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9a89164 I wish I wasn't an imperial highness or an ex-grand duchess. I'm sick of people doing things to me because of what I am. Girl-in-white-dress. Short-one-with-fringe. Daughter-of-the-tsar. Child-of-the-ex-tyrant. I want people to look and see me, Anastasia Nikolaevna Romanova, not the caboose on a train of grand duchesses. Someday, I promise myself, no one will be able to hear my name or look at my picture and suppose they know all about me. Someday I will do something bigger than what I am. life inspirational otma romanovs tsar-nicholas russian-revolution royalty self russia Sarah Miller
33dfcc2 You get towards the end of life--no, not life itself, but of something else: the end of any likelihood of change in that life. You are allowed a long moment of pause, time enough to ask the question: what else have I done wrong? life-lessons life Julian Barnes
bd862aa You know, some things don't matter that much...Like the color of a house. How big is that in the overall scheme of life? But lifting a person's heart - now, matters. life Sue Monk Kidd
0af1e26 I alternate between thinking of the planet as home - dear and familiar stone hearth and garden - and as a hard land of exile in which we are all sojourners. life sojourn Annie Dillard
01593f0 However hard he tried, he could never manage to make himself visible to human eyes and not because he can't, since for him nothing is impossible, it's simply that he wouldn't know what face to wear when introducing himself to the beings he supposedly created and who probably wouldn't recognize him anyway. There are those who say we're very fortunate that god chooses not to appear before us, because compared with the shock we would get were such a thing to happen, our fear of death would be mere child's play. Besides, all the many things that have been said about god and about death are nothing but stories, and this is just another one. death god life José Saramago
704866c I'm about to fuck up, he thought clearly, and his next thought was, but I don't have to. This was followed closely by a third thought, the last of this familiar sequence, which was, but I'm going to anyway. life Richard Russo
325469b "Supposing there is no life everlasting. Think what it means if death is really the end of all things. They've given up all for nothing. They've been cheated. They're dupes." Waddington reflected for a little while. "I wonder if it matters what they have aimed at is illusion. Their lives are in themselves beautiful. I have an idea that the only thing which makes it possible to regard this world we live in without disgust is the beauty which now and then men create out of the chaos. The pictures they paint, the music they compose, the books the write, and the lives they lead. Of all these the richest beauty is the beautiful life. That is the perfect work of art." religion life philosophy W Somerset Maugham
babb363 You must understand that love never keeps a man from pursuing his destiny. If he abandons that pursuit, it's because it wasn't true love. fate life love Paulo Coelho
14f8cf3 But with your life you make a few bad decisions, get unlucky a few times, whatever, but you have to keep going, right? moving-on letting-go goodness inspiration life love Cecelia Ahern
2548849 What happens to you, Uhtred, is what you make happen. You will grow, you will learn the sword, you will learn the way of the shield wall, you will learn the oar, you will give honor to the gods, and then you will use what you have learned to make your life good or bad. life vikings Bernard Cornwell
4fd89a0 How do you manage it, she said, at your age? I told her I'd been saving up for her all my life. relationship life love krapp play Samuel Beckett
db171e7 But I saw the pain and sadness in everything, and swirled it round my mouth like a fine wine. pain sorrow life Emma Forrest
3e7afdb I lay down across her with my face in her breasts and my hand on her. We lay there without moving. But under us all moved, and moved us, gently, up and down, and from side to side. (Pause. Krapp's lips move. No sound.) Past midnight. Never knew such silence. The earth might be uninhabited. silence life love relatipnship krapp movement play Samuel Beckett
1b6acf6 It seems to me that one ought to rejoice in the fact of death-- ought to decide, indeed, to earn one's death by confronting with passion the conundrum of life. One is responsible to life: It is the small beacon in that terrifying darkness from which we come and to which we shall return. One must negotiate this passage as nobly as possible, for the sake of those who are coming after us. life philosophy James Baldwin
a8a9d1f A tough life needs a tough language--and that is what poetry is. That is what literature offers--a language powerful enough to say how it is. words literature reading poetry life language Jeanette Winterson
d85dcbb Cicero smiled at us. 'The art of life is to deal with problems as they arise, rather than destory one's spirit by worrying about them too far in advance. Especially tonight. life rome Robert Harris
07a55ed The hardest thing is being with other people - it's like they're on a different wavelenght, but only you know it. They talk about their lives and what's wrong with them, and you kind of, like, just let them go. It's a whole different language, and you've got to remember that you can only respond in their mother tongue. It's really hard to relate. relationship life-and-living life-lessons life J.R. Ward
3ef40ea because it seemed too simple to accept that life was an act of faith. life Paulo Coelho
7fb8eda You're a beautiful boy, Clay, but that's about it. life transgressive bret-easton-ellis Bret Easton Ellis
f08159b I needed something--the distraction of another life--to alleviate fear. fear life distraction Bret Easton Ellis
ceee9a1 Don't simply knock and wait for the door to be opened. Go look for the keys. Some fit the lock better than others. life Christopher Pike
42c4edf To be strong, and beautiful, and go round making music all the time. Yes, she could do that, and with a very earnest prayer Polly asked for the strength of an upright soul, the beauty of a tender heart, the power to make her life a sweet and stirring song, helpful while it lasted, remembered when it died. life strength-of-spirit loving Louisa May Alcott
