Quotes & Sayings About Contemplating

A party full of 'likeable' people doesn't bear contemplating. — Will Self

Crutches may be a pain in the (pinched nerve back) ass to use, but damn, they are handy when your dog pushes open the bathroom door while you are contemplating life. They're also handy to turn on lights just out of your reach, and to threat your husband with if he doesn't fetch you a Fresca because you are a poor, pathetic little thing huddled under a Snuggy, unable to walk without bellowing profanities at the top of your lungs, thereby scaring your dogs, the fat squirrel stuffing his face on the deck, and the manic depressive goats that live three houses down. — Katie MacAlister

Only death consistently excites your emotions, whether contemplating when life is safe and stale, or fleeing it when life is threatened and precious — Yann Martel

You were contemplating the mountain, Mr. Conway?" Came the inquiry.
"Yes, it's a fine sight. It has a name, I suppose?"
"It is called Karakal"
"I don't think I've ever heard of it. Is is very high?"
"Over twenty-eight thousand feet."
"Indeed? I didn't realize there would be anything on that scale outside the Himalayas. Has it been properly surveyed? Whose are the measurements?"
"Whose would you expect, my dear sir? Is there anything incompatible between monasticism and trigonometry? — James Hilton

Fortunate are the nations that can build wooden houses. Because wood breathes, transforms, deteriorates, like us. It is also important to have flowers and plants where we live, because they breathe, too. Contemplating a flower for three seconds can be a captivating solitary journey back to original geometry, which is always revitalizing. — Henryk Skolimowski

He was silent for a moment, staring out the window into the rain; I imagined he was contemplating the fact that his family's presence was turning the locals into giant dogs. — Stephenie Meyer

The world that was the emonation of divine had been reduced to a handful of dust. Thousands of people, all caught in profile looked into their mobile fish tanks. Each face, each car, transporting grief, boredom, rage. Someone in one of these cars was contemplating murder. Someone, rite now, in the privecy of his aquarium, threaded the beads of his suicide through his fingers, praying along the chain like a rosary. Someone begged for help from a God he didnt quite believe in, yet had no one else to appeal to. — Janet Fitch

Flora was in that state where the spirit may be willing but the flesh is weak and wishes to go on holiday - and where the flesh in most cases wins hands down with a packed suitcase. It did so now. So she did what many a researcher both great and insignificant does when they are stuck. She yawned while contemplating how to catch the Muse by surprising Her. Almost invariably, the Muse has seen it all before - and also yawns. — Mavis Cheek

Contemplate to see that awakened people, while not being enslaved by the work of serving living beings, never abandon their work of serving living beings. — Nhat Hanh

When I was twelve years old I thought up an odd trinity: namely, God the Father, God the Son, and God the Devil. My inference wasthat God, in contemplating himself, created the second person of the godhead; but that, in order to be able to contemplate himself, he had to contemplate, and thus to create, his opposite.
With this I began to do philosophy. — Friedrich Nietzsche

Was contemplating my purpose - when the notion chose to arrive - that I'll be dead much, much longer - than I will ever be alive. — Joseph DiFrancesco

Chili is much improved by having had a day to contemplate its fate. — John Steele Gordon

The poor young man must work for his bread; he eats; when he has eaten, he has nothing left but reverie. He enters God's theater free; he sees the sky, space, the stars, the flowers, the children, the humanity in which he suffers, the creation in which he shines. He looks at humanity so much that he sees the soul, he looks at creation so much that he sees God. He dreams, he feels that he is great; he dreams some more, and he feels that he is tender. From the egotism of the suffering man, he passes to the compassion of the contemplating man. A wonderful feeling springs up within him, forgetfulness of self, and pity for all. In thinking of the countless enjoyments nature offers, gives, and gives lavishly to open souls and refuses to closed souls, he, a millionaire of intelligence, comes to grieve for the millionaires of money. All hatred leaves his heart as all light enters his mind. And is he unhappy? No. The poverty of a young man is never miserable. — Victor Hugo

I plucked my soul out of its secret place,
And held it to the mirror of my eye,
To see it like a star against the sky,
A twitching body quivering in space,
A spark of passion shining on my face.
And I explored it to determine why
This awful key to my infinity
Conspires to rob me of sweet joy and grace.
And if the sign may not be fully read,
If I can comprehend but not control,
I need not gloom my days with futile dread,
Because I see a part and not the whole.
Contemplating the strange, I'm comforted
By this narcotic thought: I know my soul. — Claude McKay

