Shane Koyczan Quotes & Sayings

I guess initially I was amazed that somebody would see something within my work that they could really relate to, but the more it's happened, the more people have come forward, I've really realized that we're all kind of going through the same thing at the same time. — Shane Koyczan

Effort is the siamese twin of success — Shane Koyczan

Beethoven
his thoughts moving at
the speed of sound
transforming emotion into music
and for a moment
it was like joy
was a tangible thing
like you could touch it
like for the first time
we could watch love and
hate dance together
in a waltz of such precision and beauty
that we finally understood
the history wasn't important
to know the man
all we ever had to do was
listen. — Shane Koyczan

If you can't see anything beautiful about yourself, get a better mirror. — Shane Koyczan

The truth is there's not enough miracles to go around, kid. And there's too many people petitioning God for the winning lotto ticket. And for every answered prayer, there's a cricket with arthritis. And the only reason we can't find answers is because the search party didn't invite us. — Shane Koyczan

I don't want to turn any of this into poetry / but / you're so beautiful / flowers turn their heads to smell you — Shane Koyczan

That's what we were told - stand up for yourself. But that's hard to do if you don't know who you are. — Shane Koyczan

Having seen TED from a distance, I always thought if ever there was a place for someone like me, the outcasts, people who maintained who they are despite being told what they were, it was TED. — Shane Koyczan

It's not magic. I remember because I make comparisons. Not in terms of better or worse, just different. And not all of these memories are great, but they're mine.
Which lends way to believe, that none of our lives are put together on an assembly line. We're not pre-packaged with memories or programmed with stories. We have to make our own. — Shane Koyczan

How can you hold your ground when everyone around you is trying to bury you beneath it? — Shane Koyczan

I accept any challenge, so challenge me — Shane Koyczan

We grew up learning to cheer on the underdog because we see ourselves in them. — Shane Koyczan

Everything she meant to say was
you've given a worth and happiness to my life
that I had no right to believe could ever exist — Shane Koyczan

Everyone knows pain. We are not meant to carry it forever. We were never meant to hold it so closely, so be certain in the belief that what pain belongs to now will belong soon to then. That when someone asks you how was your day, realize that for some of us - it's the only way we know how to say, be calm. Loosen your grip, opening each palm, slowly now - let go. — Shane Koyczan

I hid my heart under my bed because my mother said if you're not careful someday somebody's going to break it. Take it from me, under the bed is not a good hiding spot. — Shane Koyczan

When something's painful, you just avoid it. Why bother dredging up the past if it's nothing but bad stuff? — Shane Koyczan

A question like "do you love me?" was an itch our doctors told us not to scratch. — Shane Koyczan

We somehow must become what we are not, sacrificing what we are, to inherit the masquerade of what we will be. — Shane Koyczan

My heart is a protest that I let rally against my ribs. — Shane Koyczan

I sit before flowers
hoping they will train me in the art
of opening up
I stand on mountain tops believing
that avalanches will teach me to let go
I know
nothing
but I am here to learn. — Shane Koyczan

I have loved this life. I smile because I have tiny dreams that play hopscotch at the corners of my mouth. And every time I breathe they float, every time I laugh, they fly kites. — Shane Koyczan

Please, sit in my sky and let me polish your shine. — Shane Koyczan

Scrape the grey sky clean. Realize every grey cloud is a smoke screen to blind us from the truth, and the truth is whether we see them or not the sun and moon are still there, and always there is light. — Shane Koyczan

I'm not the only kid who grew up this way. Surrounded by people who used to say that rhyme about sticks and stones. As if broken bones hurt more than the names we got called, and we got called them all. So we grew up believing no one would ever fall in love with us. That we'd be lonely forever. That we'd never meet someone to make us feel like the sun was something they built for us in their tool shed. So broken heart strings bled the blues as we tried to empty ourselves so we would feel nothing. Don't tell me that hurts less than a broken bone. — Shane Koyczan

And you are worth the time it takes to take the time to get to know you. We've managed to muttle through the awkward stage of i like you and you like me, but when we both finally said 'yes' life became a multiple choice test, not knowing anything we became each others best guess. and, holding your hand is less like exploration and more like discovery. lady, i don't have to study you to be sure. you're the choice i made before i knew what the other choices were — Shane Koyczan

