Always Do What You Say You Will Do Quotes & Sayings

People will always try to steal
your power. When you do well, they'll say it's only because you're rich and your parents are big shots. People who care about you will try to steal
your power, too, but they'll go about it differently. When you fail at something, they'll try to make you feel better by saying that nobody's good at
everything, and you shouldn't be so hard on yourself. They might tell you not to feel bad about screwing up a math test because math's hard for girls.
Or they'll say you shouldn't worry so much about injustice in the world because you're only one person. And even though they mean well, they'll be
making you less than what you can be. — Susan Elizabeth Phillips

Dear Tully
I know you won't be able to stand my fucking funeral. You're not the star. I hope you at least had the photos of me airbrushed. There are so many things I should say to you, but in our lifetime we've said them all.
Take care of Johnny and the kids for me, okay? Teach the boys how to be gentlemen and Marah how to be strong. When they're ready, give them my journal and tell them about me when they ask. The truth, too. I want them to know it all.
It's going to be hard on you, now. That's one of the things I regret the most. So, here's what I have to say in my beyond-the-grave letter (very dramatic, don't you think?):
I know you'll be thinking that I left you, but it's not true. All you have to do is remember Firefly Lane, and you'll find me.
There will always be a TullyandKate.
BFF <3
Kate — Kristin Hannah

One of the most important things I learned is forging a rapport with someone at your insurance company. Know their names. You'll eventually get someone who will tell you, "This is how you do an appeal. This is what you need to say in your letter. " You can also always go to the ER to get whatever you need to tide you over for a few days. — Jenny Lawson

I am more than proud to be European. I love Europe, I love France, but I have an American mentality, and I don't know why. The way I see things, the way I talk, I'm the kind of person who, if I want to say something, I will say it - sometimes in Europe, it's not always what you need to do. — Thierry Henry

I am in my mother's room. It's I who live there now. I don't know how I got there. Perhaps in an ambulance, certainly a vehicle of some kind. I was helped. I'd never have got there alone. There's this man who comes every week. Perhaps I got there thanks to him. He says not. He gives me money and takes away the pages. So many pages,so much money. Yes, I work now, a little like I used to, except that I don't know how to work any more. That doesn't matter apparently. What I'd like now is to speak of the things that are left, say my good-byes, finish dying. They don't want that. Yes, there is more than one, apparently. But it's always the same one that comes. You'll do that later, he says. Good. The truth is I haven't much will left. When he comes for the fresh pages he brings back the previous week's. They are marked with signs I don't understand ... Here's my beginning. It must mean something, or they wouldn't keep it. Here it is. — Samuel Beckett

English, strictly speaking, is not my first language by the way. I haven't yet discovered what my first language is so for the time being I use English words in order to say things. I expect I will always have to do it that way; regrettably I don't think my first language can be written down at all. I'm not sure it can be made external you see. I think it has to stay where it is; simmering in the elastic gloom betwixt my flickering organs. — Claire-Louise Bennett

I tried eating vegetarian. I felt like a wimp going into a restaurant. "What do you want to eat sir? Broccoli?" Broccoli's a side dish, folks. Always was, always will be, OK! When they ask me what I want, I say: What do you think I want? This is America. I want a bowl of raw red meat right now. — Denis Leary

I guess I should say a little bit about my method - I really am a fence sitter. I *loathe* Science and am always keen to attack it in most situations, though not here, because I love Reason and I'm perfectly aware of the difference. I also know what a concept means like Rules of Evidence. I'm not sure that's a concept as widely circulated in these circles as it needs to be - in other words, how *do* you tell shit from shinola? That's very critical. I think reason can only take us a certain distance, and then we have to go with the divine imagination, but with all safety systems fully in operation, or the divine imagination will lead us into complete paranoia. — Terence McKenna

One of the unique things about the human brain is that it can do only what it thinks it can do. The minute you say, "My memory isn't what it used to be ... " you are actually training your brain to live up to your diminished expectations.
Low expectations mean low results.
The first rule of super brain is that your brain is always eavesdropping on your thoughts. As it listens, it leans. If you teach it about limitation, your brain will become limited.
But what if you do the opposite? What if you teach your brain to be unlimited? — Deepak Chopra

It is how it has always been. We will accept the legacy of our ancestors,' Asha says, smiling, and in her smile I do not see warmth or wisdom; I see fear.
You're afraid of losing your hold on them,' I say coolly.
I? I have no power.'
Don't you? If you keep them from the magic, they will never know what their lives could be.'
They will remain protected,' Asha insists.
No,' I say. 'Only untested'
-page 569 — Libba Bray

Some may think there is danger of setting too high a standard of action. I have heard teachers contend that a child will learn to write much faster by having an inferior copy, than by imitating one which is comparatively perfect; 'because,' say they, 'a pupil is liable to be discouraged if you give him a perfect copy; but if it is only a little in advance of his own, he will take courage from the belief that he shall soon be able to equal it.' I am fully convinced, however, that this is not so. The more perfect the copy you place before the child, provided it be written, and not engraved, the better. For it must always be possible in the nature of things, for the child to imitate it; and what is not absolutely impossible, every child may reasonably be expected to aspire after, on the principle, that whatever man has done, man may do. — Anonymous

I say, we live on, though I am wrong, this is what I say.
In the past, present, future, we live on as if in one time.
You can never stop the past from happening,
and it has happened , and will continue to happen.
This is the truth, I think I know, along with

the two other things I do know.
I exist.
I want to kiss you.

