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89d24ba God begins molding a mother after His own heart on the inside--in the inner woman and her heart--and then works outward. god heart life molding mom mother woman Elizabeth George
0207709 I wasn't sure about that, but one never knows. Sometimes a neighborhood, like a culture or civilization, is strong enough to absorb and acculturate any number of newcomers. But I don't know if that's true around here any longer. The outward forms and appearances look the same - [...]- but the substance has been altered. life philosophy Nelson DeMille
91a958e "Son, anything can happen to anyone," my father told me, "but it usually doesn't." happenings life probability Philip Roth
3295039 But truthfully? Let me tell you what I honestly think. I think, maybe he hasn't even noticed that I'm gone. But. I have. life missing Aimee Bender
31ef7a1 A last note from your narrator: I am haunted by humans. death life Markus Zusak
10054a5 "I've just been thinking it would be a lot of fun to live in a defunct shopping mall! Totally abandoned, Yet still frozen in time, Bright white lights shining, Artificial turquoise fountains spewing out clear water, Eerie eighties elevator music drifting by... Dancing erratically, shouting to the top, Because it's sad to see these places die. They're a testament to the hubris of modern America, which is dying in and of itself. Let's face it. We know we can't compete with Online shopping And Made-in-China products And eBay And Amazon. Those of us who spent our High school And college days Being wage slaves to these dying malls, We'll be old and nostalgic someday, Telling our grandkids about these wonderful buildings! They housed sets of trendy clothes Which nobody was rich enough to afford Or thin enough to fit in. We'll tell them about the first time We were almost trampled in a Black Friday stampede. The first time we saw a kid Vomit in the ugly rainbow ball pit At the children's play area, Dumped by babysitters to grow up there, Spending their childhood draped in neon. The first time eating greasy pad-thai And hamburgers At the food court. The first time falling in love In the dark movie theatre That charges too much for stale popcorn. Holding hands in the sunlit rays Of the dusty projector... Totally lost in moments. What is the meaning of this voyage? Our grandkids, Who will probably have Smartphones Surgically implanted to their brains And identical glass condominiums by then, They'll gasp in shock and say, "Wow, that sounds SO cool!" childhood consumerism dead-mall eerie life love mall nostalgia shopping Rebecca McNutt
917797f I want you to know that if I could've stayed with you I would have. I fought as hard as I could. I will never understand why I had to be taken from you so soon, but I have accepted it. Yet I want you to know that there is nothing more important to me than you. I loved you from the moment I saw you. And the happiest day of my life was when you agreed to share your life with mine. I promised that I would always be there for you. And my love for you is so strong that even though I won't be there physically, I will be there in every other way. I will watch over you. I will be there if you need to talk. I will never stop loving you. Not even death is powerful enough to overcome my feelings for you. My love for you, Lizzie, is stronger than anything. inspirational life love marriage powerful David Baldacci
b12959e The genome is as complicated and indeterminate as ordinary life, because it is ordinary life. This should come as a relief. Simple determinism, whether of the genetics or environmental kind, is a depressing prospect for those with a fondness for free will. humanity life randomness Matt Ridley
14e990c Run after truth until you're breathless. Accept the pain involved in re-creating yourself afresh. These ideas will take a life to comprehend, a hard one interspersed with drunken moments. life truth Naguib Mahfouz
1adb6c9 People never like pollution, it has become very wrong to like pollution at all. But just like there are good and bad things about people, there are good and bad things about pollution. If people were pollution we would get rid of anyone who was different, anyone who was considered an inconvenience... but we'd be getting rid of a life, a lot of lives... because we didn't like them. If pollution was a person would we still be trying to get rid of it? Would we have environmentalists still complaining and protesting and trying to get rid of all pollution? animals canada dangerous death earth environment environmentalism evil garbage help hippie hope human life litter mental-illness people plants pollution scary smog water Rebecca McNutt
148b164 This is what fascinates me most in existence: the peculiar necessity of imagining what is, in fact, real. life reality Philip Gourevitch
3d1c64a "happiness is a choice. If you choose to mope and be glum, you shall be; but if you wish to be happy and determine to enjoy what life has to offer, then you can have that as well. "She said that nothing is all good or all bad, that life offers everyone a mix of both--though sometimes it does not seem so, and bad is all we can see in our lives, while in the lives of others we see only good and feel envy. She said we must enjoy the good despite the bad, else life can beat us down and leave us hopeless, and that is no way to live." envy good happiness life Lynsay Sands
146da4f This is life. Things get taken away. You will learn to start over many times-or you will be useless. life Mitch Albom
3ce96b0 If you stumble at mere believability, what are you living for? [...] Love is hard to believe, ask any lover. Life is hard to believe, ask any scientist. life love science Yann Martel
