Quotes by American Authors - Page 591

The quest for certainty blocks the search for meaning. Uncertainty is the very condition to impel man to unfold his powers.
Erich Fromm
I don’t know how much more you can take.” He laughed. “You’re a witch. From a family of witches. My ex-wife is a witch. Apparently literally and figuratively. Plus my kid’s a witch. And I am probably some kind of animal shifter. All that, and I’m still upright and functioning. I don’t think there’s anything you could tell me that would break me at this point.
Kristen Painter
Being a spectator of calamities taking place in an other country is a quintessential modern experience, the cumulative offering by more than a century and a half's worth of those professional, specialized tourists known as journalists.
Sontag
Warner Studios official in the era of silent movies: Who the hell wants to hear actors talk?
H.W. Brands
The kindest and most meaningful thing anyone ever said to me is: Your mother would be proud of you. ... The strange and painful truth is that I'm a better person because I lost my mom young. When you say you excperienced my writing as sacred, what you are touching is the divine place within me that is my mother. Sugar is the temple I build in my obliterated place. I'd give it all back in a snap, but the fact is, my grief taught me things. ... It required me to suffer. It compelled me to reach.
Cheryl Strayed
When it comes to men, I appreciate them, don’t bash them and never love them.
Donna Lynn Hope
All the things that people do in order to show that they don't need anybody... meanwhile, all they really want to do is say, "Please keep me." We all want to be kept. The problem is we are too afraid to let anyone know about it. What are these fragile things in our hearts that have so much fear of being broken?
C. JoyBell C.
Never fails. Every new book I write seems impossible, writes like I'm typing from dictation, edits like I didn't write it, and finishes like I couldn't possibly have written it.
Kris Rafferty
I guess I always knew there was something wrong with me, but I thought it was because of my father, or my mother, and the pain they bequeathed to me like a family heirloom, handed down from generation to generation.- Tobias Eaton
Veronica Roth
The Compound Effect is the principle of reaping huge rewards from a series of small, smart choices
Darren Hardy
Boredom is the conviction that you can't change ... the shriek of unused capacities.
Saul Bellow
It's not that we had no heart or eyes for pain. We were all afraid. We all had our miseries. But to despair was to wish for something already lost. Or to prolong what was already unbearable...What was worse, to sit and wait for our own deaths with proper somber faces? Or to choose our own happiness?"So we decided to hold parties and pretend each week had become the new year. Each week we could forget past wrongs done to us. We weren't allowed to think a bad thought. We feasted, we laughed, we played games, lost and won, we told the best stories. And each week we could hope to be lucky. That hope was our only joy. And that's how we came to call our little parties Joy Luck.
Amy Tan
It is fine to commiserate with a man about his bad experience with a previous partner, but the instant he uses her as an excuse to mistreat you, stop believing anything he tells you about that relationship and instead recognize it as a sign that he has problems with relating to women.
Lundy Bancroft
Ironically for someone who had so long asserted his own individuality as his first and best defense against insults of any kind, I discovered that faith in myself proved to be the least formidable strength I possessed when confronting alone organized inhumanity on a greater scale than I had conceived possible. Faith in myself was important, and remains important to my self esteem. But I discovered in prison that faith in myself alone, sep0arate from other, more important allegiances , was ultimately no match for the cruelty that human beings could devise when they were entirely unencumbered by respect for the God given dignity of man. This is the lesson I learned in prison. It is, perhaps, the most important lesson I have ever learned.
John McCain
How can cosmic religious feeling be communicated from one person to another, if it can give rise to no definite notion of a God and no theology? In my view, it is the most important function of art and science to awaken this feeling and keep it alive in those who are receptive to it.
Albert Einstein
Up to a point a man's life is shaped by environment heredity and movements and changes in the world about him then there comes a time when it lies within his grasp to shape the clay of his life into the sort of thing he wishes to be. ... Everyone has it within his power to say this I am today that I shall be tomorrow.
Louis L'Amour
[W]e would do better to treat terrorists as common criminals, people who have broken the laws recognized by all civil societies. To treat them as soldiers is to increase their power, respectability, and commitment.
Nel Noddings
You’re not the only one in this relationship who loves achallenge,” he says. “And just so you know for the future, I like my double-chocolate chipcookies warm and soft in the middle . . . and without magnets glued to them.
Simone Elkeles
No matter how great a writer, artist, or entrepreneur, he is a mortal, he is fallible. He is not proof against Resistance. He will drop the ball; he will crash. That’s why they call it rewriting.
Steven Pressfield
And I stood there and took it because I was an object. We were all objects to Marcus McCoy.
Shaun David Hutchinson
In such seconds of decision entire futures are made
Dan Simmons
wash the brush, just beats the devil out of it
Bob Ross
Fear does not have any special power unless you empower it by submitting to it.
