Before Anything Else Quotes & Sayings

There are some women in whom conscience is so strongly developed that it leaves little room for anything else. Love is scarcely felt before duty rushes to encase it, anger impossible because one must always be calm and see both sides, pity evaporates in expedients, even grief is felt as a sort of bruised sense of injury, a resentment that one should have grief forced upon one when one has always acted for the best. — Sylvia Townsend Warner

We tend to use prayer as a last resort, but God wants it to be our first line of defense. We pray when there's nothing else we can do, but God wants us to pray before we do anything at all.
Most of us would prefer, however, to spend our time doing something that will get immediate results. We don't want to wait for God to resolve matters in His good time because His idea of 'good time' is seldom in sync with ours. — Oswald Chambers

It's going to storm," she said.
"You've been in Alabama for twenty-four hours and you think you can
read the weather?"
"Then why is it so dark?"
"It's going to storm."
She wanted to hit him. "Then I'd appreciate getting to my car before it
hits. I don't like thunderstorms. "
"No, I imagine you don't," he said softly. "That's just something else
you're afraid of. Sex, men, thunderstorms, being poor. Me. Anything else?
"Yeah," she said. "I'm afraid of alligators and poisonous snakes, or
otherwise I wouldn't be here in this hearse with you. — Anne Stuart

To have a successful writing career, you must be willing to sacrifice a great deal. The book, the deadline come first before anything else. Writing is not a job; it is a lifestyle, and it is a roller-coaster ride of highs and lows. You need self-confidence and an iron carapace. — Virginia Henley

You, you buy into all this stuff about good guys and bad guys in the world. A loan shark breaks a guy's leg for not paying his debt, a banker throws a guy out of his home for the same reason, and you think there's a difference, like the banker's just doing his job but the loan shark's a criminal. I like the loan shark better because he doesn't pretend to be anything else, and I think the banker should be where I am sitting right now. I'm not going to live some life where I pay my fucking taxes and fetch the boss a lemonade at the company picnic and buy life insurance. Get older, get fatter, so I can join a men's club in Back Bay, smoke cigars with a bunch of assholes in a back room somewhere, talk about my squash game and my kid's grades. Die at my desk, and they'll already have scraped my name off the office door before the dirt's hit the coffin. — Dennis Lehane

I'm not going to force you into anything you don't want. But I'm also not going to take a vow of chastity and pine away for you, or whatever the hell it is that men do in romance novels these days. I have needs. I'd rather satisfy them with you, but if you don't want me I suppose I'll just have to find someone else. Might take me a while, but I'll make do. I always have before. — Nenia Campbell

Back in Rome I did some acting lessons and I realised I loved it more than anything else I had ever done before. — Caterina Murino

In order to succeed in it (prayer), it should be done when we first awaken, when our whole being is calm and recollected. We need to make our meditation before anything else. — Peter Julian Eymard

The soul that has come to know God fully no longer desires anything else, nor does it attach itself to anything on the earth; and if you put before it a kingdom, it would not desire it, for the love of God gives such sweetness and joy to the soul that even the life of a king can no longer give it any sweetness. — Silouan The Athonite

They'd pay attention to me less. They'd judge me by gender, by looks, by weight before anything else. I automatically started every interaction at a disadvantage. — Kameron Hurley

I can't
I can't think about anything or anyone else," he whispered. A hand drifted up, dragging back through his hair. "I can't think straight when you're around. I can't sleep. It feels like I can't breathe
I just
"
"Liam, please," I begged. "You're tired. You're barely over being sick. Let's just ... Can we just go back to the others?"
"I love you." He turned toward me, that agonized expression still on his face. "I love you every second of everyday, and I don't understand why, or how to make it stop
"
He looked wild with pain; it pinned me in place, even before what he had said registered in my mind.
"I know it's wrong; I know it down to my damn bones. And I feel like I'm sick. I'm trying to be a good person, but I can't. I can't do this anymore. — Alexandra Bracken

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

I write. I imagine. The act of imagining in itself enlivens me. I am not frozen and paralyzed before the predator. I invent characters. At times I feel as if I am digging up people from the ice in which reality enshrouded them, but maybe, more than anything else, it is myself that I am now digging up. — David Grossman

As he ducked out into the rain, I had a notion that filled me with fresh resolve, even though I knew that the same notion had crushed a million hearts before mine and would go on crushing them as long as anyone tries to rescue a person or a country or anything else that's valuable and endangered. I thought, I can save this man. — Stuart Archer Cohen

The art in photography is literary art before it is anything else: its triumphs and monuments are historical, anecdotal, reportorial, observational before they are purely pictorial ... The photograph has to tell a story if it is to work as art. — Clement Greenberg

