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Link Quote Stars Tags Author
bb6b593 "Fate is the same for the man who holds back, the same if he fights hard. fate homer iliad life philosophy Richmond Lattimore
bc27c28 Life is a long failure of understanding, a long, mistaken shutting of the heart. heart life mistaken shutting understanding Patricia Highsmith
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
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
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
bf122fb Duerme, vuela, reposa: !Tambien se muere el mar! dreams life poetry Federico García Lorca
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
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
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
36148aa As long as you're breathing, your story's still going. ending life living story Darren Shan
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
c936336 So many people walk around with a meaningless life. They seem half asleep, even when they're busy doing things they think are important. This is because they're chasing the wrong things. The way you get meaning into your life is to devote yourself to loving others, to your community around you, to creating something that gives you purpose and meaning. devote important life live love meaning purpose wrong Mitch Albom
ca1bd59 "Oh, Youth may listen patiently, While sad Experience tells her tale, But Doubt sits smiling in his eye, For ardent Hope will still prevail! He hears how feeble Pleasure dies, By guilt destroyed, and pain and woe; He turns to Hope--and she replies, "Believe it not-it is not so!" hope life poetry Anne Brontë
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
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
cc5d0e3 The stars are the apexes of what wonderful triangles! What distant and different beings in the various mansions of the universe are contemplating the same one at the same moment! Nature and human life are as various as our several constitutions. Who shall say what prospect life offers to another? Could a greater miracle take place than for us to look through each other's eyes for an instant? empathy human-nature life miracle stars walden walden-pond Henry David Thoreau
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
cf51f2c If they succeed, it will not matter if Man becomes immortal. He will have nothing to live for. greed greed-of-man immortality life man-s-pride page-58 true James Edwin Gunn
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
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
2a61589 It takes practice, feeling happy about the ever enfolding events of life, and, because of all the conditioning we have undergone before this, it may be very difficult to make the change, but if we take the saying to heart and practice it, as the days unfold we will find ourselves living ever happier lives, smiling more, and finally, laughing more. happiness happy health i-ching life smile wisdom wu-wei Wu Wei
d1adb32 Kids must spend half their lives throwing things at the ducks in Regent's Park. How come he managed to pick a duck that pathetic? humor life Nick Hornby
28c76d4 "Nothing expresses Kafka's innermost sense of self more profoundly than his lapidary definition of "writing as a form of prayer": he was a writer. Not a man who wrote, but one to whom writing was the only form of being, the only means of defying death in life." -- kafka life writers writing Ernst Pawel
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
28529d9 I am a sacrifice bound with cords to the horns of the world's rock altar, waiting for worms. I take a deep breath, I open my eyes. Looking, I see there are worms in the horns of the altar like live maggots in amber, there are shells of worms in the rock and moths flapping at my eyes. A wind from no place rises. A sense of the real exults me; the cords loosen: I walk on my way. life purpose Annie Dillard
d34ca7f We often get into ruts, on treadmills, caught up in patterns and habits that aren't useful. We don't stop to ask, what can I learn from this week that will keep next week from essentially being a repeat of the same? inspirational life productivity repeating-the-past Stephen R. Covey
d34eb94 Das wirkliche Leben, meint er, sei ja so anders... Jedenfalls das seine, denkt er: da erkennt man keinen klaren Ablauf und keinen roten Faden, da zerrinnt es einfach, ohne Abschnitt und ohne Tat, die Leidenschaft zerrinnt in eine Stimmung, und auch die Entschlusse sind wie Sand, der leise durch die Finger rinnt, immer wieder nimmt man eine neue Handvoll, und wenn man sie aufmacht, ist wieder nichts darin geblieben, man ist verzweifelt, und auch das zerrinnt, wie die Hoffnung und der Jubel und der Schmerz und alles, wie das ganze Leben. life pain schmerz Max Frisch
d3883a3 The real troubles with living is that living is so banal. life living James Baldwin
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
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
27ac740 The world is actually a mirror, and as you change, you will see everything around you changing as well, mirroring your changes. chris-prentiss life passages-malibu passages-ventura quotes Chris Prentiss