Not once in her life had Darcy wanted to thumb her nose at danger and rip the clothes off a man, but she was contemplating that very thing. — Donna Grant

I should like to be the landscape which I am contemplating, I should like this sky, this quiet water to think themselves within me, that it might be I whom they express in flesh and bone, and I remain at a distance. But it is also by this distance that the sky and the water exist before me. My contemplation is an excruciation only because it is also a joy. I can not appropriate the snow field where i slide. It remains foreign, forbidden, but I take delight in this very effort toward an impossible possession. I experience it as a triumph, not as a defeat. — Simone De Beauvoir

The hands of the artificer," Paul said, "had wu, and allowed that wu to flow into this piece. Possibly he himself knows only that this piece satisfies. It is complete, Robert. By contemplating it, we gain more wu ourselves. — Philip K. Dick

And some of the people i knew were contemplating our circumstances. our circumstances being poorly paid jobs if we worked in the arts, two hours of sleep if we worked in money, and a newfound sense of intellectual inferiority if we worked in publishing. — Sloane Crosley

Do you mind if I kiss you?" Morag asks, her Calvinist pallor giving way to high color, getting higher.
"Why?" I ask.
"I thought it might be fun," she says. "There's nobody about; our boys are away."
Has she made a presumption of unbridled sensuality as some do when they contemplate my tropical aspect? One
American boy, holding me too close, his body a monument to sweat, actually said, "Gee, I guess that means you can get into all those neat positions." Spoken with the logic of Cuvier contemplating the Venus Hottentot. — Michelle Cliff

We become what we contemplate. — Plato

It was five minutes of screaming, slamming myself against the door, and stamping my feet-and a minute of contemplating the cold, horrible idea that I might have to leave the room to find anyone, and maybe this had been their plan all along, and Oh God, Oh God-before I heard Dr. Elpinoy's nervous voice. — Lia Habel

It is very remarkable that while the words Eternal, Eternity, Forever, are constantly in our mouths, and applied without hesitation, we yet experience considerable difficulty in contemplating any definite term which bears a very large proportion to the brief cycles of our petty chronicles. There are many minds that would not for an instant doubt the God of Nature to have existed from all Eternity, and would yet reject as preposterous the idea of going back a million of years in the History of His Works. Yet what is a million, or a million million, of solar revolutions to an Eternity? — George Julius Poulett Scrope

A moment later he was in his garden, walking, meditating, contemplating, his heart and soul wholly absorbed in those grand and mysterious things which God shows at night to the eyes which remain open. — Victor Hugo

He always smiles, even when contemplating nothing good. — Henryk Sienkiewicz

When I look out on such a night as this, I feel as if there could be neither wickedness nor sorrow in the world; and there certainly would be less of both if the sublimity of Nature were more attended to, and people were carried more out of themselves by contemplating such a scene. — Jane Austen

I limited myself to introduce a change in my way of thinking and the way I see things. When I look at my child, I do it in a different way then when I'm contemplating a chair. They are different ... the child is a living being, and the chair is an object. — Meg Tilly

Contemplating suicide-- or a graduate degree — Joe Pernice

We don't go to Sabbath meetings to be entertained or even solely
to be instructed. We go to worship the Lord. It is an individual
responsibility, and regardless of what is said from the pulpit, if one
wishes to worship the Lord in spirit and truth, he may do so by
attending his meetings, partaking of the sacrament, and
contemplating the beauties of the gospel If the service is a
failure to you, you have failed. No one can worship for you. You
must do your own waiting upon the Lord. — Spencer W. Kimball

Mothers yielding Bibles, contemplating smearing the blood of lamb chops over her doorway. Anything to keep her son alive another day. — Antonia Perdu