And also this: each day, as we go,
we will always be as young as we can be. — Derek Keck

Directors are always changing things at the last minute. Actors will do a scene, and the director will say, 'Okay, that was perfect, but this time, Bob, instead of saying "What's for dinner?" you say, "Wait a minute! Benzene is actually a hydrocarbon!" And say it with a Norwegian accent. Also, we think maybe your character should have no arms. — Dave Barry

Exactly, I repeated myself. I believe we do it all the time. We always take up certain elements again. How can it be avoided? An actor's voice always has the same timbre and, consequently, he repeats himself. It is the same for a singer, a painter ... There are always certain things that come back, for they are part of one's personality, of one's style. If these things didn't come into play, a personality would be so complex that it would become impossible to identify it.
It is not my intention to repeat myself, but in my work there should certainly be references to what I have done in the past. Say what you will, but The Trial is the best film I ever made ... I have never been so happy as when I made this film.
(talking about directing, The Trial (1962) - from Orson Welles: Interviews (book)) — Orson Welles

People always say to me
"What do you think you'd like to be
When you grow up?"
And I say, "Why,
I think I'd like to be the sky
Or be a plane or train or mouse
Or maybe a haunted house
Or something furry, rough and wild...
Or maybe I will stay a child. — Karla Kuskin

Carve out the time. Notice I do not say find the time. That is an absurd and dangerous phrase. Time is never lying around waiting for us to find her. She is elusive. She wants you to sculpt her like clay, to mold her into exactly the form you desire your days to take. If you refuse to do that, if you spend your mornings worrying and your afternoons catering to others, always hoping there will be a few minutes left for you, time will play you like a sucker, making you run harder and faster with each passing week. Time wants you to realize that she is the most precious and irreducible fact in your live. Make her into what you will — Jennifer Louden

No matter what you do, you can act your heart out, but people will always say, 'Oh, Julie Adams - 'Creature from the Black Lagoon.' — Julie Adams

We women, me and you. Tell me something real. Don't just say I'm grown and ought to know. I don't. I'm fifty and I don't know nothing. What about it? Do I stay with him? I want to, I think. I want ... well, I didn't always ... now I want. I want some fat in this life."
"Wake up. Fat or lean, you got just one. This is it."
"You don't know either, do you?"
"I know enough to know how to behave."
"Is that it? Is that all it is?"
"Is that all what is?"
"Oh shoot! Where the grown people? Is it us?"
"Oh, Mama." Alice Manfred blurted it out and then covered her mouth.
Violet had the same thought: Mama. Mama? Is this where you got to and couldn't do it no more? The place of shade without trees where you know you are not and never again will be loved by anybody who can choose to do it? Where everything is over but the talking?
- Violet Trace and Alice Manfred — Toni Morrison

Life is like molten glass. It flows, it's flexible, it can be molded and shaped and ... what do you say? Ah, yes. It holds vast potential. You have a number of uncertainties in your melt right now. But they will always be there in one form or another. Always. Unlike molten glass, life can't be fixed or frozen into a pretty vase and placed on a shelf to gather dust. — Maria V. Snyder

By purity we just mean things as they are. When something is added, that is impure. When something becomes dualistic, that is not pure. If you think you will get something from practicing zazen, already you are involved in impure practice. It is all right to say there is practice, and there is enlightenment, but we should not be caught by the statement. You should not be tainted by it. When you practice zazen, just practice zazen. If enlightenment comes, it just comes. We should not attach to the attainment. The true quality of zazen is always there, even if you are not aware of it, so forget all about what you think you may have gained from it. Just do it. The quality of zazen will express itself; then you will have it. — Shunryu Suzuki

Say what you will, dear sister, we do what we do for the promise of our youth. Yet it is always they who scar beneath the points of daggers. — Chris Galford

We say we want revival . . . but on our terms. We don't pray this way, but this is what our hearts are saying to God: "Come Holy Spirit . . . but only if you promise in advance to do things the way we have always done them in our church." "Come Holy Spirit . . . but only if I have some sort of prior guarantee that when you show up you won't embarrass me." "Come Holy Spirit . . . but only if your work of revival is one that I can still control, one that preserves intact the traditions with which I am comfortable." "Come Holy Spirit . . . but only if your work of revival is neat and tidy and dignified and understandable and above all else socially acceptable." "Come Holy Spirit . . . but only if you plan to change others; only if you make them to be like me; only if you convict their hearts so they will live and dress and talk like I do." "Come Holy Spirit . . . but only if you let us preserve our distinctives and retain our differences from others whom we find offensive. — Sam Storms

They always say, doing what I do for a living, write what you know and then people will respond to it. I luckily had a very charming, lovable mom who I think everybody could see bits and pieces of their mom in. All I had to do was write a character that was like my mom, and it made my life easier. — Dan Fogelman

People send me fanmail in the post, and I keep every letter, and I always say I will read every single one. It might take me years and years, but I'll do it. Your audience are what makes you, so you have give as much back as you can. — Zoe Sugg

About the nobles - not just de Cygne, all of them. They don't care. Just remember that. Do what you have to do with them, because they have the power. I don't know if they'll always have it, but they do now, and they'll have it as long as you live, my son. So don't ever go against them. But just remember, no matter what they say, don't ever trust them. Because they don't care about you, and they never will, because you're not one of them. He — Edward Rutherfurd