Hey," I said before he could say anything else that would make the mood even weirder or break it entirely. "You wanna grab some coffee or something someday? I mean, some time when I'm not crawling with maggots," I added with a laugh that sounded nervous to my own ears and probably sounded desperate and pathetic to his. I totally braced myself for him to hem and haw and say that he couldn't or had a girlfriend or something. I was shocked instead when he gave me a nod.
"That sounds nice. And I'm cool with the no maggots thing too. — Diana Rowland

I feel confident that the work I've put in will make people see me as a music artist before anything else. — FKA Twigs

This is not the life I want or who I want to be but I don't know anything else. I have tried to change before and I have failed. I have tried to change again and again and again and I have failed over and over and over. If there was something to make me think this time was different, i would try, but there isn't. If there was a light at the end of the tunnel, I would run to it. I am worse than I have ever been before. If there was a light at the end of the tunnel, I would run to it. — James Frey

No, I wanted to say, he didn't cut off her hands because he didn't have to, he had cut them off long before, with years of keeping all authority in his own palms, all the rules and all the power and all the answers emanating from him and no one else. And if you don't understand that, if you've never been in such a family, then you can't know the way the mind shackles itself and amputates its own limbs so adeptly that you never think to miss them, never think that you had anything so obscene as choice. — Carolina De Robertis

Before anything else, above all else, beyond all else God love us. God loves us extravagantly, ridiculously, without limit or condition. God is in love with us ... God yearns for us. — Roberta Bondi

There will come a time', I said, 'when all of us are dead. All of us. There will come a time when there are no human beings remaining to remember that anyone ever existed or that our species ever did anything. There will be no one left to remember Aristotle or Cleopatra, let alone you. Everything that we did and built and wrote and thought and discovered will be forgotten and all of this.'
I gestured encompassingly
'will have been for naught. Maybe that time is coming soon and maybe it is millions of years away, but even if we survive the collapse of our sun, we will not survive forever. There was time before organis,s experienced consciousness, and there will be time after. And if the inevitability of human oblivion worries you, I encourage you to ignore it. God knows that's what everyone else does.' -Hazel Grace Lancaster — John Green

Whatever view one takes of the outcome being affected by morale, it seems certain that the realm of illusion must be escaped before anything else. — Christopher Hitchens

Taking pity on me, Carissa kept her voice low. "You were calling out for Daemon."I dropped my face in my hands and moaned. "Oh, God."
Lesa giggled. "It was kind of cute."
A minute before the tardy bell rang, I felt an all-too-familiar warmth on my neck and glanced up. Daemon swaggered into class. Textbook-less as usual. He had a notebook, but I don't think he ever wrote anything in it. I was beginning to suspect our math teacher was an alien, because how else would Daemon get away with not doing a damn thing in class? He passed by without so much as a look.
I twisted around in my chair. "I need to talk to you."
He slid into his desk chair. "Okay."
"In private," I whispered.
His expression didn't change as he leaned back in his chair. "Meet me in the library at lunch. No one really goes in there. You know, with all those books and stuff. — Jennifer L. Armentrout

Dreams decompose, darling, < ... > like anything else. And they give off gases, some of which are poisonous and all of which are unpleasant, and so one goes away from the place in which the dreams were dreamed, and are now decomposing before your very eyes. Otherwise, you might die, dear, of monoxide poisoning. — Andrew Holleran

I broke up with this girl, and they put me with a psychiatrist who said, 'Why did you get so depressed, and do all those things you did?' I said, 'I wanted this girl and she left me.'
And he said,'Well, we have to look into that.'
And I said, 'There's nothing to look into! I wanted her and she left me.' And he said, 'Well, why are you feeling so intense?'
And I said, 'Cause I want the girl!' And he said, 'What's underneath it?' And I said, 'Nothing!'
He said, 'I'll have to give you medication.'
I said, 'I don't want medication! I want the girl!'
And he said, 'We have to work this through.'
So, I took a fire extinguisher from the casement and struck him across the back of his neck. And before I knew it, guys from Con Ed had jumper cables in my head and the rest was ... — Woody Allen

Honestly, everything else aside, I like finding stuff out about her. I mean, that I didn't know before. I had no idea who she really was. I honestly never thought of her as anything but my crazy beautiful friend who does all the crazy beautiful things. — John Green

Before entering into any kind of intimate relationships, whether friendship, familial re-connection, or romance, the idea of "needing" or "being needed" must be eliminated. It's harmful to me and others. Need is no kind of foundation for anything. Rather, I choose to be wanted. "Want" is a deliberate choice. Wanting is not based in fear or ego (which are one in the same, I believe). Want comes from recognition of someone else's goodness and loving them for it. Being wanted is unconditional. It does not require emotional games be played, it does not require reparations be made or obligations be met. Being wanted is good, in and of itself. — Jennifer DeLucy