I make a good living doing what I do. — Shane Koyczan

I will not stop. I will not slow down. I will not pull over to ask for directions. I will build the road that takes me where I want to be and I will drive, drive, drive. I will drive until the vehicle around me breaks down, falls apart and tumbles into useless debris ... and then I will walk. — Shane Koyczan

When I was a kid, I used to think pork chops and karate chops were the same thing. — Shane Koyczan

You better dust off your etiquette, better sit like you did back at whatever grade that made it clear to you that your teachers are not your parents, and that any mess you made remains your responsibility. — Shane Koyczan

When I was a kid, I was fascinated by space
And I learnt that time slows near a black hole.
Inside a black hole, time stops altogether.
Whether or not this theory will ever be proved,
I'm moved to believe this would be the perfect place to love someone. — Shane Koyczan

We don't always get the answers we want, sometimes a simple look can haunt us enough to know some ghosts need their rest. — Shane Koyczan

I remember how my grandmother tried to explain our world to me she told me a story she said the ground and the sky love each other but they don't have arms so rain is how they hold one another. — Shane Koyczan

She tells me about dreams. She says my dreams are helium and balloons, and I've made the mistake of letting go a few to many times, but I still got this one. Tied around my finger like a wedding ring because even though I don't believe in marriages, I'm gonna bring this one home. — Shane Koyczan

To discover the thing you're brilliant at you first have to endure realizing all the things you're average at. — Shane Koyczan

Don't tell me that [broken heartstrings] hurt less than a broken bone, that an ingrown life is something surgeons can cut away, that there's no way for it to metastasize - it does. — Shane Koyczan

Someone once told me that the finer points of devotion are about the size of a pinhole, and there are millions of them. And if you could connect each dot, then you've got a diagram of what you think you thought you knew, and if you're willing to admit that you know nothing ... you have the blueprint for a breakthrough. — Shane Koyczan

We used to stay inside for recess
because outside was worse — Shane Koyczan

I do my best impression of a pen
and when every problem looks like a page
I commit ink to paper — Shane Koyczan

I got bullied a lot when I was a kid, and because of that I thought for the most part that I didn't really have a childhood - I had to grow up so quick and there was no real enjoyment in that for me. — Shane Koyczan

If your heart is broken, make art with the pieces.
[Blueprint for a Breakthrough (2013)] — Shane Koyczan

If you think for one second no one knows what you've been going through; be accepting of the fact that you are wrong, that the long drawn and heavy breaths of despair have at times been felt by everyone - that pain is part of the human condition and that alone makes you a legion. — Shane Koyczan

But we are more than genteel or civilized/ we are an idea in the process of being realized. — Shane Koyczan

Opera is the original marriage of words and music, and there's a theatre element, a dramatic element. It's right up my alley. — Shane Koyczan

You see, the deaf have an intimacy with silence. It's there in their dreams. — Shane Koyczan

Don't let your luggage define your travels, each life unravels differently. — Shane Koyczan

And what I said was I'll miss you,
What I meant to say was that I love you,
What I wanted to say was that I meant what I said
I miss you like I miss my own bed
after too many nights of sleeping on couches
or hardwood floors
Or sitting silently behind the doors
Of hotel rooms became wounds
Breathing life in to this loneliness
I miss you
Like a burn victim must miss their own skin
I miss you like a sad ending
Must miss someplace new to begin
Because some say that the highway becomes a flat line
if you travel it for too long
I can't tell if that's true or false,
But I'm racing down it towards you trying to find my
Pulse. — Shane Koyczan

Sometimes becoming drug free has less to do with addiction and more to do with sanity. — Shane Koyczan

Don't tell me you're not beautiful. You're the kind of beautiful the blind would see if we could figure out some way to give them three seconds of sight. — Shane Koyczan

I've been told that people in the army do more by 7:00 am than I do in an entire day But if I wake at 6:59 am and turn to you to trace the outline of your lips with mine I will have done enough and killed no one in the process. — Shane Koyczan

