Even If We Don't Talk Quotes & Sayings

Doubt is most often the source of our powerlessness. To doubt is to be faithless, to be without hope or belief. When we doubt, our self-talk sounds like this: 'I don't think I can. I don't think I will.' ... To doubt is to have faith in the worst possible outcome. It is to believe in the perverseness of the universe, that even if I do well, something I don't know about will get in the way, sabotage me, or get me in the end. — Blaine Lee Pardoe

Fabre stood up. He placed his fingertips on d'Anton's temples. "Put your fingers here," he said. "Feel the resonance. Put them here, and here." He jabbed at d'Anton's face: below the cheekbones, at the side of his jaw. "I'll teach you like an actor," he said. "This city is our stage."
Camille said: "Book of Ezekiel. 'This city is the cauldron, and we the flesh' ..."
Fabre turned. "This stutter," he said. "You don't have to do it." Camille put his hands over his eyes. "Leave me alone," he said. "Even you." Fabre's face was incandescent. "Even you, I am going to teach." He leapt forward, wrenched Camille upright in his chair. He took him by the shoulders and shook him. "You're going to talk properly," Fabre said. "Even if it kills one of us." Camille put his hands protectively over his head. Fabre continued to perpetrate violence; d'Anton was too tired to intervene. — Hilary Mantel

Don't believe everything she says, okay? Don't leave without talking to me."
I turned around, and said, fiercely, "Never. Not even if I talk to you first. You aren't getting away now, buster."
He dove for my mouth. And when he was finished ensuring that neither of us was going to get much sleep for a while, he said, "Remember that. We're both likely to be clinging to that thought by the time this is over. — Patricia Briggs

We're fascinated by things we can't figure out, by the things that don't have a right or wrong answer. Even when we can't explain them, we need to make some sort of sense out of them - create lists, find connections, map it out. Maybe that's why, when we can't seem to figure out all sorts of other more commonplace mysteries (like why we all keep looking at the sky as if it might talk to us), we still need to try.
We think maybe it's a lot like love, that need to make sense of the sky. We don't know why we need it, we can't explain it when it happens or when it doesn't, but we need it like we need air or food.
So we keep looking for it. — Kim Culbertson

He stabs his fingers through his drying hair and resumes his pacing. "You think I don't know this went really fast? I didn't plan for this to happen. Hell, I didn't even know if you'd let me talk to you, much less be with you. But then you did and we did and ... " He stops in the center of the room and stares at me, his shoulders sagging. "I figured out pretty quick that this is a forever thing for me. I think it has been from the very beginning. — Kate Avelynn

We used to talk and smile seven days ago when I was wearing a suit. Now I'm dressed in a beard and smell of dog shit I don't even get eye contact. I ask her how her week is going, and she looks to her friend behind the counter as if to say: I think this creep is hitting on me. Shall we call the police? — Craig Stone

What's the difference between sanity and madness anyway? We all play headgames with ourselves. We all have baggage. We all cope somehow. I'm not sure if I'm mad or sane. I mean, I hold my life together, I pay my bills, I raise my kids. But the world is so polarized and bizarre now that for some people, none of these these things matter if they're not wearing the right shoes or don't have the right credit score or a fancy family car. Some people think the most important things to worry about are handbags and tan lines. Meanwhile, war and crime and poverty unfold all around us, and we ignore it. In that environment, how can we even begin to talk about sanity and madness? — A.S. King

We have to talk more. I need you to know what we need to talk about. In fact, don't decide what is and isn't important to share with me, it all is - from the mundane to the shocking. If something upsets you? Tell me. Make me a part of your life in such a deep way that I don't feel separate from it. I don't ever want to feel like you're keeping things from me again, even if it's unintentional. — Kat Bastion

Let me tell you what I think about your fucking rules," he said, his voice dripping with venom as he pushed past Liam. "You sit up in your room and you pretend like you want what's best for everyone, but you don't do any of the work yourself. I can't tell if you're just a spoiled little shit, or if you're too worried about getting your pretty princess hands dirty, but it sucks. You are fucking awful, and you sure as hell don't have me fooled ... You talk about us all being equals, like we're one big rainbow of peace and all that bullshit, but you never once believed that yourself, did you? You won't let anyone contact their parents, and you don't care about the kids that are still trapped in camps your father set up. You wouldn't even listen when the Watch kids brought it up. So what I want to know is, why can't we leave? ... What's the point of this place, other than for you to get off on how great you are and toy with people and their feelings? — Alexandra Bracken

