Being Magic Quotes & Sayings

Your employees are your company's real competitive advantage. They're the ones making the magic happen-so long as their needs are being met. — Richard Branson

Perhaps they had tried to migrate in the past but had found either their winter habitat destroyed or the path so fragmented and fraught with danger that it made more sense - to these few birds - to ignore the tuggings of the stars and seasons and instead to try to carve out new lives, new ways of being, even in such a stark and severe landscape: or rather, in a stark and severe period - knowing that lushness and bounty were still retained with that landscape, that it was only a phase, that better days would come. That in fact (the snipe knowing these things with their blood, ten million years in the world) the austere times were the very thing, the very imbalance, that would summon the resurrection of that frozen richness within the soil - if indeed that richness, that magic, that hope, did still exist beneath the ice and snow. Spring would come like its own green fire, if only the injured ones could hold on. And — Lex Williford

It's brilliant to get recognition. The CFDA was magic because it's such a big award in our industry. There's nothing more flattering than being honored by your peers. — Christopher Bailey

What was it like?" Manon asked quietly. "To love." For love was what it had been - what Asterin perhaps alone of all the Ironteeth witches had felt, had learned. "It was like dying a little every day. It was like being alive, too. It was joy so complete it was pain. It destroyed me and unmade me and forged me. I hated it, because I knew I couldn't escape it, and knew it would forever change me. And that witchling ... I loved her, too. I loved her in a way I cannot describe - other than to tell you that it was the most powerful thing I've ever felt, greater than rage, than lust, than magic. — Sarah J. Maas

There is no magic person out there, no perfect human being out there waiting for you. — Helen Reddy

Being an artist is the same as being a wizard. Only instead of a wand you use a pencil for your magic. — Kristina Webb

Medicine and society have entered into a folie a deaux regarding medicine's importance in gigantic population ills. We believe that genetics and pills and enzymes bring us health. We wait for the dementia cure (the obesity cure, the diabetes cure) rather than changing our society to decrease incidence and severity. We slash social welfare programs and access to GPs and ignore the downstream effect this will have on future generations.
To reduce non-communicable disease, the actions we need to take are societal: make it easier for people to move and eat well, strengthen education, promote community participation and meaningful work. Our collective delusion is that we can have all the benefits such a society would bring without the structural supports necessary to bring it into being, that we can attain health by inventing and buying drugs.
It is hard to know which is the more utopian vision: magic pills or a society serious about prevention. — Karen Hitchcock

Except that Morgan's face was too pinched and thin to pull off the look. "Your point being?" I did my best to keep from looking nervous or impressed. Truth be told, I was both. Morgan was my Warden, assigned to me by the White Council to make sure I didn't bend or break any of the Laws of Magic. He hung about and spied on me, mostly, and usually came sniffing around after I'd cast a spell of some kind. I would be damned if I was going to let the White Council's guard dog see any fear out of me. Besides, he would — Jim Butcher

So the real experience, beyond the dream world, is the
beauty and color and excitement of the real experience of
now in everyday life. When we face things as they are, we
give up the hope of something better. There will be no magic,
because we cannot tell ourselves to get out of our depression.
Depression and ignorance, the emotions, whatever we experi-
ence, are all real and contain tremendous truth. If we really
want to learn and see the experience of truth, we have to be
where we are. The whole thing is just a matter of being a grain
of sand. — Chogyam Trungpa

The words dripped on my consciousness, sank into my being, and carried me away to the magic long ago of once upon a time. — Peter Abrahams

The great and only possible dignity of man lies in his power deliberately to choose certain moral values by which to live as steadfastly as if he, too, like a character in a play, were immured against the corrupting rush of time. Snatching the eternal out of the desperately fleeting is the great magic trick of human existence. As far as we know, as far as there exists any kind of empiric evidence, there is no way to beat the beat the game of being against non-being, in which non-being is the predestined victor on realistic levels. — Tennessee Williams