If you have 15 minutes per visit, and you spend the first 9 minutes just collecting information from them, before you do anything else, you know half of your visit is gone already. So if you have an automated system that has most of that and, and in some cases I actually have patients complete questionnaires before they come in, so I'd gotten most of the information I need to ask about, already recorded, instead of having 9 minutes I can take 3 minutes to review all this information. — William Davis

What the fuck, Ian? I'm your partner. Before anything else, I'm the guy who - " "No!" he roared. "Before anything else you're my life, you stupid prick! — Mary Calmes

Before I take you into the beating heart of the story, let's get one thing out of the way. I know from experience that when it comes up later, it will distract you so much that you won't be able to concentrate on anything else I will tell you. My name is Jubilee Dougal. Take a moment and let it sink in. — Maureen Johnson

I saw a moving sight the other morning before breakfast in a little hotel where I slept in the dusty fields. The young man of the house shot a little wolf called coyote in the early morning. The little heroic animal lay on the ground, with his big furry ears, and his clean white teeth, and his little cheerful body, but his little brave life was gone. It made me think how brave all living things are. Here little coyote was, without any clothes or house or books or anything, with nothing to pay his way with, and risking his life so cheerfully - and losing it - just to see if he could pick up a meal near the hotel. He was doing his coyote-business like a hero, and you must do your boy-business, and I my man-business bravely, too, or else we won't be worth as much as a little coyote. — William James

Men grow up expecting to be the hero of their own story. Women grow up expecting to be the supporting actress in somebody else's. As a kid growing up with books and films and stories instead of friends, that was always the narrative injustice that upset me more than anything else. I felt it sometimes like a sharp pain under the ribcage, the kind of chest pain that lasts for minutes and hours and might be nothing at all or might mean you're slowly dying of something mundane and awful. It's a feeling that hit when I understood how few girls got to go on adventures. I started reading science fiction and fantasy long before Harry Potter and The Hunger Games, before mainstream female leads very occasionally got more at the end of the story than together with the protagonist. Sure, there were tomboys and bad girls, but they were freaks and were usually killed off or married off quickly. Lady hobbits didn't bring the ring to Mordor. They stayed at home in the shire. — Laurie Penny

He would give anything if he could feel toward a lover one tenth of what he felt for Darling. Just for one heartbeat. But it wasn't meant to be. He'd accepted that a long time ago. Darling would always be heterosexual. Nothing would ever change that, and his best friend would die before sleeping with him. Why can't I walk away from Darling? Honestly, he'd tried. He'd gone from one man to another, hoping, aching that one of them would find a way into his jaded heart. And every one of them had disappointed him, and left him with scars that were deeper and uglier than the ones marring his body. But as he breathed Ture in, that part of him that he hated most surged forward. Hope was a fickle whore, and he hated the fact that he was her bitch. You've walked this path a million times, Mari. Only Darling was Darling. Everyone else was a poor substitution. Clenching — Sherrilyn Kenyon

The problem with a plan is that you fill up the blank page of a new day with a 'to-do' list before you get there. And if you're not careful there's no room for anything else.
A plan, especially a very focused one, narrows down the possibilies of the future to just a couple of things: that things either go to plan, or they don't. — John C. Parkin

I think I'm a music fan before anything else. — Nuno Bettencourt

I don't work all day, every day on 'Rizzoli & Isles,' but I work every day. It may be a scene or two, or it may be an enormous workload, but there's really not a lot of room for anything else, and that's the choice I made. And that's why I stayed away from TV before: Because I know that that's what it is. — Bruce McGill

Your father is the first person to tell me that I am lovely who seemed to mean it. The only people who've told me that before were ones who think they're supposed to flatter a princess'
'I think you're lovely,' murmured Eadric.
'Only because you love me,' I said.
'Hmm,' he said, kissing me before I could say anything else. — E.D. Baker

O God, don't let them hurt Lord le Wyse. Help me, God. I have to save him. Why? the voice in her head asked. Why do you have to save him? The voice answered itself. Because you love him. I do! O God, I do love him. She'd loved him for a long time, and she suddenly wanted to tell him so, more than anything. But first she had to get to him before anyone else - before it was too late. — Melanie Dickerson

Primordial. It is the source or agent of everything else. Prior to its emanating anything, it is whole, self-sufficient, perfect. The godhead thus symbolizes the unconscious before the emergence of the ego out of it.58 As a — C. G. Jung

The fly ought to be used as the symbol of impertinence and audacity; for whilst all other animals shun man more than anything else, and run away even before he comes near them, the fly lights upon his very nose. — Arthur Schopenhauer