We don't know love like we should. We always talk about 'I have unconditional loveunconditional love iswe don't even know it. Because if a person stops stimulating us, we stop loving them. You're not interesting to talk to anymore, goodbye. But that real love, that love that sometimes is difficult, difficult to have. That's that love. And that's a confidence builder. — Lauryn Hill

Van Laar wasn't a climate change denier, nor did he talk defensively of the United States' appetite for oil. Rather, he confessed, "I don't give much of a fuck, and nobody I know does, either, because this industry is giving me a future, even if it's a short one and we're all about to toast together. — Tony Horwitz

We put the kettle on to boil, up in the nose of the boat, and went down to the stern and pretended to take no notice of it, but set to work to get the other things out. That is the only way to get a kettle to boil up the river. If it sees that you are waiting for it and are anxious, it will never even sing. You have to go away and begin your meal, as if you were not going to have any tea at all. You must not even look round at it. Then you will soon hear it sputtering away, mad to be made into tea. It is a good plan, too, if you are in a great hurry, to talk very loudly to each other about how you don't need any tea, and are not going to have any. You get near the kettle, so that it can overhear you, and then you shout out, "I don't want any tea; do you, George?" to which George shouts back, "Oh, no, I don't like tea; we'll have lemonade instead - tea's so indigestible." Upon which the kettle boils over, and puts the stove out. — Jerome K. Jerome

Bucky's expression wasn't hostile, but it was serious. "Someday I'm going to fight and you won't be at my back."
"Nonsense. I'm your friend. Who I work for doesn't change that."
"If you leave it too long, you won't have a choice anymore. If the Steam Council turns on the people, each of us is going to have to decide where we belong."
"And you're going to play the rebel? You won't even carry a gun," Tobias snapped. "Your father may own an arms factory, but you make toys for a living."
"I don't carry a gun because I'm too good a shot," Bucky said quietly. "But when I fire, I don't miss. I never want to find you in my sights."
"It's not that simple," Tobias shot back, feeling a need for justification.
Bucky shrugged. "No, but the barons are running out of time, and that means we won't have many more chances to talk before everything falls apart. — Emma Jane Holloway

That comes to about one hundred million people in India alone from 1947 to 1980. But we don't call that a crime of democratic capitalism. If we were to carry out that calculation throughout the world ... I wont even talk about it. But Sen is correct; they're not intended, just like the Chinese famine wasn't intended. But they are ideological and institutional crimes, and capitalist democracy and its advocates are responsible for them, in whatever sense supporters of so-called Communism are responsible for the Chinese famine. We don't have the entire responsibility, but certainly a large part of it — Noam Chomsky

We don't have to take rejection as a reflection of our self-worth. If somebody who is important (or even someone unimportant) to you rejects you or your choices, you are still real, and you are still worth every bit as much as you would be if you had not been rejected. Feel any feelings that go with rejection; talk about your thoughts; but don't forfeit your self-esteem to another's disapproval or rejection of who you are or what you have done. Even if the most important person in your world rejects you, you are still real, and you are still okay. If you have done something inappropriate or you need to solve a problem or change a behavior, then take appropriate steps to take care of yourself. But don't reject yourself, and don't give so much power to other people's rejection of you. It isn't necessary — Melody Beattie

If I hear any of you talk," Winston says. "I will personally send Brendan over to kick you in the face."
"I am not going to kick anyone in the face."
"Kick yourself in the face, Brendan."
"I don't even know why we're friends. — Tahereh Mafi

What's not so great is that all this technology is destroying our social skills. Not only have we given up on writing letters to each other, we barely even talk to each other. People have become so accustomed to texting that they're actually startled when the phone rings. It's like we suddenly all have Batphones. If it rings, there must be danger.
Now we answer, "What happened? Is someone tied up in the old sawmill?"
"No, it's Becky. I just called to say hi."
"Well you scared me half to death. You can't just pick up the phone and try to talk to me like that. Don't the tips of your fingers work? — Ellen DeGeneres

Living in low-income neighborhoods, I've seen sexual health campaigns aimed at slut-shaming us into celibacy. They talk about things like self-esteem and value and all the usual abstinence arguments. They assume that our bodies are a gift that we should bestow selectively on others, rather than the one thing that can never be anything but our own. Even if we do share it, it is ours irrevocably.
These are the bodies that hold the brains we're supposed to shut off all day at work, the same bodies that aren't important enough to heal. These are the bodies that come with the genitalia that we should be so protective of? I really don't understand the logic.
You can't tell us that our brains and labor and emotions are worth next to nothing and then expect us to get all full of intrinsic worth when it comes to our genitals. Either we're cheap or we're not.
Make up your fucking mind. — Linda Tirado