It was a loss of identity. I was a wizard. It was more than just a job, more than just a title. Wizardry was at the core of my being. It was my relationship with my magic, the way I used it, the things it let me do that defined me, shaped me, gave me purpose. I — Jim Butcher

People should get married because they have finally seen the folly of being single: "Oh, this is all just kind of a bad magic trick. I just keep bending over to reach for this wallet on a string. How much longer am I gonna do that?" — Jerry Seinfeld

Magic is energy, and its in every fibre of your being. The energy used to sustain life is the energy a mage pulls from within to use magic. — Candace Knoebel

The purpose of ritual is to change the mind of the human being. It's a sacred drama in which you are the audience as well as the participant, and the purpose of it is to activate the parts of the mind that are not activated by everyday activity ... 'Magic' becomes the development of techniques that allow communication with hidden portions of the self, and with hidden portions of all other islands in this 'psychic sea.' — Margot Adler

Here's the best thing about being a writer: it's like having a magic wand to make whatever you want happen to imaginary people in a made-up world.

Here's the worst thing about being a writer: it makes you wish even more that you had a magic wand to make whatever you want happen to actual people in your own real life" -Autumn — Claudia Mills

I have to tell you, I'm proudest of my life off the court. There will always be great basketball players who bounce that little round ball, but my proudest moments are affecting people's lives, effecting change, being a role model in the community. — Magic Johnson

As he lay there, fragments of past states of emotion, fugitive felicities of thought and sensation, rose and floated on the surface of his thoughts. It was one of those moments when the accumulated impressions of life converge on heart and brain, elucidating, enlacing each other, in a mysterious confusion of beauty. He had had glimpses of such a state before, of such mergings of the personal with the general life that one felt one's self a mere wave on the wild stream of being, yet thrilled with a sharper sense of individuality than can be known within the mere bounds of the actual. But now he knew the sensation in its fulness, and with it came the releasing power of language. Words were flashing like brilliant birds through the boughs overhead; he had but to wave his magic wand to have them flutter down to him. Only they were so beautiful up there, weaving their fantastic flights against the blue, that it was pleasanter, for the moment, to watch them and let the wand lie. — Edith Wharton

I loved being on the set with my stepfather. I loved the magic of movies. I went on the set of 'The Mod Squad' - I mean, can you imagine? Just walking into a living room and then walking behind the living room, and it's just flat. There's nothing I love more than being on a sound stage. — Jennifer Jason Leigh

She isn't a storm or a leader or a king or a war or anyone whose life and death makes noise. The problem is words. There is skin, yes. And then, inside that, there is your language, the casual, inherited magic spells taht make your skin real. It's too late now
even if we could say "Shut up" or "Where's my dinner?" in the first language, the real language, the words weren't born in us. And unless your skin and your language touch each other without interruption, there is no word strong enough to make you understand that it matters that you live. The things that really "stay" are an Orisha, a kind night, a pretended boy, a garden song that made no sense. Those come closer to being enough. — Helen Oyeyemi

There was an outburst of noise and protests, and Jeremy announced I wasn't being logical, of course they wouldn't sell me, because it was illegal, for heaven's sake. Alexa gave him a look that said you're not helping, and Gil smacked him on the back of the head, and Olivia said, yes, that was the only reason they weren't going to sell me. — Caitlen Rubino-Bradway

The skull sat on top of an old Stop sign. Someone had painted the surface of the octagon white and written KEEP OUT across it in large jagged letters. A reddish-brown splatter stained the bottom edge, looking suspiciously like dried blood. I leaned closer. Yep, blood. Some hair, too. Human hair.
Curran frowned at the sign. "Do you think he's trying to tell us something?"
"I don't know. He's being so subtle about it. — Ilona Andrews

She glanced down and gasped, and her arms slapped into place to cover all her most interesting bits. He grinned. The robe and gown were sheer and he had not spun undergarments.
She scowled. "This is not what I would call being 'very, very good.'"
"That is a matter of perspective, shei'tani. From where I'm standing, it looks very, very good indeed. — C.L. Wilson