899af43 Of my conception I know only what you know of yours. It occurred in darkness and I was unconsenting... By some bleak alchemy what had been mere unbeing becomes death when life is mingled with it. death life conception Marilynne Robinson
133d987 ...we're told by TV and Reader's Digest that a crisis will trigger massive personal change--and that those big changes will make the pain worthwhile. But from what he could see, big change almost never happens. People simply feel lost. They have no idea what to say or do or feel or think. they become messes and tend to remain messes. life philosophy crisis Douglas Coupland
34806a1 We are told to remember the idea and not the man. Because a man can fail. He can be caught, he can be killed and forgotten. But 400 years later, an idea can still change the world. I have witnessed firsthand the power of ideas. I've seen people kill in the name of them. But you cannot kiss an idea... cannot touch it or hold it. Ideas do not bleed. They do not feel pain. They do not love. And it is not an idea that I miss. It is a man. A man that made me remember the 5th of November. A man that I will never forget. life v-for-vendetta ideas Alan Moore
46947a2 Adult helplessness destroys children. Or it forces them to become tiny adults of their own. life growing-up Neil Gaiman
3629606 We are more severe judges of our own acts... We judge our thoughts, our intents, our secret curses, our secret hates, not only our acts. thoughts life truth self reflection acts severe judgement Anaïs Nin
94aaab6 A person's looking for a simple truth to live by, there it is. CHOICE. To refuse to passively accept what we've been handed by nature or society, but to choose for ourselves. CHOICE. That's the difference between emptiness and substance, between a life actually lived and a wimpy shadow cast on an office wall. free-will life still-life-with-woodpecker tom-robbins Tom Robbins
95dc0fb Bones are patient. Bones never tire nor do they run away. When you come upon a man who has been dead many years, his bones will still be lying there, in place, content, patiently waiting, but his flesh will have gotten up and left him. Water is like flesh. Water will not stand still. It is always off to somewhere else; restless, talkative, and curious. Even water in a covered jar will disappear in time. Flesh is water. Stones are like bones. Satisfied. Patient. Dependable. Tell me, then, Alobar, in order to achieve immortality, should you emulate water or stone? Should you trust your flesh or your bones? immortality death life transitory stones permanence Tom Robbins
cd719ad It was said that life was cheap in Ankh-Morpork. This was of course, completely wrong. Life was often very expensive; you could get death for free. humour life Terry Pratchett
a1b00b5 Life seems to be a process of replacing one anxiety with another and substituting one desire for another--which is not to say that we should never strive to overcome any of our anxieties or fulfil any of our desires, but rather to suggest that we should perhaps build into our strivings an awareness of the way our goals promise us a respite and a resolution that they cannot, by definition, deliver. hopes life respite goals desire Alain de Botton
57d41af The world follows its own course. Each possesses his own thoughts, each treads his own path. So it is with your mother, and so it is with your starling. As it is with everyone. The world follows its own course. thoughts life Haruki Murakami
438a9d2 You go into the office and take a book or two from the shelves. You read a few lines, like your life depended on reading 'em right. But you know your life doesn't depend on anything that makes sense, and you wonder where in the hell you got the idea it did; and you begin to get sore. rage life Jim Thompson
14535d2 Now go and make interesting mistakes, make amazing mistakes, make glorious and fantastic mistakes. Break rules. Leave the world more interesting for your being here. life mistakes Neil Gaiman
aac4362 Every man is the author of his own life. life Paul Auster
4547f7e No child is born a delinquent. They only became that way if nobody loved them when they were kids. Unloved children grow up to be serial murderers or alcoholics. life love parenting Jeannette Walls
19888d8 The world didn't give a shit. It didn't bestow. It took life Dennis Lehane
65535f8 Grab it while you can because tomorrow could suck you dry. life lifestyle Nora Roberts
e17fd53 "There is a stillness between us, a period of restlessness that ties my stomach sex shakespeare magic rain poems romance sacrifice death dreams music songs life carrack cityisle cityspire desolate fedora haunts horace-walpole mannequins phillip-k-dick puddles specters spectre amnesia androids haunting greek-mythology waking damnation count emily-dickinson magick tempest apocalypse reflections storms masquerade empty science-fiction gothic jazz ships ghosts water piano Nathan Reese Maher
99cf71a "I shot you, all right," he said, "and you lost something, but you gained something as well. You just don't know it yet. I gained something, too." What?" I got to keep my promise. I didn't leave you behind." life Mitch Albom
c286f3c If you are embarrassed about your sex, it must mean that you feel there is something demeaning or disgusting about being female. You are all wondrously made, girls. Remember that: wondrously made, and you should carry your sex proudly, a badge of honor. sisterhood life womanhood pride sexuality Phyllis Reynolds Naylor
76239f2 The only limitation is that which one sets up in one's own mind. mind success life limitation Napoleon Hill
ed03e40 One day, she'd find a way to live her life to the fullest. She was sure of it. She just had no idea how she would manage it. live life on-the-edge ilona-andrews she girl lost Ilona Andrews
8fd7cc6 They luxuriated in the feeling of deep and all pervading satisfaction, a feeling of knowing absolutely that all was well with the world...Not only were all things possible, but all things were theirs. perfection psychological feelings satisfaction life-lessons life love Hubert Selby Jr.
