Don't Think Small Quotes & Sayings

Because we don't know when we will die, we get to think of life as an inexhaustible well. Yet everything happens only a certain number of times, and a very small number really. How many more times will you remember a certain afternoon of your childhood, an afternoon that is so deeply a part of your being that you can't even conceive of your life without it? Perhaps four, five times more, perhaps not even that. How many more times will you watch the full moon rise? Perhaps 20. And yet it all seems limitless. — Paul Bowles

I'm so sorry. I don't think the etiquette manuals cover this sort of situation." He leaned in close, his lips all but grazing her neck, and inhaled. "Mmm. You smell good, too."
She nearly choked. Took a step backwards, until her back met cold stone. "Th-thank you."
"That's better. May I kiss you?" His finger dipped into her shirt collar, stroking the tender nape of her neck.
"I d-don't th-think that's a good idea."
"Why not? We're alone." His hands were at her waist.
Her lungs felt tight and much too small. "Wh-what if somebody comes in?"
He considered for a moment. "Well, I suppose they'll think I fancy grubby little boys. — Y.S. Lee

I think that sometimes people don't think before they speak. And even a small comment can make or break someone's day. — Lexi Ainsworth

Which people take the time to care for their souls, these days? I reckon not many. But ... hear this: I think that maybe in our lives
in our scrabbling for food, in the washing of our bodies and warming of them, in our small daily battles
we can forget our souls. We do not tend to them, as if they matter less. But I don't think they matter less. — Susan Fletcher

I grew up believing in God without having a clue what He is like. I called myself a Christian, was pretty involved in church, and tried to stay away from all of the things that 'good Christians' avoid- drinking, drugs, sex, swearing. Christianity was simple: fight your desires in order to please God. Whenever I failed (which was often), I'd walk around feeling guilty and distant from God. In hindsight, I don't think my church's teachings were incorrect, just incomplete. My view of God was narrow and small. — Francis Chan

People are bad at looking at seeds and guessing what size tree will grow out of them. The way you'll get big ideas in, say, health care is by starting out with small ideas. If you try to do some big thing, you don't just need it to be big; you need it to be good. And it's really hard to do big and good simultaneously. So, what that means is you can either do something small and good and then gradually make it bigger, or do something big and bad and gradually make it better. And you know what? Empirically, starting big just does not work. That's the way the government does things. They do something really big that's really bad, and they think, Well, we'll make it better, and then it never gets better.
Building Fast Companies for Growth, Inc. September 2013 — Paul Graham

I don't think I prefer writing for one age group above another. I am just as pleased with a story which I feel works well for very small children as I do with a story for young adults. — Margaret Mahy

Keep the right perspective Some people would love to have your problems. They would gladly trade places with you. They would love to have the job that frustrates you. They would love to sit in traffic in that car you don't like. They would love to have your husband, who gets on your nerves. They would love to live in the house you think is too small. — Joel Osteen

When there is a huge crack in your relationship with someone, you wonder what others do in similar situations. I realize I'm trying as hard as I can to present myself as the most unthreatening being in the world, like a small animal. I hunch into myself, avoiding going back to the same places I frequented with him. Obviously I don't eat the kind of food we ate or made together. But I don't think I'm going to move to a new house, because I have the kitchen and the large fridge that I'd wanted for so long. People say you can't possibly like your lover every single second of your life. But that's not true. I liked and looked to my lover every single second we were together. And I still can't admit that he's gone. True sorrow is when one person desires but the other doesn't. I don't know any better words to describe it, and I can't yet express this feeling through any kind of food. The one thing we know about sorrow is that it's a very personal, individual feeling. — Kyung-ran Jo

I have never described this to you before, not so much, I don't think, from lack of truthfulness as that, just naturally, one is not going to explain to people at large that from time to time one vomits up a small rabbit. — Julio Cortazar

Peter sighed into the water, and his breath sent a small circle of it into tiny ripples. "It seems cowardly, getting old. Don't you think?"
She rolled onto her side to look at him, pillowing her ear with her right arm, and letting her fingers dangle in the water beyond her head. "How is it cowardly?"
Peter kept his eyes on his reflection. "You just curl up around yourself, and sit by the fire, and try to be comfortable. When you get old, you just get smaller inside, and you try not to pay attention to anything but your blankets and your food and your bed."
"Being comfortable is not a bad thing."
Peter shrugged and turned his head to look at her as if it was a matter of fact. "Of course it is. Old people lock out all the scary, wild things. It's like they don't exist."
She wanted to say that she would have liked for those things not to exist, either, but she held her tongue, because she didn't want to sound like a coward. — Jodi Lynn Anderson