We were approaching the Louvre, but he paused to lean on the parapet, and we both stood there contemplating the passing boats, which dazzled us with their spotlights. 'Look at them,' I said, because I needed to talk about something, afraid that he might get bored and go home. 'They only see what the spotlights show them. When they go home home, they'll say they know Paris. Tomorrow they'll go and see the Mona Lisa and claim they've visited the Louvre. But they don't know Paris and have never really been to the Louvre. All they did was go on a boat and look at a painting, one painting, instead of looking at a whole city and trying to find out what's happening in it, visiting the bars, going down the streets that don't appear in any of the tourist guides, and getting lost in order to find themselves again. It's the difference between watching a porn movie and making love. — Paulo Coelho

A cowboy is a hired hand on the middle of a horse contemplating the hind end of a cow. — Edward Abbey

We feel a kind of bittersweet pricking of malicious delight in contemplating the misfortunes of others. — Michel De Montaigne

Toxic thoughts leave no room for truth to flourish. And in the absence of truth, lies reign. Spend some time soaking in your favorite verses from Scripture tonight. The more we read God's truths and let truth fill our minds, the less time we'll spend contemplating untruths and toxic thoughts. — Lysa TerKeurst

We create a lot of unnecessary problems in our lives by acting emotionally ... without contemplating the ripple effects of our actions. — Timothy Pina

The literary critic, or the critic of any other specific form of artistic expression, may detach himself from the world for as long as the work of art he is contemplating appears to do the same. — Clive James

Because I'm not thinking about the fiber content in stain resistant carpet." My eyes remained stubbornly shut.
"What does that mean?"
"It means ... " I lifted my lids and found him surveying me with simple curiosity. I swallowed a new thickness in my throat, knowing that I needed to tell him the truth. "It means my brain finds you more interesting than all the really interesting trivial facts I could be contemplating or researching at present."
His answering smile was leisurely, measured; "I think that's the nicest thing anyone has ever said to me. — Penny Reid

When, according to habit, I was contemplating the stars in a clear sky, I noticed a new and unusual star, surpassing the other stars in brilliancy. There had never before been any star in that place in the sky. — Tycho Brahe

The logic of nuclear deterrence gets more and more convoluted the deeper one goes into it. It is assumed, for instance, that the leaders of Russia, in contemplating an attack on the UK, would be sufficiently sane and rational as to weigh up the consequences of a possible retaliatory nuclear strike from the UK and decide on that basis to refrain from attacking. On the other hand, it is assumed that those same leaders would base their sane and rational decision on the likelihood of their counterparts in the UK acting so insanely and irrationally as to be willing to launch nuclear weapons against Russia that would almost certainly bring about their own total self-destruction. — Timmon Milne Wallis

Some jobs are just too hideous to contemplate, — Mike Rowe

Where the hell did you get those?" Bronagh asked me causing everyone's gaze to turn my way.

I grinned and proudly held up my flowers. "Mr. Pervert."

The lads all looked to Alec and laughed.

"How badly did you want to hit him?" Nico asked.

Alec growled, "I'm still contemplating going back inside and kicking his ass."

I rattled my head. "Relax, he was just being nice."

"Nice my ass," all four brothers said in unison, which cracked up the girls.

"They all share the same narrow mind," Aideen teased.

I fell into Alec and laughed.

"Ha. Ha. Ha. Shut up," Kane deadpanned making me laugh harder. — L.A. Casey

I write - and read - for the sake of the story ... My basic test for any story is: 'Would I want to meet these characters and observe these events in real life? Is this story an experience worth living through for its own sake? Is the pleasure of contemplating these characters an end itself? — Ayn Rand

We are of a broad, Karamazovian nature
and this is what I am driving at
capable of containing all possible opposites and of contemplating both abysses at once, the abyss above us, an abyss of lofty ideals, and the abyss beneath us, and abyss of the lowest and foulest degradation. — Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Man is the cruelest animal," says Zarathustra. "When gazing at tragedies, bull-fights, crucifixations he hath hitherto felt happier than at any other time on Earth. And when he invented Hell ... lo, Hell was his Heaven on Earth"; he could put up with suffering now, by contemplating the eternal punishment of his oppressors in the other world. — Friedrich Nietzsche

My life has two modes. One is sitting around writing and contemplating or building things. The other is execution mode. It takes a while to switch from one to the other. — Trent Reznor

The art of acting presupposes three phases: understanding a part, intuiting a part, and contemplating the essence of a part. — Franz Grillparzer