270c760 I was beginning to understand something I couldn't articulate. It was a jazzy feeling in my chest, a fluttering, a kind of buzzing in my brain. Warmth. Life. The circulation of blood. Sanguinity. I don't know. I understood the enormous risk of telling the truth, how the telling could result in every level of hell reigning down on you, your skin scorched to the bone and then bone to ash and then nothing but a lingering odour of shame and decomposition, but now I was also beginning to understand the new and alien feeling of taking the risk and having the person on the other end of the telling, the listener, say: Bad shit at home? You guys are running away? Yeah, I said. I understand, said, Noehmi. feeling irma-voth life literature miriam-toews novel Miriam Toews
23f296b Some folk learned the nature of God, that He was merciful, having spared a husband or some cattle, that He was strict, having meted out hard punishment for small sins, that He was attentive, having sent signs of the hunger beforehand, that He was just, having sent the hunger in the first place, or having sent the whales and the teeming reindeer in the end. Some folk learned that He was to be found in the world-in the richness of the grass and the pearly beauty of the Heavens, and others learned that He could not be found in the world, for the world is always wanting, and God is completion. learning life wisdom world Jane Smiley
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
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
1ee3893 Things are not always how they seem. christmas first-kiss holiday life love my-true-love-gave-to-me winter Stephanie Perkins
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
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
dc8e6ee Pardon me, but my father says that it is a lie that Americans have everything. You have no sheep, no goats, no trees, no oil, no vines, no wine, not even chickens. He asks, 'What kind of life is that?' He says, 'No wonder you don't sing or dance or recite poetry very often. culture life meaningfulness Robert Fulghum
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
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
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
df7e05b I'm here. I love you. I don't care if you need to stay up crying all night long, I will stay with you. If you need the medication again, go ahead and take it - I will love you through that, as well. If you don't need the medication, I will love you, too. There's nothing you can ever do to lose my love. I will protect you until you die, and after your death I will still protect you. I am stronger than Depression and I am braver than Loneliness and nothing will ever exhaust me. life loneliness love Elizabeth Gilbert
e15c297 "I had to do something about my longing, so I got up, went to the kitchen in my nightgown, peeled a pound of potatoes, boiled them up, sliced them, fried them in butter, salted them generously and ate every bite of them - asking my body the whole while if it would please accept the satisfaction of a pound of fried potatoes in lieu of the fulfillment of lovemaking. My body replied, only after eating every bite of food: "No deal, babe." -- life longing love women Elizabeth Gilbert
e173991 Yes it's me, I myself, what I turned out to be, (...) I'm the one here in myself, it's me. (...) Whatever I was, whatever I wasn't--it's all in what I am. Whatever I wanted, whatever I didn't want--all of this has shaped me. Whatever I loved, or stopped loving--in me it's the same nostalgia (Alvaro de Campos) life loneliness love nostalgia self-knowledge Fernando Pessoa
e1f5874 Listen! I know it's not right to talk. Better to set an example, better to just start - I have already started - and - and can one really be unhappy? Oh, what do my grief and my misfortune matter if I have the strength to be happy? You know, I don't understand how one can walk by a tree and not be happy at the sight of it! Or to speak with a man and not be happy in loving him? Oh, it's just that I can't express it - and yet there are so many things at every stop so beautiful that even the most desolate of men find them beautiful. Look at a child, look at Go's sunrise, look at the grass, how it grows, look into eyes that look at you and love you - life love meaning-in-life Fyodor Dostoyevsky
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
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
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
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
e7996dc Has God created millions of people over tens of thousands of years who are going to spend eternity in anguish? Can God do this, or even allow this, and still claim to be a loving God? Does God punish people for thousands of years with infinite, eternal torment for things they did in their few finite years of life? death god hell life religion Rob Bell
e9e2b24 I don't want to reject my life. I want to change my life without changing my life. life Gretchen Rubin
f084d36 It was a wonderful time to be alive, or even dead. life the-past Billy Collins