Even so, the two of us look memorable in these clothes. And your shirt is transparent. I don't think I can take a bunch of men ogling you." He didn't look up as he took his rifle apart and carefully wrapped it around before putting it in his pack. The ammunition belt followed, along with every other visible weapon.
Dahlia gasped and crossed her arms over her breasts. "You could have said something."
"I didn't want to embarrassed you." This time he did look up, only a small glance.
She had the impression of a fleeting smile. She caught the shirt he threw her and hastily put it on. "Next time, I'm pushing you in," she vowed. — Christine Feehan

And me, I've got to start all over. Not only build a new life, but construct a new person. I call my old self "that other guy," for I share nothing but his memories, and everything he ever liked I've had to discover all over again, one by one, so that I've held on to, for example, reading, motorcycling, and birdwatching, but I'm not yet sure about art or music (I can look at it or listen to it, but not with the same "engagement" I used to), and I have no interest in work, charity, world events, or anybody I don't know. In my present gypsy life, I encounter a lot of people every day, and some of them I instinctively like and respond to in a brief encounter at a gas station or small-town diner, but for the most part I look around at ugly and mean-spirited people and think, "Why are you alive? — Neil Peart

I'd make a good friend, not mother. I'm too selfish. I think a lot of mothers are selfish and they end up having children, but I don't want to put some small tiny person through that. — Tracey Emin

Current relationship status?" Her voice cut like an arctic chill blowing through the room.
"If you mean me, then you're not my type. If you mean my dad, he's single, but I don't think you're his type either," I said with a small smile. Mercy didn't find it amusing. A small blue vein in her forehead started throbbing like crazy ... "Actually, come to think of it, I don't think he has a type. I've never seen him with a woman.
Mercy, I hate to break it to you, but there's a very real possibility my dad is gay. — Jus Accardo

I got married three days after graduation, and the first thing I did what I was expected to do which was to work on a small newspaper. So we were in Chicago where my husband worked for the Chicago Sun-Times and we were having dinner with his editor and he said 'So what are you 'gonna do honey?' and I said 'I'm going to work on a newspaper', and he said 'I don't think so, because Newspaper Guild regulations said that I couldn't work on the same newspaper as my husband. — Madeleine Albright

I think in terms of being a New Yorker, as my friends would say, I don't take a lot of mess. I have no tolerance for people who are not thinking deeply about things. I have no tolerance for the kind of small talk that people need to fill silence. And I have no tolerance for people just not being a part of the world and being in it and trying to change it. — Jacqueline Woodson

I'm putting back into the self the responsibility for the collective life. If each one of us took very seriously the fact that every little act, every little word we utter, every injury we do to another human being is really what is projected into larger issues; if we could once begin to think of it that way, then each one of us, like a small cell, would do the work of creating a human self, a kind of self who wouldn't have ghettos, a kind of self that wouldn't go to war. Then we could begin to have the cell which would influence and enormous amount of cells around you. I don't think we can measure the radius of the personal influence of one person, within the home, outside of the home, in the neighborhood, and finally in national affairs. — Anais Nin

Just one more?" he said, holding up his thumb and index finger to indicate tiny. Oh so small. "Just one more little one? I don't think that was my best work, and what if this is the only time we ever kiss? Then you'll go on for the rest of your life thinking that's the best I can do. I don't think my ego can take that."

He sure as hell hoped this wouldn't be the only time they ever kissed. In fact, he was going to make damn sure of it, and then some. But for the moment, this angle was going to work for him. He could see her indecision. He leaned closer, his lips nearly touching hers. Her eyes fluttered shut as he whispered against her mouth, "Just one more. — Tracy Brogan

It may sound reactionary, I know. But we can all feel it. We've changed the way we think of ourselves as citizens. We don't think of ourselves as citizens in the old sense of being small parts of something larger and infinitely more important to which we have serious responsibilities. We do still think of ourselves as citizens in the sense of being beneficiaries
we're actually conscious of our rights as American citizens and the nation's responsibilities to us and ensuring we get our share of the American pie. We think of ourselves now as eaters of the pie instead of makers of the pie. So who makes the pie?
...
Something has happened where we've decided on a personal level that it's all right to abdicate our individual responsibility to the common good and let government worry about the common good while we all go about our individual self-interested business and struggle to gratify our various appetites. — David Foster Wallace

I don't believe in marriage. I think at worst it's a hostile political act, a way for small-minded men to keep women in the house and out of the way, wrapped up in the guise of tradition and conservative religious nonsense. At best, it's a happy delusion - these two people who truly love each other and have no idea how truly miserable they're about to make each other. But, but, when two people know that, and they decide with eyes wide open to face each other and get married anyway, then I don't think it's conservative or delusional. I think it's radical and courageous and very romantic. — Tina Modotti

