Almost Given Up Quotes & Sayings

the real stars - the ones who made it all the way up to that peak where they've been granted by adoring fans an almost godlike status - have always been special in some way, blessed with dazzling gifts and/or beauty, both talented and given to hard work. — Nancy Jo Sales

Every year, hundreds of thousands of people try their hand at this demanding profession (humor columnist). After a few months, almost all of them have given up and gone back to the ninth grade. — Dave Barry

Despite having known him for almost a year, there were a lot of things I still didn't know about Zachary Goode. Like how soap and shampoo could smell so much better on him than anyone else. Like where he went when he wasn't mysteriously showing up at random (and frequently dangerous) points in my life. And, most of all, I didn't know how, when he mentioned the jacket, he made me think about the sweet, romantic part of the night last November when he'd given it to me, and not the terrible, bloody, international-terrorists-are-trying-to-kidnap-me part that came right after — Ally Carter

I am almost ashamed to answer,' she said. 'As I have said before, Emily
Fox-Seton has become the lodestar of my existence. I cannot live without
her. She has walked over to Maundell to make sure that we do not have a
dinner-party without fish to-night.'
'She has _walked_ over to Maundell,' said Lord Walderhurst
'after
yesterday?'
'There was not a pair of wheels left in the stable,' answered Lady
Maria. 'It is disgraceful, of course, but she is a splendid walker, and
she said she was not too tired to do it. It is the kind of thing she
ought to be given the Victoria Cross for
saving one from a dinner-party
without fish.'
The Marquis of Walderhurst took up the cord of his monocle and fixed the
glass rigidly in his eye.
'It is not only four miles to Maundell,' he remarked, staring at the
table-cloth, not at Lady Maria, 'but it is four miles back. — Frances Hodgson Burnett

Unfortunately, the world has taken some of the greatest minds God has given us and locked them up in cages. Most very brilliant or creative people seem strange to ordinary people. Geniuses are almost always outcasts. The intelligent are bullied on the playground. They see the world differently and are shunned for it. They nearly all turn out to be lonely at the least, locked up at the worst. It's human nature to encourage the status quo and shun those who see life differently. — Ted Dekker

Almost all genius up to now was one-sided - the result of a sickly constitution. One type had too much sense of the external, the other too much inner sense. Seldom could nature achieve a balance between the two - a complete constitution of genius. Often a perfect proportion arose by chance, but this could never endure because it was not comprehended and fixed by the spirit - they remained fortunate moments. The first genius that penetrated itself found here the exemplary germ of an immeasurable world. It made a discovery which must have been the most remarkable in the history of the world - for with it there begins a whole new epoch for humanity - and true history of all kinds becomes possible for the first time at this stage - for the way that had been traversed hitherto now makes up a proper whole that can be entirely elucidated. That point outside the world is given, and now Archimedes can fulfill his promise. — Novalis

He had a feeling that somewhere in the course of her life something had happened to her, something terrible which in the end had given her a great understanding and clarity of mind. He knew, too, almost at once, on the day she had driven up to the door of the cottage, that she had made a discovery about life which he himself had made long since . . . that there is nothing of such force as the power of a person content merely to be himself, nothing so invincible as the power of simple honesty, nothing so successful as the life of one who runs alone. Somewhere she had learned all this. She was like a woman to whom nothing could ever again happen. — Louis Bromfield

The humans aren't stupid, no matter what the purebloods say; they're just blind, and sometimes, that's worse. They put their fear in stories and songs, where they won't forget it. "Up the airy mountains and down the rushy glen, I dare not go a-hunting for fear of little men." We've given them plenty of reasons to fear us. Even if they've almost forgotten - even if they only remember that we were beautiful and not why they were afraid - the fear was there before anything else. There were reasons for the burning times; there's a reason the fairy tales survive. And there's a reason the human world doesn't want to see the old days come again. — Seanan McGuire