I consider myself a songwriter before anything else. The fact that I have been able to write both of my records and establishing myself as a songwriter is super-important to me. Some people have that gift, where they can take on anything and make people believe it. I like to do a song from personal experience. — Kate Voegele

He agreed with David Hockney that an artist really had to be able to draw before anything else could be achieved. — Alexander McCall Smith

The potential, for anything, was overwhelming to a degree that bothered him. It wasn't, he thought, the idea of power. It certainly wasn't that nervous feeling T.C. would get in the pit of his stomach when he knew he had an incredible opportunity in front of him, that amazing brief pause before an act of creation. This was something else. Something to fear and respect. — Adam P. Knave

I was always a filmmaker before I was anything else. If I was always anything, I was a storyteller, and it never really made much of a difference to me what medium I worked in. — Nicholas Meyer

My bottom belly was gone! I'd contemplated having that thing sucked out many times, but if you've ever had a face-lift and a brow lift and felt the pain of that, it makes you pause before doing anything else too invasive. — Adena Halpern

I kept my hands firmly on the iron rail before me. Grabbing the weight bar and walloping the Beast Lord upside the head wouldn't be the best diplomatic move.
"I'm sorry, Your Majesty." There. I was civil. It almost killed me.
"Apology accepted."
"Will there be anything else?"Your Arrogance. — Ilona Andrews

She went up on tiptoe, and that easily, her mouth was against his. It was barely a kiss - just a quick, startling press of her lips.
Before she could even think of moving away, he had hold of her. He knew he was probably doing everything wrong, but he couldn't bring himself to worry, because she was in his arms, her lips were parting, her hands were twining around his neck, and sweet Djel, her tongue was in his mouth. No wonder Fjerdans were so cautious about courtship. If Matthias could be kissing Nina, feeling her nip at his lip with her clever teeth, feel her body fitted against his own, hear her release that little sigh in the back of her throat, why would he ever bother doing anything else? Why would anyone? — Leigh Bardugo

I think we're fully prepped. Let's see if the boss needs help with anything else before we start serving. Wrapping her arm in mine, we walked out of kitchen into the main party room looking for Danver. This was the first time we'd been out of the cooking area since we arrived and I think we were both shocked by what we saw. — Michelle Hughes

What I absolutely want is to suggest that before it's anything else, redemption is God mending the bicycle of our souls; God bringing out the puncture repair kit, re-inflating the tires, taking off the rust, making us roadworthy once more. Not so that we can take flight into ecstasy, but so that we can do the next needful mile of our lives. — Francis Spufford

, I found the whole modern world talking scientific fatalism; saying that everything is as it must always
have been, being unfolded without fault from the beginning. The leaf on the tree is green because it could
never have been anything else. Now, the fairy-tale philosopher is glad that the leaf is green precisely because
it might have been scarlet. He feels as if it had turned green an instant before he looked at it. — G.K. Chesterton

I believe that before anything else I'm a human being
just as much as you are ... or at any rate I shall try to become one. I know quite well that most people would agree with you, Torvald, and that you have warrant for it in books; but I can't be satisfied any longer with what most people say, and with what's in books. I must think things out for myself and try to understand them. — Henrik Ibsen

Yes. What is it, guilt, revenge, love, what?"
I swallowed. "I live alone."
"And your point is?"
"You have the Pack. You're surrounded by people who would fall over themselves for the pleasure of your company. I have no one. My parents are dead, my entire family is gone. I have no friends. Except Jim, and that's more of a working relationship than anything else. I have no lover. I can't even have a pet, because I'm not at the house often enough to keep it from starving. When I come crawling home, bleeding and filthy and exhausted, the house is dark and empty. Nobody keeps the porch light on for me. Nobody hugs me and says, 'Hey, I'm glad you made it. I'm glad you're okay. I was worried.' Nobody cares if I live or die. Nobody makes me coffee, nobody holds me before I go to bed, nobody fixes my medicine when I'm sick. I'm by myself. — Ilona Andrews

before indulging in any form of foreplay kissing, massage and anything else you need to create desire in her! The following tips can help you in stirring her desire: Compliment her, her thoughts, mind, body make her feel irresistible Giver her your complete focus and attention. Just for now leave your taxes and conerns at the door step Really appreciate her and her body Tell her what you'd love to do her and how you want to please her Share your vulnerability and build trust and confidence. Share your fantasies that are normal, real and healthy Maintain a sense of fun as well! Don't talk or act negatively. — Gabrille Cerise

