Except Yourself Quotes & Sayings

If you are just yourself, that's when people start gravitating towards you because nobody else can be you except you. Be authentic, don't give up, and start today. — Tyler Oakley

You are not in competition with anybody except yourself;plan to outdo your past not other people. — Jaachynma N.E. Agu

Think, for example, has a higher suicide rate: countries whose citizens declare themselves to be very happy, such as Switzerland, Denmark, Iceland, the Netherlands, and Canada? or countries like Greece, Italy, Portugal, and Spain, whose citizens describe themselves as not very happy at all? Answer: the so-called happy countries. It's the same phenomenon as in the Military Police and the Air Corps. If you are depressed in a place where most people are pretty unhappy, you compare yourself to those around you and you don't feel all that bad. But can you imagine how difficult it must be to be depressed in a country where everyone else has a big smile on their face?2 Caroline Sacks's decision to evaluate herself, then, by looking around her organic chemistry classroom was not some strange and irrational behavior. It is what human beings do. We compare ourselves to those in the same situation as ourselves, which means that students in an elite school - except, perhaps, — Malcolm Gladwell

I'm one of those people who lives for the moment. If you concern yourself with what's going to happen a year from now, or five years from now, you defuse the moment. Whatever comes, comes. For this time I enjoy the ascent. I don't worry about anything except getting thinner thighs. — Oprah Winfrey

Sympathy is never waisted except when you give it to yourself. — John W. Roper

Our greatest enemies are always our own doubts and fears. But there are no limits to what you can do, be, or have except for the limits you place on yourself. — Brian Tracy

You need to feel good about yourself, the motivation has to come from within. You have nobody to fall back on except yourself. — Dana Hill

Do not use your energy except for a cause more noble than yourself. Such a cause cannot be found except in Almighty God Himself: to preach the truth, to defend womanhood, to repel humiliation which your Creator has not imposed upon you, to help the oppressed. Anyone who uses his energy for the sake of the vanities of the world is like someone who exchanges gemstones for gravel. There is no nobility in anyone who lacks faith. The wise man knows that the only fitting price for his soul is a place in Paradise ... — Ibn Hazm

When you by nature subscribe to the view that everyone except yourself is a berk or a wanker, it is hard to bond with anybody in any rational common cause. — Lynne Truss

Make a determination to take no one seriously except God. You may find that the first person you must be the most critical with, as being the greatest fraud you have ever known, is yourself. — Oswald Chambers

Sometimes I think that wisdoms slip from my mind like drool from the lips of an idiot ...
Where's all this stuff coming from? Is it any good? Any good in, you know, the wisdom sense? Who am I to spout this stuff anyway?
Well, here's the thing. You too can find yourself shedding wisdom like cat hair if you only allow yourself the liberty of introspection.
Think about what you alone know that no one else does. That one neat wonderful profound insight. It is fully yours. No one else on this planet of about six billion people understands it like you do.
Now, see if you can share it with someone. Bestow it, a gift of yourself.
Wisdom is like gossip. Except it's the good kind. — Vera Nazarian

In the movie of life, nothing matters except our King and God. Don't let yourself forget. Soak it in and keep remembering that it is true. He is everything. — Francis Chan

You went back in time," he repeated, "and you expect his cell phone to work?"
"Well, no, I just, I mean, I came back and he hasn't! Shouldn't he have?"
Morrison, very steadily, said, "Were you together?"
"No! I just said he went to fight the Morrigan!"
"I see." There was a pause. "The man is seventy-four years old, Joanie. He can take care of himself. If you were," a great and patient pause filled the line before he went on, "time traveling. If you were time traveling and got separated, then I can't think of any reason he would necessarily come back to the present at the same time you did."
"Except I was the focal point, it was my fault, it
!"
"Joanne. Siobhan. Siobhan Grainne MacNamarra Walkingstick."
I didn't think anybody had ever said my name like that before. I gulped down a hysterical sob and whispered, "Yeah?"
Morrison, with gentle emphasis, said, "I love you. Now pull yourself together and go find the bad guy," and hung up. — C.E. Murphy

(Psychoanalysis, it seems, does wonders for a man's prose style: it renders it labyrinthine without subtlety.) There is no place, then, for human agency, except the kind that leads you to talk about yourself in the presence of another for twenty years. Shallowness can go no deeper. — Theodore Dalrymple