The goal - at least the way I think about entrepreneurship - is you realize one day that you can't really work anyone else. You have to start your won thing. It almost doesn't matter what the thing is. We had six different business plan changes, and then the last one was PayPal.
If that one didn't work out, if we still had the money and the people, obviously we would not have given up. We would have iterated on the business model and done something else. I don't think there was ever clarity as to who we were until we knew it was working. By then, we'd figured out our PR pitch and told everyone what we do and who we are. But between the founding and the actual PayPal, it was just like this tug-of-war where it was like, "We're trying this, this week." Every week you go to investors and say, "We're doing this, exactly this. We're really focused. We're going to be huge." The next week you're like, "That was a lie. — Jessica Livingston

You didn't want to die. Most mortals don't, even if they find themselves in as desolate and soul-destroying a spot as you. Almost all of those who take their own lives wish at the last moment that they hadn't. They see at the end how much they've given up, how precious life is, even when it's treated them like dirt and crushed their dreams. Many think they've passed beyond hope, but they never really have, not until they pass beyond life itself. Alas, that knowledge comes too late for most would-be-suicides and they die with regret. Very few are offered the chance that you have been handed. — Darren Shan

Arthur had almost given up. That is to say, he was not going to give up. He was absolutely not going to give up. Not now. Not ever. But if he had been the sort of person who was going to give up, this was probably the time he would have done it. — Douglas Adams

The other night we talked about literature's elimination of the unessential, so that we are given a concentrated "dose" of life. I said, almost indignantly, "That's the danger of it, it prepares you to live, but at the same time, it exposes you to disappointments because it gives a heightened concept of living, it leaves out the dull or stagnant moments. You, in your books, also have a heightened rhythm, and a sequence of events so packed with excitement that I expected all your life to be delirious, intoxicated."
Literature is an exaggeration, a dramatization, and those who are nourished on it (as I was) are in great danger of trying to approximate an impossible rhythm. Trying to live up to Dostoevskian scenes every day. And between writers there is a straining after extravagance. We incite each other to jazz-up our rhythm. — Anais Nin

In the United States we think we have at our disposal virtually everything - and I emphasize the word "think." We have big houses and cars, good medical treatment, jets, trains and monorails; we have computers, good communications, many comforts and conveniences. But where have they gotten us? We have an abundance of material things, but a successful society produces happy people, and I think we produce more miserable people than almost anyplace on earth. I've traveled all over the world, and I've never seen people who are quite as unhappy as they are in the United States. We have plenty, but we have nothing, and we always want more. In the pursuit of material success as our culture measures it, we have given up everything. We have lost the capacity to produce people who are joyful. The pursuit of the material has become our reason for living, not enjoyment of living itself. — Marlon Brando

If she moved her head all the way up against the wall and tilted it to the left she could just see the edge of the moon through the bars. Just a silver sliver, almost close enough to eat. A sliver of cheese, a sliver of cake, a cup of tea to be polite. Someone had given her a cup of tea once, someone with blue-green eyes and long ears. Funny how she couldn't remember his face, though. All that part was hazy, her memory of him wrapped in smoke but for the eyes and ears. And the ears were long and furry. — Christina Henry

Those who are to follow the arts should have a training in what is called poverty. Given a comfortable middle-class start in life, the artist is almost sure to end up by becoming a bellyacher, constantly complaining because the public does not rush forward at once to proclaim him. — Sherwood Anderson

We in this room have no private properties. Perhaps one or two of us may own the homes we live in, or have a dollar or two set aside - but we own nothing that does not contribute directly toward keeping us alive. All that we own is our bodies. And we sell our bodies every day we live. We sell them when we go out in the morning to our jobs and when we labor all day. We are forced to sell at any price, at any time, for any purpose. We are forced to sell our bodies so that we can eat and live. And the price which is given us for this is only enough so that we will have the strength to labor longer for the profits of others. Today we are not put up on platforms and sold at the courthouse square. But we are forced to sell our strength, our time, our souls during almost every hour that we live. We have been freed from one kind of slavery only to be delivered into another. Is this freedom? Are we yet free men? — Carson McCullers

I should say we know that there are many, many other Earths out there. We're almost certain that there will be upwards of a billion Earth-like planets in our galaxy alone, so there is no lack of real estate where life might happen, but what we don't know is how likely it is given the real estate, given a wonderful pristine planet like Earth how likely is it that life will pop up inhabited? We don't know the answer to that. — Paul Davies

