We might say they’re just words. Perhaps that’s true. Yet once heard or once read, these words can grab a sense of permanence as if they had meant to touch our very souls.

If we could hear or read these words again, would they go in and out of our minds or would they resonate and remain? So as not to be forgotten, we might clip them to our refrigerators or text them to a friend or read them aloud in front of the fireplace and embrace their hope and promise for a better world.

Enter the chat room. Let’s put famous interviewer, the late Barbara Walters there to prompt some interesting writers and a few iconic people from throughout our history. Though some may think we may have lost our way as a human race, we can trust the light left in our eyes by these words of wisdom. Listen to your inner voice or read them aloud and see if you agree.

BW: What is the greatest fear in our lives that keeps us from finding joy and contentment?

“Life will break you,” said author Louise Erdich. “Nobody can protect you from that, and being alone won’t either, for solitude will also break you with its yearning. The answer is you have to risk. You have to love. You have to feel. It is the reason you are here on earth. You have to risk your heart. Think of it this way. You’re sitting under an apple tree. You are broken, or betrayed, or left, or hurt, or death brushes too near, and you are listening to the apples falling all around you in heaps, wasting their sweetness. Tell yourself to taste as many as you could.”

BW: Anyone else to answer the same question?

“To love is to risk not being loved in return,” said singer Bob Marley. “To hope is to risk pain, to try is to risk failure, but risk must be taken because the greatest hazard in life is to risk nothing.”

BW: Love is something that’s hard to know whether we have it or not. Can someone try to explain how we can better understand this feeling?

“Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast,” said a biblical scholar. “It is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth.”

Martin Luther King added, “Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.”

BW: The lives of so many young people in America have tragically ended with senseless violence in public places. Anyone want to comment about that?”

“A young life ending is a hypothesis,” said author Edouard Leve. “Those who die old are made of the past. Thinking of them, one thinks of what they have done. Thinking of a dead child, a dead young man or woman, one thinks of what you could have become. You were, and you will remain, made up of possibilities.”

BW: We appear to be a divided country, split politically, culturally, and racially. What do we need to stop all the chaos and bring us all together?

“What we need in the United States is not division,” said presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy just weeks before he was assassinated in 1968. “What we need in the United States is not hatred. What we need in the United States is not violence and lawlessness. We need love and wisdom, and compassion toward one another.”

BW: The American people are suffering on many levels. We walk with smiles, but inside we cry. Like Louise had said, “Life will break you.” Sometimes, it’s a struggle to get through another day. How can we heal?

“Be gentle,” said author Jeff Foster. “You are trying to bring light and love to the dark places inside. Go slow. You want to get to know forgotten parts of yourself. There’s no rush. You will meet energies you spent your life pushing away and denying. Healing is not a destination. Forgive yourself each day. You didn’t know how to slow down until now. You didn’t know how to meet pain. You didn’t know how to face yourself. Breathe. Healing doesn’t happen all at once. It’s only moment by moment. It’s now that you can begin your life again.”

BW: If you had one question you would ask to those American people who have the opportunity to grow from childhood into adulthood and then into their twilight years, what would that question be?

Robert Holden replied, “Do you live your life only to get to the end of it? In the manic society that most of us experience, people exhibit a frantic, neurotic behavior I call ‘Destination Addiction.’ People who suffer from this addiction believe that success is a destination. They believe that the future is where success is, happiness is, and heaven is. Each passing moment is merely a ticket to get to the future. They live in the ‘not now,’ they are psychologically absent, and they disregard everything so they can keep chasing the next thing. We are always on the run, on the move, and on the go. Our goal is not to enjoy the day, it is to get through the day.”

Timothy Leary put a punctuation mark on the chat room discussion.

“Who knows what you might learn from taking a chance on a conversation with a stranger? Everyone carries a piece of the puzzle into what we want with a satisfying life. Nobody comes into your life by mere coincidence.”

We are born into light that becomes dark. We find open doors that close, and we learn that success can end in failure. Reverse these phrases and see the difference. We are born from the dark that turns into light. Doors close but then they open. Failure ends with success.

Sometimes, all it takes is a flip of the coin and life rewards us with happiness and joy.

Rich Strack can be reached at richiesadie11@gmail.com