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
0aa81e7 It's amazing what the gene pool will do to perpetuate itself. life perpetuation procreation Mohsin Hamid
f4279bf When a boy's first romantic interlude is with Pheobe the Dog-Faced Girl, he feels a need to get out into the world and find a new life. circus dating funny girls humor life life-experience love teenagers Annette Curtis Klause
f5334e0 To study the self is to forget the self. Maybe if you sat enough zazen, your sense of being a solid, singular self would dissolve and you could forget about it. What a relief. You could just hang out happily as part of an open-ended quantum array. japanese life meditation physics quantum-mechanics science sense-of-self spirituality Ruth Ozeki
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
07830f5 If we had directions, it wouldn't be life. It would be an assignment. Grunt work. life life-and-living James Patterson
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
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
f8053ff But death is not easy, and life can win by simulating it. life life-and-death Iris Murdoch
f85103b "There are five people you meet in heaven," the Blue Man suddenly said. "Each of us was in your life for a reason. You may not have known the reason at the time, and that is what heaven is for. For understanding your life on Earth." Eddie looked confused. "People think of heaven as a paradise garden, a place where they can float on clouds and laze in rivers and mountains. But scenery without solace is meaningless. "This is the greatest gift God can give you: To understand what happened in your life. To have it explained. It is the peace you have been searching for." death enlightenment explanation god knowledge life life-after-death meaning-of-life peace power wisdom Mitch Albom
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
f9aa364 For we die every day; oblivion thrives Not on dry thighbones but on blood-ripe lives, And our best yesterdays are now foul piles Of crumpled names, phone numbers and foxed files. life time Vladimir Nabokov
fb668e9 All sorts of strange people were around, people who looked more at home than she was, even the homeless ones who spoke no English, more at home maybe because they were younger, and when she went out it seemed to her that she too had migrated, that everyone migrates, even if we stay in the same houses our whole lives, because we can't help it. We are all migrants through time. home house life migrants migration people time Mohsin Hamid
fc5c3f4 Perhaps everyone had their own way of preparing to die. Life got you ready. life Lorrie Moore
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
fd0b93e Fear doesn't stop a warrior. It pushes you further. life Chloe Neill
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
513a4a4 I mean, what is this life of ours supposed to be for? Are we to spend it identifying each other with catalogues, like tourists in an art gallery? Or are we to try to exchange some kind of a signal, however garbled, before it's too late? chrisopher-isherwood life Christopher Isherwood
b127edb He put his life on hold as he waited for his life to begin. life living Keith Donohue
51f9e7f Or maybe there's one thing to say, about the capitalism of the heart, the belief that the essence of life too can be seized and hoarded, that you can corner the market on confidence, stage a hostile takeover of happiness. life therapy thoughts Rebecca Solnit
51fe3e5 Nothing had just happened to her, she had made a choice, and then she had made another and another after that. Taken together, the small choices anyone made added up to a life. big-picture choice choices choices-and-consequences decisions life life-lessons maturation wisdom J. Courtney Sullivan
e08b440 That young man will go far, she said. I don't know in what direction, but he will go far. direction life Alexander McCall Smith
52c16f1 Last day I saw him human, he was sad about the world. life sadness Aimee Bender
5300b72 She seemed to have no inkling that life wasn't as orderly as her pencil case and that everything is chance and at any moment any number of remarkable things can happen that are totally beyond our control, events that rip up our maps and re-polarize our compasses - the madwoman walking towards us, the train falling off the bridge, the boy on the bicycle. life Kate Atkinson
73fde13 There was a great deal of progress being made, right under their noses, particularly in Africa, and this progress was good. Life was much harder for tyrants than it had been before. alexander-mccall-smith life progress tyrants Alexander McCall Smith
ea07e09 All of life seems to me a strange dream about losing things you never had to begin with. About trying to find your glasses when you can't see because you don't have your glasses on. life Lorrie Moore
ea13bd0 The priest's work, the priest's service, was understood as an act of worship. This was God's desire at Sinai - that everybody would understand their roles as priests. Thst everybody would worship God by serving each other. humanity inspirational jesus life serving-god serving-others Rob Bell