And every night I would think of you. Now that I can no longer see you, I realize how much I needed you. School is incredibly boring, but as a matter of self-discipline I am going to all my classes and doing all the assignments. Everything seems pointless since you left. I'd like to have a nice, long talk with you. If possible, I'd like to visit your sanatorium and see you for several hours. And, if possible, I'd like to go out walking with you side by side the way we used to. Please try to answer this letter, even a short note, I don't care." I — Haruki Murakami

The key to faking deaths is a fine appreciation of arterial spray patterns. I have found that blood bags work very well at simulating spray with a strategically poked hole; apply pressure to the bottom of the bag, practice a bit, and before long you will be able to write stories of carnage and odes to gore.
A small fan brush-the sort that one dude used to paint happy little trees-can paint a picture of blunt force spatters if you flick the surface properly. You could even talk to yourself, as that painter did, while you flick blood around: And maybe over here we have a nice stab wound. And, I don't know, maybe there's a few more back over here. Multiple stab wounds. It doesn't matter, whatever you feel like. — Kevin Hearne

I want you to know how proud I am. You're doing the right thing, and I don't want you to worry about what's going to happen after. We'll figure it out." She looked back at David and beamed, as happy as I'd ever seen her.
"I have no doubt of that. Although I do have one serious concern."
"Yes?"
"UPARG? It doesn't roll off the tongue in quite the same way IPCA did."
Raquel heaved a why must you joke at inappropriate times sigh, then lifted her chin haughtily. "Well, maybe we won't invite you to be a part of it, then."
I laughed. "Please, by all means, leave me out. I think it's high time I retire."
"Even if we issue you your own custom companion Taser for Tasey?"
I pursed my lips thoughtfully. "We'll talk when I'm done here. — Kiersten White

When two people talk, they don't just fall into physical and aural harmony. They also engage in what is called motor mimicry. If you show people pictures of a smiling face or a frowning face, they'll smile or frown back, although perhaps only in muscular changes so fleeting that they can only be captured with electronic sensors. If I hit my thumb with a hammer, most people watching will grimace: they'll mimic my emotional state. This is what is meant, in the technical sense, by empathy. We imitate each other's emotions as a way of expressing support and caring and, even more basically, as a way of communicating with each other. — Malcolm Gladwell

We are more than our problems. Even if our problem is our own behavior, the problem is not who we are-it's what we did. It's okay to have problems. It's okay to talk about problems-at appropriate times, and with safe people. It's okay to solve problems. And we're okay, even when we have, or someone we love has a problem. We don't have to forfeit our personal power or our self-esteem. We have solved exactly the problems we've needed to solve to become who we are. — Melody Beattie

A black raven flew past me and landed on the back of the couch.
Roman slapped his hand over his face.
"There you are," the raven said in Evdokia's voice. "Ungrateful son."
"Here we go ... " Roman muttered.
"Eighteen hours in labor and that's what I get. He can't even pick up the phone to talk to his own mother."
"Mother, can't you see I have people here?"
"I bet if their mothers called them, they would pick up."
That would be a neat trick for both of us. Sadly, dead mothers didn't come back to life, even in post-Shift Atlanta.
"Nice to see you, Roman." I grabbed Curran by the hand.
The bird swiveled toward me. "Katya!"
Oh no.
"Don't you leave. I need to talk to you."
"Got to go, bye! — Ilona Andrews

The American official was trying to talk about aid and development projects and finally a local tribal chief got up and said, "Even if you turn our country into heaven, we don't want it from you. Just leave us." — Yaroslav Trofimov

Like, this whole Molly thing with the secret crushes that go nowhere. I'm over it." "Oh, you're over it?" My throat tightens. "Uh, I'm sorry boys don't like me." "That is such bullshit, Molly. You don't even talk to them." Here we go. Cassie's soapbox: the fact that I've had twenty-six crushes and exactly zero kisses. Apparently, it's because I need to woman up. If I like a guy, I'm supposed to tell him. Maybe in Cassie's world, you can do that and have it end in making out. But I'm not so sure it works that way for fat girls. — Becky Albertalli

I notice when I'm at a party where I don't know anybody - even if I have nothing in common with somebody - we can still talk because we were raised by the same TV and cartoons and movies. — Ernest Cline

In our competitive world we're taught to never quit trying, never give up, and never give in - so we don't hear much about surrendering. If winning is everything, surrendering is unthinkable. Even Christians would rather talk about winning, succeeding, overcoming, and conquering than yielding, submitting, obeying, and surrendering. But surrendering to God is the heart of worship. — Rick Warren