3c20d7b That was what you did. You died. You did not know what it was about. They threw you in and told you the rules and the first time they caught you off base they killed you. Or they killed you gratuitously like Aymo. Or gave you the syphilis like Rinaldi. But they killed you in the end. You could count on that. Stay around and they would kill you. death government government-corruption hemingway illness life syphilis war Ernest Hemingway
ae181ef What a huge inaccessible lumber-room of thought and experience we amounted to, I thought; how much we are, how little we transmit. inner-life life thought H.G. Wells
067a217 This very pride in keeping his word was that he was keeping it to miscreants. It was his last triumph over these lunatics to go down into their dark room and die for something that they could not even understand. The barrel-organ seemed to give the marching tune with the energy and the mingled noises of a whole orchestra; and he could hear deep and rolling, under all the trumpets of the pride of life, the drums of the pride of death. life pride G.K. Chesterton
13cee74 Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. death hope inspirational life motivatonal Timothy Ferriss
02249c5 Accept the unknown. There are no secondary characters. Each one is silhouetted against the sky. All have the same stature. Within a given story some simply occupy more space. life place-in-life John Berger
e73b373 That is life's talent. To accept new things. life Hiroki Endo
06ae49b "My funeral," the Blue Man said. "Look at the mourners. Some did not even know me well, yet they came. Why? Did you ever wonder? Why people gather when others die? Why people feel they should? "It is because the human spirit knows, deep down, that all lives intersect. That death doesn't just take someone, it misses someone else, and in the small distance between being taken and being missed, lives are changed. "You say you should have died instead of me. But during my time on earth, people died instead of me, too. It happens every day. When lightning strikes a minute after you are gone, or an airplane crashes that you might have been on. When your colleague falls ill and you do not. We think such things are random. But there is a balance to it all. One withers, another grows. Birth and death are part of a whole. "It is why we are drawn to babies . . ." He turned to the mourners. "And to funerals." birth connected cycle death funeral karma life love marriage spirit we-are-one Mitch Albom
e64e983 The eyes were certainly memorable and beautiful, moist calves' eyes heavily lashed and with the same look of troubled pain at the unpredictability of the world's terrors. confusion life pain P.D. James
072f96a ...courage wasn't something you were bequeathed at birth, and it wasn't a lack of fright. It was overcoming your fear, because the ones you love mattered more. courage jodi-picoult life love Jodi Picoult
3a6b6b3 He came to destroy sin because it is fatal. life sin John Piper
1a9b603 Ender began to eat, slowly and carefully, pretending not to notice he was the center of attention. funny humour life Orson Scott Card
90790a6 And gradually it dawned on him, if a dawning can take place in total blackness, that his life has consisted of a run of rehearsals for a play he had failed to take part in. And that what he needed to do from now on, if there was going to be a now on, was abandon his morbid quest for order and treat himself to a little chaos, on the grounds that while order was demonstrably no substitute for happiness, chaos might open the way to it. life order John le Carré
ab24c3b The true secret of happiness lies in taking a genuine interest in all the details of daily life. -William Morris. elevate everyday genuine happy hygge interest life secret Louisa Thomsen Brits
aca235c If you really want to get to know someone, you have to divorce him. life love marriage Elizabeth Gilbert
1b4f8c7 What was the power that turned the worm into a moth? It was greater than any power the Builders had had, he was sure of that. The power that ran the city of Ember was feeble by comparison... intelligent-design life power Jeanne DuPrau
09d591d There the old Eskimo hunters she had known in her childhood thought the riches of life were intelligence, fearlessness, and love. A man with these gifts was rich and was a great spirit who was admired in the same way that the gussaks admired a man with money and goods. intelligence life love riches Jean Craighead George
e2fc005 The living cell is the most complex system of its size known to mankind. Its host of specialized molecules, many found nowhere else but within living material, are themselves already enormously complex. They execute a dance of exquisite fidelity, orchestrated with breathtaking precision. Vastly more elaborate than the most complicated ballet, the dance of life encompasses countless molecular performers in synergetic coordination. Yet this is a dance with no sign of a choreographer. No intelligent supervisor, no mystic force, no conscious controlling agency swings the molecules into place at the right time, chooses the appropriate players, closes the links, uncouples the partners, moves them on. The dance of life is spontaneous, self-sustaining, and self-creating. cells complexity evolution life materialism molecules naturalism nature science Paul Davies
09d73de He wondered at times whether he didn't belong to a class of people secretly convinced they had an arrangement with fate; in return for docility or ingenuous good will they were to be shielded from the worst brutalities in life. brutality fate good-will life Saul Bellow