d9d5414 "He likes driving very fast on the wrong side of the road," said Sarah. "Which I can completely understand." life fast nonconformity Hilary McKay
1763f75 Wake up! If you knew for certain that you had a terminal illness - if you had precious little time left to make use of your life and consider who you are, you'd not waste time on self-indulgence or fear, lethargy or ambition. Be happy now, without reason - or you never will be at all. life Dan Millman
72fb4c5 My point is: in this whole wide world the only person you can depend on is you. life japanese Haruki Murakami
404140f I go out on the porch and gaze up at the stars twinkling above, the random scattering of millions of stars. Even in a planetarium you wouldn't find as many. Some of them really look big and distinct, like if you reached your hand out intently you could touch them. The whole thing is breathtaking. Not just beautiful though--the stars like the trees in the forest, alive and breathing. And they're watching me. What I've done up till now, what I'm going to do--they know it all. Nothing gets past their watchful eyes. As I sit there under the shining night sky, again a violent fear takes hold of me. My heart's pounding a mile a minute, and I can barely breathe. All these millions of stars looking down on me, and I've never given them more than a passing thought before. Bot just stars--how many other things haven't I noticed in the world, things I know nothing about? I suddenly feel helpless, completely powerless. And I know I'll never outrun that awful feeling. (135) life Haruki Murakami
309d56c "Forget your voice, sing! Forget your feet, dance! lover present dance live spirituality music song spiritual life love inspirational sing awareness-quotes be become let-go conscious consciousness-quotes consciousness feet enjoy yourself khayyam harmony letting-go-quotes living-in-the-now moment saadi kamand kamand-kojouri kojouri sufi rumi hafiz hafez awareness surrender forget voice beloved Kamand Kojouri
3e15f8f Form follows emotion life inspirational Walter Isaacson
9d49af8 The greatest cause in the world is joyfully rescuing people from hell, meeting their earthly needs, making them glad in God, and doing it with a kind, serious pleasure that makes Christ look like the Treasure he is. kindness christianity treasure god life purpose christ John Piper
89c14b6 The Christian life is not about pleasing God the finger-shaker and judge. It is not about believing now or being good now for the sake of heaven later. It is about entering a relationship in the present that begins to change everything now. Spirituality is about this process: the opening of the heart to the God who is already here. relationship spirituality god life Marcus J. Borg
dfc57ac I feel very strongly about putting questions; it partakes too much of the style of the day of judgement. You start a question, and it's like starting a stone. You sit quietly on the top of a hill; and away the stone goes, starting others; and presently some bland old bird (the last you would have thought of) is knocked on the head in his own back garden, and the family have to change their name. No, sir, I make it a rule of mine: the more it looks like Queer Street, the less I ask. life inspirational Robert Louis Stevenson
bffff0f It was the ghost of rationality itself ... This is the ghost of normal everyday assumptions which declares that the ultimate purpose of life, which is to keep alive, is impossible, but that this is the ultimate purpose of life anyway, so that great minds struggle to cure diseases so that people may live longer, but only madmen ask why. One lives longer in order that he may live longer. There is no other purpose. That is what the ghost says. life great-minds purpose-of-life rationality madmen Robert M. Pirsig
b2064be That we're going to die is something we know from the moment we are born, That's why, in some ways, it's as if we were born dead. death life José Saramago
5b6b6e6 Some people have a thick skin and you don't. Your heart is really open and that is going to cause pain, but that is an appropriate response to this world. pain life Anne Lamott
dedbb75 How do we know that our life really happened and that we are not simply accumulating details, making it all up as we go along? life supernatural Rachel Klein
d5dbab0 If you're in your life, chance. Viewed from the outside, like a book you're reading, it's fate all the way. fate life David Mitchell
7e6b675 There's a power struggle going on across Europe these days. A few cities are competing against each other to see who shall emerge as the great 21st century European metropolis. Will it be London? Paris? Berlin? Zurich? Maybe Brussels, center of the young union? They all strive to outdo one another culturally, architecturally, politically, fiscally. But Rome, it should be said, has not bothered to join the race for status. Rome doesn't compete. Rome just watches all the fussing and striving, completely unfazed. I am inspired by the regal self-assurance of this city, so grounded and rounded, so amused and monumental, knowing she is held securely in the palm of history. I would like to be like Rome when I am an old lady. life old rome Elizabeth Gilbert
c12d7f6 We are only lightly covered with buttoned cloth; and beneath these pavements are shells, bones and silence. silence death life thought Virginia Woolf
d03ed55 There is no complete life. There are only fragments. We are born to have nothing, to have it pour through our hands. life transience James Salter
295a5ea Congress shall make no law abridging the freedom of production and trade... sex wealth slavery freedom reason life love philosophy causality individual-rights objective-law volition pursuit-of-happiness commerce jobs usa economy rock-and-roll crisis economics law regulation force liberty society political-philosophy constitution government atheism capitalism tyranny trade drugs Ayn Rand