I smile because there are tiny dreams that play hopscotch at the corners of my mouth, and every time I breathe they float and every time I laugh they fly kites. — Shane Koyczan

We're all shipwrecked on this idea that everything has to be explained. — Shane Koyczan

What I said was
I'll miss you
what I meant to say was
I love you
what I wanted to say was
that I meant what I said
and it's funny
how all those things I
could have said
flooded my head after we said goodbye
and I should have told you
I'd be willing to hold you
until my flesh crumbles into bone
because I'm willing to die alone
but god knows I don't want to live that way. — Shane Koyczan

Maybe the best we can hope for is that those we leave behind find comfort in knowing, that we're born out of love, and not science. That biology explains the how, but love explains the why — Shane Koyczan

We are graduating members from the class of we made it, not the faded echoes of voices crying out names will never hurt me. Of course they did. But our lives will ever always continue to be a balancing act that has less to do with pain and more to do with beauty. — Shane Koyczan

We so seldom understand each other. But if understanding is neither here nor there, and the universe is infinite, then understand that no matter where we go we will always be smack dab in the middle of nowhere. All we can do is share some piece of ourselves, and hope that it's remembered. Hope that we meant something to someone — Shane Koyczan

So if anyone ever tells you:
You're not good enough!
You're not smart enough!
Give up your foolish dream!
If anyone ever tells you to quit,
You got to make them wear a diaper on their mouth
Because, man, they're just talking shit. — Shane Koyczan

And if you can't see anything beautiful about yourself
get a better mirror
look a little closer
stare a little longer
because there's something inside you
that made you keep trying
despite everyone who told you to quit
you built a cast around your broken heart
and signed it yourself
you signed it
they were wrong — Shane Koyczan

Bullying, to me, starts very small around the kindergarten age where the first thing we learn is to call each other names. Something so small can be so long lasting in someone's life. — Shane Koyczan

I think everybody gets bullied in their own way. Even athletes probably get it from their parents. To a degree everybody gets bullied. — Shane Koyczan

Scrape the grey sky clean, realize that every dark cloud is a smokescreen meant to blind us from the truth — Shane Koyczan

My experiences with violence in schools still echo throughout my life but standing to face the problem has helped me in immeasurable ways, — Shane Koyczan

I accept that today may be imperfect ... I accept that I may be as well. What I don't accept is that imperfection should be the crutch I use to excuse myself from participating in joy. — Shane Koyczan

There's 6.5 billion people curled up like fists protesting death, but every breath we take has to be given back; a nine year old boy taught me that. — Shane Koyczan

Look at an avalanche, and see that we are at our most powerful when we let go. Look at a flower, and see that we are at our most beautiful when we open up. — Shane Koyczan

Getting over it/ just means getting around it/ and sometimes/ you gotta go through it/ leave it torn and blasted apart — Shane Koyczan

We come from the mentality, that rarely sees the horror in symmetry or the beauty in non-conformity — Shane Koyczan

So men and women were born into workers
Because ideas like
Right and wrong
Get outweighed by need
Anytime you've got mouths to feed. — Shane Koyczan

I will love myself despite the ease with which I lean toward the opposite. — Shane Koyczan

This is my voice. There are many like it, but this one is mine. — Shane Koyczan

For me, poetry was ... the fastest way to express what I was feeling, what I was going through. — Shane Koyczan

I've been shot down so many times I get altitude sickness just from standing up for myself. — Shane Koyczan

It's not about putting forth the questions, it's about accepting the answers we ask for. — Shane Koyczan

The tiniest dream that you make happen is worth more than the biggest dream that you never attempt. — Shane Koyczan

We wear our lives
Like costumes
Use bills and coins like props
In an over budget production
That we cannot seem to stop
So it just goes on like this
As if we accept this
As if we've all become
Buddhas of mass production
Our brains rotting
Like teeth
Under the sweet
Unending bliss of false enlightenment. — Shane Koyczan

For me, growing up and going to school and not seeing any anti-bullying posters and not hearing people talk about bullying was very desolate. — Shane Koyczan

Look directly into every mirror. Realize our reflection is the first sentence to a story, and our story starts: We were here. — Shane Koyczan