I said you weren't inconsequential. No one is. We change at least one person's life just by being born. If you don't believe me, go ask your mother. The fellows who write history books may not think that's so special. I happen to disagree. Isabelle and her family may be long gone, but because they lived, regardless of how small their lives may have been, I believe they are worth remembering, even if only by strangers.
- BEFORE EVER AFTER — Samantha Sotto

New York has a thousand universes in it that don't always connect but we do all walk the same streets, hear the same sirens, ride the same subways, see the same headlines in the Post, read the same writings on the walls. That shared landscape gets inside of all of us and, in some small way, unites us, makes us think we know each other even when we don't. — Jay-Z

Death is always on the way, but the fact that you don't know when it will arrive seems to take away from the finiteness of life. It's that terrible precision that we hate so much. But because we don't know, we get to think of life as an inexhaustible well. Yet everything happens a certain number of times, and a very small number, really. How many more times will you remember a certain afternoon of your childhood, some afternoon that's so deeply a part of your being that you can't even conceive of your life without it? Perhaps four or five times more. Perhaps not even. How many more times will you watch the full moon rise? Perhaps twenty. And yet it all seems limitless. — Paul Bowles

Don't wish ... DO! Don't try ... BE! Don't think ... KNOW! And above all: Bless a stranger with a small, yet powerful, random act of kindness. You feel me? — T.F. Hodge

The earth isn't spinning because you told it to do so. Your intestines aren't digesting by your command. You're made up of a trillion cells who don't ask your permission before offering their rakats. And we think submission is applying strict discipline to our worship? We think surrender is about not eating a pig? It's just not that small to me. i can't fit my deen into a neat little box, because to me everything comes from Allah. Birds sing Allah's name. to say Allah is in this book and not that ... do you know who you're talking about? the Allah that made you from a clot and clothed in flesh ... Allah is too big and open for my deen to be small and closed. — Michael Muhammad Knight

I don't know what it is that comes over me, but suddenly I'm crossing to his side of the table and sitting down in his lap, arms wrapping around his neck. His lips are soft against mine, and when I part them he tenderly obliges, tasting me delicately. His fingers prod at my back, never going further than the small indent at the base of the spine, and it's all very lovely and nice.
"I think I could get used to you," I say, looking down into his beautiful brown eyes, deep like the color of autumn.
(From "Undone, The Romance of Nick and Layla [Part 5"]). — Crystal Cierlak

You may think that you are insignificant in the great plan of God, but you are not. You are tremendously important to God - so much so that Jesus died for you, and the Holy Spirit lives in you. You may seem small in your own eyes, and this is good; because God resists the proud but gives grace to the humble. However, don't let your humility become sin by making you believe you can do nothing for God. God can use you to help Him accomplish His will on this earth. — Warren W. Wiersbe

I get female groupies, but I don't get male groupies. I have women who offer to sleep with me all the time. But not men. They're all talk and nay action
as we'd say in Scotland. If I go anywhere near most of our male following, they are freaked. Absolutely freaked. I think my height has got a lot to do with it. I'm really tall. I'm five-eight, and with heels, I'm six foot, so people are like. 'Whoa, Amazon!' People are a wee taken aback by that 'cause I think people expect me to be small. — Shirley Manson

What is he?"
"I can't puzzle it out. He doesn't have horns, pointed ears - or apparently a need to eat. He does have small fangs, but he also sports a tan line."
"You checked? Natalya, you durrrty bitch."
"Hey, I had to determine if he was a blood sucker or not. Now I don't know what to think. — Kresley Cole

Do you believe in God?" Her small hand grips onto my larger one. "Yeah, baby girl," I say, looking down and watching her smile at my answer. "Do you think God will let me see you again?" She continues to ask questions that keep breaking me. "I know he will," I say, believing it more than anything. My faith has now been shaken, but I can't lose hope that where she is going will be somewhere beautiful and amazing. "When I go to God, will I see Charlie the goldfish?" She yawns, almost drifting off as the hospital machines beep around us. I nearly smile at her question, but I can't, because at the end of the day we're talking about death, and the inevitable end that's fast approaching. "I don't know, baby girl," I tell her, wishing I had the right answers for her. — River Savage

I don't think my acting was ever bad; I always knew that I could do it. But when you go to audition for a drama, they're very serious in the room, and I was used to being kind of goofy and having small talk. — Mary Lynn Rajskub

What we all need most urgently now: to realize that transience is not separation - for we, transient as we are, have it in common with those who have passed from us, and they and we exist together in one being where separation is just as unthinkable. Could we otherwise understand such poems if they had been nothing but the utterance of someone who was going to be dead in the future? Don't such poems continually address inside of us, in addition to what is found there now, also something unlimited and unrecognizable? I do not think that the spirit can make itself anywhere so small that it would concern only our temporal existence and our here and now: where it surges toward us there we are the dead and the living all at once. — Rainer Maria Rilke