I want to take away your sunshine, Lukas. Not because I'm evil but because the sun can't exist without shadows. I want to examine the lie that keeps you afloat
the idea that it's wonderful to be Lukas, that it's splendid to be the tsar's favorite dwarf, that there's nothing better to do than bring crackers to Menshikov like some kind of dog. When does it hurt the most, Lukas? That's what I'd like to know. What hurts you more than anything else? Is it when the tsar mocks you? Or is it when he can't remember your name? Is it when he forgets all about your for a year or two? When are you going to curse Peter Alexeyevich to Hell, Lukas? That's what I'd like to know. I want to get behind that smile of yours, and your clown's heart. And then I'll console you when you fall apart
I'll console you when you realize that you are infinitely unloved.
At that moment I'll be at your side, but no before.
Not a moment before. — Peter H. Fogtdal

Hope is a soldier. It fights against tribulations, the Cross, despondency, despair, and waits for better things to come in the midst of evil. Without hope faith cannot endure. On the other hand, hope without faith is blind rashness and arrogance because it lacks knowledge. Before anything else a Christian must have the insight of faith, so that the intellect may know its directions in the day of trouble and the heart may hope for better things. By faith we begin, by hope we continue. — Martin Luther

Before I can say anything else, he steps forward and takes my face in his hands. Then he's kissing me one last time. — Marie Lu

When they separated, the freckleless spot between Pete's eyes was bright red. Before anything else could be said or done, May grabbed her bike and hopped on. She waited until she was six houses down to turn and see if he was still standing in the driveway watching her. He was. She stopped for just a moment, and they caught each other's eyes. Then he slowly started walking backward toward the house. May couldn't see that well, considering that her eyes were still a little blurry and he was far away, but it looked like he was smiling. — Maureen Johnson

tucked an arm around the back of Prophet's neck and Prophet buried his face in Doc's shoulder as Doc said, "It's not fair. I know it's not. But before you do anything else, you have to tell Tom." "How do you know I haven't?" "How do I know the sun rises in the morning?" "Fucker," Prophet muttered against Doc's shoulder. "Disability-hater." Doc rubbed the back of his neck but didn't make a move to let him go. And Prophet was okay with that. "Do you want me to tell him?" Doc asked finally. "Yeah. But you can't." God, it was safe right here, with Doc. And Prophet wanted it to be this safe with Tommy . . . and it was, except for this issue. Which he hadn't given Tommy the chance to deal with. "I can be there with you. I'll answer the questions he'll have, so you don't have to." Prophet lifted his head. "Yeah, I get you're trying to make it easier on me, but fuck, it's not going to be at all. I can't pretend anything will help." "Not pretending is the first step. — S.E. Jakes

She sent you to your death once, in case you've forgotten," he said, a sudden chill dropping into his voice. "Why should her collapse concern me?"
I paused. Tybalt was a cat before he was anything else. If something didn't affect him personally, he was unlikely to give a damn. Slowly, I said, "Because Rayseline is blaming me, and if Luna dies
"
"The little bitch will push for your execution under Oberon's law," he snarled. I blinked. I'd expected a reaction, but nothing that strong. — Seanan McGuire

If there is anything in us, it is not our own; it is a gift of God. But if it is a gift of God, then it is entirely a debt one owes to love, that is, to the law of Christ. And if it is a debt owed to love, then I must serve others with it, not myself.
Thus my learning is not my own; it belongs to the unlearned and is the debt I owe them ... My wisdom belongs to the foolish, my power to the oppressed. Thus my wealth belongs to the poor, my righteousness to the sinners ...
It is with all these qualities that we must stand before God and intervene on behalf of those who do not have them, as though clothed with someone else's garment ... But even before men we must, with the same love, render them service against their detractors and those who are violent toward them; for this is what Christ did for us. — Martin Luther

I want to fall in love with something in the way I fell in love with the idea of Harry before I write anything else. — J.K. Rowling

Before you invest in anything else, exhaust the possibilities of investing in your own business first. — Paul Zane Pilzer

TRUST YOUR FEELINGS BEFORE YOU TRUST ANYONE ELSE. YOUR FEELINGS ARE YOUR DIVINE GUIDANCE. IF ANYTHING MAKES YOU FEEL GOOD, THEN DO IT. IF YOU DO NOT GET A GOOD FEELING, THEN IT IS NOT FOR YOU. — Premlatha Rajkumar

My injuries are more due to attrition than accidents. I have a couple of herniated discs in my neck, and that more than anything else - I had a flare-up last December, and I had actually made the decision to retire before that, but that just cemented the choice. I was flat on my back. — Sascha Radetsky

Fucking was easy. It was this intimacy between two people that destroyed your heart so you couldn't see anything else but the bitch before you, giving you something you never knew you even needed. — Tillie Cole