164316f It's not a big thing, but I guess it's true- big things are often just small things that are noticed. life Ned Vizzini
9a6b996 You bring joy and pain in equal measure- come aboard if your destination is oblivion. It should be our next stop. We can sit together. You can have the window seat, if you want. But it's a sad view. life Yann Martel
99dd266 One keeps oneself neat out of mere decency mere sanity, awareness of other people. And finally even that goes, and one dribbles unashamed. life serenity Ursula K. Le Guin
997ab6e We spent today sending men to hell. What's more natural than to pass the night dreaming of procreating a few more to take their place? life sex war A.J. Hartley and David Hewson
d20ebc3 It's a terrible thing, I think, in life to wait until you're ready. I have this feeling now that actually no one is ever ready to do anything. There is almost no such thing as ready. There is only now. And you may as well as do it now. Generally speaking, now is as good a time as any. life readiness start-up Hugh Laurie
f26f3f0 Friendships were so damn complicated, so bound with sharp edges that could jab a hole through you at any given point. life J.D. Robb
e4d9c1b "True enough. I say this all the time. Trez looked at his hands. "I didn't ask for this." "No one asks for life." The executioner hiked iAm's body up higher. "And sometimes they do not ask for death..." life life-and-living life-quote J.R. Ward
539d251 The petite bourgeoise and small property in general represent a precious zone of autonomy and freedom in state systems increasingly dominated by large public and private bureaucracies. bureaucracy capitalism freedom life petite-bourgeoise private-sector public-sector trade-unions work James C. Scott
3a4f16c The forces of blind life that work across this hilltop are as irresistible as she said they were, they work by a principle more potent than fission. But I can't look upon them as just life, impartial and eternal and in flux, an unceasing interchange of protein. And I can't find proofs of the crawl toward perfection that she believed in. Maybe what we call evil is only as she told me that first day we met, what conflicts with our interests; but maybe there are such realities as ignorance, selfishness, jealousy, malice, criminal carelessness, and maybe these things are evil no mater whose interests they serve or conflict with. good-vs-evil humanity life nature Wallace Stegner
3b692b9 What a lucky girl you are to have this opportunity to live in one of the world's great cities at this most fascinating point in its long, rich history, they had said. Little Becky had known enough not to ask if there was going to be a Banana Republic or a Gap there, or a Tower Records or a Starbucks or a Tweeters or a Blockbuster or a Super CVS or a Saks. Her mother only mentioned museums and concert halls and churches and architecture, so Little Becky was quite sure there was no room left in Prague for anything good to be built. life Nancy Clark
983b6ca I earned a mater's degree in journalism and took the first job offered, as a sports writer. Instead of chasing my own fame, I wrote about famous athletes chasing theirs. fame job journalism life work writer Mitch Albom
afa5dd7 You can let yourself off the hook anytime you want, Liz. That's the divine contract of a little something we call free will. life Elizabeth Gilbert
27cb9dc But as we all know, rock 'n' roll will never die, and education too, as Henry Adams always sez, keeps going on forever. henry-adams introduction life rock-and-roll slow-learner slow-learner-early-stories thomas-pynchon Thomas Pynchon
e2270bb Fracture lines etch the surface of the glass box as if a body fell from the sky and landed on it. He doesn't hear the impact, can't smell the blood. life metaphor poetic poetic-prose reassurance recovery wintergirls Laurie Halse Anderson
114f533 I needed to make choices for me, whoever I was. I'd say I needed to find myself, if that didn't sound like I was heading into the Himalayas, taking only a backpack stuffed with angst and clean underwear life sarcastic Kelley Armstrong
54a4919 "Each time we talk, he listens to me ramble, then he tries to pass on some sort of life lesson. He warns me that money is not the most important thing, contrary to the popular view on campus. He tells me I need to be "fully human." He speaks of the alienation of youth and the need for "connectedness" with the society around me." connect human lesson life money ramble society talk youth Mitch Albom
aed71e8 Cecilia had unleashed her blood in the bath, Amy Schraff said, because the ancient Romans had done that when life became unbearable, and she thought when Dominic heard about it, on the highway, amid the cactus, he would realize that it was she who loved him. jeffrey-eugenides life suicide the-virgin-suicides unbearable Jeffrey Eugenides
96b2e45 Life is sacrifice and risk taking, and nothing that doesn't entail some moderate amount of the former, under the constraint of satisfying the latter, is close to what we can call life. If you do not undertake a risk of real harm, reparable or even potentially irreparable, from an adventure, it is not an adventure. harm life risk risk-taking sacrifice Nassim Nicholas Taleb