Hours trickle by, and I wilt. The magic isn't here for me tonight. I can't get away from the heavy feeling of being me. I want to blend in, to be someone besides myself, someone who is part of something secret and subversive and exciting. — Bethany Griffin

You got to understand the god thing. It's not magic. Not exactly. It's about focus. It's about being you, but the you that people believe in. It's about being the concentrated, magnified essence of you. — Neil Gaiman

A basic language-literacy of Nature is falling from us. And what is being lost along with this literacy is something perhaps even more valuable: a kind of language-magic, the power that certain words possess to enchant our imaginative relations with Nature and landscape. — Robert Macfarlane

A feeling of contentment flooded through me as I felt magic surging up from my feet. I flung another hand out, and the fog seemed to flinch in its rush to pull back. "Okay," Jenna said, tugging at my arm. "You're back to being a badass. Now, run. — Rachel Hawkins

There's something about love that resembles faith. It's kind of blind trust, isn't it? The sweetest euphoria. The magic of connecting with a being beyond our limited, familiar selves. But if we get carried away by love- or by faith- it turns into a dogma, a fixation. The sweetness becomes sour. We suffer in the hands of the gods that we ourselves created. — Elif Shafak

Black Magick is the process of self-transformation through an antinomian initiatory structure, Black meaning the hidden wisdom, power of darkness, dreams and staging the reality you wish and Magick being the process to ascend, become immortal in spirit. — Michael W. Ford

It is a curious thought that the earliest description of the steam-engine in antiquity describes its use for the magic opening of the temple doors, when the priests lit the fires on the altars, to deceive the populace into ascribing to a deity what was the work of the engineer. In much the same way today, the almost boundless fecundity of the creative scientific discoveries and inventions of the age are being appropriated for the purpose of the mysterious opening of doors into the holy of holies of the temples of mammon by a hierarchy of imposters and humbugs, whom it is the first task of a sane civilization to expose and clear out. — Frederick Soddy

Even the wolf gets anxious, but the wolf keeps moving and doing, all while being washed in the magic of moonlight — Jason E. Hodges

... food is capable of feeding far more than a rumbling stomach. Food is life; our well-being demands it. Food is art and magic; it evokes emotion and colors memory, and in skilled hands, meals become greater than the sum of their ingredients. Food is self-evident; plucked right from the ground or vine or sea, its power to delight is immediate. Food is discovery; finding an untried spice or cuisine is for me like uncovering a new element. Food is evolution; how we interpret it remains ever fluid. Food is humanitarian: sharing it bridges cultures, making friends of strangers pleasantly surprised to learn how much common ground they ultimately share. — Anthony Beal

I don't know where hell is ... another dimension, perhaps, or another plane of reality. As for getting there ... it's a choice between sinning and being tricked by demons It's a plane of evil ... despair ... and magic of the foulest kind. — Alan Grant

Theurgy is ritual magic - but magic that enacts the will of God, not of the magician. It brings divine energies down to earth, elevating and spiritualizing the world of matter, including the very being and substance of the participants. Each time the believer takes part with attention and devotion, he or she becomes more attuned to God. — Richard Smoley

I enjoy being the messenger for God in terms of letting people know about HIV and AIDS. — Magic Johnson

In a sense, touring is crazy. You go city to city playing the show over and over again. But there's something magic about being in front of people, so it's not like going through the motions every night. It's a different experience. — G-Eazy

Something snatched onto Crickets' left leg, and it was rapidly pulling her into the depths away from the wharf. Air-bubbles restricted her view in the pre-stirred water, as she kicked furiously against the high strength of her unknown assailant. Being from Louisiana, Cricket's first instinct told her she was going down to a certain-death by Alligator! — Darwun St. James

You know how it is
you get older, you get wiser, you start to ask yourself 'is it any use being able to summon creatures of the nether deeps when I could be watching BBC 4? — Kate Griffin