I'm confused, Beatrice," she says. "What exactly do you want us to do?"
"I didn't come here to ask you for help," I say. "I thought you should know that a lot of people are going to die, very soon. And I know you don't want to stay here doing nothing while that happens, even if some of your faction does."
She looks down, her crooked mouth betraying just how right I am.
"I also wanted to ask you if we can talk to the Erudite you're keeping safe here," I say. "I know they're hidden, but I need access to them."
"And what do you intend to do?" she says.
"Shoot them," I say, rolling my eyes.
"That isn't funny."
I sigh. "Sorry. I need information. That's all. — Veronica Roth

I'm speaking to you man to man," he said, "not doctor to patient. How much longer can you continue denying yourself? You can't live without warmth." "Warmth?" I said, sending him a 'shut up' message. "Yes. Sexual expression. David, you don't even masturbate." We were silent for at least a minute. My intrigues huddled within me like guerilla warriors, hiding behind other thoughts. Finally, I thought of something to say: "If we're going to talk man to man and not doctor to patient, then I don't think you should charge me for this hour. — Scott Spencer

I don't like to just talk of Africa, and south of the Sahara in general. No, I'll talk about the Third World in general. I'll like to say this - we in the United States would never believe that another form of goverment - I don't care even if it's against the racism, etc. - it is hard to get the masses of people to believe or accept that a socialist government will relieve them of most of the problems. — Huey Newton

However, we need to participate and manage skillfully, helpfully, and harmoniously, for a better world, family and society to be possible. So everybody's spiritual by nature I believe, not that they necessarily have to be religious. Everybody wants, or cares about, and has values even if they don't talk about them all the time explicitly, like some noisy preachers do with their foghorn voices and dogmatic views. — Surya Das

In order to change, however, you have to be willing to acknowledge the need for change - in other words, you have to come to terms with the fact that everything in your life isn't perfect. There is this concept - among not just Scientologists, but everyone - that we are all supposed to have it together. Whether it's our work, love lives, family relationships, or even feelings about ourselves, we need to present this idealized image to others. We are so conditioned when asked "How are you?" to say "Good" or "Great." But why not "I don't know. I hate everyone today." Why are we so scared to be judged imperfect or to talk about how we really feel? To be authentic? If we can just tell each other how and what we are really doing, step outside of what we believe others think we should be, the result can be therapeutic. — Leah Remini

Who's to blame when your kid goes nuts? Is it a blessing to not have children? 'We Need to Talk About Kevin' became a hit cult book for women without offspring who were finally able to admit they didn't want to give birth. They felt complete, thank you very much, and lived in silent resentment for years at other women's pious, unwanted sympathy toward them for not having babies. With even gay couples having children these days, aren't happy heterosexual women who don't want to have kids the most ostracized of us all? To me they are beautiful feminists. If you're not sure you could love your children, please don't have them, because they might grow up and kill us. — John Waters

The extrovert assumption is so woven into the fabric of our culture that an employee may suffer reprimands for keeping his door closed (that is, if he is one of the lucky ones who has a door), for not lunching with other staff members, or for missing the weekend golf game or any number of supposedly morale-boosting celebrations. Half. More than half of us don't want to play. We don't see the point. For us, an office potluck will not provide satisfying human contact - we'd much rather meet a friend for an intimate conversation (even if that friend is a coworker). For us, the gathering will not boost morale - and will probably leave us resentful that we stayed an extra hour to eat stale cookies and make small talk. For us, talking with coworkers does not benefit our work - it sidetracks us. — Laurie A. Helgoe

Simply put, white cops are afraid of black men. We don't talk about it, we pretend it doesn't exist, we claim "color blindness," we say white officers treat black men the same way they treat white men. But that's a lie. In fact, the bigger, the darker the black man the greater the fear. The African-American community knows this. Hell, most whites know it. Yet, even though it's a central, if not the defining ingredient in the makeup of police racism, white cops won't admit it to themselves, or to others. — Norm Stamper

The blue-eyed rabbi in our village at Samotschin used to talk to me as though I were a grown person, even when I was just a boy. We must believe in God, he told me, because if we don't we will have to believe in man, and then we will only be disappointed. — Anna Funder

When it comes to current attitudes about surgery, the practice of dismissing the cultural context and rationalizing it as individual betterment "flattens the terrain of power relations." In other words, we can talk about doing it for us until our high-end lipstick flakes off, but we should also keep in mind that we probably wouldn't even be thinking about what life would be like with a new nose or perkier breasts or shapelier inner thighs if it weren't for a long-standing cultural ideal that rewards those who adhere to it with power that often doesn't speak its name, but is instantly recognizable to those who don't have it. — Andi Zeisler