ae9533f When you change the way you see and interpret events, suddenly everything will be different for you. Everything will make sense. chris-prentiss inspiration inspirational life passages-malibu passages-ventura perspective philosophy Chris Prentiss
96a9d67 I've spent so much time these last years wondering what I'm supposed to be. A wife? A lover? A celibate? An Italian? A glutton? A traveler? An artist? A Yogi? But I'm not any of these things, at least not completely. And I'm not Crazy Aunt Liz, either. I'm just a slippery antevasin - betwixt and between - a student on the ever-shifting border near the wonderful, scary forest of the new. life Elizabeth Gilbert
f355345 Sometimes I think that just as trains and carriages are means of locomotion to get us from one place to another on this earth, so typhoid and consumption are means of locomotion to get us from one world to another. life locomotion van-gogh Irving Stone
7a63a1b I am already living, but something is telling me with unchallengeable authority: you are not living properly. The numinous authority of form enjoys the prerogative of being able to tell me 'You must'. It is the authority of a different life in this life. This authority touches on a subtle insufficiency within me that is older and freer than sin; it is my innermost not-yet. In my most conscious moment, I am affected by the absolute objection to my status quo: my change is the one thing that is necessary. If you do indeed subsequently change your life, what you are doing is no different from what you desire with your whole will as soon as you feel how a vertical tension that is valid for you unhinges your life. life not-yet status-quo will Peter Sloterdijk
eae2cd9 "Zen is a journey of exploration and a way of living that, in and of itself, does not belong to any one religion or tradition. It is about experiencing life in the here and now and about removing the dualistic distinctions between "I" and "you" between "subject" and "objective", between our spiritual and our ordinary, everyday activities." chris-prentiss happiness inspiration life philosophy zen zen-and-the-art-of-happiness Chris Prentiss
7aa17fc But that I should have ended up in a place like this seems too custom-made a nightmare to be the work of mere ill fortune. ill-fortune life Zoë Heller
bb2d62d Here had lived an elder race, to which we look back with disquietude. The country which we visit at week-ends was really a home to it, and the graver sides of life, the deaths, the partings, the yearnings for love, have their deepest expression in the heart of the fields. countryside death e-m-forster howards-end life love parting E.M. Forster
f3f43a2 "Morrie closed his eyes. "I know, Mitch. You mustn't be afraid of my dying. I've had a good life, and we all know it's going to happen. I maybe have four or five months." dying good ill life live months Mitch Albom
56857cf I would recommend a solo flight to all prospective suicides. It tends to make clear the issue of whether one enjoys being alive or not. flying life suicide T.H. White
316a08c "One by one, the thoughts and memories of sadness raised their hands, stood up to identify themselves. I looked at each thought, at each unit of sorrow, and I acknowledged its existence and felt (without trying to protect myself from it) its horrible pain. And then I would tell that sorrow, "It's OK. I love you. I accept you. Come into my heart now. It's over."..." life pain sadness Elizabeth Gilbert
5751545 Adulthood's full of ghosts... High-functioning sleepwalkers, essentially. life sleep Emily St. John Mandel
eb440ac The search for contentment is, therefore, not merely a self-preserving and self-benefiting act, but also a generous gift to the world. Clearing out all your misery gets you out of the way. You cease being an obstacle, not only to yourself but to anyone else. Only then are you free to serve and enjoy other people. happiness life people Elizabeth Gilbert
01e1e07 "Old Korean adage, "Even jade has flaws." Or, in other words: Nothing in life is ever perfect." flaws jade korean-quote life perfection perfection-seeking Alan Brennert
94c234f Like life, games were governed by rules. But unlike life, games were utterly defined by those rules. The rules were the game, and if one played by different rules, then one simply played a different game. Since a fixed framework of rules determined the meaning of every move as a move, games possessed a clarity that made life seen like a drunken brawl by comparison. The proprieties were indubitable, the permutations secure; only the outcome was shrouded. life rules R. Scott Bakker
57b9801 How do we teach a child--our own, or those in a classroom--to have compassion: to allow people to be different; to understand that like is not equal; to experiment; to laugh; to love; to accept the fact that the most important questions a human being can ask do not have--or need--answers. children compassion difference growing-up life teaching Madeleine L'Engle