She could walk through a lightning storm without being touched; grab a bolt of lightning in the palm of her hand; use the heat of lightning to start the kindling going under her medicine pot. She turned the moon into salve, the stars into swaddling cloth, and healed the wounds of every creature walking up on two or down on four. — Gloria Naylor

I think making a movie or a record, the best things happen by accident - and those end up being the magic. Every time I've followed my gut it's been better than when I've tried to do what I was supposed to do. — Zooey Deschanel

AUGUST 25 A Special Angel By Maria Gillard Thank you for my childhood, for my laughing heart and soul for all your magic, and for being bold Thank you for being my mom's best friend and loving me no matter what state I was in Thanks for chives and roses, popcorn and TV Thanks for always letting me be me Thanks for rides to swim meets and yummy chocolate cake Thanks for being strong and true when my heart was aching Thank you for the blankets and pillow for my head Thank you for the back hill and the Westside River bed Thank you for the smell of melting butter on the stove Thank you for the nickels you gave me for the store You were a special angel sent to all of us with your disguise of freckles, kisses, hugs and guts We know you're out there somewhere and you'll stay inside our dreams We know wherever you are there's a brilliant golden beam Watch over us, dear angel, as you go on your way and we will laugh and sing and dance again someday Amen — Cathleen O'Connor

Even without being believed, magic can change things. It moves invisibly through the air, dissolving the usual ways of seeing, allowing new ways to creep in, secretly, quietly, like a stray cat sliding thought the bushes. — Janet Taylor Lisle

This all seemed quaint and amusing, but as the book moved through to the modern day, nothing changed. People still fell to the influence of persuasion techniques, especially when they broadcast information about themselves that allowed identification of their personality type
their true name, basically
and the attack vectors for these techniques were primarily aural and visual. But no one thought of this as magic. It was just falling for a good line or being distracted or clever marketing. Even the words were the same. People still got fascinated and charmed, spellbound and amazed, they forgot themselves, and were carried away. They just didn't think there was anything magical about that anymore. — Max Barry

Sooner or later someone's going to catch the imagination of these people with some new magic. At the bottom of it will be a promise of regaining the feeling of participation, the feeling of being neede on earth - hell, dignity. The police are bright enough to look for people like that, and lock them up under the antisabotage laws. But sooner or later someone's going keep out of thei site long enough to organize a following. — Kurt Vonnegut

I'd like to think that the nature of the two teams - Boston being a championship team over the years and the Lakers, same thing - was a lot bigger than Larry Bird or Magic Johnson. — Oscar Robertson

If there really was one true god, it should be a singular composite of every religion's gods, an uber-galactic super-genius, and the ultimate entity of the entire cosmos. If a being of that magnitude ever wrote a book, then there would only be one such document; one book of God. It would be dominant everywhere in the world with no predecessors or parallels or alternatives in any language, because mere human authors couldn't possibly compete with it. And you wouldn't need faith to believe it, because it would be consistent with all evidence and demonstrably true, revealing profound morality and wisdom far beyond contemporary human capacity. It would invariably inspire a unity of common belief for every reader. If God wrote it, we could expect no less. But what we see instead is the very opposite of that. — Aron Ra

Sig Sauer. Nine millimetres. Thirteen in the magazine. Big bullets. One of these hits you and it could blow your head off; something even the magic can't fix. Other than that you should be all right, presuming you remembered to wear the regulation above-ground micro-fibre jumpsuit recently patented by me. Then again, being a Recon jock, you probably didn't. — Eoin Colfer

Her ankle was screaming like a blonde in a horror flick ...
Huffing a little, she once more wished that being a witch was lot more like Harry Potter made it out to be and a lot less like being a good cook. This whole situation would be vastly improved if all she had to do was dig her magic wand out of her bag, point it at the security guards chasing her, and shout, Stupefy! — Christine Warren