65b0769 "Last night I thought about all that kerosene I've used in the past ten years. And I thought about books. And for the first time I realized that a man was behind each one of the books. A man had to think them up. A man had to take a long time to put them down on paper. And I'd never even thought that thought before." He got out of bed. "It took some man a lifetime maybe to put some of his thoughts down, looking around at the world and life and then I come along in two minutes and boom! it's all over." "Let me alone," said Mildred. "I didn't do anything." "Let you alone! That's all very well, but how can I leave myself alone? We need not to be let alone. We need to be really bothered once in a while. How long is it since you were bothered? About something important, about something real?" books bother create creation creativity destruction ignorance important kerosene life lifetime observation real reality reality-check thought time work world Ray Bradbury
84abdf0 I will not stop singing the Muses who set me dancing. creativity dancing euripides happiness inspiration inspirational-quotes joy life love muses poet poetry sing tragedy work writer Anne Carson
0236314 You can't undo loss. You can't unmake a mistake. christmas first-kiss holiday life love my-true-love-gave-to-me winter Stephanie Perkins
0264fc6 One afternoon, I am complaining about the confusion of my age, what is expected of me versus what I want for myself. life relationships Mitch Albom
383102c But I was living my life sideway. I did not act on what I wanted, I did not say the things I thought, and being so stifled and clamped all the time left me exhausted; no matter what I was doing, I was always imagining something else. anxiety life Curtis Sittenfeld
b22690a You don't know what would have happened if I hadn't pushed. Nobody knows. I did it the way I did it, and it worked. Above all, it worked. crazy ender genius life love push Orson Scott Card
de1b3d1 Nothing worth knowing can ever be taught in a classroom. learning life university Chip Kidd
af333a9 Each time you turn your life issues over to God and allow Him to lead, you build trust in Him. author build christian god issues lead life over time trust turn Elizabeth George
de0c5a2 Mom used to say that the thoughts in our heads were nothing more than electrical impulses. I remember Dad and her talking about this over dinner. It frustrated Dad that the human brain can fire electrical sparks and think, but that the electricity he'd pump into an android brain would never give it independent thought. The body isn't that different from a machine. Humans and androids both run on electricity. That lightning spark of energy I saw in the reverie. That was my mother's last thought, an echo of electricity, something that sparked when I entered her dreamscape. That spark is gone now. Her life is gone now. Everything that made her, her, is gone now. Faded into nothing. dreams electricity independent life spark talk thoughts Beth Revis
0b2141c I might be the hazardous waste site that polluted it, but Cape Breton Island is still my home. canada-day cape-breton coal country hazardous home life living nova-scotia patriot pollution steel sydney-tar-ponds toxic Rebecca McNutt
0b34c64 I do understand that they fall when I'm least able to pay attention because poems fall not from a tree, really, but from the richly pollinated boughs of an ordinary life, buzzing, as lives do, with clamor and glory. They are easy to miss but everywhere: poetry just is, whether we revere it or try to put it in prison. It is elementary grace, communicated from one soul to another. grace life poems poetry Barbara Kingsolver
f1634da Every day, when you're on the run, is the whole of your life. Every free minute is a short story with a happy ending. life running-away Gregory David Roberts
db3704b "Are you happy?" "I think I may be going to be happy." Remember, things do not force, forge or fashion. They fall into place" fate happiness hope life Ann Beattie
8641e47 You know, it's really very peculiar. To be mortal is the most basic human experience, and yet man has never been able to accept it, grasp it, and behave accordingly. Man doesn't know how to be mortal. And when he dies, he doesn't even know how to be dead. dying immortality life living mortality philosophy Milan Kundera
2b31999 It took him half an hour to reach the little mission chapel. From his position on his back in the river he could see just the tip of the steeple, but for the most part he gazed upward at the constellations. Rudy knew his constellations, because each one of his daughters had done a science project on them and they'd spent hours lying on their backs in the middle of the Edgar Lee Masters campus looking up at the sky. As the river bent to the south, he could see Virgo and Centaurus coming into view. At first they reminded him of true beauty, and he was overwhelmed. He knew that this heart-piercing ache, however painful, was the central experience of his life and that he would have to come to terms with it. No one - not Aristotle, not Epicurus, not Siva Singh - would ever convince him otherwise. But then it occurred to him that Virgo and Centaurus were just as arbitrary as the rudimentary classification system he'd used for his books - Helen's books. There were a lot of stars left out of the constellations, and nothing to stop you from drawing the lines in different ways to create different pictures. He wanted to lift his wings and fly, but he didn't have the power. He could only let the river carry him along. life river Robert Hellenga
2dbda2e Like a small boat adrift in the fog, she caught glimpses during patches when the mist cleared of a world far away, in which everything was changing. change floating life Ruth Ozeki
da3a710 It's got to be a nice life, long as you don't get caught. life Jodi Picoult
367f723 If want a person wants is his life, he tends to be quiet about wanting anything else. life Ann Patchett
86c0744 The colour of the magpie, her father was saying, was symbolic of creation. The void, the mystery of that which had not yet taken form. Black and white, he said. Presence and absence. life magpie mystery void Kate Mosse