I think I'll get a little more interesting small parts and see if I can really ... I guess you don't have to have the pressure on you compared to when you're a leading man in a film. — Robert Maillet

She can't force us to go to the ball. We're grown men, for Lord's sake!"
Will cocked an eyebrow at his younger brother. "You don't think she can force us? We are speaking of the same mother, correct? Small frame,
enormous will? — Sarah MacLean

I'm not a fancy person. I love small spaces. I like tiny cars. I don't buy things, aside from music and books. I don't get loads of attention and maybe it's because I'm kind of boring. I don't think I'm boring, but I have different interests. I don't go out much, not because I'm hiding but because I'm not a big drinker. I go out and have a good time, I go to concerts and stuff. — Ellen Page

My brothers were still catching sparrows when my cousin told me to give him the baby bird. I didn't want to, but I took the squirming bird out of my pocket anyway. I wanted another look at it. It was so small. I don't think it could fly yet. My cousin plucked the bird from my palm and went off with it. I should never have taken it out of my pocket. When he returned, the birds were all burnt to a crisp. Their bones were popping out of their skin. I couldn't even tell which of the birds was mine. I looked at their burnt feathers and blackened skin and burst into tears. I cried for him to give me back my bird, but it was too late. My yelling must have irritate him, because he grabbed the smallest one and shoved it in my face, and said, 'Here it is.' When I took that charred baby bird from him, I felt the world crash down on me. It was the first time I had ever held something that had died. I love you as much as the sorrow I felt. — Kyung-Sook Shin

I just don't think there are any rules to color. You have a small space with no windows? Put lamps in there, make it dramatic, paint the ceiling black. Do something with it. If it's dark, accentuate the darkness. — David Bromstad

Separate vacations have become more popular among married couples. We don't think this is a good idea. Over time, doing your own thing will cause you to lead separate lives. We are not talking about a three-day trip to Florida with your sister or best friend - if you want to take small trips like this, feel free to. But if you want to take a major vacation - say, to spend two weeks in Europe - your husband should be your travel companion. But suppose your idea of a fun vacation is going to Europe or lying on the beach in the Caribbean, while your husband loves tours of historic sites and museums. Our advice is to figure out a way to do a little of both. One year, you can go to the beach, the next year you can do a tourist package together, or go on a trip with a beach near some sites of cultural interest. Once you start planning separate vacations, you become like roommates, not lovers. — Ellen Fein

Beauty is everywhere and it comes in all different forms. Many times I don't find a size zero girl amazing, I find her really shockingly thin or small, and I think that beauty comes in all different forms. Beauty is about how you feel. There are plenty of people who are amazing to look at who are super beautiful, and then there are plenty of people who are easy to look at who are not beautiful at all, they open their mouth or they have an attitude or they are cruel, and they look hideous suddenly. — Kelly Cutrone

I imagine the feelings of two people meeting after many years. In the past they spent some time together, and therefore they think they are linked by the same experience, the same recollections. The same recollections? That's where the misunderstanding starts: they don't, have the same recollections; each of them retains two or three small scenes from the past, but each has his own; their recollections are not similar; they don't intersect. — Milan Kundera

I don't tell my mother what happened the night before. I'm too embarrassed to tell her that I allowed that fat nasty man to stick his tongue in my mouth. A small part of me is afraid to tell her the truth. What if she doesn't do anything with the information? She isn't protecting me from Billy Dean so why would I think she would call the police on Big Ray? It's easier to remain quiet and optimistic and think that if I had told her then maybe she would have become enraged and driven to his house and cracked him over the head with that blaring television set. Although I can't imagine my mother capable of that level of passion, part — Marlayna Glynn

Anyway, my office is small - one room, but on the corner, with a couple of windows. The sign on the door reads, simply, HARRY DRESDEN, WIZARD. Just inside the door is a table, covered with pamphlets with titles like: Magic and You, and Why Witches Don't Sink Any Faster Than Anyone Else - a Wizard's Perspective. I wrote most of them. I think it's important for we practitioners of the Art to keep up a good public image. Anything to avoid another Inquisition. — Jim Butcher

Some people don't have an open mind, and when I was traveling to different places I think I found it hard to enjoy things. You know, I come from a great city where there are lots of things happening, and if you end up in a small town where you don't have all those things you can feel the difference. Somewhere along the way, though, I think I learned to appreciate the difference. — Logan Lerman

I don't think anyone ever sets out to make a crappy movie, but there are a lot of forces working against those people who are trying to make something decent. There are a lot of fine lines to walk and small battles to fight. — Bryan Lee O'Malley

The real power is in the hands of small groups of people and I don't think they have titles. — Bob Dylan

