • Just because things have been a certain way doesn’t mean they have to stay that way
  • Sometimes God has to allow other people to go ahead of you so that the path can be clear when you get there
  • You will spark a change that shifts your family in the direction of healing for generations to come, all because you started to work on yourself first
  • Would we stay bitter together or become better alone?
  • I can’t connect with you unless I’m willing to back to who I used to be
  • Little by little small things begin to add up
  • Hanging on to the idea of who you think someone is does not do any favors to yourself or that person
  • You have to let go of people you never thought would leave your side
  • So often we confuse loyalty with longevity
  • Unforgiveness will transform you from victim to the villain
  • Our pain blinds us from seeing others pain
  • Hurt people, hurt people
  • You have to understand that people do the best they can and sometimes their best is hurtful to you
  • People who do bad things are not always evil, often they are broken
  • Do not become so distracted with trying to diagnose someone’s issue that you fail to pursue treatment for your wounds
  • Closure is not a moment between two people – It is the moment you stop reliving your history and let go of the “what if’s.”
  • Unforgiveness = The secret sense of joy we experience when we hear that people who caused us to stumble are now struggling themselves – or begin to wish bad things on them so they can suffer the same way we did
  • You must overcome the feelings that you have buried
  • If a person has proved they are not stable or conscientious enough to be an integral part of your life, continuing to engage with them is dangerous – Expect to have your life unnecessarily broken when you could be striving toward wholeness
  • Distract myself with myself
  • Distracting yourself with rebuilding yourself
  • Remember what happened to you because it gave you perspective you would have never had otherwise
  • You don’t get do overs in life because you don’t need them. You needed to mess up. You had to make those mistakes. Your heart had to be broken. You needed to lose your way. There are lessons in those moments that could not have been delivered any other way. You cannot live in the past and maximize the present.
  • You have to trust that even in your disappointment there is a bigger, better plan taking place behind the scenes that you cannot see
  • If the people around you could determine what your future is supposed to look like, you would have no need to ask God to direct your path
  • Have you ever prayed one of those prayers that you knew could not fail? “God if you want me to call my ex-boyfriend back then let my phone turn on when I press the power button.” – These are the prayers we recite when we are determined to get our way
  • Don’t trust the sign you’re looking for, trust the one you never expected to see
  • Regardless of how off-track your life may seem, you are exactly where you need to be
  • When God’s destiny for your life begins to outweigh the distractions around you, you’re honing the gift of focus
  • One play could change the entire game
  • If you’re too busy appeasing the distractions in your life, you may miss the opportunity that was meant to reveal something exceptional about yourself
  • Too often we become so consumed with excelling and going to the next level that we don’t take the time to perfect our gift on the level that we’re on
  • You must be willing to not be distracted by someone else’s progress long enough to see your growth
  • You have to protect your purpose from the things in life that are often the source of your joy but don’t necessarily challenge you to move forward
  • I think we’re often afraid to say “no” because we fear how it will affect the other person, but don’t consider how saying “yes” can harm us
  • There will be some opportunities you lose so that you can be forced into something better
  • God never takes away anything from us that He doesn’t return with interest
  • What may look like a loss to you is actually an opportunity for God
  • God’s plans are always bigger and better than our own. So don’t be discouraged when plans fall apart
  • Love built on a lie
  • Relationships that we choose reflect the relationship we have within ourselves
  • Don’t give another person permission to hold your heart unless you know their hands belong to God
  • Relationships that truly make a difference in our lives are the ones that require to break out of our patterns and rhythms. They force us to examine our intentions, motives and ways
  • If you want to constantly win at this thing called love, you have to be willing to let go of every misconception you’ve ever had about relationships and roles
  • You don’t have to rush what God has ordained
  • The truth is it’s time for you to wake up. You can no longer go through life unconsciously hurting yourself and asking someone else to heal you
  • The longer you stay, the more you deny the strength you have to move on
  • Don’t give your patience away to people who will abuse it
  • Surround yourself with people who can reciprocate what you pour
  • It’s so easy to point the finger and place blame, but every failed relationship has at least two sets of fingerprints on it
  • Why did I become so desperate for love that I lost my power?
  • Each heartbreak you learn something new about yourself
  • It’s not what you can see that scares you, its what you never saw coming that can knock the wind out of you
  • Forgive yourself for not protecting your heart in the past, but you won’t allow that to create walls
  • You cannot be mentored by someone who is struggling in the same area as you
  • Trust that if you don’t have something, it’s because you aren’t ready for it
  • Believe that if it’s on your plate, you can handle it
  • Don’t do what feels right, do what makes you a better person
  • Be strong enough to choose you
If these notes inspired you, forward them to someone who may need to be inspired too.

God Bless,
Jen DeLeon