Rachel drank some more bourbon. "What I am trying to do," she said, "is to
thank you. And to say it as genuinely as I can. I do thank you. I will remember as
long as I live when you came into the room and got me, and I will always
remember when you killed them, and I was glad, and you came and we put our
arms around each other. And I will always remember that you cried. — Robert B. Parker

Second choice always comes as a result of being realistic and lowering your sights. If you want to go through life accepting second best, or worse still, third or fourth, then don't be surprised if you end up feeling unfulfilled with your lot. Set a goal that puts fire in your belly and keep striving until you reach it. Providing you want it badly enough, you will do whatever it takes. ~ "Once you say you're going to settle for second, that's what happens to you in life." - John F. Kennedy ~ — Jack The Crack

Most inspirational writers were born as driftwood and will say they have been beaten against every shoreline during their life. We understand storms. We understand drowning. We understand being devalued. We understand being stranded alone on a beach. God made us this way so we would know where every lighthouse can be found and tell others how to find them. We were never meant to stand on the beach with you because every rescue we do rescues ourselves. We always go back to the sea because that is where driftwood belongs
forever searching for answers to our endless questions and sharing what we learned ... (2012, Writer's Conference) — Shannon L. Alder

Dad phoned to wish us happy anniversary, and I picked up the phone and I was going to play it cool, but then I started crying when I started talking - I was doing the awful chick talk-cry: mwaha-waah-gwwahh-and-waaa-wa - so I had to tell him what happened, and he told me I should open a bottle of wine and wallow in it for a bit. Dad is always a proponent of a good indulgent sulk. Still, Nick will be angry that I told Rand, and of course Rand will do his fatherly thing, pat Nick on the shoulder and say, "Heard you had some emergency drinking to do on your anniversary, Nicky." And chuckle. So Nick will know, and he will be angry with me because he wants my parents to believe he's perfect - he beams when I tell them stories about what a flawless son-in-law he is. Except for tonight. I know, I know, I'm being a girl. — Gillian Flynn

Yes. Just now, I was actually trying to rank 'I love you, I like you, I worship you, I have to have my cock inside you,' in terms of relative sincerity.
Did I day that? he said sounding slightly startled.
Yes. Weren't you listening?
No, he admitted. I meant every word of it though. His hand cupped one buttock, weighing it appreciatively. Still do come to that.
What, even that last one? I laughed and rubbed my forehead gently against his chest, feeling his jaw rest snugly on top of my head.
Oh, aye, he said gathering me firmly against him with a sigh. I will say the flesh requires a bit of supper and a wee rest before I think of doin' it again, but the spirit is always willing. God, ye have the sweetest fat wee bum. Only seeing it makes me want to give it yea again directly. It's lucky ye're wed to a decrepit auld man, Sessenach, or ye'd be on your knees with your arse in the air this minute. — Diana Gabaldon

As long as you're around, your life is too. So just as you shower love and affection and attention on the husbands, wives, parents, children and forever friends who surround you, you have to do so equally with your life, because it's yours, it's you, and it's always there rooting for you, cheering you on, even when you feel like you can't do it. I gave up on my life for a while, but what I've learned is that even when that happens and especially when that happens, life never gives up on you. Mine didn't. And we'll be there for each other until those final moments when we will look at each other and say, 'Thanks for staying until the end.'
And that's the truth. — Cecelia Ahern

Give it your best shot. Go for it. If it's what you really want to do, go for it. Even if you don't make it, you will never look back and have regrets. You can always say, "Hey, I went for it. I tried my hardest. It was an awesome experience." — Carmen Rasmusen

I have found, writing a blog, that being non-opaque is necessary. You pretty much have to say what you know in much more firm terms or risk that the legions who always know more than you do will tell the story better. — Kara Swisher

We begin to say something that cannot be said. When you see on the front page a woman in Iraq who's just seen her husband blown up, you see her there, her mouth wide open, you know the sound coming out of her, a howl of grief and pain
that's the beginning of language.
Trying to express that, it's inexpressible, and poetry is really to say what can't be said. And that's why people turn to it in these moments. They don't know how to say this, [but] part of them feels that maybe a poem will say it. It won't say it, but it'll come closer to saying it than anything else will.
I think there are always two sides, and one of them is the unsayable. The utterly singular. Who you are; who you can never tell anybody. And on the other hand, there is what you can express. How do we know about this thing we talk about? Because we talk about it. We're using words. And the words never say it, but the words are all we have to say it. — W.S. Merwin

When you say you want all peoples to unite, you really mean that you want all peoples to unite to learn the tricks of your people. If the Bedouin Arab does not know how to read, some English missionary or schoolmaster must be sent to teach him to read, but no one ever says, 'This schoolmaster does not know how to ride on a camel; let us pay a Bedouin to teach him.' You say your civilisation will include all talents. Will it? Do you really mean to say that at the moment when the Esquimaux has learnt to vote for a County Council, you will have learnt to spear a walrus? I recur to the example I gave. In Nicaragua we had a way of catching wild horses - by lassooing the fore feet - which was supposed to be the best in South America. If you are going to include all the talents, go and do it. If not, permit me to say what I have always said, that something went from the world when Nicaragua was civilised. — G.K. Chesterton