3644764 "Maybe someday, if I succeed at something, I'll stop saying, "It isn't fair" about everything else." aims ambition dedication determination difficulties dreams equality fairness hardships life perseverance success trials Lois Lowry
1d0d322 I don't care how happily married you are or how deeply enmeshed you are with your children and family and career -- every woman needs a couple of chicks who'll break out the sangria just because you need to vent. friendship girl-life life relationships women Jen Lancaster
c511510 The truth is that people never realize their lives are about to change in unforeseen ways--that's just the nature of unforeseen ways. life truth Will Schwalbe
35f8d51 I wrote this book to show you that a cure is entirely possible because I've seen it happen over and over again. addiction-and-recovery addiction-cure addiction-free alcohol-abuse alcohol-addiction alcohol-addiction-treatment alcoholism-cure amazon author book bookstore chris-prentiss cure-addiction drug-abuse drug-addiction drug-addiction-treatment end-the-cycle freedom great-authors great-books kindle life new-book nook passages-malibu passages-ventura philosophy self-help sober sobriety wisdom Chris Prentiss
035a70e "I wonder if it's suffering." "What, our generation?" "The baby!" life Kenzaburō Ōe
d6ae115 It was as though she had veered, accidentally, into her own life. life Carol Shields
1193782 "Surely," he said, "the great mountains of the world are a present remedy if men did but know it against our modern discontent and ambitions. In the hills is wisdom's fount. They are deep in time. They know the ways of the sun and the wind, the lightning's fiery feet, the frost that shattereth, the rain that shroudeth, the snow that putteth about their nakedness a softer coverlet than fine lawn." life nature patience wisdom E.R. Eddison
cfbea94 Of all the women he knew, she had meant the most; and was the one person in his life he felt he had missed, in some ways. felt he-knew his-life life love love-of-his-life meant-the-most missed one-person only-love women Larry McMurtry
b17dd81 You have chosen to exist, and more than just exist-- you've been chosen to share in the Universal consciousness. chris-prentiss inspiration life passages-malibu passages-ventura universe Chris Prentiss
1caf77b Everything in life had a purpose, and unless it achieved that purpose, it was just taking up space on the planet and wasting everybody's time. life purpose time Jeannette Walls
1d41670 I cite too the ordinary fears of mortality the inspection of a fast-growing mole on the side of the nose blood in the stool a painful injury or the mournful witness of the slow death of a parent all this is given to all men as well as the starting awake in the nether hours of the night from such glutinous nightmare that on'e self name relationships nationality place in life all data of specificity wipe out amnesiatically asiatically you don't even know the idea human it is such a low hour of the night and he shares it with all of us. life stream-of-consciousness E.L. Doctorow
b378ce2 You can't save everyone. It's not an option. choose choosing life option save Darren Shan
1dc2fd1 It actually felt harder, not easier, to be with people. The toughest challenge was my face; maintaining a 'normal' expression was utterly exhausting. life love moving-on sad wife Marian Keyes
b76510d For marriage has nothing in common with love. marriage makes for security; love makes only for suffering. On the other hand, love could be so distilled, spun so fine as to implicate third and fourth persons, as to take up three or four exciting acts in a play. life love marriage nobel-prize quotes Günter Grass
65cd5c6 I know now it is children who accept life; grown people cover it up and pretend it is different with drinks. children drinking life Rumer Godden
1e5711f We're better off not worrying about ourselves, and to do that, we have to worry about others. compassion human-beings landry life others ourselves pearl-in-the-mist thoughtful v-c-andrews worrying V.C. Andrews
132249d When you understand that what you're telling is just a story. It isn't happening anymore. When you realize the story you're telling is just words, when you can just crumble it up and throw your past in the trash can, then we'll figure out who you're going to be. life Chuck Palahniuk
8fe830c "In the South American rainforest, there is a tribe called the Desana, who see the world as a fixed quantity of energy that flows between all creatures. Every birth must therefore engender a death, and every death brings forth another birth. This way, the energy of the world remains complete. When they hunt for food, the Desana know the animals they kill will leave a hole in the spiritual well. But that hole will be filled, they believe, by the Desana hunters when they die. Were there no men dying, there would be no birds or fish being born. I like this idea. Morrie likes it, too. The closer he gets to goodbye, the more he seems to feel we are all creatures in the same forest. What we take, we must replenish. "It's only fair," he says." inspiration life life-lessons truths Mitch Albom
1ee3893 Things are not always how they seem. christmas first-kiss holiday life love my-true-love-gave-to-me winter Stephanie Perkins
1f6bdbc He sometimes asked himself a question about life. Which are truer, the happy memories, or the unhappy ones? He decided, eventually, that the question was unanswerable. julian-barnes life memories memory the-only-story truth unanswerable unhappy-memories Julian Barnes
c254671 How little it takes to make a young girl happy! A pretty dress, sunshine, and somebody opposite, and they are blest. happiness life love naivete pretty-little-things Louisa May Alcott