I don't think sexuality defines a person. It's one small part of who you are, in my view. You are many things, and I never felt that people were defined by their sexuality solely. — William Friedkin

Poetry is the most direct and simple means of expressing oneself in words: the most primitive nations have poetry, but only quitewell developed civilizations can produce good prose. So don't think of poetry as a perverse and unnatural way of distorting ordinary prose statements: prose is a much less natural way of speaking than poetry is. If you listen to small children, and to the amount of chanting and singsong in their speech, you'll see what I mean. — Northrop Frye

I guess what I like in my movies is where you see a character change by maybe two degrees as opposed to the traditional movie change of ninety degrees. I guess that always feels false to me in movies because that doesn't truly happen. Around me, at least in the life I live, I guess I don't see people change ninety or a hundred degrees. I see them change in very small increments. I think it's just a monitor I might have on myself as a writer to not make any false scenes. — Paul Thomas Anderson

I want it to be a palace - only I don't think palaces are very luxurious. They're so big, so promiscuously public. A small house is the true luxury. A residence for two people only - for my wife and me. It won't be necessary to allow for a family, we don't intend to have children. Nor for visitors, we don't intend to entertain. — Ayn Rand

All right, so give me some idea of what you can do," says Haymitch.
I can't do anything," says Peeta, "unless you count baking bread."
Sorry, I don't. Katniss. I already know you're handy with a knife," says Haymitch.
Not really. But I can hunt," I say. "With a bow and arrow."
And you're good?" asks Haymitch.
I have to think about it. I've been putting food on the table for four years. That's no small task. I'm not as good as my father was, but he'd had more practice. I've better aim than Gale, but I've had more practice. He's a genius with traps and snares. "I'm all right," I say. — Suzanne Collins

I like to think that one day after I die, at least one small particle of me will float away to Neverland, and be apart of a flower or something like that. I like to think that nothing's final, and that everyone gets to be together even when it looks like they don't, that it all works out even when all the evidence seems to say something else ... — Jodi Lynn Anderson

But my husband came from a small town and hardworking parents like I did, and I don't think we've lost that mind-set. We don't have a bowling alley in our basement. We don't have houses on the beach and one in New York and one in L.A. — Carrie Underwood

food has played a central role not only in my professional but also in my emotional life, in all of my dealings with loved ones and most of all in my relationship to myself and my body. I am what feeds me. And how I feed myself at any given moment says a lot about what I'm going through or what I need. I don't believe I am alone. Yes, we eat for our stomachs, but we hunger with our hearts. Like most people and many women, I think about what to eat all the time. I am constantly plotting my next meal, planning how and what I will shop for, and ever hatching new plans to avoid the foods I know will undermine my well-being. Foods are like men: some are good, some are bad, and some are okay only in small doses. But most should be tried at least once. — Padma Lakshmi

I really want to do something in Europe. With a small movie, it can be an interesting challenge. But I have to get the right project. I don't think it's so important to go to Hollywood. All that trash that comes out of there! I don't want to do that. — Ziyi Zhang

Skulduggery: I don't know what they are, but there are dozens of them, relatively small, moving as a pack
Valkyrie: They might be kittens
Skulduggery: They're stalking us
Valkyrie: They might be shy
Skulduggery: I don't think they're kittens
Valkyrie: Puppies then? — Derek Landy

Visualize what you want out of life and think big. Don't feel undeserving. We're all deserving of living our dreams - some of us realize it and some don't. You're not doing anyone any favors by living small. Embrace these truths and step up. The world is waiting. — Jillian Michaels

I'm from a small town in North Carolina and went to a small college and didn't think that someone like me could make a living in L.A. doing comedy. I worked hard, especially in college, but at that age, you don't know what's next. — Fortune Feimster

You think my feelings toward you apathetic? You think you bore me?"
"Don't I?"
He shook his head slowly, continuing toward her, stalking her in the small space.
"No.God knows you are infuriating . And impulsive ... " Her back came up against the wall, and she gave a little squeak, even as he advanced. "And altogether maddening ... " He placed one hand to her jaw, carefully lifting her face to his, feeling the leap of her pulse under his fingertips. "And thoroughly intoxicating ... " The last came out on a low growl, and her lips parted, soft and pink and perfect.
He leaned close, his lips a fraction from hers.
"No ... you are not boring. — Sarah MacLean

I don't want to make a big deal about this or anything, but I think it's kind of cool how you do everything you do."
I squinted at him.
"I mean, you use sign language, and it's hard to communicate. But you're into art and you can seriously cook and, for goodness' sakes, you can even jitterbug. By the way, I told my mom, and she wants a video. Totally doesn't believe me. But, yeah, I think it's nice that you don't let a little hitch in life slow you down. I admire that."
I smiled. For a minute, I admired myself, too. He didn't know how deep my problems ran, but he was right all the same. It was no small thing to try, to find out what you cared about in life. Even this moment, with this wonderful, temporary boy beside me, was a tiny miracle. I ought to give myself some credit. — Kiera Cass