A woman with super long platinum blonde hair, a fake tan, injected bubble gum pink lips, and a large boob job came in. Phoebe showed her where to set up in front of us and we all sat patiently.
"Hello, I'm Tandy" I almost rolled my eyes at her name, given her appearance. She placed a case on the coffee table in front of us, opened it, and pulled out rubber penises. I almost shot my drink out of my nose, again. "I will be instructing you on proper blow job technique."
"Oh my God, Phoebe." I shouted at her.
"Yeah," Viola clapped her hands and reached out to be the first to get a rubber practice penis. — Sadie Grubor

Last year in the region where we live part of the year there were violent windstorms, whole forests were leveled, two- and three-hundred-year-old trees torn up by the roots and tossed aside, houses sliced almost in half by the once-sheltering giants flung down through their roofs. Yesterday another storm, powerful but less so, took down no trees. The ground, though, is littered with leaves, as though autumn had arrived, but the leaves are still green, still alive, many torn away in clumps, with the twigs still intact that attached them to their branches. There's something disconsolate about them - the desiccated leaves of autumn always appear to have found the place to which they've been destined, but these don't seem to grasp what's happened to them: they lie on the ground at awkward angles, like things wounded that haven't completely given in to death and don't know yet they must. — C. K. Williams

Aleksander," I whispered. A boy's name, given up. Almost forgotten. — Leigh Bardugo

Be flexible. Be compassionate. Rules can never cure insecurity. Integrity matters. Never try to script what your relationships will look like. Love is abundant. Compatibility matters. You cannot sacrifice your happiness for that of another. Own your own shit. Admit when you fuck up. Forgive when others fuck up. Don't try to find people to stuff into the empty spaces in your life; instead, make spaces for the people in your life. If you need a relationship to complete you, get a dog. It is almost impossible to be loving or compassionate when all you feel is fear of loss. Trust that your partners want to be with you, and that if given the freedom to do anything they please, they will choose to cherish and support you. Most relationship problems can be avoided by good partner selection. Nobody can give you security or self-esteem; you have to build that yourself. — Franklin Veaux

The kings had, however, begun to realize its potential for extending communication, in an almost magical way, beyond what could be accomplished with the spoken word. Writing could perpetually and eternally address an audience on a king's behalf; the words were always there, even when the king was not thinking about them. Given that the population was almost entirely illiterate, such an audience was mostly made up of gods. The statuette of the king's personal god (or sometimes of the king himself), inscribed with the same text as the tablet, could therefore pray continuously in a way that a real person could not. — Amanda H. Podany

In view of the importance of philanthropy in our society, it is surprising that so little attention has been given to it by economic or social theorists. In economic theory, especially, the subject is almost completely ignored. This is not, I think, because economists regard mankind as basically selfish or even because economic man is supposed to act only in his self-interest; it is rather because economics has essentially grown up around the phenomenon of exchange and its theoretical structure rests heavily on this process. — Kenneth E. Boulding

In a set of classic experiments, the psychologist Z. Y. Kuo6 showed that almost all kittens who witness their mother killing and eating a rodent eventually do so themselves. However, when kittens are raised in the same cage with a rat, never seeing any other rat, and never seeing a cat kill a rat, then they almost never kill rats themselves. When kittens have a rat for a littermate and also witness their mothers killing rats outside the cage, about half of them learn to kill - but they tend to kill only the kinds of rat they had seen their mothers kill, and not the kinds that they grew up with. Finally, when kittens are given an electric shock each time they see a rat, they soon learn not to kill rats - indeed, to run in terror from them. — Carl Sagan

The whole day of Bel Tine would be taken up with singing and dancing and feasting, with time out for footraces, and contests in almost everything. Prizes would be given not only in archery, but for the best with the sling, and the quarterstaff. There would be contests at solving riddles and puzzles, at the rope tug, and lifting and tossing weights, prizes for the best singer, the best dancer and the best fiddle player, for the quickest to shear a sheep, even the best at bowls, and at darts. — Robert Jordan