It's not that they knew what you were doing exactly. They could feel what you were feeling, and as the lie you were contemplating brought you down, they felt that drain themselves, and thus became more confused and unclear---which was an unconscious signal to them that something was wrong, and that you were probably up to no good. So they backed away. — James Redfield

In contemplating the pecuniary resources needed for the removal of such a number to so great a distance [freed slaves to Africa], my thoughts and hopes have long been turned to the rich fund presented in the western lands of the nation ... — James Madison

To while away the day contemplating evils that might have been is to poison the happiness we already have. — Christopher Paolini

What is there in man so worthy of honor and reverence as this, that he is capable of contemplating something higher than his own reason, more sublime than the whole universe- that Spirit which alone is self-subsis-tent, from which all truth proceeds, without which there is no truth? — Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi

While making "Possessed", I wept each morning on my drive to the studio, and I wept all the way back home. I found it impossible to sleep at night, so I'd lie in bed contemplating the future. I fear it with all my heart and soul even as I fear the dark. — Joan Crawford

Meditation is a half-way house between thinking and contemplating ... — Evelyn Underhill

In my opinion, it was chiefly owing to their deep contemplation in their silent retreats in the days of youth that the old Indian orators acquired the habit of carefully arranging their thoughts.
They listened to the warbling of birds and noted the grandeur and the beauties of the forest. The majestic clouds - which appear like mountains of granite floating in the air - the golden tints of a summer evening sky, and the changes of nature, possessed a mysterious significance.
All of this combined to furnish ample matter for reflection to the contemplating youth. — Francis Assikinack

A seeker of Truth looks beyond the apparent and contemplates the hidden. — Rumi

He that contemplates hath a day without night. — George Herbert

Many a suicide might be averted if the person contemplating it could find the proper assistance when such a crisis impends. — Clifford Whittingham Beers

Judgment is very easy, but I think, on the whole, professional critics maybe see too much, and compare too much, and forget the joy of actually looking and contemplating for its own sake. — Antony Gormley

It's true that he would come to himself at once, and yet, if he were asked what he had been thinking about while standing there, he would most likely not remember, but would most likely keep hidden away in himself the impression he had been under while contemplating. These impressions are dear to him, and he is most likely storing them up imperceptibly and even without realizing it - why and what for, of course, he does not know either; perhaps suddenly, having stored up his impressions over many years, he will drop everything and wander off to Jerusalem to save his soul, or perhaps he will suddenly burn down his native village, or perhaps he will do both. There are plenty of contemplators among the people. Most likely Smerdyakov, too, was such a contemplator, and most likely he, too, was greedily storing up his impressions, almost without knowing why himself. — Fyodor Dostoyevsky

In choosing a companion, it is necessary to study the disposition, the inheritance, and training of the one with whom you are contemplating making life's journey. — David O. McKay

Originality is something that is easily exaggerated, especially by authors contemplating their own work. — John Kenneth Galbraith

Yes, letter writing is antiquated - though there remain a few renegades who still so treasure the luxury of contemplating their lives in letters that they would rather write than call. — Joan Frank

Stop contemplating and start celebratingYeah, you gotta live before you die. — Mike Ness

Len Colter sat in the shade under the wall of the horse barn, eating pone and sweet butter and contemplating a sin. — Leigh Brackett

Contemplating the task ahead would not make it easier or the water warmer. — J.K. Rowling

Happiness: an agreeable sensation arising from contemplating the misery of another. — Ambrose Bierce

I have always thought it rather interesting to follow the involuntary movements of fear in clever people. Fools coarsely display their cowardice in all its nakedness, but the others are able to cover it with a veil so delicate, so daintily woven with small plausible lies, that there is some pleasure to be found in contemplating this ingenious work of the human intelligence. — Alexis De Tocqueville

Success is not necessarily determined by material possessions or accomplishments. You can enjoy success simply by reaching the point where you are perfectly content with your life in every respect and you feel no dissatisfaction or pressing need for anything else. In this sense, you can be a success sitting by yourself in a quiet place contemplating the world. — Brian Tracy

No, I wasn't going to refer to cowardice. What I was going to say was, that a man contemplating suicide should bear in mind that his act is usually paid for by others. It is not just his personal affair. Everyone who takes his or her own life increases the fear in all his progeny of committing the same act during a period of depression. In fact, every blood relation he possesses gets a drop of the same poison. Nice parting gift. — Olive Higgins Prouty