You see," I said, "I'm a socialist. I don't think this world was made for a small minority to dance on the faces of everyone else. — H.G.Wells

Did you fall in love with her?"
"I care about her. A lot."
"You're not supposed to marry someone if you don't fall in love with her."
"Well, love is a choice, too."
Holly shook her head. "I think it's something that happens to you."
Mark smiled into her small, earnest face. "Maybe it's both," he said, and tucked her in. — Lisa Kleypas

That's a lot of vegetables. "It is, yes, and if you eat them like a good girl ... " He lifted the silver lid on another plate, revealed a small pizza, with pepperoni arranged into a smiley face. She tried to give him a stony stare, but the laugh won out. "You think you're cute, don't you, pal?" "Adorable." "In this case, you can have adorable. Ow!" She managed the stony stare when he slapped her hand away from the pizza. "Vegetables first. — Nora Roberts

Wise Penelope! That's was Odysseus said to his wife when he got home. I don't think he ever told her he loved her. He probably knew the words would sound too small. — Hugh MacLennan

I don't think I have rebelled against Latina culture. I have rebelled against those who try to make me warm tortillas for my brothers when they can warm them for themselves, I have rebelled against a patriarchal religion. I rebel against small mindedness in all ways and in every situation but those things are not an intrinsic part of Latina culture and I will fight tooth and nail against anyone who tries to make me feel like I'm less Xicana for not embracing the small-mindedness. — Alice Bag

I think that God gives you your own will and choices. I don't believe that we're supposed to drag ourselves through life defeated and not see God's blessings. But you have to make the right choices and follow that still, small voice within you. Because I think that's how God leads us. — Joel Osteen

He went into the Gray Joy, drank a glass of Arkanarian brew, patted the hostess's cheek, and deftly used one of his swords to flip the table of the usual informer, who was gawking at him with empty eyes. Then he walked over to a far corner and tracked down a shabby bearded man with an inkwell around his neck. "Hello, Brother Nanin," he said. "How many petitions have you written today?"
Brother Nanin smiled shyly, showing small, decayed teeth. "There aren't many petitions written nowadays, noble don," he said. "Some people think that asking is pointless, while others expect that in the near future they'll be able to take without asking. — Arkady Strugatsky

What?" he asked in a low voice.
"You looked like you spent your last joy bill."
He hissed, "What does that even mean?"
"I don't know. I was just trying it out."
"Well, it doesn't work. It doesn't make sense. And anyway, I've got plenty of joy bills. Loads."
Helen said, "What's happening there on your phone?"
"A very small joy debit."
His older sister's smile shone brightly. "You see, it does work. Now, did you or did you not need to get out of that room?"
Gansey inclined his head in slight acknowledgment. Gansey siblings knew each other well.
"You're so welcome," Helen said. "Let me know if you need me to write a joy check."
"I really don't think it works. — Maggie Stiefvater

I don't agree with the sentiment 'write what you know.' ... I think one should write what one doesn't know. The world is bigger and wider and more complex than our small subjective selves. One should prod, goad the imagination. — Cynthia Ozick

Although I am a public figure, I'm still a little shy. I don't think my own personality is important. I prefer to keep some small dosage of privacy. — Joshua Lederberg

I'm not a 'messiah' coming to change Washington. I don't come with a political background, so I think it's part of my responsibility to raise my hand and say 'Why?' Folks don't just want smaller government; they want an efficient small government. — James Lankford

Even if you do die, I was thinking today, it's really only on the arbitrary human scale that a human life seems fort, or long, or whatever, and like, from the perspective of eternal time, the human life is vanishingly small, like it's really equivalent whether you live to be 17 or 94 or even 20,00 years old, which is obviosusly impossible, and then, on the other hand, from the perspective of an ultra-nanoinstant, which is the smallest measurable unit of time, a human life is almost infinite even if you die when you're like, a toddler. So either way it doesn't even matter how long you live. So I don't know if that makes you feel better, but it's just something to think about. — Jesse Andrews

He looked up as the party emerged and nickered a soft hello to his master, who was dressed in an unfamiliar green cloak and had dirt plastered on his face. Halt glanced at him, brow furrowed, and silently mouthed the words 'shut up'. Abelardshook his mane, which was as close as a horse could come to shruging, and turned away.
'My horse recognized me,' Halt said accusingly out of the side of his mouth to Horace.
Horace glanced at the small shagging horse, standing beside his own massive battlehorse.
'Mine didn't,' he replied. 'So that's a fifty-fifty result.'
'I think I'd like odds better than that,' Halt replied.
Horace suppressed a grin. 'Don't worry. He can probably smell you.'
'I can smell myself,' Halt replied acerbically. 'I smell of tea and soot.'
Horace thought it was wiser not to reply to that. — John Flanagan