DO YOU believe," the disciple asked the rabbi, "that God created everything for a purpose?"
"I do," replied the rabbi.
"Well," asked the disciple, "why did God create atheists?"
The rabbi paused before giving an answer, and when he spoke his voice was soft and intense. "Sometimes we who believe, believe too much. We see the cruelty, the suffering, the injustice in the world and we say: 'This is the will of God.' We accept what we should not accept. That is when God sends us atheists to remind us that what passes for religion is not always religion. Sometimes what we accept in the name of God is what we should be fighting against in the name of God."
-Chief Rabbi Emeritus [of the United Synagogues of the British Commonwealth] Jonathan Sacks — Jonathan Sacks

No matter how hard you work at your craft and no matter how successful you become, people just have to find something negative to hang on you. You can be the greatest ever at what you do, and people will still turn on you. Even with all the championships Michael Jordan has won, people say, "Well, he's a great basketball player but he's not socially conscious." The bar is always being raised as you go. The rules are always being rewritten. There's aggravation that comes with that, but that's part of what makes triupmh so swett. — Charles Barkley

The Parable of the Lost Sheep 10"Take heed that you do not despise one of these little ones, for I say to you that in heaven their angels always see the face of My Father who is in heaven. 11"For the Son of Man has come to save that which was lost.a 12"What do you think? If a man has a hundred sheep, and one of them goes astray, does he not leave the ninety-nine and go to the mountains to seek the one that is straying? 13"And if he should find it, assuredly, I say to you, he rejoices more over that sheep than over the ninety-nine that did not go astray. 14"Even so it is not the will of your Father who is in heaven that one of these little ones should perish. — John C. Maxwell

Men always say, "Let's see what you can do." If we always talk and never work we will not accomplish anything. — Belva Ann Lockwood

When I say 'I won't hurt you', it's a promise, which can and will be kept but it does not come from me without a breakdown of what it means.
It does not mean we will never disagree, nor does it mean that you will always like everything which I say or do. It does not mean that you will never hurt yourself by behaving in a way which is damaging to a relationship or by behaving in a way which would ultimately result in my withdrawal from your life. What it does mean is that I can promise all that I expect in terms of loyalty, honor and respect. It means I am faithful. It also means that I will not intentionally or carelessly behave in a way which causes upset or doubt. It means, at the lowest level, 'You will break these terms before I do.'
Communication is essential. Trust is paramount.
Be completely honest and don't make promises that you can't keep, that's all. — Eva Schuette

I don't like the idea of signs and portents. People like to say fate is inescapable, but I believe there's always an escape. We make our own luck,and we do that by bending our will and energy toward what we want. I think that if you look for an omen, you'll find one, and it will tell you exactly what you desire it to, for good or ill. It would have been easy, had I wanted, to think of that tiny, shimmering smudge as some sort of sign, but I didn't need it to be. I didn't need signs. I had myself. — Kat Howard

Where do you find hope, and in what shape or form does it rest?
I say to you now that absolute and genuine hope is found only in Christ Jesus. He is never far way and always within your grasp. He expects you to seek Him, but when you do He is quickly found. Only upon your discovery of Christ will you recognize the desperate condition of your soul, and through glorious and supernatural revelation comprehend that it was this living Hope who graciously discovered and delivered you. — Cheryl Zelenka

Things will get better, right? Isn't that what you always tell the victims - that time heals everything?" "I reckon that's what we say." Emma looked up at him. "You don't think it's true?" Jeremy frowned, his dark eyes troubled. "I don't guess I do. I don't think there's enough time to repair some things. Some things just become part of a person, like their skin color. It doesn't have to define them, but it's always with them. — Jana Deleon

I hope you will be surprised and knowing at once. I hope you'll always have love. I hope you'll always have a good sense of humour. I hope when people ask what you're going to do with your English and/or creative writing degree you'll say: Continue my bookish examination of the contradictions and complexities of human motivation and desire; or maybe just: Carry it with me, as I do everything that matters. — Cheryl Strayed

The Beauty of It If all I have is Now, where will I look for Joy? Without hope for the future, without hope that things will change, with no hope of finding what's been lost, and no hope of restoring the past, with only the risk to crack open all that has hardened about me, what will I do with what I have? At first, this might seem scary or sad, but as a tired swimmer comes ashore surprised to find pearls washing through his legs, I lift my tired head again and again to find all I need is right where I am. But being human, I stray and dream of lives other than my own, and soon I am busy wanting something else, somewhere else, someone else; busy imagining something just out of reach to strive for. It leads me to say if you are unhappy or in pain, nothing will remove these surfaces. But acceptance and a strong heart will crack them like a shell, exposing a softness that has always been, exposing a soft thing waiting to take form. It glows. I think it is the one spirit we all share. — Mark Nepo

Don't worry about whether God is saying 'Yes' or 'No' to your (prayer) request. Don't be downcast when the answer is not in sight. Quick thinking of faith formulas and methods. Just commit every prayer to Jesus and go about your business with confidence that He will not be one moment early or late in answering. And, if the answer you seek is not forthcoming, say to your heart, 'He is all I need. If I need more, He will not withhold it. He will do it in His time, in His way; and, if He does not fulfill my request, He must have a perfect reason for not doing so. No mater what happens, I will always have faith in His faithfulness.' pg. 152. — David Wilkerson

Faith is expectancy. You do not receive what you want; you do not receive what you pray for, not even what you say you have faith in. You will always receive what you actually expect. — Eric Butterworth

Do you remember what I said that first night we moved into our new house? What you asked me to say as my vows? It still stands Tru, it will always stand. My love for you is limitless, it knows no bounds. You're in my veins. I bleed you. I belong to you...I always have and I always will. You will always be my June, Tru. — Samantha Towle

1:145-146
NO SURE SENSE

Say: No one knows the unseen except God (27:65).