8ff908e If we lived for ever, what you say would be true. But we have to die, we have to leave life presently. Injustice and greed would be the real thing if we lived for ever. As it is, we must hold to other things, because Death is coming. I love death - not morbidly, but because He explains. He shows me the emptiness of Money. Death and Money are the eternal foes. Not Death and Life. . . . Death destroys a man: the idea of Death saves him. Behind the coffins and the skeletons that stay the vulgar mind lies something so immense that all that is great in us responds to it. Men of the world may recoil from the charnel-house that they will one day enter, but Love knows better. Death is his foe, but his peer, and in their age-long struggle the thews of Love have been strengthened, and his vision cleared, until there is no one who can stand against him. life love E.M. Forster
24486c4 I am a student of life, and don't want to miss any experience. There's poetry in this sort of thing, you know--or perhaps you don't know, but it's all the same. poetry life knowledge H.P. Lovecraft
25ee4a9 If it is true that we need a degree of certainty to get by, it is also true that too much of the stuff can be lethal. life dogmatism Terry Eagleton
2228fc2 "I wish I worried about my uncle's opinions, and had problems to work out with my mom. Hell, I'd settle for knowing what her voice sounded like." I put a hand on her shoulder. "Trite but true--you don't know what you have until it's gone. People change. The world changes. And sooner or later you lose people you care about. If you don't mind some advice from someone who doesn't know much about families, I can tell you this: Don't take yours for granted. It might feel like all of them will always be there. But they won't." life karrin-murphy harry-dresden Jim Butcher
5a5e240 "It was one lesson he never forgot.You don't sit back when you or a loved one is being assaulted.And you don't act like the goverment with their "proportional responses" and all that nonsense.If someone hurts you,mercy and pity must be put aside,You eliminate the enemy.You scorch the earth." revenge care life love Harlan Coben
0802171 Theologians talk about a prevenient grace that precedes grace itself and allows us to accept it. I think there must also be a prevenient courage that allows us to be brave - that is, to acknowledge that there is more beauty than our eyes can bear, that precious things have been put into our hands and to do nothing to honor them is to do great harm. And therefore, this courage allows us, as the old men said, to make ourselves useful. It allows us to be generous, which is another way of saying exactly the same thing. courage kindness life love generous brave stewardship giving grace Marilynne Robinson
abe350f Dreams should make you think, 'If I had the guts to do it and I didn't care what anybody thought, this I what I'd really do'. time dreams life do lesson Cecelia Ahern
4e2dc56 If you can't get to be uncommon through going straight, you'll never get to do it through going crooked. [...] live well and die happy. life straight Charles Dickens
388dcb3 As time went on, we learned to arm ourselves in our different ways. Some of us with real guns, some of us with more ephemeral weapons, an idea or improbable plan or some sort of formulation about how best to move through the world. An idea that will let us be. Protect us and keep us safe. But a weapon nonetheless. world life plans guns ideas weapons safety protection Colson Whitehead
9c44b89 "Life doesn't come with any guarantees. You have to risk it to get the biscuit." - The Alchemist, Paulo Cohelo -" life-quotes life risk-it the-alchemist risks Paulo Coelho
1e7c2c0 You got one choice at the beginning but if you didn't choose right, things got narrow real quick. life mistakes Ron Rash
a6c1a3f What made losing someone you loved bearable was not remembering but forgetting. Forgetting small things first... it's amazing how much you could forget, and everything you forgot made that person less alive inside you until you could finally endure it. After more time passed you could let yourself remember, even want to remember. But even then what you felt those first days could return and remind you the grief was still there, like old barbed wire embedded in a tree's heartwood. pain loss sadness life love Ron Rash
b3af195 I could not but wonder at the queen's unprecedented civility, until I realized with a flush of shame that it was my own improved behavior that motivated hers. So it is that we in life determine our own treatment. life-lessons life realizations Catherine Gilbert Murdock
ffbf722 I take thee at thy word: Call me but love, and I'll be new baptized; Henceforth I never will be Romeo. theatre shakespeare names poetry inspiration identity life love inspirational new-life birth resurrection theater name William Shakespeare
9dcd321 Let every man be master of his time. time self-determination life William Shakespeare
f0b58b6 I'll have that someday, thought Peter. Someone who'll kiss me good-bye at the door. Or maybe just someone to put a blindfold over my head before they shoot me. Depending on how things turn out. death humor life funny-but-sad goals Orson Scott Card
dfc0524 And in fact the only way I can deal with this eerie situation at all is to make a conscious decision that I have already lived and finished the life I planned to live - and everything from now on will be A New Life, a different thing, a gig that ends tonight and starts tomorrow morning. life endings Hunter S. Thompson
32e5aec She regretted nothing she had shared with her lover, nor was she ashamed of the fires that had changed her life; just the opposite, she felt that they had tempered her, made her strong, given her pride in making decisions and paying the consequences for them. life inspirational strong pride Isabel Allende