8f1ca73 The faith in an afterlife, however much our reason ridicules it, very modestly extends our faith that each moment of our consciousness will be followed by another - that a coherent matrix has been prepared for this precious self of ours. The guarantee that our self enjoys an intended relation to the outer world is most, if not all, of what we ask from religion. God is the self projected onto reality by our natural and necessary optimism. He is the not-me personified. faith god life self-consciousness John Updike
8d01b76 "Holly steps back. Being warned about a ghost and seeing him are not the same. 'What did they death immortality life metaphor mortality speech time title David Mitchell
8cce462 There is so much about my fate that I cannot control, but other things do fall under my jurisdiction. There are certain lottery tickets I can buy, thereby increasing my odds of finding contentment. I can decide how I spend my time, whom I interact with, whom I share my body and life and money and energy with. I can select what I eat and read and study. i can choose how I'm going to regard unfortunate circumstances in my life - whether I will see them as curses or opportunities (and on the occasions when I can't rise to the most optimistic viewpoint, because I'm feeling too damn sorry for myself, I can choose to keep trying to change my outlook). I can choose my words and the tone of voice in which I speak to others. And most of all, I can choose my thoughts. fate life Elizabeth Gilbert
2f261df You can be happy if you are willing to let go of your past and leave yourself unencumbered so you can fly freely. happiness life philosophy zen zen-and-the-art-of-happiness Chris Prentiss
8b99f5c He began to see the truth, that Ged had neither lost nor won but, naming the shadow of his death with his own name, had made himself whole: a man: who, knowing his whole true self, cannot be used or possessed by any power other than himself, and whose life therefore is lived for life's sake and never in the service of ruin, or pain, or hatred, or the dark. In the Creation of Ea, which is the oldest song, it is said, 'Only in silence the word, only in dark the light, only in dying life: bright the hawk's flight on the empty sky. coming-of-age death evil fear good-and-evil life manhood self-knowledge Ursula K. Le Guin
8abaca1 You know what's wrong with scientific power?... It's a form of inherited wealth... Most kinds of power require a substantial sacrifice by whoever wants the power. There is an apprenticeship, a discipline lasting many years. Whatever kind of power you want. President of the company. Black belt in karate. Spiritual Guru. Whatever it is you seek, you have to put in the time, the practice, the effort. You must give up a lot to get it. It has to be very important to you. And once you have attained it, it is your power. It can't be given away: it resides in you. It is literally the result of your discipline. Now, what is interesting about this process is that, by the time someone has acquired the ability to kill with his bare hands, he has also matured to the point where he won't use it unwisely. So that kind of power has a built-in control. The discipline of getting the power changes you so that you won't abuse it. But scientific power is like inherited wealth: attained without discipline. You read what others have done, and you take the next step... There is no discipline... no mastery: old scientists are ignored. There is no humility before nature... A karate master does not kill people with his bare hands. He does not lose his temper and kill his wife. The person who kills is the person who has no discipline, no restraint, and who has purchased his power in the form of a Saturday night special. And that is the kind of power that science fosters, and permits. experience hard-work life meaning-of-life responsibility science Michael Crichton
caefadc Every breath we draw wards off the death that constantly impinges on us.... Ultimately death must triumph, for by birth it has already become our lot and it plays with its prey only for a short while before swallowing it up. However, we continue our life with great interest and much solicitude as long as possible, just as we blow out a soap-bubble as long and as large as possible, although with the perfect certainty that it will burst. life Irvin D. Yalom
cd30614 I have always said that the way to deal with the pain of other's is by sympathy, which is suffering with, and that the way to deal with one's own pain is to put one foot after the other. Yet I was never willing to suffer with others, and when my own pain hit me, I crawled into hole. Sympathy I have failed in, stoicism I have barely passed. But I have made straight A's in irony- that curse, that evasion, that armor, that way of staying safe while seeming wise. One thing I have learned hard, if indeed I have learned it now: it is a reduction of our humanity to hide from pain, our own or other's. to hide from anything. That was Marian's text. Be open, be available, be exposed, be skinless. Skinless? Dance around in your bones. humanity life pain suffering Wallace Stegner
62d1458 But I will never ask anyone from our village-from any village in Tlanth-to risk his or her life unless I'm willing to myself. life morals war Sherwood Smith
d120831 Long ago the signalling had become no more than a meaningless ritual, now maintained by an animal which had forgotten to learn and a robot which had never known to forget. intelligence life Arthur C. Clarke
01ef7bc All of one's life is a struggle towards that; the narrow path between freedom and belonging. I have sometimes sacrificed freedom in order to belong, but more often I have given up all hope of belonging. freedom life Jeanette Winterson
356d30f He sat down and collected his thoughts. They were quite easy to collect, because there weren't very many of them, and they all concerned the same subject--what a burden his life was. life thinking thoughts troubles Philip Pullman
