Hounslow Youth Counselling Service

"Don't be pushed by your problems, be led by your dreams" - Ralph Waldo Emerson, poet and philosopher

“The most common way people give up their power is by thinking they don't have any.” ― Alice Walker

“Stay together friends/Don’t scatter and sleep/Our friendship is made/Of being awake” - Rumi

“Be proud of who you are.” – Eminem

"To bring about change, you must not be afraid to take the first step. We will fail when we fail to try." - Rosa Parks

"Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that." - Martin Luther King, Jr.

"I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel'. - Maya Angelou

"Many stories matter. Stories have been used to dispossess and to malign. But stories can also be used to empower and to humanise. Stories can break the dignity of a people. But stories can also repair that broken dignity" - Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie.

"You’re braver than you believe, stronger than you seem and smarter than you think". – Christopher Robin from AA Milne's Winnie the Pooh

"Talk to yourself as you would to someone you love" - Brene Brown, Author

"You are your best thing" - Toni Morrison.

"We have a choice every day regarding the attitude we will embrace for the day. Life is 10% what happens to us and 90% how we react to it. Our attitude is everything." - Charles R Swindoll

"The reason why we struggle with insecurity is because we compare our behind the scenes with everyone elses' highlight reel" - Steven Furtick

"During your life, never stop dreaming. No one can take away your dreams." - Tupac Shakur, rapper

"Kindness is the language which the deaf can hear and the blind can see" - Mark Twain.

"I have two hands: one for me, one for other people". - Millie Bobby Brown, actress

“We can’t change the world until we change ourselves.” – Biggie Smalls

"'We can all dance' he said 'if we find the music that we love'..." - from Giraffes Can't Dance by Giles Andreae

"I think you travel to search and you come back home to find yourself there" - Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

"I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life and that is why I succeed." - Michael Jordan

"If someone does not smile at you, be generous and offer your own smile. Nobody needs a smile more than the one that cannot smile to others." - Dalai Lama

“Don't be pushed around by the fears in your mind. Be led by the dreams in your heart.” ― Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart

“Stop lookin’ at what you ain’t got, and start being thankful for what you do got.” – T.I.

"If you think you are too small to make a difference, try sleeping with a mosquito." - Dalai Lama

“When the winds of change blow, some people build walls and others build windmills.” - Chinese Proverb

"If you can't love yourself how in the hell you gonna love somebody else?" - Ru Paul

"Everybody’s somebody’s everything. I know you right. Nobody’s nothing. That’s right." - Chance the Rapper

"We are all imperfect beings who need one another" - Haemin Sunim, Love for Imperfect Things

“Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms—to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.” - Viktor Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, holocaust survivor

“Fulfillment isn’t found over the rainbow—it’s found in the here and now. Today I define success by the fluidity with which I transcend emotional land mines and choose joy and gratitude instead.” - Ru Paul

“Life is not about waiting for the storms to pass. It's about learning how to dance in the rain.” ― Vivian Greene

"Happiness can be found, even in the darkest of times, if one only remembers to turn on the light." - J. K. Rowling

"Made so many wrong decisions, 'Til I fell in love with optimism.” - Dave, Voices

"Every day may not be good but there is something good in every day". - Alice Morse Earle.

“We ain’t picture perfect but we worth the picture still.” – J. Cole, Crooked Smile.

"You must take action. You must do the impossible. Because giving up is never an option". - Greta Thunberg

"Sometimes it's the journey that teaches you a lot about your destination". - Drake

"I will not lose, for even in defeat, there is a valuable lesson learned, so it evens up for me." - Jay-Z

“You’ll never get bored when you try something new. There’s really no limit to what you can do.” - Dr Seuss

"Be who you are and don't let anyone affect the confidence you have in your individuality" - Demi Lovato

" If you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change" - Dr Wayne Dyer

“Wherever you are, at any moment, try and find something beautiful. A face, a line out of a poem, the clouds out of a window, some graffiti, a wind farm. Beauty cleans the mind.” ― Matt Haig, Reasons to Stay Alive

“Never lose hope. Storms make people stronger and never last forever.” ― Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart

"Without the dark, we'd never see the stars.” ― Stephenie Meyer, Twilight

"The good driver sees the organic flow of all the cars on the road and becomes one with the flow upon joining it. The bad driver does not see this flow as a whole and thinks only of his own driving" - Haemin Sunim, Love for Imperfect Things

“Those who have a 'why' to live, can bear with almost any 'how'.” - Viktor Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, holocaust survivor

“Never be limited by other people’s limited imaginations.” —Dr. Mae Jemison, first African-American female astronaut

"Do the best you can until you know better. Then when you know better, do better" - Maya Angelou, Author

"Show me someone who has done something worthwhile, and I'll show you someone who has overcome adversity". - Lou Holtz, Coach