My wife was on a visit to her aunt's, and for a few days I was a dweller once more in my old quarters at Baker Street.
'Why,' said I, glancing up at my companion, 'that was surely the bell? Who could come tonight? Some friend of yours, perhaps?'
'Except yourself I have none,' he answered. 'I do not encourage visitors. — Arthur Conan Doyle

You're not a Dom, not a Master, Josh," she said. "You've never even been close. You're a submissive. A gorgeous, incredibly sensual submissive that any Mistress in her right mind would cherish forever. You were doing as your Mistress told you to do, and she used you cruelly. I won't let you blame yourself for anything, Josh, except maybe for not recognizing it sooner, because you are an intelligent man. Your inly crime is in denying your own worth, because she made you doubt yours. A Mistress doesn't do that, Josh. — Joey W. Hill

We were no longer, technically, children although in many ways I am quite sure that we were. Childish has become a term of contempt.
"Don't be childish, darling."
"I hope to Christ I am. Don't be childish yourself."
It is possible to be grateful that no one that you would willingly associate with you say, "Be mature. Be well-balanced, be well-adjusted."
Africa, being as old as it is, makes all people except the professional invaders and spoilers into children. No one says to anyone in Africa, "Why don't you grow up?" ...
Men know that they are children in relation to the country and, as in armies, seniority and senility ride close together. But to have the heart of a child is not a disgrace. It is an honor. A man must comport himself as a man ... But it is never a reproach that he has kept a child's heart, a child's honesty and a child's freshness and nobility. — Ernest Hemingway,

It's a way to use you and who you are. It's a way to use every detail of who you are. It's an assignment to save life instead of taking it, to answer prayers instead of cutting them off. It's a chance to do something that matters terribly to others while doing only good for yourself. That's what it's like to do good for yourself. That's what it's like to do good, you know. It's like working for The Right Man except that you believe in it with your whole heart and your whole soul, so much so that it becomes your will and your purpose with love. — Anne Rice

There are times in every person's life when they feel lonely, isolated, like maybe they don't belong. For adoptees, this is often exacerbated by the circumstances. Because you were given up, you have a built-in scapegoat; you can blame everything that you feel on the fact that you were adopted. But, I want you to know that this is a fallacy. Finding your biological parents will not fill in the void that you feel. You will get answers to your questions, but no one can fill in the missing pieces except for you. Before you go on a search, take the time to get to know yourself very well. Heal the hurts you've experienced. Acknowledge the past and how it has affected you. Become a whole person who is seeking roots, not a damaged person who is seeking fulfillment. — Janet Louise Stephenson

Nothing that happened before this moment has any power over you whatsoever, except to the extent to which you carry it into this moment. Dwell in the present with full forgiveness of yourself and others, and your life will be lifted to divine right order ... perfection, prosperity and peace. — Marianne Williamson

You have to accept yourself, who you are. You don't believe. You still fight who you are. Until you accept yourself, until you believe, you won't be able to call forth your Han, your power, except in great anger. — Terry Goodkind

I think the reward for conformity is that everyone likes you except yourself. — Rita Mae Brown

Go for a walk outdoors. Reconnect with the feeling of the wind blowing through your hair. Listen to the birds that live in a tree in your yard. Watch the sunset. Take time to smell the flowers that bloom in the park during the summer. The natural world is just as natural as it ever was, except there's less of it than there was twenty-five years ago - and most of us don't make a point of enjoying it often enough. — Skye Alexander

They say the princess is a stunner," said Peashot. "They also say she's eighteen and twice as tall as you," Vayle replied. "I meant the younger one." "The younger one is a boy." "Oh. Well then I meant the older one. Five years is not so much, and anyway, I'll grow." "Yes, I'm sure she thinks daily of a delinquent midget apprentice growing up to claim her hand ahead of all the nobles and princes of the realm. What could any of them possibly give that you don't have, except titles, land, wealth and all that. You don't have any of those things lying around, do you?" "You're an idiot, Vayle. What does delinquent mean?" "It means you. If anybody asks you to describe yourself, that's the word you want." "Thanks. Idiot." "My pleasure. Allisian is pretty though, but I've heard that the prince chops off the heads of men who stare at his sister." Peashot snorted. — Jonathan Renshaw

You can't insure against the future, except by really believing in the best bit of you, and in the power beyond it. — D.H. Lawrence