36148aa As long as you're breathing, your story's still going. ending life living story Darren Shan
da63284 A relationship is like a garden. To create a condition that will cause your plants to thrive and produce abundantly, you must weed, water, fertilize, and care for the plants in your garden. You must also know about the special needs of the plants you're caring for. Some need more or less light than others, some need more or less water than others, and some need special fertilizers. inspiration life love relationships the-laws-of-love Chris Prentiss
da9fe00 You may think this a strange story, but it is not. There are people whose lives are every bit as unusual as Bobby Box's--I can promise you that. Not all of them end as well, of course. For many people, the world is a place of sadness and sorrow, which is a great pity, as we have only one chance at life, and it is very bad luck if things do not go well. But even if you think they are not going well, you can still wish, as Bobby Box did. And sometimes those wishes will come true, as his did, and the world will seem filled with light and happiness. That can happen, you know. So never give up hope; never think things are so bad that they can never get better. They can get better, and they do. And if you have the chance to make things easier for another person, never miss it. Stretch out your hand to help them, to cheer them up, to wipe away their tears. Stretch out your hand as that man and that woman did to Bobby Box. Stretch out your hand and see what happens. life Alexander McCall Smith
8677916 Part fact part fiction is what life is. And it is always a cover story. I wrote my way out. life writers Jeanette Winterson
8641ffc Ghosts... they are the completions of the deads intended gestures, there unfinished plans still hanging in the air - something like when you forgot one thing and so you pantomime the motion. inspirational-attitude life Anne Tyler
0aa81e7 It's amazing what the gene pool will do to perpetuate itself. life perpetuation procreation Mohsin Hamid
376dedf When you're lost in those woods, it sometimes takes you a while to realize that you are lost. For the longest time, you can convince yourself that you've just wandered a few feet off the path, that you'll find your way back to the trailhead any moment now. Then night falls again and again, and you still have no idea where you are, and it's time to admit that you have bewildered yourself so far off the path that you don't even know from which direction the sun rises anymore. life Elizabeth Gilbert
de61940 I was always moved when mean people were suddenly nice to me. It was a weakness that would lead me into some bad relationships later in life. bad canada life love montréal pg-76 relationships thirteen weakness Heather O'Neill
38c9be7 If you like someone, you should have to make an effort. christmas first-kiss holiday life love my-true-love-gave-to-me winter Stephanie Perkins
38dfe1d In fact, I can't think of much I'd like better than for him to step into the room right now, glasses fogged and smelling of damp wool, shaking the rain from his hair like an old dog and saying: 'Dickie, my boy, what you got for a thirsty old man to drink tonight? donna-tartt horror humor life ocd the-secret-history Donna Tartt
842e005 "It takes a huge investment in introspection to learn that the thirty or more hours spent "studying" the news last month neither had any predictive ability during your activities of that month nor did it impact your current knowledge of the world." knowledge life news prediction time work Nassim Nicholas Taleb
83b91bf Although I am unconvinced that I desire life, I am not yet ready to embrace death. fate life living Charles Stross
39cd249 I asked them: Does it hurt? And the scar people nodded, yes. But it felt somehow wonderful, they said. For one long second, it felt like the world was holding them close. life pain Aimee Bender
e433ec3 Isn't it a mercy that we never get cured of being expectant? It makes life so bearable. However regularly we are disappointed and nothing whatever happens, after the first blow has fallen, after the first catch of the breath, the first gulp of misery, we turn our eyes with all their old eagerness to a point a little further along the road. expectation hope hoping life life-and-living Elizabeth von Arnim
08cf036 I don't want to have these burdens. But I can't bear to turn them over to anyone else, either. Because, despite all the work, I like being in control of my own life. control life Robin Hobb
7a2a722 Y lo que, por el contrario, me sucede a mi en las raras horas de placer, lo que para mi es delicia, suceso, elevacion y extasis, eso no lo conoce, ni lo ama, ni lo busca el mundo mas que si acaso en las novelas; en la vida, lo considera una locura. Y en efecto, si el mundo tiene razon, si esta musica de los cafes, estas diversiones en masa, estos hombres americanos contentos con tan poco tienen razon, entonces soy yo el que no la tiene, entonces es verdad que estoy loco, entonces soy efectivamente el lobo estepario que tantas veces me he llamado, la bestia descarriada en un mundo que le es extrano e incomprensible, que ya no encuentra ni su hogar, ni su ambiente, ni su alimento. existencialismo existentialism hesse life lobo lobo-estepario modern-life vida-moderna Hermann Hesse
7a0c003 "... he was shaken by the overwhelming revelation that the headlong race between his misfortunes and his dreams was at that moment reaching the finish line. The rest was darkness. "Damn it," he sighed. "How will I ever get out of this labyrinth!" life suffering Gabriel Garcí­a Márquez
07830f5 If we had directions, it wouldn't be life. It would be an assignment. Grunt work. life life-and-living James Patterson