Nothing is inevitable if we are willing to contemplate what is happening. — Marshall McLuhan

Walking helps me a lot to feel alive, and I do this every single day, my wife and I. We have long conversations about nature, and we also walk silently, just contemplating. — Paulo Coelho

steps, deep in thought. A breeze was slightly disturbing his hair. Then, as we watched, he walked very slowly up the steps. At the top, he turned and came back down, a little faster. Turning once more, my father became still again for several seconds, contemplating the steps before him. Eventually, he climbed them a second time, very deliberately. This time he continued on across the grass until he had almost reached the summerhouse, then turned and came walking slowly back, his eyes never leaving the ground. In fact, I can describe his manner at that moment no better than the way Miss Kenton puts it in her letter; it was indeed 'as though he hoped to find some precious jewel he had dropped there'. — Kazuo Ishiguro

Contemplating an object fixedly with the mind, asking myself, 'What is it?' without thinking of any other object or relating it to anything else for hours on end. — Simone Weil

The true value of the Christian religion rests, not upon speculative views of the Creator, which must necessarily be different in each individual, according to the extent of the knowledge of the finite being, who employs his own feeble powers in contemplating the infinite:;: but it rests upon those doctrines of kindness and benevolence which that religion claims and enforces, not merely in favour of man himself but of every creature susceptible of pain or of happiness. — Charles Babbage

If you want to be a writer, you should go into the largest library you can find and stand there contemplating the books that have been written. Then you should ask yourself, 'Do I really have anything to add?' If you have the arrogance or the humility to say yes, you will know you have the vocation. — Margaret Atwood

Contemplate sweetly on love, and the wisdom of God shall find you. — Harold Klemp

Once you discover that the world rewards reckless faith, no lesser world is worth contemplating. — G. Willow Wilson

Tera said, "All right, who's doing the obligatory thing with the rock?"
"What thing?" Bowe asked.
Mariketa said, "You know, someone drops a rock, and we all silently watch it fall while contemplating the plummet to our deaths?"
Oh, that rock thing. — Kresley Cole

I hope you're not contemplating retaliation against Mr. Figueroa."

She smiled again. "Don't need to. Karma will take care of him."

"As long as Karma isn't a hit man from New Delhi, we're good. — Marianne Stillings

We are like caterpillars contemplating pupation. — Terence McKenna

Our struggles with e-mail are a bit pathetic, but the larger topic is worth considering: Is it possible to design an environment in which undesired behaviors - whether yours or your colleagues' - are made not only harder but impossible? As it turns out, lots of people actually make their living contemplating how to wipe out the wrong kinds of behaviors. — Chip Heath

I lived in a guest house on the monastery grounds, but spent all my time after breakfast with the Benedictines. My partners-in-crime were two other volunteers from the Great Lakes area. Charlie just finished his first year of college and Debbie was a teacher in her forties who was contemplating the next season of her life. We three were all very different but got along capitally in the specious guest house. — Annie Kontor

We can say that true gratitude does not give rise to the debtor's ethic because it gives rise to faith in future grace. With true gratitude there is such a delight in the worth of God's past grace, that we are driven on to experience more and more of it in the future ... it is done by transforming gratitude into faith as it turns from contemplating the pleasures of past grace and starts contemplating the promises of the future. — John Piper

Relax; the world's not watching that closely. It's too busy contemplating itself in the mirror. — Richelle E. Goodrich

Thus strategists hesitate over the map, the few pins and lines of coloured chalk, contemplating a change in the pins and lines, a matter of inches, which outside the room, out of sight of the studious officers, may engulf the past, present and future in ruin or life. She was a symbol to herself then, lacking the life of both child and woman; victory and defeat were changes of pin and line; she knew nothing of war. — Evelyn Waugh

Here is this three-pound mass of jelly you can hold in the palm of your hand, and it can contemplate the vastness of interstellar space. It can contemplate the meaning of infinity and it can contemplate itself contemplating on the meaning of infinity. — Vilayanur S. Ramachandran

This book could corrupt or debauch. It would not make suitable reading for Boy Rangers, Aunt Matilda, or those contemplating a life of celibacy. - Eric Bishop-Potter on "Jimmy, Mrs Fisher and Me. — Eric Bishop-Potter