Don't talk so, Lysis. I'm sure you kept your head much better than I did." He smiled, and quoted a certain phrase, recalling a personal matter between us. Then he said, "Am I getting old, to find myself always thinking, 'Last year was better'?"-"Sometimes it seems to me, Lysis, that nothing has been the same since the Games."-"We think so, my dear, because that was our concern. If you asked that potter over there, or that old soldier, or Kallippides the actor, each would name his own Isthmia, I daresay ... It has been a long war, Alexias. Twenty-four years now. Even Troy was only ten. — Mary Renault

Grandma Clara acted toward God the way we act toward people we're madly in love with.
When you are truly in love, you go to great lengths to be with the one you love. You'll drive for hours to be together, even if it's only a short while. You don't mind staying up late to talk. Walking in the rains is romantic, not annoying. You'll willingly spend a small fortune on the one you're crazy about. When you are apart from each other, it's painful, even miserable. He or she is all you think about; you jump at any chance to be together. — Francis Chan

Dear America,
I suppose we should introduce ourselves: We're South Louisiana ... You probably already know that we talk funny and listen to strange music and eat things you'd probably hire an exterminator to get out of your yard.
We dance even if there's no radio. We drink at funerals. We talk too much and laugh too loud and live too large and, frankly,we're suspicious of others who don't. — Chris Rose

If by 'God' you have something definite in mind - a being that is loving, or jealous, or whatever - then you're faced with the question of why God's that way and not another way. And if you don't have anything very definite in mind when you talk about 'God' being behind the existence of the universe, then why even use the word? So I think religion doesn't help. It's part of the human tragedy: we're faced with a mystery we can't understand - Steven Weinberg — Jim Holt

No, I don't believe it," Joseph said. "From listening to my father and grandfather talk about El Shaddai, I think he's different from the gods of Egypt. I think that none of us could ever be good enough for God. I think of Him as being so good that a human can't even enter His presence. A man would die if he did. I think God's merciful, Rashidi. I think he forgives us because he loves us, just as we forgive our children because we love them.
"Rashidi's eyes brightened. "A God that loves people! Now there's a new thought! — Gilbert Morris

I want to talk about faith. It's not about whether something is true, or-or-or based in fact or reality or the laws of physics or nature or even basic common sense. It's about whether or not we're dumb enough to believe in it that matters. Oh, folks, who the hell am I to say that there is no God? Who am I? Or to say that anybody's belief in the church doesn't make their life better? Maybe it does. Or that this man, Dr. Jinx - who am I to say that he can't cure diseases with his sorcery? I don't know. I say maybe he can. And I believe that maybe he can.

Ladies and gentlemen, if we believe... if we just believe... then we can do anything!

Oh, yeah, ladies and gentlemen. I feel it now! Do you feel it? Do you feel the spirit? Do you feel the invisible things around you that don't really exist? Oh, it doesn't matter! — Dennis Reynolds

They must talk to each other directly, Ender, mind to mind. What one thinks, another can also think; what one remembers, another can also re-member. Why would they ever develop language? Why would they ever learn to read and write? How would they know what reading and writing were if they saw them? Or signals? Or numbers? Or anything that we use to communicate? This isn't just a matter of translating from one language to another. They don't have a language at all. We used every means we could think of to communicate with them, but they don't even have the machinery to know we're signaling. And maybe they've been trying to think to us, and they can't understand why we don't respond. — Orson Scott Card

You know, hon, after Stephie died, we never really talked about her." she says, her hands tight around the cart handle. "There's a lot of pain there. Still. I guess we feel like we failed her. Like maybe if we were home instead of away at college, we could've done something to fix her. Something my patents and the doctors and her boyfriend missed. Sometimes I think I don't have the right to talk about her. Like at the end, I don't know her well enough to say anything. So much of her life became secret. She spent all of her time with her boyfriend, and when she was home, her nose was buried in her diary. I swear that diary was her best friend, even more than Megan."
"Did you ever read it?" I ask.
"No."
"Not even after she died?"
Aunt Rachel shakes her head, removing an eggplant from the middle row and pressing her fingers against its flesh. "To this day, I don't know if I would've, either. We never found it, Delilah. It's like she just ... took it with her. — Sarah Ockler

You have two choices," Vance said.
I stopped in the doorway to the hall and put my hands on my hips.
"And those would be?" I asked.
"We can talk or we can f**k."
My eyes rounded. Then they narrowed. I didn't answer.
"Though," he went on, "I should tell you even if you pick talking, after we're done, we're still gonna f**k."
I frowned at him and leaned in. "You are too much," I snapped.
He ignored my threatening posture. "You don't chose, I will, and I'll pick f**king. We can talk after. — Kristen Ashley