The librarian, whom I had never seen before, presided over the library like a watchdog, one of those poor dogs who are deliberately made vicious by being chained up and given little to eat; ot better, like the old, toothless cobra, pale because of centuries of darkness, who guards the king's treasure in the Jungle Book. Paglietta, poor woman, was little less than a lusus naturae: she was small, without breasts or hips, waxen, wilted, and monstrously myopic; she wore glasses so thick and concave that, looking at her head-on, her eyes, light blue, almost white, seemed very far away, stuck at the back of her cranium. She gave the impression of never having been young, although she was certainly not more than thirty, and of having been born there, in the shadows, in that vague odor of mildew and stale air. — Primo Levi

Stand-up is still my favorite, but the podcast is a close second. It's so fun, and it's given me the opportunity to have three-hour conversations with people I wouldn't have otherwise been able to talk to. When I talked to Maynard Keenan from Tool, I almost couldn't believe it was happening. — Joe Rogan

Still, there was also was something reassuring about working for Commercial, almost hopeful. Like things that were lost could be found again. As we drove away, I always tried to imagine what it would be like to open your door to find something you had given up on. — Sarah Dessen

A month earlier, twenty-six-year-old Zamperini had been one of the greatest runners in the world, expected by many to be the first to break the four-minute mile, one of the most celebrated barriers in sport. Now his Olympian's body had wasted to less than one hundred pounds and his famous legs could no longer lift him. Almost everyone outside of his family had given him up for dead. — Laura Hillenbrand

You cracked up. You were looking at me and laughing.
And I said, What? And you said, I love you.
And we were both completely shocked. Because it was a little premature, surely.
And you said it again, as though you were checking the flavor, and it tasted perfectly right. You said it again, softly, I love you; you were looking right into my heart. You said it again, almost shouting. And you were laughing and it was as though you were so happy you couldn't believe that someone had given you this good thing.
And it was partly that, and it was partly because you were thinking you'd had a premature decision, whereas guys your age were more generally associated with premature ejaculation. As well as inability to speak girl and commitment problems to anything other than games with buttons.
And the best part was when you said, You love me, too. And all I had to do was nod. Because it was true. — Fiona Wood

This was a little joke of John's; he used to say that a regular course of "the Birtwick horseballs" would cure almost any vicious horse; these balls, he said, were made up of patience and gentleness, firmness and petting, one pound of each to be mixed up with half a pint of common sense, and given to the horse every day. — Anna Sewell

Yet anything less ecstatic than the singing of today's widows in Vrindavan would be hard to imagine. At the back, the madwomen are shrieking. In the foreground, the exhausted old widows struggle to keep up with the cantor's pitch, many nodding asleep until given a poke by one of the ashram managers walking up and down the aisles with a stick. It is difficult to think of a sorrier or more pathetic sight. Vrindavan, Krishna's earthly paradise, is today a place of such profound sadness and distress that it almost defies description. — William Dalrymple

I really think I write about everyday life. I don't think I'm quite as odd as others say I am. Life is intrinsically, well, boring and dangerous at the same time. At any given moment the floor may open up. Of course, it almost never does; that's what makes it so boring. — Edward Gorey

I've given up email. Well, almost. At the weekend I set up one of those auto-reply messages, informing my correspondents that I would no longer be checking my emails, and that instead they might like to call or write, as we used to in the olden days. — Tom Hodgkinson

This is the same establishment that all those who want, or rather aspire to, to be literary figures of the century, artists, painters and sculptors want acceptance from and approval. They want to be looked up to. Young and upcoming poets must approach their craft with an almost angelic perspective. So many writers are missing a condensed fusion in their writing, they condescend to their audience, the truth is not spoken in their work, they gabble, their words seem to make a hot fuss on the page. What do they gain? They gain this, simply nothing. Poets must assemble and present their work accordingly to how they see fit and should be careful of advice from other writers and editors. Sometimes there can be too much going on in the words that are meant to be given with the best of intentions. — Abigail George

Few minds are spacious; few even have an empty place in them or can offer some vacant point. Almost all have narrow capacities and are filled by some knowledge that blocks them up. What a torture to talk to filled heads, that allow nothing from the outside to enter them! A good mind, in order to enjoy itself and allow itself to enjoy others, always keeps itself larger than its own thoughts. And in order to do this, these thoughts must be given a pliant form, must be easily folded and unfolded, so that they are capable, finally, of maintaining a natural flexibility.
All those short-sighted minds see clearly within their little ideas and see nothing in those of others; they are like those bad eyes that see from close range what is obscure and cannot perceive what is clear from afar. Night minds, minds of darkness. — Joseph Joubert