1f94e51 Some people go through the heavy stuff. They fight in wars. They're in jail. They start a business and it gets shut down by gangsters. They end up hustling their ass in a foreign country. It's one long list of setbacks and humiliations. But it doesn't touch them, not really. They're having an adventure. It's like: What's next? And then there's other people who are just trying to live quietly, they stay out of trouble, they're maybe ten years old, or fourteen, and one Friday morning at 9:35 something happens to them, something private, something that breaks their heart. Forever. life Michel Faber
25a7024 This is what it means to live on. When granted hope, a person uses it as fuel, as a guidepost to life. It is impossible to live without hope. life Haruki Murakami
87ef0c7 It's creepy, but here we are, the Pilgrims, the crackpots of our time, trying to establish our own alternate reality. To build a world out of rocks and chaos. What it's going to be, I don't know. Even after all that rushing around, where we've ended up is the middle of nowhere in the middle of the night. And maybe knowing isn't the point. Where we're standing right now, in the ruins in the dark, what we build could be anything. living life construction importance-of-existence Chuck Palahniuk
4a546b4 Sometime, somewhere, life always comes to a fight, and peace always comes to an end. war life caine morganville morganville-vampires fighting peace vampires Rachel Caine
ea641be Of the twelve companions of Thorin, ten remained. Fili and Kili had fallen defending him with shield and body, for he was their mother's elder brother. heroic death life J.R.R. Tolkien
727becb Now every mortal has pain and sweat is constant, but if there is anything dearer than being alive, it's dark to me. We humans seem disastrously in love with this thing (whatever it is) that glitters on the earth-- we call it life. We know no other. The underworld's a blank and all the rest just fantasy. mortality living life Anne Carson
102c1fd You have to find what's good and true and beautiful in your life as it is now. Looking back makes you competitive. And, age is not a competitive issue. competitive-issue true good life beautiful Mitch Albom
0614973 After his experience with Minos, Nico realized that most spectres held only as much power as you allowed them to have. They pried into your mind, using fear or anger or longing to influence you. Nico had learned to shield himself. Sometimes he could even turn the tables and bend ghosts to his will. past life wisdom lesson Rick Riordan
6c71d67 They say that in the second before our death, each of us understands the real reason for our existence, and out of that moment, heaven or hell is born. heaven life hell Paulo Coelho
d48c653 When the last autumn of Dickens's life was over, he continued to work through his final winter and into spring. This is how all of us writers give away the days and years and decades of our lives in exchange for stacks of paper with scratches and squiggles on them. And when Death calls, how many of us would trade all those pages, all that squandered lifetime-worth of painfully achieved scratches and squiggles, for just one more day, one more fully lived and experienced day? And what price would we writers pay for that one extra day spent with those we ignored while we were locked away scratching and squiggling in our arrogant years of solipsistic isolation? Would we trade all those pages for a single hour? Or all of our books for one real minute? time writing death life charles-dickens regret writers old-age Dan Simmons
44c93c3 My whole life I though I was the star of an overly earnest romance movie, and it turns out I was in a goddamned buddy comedy all along. romance life comedy romance-movie star film movie movies John Green
f8e0026 a heck of a lot of things are bound to go wrong in a world as big as this one. And if there's an answer to why it's that way - and there ain't always - why, it's probably not just one answer by itself, but thousands of answers. life problems Jim Thompson
4e3e5a7 "You and I, we must carry on, Gemma. I cannot afford the luxury of love. I must marry well. And now I must look after you. It is my duty." "If you wish to suffer, you do so of your own free will, not on my behalf. Or Father's or Grandmama's or anyone's. You are a fine physician, Thomas. Why is that not enough?" "Because it isn't," he says with a rare candor. "Only this and the hope of nothing more? A quiet respectability with no true greatness or heroism in it, with only my reputation to recommend me. So you see, Gemma, you are not the only one who cannot rule her own life." responsibility life love thomas-doyle gemma-doyle yearn control Libba Bray
cb63f43 "October O love, turn from the changing sea and gaze, Down these grey slopes, upon the year grown old, A-dying 'mid the autumn-scented haze That hangeth o'er the hollow in the wold, Where the wind-bitten ancient elms infold Grey church, long barn, orchard, and red-roofed stead, Wrought in dead days for men a long while dead. Come down, O love; may not our hands still meet, Since still we live today, forgetting June, Forgetting May, deeming October sweet? - - Oh, hearken! hearken! through the afternoon The grey tower sings a strange old tinkling tune! Sweet, sweet, and sad, the toiling year's last breath, To satiate of life, to strive with death. And we too -will it not be soft and kind, That rest from life, from patience, and from pain, That rest from bliss we know not when we find, That rest from love which ne'er the end can gain? - Hark! how the tune swells, that erewhile did wane! life love october bliss William Morris
cf2b3fb Life is not a plot; it's in the details. life plot Jodi Picoult
a8a3632 He wishes he had never entered the funhouse. But he has. Then he wishes he were dead. But he's not. Therefore he will construct funhouses for others and be their secret operator -- though he would rather be among the lovers for whom funhouses are designed. life love John Barth