The key to teaching anything is to remember what it was like not to understand that thing. That's a very hard thing to do. Every time you come to understand something you didn't understand before, you are transformed. You become a different person from who you were before. The key to teaching someone else to understand that same thing is to remember your former, untransformed self. If you can do that, I think you can teach anything, even physics. — David Goodstein

A popular Harvard business professor urged his students to read the obituaries in the New York Times before they read anything else, in order to learn from the lives of great men. — Georges F. Doriot

People felt themselves watching him even before they knew that there was anything different about him. His eyes made a person think that he heard things that no one else had ever heard, that he knew things no one had ever guessed before. He did not seem quite human. — Carson McCullers

No Geologist worth anything is permanently bound to a desk or laboratory, but the charming notion that true science can only be based on unbiased observation of nature in the raw is mythology. Creative work, in geology and anywhere else, is interaction and synthesis: half-baked ideas from a bar room, rocks in the field, chains of thought from lonely walks, numbers squeezed from rocks in a laboratory, numbers from a calculator riveted to a desk, fancy equipment usually malfunctioning on expensive ships, cheap equipment in the human cranium, arguments before a road cut. — Stephen Jay Gould

If the newspapers cut me up so much that I shall not venture before the world again, I have resolved to become a house painter; that would be as easy as anything else, and I should, at any rate, still be an artist! — Frederic Chopin

I was one those kids who had books on them. Before weddings, Bar Mitzvahs, funerals and anything else where you're actually meant to not be reading, my family would frisk me and take the book away. If they didn't find it by this point in the procedure, I would be sitting over in that corner completely unnoticed just reading my book. — Neil Gaiman

Pick something else".
For an instant's flash Kylis remembered being taunted like this before, when she was very small. Anything but that. Anything but what you really want. — Vonda N. McIntyre

When I am an old man and I can remember nothing else, I will remember this moment. The first time my eyes beheld an angel in the flesh. "I will remember your body and your eyes, your beautiful face and breasts, your curves and this." He traced his hand around her navel before dragging it lightly to the top of her lower curls. "I will remember your scent and your touch and how it felt to love you. But most of all, I will remember how it felt to gaze at true beauty, both inside and out. For you are fair, my beloved, in soul and in body, generous of spirit and generous of heart. And I will never see anything this side of heaven more beautiful tham you — Sylvain Reynard

It's all about the spirit. Every man, woman and child should be seen as a spirit first, before anything else. We are all spirits in the first instance. — Andrew Agbonlahor

Finding such a person makes everyone else appear so ordinary ... and if anything happens to him, you've got nothing left but to return to the ordinary world, and a kind of isolation that never existed before. — Alan Turing

My Mother

My mother was not educated but she was the best teacher I've ever had in my entire life. She had what it's called natural wisdom, bless her precious soul. Here some of her teachings: Human Values:
Love: Learn to love because everything that's based on love has a deep rooted foundation.
Kindness: Be kind all the time but never let anyone take advantage of your kindness.
Peace: Learn to have peace with yourself when the world turns against you because it starts with you.
Honesty: Be honest to yourself and then to the others.
Respect: Respect others and they will respect you.
Openness: Be always transparent especially when you are hurting. Never pretend that it's all okay.
Loyalty: Always be loyal to your family and make sure your family comes before anything else.
She taught me to learn to compose myself when life gets tough and unfair to me.

I love you mama & Happy Mothers Day — Euginia Herlihy

He didn't operate on the same frequency as everyone else. On one hand, he was more dangerous than anyone I'd ever met.
He could slip into a room, kill you with a spatula, and be out of town before anyone knew about it. On the other, he was the most pure, untarnished soul I'd ever come across. It was an odd mix so uniquely Kale, and I wouldn't change it for anything in the world. — Jus Accardo

Zen does not ask you to believe in anything you cannot confirm for yourself. It does not ask you to memorize any sacred words. It does not require you to worship any particular thing or revere any particular person. It does not offer any rules to obey. It does not give you any hierarchy of learned men whose profound teachings you must follow to the letter. It does not ask you to conform any code of dress. It does not ask you to allow anyone else to choose what is right for you and what is wrong. Zen is complete absence of belief. Zen is the complete lack of authority. Zen tears away every false refuge in which you might hide from the truth and forces you to sit naked before what is real. That's real refuge. — Brad Warner

For a long time, I did not move from the dark, wood-panelled hall. I wanted company, and I had none, lights and warmth and a strong drink inside me, I needed reassurance. But, more than anything else, I needed an explanation. It is remarkable how powerful a force simple curiosity can be. I had never realized that before now. In spite of my intense fear and sense of shock, I was consumed with the desire to find out exactly who it was that I had seen, and how, I could not rest until I had settled the business, for all that, while out there, I had not dared to stay and make any investigations. — Susan Hill

