Henry Cloud

“In the end, as a leader, you are always going to get a combination of two things: what you create and what you allow.”

“Closed systems run down and get more chaotic over time. Always get better by being 'open' to outside energy and templates of better ways to function.”

“The best way to advance in a career is to get great results while working with people.”

“Leave your pride, ego, and narcissism somewhere else. Reactions from those parts of you will reinforce your children's most primitive fears.”

“What happens with a lot of leaders is that their leadership style is like ADD; they are all over the place with different ideas. They could be driving one idea forward but then move on to something else too soon.”

“Some people's developmental path has not equipped them to stand up and let go of something.”

“Denial of one's need for others is the most common type of defense against bonding. If people come from a situation, whether growing up or later in life, where good, safe relationships were not available to them, they learn to deny that they even want them. Why want what you can't have? They slowly get rid of their awareness of the need.”

“Setting boundaries isn't an alternative to loving your child. It is a means of loving her.”

“You aren't alive if you aren't in need.”

“I fell in love with the topic of leadership. For three decades, that has been a major focus of my hands-on work: listening to and working with leaders, their teams and their organizations.”

“The power of being in the physical presence of another person delivers real benefits.”

“Physical presence provides chemical, relational, psychological and physiological effects that virtual relationships cannot. Our brains change in the presence of another person and their behavior.”

“If you want to become healthy, you have to surround yourself with a group of people that are getting healthy, and you have to be connected to a community that is doing what you want to do.”

“I think that God will provide opportunities and people and experiences, and everything we need to date and ultimately to find the one.”

“Part of executive functions is the ability to look to a goal deadline and assess where an organization is in meeting it.”

“Don't use all-or-nothing thinking. Take each day as its own day, and don't worry about it if you mess up one day. The most important thing you can do is just get back up on the horse.”

“Learning to accept powerlessness has profound spiritual implications for your child. When we accept the reality of our human condition -- that we are ultimately powerless to change our fallen state, yet totally responsible for being in it -- we are driven to receive God's solution based on his Son's payment of a debt we can't pay.”

“This is one of the marks of a truly safe person: they are confrontable.”

“As a psychologist, I can tell you that there are people who look very good in a group, but they're very different in a one-on-one situation.”

“Some goals are not going to fulfill you. Choose goals that you value and care about.”