943d776 It is not so important, what happens to the body. I have led in some ways a blessed life. God has been good and not tested me. Now he does I cannot fail him. I have been vigilant over my heart, and I have not always liked what I have found there. If it comes into the hands of the hangman at the last, so be it. It will be in God's hands soon enough. life Hilary Mantel
c9831d7 Don't you think it's better to continue reading than to just close the book? close death life reading Rebecca McNutt
ba13855 "Look to the east," she said, "for always, while the light dies in the west, there is the promise of rebirth from the east." hope life rebirth Marion Zimmer Bradley
9347a7e Death is not in the nature of things; it is the nature of things. life nature John Fowles
590300b This life you cry up so much is what I wanted to extinguish by suicide, whereas my dream, my dream--oh, it has revealed to me a great, new, regenerated intensity of life! life revelation suicide Fyodor Dostoyevsky
eb7a484 It is time someone put in a good word for the petite bourgeoise. Unlike the working class and capitalists, who have never lack for spokespersons, the petite bourgeoise rarely, if ever, speaks for itself. freedom life petite-bourgeoise trade-unions work James C. Scott
ba0cd01 At least until there are new lakes in the clouds that open upon living cities as yet unknown, and perhaps forever, that is a question which you must answer within your own heart. heart life winter Mark Helprin
597ca16 If nothing else, school teaches that there is an answer to every question; only in the real world do young people discover that many aspects of life are uncertain, mysterious, and even unknowable. If you have a chance to play in nature, if you are sprayed by a beetle, if the color of a butterfly's wing comes off on your fingers, if you watch a caterpillar spin its cocoon-- you come away with a sense of mystery and uncertainty. The more you watch, the more mysterious the natural world becomes, and the more you realize how little you know. Along with its beauty, you may also come to experience its fecundity, its wastefulness, aggressiveness, ruthlessness, parasitism, and its violence. These qualities are not well-conveyed in textbooks. books insects knowledge learning life nature plants school Michael Crichton
92a5349 grace is a small white butterfly, and life is a semi trailer careening up 101. life Anne Lamott
3cf9a17 "All we can do about this nightmare we live in is to create, if we are very lucky, a few islands of love and trust to sustain us and help us forget. But love dies while the lovers go on living, and Woolrich excels at making us watch while relationships corrode. He knew the horrors that both love and lovelessness can breed, yet he created very few irredeemably evil characters; for with whoever loves or needs love, Woolrich identifies, all of that person's dark side notwithstanding. ("Introduction")" crime-fiction life noir noir-fiction Francis M. Nevins
ad2bdf3 To pick a modern image we once heard, but can't remember where: life is like driving a car with its front window opaque. All you have to go by are your rearview mirrors. life Amos Oz
478401c You think this is living? This is eating, nothing else. life living Peter S. Beagle
59dd835 Stress and anxiety cause our brains to release chemicals that put lines in our faces and tear us down emotionally and spiritually. inspiration life passages-malibu passages-ventura positive-thinking stress Chris Prentiss
acfd3d5 I can pretend it's all pretend! I can be the life of your death and you can be the death of my life... what a trade-off! life pretend sad trade trade-off vow Rebecca McNutt
090584d There are things we do automatically, our body, acting on its own, avoids inconvenience whenever possible, that is why we sleep on the eve of battle or execution, and why ultimately we die when we can no longer bear the harsh light of existence. existence life sleep José Saramago
47a2f20 Life is short, nature is hostile, and man is ridiculous; but oddly enough most misfortunes have their compensations, and with a certain humour and a good deal of horse-sense one can make a fairly good job of what is after all a matter of very small consequence. life man W. Somerset Maugham
5a522e8 But, Henry, this is wicked!' But, Adam, the world is wicked. Maoris prey on Moriori, Whites prey on darker-hued cousins, fleas prey on mice, cats prey on rats, Christians on infidels, first mates on cabin boys, Death on the Living. 'The weak are meat, the strong do eat. humanity life David Mitchell
c97585c L'amore per un figlio non puo essere libero: sin dai primi segni di movimento nell'utero germoglia in noi una devozione tanto potente quanto viscerale, irresistibile come l'atto stesso della nascita. Ma, per quanto potente esso sia, si tratta pur sempre di un amore fatto di controllo; si diventa guardiani, protettori, custodi: c'e tantissima passione in questo, certo, ma mai abbandono. Avevo sempre, sempre dovuto bilanciare la compassione con la saggezza, l'amore con il giudizio, l'umanita con l'inflessibilita. Solo a Jamie avevo dato tutto cio che possedevo, rischiando tutto. Avevo gettato al vento cautela, giudizio e saggezza, insieme ai piaceri e alle limitazioni di una carriera duramente conquistata. Gli avevo portato in dono nient'altro che me stessa, non ero stata altro che me stessa con lui, donandomi anima e corpo, e avevo lasciato che mi vedesse nuda, confidando che mi avrebbe amata tutta intera, comprese le mie fragilita, perche un tempo era stato cosi. jamie-fraser life love Diana Gabaldon