With that text I put this question: How do you feel about doing work that brings no benefit to you or anyone? Aren't you always aware of a destination when you walk out your door? Do you ever walk out, look around in all directions, then go back into your house and sit there with no purpose, for no reason?

You often plan work without knowing what will come of it. You plant seeds with no guarantee they will sprout. You enter into a business deal with no sure sense it will make profit. Many do not reach the point they move toward, but that doesn't man they stop trying.

Certainty comes only with work we do in the invisible, but we cannot know that. Journeys taken and seeds planted there never disappoint. The saints and hermits and prophets might be able to give us some of their confidence if we could work along with them. — Bahauddin

I don't want you to go." Waves rocked against the pier. The sun was too bright. Weathered boards creaked beneath Arin's feet.
"Only because you enjoy a good bully. Someone to make you behave as you ought."
"No, Roshar."
"You know well enough what to do now. You'll be fine."
"That's not why."
"Why you'll miss me? I admit that the impending absence of my keen wit would make anyone sad."
"Not exactly."
"Now I'm getting sad, just thinking about how it would feel to be parted from my sweet self. Lucky me: I will always have my own company."
"What you said at the banquet was true."
"Everything I say is true."
"That I love you."
Roshar's face went still. "I said that?"
"You know that you did."
"That was more for the drama of the moment."
"Liar."
"I am, aren't I?" Roshar said slowly. "I really am. Arin." His voice roughened. "You'll see me again."
"Soon," Arin told him, and embraced him. — Marie Rutkoski

I hear Your voice inside me, calling me home. Who will believe in me?

Those who know My voice.

I am not channeling. The word of God is upon my heart.

You have all you need. Stop looking to another. My Word is written within you. Ask and you shall receive. No Voice speaks clearer. Surrender to Me. Do not think what is next. It shall be shown for what it is. Listen to Me. Lest you forget, true wisdom comes only from Source.

Don't be afraid to be alone with yourself. I am here. Listen to Me as I speak clearly your name. Must you always seek to drown Me out? I am here. Hear Me now. I give you rest. Rest in Me, not in what you think. You are more than that. Oh, so much more you are. Listen to Me, listen up My dear. Hear Me clear. My words ring true like a bell. Yes, clear as a bell I speak unto you. Give Me room. Move over. Get out of your way, I say. I speak peace and love unto your heart. — Debra Clemente

Once a King in Narnia, always a King in Narnia. But don't go trying to use the same route twice. Indeed, don't try to get there at all. It'll happen when you're not looking for it. And don't talk too much about it even among yourselves. And don't mention it to anyone else unless you find that they've had adventures of the same sort themselves. What's that? How will you know? Oh, you'll know all right. Odd things, they say-even their looks-will let the secret out. Keep your eyes open. Bless me, what do they teach them at these schools.
-The Professor — C.S. Lewis

It's true,' Elena said, 'that my own need for provocation is something other people seem to find very difficult to understand. Yet to me it has always made perfect sense. But I do admit that it has brought nearly all of my relationships to an end, because it is inevitable that that end is also - as you say, by the same logic - something I will feel driven to provoke. If the relationship is going to end, in other words, I want to know it and confront it as soon as possible. Sometimes,' she said, 'this process is so quick that the relationship is over almost as soon as it has begun. Very often I have felt that my relationships have had no story, and the reason is because I have jumped ahead of myself, the way I used to turn the pages of a book to find out what happens in the final chapter. I want to know everything straight away. I want to know the content without living through the time span. — Rachel Cusk

A discussion between Haldane and a friend began to take a predictable turn. The friend said with a sigh, 'It's no use going on. I know what you will say next, and I know what you will do next.' The distinguished scientist promptly sat down on the floor, turned two back somersaults, and returned to his seat. 'There,' he said with a smile. 'That's to prove that you're not always right.' — John B. S. Haldane

Well, of course, you can't expect people to rearrange their minds in five minutes. And I'm not good at this. And I don't want to do it. It's a bore, anyway. Unfortunately I know what will happen if I keep on; I'll say that if we are going to talk about these things, let us please talk about them seriously and our fake Britisher will say that he always takes pretty girls seriously and then I'll say I don't you cut off your testicles and shove them down your throat? and then I'll lose my job and then I'll commit suicide. I once hit a man with a book but that was at a feminist meeting and anyway I didn't hit him really, because he dodged. I have never learned the feminine way of cutting a man down to size, although I can imagine how to do it, but truth to tell, that would go against what I believe, that men must live up to such awful things. — Joanna Russ

People are always trying to tell you how they feel. Some of them say it outright, and some of them, they tell you with their actions. And you have to listen. I don't know what will happen with your lady friend. I think she's a nice person, and I hope you get what you want. But do me a favor: Listen, and don't ignore what you hear. — Justin Halpern

But I had this idea also that you don't take so wide a stance that it makes a human llife impossible, nor try to bring together irreconcilables that destroy you, but try out what of human you can live with first. And if the highest should come in that empty overheated tavern with its flies and the hot radio buzzing between the plays and plugged beer from Sox Park, what are you supposed to do but take the mixture and say imperfection is always the condidtion as found; all great beauty too, my scratched eyeballs will always see scratched. — Saul Bellow

