Youth is not
a time of life - it is a state of mind, it is a temper of the will,
a quality of the imagination, a vigor of the emotions,
a predominance of courage over timidity,
of the appetite for adventure over love of ease.
Nobody grows
old by merely living a number of years.
People grow old only by deserting their ideals.
Years wrinkle the skin, but to give up enthusiasm wrinkles the soul.
Worry, doubt, self-distrust, fear and despair - these are the long,
long years that bow the head and turn the growing spirit back to dust.
Whether they
are sixteen or seventy, there is in every being's heart
the love of wonder, the sweet amazement at the stars
and starlike things and thoughts, the undaunted challenge of events,
the unfailing childlike appetite for what is to come next, and the joy and the
game of life.
You are as
young as your faith, as old as your doubt; as young as your self-confidence,
as old as your fear, as young as your hope, as old as your despair.
When the wires are all down and all the innermost core of your heart is covered
with the snows of pessimism and the ice of cynicism, then you are grown old
indeed.
But so long
as your heart receives messages of beauty, cheer, courage,
grandeur and power from the earth, from man and from the Infinite, so long you
are young.
Author Unknown
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