Little had changed after independence. Jomo Kenyatta's face hung in a framed portrait in every shop where Queen Elizabeth's had been. Some schools were built, some streets renamed. But educated people are a liability in a dictatorship: all the schools were underfunded, few of them succeeded. A great deal of foreign money was given to the government and most of it ended up in the pockets of politicians, some of whom were assassinated. It is almost impossible to exaggerate the fatness of corrupt African politicians. — Paul Theroux

The room was almost dark, with just flickers of light coming from the logs burning in the hearth. I could just see his shape, sitting in the leather, wing-backed chair, silhouetted by the fire.
"Come here."
His voice was quiet, but with the firmness I had come to expect from him. I moved closer and knelt down in front of him, my naked bottom facing the warmth of the fire. I bent my head downwards and looked at the floor as I had been taught, but he surprised me by lifting up my chin with his hand.
"You look so beautiful."
He bent and kissed me softly on the lips, and I shivered in anticipation. Was it to be pleasure or pain this time? Or perhaps a combination of both, given in the way that only he can. — Rachel De Vine

I was a man who stood in symbolic relations to the art and culture of my age ... The gods had given me almost everything. I had genius, a distinguished name, high social position, brilliancy,intellectual daring; I made art a philosophy, and philosophy an art: I altered the minds of men and the colour of things: there was nothing I said or did that did not make people wonder ... I treated Art as the supreme reality, and life as mere mode of fiction: I awoke the imagination of my century so that it created myth and legend around me: I summed up all systems in a phrase, and all existence in an epigram. — Oscar Wilde

I have an idea about building almost like a studio for some of the best Tropfest filmmakers, so they can come together and support and be given space and resources they need to tell great stories year around, so it's not just about the festivals. You know, the sky's the limit with this thing, and I'm still making it up as I go along. — John Polson

In the civilization of our times, it is normal, and almost obligatory, for cookery and fashion to take up most of the culture sections, for chefs and fashion designers now enjoy the prominence that before was given to scientists, composers and philosophers. Gas burners, stoves and catwalks meld, in the cultural coordinates of our time, with books, laboratories and operas, while TV stars and great footballers exert the sort of influence over habits, taste and fashion that was previously the domain of teachers and thinkers — Mario Vargas-Llosa

We weren't very professional; she could have gone to almost any town and put together a smoother ensemble, but we were pioneers, and professional musicians probably wouldn't have come up with what we did ... professional musicians probably wouldn't have given Janis Joplin the space to be herself, which was probably our greatest gift to her — Sam Andrew

The first day without you is painful in a way that is almost exquisite. I imagine quitting smokers must feel like this, or crash-dieters - the early determination, where the loss of what you have given up is replaced with the adrenaline of denial. — Louise Doughty

For all its amazing strength, our hearts are made of eggshells, and sometimes all it takes is someone you'd almost given up on declaring their love for it to crack wide open — Leisa Rayven

Julia smiled as if he'd given her a present and eagerly sat in it, pulling her legs under herself and curling up like a kitten. Gabriel could swear that he heard her purring. He smiled at the sight of her, momentarily relaxed and almost happy over such a trivial event. — Sylvain Reynard

Inspired men have been raised up, who have given us our form of government, and the code of laws by which we are controlled, the best ever evolved by man, so far as we are able to judge. The Lord has strengthened the arms of the patriots who have defended us against the assaults of all those who have come up against us, and delivered us until today, from those who would have torn us asunder. Against all opposition, I sometimes think almost against ourselves, the Lord has brought us to our present condition, until this nation, like a city set on a hill, has become the light of the world. — Anthony W. Ivins

There was nothing so special about First Class, apart from the amount of uncalled for, almost disturbing, attention I got from the various six-feet tall heavily made up air hostesses, that I would come back for more given the steep price tag. — Vann Chow

Our world today desperately hungers for hope, and yet uncounted people have almost given up. There is despair and hopelessness on every hand. Let us be faithful in proclaiming the hope that is in Jesus! — Billy Graham