e5db13b If we rub a fabric too often, it will quickly grow threadbare; and Nobu's words had rasped against me so much, I could no longer maintain that finely lacquered surface Mameha had always counseled me to hide behind. hurt life words Arthur Golden
072ab11 A funeral is like a little game, really. You have to just play along and say the right thing and behave the right way until it's over. Be pleasant but don't smile too much; be sad but don't overdo it or the family will feel worse than they already do. Be hopeful but don't let your optimism be taken as a lack of empathy or an inability to deal with the reality. Because if anybody was to be truly honest there would be a lot of arguments, finger-pointing, tears, snot, and screaming. empathy funerals honesty life optimism reality society sympathy Cecelia Ahern
793aa4f I am one in a row of specimens. It's when I try to flutter out of line that he hates me. I'm meant to be dead, pinned, always the same, always beautiful. He knows that part of my beauty is being alive, but it's the dead me he wants. He wants me living-but-dead. I felt it terribly strongly today. That my being alive and changing and having a separate mind and having moods and all that was becoming a nuisance. He is solid; immovabile, iron-willed. He showed me one day what he called his killing-bottle. I'm imprisoned in it. Fluttering against the glass. Because I can see through it I still think I can escape. I have hope. But it's all an illusion. A thick round wall of glass. death hate life prison John Fowles
0677a76 If you won't share my life with me, maybe you'll share my death. death life pygmy Chuck Palahniuk
061851b When you see something, it can't be unseen. When you hear a sound, it can never be unheard. I know, deep down, that this evening I have learned something that can never be unlearned. And the part of my world that is altered will never be the same. life Cecelia Ahern
05e28b0 "Why is it when people are proud of me that my life sucks?" "Because growing up means making tough choices, and doing the right thing doesn't necessarily mean doing the thing that feels good." -- life mrs-collins noah-hutchins right-thing sucks Katie McGarry
77b66db And that fear I'd felt, the disembodying confusion, seemed to be a drug I was now addicted to, because moving through the ordinary world- watching CNN, reading the Times, walking to Sant Ambroeus to have a coffee at the bar- made me feel exhausted, even depressed. Perhaps I was suffering from the same problem as the man who'd sailed around the world and now on land, facing his farmhouse, his wife and kids, understood that the constancy of home stretching out before him like a dry flat field was infinitely more terrifying than any violent squall with thirty-foot swells. fear life settling Marisha Pessl
3ca0c81 Art is long and life is short. gay life writers Christopher Bram
77aa610 How many a man has dated a new era in his life from the reading of a book! life new-era reading Henry David Thoreau
3df8499 For all that was happening to him, his voice was strong and inviting, and his mind was vibrating with a million thoughts. He was intent on proving that the word 'dying' was not synonymous with 'useless'. alive dying life prove useless Mitch Albom
ffd5ba2 But the characteristic that is truly special about our species...[is] our ability to model our world and understand both it and where we fit into its overall scheme.... human-life life Arthur C. Clarke
669f082 Dogs were not loyal but servile, that cats were opportunists and traitors, cats dogs life loyalty traitor Gabriel Garcí­a Márquez
3e03b2f Meaning. If you're going to die, you want to find meaning in life. You want to connect the dots. death find franny-billingsley life meaning Franny Billingsley
667c577 But it would be like going to Heaven and not finding any of your friends there. Her life would go all beatific and empty in the eyes. home life living where-you-live Lorrie Moore
f084d36 It was a wonderful time to be alive, or even dead. life the-past Billy Collins
75f7b54 Life, I announced, is not a B picture. Well, it ain't no De Mille epic either, boss. Things'll work out, Bernie. life Lawrence Block
3ec0d1c Everyone who tells a story tells it differently, just to remind us that everybody sees it differently. life perspective truths Jeanette Winterson
ac7f166 Eddie told her he had made things square and her eyebrows lifted and her lips spread and Eddie felt and old, warm feeling he had missed for years, the simple act of making his wife happy life marriage Mitch Albom
ab2514e Don't look to be saved in any one thing, person, machine, or library. Do your own bit of saving, and if you drown, at least die knowing you were headed for shore. life ray-bradbury self-help Ray Bradbury
1a2f2fe "Your actions create an "energy vortex" that draws in the necessary ingredients for your venture." happiness inspirational-quotes life philosophy zen zen-and-the-art-of-happiness Chris Prentiss
acf503e "The ties that bind us to life are tougher than you imagine, or anyone can who has not felt how roughly they may be pulled without breaking. You might be miserable without a home, but even you could live; and not so miserably as you suppose. The human heart is like india-rubber; a little swells it, but a great deal will not burst it. If "little more than nothing will disturb it, little less than all things will suffice" to break it. As in the outer members of our frame, there is a vital power inherent in itself that strengthens it against external violence. Every blow that shakes it will serve to harden it against a future stroke; as constant labor thickens the skin of the hand, and strengthens its muscles instead of wasting them away: so that a day of arduous toil, that might excoriate a lady's palm, would make no sensible impression on that of a hardy ploughman." life Anne Brontë