Les Brown
Go for it. It will make a great story.
Gina Greenlee
There are people who come home from war and want to talk about the pain, but no one wants to listen; there are others who want to keep silent and repress the memories, and all their family and friends want is to talk about it. I call this the war veteran reintegration paradox.
M.B. Dallocchio
Sometimes when you're hurting, it helps to throw yourself at something that will take your weight.
Paula McLain
Captain?""Yeah?""Do you think it was destiny that brought us together?"He squinted and, after a thoughtful moment, shook his head. "No. I'm pretty sure it was Cinder.
Marissa Meyer
Do you prefer Mitch? Or is Mitchell better?'.. .. Mitch, I say. Mitch is what my friends called me. 'Well, Mitch it is then,' Morrie says, as if closing a deal. 'And, Mitch?' Yes? 'I hope one day you will think of me as your friend.
Mitch Albom
Arianna, hold on! I’m coming!” I yell as I watch the life leave her eyes and she falls to the ground.“NO!” I scream as my eyes fly open.
Brittany DeLys
On and off the field, you're my hardest fall, Zoe. No one ever compared. No one ever will.
Ella Maise
I love the story of a thing. I love a thing for what it means a thousand times more than for what it's worth.
Elizabeth Wein
Joy, you are my everything. You are everything that matters to me. Tell me that you understand. Tell me that you feel this, too.
Dawn Metcalf
So often we focus on finding answers to life's mysteries...when in reality, a wiser approach is to start asking better questions, and more of them.
Dana Gore
Because we lack a divine Center our need for security has led us into an insane attachment to things. We really must understand that the lust for affluence in contemporary society is psychotic. It is psychotic because it has completely lost touch with reality. We crave things we neither need nor enjoy. 'We buy things we do not want to impress people we do not like'. Where planned obsolescence leaves off, psychological obsolescence takes over. We are made to feel ashamed to wear clothes or drive cars until they are worn out. The mass media have convinced us that to be out of step with fashion is to be out of step with reality. It is time we awaken to the fact that conformity to a sick society is to be sick. Until we see how unbalanced our culture has become at this point, we will not be able to deal with the mammon spirit within ourselves nor will we desire Christian simplicity.
Richard J. Foster
The only people capable of handling success are those who have learned to handle failures w/o taking their eyes off the prize.
Orrin Woodward
Sure, I told him to fuck himself and yes, I paid for it dearly (ruptured spleen). But after my recovery and given the time to reflect, I have a better understanding of who I am penning this for. Not just for the parole board. Not just for wronged Chinese people, not for racist whites, not for my prison therapy group, not for Manny or Jaynuss, not for Momma, not for my once-again estranged father, not even for Lene (though I hope and, in weaker moments, pray she will read this one day), but for others, like myself. Those who lack foresight. Those often overwhelmed by the present. Those ignorant of and indifferent to the past. Those whose worst qualities come to the surface when tested. Those who are fertile ground for dubious moral judgment. Those who feel, in some mysterious but common sense, unmoored.
Leland Cheuk
The secret of joy is to give love without seeking it.
Debasish Mridha
We were orphans before we were ever the sons of these songs.
The Gaslight Anthem
The only thing worse than training employees and losing them is to not train them and keep them.
Zig Ziglar
The drawings make you smile,” he replied with a grin. “Working on the speech doesn’t do anything.”That...that was so sweet, I wanted to hug him tight, kiss him, too. “Working on your speech will make me smile, too.”His brows lifted and then he flipped his notebook closed. “I know what else will make you smile.”“What? You actually doing some homework?”“Nope.” He glanced at the door again and then rose. “I think me sitting closer to you will make you smile.”The boy knew me well.He took a step closer. “I think holding your hand will make you smile.”I straightened as I watched him.“And I think...” He sat on the edge of the bed and twisted his body toward mine. “I think kissing you will make you smile, too.
Jennifer L. Armentrout
A person au fait with the millenarian edict of knowing oneself does not need a tattoo, pierced ear, or gaudy neck chains to declare who they are. Eccentricity for its own sake is simply a boring fashion statement and not a thoughtful statement of what comprises a wholesome self. A self-poised person does not need to own a luxury car to determine their degree of self-worth. Nor does a self-determined person need to idolize celebrities, hate other people whom they do not wish to exemplify, or live vicariously through other people’s admirable deeds. A person with unique and contented self-identify does not flip through fashion magazines or scan the headlines of gossip magazines when loitering in the supermarket checkout stand. A person who contemplates the meaningfulness of their existence is not fixated with posing in other people’s raiment or observing other people’s nakedness. A person who knows who they are and realizes how to accomplish all of their life goals does not dally by people watching or become distracted by envying other people.