There is no separating yourself from the things you make, he thought. If you are a cesspool, what else can your work be except shit? — Noah Hawley

Being a lifetime wife and mother has afforded me the luxury of having multiple and even simultaneous careers: I've been a chauffeur. A chef. An interior decorator. A landscape architect, as well as a gardener. I've been a painter. A furniture restorer. A personal shopper. A veterinarian's assistant and sometimes the veterinarian. I've been an accountant, a banker and on occasion, a broker. I've been a beautician. A map. A psychic. Santa Claus. The Tooth Fairy. The T.V. Guide. A movie reviewer. An angel. God. A nurse and a nursemaid. A psychiatrist and psychologist. Evangelist. For a long time I have felt like I inadvertently got my master's in How To Take Care of Everybody Except Yourself and then a Ph.D. in How to Pretend Like You Don't Mind. But I do mind. — Terry McMillan

JONAS RECEIVER OF MEMORY Go immediately at the end of school hours each day to the Annex entrance behind the House of the Old and present yourself to the attendant. Go immediately to your dwelling at the conclusion of Training Hours each day. From this moment you are exempted from rules governing rudeness. You may ask any question of any citizen and you will receive answers. Do not discuss your training with any other member of the community, including parents and Elders. From this moment you are prohibited from dream-telling. Except for illness or injury unrelated to your training, do not apply for any medication. You are not permitted to apply for release. You may lie. — Lois Lowry

As a Cambion, balance is paramount.
Never lose control, never allow emotions to run wild, and never, ever forget who you are and what lives within you. Such discipline requires a sound mind, a thick skin, and a high tolerance for all things weird, because one wrong move and it's over. No matter how tempting it is at first, in the end, there's nothing more tragic, more excruciating than losing yourself.
Well, except maybe high school. — S.A.M.

For years now I've kind of operated under an informal shopping cycle. A bit like a farmer's crop rotation system. Except, instead of wheat, maize, barley, and fallow, mine pretty much goes clothes, makeup shoes, and clothes (I don't bother with fallow). Shopping is actually very similar to farming a field. You can't keep buying the same thing, you have to have a bit of variety. Otherwise you get bored and stop enjoying yourself. — Sophie Kinsella

A fish, which you can't see, deep down in the water, is a kind of symbol of peace on earth, good will to yourself. Fishing gives a man ... some time to collect his thoughts and reaarange them kind of neatly, in an orderly fashion. Once the bait is on the hook and the boat is anchored, there's nothing to interfere with thinking except an occasional bite — Robert Ruark

The twentieth-century artist who uses symbols is alienated because the system of symbols is a private one. After you have dealt with the symbols you are still private, you are still lonely, because you are not sure anyone will understand it except yourself. The ransom of privacy is that you are alone. — Louise Bourgeois

Depression is awful beyond words or sounds or images ... it bleeds relationships through suspicion, lack of confidence and self-respect, the inability to enjoy life, to walk or talk or think normally, the exhaustion, the night terrors, the day terrors. There is nothing good to be said for it except that it gives you the experience of how it must be to be old, to be old and sick, to be dying; to be slow of mind; to be lacking in grace, polish and coordination; to be ugly; to have no belief in the possibilities of life, the pleasures of sex, the exquisiteness of music or the ability to make yourself and others laugh. — Kay Redfield Jamison

I've always remembered something Sanford Meisner, my acting teacher, told us. When you create a character, it's like making a chair, except instead of making someting out of wood, you make it out of yourself. That's the actor's craft - using yourself to create a character. — Robert Duvall

I'm not going to say I told you so" is pretty much the same thing as saying "I told you so." Except worse because you're saying "I told you so" and congratulating yourself for your restraint in not saying what you totally just said. — Jenny Lawson

He had wanted to go to the Academy and become a Shadowhunter, to learn more about his own life and remember everything he had lost, to become someone stronger and better.
Except that you did not become someone stronger and better by only thinking about yourself. — Cassandra Clare

Except that the poor other man i was to run off with died, remember. Suddenly there is death. Life goes on but he's not here. There are certain recurrent shocks in life, which you can just steady yourself for
you can take a deep breath and it passes by and it doesn't hurt so much. But this is different. He was such a support for me in my head for so long. And now he's not here even to be there. I've managed, however. Actually I've been so heroic I wouldn't recognize myself. — Philip Roth