The time must come inevitably when mankind shall surmount the imbecility of religion, as it has surmounted the imbecility of religion's ally, magic. It is impossible to imagine this world being really civilized so long as so much nonsense survives. In even its highest forms religion embraces concepts that run counter to all common sense. It can be defended only by making assumptions and adopting rules of logic that are never heard of in any other field of human thinking. — H.L. Mencken

She had always enjoyed the warm, calming feeling of the sand. It slipped as a silken scarf of liquid sunshine across the surface of her skin. Kayn took one hand and ran it over the surface of the sand, and it shifted as though it had been moved by a light breeze without her hand making contact. Her life now had no room for feet being firmly planted on the ground. She had to allow her mind to take off in flight and accept the impossible. She had to embrace life as a toddler. In a child's world, every breath of life is a mystery; everything had the possibility of being magic. — Kim Cormack

The word patriotism, or its equivalents and derivations, is upon everyone's lips at the present time. It is a magic word which is thought by most people to cover any multitude of sins. To be patriotic in whatever cause is tantamount to being virtuous, while no worse charge can be brought against a man in popular estimation than to say he is unpatriotic. — Ernest Belfort Bax

It hadn't been Druid magic. It had been the power of a Warrior. There was only one Warrior who she knew could alter a person's perception of their surroundings with such ease. "Phelan," she murmured. His power was so great, she and her wyrran had thought they were being attacked by at least a dozen Warriors. Their claws had felt real as they scoured her skin, their roars loud to her ears. — Donna Grant

I do so love how all magic comes with its share of dire warnings and unclear requirements," sighed Tybalt. "It's like being on the stage, only there's no director, and the understudies have all died of typhus. — Seanan McGuire

Magic clubs have as much to do with magic as country clubs have with being in the country. — Theodore Annemann

When you're drug kingpin - you're a mayor. You are a governor. But of a different society. You get to do what you want to do, just like any mayor. You can park your car anywhere. You get the best women. You go to the restaurants and eat free. It was like being a rock star. Like being Magic Johnson or Michael Jordan. It was just pure freedom, everything I was looking for. I desperately wanted freedom. — Rick Ross

Physical attraction that strong is addictive. And knowing that kind of magic isn't just a fantasy makes me want to find it again. But what about being with someone who makes me a better person? What about sharing my life with someone who adores me as much as I adore him, whom I can always count on, who helps me find my way when I'm lost? — Susane Colasanti

Angus skidded to a stop and lifted his jaw as if sensing he was being watched. He looked in her direction and instantly covered his manhood as his eyes caught Jane's shocked face in the tree limbs. "Oh, lassie."
"Oh, naked man," Jane teased before she could stop herself. — Michelle M. Pillow

Magic underlies the relationship between us, and the greater immensities of birth and death. Thus the experience of being in the presence of something magical is an empowering, uplifting experience. Magic, understood this way, contributes meaning to life. — Brendan Myers

The magic in these Masonic rituals is very, very old. And way back in those days, it worked. As time went on, and it started being used for spectacle, to consolidate what were only secular appearances of power, it began to lose its zip. But the words, moves, and machinery have been more or less faithfully carried down over the millennia, through the grim rationalizing of the World, and so the magic is still there, though latent, needing only to touch the right sensitive head to reassert itself. — Thomas Pynchon

I probably get a deeper satisfaction of having taken a very good photograph than of having written something very good, a very good story. Maybe it's because the element of magic is so present in a good photograph - luck and magic, but also hard work and being ready and all that. — Teju Cole

This was middle school, the age of miracles, the time when kids shot up three inches over the summer, when breasts bloomed from nothing, when voices dipped and dove. Our first flaws were emerging, but they were being corrected. Blurry vision could be fixed invisibly with the magic of the contact lens. Crooked teeth were pulled straight with braces. Spotty skin could be chemically cleared. Some girls were turning beautiful. A few boys were growing tall. — Karen Thompson Walker