"Sometimes the smallest things take up the most room in your heart". - Winnie the Pooh (AA Milne)

"Don't aim at success. The more you aim at it and make it a target, the more you are going to miss it. For success, like happiness, cannot be pursued; it must ensue." - Victor Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, holocaust survivor

“You are so busy being YOU that you have no idea how utterly unprecedented you are.” ― John Green, The Fault in Our Stars

"For the kids out there that are worried about what the future holds, especially the LGBTQI+ kids, our brothers and sisters that came before us didn't fight for nothing. Trust me: we will only move forward, but you need to put your fear aside and find the strength to believe that." - Michelle Visage

“Change will not come if we wait for some other person or some other time. We are the ones we’ve been waiting for. We are the change that we seek.” — Barack Obama

"Openness may not completely disarm prejudice, but it's a good place to start." — Jason Collins from the essay The Gay Athlete,

"However long the night, the dawn will break." - African Proverb, Hausa Tribe

"... We must be brave, we must beware - mostly of ourselves/For the mind is like a spider, it will weave many webs/But the heart is like an arrow of light/It will pierce a hole in the dark that life will fill..." - Mark Nepo, extract from "Coming up for Air"

"...no person is your friend (or kin) who demands your silence, or denies your right to grow and be perceived as fully blossomed as you were intended." - Alice Walker

“We come to love not by finding a perfect person, but by learning to see an imperfect person perfectly.” – Sam Keen, To Love and Be Loved

"The only way to have a friend is to be one" - Ralph Waldo Emerson, Poet & Philosopher

"Pay no mind to those who talk behind your back, it simply means that you are two steps ahead." - Tupac Shakur, rapper

"Live in the sunshine, swim the sea, drink the wild air" - Ralph Waldo Emerson, poet and philosopher

“It isn’t the hours you put in, it’s what you put in the hours”. - Sam Ewing, motivational speaker

"I've missed more than 900 shots in my career. I've lost almost 300 games. 26 times I've been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I've failed over and over again in my life and THAT is why I succeed". - Michael Jordan

"Beauty begins the moment you decide to be yourself" - Coco Chanel

"A flower does not think of competing with the flower next to it, it just blooms" - Zeb Shin

"I've had a lot of worries in my life, most of which never happened." - Mark Twain

"Anxiety and fear are cousins but not twins. Fear sees a threat. Anxiety imagines one." - Max Lucado

"Today is unique! It has never occurred and it will never be repeated. At midnight it will end, quietly, suddenly, totally. Forever. But the hours between now and then are opportunities with eternal possibilities." ~ Charles R. Swindoll

"The only person you are destined to become is the person you decide to be" - Ralph Waldo Emerson, poet an philosopher

"You don’t have to control your thoughts. You just have to stop letting them control you." — Dan Millman

"Long live the rose that grew from concrete when no one else even cared." - Tupak Shakur, rapper

"We must be willing to let go of the life we’ve planned, so as to have the life that is waiting for us." — Joseph Campbell

" I just stop thinking and start moving - you just gotta be you" - Lil Uzi Vert

"Don't compare your life to others. There's no comparison between the sun and moon. They shine when it's their time." (unknown)

"For beautiful eyes, look for the good in others; for beautiful lips, speak only words of kindness; and for poise, walk with the knowledge that you are never alone". - Audrey Hepburn

"The summit is what drives us, but it is the climb itself that matters most". - Conrad Ankor, American Rock climber and author

"Shame loves perfectionists - it's so easy to keep us quiet" - Brene Brown.

'Everybody is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree it will live its whole life feeling it is stupid'. - Albert Einstein

'I've not failed. I've just found 10,000 ways that won't work' - Thomas Edison, inventor of the light bulb

"Some people want it to happen, some wish it would happen, others make it happen" - Michael Jordan, Basketball Player

"Imperfections are not inadequacies; they are reminders that we're all in this together" - Brene Brown.

"Art and life are subjective. Not everybody's gonna dig what I dig, but I reserve the right to dig it." - Whoopi Goldberg

"Imma be what I set out to be without a doubt undoubtedly." - Eminem

"Until we receive with an open heart, we are never really giving with an open heart." - Brene Brown

"Poetry is one of the purest forms of conversation there is". - Caleb Femi, Poet

“You look ridiculous if you dance. You looks ridiculous if you don’t dance. So you might as well dance.” — Gertrude Stein

“Between the stimulus and the response there is a space and in that space is your power and your freedom” - Victor Frankl

"It's when someone listens to how you feel. They won't tell you that you're wrong. You are allowed to feel how you want to feel."

"It helps you get out what you are thinking and feeling."

"It was good to be able to talk about my problems and not feel alone."