5ab8465 Quien no lleva dentro un lobo no tiene por eso que ser feliz tampoco. hermann hesse life lobo lone loner soledad vida wolf Hermann Hesse
145e12f There has always been a 'and this is where I come in' feeling about a night call. And as my lights swept the cobbles of the deserted market place it was there again, a sense of returning to fundamentals, of really being me. calling career life profession vet James Herriot
7897d5d "In quel preciso momento, Karla e entrata nella stanza. Ha spento la televisione, ha guardato Todd fisso negli occhi e ha detto: "Todd, tu esisti non soltanto come membro di una famiglia o di una compagnia o di una nazione, ma come membro di una ... sei un essere umano. Sei parte dell' . Attualmente la nostra specie ha problemi profondi e stiamo cercando di sognare un modo per uscirne e stiamo usando i computer per cavarcela. La costruzione di hardware e software e il campo in cui la specie ha deciso di investire energie per la sua sopravvivenza e questa costruzione richiede zone di pace, bambini nati dalla pace, e l'assenza di distrazioni che interferiscano col codice. Non possiamo acquisire conoscenza attraverso l'informatica, ma a usarla per tenerci fuori dalla merda. Quello che tu percepisci come un vuoto e un paradiso terrestre: alla lettera, linea per linea, la liberta di impedire all'umanita di diventare non lineare". Si e seduta sul divano e c'era il rumore della pioggia che tamburellava sul soffitto e mi sono reso conto del fatto che non c'era abbastanza luce nella stanza e che noi eravamo tutti in silenzio. Karla ha detto: "Abbiamo avuto una vita discreta. Nessuno di noi, a quanto mi risulta, e mai stato maltrattato. Non abbiamo mai desiderato niente, ne abbiamo mai voluto possedere qualcosa. I nostri genitori sono tutti ancora insieme, a parte quelli di Susan. Ci hanno trattato bene, ma la moralita, qui. Todd consiste nel sapere se le loro mani sono state sprecate in vite non creative, o se queste mani sono utilizzate per portare avanti il sogno dell'umanita". Continuava a piovere. "Non e una coincidenza che come specie abbiamo inventato la classe media. Senza la classe media, non avremmo potuto avere quel particolare tipo di configurazione mentale che contribuisce in misura consistente a sputar fuori i sistemi informatici e la nostra specie non avrebbe mai potuto farcela ad arrivare allo stadio evolutivo successivo, qualunque esso sia. Ci sono buone probabilita che la classe media non rientri neanche nella prossima fase evolutiva. Ma non e ne qui ne la. Che piaccia o no, Todd, tu, io, Dan, Abe, Bug, e Susan... tutti noi siamo fabbricanti del prossimo ciclo Rem del sogno umano. Tutti gli altri ne saranno attratti. Non metterli in discussione, Todd, e non crogiolartici dentro, ma non permettere mai a te stesso di "." life Douglas Coupland
5aeb05c Stress comes from the way you relate to events or situations. life philosophy stress stress-management zen zen-and-the-art-of-happiness Chris Prentiss
5b4fe09 Life is all about chances. It's all about these little moments that add up to greatness. And there are times when you have to grab greatness by the balls and say, 'Hey! Greatness! I've got your nuts and you can't do a single godsdamn thing about it! life taking-chances T.J. Klune
e28638c I see dull people as projects ... to be reformed life people project psychology reform Ben Elton
abe1b96 Don Ricardo wanted a successor worthy of himself. Jorge would always be cocooned in the privileges of his class, hiding from his mediocrity in creature comforts. Penelope, the beautiful Penelope, was a woman, and therefore a treasure, not a treasurer. Julian, who had the soul of a poet, and therefore the soul of a murderer, fulfilled all the requirements. It was only a question of time. life poetic Carlos Ruiz Zafón
abdddea "You have to live each hour as if it's your last," she said, "and each day as if you were immortal. When my father grew ill, he had so many regrets. There were so many things he wished he'd done, he told me. He'd always assumed he had more time. That's something I've always carried with me. Why on earth do you think I decided to attempt the flute at such an advanced age? Everyone told me I was too old, that to be truly good at it I had to have started as a child. But that's not the point, really. I don't need to be truly good. I just need to enjoy it for myself. And I need to know I tried." life regrets trying Julia Quinn
79ecfbd There are lot of things we don't want to know about the people we love. fight life love women Chuck Palahniuk
d54bdd0 In a strange way, I envied the quality of Morrie's time even as I lamented its diminishing supply. Why did we bother with all the distractions we did? life wasted-time Mitch Albom
908bc25 Eddie admitted that some of his life he'd spent hiding from God, and the rest of the time he thought he went unnoticed. life Mitch Albom
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