Music acts on the whole of the organism like a magic force which suppresses the understanding and irresistibly takes possession of the entire being. To insist on analysing this force is to destroy its very essence. — Emile Jaques-Dalcroze

I can't wait." Kian pressed my hands to his lips. "I love you with all my heart, all my being, all of myself. Whatever my mother says, whatever the law says, you are still my intended. I can feel it. Feel it the way I feel the power of Winter Magic in my blood. It is a truth more ancient than any laws, any magic. We can still communicate telepathically, with our minds, which is one magic of love. When you have love for someone, and it is returned, lovers can communicate through the mind - as long as we have that connection, we will never be truly parted. Promise me that, Breena. — Kailin Gow

Being near you for a day was at the top of my bucket list of the greatest life achievements, so this has by far exceeded my expectations and everyday has been magic. — Crystal Woods

In the doleful court behind my building a patchwork of windows was all that separated me from a hundred muted lives being led without mystery or menace or magic. — Amor Towles

Ena," Brett said.
"Lady Ena, Ryker corrected from the doorway.
Brett smiled. He couldn't imagine her wanted to be called anything but Ena, but he would call her anything that pleased her.
The sharp look she gave her butler made Brett think calling her Lady Ena was out.
Ryker, being his usual unflappable self, just looked at her as if he was in charge and she would go by her new title or else. — Terry Spear

When we meditate to expand our consciousness, we perceive reality from an evolved perspective. The yogic mindset is able to create the miraculous magic of each moment at all times. Even when doing mundane chores, a yogi is able to tap into the flow of inspiration. Holding unwavering focus, the mind of consciousness is efficient and effective in dealing with every day realities by being. The vast void mind of awareness is aligned to the world of all enlightened beings of the past as in the moment of now- alight as a Lamp.The magic of Now is consciousness. — Nandhiji

Cassandra always hid when she read, though she never quite knew why. It was as if she couldn't shake the guilty suspicion that she was being lazy, that surrendering herself so completely to something so enjoyable must surely be wrong. But surrender she did. Let herself drop through the rabbit hole and into a tale of magic and mystery ... — Kate Morton

Rather than get hung up on historical details, we need to keep coming back to the question, 'What does God want to tell us?' If we hang our faith on the absolute historical accuracy of Scripture in every detail, we risk making Scripture a sort of 'magic' book that turns up the right answers to all sorts of rather irrelevant questions, instead of being a book that gives us, in the wonderful words of the Coronation service, 'the lively oracles of God'. The Bible is not intended to be a mere chronicle of past events, but a living communication from God, telling us now what we need to know for our salvation. — Rowan Williams

No. I don't want to set the speed. I don't like being in control. I want him to set the pace. I'm not good at this kind of stuff. I'm stunned. I think I'm just staring at him with my mouth hanging open. How could he be so perfect in so many ways and then do something like this to me? Can't he see that I'm about as aggressive as a water lily?

Webb, R. M. (2015-09-01). Speak (Witches & Warlocks Book 1) (p. 36). . Kindle Edition. — R.M. Webb

Miracles have a higher percentage of being permanent than magical solutions. — Nike Thaddeus

Tamlin waved his hand, and a hundred candles sprang to life. Whatever Lucien had said about magic being drained and off-kilter thanks to the blight clearly hadn't affected Tamlin as dramatically, or perhaps he'd been far more — Anonymous

Perhaps there's given up being magic because people didn't believe in it any more. — E. Nesbit

When I was tiny, the county fair came through town. Our parents took us, and got tickets for the rides, even though I was scared to death of all of them. Edward was the one who convinced me to go on the merry-go-round. He put me up on one of the wooden horses and he told me the horse was magic, and might turn real right underneath me, but only if I didn't look down. So I didn't. I stared out at the pinwheeling crowd and searched for him. Even when I started to get dizzy or thought I might throw up, the circle would come around again and there he was. After a while, I stopped thinking about the horse being magic, or even how terrified I was, and instead, I made a game out of finding Edward.
I think that's what family feels like. A ride that takes you back to the same place over and over. — Jodi Picoult