Typically I go in the studio and whatever I'm contemplating that day will wind up being a song. I don't come in with lyrics ... I just go in and let it happen. — Alanis Morissette

IF YOU WOULD BE FREE OF GREED, FIRST YOU HAVE TO LEAVE EGOTISM BEHIND.
THE BEST MENTAL EXERCISE FOR RELINQUISHING EGOTISM IS CONTEMPLATING IMPERMANENCE. — Dogen

Live contemplating the body through mindfulness. Live contemplating feelings. In this way you will be aware of and control wrong desires. — Gautama Buddha

She was certainly rather drunk. Her eyes were fixed as if upon some far-off point. She seemed to be contemplating a future at once monotonous and insecure with an indifference which was after all a sort of hard-won courage. — Jean Rhys

I would enjoy sitting in a rocker ... listening to soft music and contemplating the things of the universe. But such activity offers no challenge and makes no contribution. — Gordon B. Hinckley

And to you, my dear visitors, I wish to speak of this youth, my brother, for there has been no appearance in my life more precious than this one, more prophetic and moving. My heart feels tender, and at this moment I am contemplating my whole life as if I were living it all anew ... — Fyodor Dostoyevsky

When I was contemplating medical school after graduating from Knox, several people suggested that nursing was a more suitable profession for women. My own mother discouraged me from becoming a doctor. But this is not why I became a nurse instead! — Mary Pope Osborne

Saloons provide moments of genuine ecstasy - but only if your soul is at peace and the rest of your life bears contemplating. Otherwise, they are palaces of misery. — Wilfrid Sheed

From the Greek word for spectators, theatai, the later philosophical term "theory" was derived, and the word "theoretical" until a few hundred years ago meant "contemplating," looking upon something from the outside, from a position implying a view that is hidden from those who take part in the spectacle and actualize it. The inference to be drawn from this early distinction between doing and understanding is obvious: as a spectator you may understand the "truth" of what the spectacle is about; but the price you have to pay is withdrawal from participating in it. — Hannah Arendt

A few miles away across the East River was the apartment he could never get used to, the job where he had nothing to do, the dozen or so people he knew slightly and cared about not at all: a fabric of existence as blank and seamless as the freshly plaster wall he passed. Soon his wife would return from New Jersey. Soon everyone would be back, and things would go on much as they had before. From the street outside came the sound of laughter and shouting, bottles breaking, voices droning in the warm air, and children playing far past their bedtime. It all meant nothing whatever to Lowell. Standing in the parlor of a house no longer his, listening to the voices of people whose lives were closed to him forever, contemplating a future much like his past, he realized that it was finally too late for him. Everything had gone wrong, and he had succeeded at nothing, and he was never going to have any kind of life at all. — L.J. Davis

I was always of the
mindset that whatever will be, will be. We can only just try to control our
own lives, that because our lives are so hopelessly entangled in the
choices of others, we can never have full control over our destiny or fate
or purpose or whatever you want to call it. The choices we make define
us, of course, but so do the choices of everyone around us whether we
know them or not. Instead of contemplating what-if scenarios, I always
just tried to accept things. — David Bowick

Live contemplating the body. Contemplate internally and externally. Contemplate the origination of things in the body. Contemplate the dissolution of things in the body. — Gautama Buddha

The computer focuses ruthlessly on things that can be represented in numbers. In so doing, it seduces people into thinking that other aspects of knowledge are either unreal or unimportant. The computer treats reason as an instrument for achieving things, not for contemplating things. It narrows dramatically what we know and intended by reason. — George Friedman

If we turn from contemplating the world as a whole, and, in particular, the generations of men as they live their little hour of mock-existence and then are swept away in rapid succession; if we turn from this, and look at life in its small details, as presented, say, in a comedy, how ridiculous it all seems! — Arthur Schopenhauer

It was a strange feeling going into a church I did not know for a service that I did not really believe in, but once inside I couldn't help a feeling of warmth and security. Outside there were wars and road accidents and murders, striptease clubs and battered babies and frayed tempers and unhappy marriages and people contemplating suicide and bad jokes, but once in St. Martin's there was peace. Surely people go to church not to involve themselves in the world's problems but to escape from them. — Michael Palin