When we expand our thinking and beliefs our love flows freely. When we contract we shut ourselves off. Can you remember the last time when you were in love? Your heart went ahhh!! It was such a wonderful feeling. It is the same with loving yourself except that you will never leave once you have your love for yourself.Its with you for the rest of your life, so you want to make it the best relationship that you can have. — Louise L. Hay

You know, very few people really want to become individuals," he says. "People claim they do, but they don't. They want to retain the invisibility of childhood anonymity forever. But that's not possible except in a police state. In an ordinary life, you have to become yourself. — Charles Baxter

There's some that came here never believing they were dead. They insisted all the way that they were alive, it was a mistake, someone would have to pay; made no difference. There's others who longed to be dead when they were alive, poor souls; lives full of pain or misery; killed themselves for a chance of a blessed rest, and found that nothing had changed except for the worse, and this time there was no escape; you can't make yourself alive again. — Philip Pullman

Her chest feels very tight, as if she's suddenly full of poison. You have to keep it all inside. Like throwing yourself on a bomb to save everyone else. Except you're the bomb. — Kelly Link

You cannot control anything except your thoughts. With yoga, you do not control yourself but you harmonize with nature. — Debasish Mridha

Always get to the set or the location early, so that you can be all alone and draw your inspiration for the blocking and the setups in private and quiet. In one sense, it's about protecting yourself; in another sense, it's about always being open to surprise, even from the set, because there may be some detail that you hadn't noticed. I think this is crucial. There are many pictures that seem good in so many ways except one: They lack a sense of surprise, they've never left the page. — Martin Scorsese

Is something the matter?" "I thought you'd prefer distancing yourself from Arabella. She just took to the floor with Mr. Sumner." Theodore narrowed his eyes as he searched the crowd. Sure enough, Arabella was in Grayson's arms, laughing at something the man was whispering in her ear. No one except him should be whispering in her ear. He took a breath and twirled Felicia around in circles, trying to get closer to Arabella. "What are you doing?" Felicia hissed. "I need to speak to Arabella." "From what I've heard, she doesn't want to speak to you. Eliza told me she's beyond annoyed with you." "Yes, well, I'm a bit annoyed with her at the moment, so we're fairly even. When we get closer to them, I'm going to hand you off to Grayson and take Arabella. — Jen Turano

There's no one who can teach you except yourself. Each of us needs to look at what our belief system really consists of. Look at the concepts that come across your mind and just notice what you believe. — Byron Katie

I'd discovered you never know yourself until you're tested and that you don't even know you're being tested until afterwards, and that in fact there isn't anyone giving the test except yourself. — Marilyn French

Grant, O Lord my God, that I may never fall away in success or in failure; that I may not be prideful in prosperity nor dejected in adversity. Let me rejoice only in what unites us and sorrow only in what separates us. May I strive to please no one or fear to displease anyone except Yourself. May I see always the things that are eternal and never those that are only temporal. May I shun any joy that is without You and never seek any that is beside You. O Lord, may I delight in any work I do for You and tire of any rest that is apart from You. My God, let me direct my heart towards You, and in my failings, always repent with a purpose of amendment. — Thomas Aquinas

Without the blessing of the Lord, your best endeavors will do no good. He has the hearts of all men in His hands, and except He touch the hearts of your children by His Spirit, you will weary yourself to no purpose. Water, therefore, the seed you sow on their minds with unceasing prayer. — J.C. Ryle

Sitting with him was like sitting by yourself; he didn't talk except when it suited him. You asked him a question in the morning and he might answer in the afternoon, or he might never. — Flannery O'Connor

Loving yourself isn't just about celebrating your accomplishments and nurturing your talents. Those things are nice, sure. But that's not how we know others love us. We know others love us when they see us with our face on the ground, crying and weak, feeling like we've got nothing to offer the world - and they smile, and they reach out, and they love us anyway. Loving yourself is what you do when you fail, when you don't know, when you screw up, when you forget, when you lose everything. Loving yourself is what you do when you can't approve of what you've done. Loving yourself is what you do when you're not sure if it's going to get better. Loving yourself is what you must do in those moments when you can't like yourself. Real love is when you reach out for no good reason at all, except to love. — Vironika Tugaleva