It was these secondary levels of life, these extrasensory flashes and floating nuances of being, these pockets of rapport forming unexpectedly, that made me believe we were a magic act, adults and children together, sharing unaccountable things — Don DeLillo

There is nothing so nice as supposing. It's almost like being a fairy. If you suppose anything hard enough it seems as if it were real. — Frances Hodgson Burnett

The highest art ... sets down its creations and trusts in their magic, without fear of not being understood. — Hermann Hesse

Probably my first memory of theatre, the first one I guess that had an impact on me was when I saw my very first panto with my Primary School. I think just going there and experience that for the first time, being so young, it's something that's actually stuck with me right up until now. And to think back and to sort of remember that magic and that first little hint of it was brilliant. — Colin Morgan

As he rose to his feet he noticed that he was neither dripping nor panting for breath as anyone would expect after being under water. His clothes were perfectly dry. He was standing by the edge of a small pool - not more than ten feet from side to side in a wood. The trees grew close together and were so leafy that he could get no glimpse of the sky. All the light was green light that came through the leaves: but there must have been a very strong sun overhead, for this green daylight was bright and warm. It was the quietest wood you could possibly imagine. There were no birds, no insects, no animals, and no wind. You could almost feel the trees growing. The pool he had just got out of was not the only pool. There were dozens of others - a pool every few yards as far as his eyes could reach. You could almost feel the trees drinking the water up with their roots. This wood was very much alive. — C.S. Lewis

They are made to believe they cannot behave without their imaginary friend watching over them. Some of them set out to demonstrate this too. They feel they have no purpose without this magic father in the sky, and their leaders make it so they are too weak willed to have any purpose other than being steered like a herd of tranquilized cattle. Looking to an imaginary paradise, which will never come, they pledge their real lives to slavery, keeping themselves captive. — Damien Ba'al

I roll my eyes. "Oh, the woe of being adored."
Beta Sinta grins. "It's a hard life. — Amanda Bouchet

What do you want from me? Am I to be some tool that people use to do magic? Is that my purpose in life?" "No, of course not!" Blaise protested, pushing away an unwelcome tendril of guilt. In a way, that had been exactly what he had originally intended for Gala, but she wasn't supposed to be a person, with the feelings and emotions of a human being. — Dima Zales

Because, between 'reality' on the one hand, and the point where the mind strikes reality, there's a middle zone, a rainbow edge where beauty comes into being, where two very different surfaces mingle and blur to provide what life does not: and this is the space where all art exists, and all magic. — Donna Tartt

At the magic touch of the beautiful the secret chords of our being are awakened, we vibrate and thrill in response to its call. Mind speaks to mind. We listen to the unspoken, we gaze upon the unseen. The master calls forth notes we know not of. Memories long forgotten all come back to us with a new significance. Hopes stifled by fear, yearnings that we dare not recognise, stand forth in new glory. — Okakura Kakuzo

Every human being has a fascinating existence, with a big cast of good and evil characters in each. And almost always, somewhere along the way, magic. — Lucinda Riley

When the reason for a thing's being illuminated, it doesn't hold the same mystery it does when it is unknown, which is both a wonderful and a horrible revelation. It's wonderful because it's like peeking into the universe and understanding a tiny bit of its complexity. It's also horrible because a little bit of magic is removed from the world with each discovery. — Bradley Somer

Writers and people who had command of words were respected and feared as people who manipulated magic. In latter times I think that artists and writers have allowed themselves to be sold down the river. They have accepted the prevailing belief that art and writing are merely forms of entertainment. They're not seen as transformative forces that can change a human being; that can change a society. They are seen as simple entertainment; things with which we can fill 20 minutes, half an hour, while we're waiting to die. — Alan Moore