Like what, baby? Like that you miss me?" She started to protest but he cut her off. "Do not say a word. Just listen a minute, if you can. I miss you too, like a fucking phantom limb, do you understand? You are a crucial, functioning part of me, always will be. But I get it. I'm a shit. I won't deny. But I'll never, ever be happy or complete without you. — Liz Crowe

That first winter, when it was time for her friends to leave, the girl ventured out into the show to say goodbye, and the stunning raven-haired Squaller handed her another gift.
"A blue kefta," said the math teacher, shaking her head. "What would she do with that?"
"Maybe she knew a Grisha who died," replied the cook, taking note of the tears that filled the girl's eyes. They did not see the note that read, You will always be one of us. — Leigh Bardugo

This is a perfectly good picture. And if I didn't know you, I would be impressed and charmed. But I do know you."
He thought some more, wondering whether he dared say precisely what he felt, for he knew he could never explain exactly why the idea came to him. "It's the painting of a dutiful daughter," he said eventually, looking at her cautiously to see her reaction. "You want to please. You are always aware of what the person looking at this picture will think of it. Because of that you've missed something important. Does that make sense?"
She thought, then nodded. "All right," she said grudgingly and with just a touch of despair in her voice. "You win."
Julien grunted. "Have another go, then. I shall come back and come back until you figure it out."
"And you'll know?"
"You'll know. I will merely get the benefit of it. — Iain Pears

From the writer's point of view, critics should be ignored, although it's hard not to do what they suggest. I think it's unfortunate to have critics for friends. Suppose you write something that stinks, what are they going to say in a review? Say it stinks? So if they're honest, they do, and if you were friends you're still friends, but the knowledge of your lousy writing and their articulate admission of it will be always something between the two of you, like the knowledge between a man and his wife of some shady adultery. — William Styron

In books there's always somebody standing by ready to say hey, the world's in danger, evil's on the rise, but if you're really quick and take this ring and put it in that volcano over there everything will be fine.
But in real life that guy never turns up. He's never there. He's busy handing out advice in the next universe over. In our world no one ever knows what to do, and everyone's just as clueless and full of crap as everyone else, and you have to figure it all out by yourself. And even after you've figured it out and done it, you'll never know whether you were right or wrong. You'll never know if you put the ring in the right volcano, or if things might have gone better if you hadn't. There's no answers in the back of the book. — Lev Grossman

It was wonderful to walk down the long flights of stairs knowing that I'd had good luck working. I always worked until I had something done and I always stopped when I knew what was going to happen next. That way I could be sure of going on the next day. But sometimes when I was starting a new story and I could not get it going, I would sit in front of the fire and squeeze the peel of the little oranges into the edge of the flame and watch the sputter of blue that they made. I would stand and look out over the roofs of Paris and think, "Do not worry. You have always written before and you will write now. All you have to do is write one true sentence. Write the truest sentence that you know." So finally I would write one true sentence, and then go on from there. It was easy then because there was always one true sentence that you knew or had seen or had heard someone say. — Ernest Hemingway,

The views of others reflect not at all upon you unless you allow them to. Their views are colored by their own life experiences: their fears, their loves, their hatreds, their needs, their insecurities. Nothing you can say will ever change their minds. Only they can do that. What better way to show them the error of their ways than to demonstrate to them that the Light that they revere is in every path to spirituality? To lead and instruct by being the best that we can be, always? And that darkness can be found in anyone, in any faith, and that it is not so much to be feared so long as it is in balance with the Light within. Balance is the key. Tolerance is the way. — Madelyn Alt

People will not remember what you say. People will not remember what you do. They will always remember how you made them feel.
Maya Angelou... — Mollie Bickle Cardwell

If God seems slow in responding, it is because He is preparing a better gift. He will not deny us. God withholds what you are not yet ready for. He wants you to have a lively desire for His greatest gifts. All of which is to say, pray always and do not lose heart. — Saint Augustine

Then I stay beside you for as long as we have." He kept stroking my hair. Cats like to be petted. Cait Sidhe like to pet. "October, I meant it when I told you I was not leaving you. I will never leave you while both of us are living. You were not quite this human when I met you, and you were far less human when I finally allowed myself to love you. But the essential core of your being has remained the same no matter what the balance of your blood."
"How is it that you always know the exact right stupid romance novel thing to say?" I asked, leaning up to kiss him.
He smiled against my lips. When I pulled back, he said. "I was a student of Shakespeare before the romance novel was even dreamt. Be glad I do not leave you horrible poetry on your pillow, wrapped securely around the bodies of dead rats. — Seanan McGuire

You won't always spoil her .or treat her like a princess.You won't tell her she's beautiful everyday.You won't make her smile every night and you won't always want her the way you do now.That fades.Those giddy little stomach flutters fade and you're then left with reality.There will be day's you will forget to tell her she's beautiful,even though she needs to hear it.There will be days you'll to say i love you.There will be days you'll forget a birthday or an anniversary.There will be a time when she will walk past you and you won;t want to ravish her, the way you do now.Those things fade, and when they do, what's left is what's truly worth fighting for Love isn't always beautiful, heck,it's not even close to being perfect half the time,feelings change, the spark dies down and what you're left with is something you either chose to fight for you don't When you know that even through those things are gone,you're still willing to fight for every breath ,then you know the love is real. — Bec Botefuhr