f9b43b4 I have no place in my life for someone who is sure he can do everything. life Mercedes Lackey
8fc1e68 So this was it. You take a wrong step and you end up wearing yesterday's underwear, sitting on the carpet trying to teach yourself how to knit. And even that doesn't work. She never expected it to be so hard. Life. life knitting twenty-something Kate Jacobs
41f82cd Beauty is one of the great facts of the world, like sunlight,or springtime, or the reflection in dark waters of that silver shell we call the moon. You have only a few years in which to live really, perfectly, and fully. When your youth goes, your beauty will go with it, and then you will suddenly discover that there are no triumphs left for you...Time is jealous of you, and wars against your lilies and your roses. You will become sallow, and hollow-cheeked, and dull-eyed...Ah! realise your youth while you have it. Don't squander the gold of your days, listening to the tedious, trying to improve the hopeless, or giving away your life to the ignorant, the common, and the vulgar...Live! Live the wonderful life that is in you! Let nothing be lost upon you. Be always searching for new sensations. Be afraid of nothing...The world belongs to you for a season...how tragic it would be if you were wasted. For there is such a little time that your youth will last. The common hillflowers wither, but they blossom again. The laburnum will be as yellow next June as it is now. In a month there will be purple stars on the clematis, and year after year the green night of its leaves will hold its purple stars. But we never get back our youth. The pulse of joy that beats in us at twenty, becomes sluggish. Our limbs fail, our senses rot. We degenerate into hideous puppets, haunted by the memory of the passions of which we were too much afraid, and the exquisite temptations that we had not the courage to yield to...Youth! Youth! There is absolutely nothing in the world but youth. world youth life temptations Oscar Wilde
4739929 Hot weather opens the skull of a city, exposing its white brain, and its heart of nerves, which sizzle like the wires inside a lightbulb. And there exudes a sour extra-human smell that makes the very stone seem flesh-alive, webbed and pulsing. human life description summer city Truman Capote
08db566 In the recurring dream everything has already fallen down, and I'm underneath. I'm crawling, sometimes for days, under the rubble. And as I crawl I realize that this one was the Big One. It was the earthquake that shook the whole world, and every single thing was destroyed. But this isn't the scary part. That part always comes right before I wake up. I am crawling and then suddenly I remember: the earthquake happened years ago. This pain, this dying, this is just normal. This is how life is. In fact, I realize, there never was an earthquake. Life is just this way, broken, and I am crazy for dreaming something else. life Miranda July
dbf756d For she had a great variety of selves to call upon, far more than we have been able to find room for, since a biography is considered complete if it merely accounts for six or seven selves, whereas a person may have many thousand...and these selves of which we are built up, one on top of the other, as plates are piled on a waiter's hand, have attachments elsewhere, sympathies, little constitutions and rights of their own... so that one will only come if it is raining, another in a room with green curtains, another when Mrs. Jones is not there... and some are too wildly ridiculous to be mentioned in print at all. life Virginia Woolf
9bc686b The bad part is life continues. The good part is that the pain goes away. pain life Mary Balogh
3761e05 "War as a moral metaphor is limited, limiting, and dangerous. By reducing the choices of action to "a war against" whatever-it-is, you divide the world into Me or Us (good) and Them or It (bad) and reduce the ethical complexity and moral richness of our life to Yes/No, On/Off." good-and-evil war life ethics morals Ursula K. Le Guin
d8e0692 YOU'RE ONLY PUTTING OFF THE INEVITABLE, he said. That's what being alive is all about. humor life Terry Pratchett
4af622b No one can tell you what your life is goin to be, can they? No. It's never like what you expected. Quijada nodded. If people knew the story of their lives how many would then elect to live them? life Cormac McCarthy
80bb434 I dont believe in God. Can you understand that? Look around you man. Cant you see? The clamour and din of those in torment has to be the sound most pleasing to his ear. And I loathe these discussions. The argument of the village atheist whose single passion is to revile endlessly that which he denies the existence of in the first place. Your fellowship is a fellowship of pain and nothing more. And if that pain were actually collective instead of simply reiterative then the sheer weight of it would drag the world from the walls of the universe and send it crashing and burning through whatever night it might yet be capable of engendering until it was not even ash. And justice? Brotherhood? Eternal life? Good god, man. Show me a religion that prepares one for death. For nothingness. There's a church I might enter. Yours prepares one only for more life. For dreams and illusions and lies. If you could banish the fear of death from men's hearts they wouldnt live a day. Who would want this nightmare if not for fear of the next? The shadow of the axe hangs over every joy. Every road ends in death. Or worse. Every friendship. Every love. Torment, betrayal, loss, suffering, pain, age, indignity, and hideous lingering illness. All with a single conclusion. For you and for every one and every thing that you have chosen to care for. There's the true brotherhood. The true fellowship. And everyone is a member for life. You tell me that my brother is my salvation? My salvation? Well then damn him. Damn him in every shape and form and guise. Do I see myself in him? Yes, I do. And what I see sickens me. Do you understand me? Can you understand me? suicide religion life salvation Cormac McCarthy