Our society assigns us a tiny number of roles: We're producers of one thing at work, consumers of a great many things all the rest of the time, and then, once a year or so, we take on the temporary role of citizen and cast a vote. Virtually all our needs and desires we delegate to specialists of one kind or another - our meals to the food industry, our health to the medical profession, entertainment to Hollywood and the media, mental health to the therapist or the drug company, caring for nature to the environmentalist, political action to the politician, and on and on it goes. Before long it becomes hard to imagine doing much of anything for ourselves - anything, that is, except the work we do "to make a living." For everything else, we feel like we've lost the skills, or that there's someone who can do it better ... it seems as though we can no longer imagine anyone but a professional or an institution or a product supplying our daily needs or solving our problems. — Michael Pollan

Before money or anything else. Money cannot buy it ... Because a man I do not trust could not get money from me on all the bonds in Christendom. — J. P. Morgan

This is one of the most serious problems with seeker-sensitive churches. I was talking to a pastor at a seeker-friendly church not long ago about his idea that prospective Christians needed to "feel welcome" and "accepted" before anything else: no "threats," no "judgmental baggage." I asked, "If you had a person living in sin come to your church, would you confront him?" He furrowed his brow and shook his head disapprovingly. "Oh, no! We'd want him to feel loved and welcome." My eyes widened. "How long would it be before you would actually say something about that?" "Maybe a year and a half, two years," he said, smiling. "Because then he would really feel a part of things." That was shocking to me. Is there some virtue in leaving a man in his sin for the sake of feeling accepted? "Well, that's the difference between your church and our church," I said finally. "Openly practicing sinners come to our church, and they either get saved or they don't come back. — John F. MacArthur Jr.

It seems all humans ever do is muddle through and hope to have a rest period before the next obstacle comes along. It's the love that keeps us going, whether it's a partner, or your family, or your friends who are also your family. If we didn't have that love, anything else keeping you running will eventually burn out. — Sean Kennedy

I do not believe that all books will or should migrate onto screens: as Douglas Adams once pointed out to me, more than 20 years before the Kindle showed up, a physical book is like a shark. Sharks are old: there were sharks in the ocean before the dinosaurs. And the reason there are still sharks around is that sharks are better at being sharks than anything else is. Physical books are tough, hard to destroy, bath-resistant, solar-operated, feel good in your hand: they are good at being books, and there wil always be a place for them. — Neil Gaiman

I had meant my promise to George. I had said that I was, before anything else, a Boleyn and a Howard through and through; but now, sitting in th shadowy room, looking out over the gray slates of the city, and up at the dark clouds leaning on the roof of Westminster Palace, I suddenly realized that George was wrong, and that my family was wrong, and that I had been wrong
for all my life. I was not a Howard before anything else. Before anything else I was a woman who was capable of passion and who had a great need and a great desire for love, I didn't want the rewards for which Anne had surrendered her youth. I didn' want the arid glamour of George's life, I wanted the heat and the sweat and the passion of a man that I could love and trust. And I wanted to give myself to him: not for advantage, but for desire. — Philippa Gregory

You think I don't know pain?" Puck shook his head at me. "Or loss? I've been around a lot longer than you, prince! I know what love is, and I've lost
my fair share, too. Just because we have a different way of handling it, doesn't mean I don't have scars of my own."
"Name one," I scoffed. "Give me one instance where you haven't - "
"Meghan Chase!" Puck roared, startling me into silence. I blinked, and he sneered at me. "Yeah, your highness. I know what loss is. I've loved that
girl since before she knew me. But I waited. I waited because I didn't want to lie about who I was. I wanted her to know the truth before anything else.
So I waited, and I did my job. For years, I protected her, biding my time, until the day she went into the Nevernever after her brother. And then you
came along. And I saw how she looked at you. And for the first time, I wanted to kill you as much as you wanted to kill me. — Julie Kagawa

I never want to repeat myself. I can't imagine anything else as upsetting as realizing I'm redoing something I did before. For some reason, when it comes to film, I'm very good at not repeating myself. Even though in the rest of my life, I'm constantly repeating my mistakes. — Doug Liman

I walked him to the door. "Is there anything else you want me to do? Check your mail? Water your plants?"
"My mail is being forwarded to my lawyer. And I'm watering my own plants."
"So, you feel safe in the Batcave?" The corners of his mouth curved into the hint of a smile. He leaned forward and kissed me at the base of my neck, just above my T-shirt collar.
"Sweet dreams." Before he left, he said good-night to Grandma, who was still in the kitchen.
"What a nice, polite young man," Grandma said. "And he's got an excellent package."
I went straight to her closet, found the bottle of booze, and dumped some into my cocoa. — Janet Evanovich

Writing my first book, I think in hindsight I went into it saying, 'It's gonna sell.' I was earning enough to scrape by sometime around a book or two before 'Tell No One.' I moved up from $50,000 to $75,000, then $150,000 for each book. I had never thought I would be doing anything else. I had enough encouragement. — Harlan Coben

I was good. I was at home with baseball. But I set my routines, and I need them. I can't ... I can't play without them."