It's a rare gift to be appreciated by even one person. In life, the majority may not ever notice you. Know You're still relevant. You're always great. There will always be countless varieties of energies on earth. Not just anyone- Nor will everyone see or hear the other, so its not at all personal. Nor is it even necessary for the majority to see you. Find time to appreciate and see yourself. Inside you will find your strength. It's in there. Stay true, Stay encouraged! If one person can make it then so can you. Oneness is what you are. If one gets there we all do. Say it again and again! Let the words echo throughout your being. Stay true to your dreams. — Sereda Aleta Dailey

My heart is a traitor," the boy said to the alchemist, when they had paused to rest the horses. "It doesn't want me to go on." "That makes sense," the alchemist answered. "Naturally it's afraid that, in pursuing your dream, you might lose everything you've won." "Well, then, why should I listen to my heart?" "Because you will never again be able to keep it quiet. Even if you pretend not to have heard what it tells you, it will always be there inside you, repeating to you what you're thinking about life and about the world." "You mean I should listen, even if it's treasonous?" "Treason is a blow that comes unexpectedly. If you know your heart well, it will never be able to do that to you. Because you'll know its dreams and wishes, and will know how to deal with them. "You will never be able to escape from your heart. So it's better to listen to what it has to say. That way, you'll never have to fear an unanticipated blow. — Paulo Coelho

In this country, two things stand first in rank: your flag and your mail. You all know what honor you pay to your flag, but you should know, also, that your mail, - just that ordinary postal card - is also important. But a postal card, or any form of mail, is not important, in that way, until you drop it through a slot in this building, and with a stamp on it, or into a mail box outdoors. Up to that instant it is but a common card, which anybody can pick up and carry off without committing a criminal act. But as soon as it is in back of this partition, or in a mail box, a magical transformation occurs; and anybody who now should willfully purloin it, or obstruct its trip in any way, will find prison doors awaiting him. What a frail thing ordinary mail is! A baby could rip it apart, but no adult is so foolish as to do it. That small stamp which you stick on it, is, you might say, a postal official, going right along with it, having it always in his sight. — Ernest Vincent Wright

No matter what happens, it will, then, always remain secret: only I know exactly the weight and force of the covenants I have made
I and the Lord with whom I have made them
unless I choose to reveal them. If I do not, then they are secret and sacred no matter what others may say or do. Anyone who would reveal these things has not understood them, and therefore that person has not given them away. You cannot reveal what you do not know! — Hugh Nibley

Philip stood with the tip of a sword pressed into Mr. Beaufort's throat. I saw another sword on the floor. Neither gentleman looked toward the door. Philip looked perfectly in control, his sword bending the skin of Mr. Beaufort's neck without piercing it. When he spoke, though, his voice sounded so fierce I hardly recognized it. "Tell me what you did to her."
"I made sure you wouldn't want her anymore."
"I will always want her," Philip said in a quiet, furious voice. "Always! There is nothing you could do to change that."
Mr. Beaufort sneered. "Then why do you want to know?"
"Because I would never make her say the words. And because I want to know how much I should enjoy running you through. — Julianne Donaldson

To be sure, there's a warm passion behind what you say. But if you give in to that passion, friends, you're doing what I always warned you agin: you're a placing the satisfaction of your own feelings above the work you have to do ... Don't you worry that John Faa's heart is too soft to strike a blow when the time comes. And the time will come under judgement. Not under passion. — Philip Pullman

Children never grow tired; their likes and dislikes are constant; let them laugh at something once and they laugh always; do what you will, they are sure to say, 'Do it again! — Marthe Bibesco

Whenever I think of all the people we've baptized over the years, I always recall a conversation Jep had with on of his buddies in the backseat of our car when he was really young. Jep's friend Harvey asked him what it meant to be a christian.
"Well, when you get to be about thirteen or fourteen years old, my daddy will sit you down and study the Bible with you," Jep told him. "He'll make sure you know what he's talking about. And then he'll tell you that Jesus is going to be your Lord and when that happens, you can't act bad anymore. If you say yes, we're all going down to the river. We'll be so excited that we'll be skipping down there. My daddy will put you under the water, but he won't drown you. He'll bring you back up and everybody will be clapping and smiling. That's what he'll do. — Phil Robertson

What work do I have to do then?" said Will, but went on at once, "No, on second thought, don't tell me. I shall decide what I do. If you say my work is fighting, or healing, or exploring, or whatever you might say, I'll always be thinking about it. And if I do end up doing that, I'll be resentful because it'll feel as if I didn't have a choice, and if I don't do it, I'll feel guilty because I should. Whatever I do, I will choose it, no one else. — Philip Pullman

Integrating the mind is the essence of life. Decide you will always say and do only what you feel is right. Then, you will come to tremendous clarity and conviction in the inner and outer worlds. — Swami Nithyananda

- What do the children say?
- There's a thing the children say.
- What do the children say?
- They say: Will you always love me?
- Always.
- Will you always remember me?
- Always.
- Will you remember me a year from now?
- Yes, I will.
- Will you remember me two years from now?
- Yes, I will.
- Will you remember me five years from now?
- Yes, I will.
- Knock knock.
- Who's there?
- You see?
("Great Days," Forty Stories) — Donald Barthelme

You don't really think that things will ever get better, but they do. People always ask me, "What would you say to gay teen youth that are suicidal, or someone who is addicted right now?," and it's hard to say with words that things will change, but they do. — Patty Schemel

