Life is painful and messed up. It gets complicated at the worst of times, and sometimes you have no idea where to go or what to do. Lots of times people just let themselves get lost, dropping into a wide open, huge abyss. But that's why we have to keep trying. We have to push through all that hurts us, work past all our memories that are haunting us. Sometimes the things that hurt us are the things that make us strongest. A life without experience, in my opinion, is no life at all. And that's why I tell everyone that, even when it hurts, never stop yourself from living.

— Alysha Speer

Love doesn't give you very many choices. When you love someone, you just want to be with them. If they break your heart, you will still love them. Because hearts are easy to break, and though love is tender and sometimes fragile, love isn't. Love sort of envelops you. It covers you like a giant shadow, then pulls you in like a blanket. You are so warm. The feeling surrounds you, and no matter how you feel, it is always there. You can't escape it. But you wouldn't want to. You are so, so safe. You can't remember the last time you were this happy. Were you ever? This happy? Every second you are apart feels like hours. Sometimes, right before you fall asleep, you miss them so much it hurts. You ache for them. Their warmth. Their touch. Their smell. You need them. When you can't sleep you wish and wish and wish that they would wake up and talk to you. When you dream of them, you wake up smiling. When pain stabs into you, you reach out for them. You cry to them, begging them to hold you and make it all go away, make everything go away. Love addicts you to its feeling. You never, ever want to lose that feeling. Sometimes the fear of losing love drives people to do crazy things. Like buy a plane ticket. Make a phone call. Run out of a class. Cry. Write. Laugh. Because when you love someone, you really love them. You give them your whole heart. You trust them. Furthermore, you never want to be away from them. Sometimes, you don't even need their words. You just need them there. Love is such an amazing thing, and too many people take it for granted. If you're in love, don't let it go. Don't you dare let it go.

— Alysha Speer

Love is hard to find, hard to keep, and hard to forget.

— Alysha Speer

Never be afraid to be sexy!

— Alysha Speer

On a second note, though, I have something to say about pain. There are lots of kinds of pain. Pain of smashing your fingers in a car door, pains of losing a baby, pain of failing a test. But in their own little ways, these pains are all agonizing. Which is sad, and yet, happy, if you really think about it. If we never lost our car keys, or stepped in gum, or had a bad hair day, what kind of people would we be? In a word? Boring. We wouldn't be passionate; we wouldn't know it was exciting to get pregnant, or score an A on a final. So that's why, today at least, I am grateful for pain. Because it's part of what makes me the whacky, goofy, jaded, person that I am. Peace.

— Alysha Speer

Only write a story that only you can write.

— Alysha Speer

Sleep did not honor me with its presence.

— Alysha Speer

So many thoughts ran through my head. Most of them contained the same, simply three words so often strung together that it was too much a classic cheese or cliché to say it, but they still had meaning, no matter how many times they had been repeated.

— Alysha Speer

There was something behind the softness that intertwined our fingers together—love? It felt different from two days ago. All I could think about was his smooth hand, wrapped in mine. It was more than affection—but I wasn’t sure how much more, or if that would ever change.

— Alysha Speer

The truth doesn't mind being told every once in a while.

— Alysha Speer