Kilroy J. Oldster
You have that faraway look in your eyes that makes me want to pull you into my dreams, bring you to your knees worshiping me - desperately. You, the nectar and the muse of my poetry.
Melody Lee
You have two choices... You can make the BEST of IT or you can let IT get the BEST of you!
Tanya Masse
Expect nothing but be ready for everything.
Debasish Mridha
When you come out of the grips of a depression there is an incredible relief, but not one you feel allowed to celebrate. Instead, the feeling of victory is replaced with anxiety that it will happen again, and with shame and vulnerability when you see how your illness affected your family, your work, everything left untouched while you struggled to survive. We come back to life thinner, paler, weaker … but as survivors. Survivors who don’t get pats on the back from coworkers who congratulate them on making it. Survivors who wake to more work than before because their friends and family are exhausted from helping them fight a battle they may not even understand. I hope to one day see a sea of people all wearing silver ribbons as a sign that they understand the secret battle, and as a celebration of the victories made each day as we individually pull ourselves up out of our foxholes to see our scars heal, and to remember what the sun looks like.
Jenny Lawson
Every lawyer shall tell his or her client that becoming involved with the legal system is like three years of experimental chemotherapy, one hundred percent guaranteed not to work.
Lawrence Joseph
I'd ask [God] why he keeps trying to kill us all with disease, pestilence, and natural disasters. I'd ask why 99% of all species there ever were are now extinct -- if God works in mysterious ways, that way is mysteriously genocidal.
Neil deGrasse Tyson
I believe the discussion itself is divine.
Rob Bell
It should surprise no one that modern soldiers return home just as conflicted and detached as previous generations. The difference is that in the age of vapid American decadence, their simpler fundamental values are largely irrelevant to we civilians.
Tiffany Madison
Have you considered—between now and any future leg-shackling, that is—the possibility of spending some time not running things?” “Oh, I do,” she said earnestly. “Twice daily! I try very hard not to run things in my sleep, nor whilst cleaning my teeth. Far too difficult to bark orders with tooth powder in one’s mouth.
Erica Ridley
Suspense left my life a long time ago, now it has returned. I do not care for it.
Ben Marcus
Making friends is not a big deal. Replacing me with them after talking to them for only one bloody day is a big deal.
Erica Sehyun Song
Not knowing how to feed the spirit, we try to muffle its demands in distraction...What matters is that one be for a time inwardly attentive.
Anne Morrow Lindbergh
Champions have the courage to keep turning the pages because they know a better chapter lies ahead.
Paula White
Life lived in the absence of the psychedelic experience that primordial shamanism is based on is life trivialized, life denied, life enslaved to the ego.
Terence McKenna
I don't think relationships are just physicality. There are ways to show you care about someone, not just using your lips... Or any other body part.
Jenny Han
Denny gave me a strange look when I showed up in the band room, but I have always believed playing drums is no excuse not to look cute. Besides, if McDaniel shows up, I want to look my best. Oh, crap, I should be paying attention. “Did you hear anything I said?”I answer honestly, “No.”Denny runs a hand through his spiked hair and asks, “Do you really want to learn how to march?”“I have to learn to march if I want to be a part of the section, right?”“Right.”“Then, it doesn’t really matter if I want to do anything. It’s something I have to do.”Denny looks confused and partially like he’s completely regretting the decision to add me to his section, but proceeds to teach me drill for the better part of two hours. While we run through the steps, I look longingly over at my quints, which I have secretly decided to name Quincy.
Courtney Brandt
Work to become whole enough to love and to be loved.
Bryant McGill
I agree with Pierre Bayle and with Unamuno that when cold reason contemplates the world it finds not only an absence of God, but good reasons for supposing that there is no God at all. From this perspective, from what Unamuno called the 'tragic sense of life', from this despair, faith comes to the rescue, not only as something nonrational but in a sense irrational. For Unamuno the great symbol of a person of faith was his Spanish hero Don Quixote. Faith is indeed quixotic. It is absurd. Let us admit it. Let us concede to everything! To a rational mind the world looks like a world without God. It looks like a world with no hope for another life. To think otherwise, to believe in spite of appearances, is surely a kind of madness. The atheist sees clearly that windmills are in fact only windmills, that Dulcinea is just a poor country bumpkin with a homely face and an unpleasant smell. The atheist is a Sarah, justifiably laughing in her old age at Abraham's belief that God will give them a son.What can be said in reply? How can a fideist admit that faith is a kind of madness, a dream fed by passionate desire, and yet maintain that one is not mad to make the leap?
Martin Gardner
Wherever you are, be loving, caring, kind, and above all, be happy.
Debasish Mridha