Of all the wonderful things government says, that's always been just about my favorite. As opposed to if you get to keep the money. Because what you'll do is go out and bury it in your yard, anything to prevent that money from creating jobs. They never stop saying it.We will say, "This is expected to create x number of jobs." On the other hand, we never say that the money we removed from another part of the economy will kill some jobs. — Dave Barry

One can always satisfy oneself, I suppose; it's other people one can't satisfy. One thinks one's way of life is sound and then comes an external vision to say: you are a fake, you are nothing, you're animal and must die, and no one will know you were ever here. It's an intimation of the whole absurdity of what you are and do. It's the worst kind of despair. — Malcolm Bradbury

Others will always seek to define you based on what they think you represent or who they think you are. But you have to be the one to control what you do and what you say and how you present yourself. — Loretta Lynch

Francisco, I did love you-' she said, and caught her breath, shocked, realizing that she had not intended to say it and, simultaneously, that this was not the tense she had wanted to use.
'But you do,' he said calmly, smiling. 'You still love me-even if there's one expression of it that you'll always feel and want, but will not give to me any longer. I'm still what I was, and you'll always see it, and you'll always grant me the same response, even if there's a greater one that you grant to another man. No matter what you feel for him, it will not change what you feel for me and it won't be treason to either, because comes from the same root, it's the same payment in answer to the same values. No matter what happens in the future, we'll always be what we were to each other, you and I, because you'll always love me. — Ayn Rand

Being yourself is what will make you survive through anything. If you make music to please someone, it's the first step in the wrong direction. Always do what you believe in, no matter what people say. Only way to go! — Zedd

Each day, speak as if someone may be listening in and act as if someone could be watching. Do not say it if you do not mean it or know it to be true. Do not do anything privately that would shame you publicly. Good judgment should not cease simply because you think no one will ever know. Everything performed in the darkness is always revealed in the light. The Universe has an uncanny way of laying your life bare. Make sure you can deal with what may eventually be revealed. — Carlos Wallace

It's funny when so many people I meet tell me that I'm a complicated and mysterious person they can't understand. The problem isn't in me but in them. When I say something, I do it. The problem is that they don't believe I will, and they don't believe anyone can do what I say I will. That's their confusion. But actually, I'm a simple person, as I always match my own words. That's how you must see it. Just cut through "common sense" and move forward, and achieve! Let others worry about the how. — Robin Sacredfire

Why?" I asked softly. The word was carried away on the wind, but he heard.
"Because I want you."
I gave him a sad smile, wondering if we'd meet again in the land of the dead. "Wrong answer," I told him.
I let go.
[ ... ]
I looked him in the eye. "I will always love you."
Then I plunged the stake into his chest.
It wasn't as precise a blow as I would have liked, not with the skilled way he was dodging. I struggled to get the stake in deep enough to his heart, unsure if I could do it from this angle. Then, his struggles stopped. His eyes stared at me, stunned, and his lips parted, almost into a smile, albeit a grisly and pained one.
"That's what I was supposed to say ... " he gasped out. — Richelle Mead

Don't ever think that what my Son chose to do didn't cost us dearly. Love always leaves a significant mark," she stated softly and gently. "We were there together."
Mack was surprised. "At the cross? Now wait. I thought you left him - you know - 'My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?'" It was a Scripture that had often haunted Mack in The Great Sadness.
"You misunderstand the mystery there. Regardless of what he felt at that moment, I never left him."
"How can you say that? You abandonded him just like you abandoned me!"
"Mackenzie, I never left him, and I have never left you."
"That makes no sense to me," he snapped.
"I know it doesn't, at least not yet. Will you at least consider this: when all you can see is your pain, perhaps then you lose sight of me? — Wm. Paul Young

It's more than you think it can be," she heard herself say. "It changes everything, and fixes everything that matters. Maybe you're never going to be the same, and maybe part of you is always afraid of what will happen if ... but he's always going to be there. All you have to do is reach out, and he's going to be there. — J.D. Robb

Because you are not scared to admit out loud that you're afraid. Or to ask questions ... and because you know that your husband is in pain, you will go to him and not threaten his ability to provide with words that cut and burn in another's mind forever, until death do you apart. Because you will tell him that its right for him to change profession and that it is not his fault that the shoe he first brought to your marriage no longer fits. You'll say that you don't care what your parents think , or people think, and material things can always be replaced, but not him. And because you will have the patience and wisdom to understand everything that he is afraid of, you'll kiss his boo-boos instead of rubbing salt in the wounds of his failures ... — Leslie Esdaile

I lied," I said ...
"I know it," he said.
"Then do something about it. Do anything, just so it's something."
"I cant," he said.
"There aint anything to do? Not anything?"
"I didn't say that," Grandfather said. "I said I couldn't. You can."
"What?" I said. "How can I forget it? Tell me how to."
"You cant," he said. "Nothing is ever forgotten. Nothing is ever lost. It's too valuable."
"Then what can I do?"
"Live with it," Grandfather said.
"Live with it? You mean, forever? For the rest of my life? Not ever to get rid of it? Never? I cant. Dont you see that I cant?"
"Yes you can," he said. "You will. A gentleman always does. A gentleman can live through anything. He faces anything. A gentleman accepts the responsibility of his actions and bears the burden of their consequences, even when he did not himself instigate them but only acquiesced to them, didn't say No though he knew he should. — William Faulkner

SThat's enriched my life more than I can say. Of course you could do more - you can always do more, and you should do more - but still, the important thing is to do what you can, whenever you can. — Will Schwalbe