Pug said: "I'm trying to think of the best way of knocking you off."
"The Chinese do it with rats," I said. "They let 'em eat the victim."
"Where am I going to get the rats?"
"Well," I said, "there're three in the car now."
I don't know which one hit me; Pug or the guy with the garlic breath. It was the barrel of a pistol and it cooled me for a couple of minutes. When I came to we had stopped by a small shack. I was alone with the guy on my left. — Jonathan Latimer

I don't think the isolation of the American writer is a tradition; it's more that, geographically, he just is isolated, unless he happens to live in New York City. But I don't suppose there's a small town around the country that doesn't have a writer. — Nelson Algren

What makes someone an artist? I don't think is has anything to do with a paintbrush. There are painters who follow the numbers, or paint billboards, or work in a small village in China, painting reproductions. These folks, while swell people, aren't artists. On the other hand, Charlie Chaplin was an artist, beyond a doubt. So is Jonathan Ive, who designed the iPod. You can be an artist who works with oil paints or marble, sure. But there are artists who work with numbers, business models, and customer conversations. Art is about intent and communication, not substances. — Seth Godin

Look, you're small-town. I've had over 50 jobs, maybe a hundred. I've never stayed anywhere long. What I am trying to say is, there is a certain game played in offices all over America. The people are bored, they don't know what to do, so they play the office-romance game. Most of the time it means nothing but the passing of time. Sometimes they do manage to work off a screw or two on the side. But even then, it is just an offhand pasttime, like bowling or t.v. or a New Year's Eve party. You've got to understand that it doesn't mean anything and then you won't get hurt. Do you understand what I mean?"
I think that Mr. Partisan is sincere."
You're going to get stuck with that pin, babe, don't forget what I told you. Watch those slicks. They are as phony as a lead dime. — Charles Bukowski

As a person who came from a small town and had dreams of becoming an actor, I know what it's like to have no support system for what it is that you want to do. A lot of people think you don't have a chance. — Anika Noni Rose

Life is long and full of an infinite number of decisions. I have to think that the small ones don't matter, that I'll end up where I need to end up no matter what I do. — Taylor Jenkins Reid

Start small, think big. Don't worry about too many things at once. Take a handful of simple things to begin with, and then progress to more complex ones. Think about not just tomorrow, but the future. Put a ding in the universe. — Steve Jobs

Still, these days when I daydream about the movie, I don't think about the big picture. It's more fun for me to think of little things that would add to the movie. I like to think the powers that be would let me amuse myself with some small things in order to shut me up while they re-write the screenplay to turn Kvothe into a lesbian, shape-changing unicorn.
— Patrick Rothfuss

Think big and don't listen to people who tell you it can't be done. Life's too short to think small. — Tim Ferriss

I don't think anyone's a failure as long as they're still innocent. Just a little. They may lose everything good in them but as long as they believe just a little in something very small, they're still innocent. To fail is to lose every bit of innocence. — Charlotte Bingham

You can't make people happy by law. If you said to a bunch of average people two hundred years ago "Would you be happy in a world where medical care is widely available, houses are clean, the world's music and sights and foods can be brought into your home at small cost, travelling even 100 miles is easy, childbirth is generally not fatal to mother or child, you don't have to die of dental abcesses and you don't have to do what the squire tells you" they'd think you were talking about the New Jerusalem and say 'yes'. — Terry Pratchett

I think doing more live stuff's made us feel a certain way about that particular point. I quite like small clubs. I don't really like playing in big clubs, and I think I'm really into the idea of a few people being together. — Sean Booth

It seems like he's keeping my foot within his grasp for longer than necessary when I see his eyes wander up my legs again. I tingle in every spot his gaze touches.
His voice sends shivers up my spine when he asks, "Have you ever been fucked, Eve?"
My eyelids flutter and I let out a small surprised gasp at his question, breath gushing from my lips. I'm not exactly a virgin, not too far off though, and I can safely say that I have never been fucked in the way that Phoenix is insinuating. Most of the sex I've had has been the fantasy kind. Our eyes lock and he moves his hand from the heel of my foot up along the back of my leg, massaging my shin.
I actually moan when his fingers press in, releasing the tension from a knotted muscle. His mouth opens as he watches me.
"I don't think that's a very appropriate question to ask of a friend," I finally manage to croak out.
He smiles darkly. "I told you I was bad news. — Raine Anthony

Don't think small when you pray. God has a way to bring your dreams to pass if you'll dare to be bold enough to ask. — Joel Osteen