Because I've been that drunk person in the club so many thousands of times, when I'm in an environment where people are drunk or on drugs, I certainly don't judge them. Because it's almost a given that for much of my life I've been way more messed up than them. — Moby

I suddenly felt that it was all the same to me whether the world existed or whether there had never been anything at all: I began to feel with all my being that there was nothing existing. At first I fancied that many things had existed in the past, but afterwards I guessed that there never had been anything in the past either, but that it had only seemed so for some reason. Little by little I guessed that there would be nothing in the future either. Then I left off being angry with people and almost ceased to notice them. Indeed this showed itself even in the pettiest trifles: I used, for instance, to knock against people in the street. And not so much from being lost in thought: what had I to think about? I had almost given up thinking by that time; nothing mattered to me. If at least I had solved my problems! Oh, I had not settled one of them, and how many there were! But I gave up caring about anything, and all the problems disappeared. — Fyodor Dostoyevsky

A lot of people who read my novel 'Smog City' ask me why I never killed off either of the two main characters. To be honest, it's because I've given them life. Not literally of course, but since I spent so much time developing and creating my characters, they've ended up with complex personalities, in fact they're almost sentient in a way, and to write them off as dead would be like killing a close friend to me. — Rebecca McNutt

You have worked to build me what I asked for all the days of our lives. Even when the task seemed impossible, even when it would have been easier to give it up, you did not, but kept on going. You have kept me warm in winter, and cool in summer. You have laughed with me, and you have cried. You have given me children who are almost, but not quite, my greatest joy.
For the greatest joy of all is the way you held my wish in the center of your heart thorough all the days of our lives. That is where the room that you have built for me lies. Just as the room I built for you lies within mine. And in this way have all our wishes been granted. Together, we have made ourselves a home. — Cameron Dokey

Remember when I was obsessed with that little Lithuanian restaurant downtown? And it was only ever open when the grumpy old woman ran it felt like opening? I'd stop by every day for a week with no luck. And then, when I'd pretty much given up on ever tasting Napoleonas torte again, I'd drive by and see the open sign in the window.
Well, being with Chris is like trying to date that restaurant. I never know when he's going to be there and how open he'll be to me. Almost never is he all there, all in. Almost never do I get the Chris I got the night of Kiley's wedding
open sign, cold cucumber soup, rouladen, poppy seed kolaches. — Rainbow Rowell

Instead they dream of furniture
Of buying a new hat
Of owning matching silverware
Could you imagine that?

Yes there are places in the world
Where dreams are almost dead
So please my child do keep in mind
Before you go to bed

To dream a dream as big
As big could ever dream to be
Then dream a dream ten times as big
As that one dream you see

Please dream for those who've given up
For those who've never tried
Please use your dream to make new dreams
For all the dreams that died

So when you think your dreaming's done
Just remember what I said
'Close your eyes my child and dream
That perfect dream inside your head. — Dallas Clayton

The wave of pure outrage blindsided me. I shouldn't be here, I thought. This is utterly fucked up. I should have been sitting in a garden down the road, barefoot with a drink in my hand, swapping the day's work stories with Peter and Jamie. I had never thought about this before, and it almost knocked me over: all the things we should have had. We should have stayed up all night together studying and stressing out before exams, Peter and I should have argued over who got to bring Jamie to our first dance and slagged her about how she looked in her dress. We should have come weaving home together, singing and laughing and inconsiderate, after drunken college nights. We could have shared a flat, taken off Interrailing around Europe, gone arm-in-arm through dodgy fashion phases and low-rent gigs and high-drama love affairs. Two of us might have been married by now, given the other one a godchild. I had been robbed blind. — Tana French

Soon, however, she began to reason with herself, and try to be feeling less. Eight years, almost eight years had passed, since all had been given up. How absurd to be resuming the agitation which such an interval had banished into distance and indistinctness! What might not eight years do? Events of every description, changes, alienations, removals,
all, all must be comprised in it; and oblivion of the past
how natural, how certain too! It included nearly a third part of her own life.
Alas! with all her reasonings, she found, that to retentive feelings eight years may be little more than nothing. — Jane Austen