a9ee426 She says screens are the cigarettes of our age. They're toxic, and we're only going to realize the damage they're doing when it's too late. bully family friendship funny life starbucks sunglasses Sophie Kinsella
9d74e3a One day, I will look up and all the people I know will be dead or abroad. life memories Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
d3d1af4 Did they want what I wanted? Did they want to understand, to unlock it? To decode it? To glean, to touch, to learn, to get something, to proceed, to get somewhere, to graduate, to work, to thrive; to someday, sometime, finally earn the luxury, the permission to ... stop, to stop all of this, to relax, and forget? life work Chip Kidd
42617fd On his thirteenth birthday he had seen a film in which the central character was a painter who, unable to sell his work, grew cold and hungry as he went from one unsuccessful interview to the next; eventually he had become a vagrant, sleeping in the streets of the city where once he had walked in hope. Hawksmoor left the cinema in a mood of profound, terrified apprehension and, from that time, he was filled with a sense of time passing and with the fear that he might be left discarded on its banks. The fear had not left him, although now he could no longer remember from where it came: he looked back on his earlier life without curiosity, since it seemed to lack intrinsic interest, and when he looked forward he saw the same steady attainment of goals without any joy in their attainment. For him, the state of happiness was simply the state of not suffering and, if he cared for anything, it was for oblivion. anxiety goals life oblivion time Peter Ackroyd
c439d48 "Perhaps this is what Henry James meant when he talked about the "irresponsibility" of characters. Characters are irresponsible, art is irresponsible when compared to life, because it is first and foremost important that a character be real, and as readers or watchers we tend to applaud any effort made towards the construction of that reality. We do not, of course, indulge actual people in the world this way at all. In real life, the fact that something seems real to someone is not enough to interest us, or to convince us that that reality is interesting. But the self-reality of fictional characters is deeply engrossing, which is why villains are lovable in literature in ways that they are not in life." fiction-writing life morality James Wood
9ddb79d Not always getting what you want, but sometimes getting what you need. christmas first-kiss holiday life love my-true-love-gave-to-me winter Stephanie Perkins
a158b28 And just as music is the space between notes, just as the stars are beautiful because of the space between them, just as the sun strikes raindrops at a certain angle and throws a prism of color across the sky - so the space where I exist, and want to keep existing, and to be quite frank I hope I die in, is exactly this middle distance: where despair struck pure otherness and created something sublime. life life-and-death Donna Tartt
ad48e7e What really mattered in life, what gave it weight, was death. life Jeffrey Eugenides
a66da67 On the earth, satellite of a star speeding through space, living things had arisen under the influence of conditions which were part of the planet's history; and as there had been a beginning of life upon it, so, under the influence of other conditions, there would be an end: man, no more significant than other forms of life, had come not as the climax of creation but as a physical reaction to the environment. human life man W. Somerset Maugham
9e433ba When you win, the rules change, and you find you've lost life meaning meaning-of-life David Mitchell
fc86fd4 God doesn't mock us. He never gives us a goal that we cannot accomplish in His strength. I want to assure you, you can glorify God, you MUST glorify God. But you have to determine deep within your heart that you're going to do it His way. god life strength Charles R. Swindoll
5360afd Be honest with yourself; set the alarm for the time the Real You will get up, not the Ambitious You, because the Ambitious You doesn't really exist. funny humor life mornings sleep Laurie Notaro
8217104 The Word frees us from smallness of mind (1 Kings 4:29) and from threatening confinements (Psalm 18:19). life living open-mindedness word John Piper
95355b7 She had refused to draw the monster. She feared to give him form. christina-dodd fear life monster suspense thriller virtue-falls Christina Dodd
a9bc24f "Well... "why" is a hard question to answer in any language." life love why Elizabeth Gilbert
d2f8c65 I know at least what I am,' he simply went on; 'the other side of the medal's clear enough. I've not been edifying--I believe I'm thought in a hundred quarters to have been barely decent. I've followed strange paths and worshipped strange gods; it must have come to you again and again--in fact you've admitted to me as much--that I was leading, at any time these thirty years, a selfish frivolous scandalous life. And you see what it has made of me. life Henry James
bc27c28 Life is a long failure of understanding, a long, mistaken shutting of the heart. heart life mistaken shutting understanding Patricia Highsmith
bb6b593 "Fate is the same for the man who holds back, the same if he fights hard. fate homer iliad life philosophy Richmond Lattimore
e9e2b24 I don't want to reject my life. I want to change my life without changing my life. life Gretchen Rubin
d46a0c2 I am positive of only a few things in life, and one is that if you want to have a decent middle and old age, you have to get exercise almost every day. day life Anne Lamott
b474c51 That paper-- it sits there, open at the employment section. It sits there like a war, and each small advertisement is another trench for a person to dive into. To hope and fight in. fight life struggle unemployment Markus Zusak