e657a8a This was a factory, a sorting house. We were no different from dogs and pigs and cows: all of us were allowed to play when we were small, but then, just before reaching maturity, we were sorted and classified. Being a high school student was the first step toward becoming a domestic animal. work education life growing-up high-school childhood Ryū Murakami
d758faf "Here's a nice image for a life in balance," she said. "You're juggling these four balls that you've named work, family, friends, spirit. Now, work is a rubber ball. If you drop it, it bounces back. The other balls they're made of glass." "I've dropped a few of those glass balls in my day. Sometimes they chip, sometimes they shatter to pieces." -- life James Patterson
443d4c0 Life is now in session. Are you present? inspiration life John C. Maxwell
1077fa7 Every one of us is losing something precious to us. Lost opportunities, lost possibilities, feelings we can never get back again. That's what part of it means to be alive. But inside our heads -- at least that's where I imagine it -- there's a little room where we store those memories. A room like the stacks in this library. And to understand the workings of our own heart we have to keep on making new reference cards. We have to dust things off every once in a while, let fresh air in, change the water in the flower vases. In other words, you'll live for ever in your own private library. library loss life little-room lost-opportunity Haruki Murakami
5c3dc2c Sweet life continues in the breeze, in the golden fields. life field-station breeze jack-kerouac Jack Kerouac
6ca1641 They haven't left us much to believe in, have they?--even disbelief. I can't believe in anything bigger than a home or vaguer than a human being. life Graham Greene
145c4f2 The so-called 'psychotically depressed' person who tries to kill herself doesn't do so out of quote 'hopelessness' or any abstract conviction that life's assets and debits do not square. And surely not because death seems suddenly appealing. The person in whom Its invisible agony reaches a certain unendurable level will kill herself the same way a trapped person will eventually jump from the window of a burning high-rise. Make no mistake about people who leap from burning windows. Their terror of falling from a great height is still just as great as it would be for you or me standing speculatively at the same window just checking out the view; i.e. the fear of falling remains a constant. The variable here is the other terror, the fire's flames: when the flames get close enough, falling to death becomes the slightly less terrible of two terrors. It's not desiring the fall; it's terror of the flames. And yet nobody down on the sidewalk, looking up and yelling 'Don't!' and 'Hang on!', can understand the jump. Not really. You'd have to have personally been trapped and felt flames to really understand a terror way beyond falling. suicide life life-and-death David Foster Wallace
b23d0b7 "I know," said Peter. "Perhaps better than anyone. But you can't stay a child forever. To choose to speak into Echo's Well is to choose illusion. To choose to avoid the responsibilities of being an adult. The real trick--the real choice--is to keep the best of the child you were, without forgetting when you grow up. "It is the best of both worlds, Jack. Being a child is to believe in magic everywhere... "...but even Peter Pan had to grow up one day." life inspirational peter-pan jack childhood James A. Owen
0c3ac01 "The way we are living, poetry living life choices Seamus Heaney
ef6aee9 By betrayal, I mean promising to be on your side, then being on somebody else's. life Jeanette Winterson
1130fbf I wish i could tell you that through the tragedy i mined some undiscovered, life-altering absolute that i could pass on to you.I didn't.The cliches apply-people are what count,life is precious,materialism is over rated, and the little things matter,live in the moment-and i can repeat them to you ad nauseam.you might listen, but you won't internalize.Tragedy hammers it hm.Tragedy etches into your soul.You might not be happier.But you will be better. tragedy life truth Harlan Coben
58409ec there is no ascent to the heights without prior descent into darkness, no new life without some form of death. life Karen Armstrong
0ca2c50 Life's only choosing when to die. Life's a big postponement because the choice is so difficult. It's a tremendous relief not to have to choose. life interesting-quotes Anthony Burgess
51ceec6 Being unheard is the ground floor of giving up, and giving up is the ground floor of doing yourself in. It's not so much, what's the point? It's more like, what's the difference? ground-floor suicide loss death life give-up unheard giving-up difference purpose point Mitch Albom
0c37dac Each human being is unique, each with their own qualities, instincts, forms of pleasure, and desire for adventure. However, society always imposes on us a collective ways of behaving, and people never stop to wonder why they should behave like that. They just accept it, the way typists accepted the fact that the QWERTY keyboard was the best possible one. Have you ever met anyone is your entire life who asked why the hands of a clock should go in one particular direction and not the other? life common-sense society Paulo Coelho
86e7550 "Keep your words. This pain is no life." "You only feel pain because you're alive, boy!" the keeper thundered. "This is the mystery of it. Life is lived on the ragged edge of the cliff. Fall off and you might die, but run from it and you are already dead!" living life tosca-lee ted-dekker forbidden mortal Ted Dekker