Just having the camera, being able to pull back from situations and be an observer, it saved my life ... I realised I could find these intimate moments and that people trusted me. That, basically, my camera was magic. — Ryan McGinley

Non-magic people (more commonly known as Muggles) were particularly afraid of magic in medieval times, but not very good at recognizing it. On the rare occasion that they did catch a real witch or wizard, burning had no effect whatsoever. The witch or wizard would perform a basic Flame-Freezing Charm and then pretend to shriek with pain while enjoying a gentle, tickling sensation. Indeed, Wendelin the Weird enjoyed being burned so much that she allowed herself to be caught no less than forty-seven times in various disguises. Harry — J.K. Rowling

Narrowing her eyes, Jocasta ground her teeth together and stalked toward the source of the magic. Her walking stick thudded against the ground in time with her step. She drew her cloak about her bony shoulders, huddling into it against the chill of the late October air. Her bones were too old to be traipsing about at this hour of the night, but that was what came of being the head of the SALEM Council. — Violet Merriweather

What is being lost is the magic of the word. I am not an image person. Imagery belongs to another civilization: the caveman. Caveman couldn't express himself so he put images on walls. — Elie Wiesel

This wasn't a place for illusions; the reality here was the genuine happiness that came about from the natural magic of standing next to someone and being consumed by the fortitude in his or her humanity. — Ishmael Beah

I think you just have to keep knocking down doors, you have to keep being aggressive, and even if somebody says 'No', then you have to knock on the next door. — Magic Johnson

The idea of being part of this tapestry of humanity is a far more enlightening idea for me than believing you are going to this different place when you die. The magic of reality is far more potent. — Matthew Healy

The beauty and magnitude of a diva's voice resides, so the iconography suggests, in her deformity. Her voice is beautiful because she herself is not-and her ugliness is interpreted as a sign of moral and social deviance. Reading biographies of divas, I can't ignore the repeated references to physical flaws-for example, Benedetta Pisaroni's "features horribly disfigured by small-pox," prompting spectators to shut their eyes "so as to hear without being condemned to see." Audiences speculated that Maria Malibran was not anatomically a woman, but an androgyne or hermaphrodite-an aberrant physique to match her voice's magic power. — Wayne Koestenbaum

Film photography will always be superior to digital - because no matter how many lasers and instant buttons and HD pixels you've got, a human being can take a photograph with much more integrity and meaning than one a built-in robot took. — Rebecca McNutt

Everyone always talks about the magic of books being able to take you to other places, to let you see exotic worlds, to make you experience new and interesting things. Well, do you think words alone can do this? Of course not! If you've ever thought that books are boring, it's because you don't know how to read them correctly. From now on, when you read a book, I want you to scream the words of the novel out loud while reading them, then do exactly what the characters are doing in the story. Trust me, it will make books way more exciting. Even dictionaries. Particularly dictionaries. — Brandon Sanderson

If you think ahead to what to say next - like how to fix it or make the person feel better - BOOM! Off the board. You're into the future. Empathy requires staying with the energy that's here right now. Not using any technique. Just being present. When I have really connected to this energy, it's like I wasn't there. I call this "watching the magic show". In this presence, a very precious energy works through us that can heal anything, and this relieves me from my "fix-it" tendencies. — Marshall B. Rosenberg

Once you have mates who know you, right down under the this-and-that you decide people want to see today, then there's no room left for the someday person who'll magic you into being all your finest dreams. You've turned solid:you're the person your mates know, forever. — Tana French

I am, as far as I can tell, about a month behind Lord Byron. In every town we stop at we discover innkeepers, postillions, officials, burghers, potboys, and all kinds and sorts of ladies whose brains still seem somewhat deranged from their brief exposure to his lordship. And though my companions are careful to tell people that I am that dreadful being, an English magician, I am clearly nothing in comparison to an English poet and everywhere I go I enjoy the reputation- quite new to me, I assure you- of the quiet, good Englishman, who makes no noise and is no trouble to any one ... — Susanna Clarke