I don't think that the status of a show, big or small, should affect a person's performance. — Sophie Turner

He pulled her closer and she felt the bulge in his jeans. "I never knew books were so sexy."
"You got turned on today by a bologna sandwich, too." She wrapped her arms around his waist. "I don't think it's the books."
"You're right. Maybe it's not the books or the bologna." He leaned lower.
"Maybe it's not." She rose up on her tiptoes, closer to his tempting mouth.
He groaned and closed the small distance between them, backing her up against the shelves as his lips covered hers. — Cat Johnson

Seriously though. This female attraction to the alpha-male throws me off a little bit, because I'm not anything like the guys you read about."
Yeah. You're better.
"I could never drive a motorcycle, or fight another man just for fun. And as much as I've fantasized about having sex with you this year, I don't think I could ever say, 'I own you', with a straight face. And I've always wanted a tattoo, but probably just a small one, because no way in hell I could endure the pain. Overall, the books were interesting but they also made me feel highly inadequate. — Colleen Hoover

Hester shook her head. 'Don't confuse what you do with who you are, dearie. Besides, there's no shame in humble work. Why, Aesop himself, the king of storytellers, was a slave his whole life. Never drew a free breath, yet he shaped the world with just three small words: there once was. And where are his great masters now, hmm? Rotting in tombs, if they're lucky. But Aesop - he still lives to this day, dancin' on the tip of every tongue what's ever told a tale.' She winked at Molly. 'Think on that, next time you're scrubbing floors. — Jonathan Auxier

Our father came to sleep in our house that night. He carried a small suitcase with a black mourning suit and a pair of polished shoes. Corrigan stopped him as he made his way up the stairs. 'Where d'you think you're going?'Our father gripped the bannister. His hands were liverspotted and I could see him trembling in his pause. 'That's not your room,' sad Corrigan. Our father tottered on the stairs. He took another step up. 'Don't,' said my brother. His voice was clear, full, confidant. Our father stood stunned. He climbed one more step and then turned, descended, looked around, lost.
'My own sons,' he said.
We made a bed for him on a sofa in the living room, but even then Corrigan refused to stay under the same roof; he went walking in the direction of the city center and I wondered what alley he might be found in later that night, what fist he might walk into, whose bottle he might climb down inside. — Colum McCann

One time Marian showed me some sand. When she gave it to me, she said, "These are very interesting stones." It just looked like sand, but she asked me to took through a magnifying glass. Then those small stones were as interesting as the stones I have in my office. The stones in my office are bigger, but under the glass the sand was quite similar.
If you say, "This is a rock from the moon", you will be very much interested in it. Actually I don't think there is a great difference between rocks we have on the earth and those on the moon. Even if you go to Mars, I think you will find the same rocks.
I am quite sure about it.
So if you want to find something interesting, instead of hopping around the universe like this, enjoy your life in every moment, observe what you have now, and truly live in your surroundings. — Shunryu Suzuki

I'm wiser than that person. For it's likely that neither of us knows anything fine and good, but he thinks he knows something he doesn't know, whereas I, since I don't in fact know, don't think that I do either. At any rate, it seems that I'm wiser than he in just this one small way: that what I don't know, I don't think I know. — Socrates

It's for scientists to lay out the data and lay out what they think, and then it's for the public to make up its own mind. We don't live in a priesthood where some small group imposes its views on other people - that's not the way that science works, and it's not the way a democratic society should work. — Venkatraman Ramakrishnan

...and as she stood on the Ashford platform waiting for the small train to come in, she seemed already separated from the people around her. Tomorrow I shall not be among you anymore; not of you but mysteriously still with you, thought Philippa. As Lady Abbess of Brede had said, "People think we renounce the world. We don't. We renounce its ways but we are still very much in it and it is very much in us. — Rumer Godden

Karou's glance flickered to where the corpse had been, which did not go unnoticed by Liraz. "You think I didn't learn?" the angel asked, incredulous.
And with that, Karou almost dared to hope. "Did you?" she asked, and her voice was very small.
Did you learn?
Did you glean Ziri's soul?
Dear gods and stardust, did you?
Liraz started to tremble. "I don't know," she said, "I don't know." Her voice shattered, and just like that she was crying. — Laini Taylor

I don't think haters are small-minded; it's more tragic than that. I think they're great minded, but choose to sell themselves short every day. — Steve Maraboli

I don't think of community as being a romantic notion. I think it's as vital as air and water, and so I think that informs a lot of what I write about. It could be a story about a couple, or a song about the slow death of the family farm or a small town. — Greg Brown

One of the best ways to cultivate a possibility mind set is to prompt yourself to dream one size bigger than you normally do. Let's face it, most people dream too small, they don't think big enough. — John C. Maxwell