He didn't say anything else until we got to home plate and stepped on it at the same time. He put his hands on my face and looked at me directly, as if putting a tunnel of attention between us. His thumbs rested on my cheeks.

Why hadn't I seen it the night before? Or an hour ago? Why didn't I put it all together from the exhibition games and the spring training video? He was coming apart at the seams.

"You," he said. "You threw it all in the fire. Things started collapsing right before you, and when you came, everything went to hell. It's you. I denied it, because if I let you in, I had to start over. I tried to bend it around to not want you. But I can't deny it anymore. There's no center without you. — C.D. Reiss

Look for, and work on becoming, a man or woman who, as a single, seeks God wholeheartedly, putting Him before anything else. Don't worry about impressing the opposite sex. Instead, strive to please and glorify God. Along the way you'll catch the attention of people with the same priorities. — Joshua Harris

We who are rich with respect to the rest of the world must come to grips with our own poverty if we are going to make a difference. We must allow our hearts to be broken so we can make things whole once again. We must fall apart before we can build up. Anything else is not compassion. It may raise money or impress the neighbors, but it won't satisfy. — Jeff Goins

I suppose it was the worst book any man has ever written. It was a colossal tome and faulty from start to finish. But it was my first book and I was in love with it. If I had had the money, as Gide had, I would have published it at my own expense. If I had had the courage that Whitman had, I would have peddled it from door to door. Everybody I showed it to said it was terrible. I was urged to give up the idea of writing. I had to learn, as Balzac did, that one must write volumes before signing one's own name. I had to learn, as I soon did, that one must give up everything and not do anything else but write, that one must write and write and write, even if everybody in the world advises you against it, even if nobody believes in you. Perhaps one does it just because nobody believes; perhaps the real secret lies in making people believe. That the book was inadequate, faulty, bad, terrible, as they said, was only natural. — Henry Miller

The best way to experience power (or anything) is to give it away. Make someone else powerful and you become twice as powerful as you were before. Make someone else loved and you become twice as loved. Make someone else feel good and you feel twice as good. It doesn't get any better than this. And it's all so ... simple. — Neale Donald Walsch

Was i on five or six? "Peter! You made me lose my count again!" "I have that effect on women." I roll my eyyes at him and he grins back at me, but before he can say anything else, I yell," Kitty! Get down here! — Jenny Han

Writing keeps me at my desk, constantly trying to write a perfect sentence. It is a great privilege to make one's living from writing sentences. The sentence is the greatest invention of civilization. To sit all day long assembling these extraordinary strings of words is a marvelous thing ...
For me, a line has to sing before it does anything else. The great thrill is when a sentence that starts out being completely plain suddenly begins to sing, rising far above itself and above any expectation I might have had for it. That's what keeps me going on those dark December days when I think about how I could be living instead of writing. — John Banville

The greatest managers in the world do not have much in common. But despite their differences, these great managers do share one thing: Before they do anything else, they first break all the rules of conventional wisdom. — Marcus Buckingham

Suddenly it occurred to me that maybe the Itineris didn't suck as much as I'd thought. Something had scared this werewolf, and there were only a few things I could think of that could do that. Scary Irish Prodigium hunters? Way up on that list.
"Elodie-" I started to say, but before I got anything else out, she winked out like a bitchy firefly.
The werewolf and I were plunged into darkness. I cursed, and the werewolf made a growl that sounded like the same word. For a few moments, just long enough to make me think that maybe I'd been wrong, the woods were quiet and still.
And then everything erupted at once. — Rachel Hawkins

There was a knock at the door. It was Lumiere. The Beast bade him enter.
"Is there anything else you require tonight before retiring, master?"
"I - I thought we might go skating tomorrow."
Lumiere's eyebrows shot up. "Skating, master? You? You've never skated in your life!"
"Belle mentioned that she has skated before. Back in her village. I thought she might like to try it here. How hard can it be?"
"On the backside? Very," said Lumiere. — Jennifer Donnelly

Apostolic preaching cannot be carried on unless there be apostolic prayer. Men of God, before anything else, are indispensable to the furtherance of the kingdom of God on earth. — Edward McKendree Bounds