J.D. Stroube Quotes

The walls that caged me were not of this world, but were within my mind.

Life is filled with unanswered questions, but it is the courage to seek those answers that continues to give meaning to life. You can spend your life wallowing in despair, wondering why you were the one who was led towards the road strewn with pain, or you can be grateful that you are strong enough to survive it.

What you are or where you came from is not important. It is who you are and the choices you make, that determine who you will become. If you can look inward and be satisfied, the opinions of others should melt away.

A victim has the potential to transform into a survivor, but if that is forgotten, a true victim is what they become. A survivor must endure strife and persevere against those thoughts that would convince them otherwise. Holding fast to ones will will allow them to know their strength has not evaporated; They will never be without hope.

No one has free will until they are an adult, and by then the choices that were made for them, have already set them on a course that gives limited freedom in the choices to be made.

If the town were a black hole, I was the helpless star being sucked into oblivion. It was an oblivion I craved.

These were people who hunted for a way to erase the haunted, malnourished gaze from their souls and replace it with their faith in freedom and safety.

In that smooth fortress of glass, I caught a glimpse of my corruption gripping steel, which before I had thought of as my salvation, but now represented my obliteration.

All that is left to bring you pain, are the memories. If you face those, you’ll be free. You can’t spend the rest of your life hiding from yourself; always afraid that your memories will incapacitate you, and they will if you continue to bury them.

Over the years, I learned to smile or laugh when I was supposed to. I kept my true self hidden; I did not need to unleash my pain on the world around me. Instead, I taught myself to ignore it. I did not realize that the pain was eating away at my soul.

Even knowing that my presence brought a shadow over the lives of my loved ones, I can't regret the experiences I've had with them. They gave me life, becoming an integral part of my soul. They healed me when I was broken and somehow they recovered those parts of me, I thought lost forever.

Mmmm… stay.” Her voice was barely audible, as she grazed her lips against mine and her head fell back against the pillow into a deep sleep.

Once I embraced the dreams that once inspired. Now I've found that there is too much I didn't recognize as a gift. I may be too late to see, cherish, and endure. I may never change, but be forever stuck in the past without realizing until my eyes open to the sun and I have forgotten the moon.

Once I was free; there was no cage that could bind me, and I had yet to create my box of numbness within my mind to be my silent protector.

Their screams would echo through the house and reverberate against my eardrums until my mind would fracture. Years went by and with each fracture; I lost a piece of my soul until I became lost and empty inside.

My parents had torn through my innocence and left me with a tar-like substance that was corrupting what was left of me. I could feel it at night; slithering and curling around my soul as it slowly devoured me. It was draining my energy and replacing it with an evil I was afraid to confront.

I could see her will leaving and death seeping through her skin to skewer her soul.

The melodious song mesmerized me and cloaked my soul in a most liberating embrace I had never known. The emotion enveloped me, and smothered the emptiness.