6929cbf Remember the botched brothel-visit in L'Education sentimentale and remember its lesson. Do not participate: happiness lies in the imagination, not the act. Pleasure is found first in anticipation, later in memory. happiness life memory pleasure Julian Barnes
b6b6ce4 I was starting to see that what looks like garbage from one angle might be art from another. Maybe it did take a crisis to get to know yourself; maybe you needed to get whacked hard by life before you understood what you wanted out of it. understanding life truth garbage crisis yourself Jodi Picoult
aab9f40 [I] don't think I was trying to kill myself. I just wanted to hurt, and understand exactly whay I was hurting. This made sense: you cut, you felt pain, period. humor life Jodi Picoult
ffc7d6c I think God is something that people use to avoid reality. I think faith allows people to reject what is right in front of our eyes, which is that thing, this life, this existence, this consciousness, or whatever word you want to use for it, is all we have, and all we'll ever have. I think people have faith because they want and need to believe in something, whatever that something is, because life can be hard and depressing and brutal if you don't. life James Frey
9e709eb Humankind has not learned about balance, let alone practiced it. It is guided by greed and ambition, steered by fear. In this way it will eventually destroy itself. But nature will survive; at least the plants will. nature people greed fear life journy ambition humankind emotions Brian L. Weiss
3a64ba5 "I can't promise I'll never kill anyone again," he once said, strapping a refrigerator to his back. "It's unrealistic to live your life within such strict parameters" life David Sedaris
06a6649 The previously unloved may find it hard to believe that they are now loved; that is such a miracle, they feel; such a miracle. life love miracles Alexander McCall Smith
21e682d And to those who believe that adventures are i say try routine: it kills you far more quickly. life inspirational routine Paulo Coelho
efa0af0 He found that it was easy to make a heroic gesture, but hard to abide by its results. heroism life hard W. Somerset Maugham
4ae2523 Deception is mostly a game we play with ourselves. lies life truth Terry Brooks
05ced26 But Philip was impatient with himself; he called to mind his idea of the pattern of life: the unhappiness he had suffered was no more than part of a decoration which was elaborate and beautiful; he told himself strenuously that he must accept with gaiety everything, dreariness and excitement, pleasure and pain, because it added to the richness of the design. unhappiness pain suffering life W. Somerset Maugham
a06d47c Do not grieve so much for a husband lost that it wastes away your life. loss life love grieve Euripides
60f29a3 Charitably... I think... sometimes, perhaps, one must change or die. And, in the end, there were, perhaps, limits to how much he could let himself change. death life Neil Gaiman
5e1d65e Each day is a little life: every waking and rising a little birth, every fresh morning a little youth, every going to rest and sleep a little death. life philosophy wisdom Arthur Schopenhauer
80d133f Accept the seasons of your heart, even as you have always accepted the seasons that pass over your fields. And you would watch with serenity through the winters of your grief. seasons grief sorrow joy life acceptance serenity Kahlil Gibran
0ced91e "It isn't the bloody weather!" I've shocked them into silence. I should stop. Apologize for my outburst. Make amends. Blame the climate. But I cannot. Something in me has given way and it cannot be put back again. "Did you know that he had returned to the laudanum? That he couldn't give it up? That our good intentions were not nearly so powerful as his will to die?... No, Thomas. Is this the life you want for me? To be like you? To wear blinders and talk of nothing that matters and drink weak tea with other people who would do anything to hide the truth, especially from themselves?" life Libba Bray
5080a03 He remembered the old Chinese proverb, sometimes ascribed to Confucius: If you sit by the river for long enough, the body of your enemy will float by. life Salman Rushdie
b972ab7 Well, I've had my fun; I've had it, he thought, looking up at the swinging baskets of pale geraniums. And it was smashed to atoms--his fun, for it was half made up, as he knew very well; invented, this escapade with the girl; made up, as one makes up the better part of life, he thought--making onself up; making her up; creating an exquisite amusement, and something more. But odd it was, and quite true; all this one could never share--it smashed to atoms. imagination life truths invention Virginia Woolf
d9664c6 Now what is history? It is the centuries of systematic explorations of the riddle of death, with a view to overcoming death. That's why people discover mathematical infinity and electromagnetic waves, that's why they write symphonies.. history life sence Jon Krakauer
f8460d5 "Haley and I would talk for hours about which member of 'N Sync we'd want to marry. After long deliberation, the answer was always J. C. Chasez. Joey Fatone's last name was going to be "Fat One" no matter how great he was, and even though they didn't know at their age that Lance Bass was gay outright, they sensed he'd make a better good friend and confidante. As for Justin Timberlake, well, JT was the coolest and hottest, but too flashy, so we couldn't trust him to be faithful. J. C. Chasez was the smart compromise." humor life ideal-man jc-chasez jt n-sync Mindy Kaling
6bb3323 In life, you have to take lots of decisions and if you don't take decisions you would never do anything because you would spend all your time choosing between things you could do. life inspirational Mark Haddon
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