When you continuously know and sense yourself as the space of consciousness rather than what appears in consciousness - sense perceptions, thoughts, emotions - then it can be said that you are enlightened ... except that you wouldn't think or speak of yourself as 'enlightened', because that would instantly create another mind-based conceptual identity and so it would be the end of 'your' enlightenment. — Eckhart Tolle

This is beautiful," I said, ignoring the shop window to trace the gleaming stone walls fronting another boutique.
"You know what's funny?" Jacob asked. He didn't wait for my answer. "You can see beauty in everything, except for yourself."
***
I swallowed hard. Erik thought my body was beautiful, Karin that it was enviable. At random times, people had noted that my hands were beautiful, or my hair. The Twisted Sisters had called my art beautiful. Mom had the best intentions and always told me before and after my laser surgeries that I would be beautiful. But no one had ever said that I was beautiful, all my parts taken together, not just the bits and pieces. — Justina Chen

Today you are no longer a victor nor victim of the past and future, today is completely independent, there are no restrictions; except for the ones you place upon yourself. — Noel DeJesus

Didn't I talk about us like we were a thing from our first date? I fell in love with you that first time we went out for burgers and dancing. I love our weird dates and your belly laugh and how you see beauty in everything. Except yourself. And I love being the one to help you get there. I love the way you daydream I love the way you hold my hand. I can't stop thinking about the way you taste. — Alessandra Thomas

We only betray ourselves. No one is betrayed except by himself. One way to betray yourself is to try to be too many people at once.
"How many people should a person try to be in your opinion?"
One at the most. Most people don't even succeed in that. — MacDonald Harris

Count yourself lucky. I watched my entire family as they were eaten alive by the very pack of animals you have downstairs in your house with your child. The blood of my parents flowed from their bodies through the floorboards and drenched me while I lay in terror of being torn apart by them. I was only a year older than your child when it happened. My parents gave their lives for mine and I watched as they gave them. So you'll have to excuse me if I have a hard time thinking good of any animal except those who are dead or caged. (Angelia) — Sherrilyn Kenyon

When you are very simple, honest, and kind, people may take advantage of you and cheat you, but be loving and kind. Remember that no one can cheat you except you and yourself. — Debasish Mridha

From the Bible we can surmise that God will ask us two crucial questions: First, "What did you do with my Son, Jesus Christ?" God won't ask about your religious background or doctrinal views. The only thing that will matter is, did you accept what Jesus did for you and did you learn to love and trust him? Jesus said, "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me."17 Second, "What did you do with what I gave you?" What did you do with your life - all the gifts, talents, opportunities, energy, relationships, and resources God gave you? Did you spend them on yourself, or did you use them for the purposes God made you for? — Rick Warren

You can't blame me. I mean that literally. You're incapable of blaming me. You're human. Being human is choosing freedom over imprisonment, autonomy over dependency, liberty over servitude. You can't blame me because you know (come on, man, you've always known) that the idea of spending eternity with nothing to do except praise God is utterly unappealing. You'd be catatonic after an hour. Heaven's a swiz because to get in you have to leave yourself outside. You can't blame me because
now do please be honest with yourself for once
you'd have left, too. — Glen Duncan

The matter is quite simple. The bible is very easy to understand. But we Christians are a bunch of scheming swindlers. We pretend to be unable to understand it because we know very well that the minute we understand, we are obliged to act accordingly. Take any words in the New Testament and forget everything except pledging yourself to act accordingly. My God, you will say, if I do that my whole life will be ruined. How would I ever get on in the world? Herein lies the real place of Christian scholarship. Christian scholarship is the Church's prodigious invention to defend itself against the Bible, to ensure that we can continue to be good Christians without the Bible coming too close. Oh, priceless scholarship, what would we do without you? Dreadful it is to fall into the hands of the living God. Yes it is even dreadful to be alone with the New Testament. — Soren Kierkegaard

Speak seldom, but to important subjects, except such as particularly relate to your constituents, and, in the former case, make yourself perfectly master of the subject. — George Washington

Each mistake teaches you something new about yourself. There is no failure, remember, except in no longer trying. It is the courage to continue that counts. — Chris Bradford

Nobody can build the bridge for you to walk across the river of life, no one but you yourself alone. There are, to be sure, countless paths and bridges and demi-gods which would carry you across this river; but only at the cost of yourself; you would pawn yourself and lose. There is in the world only one way, on which nobody can go, except you: where does it lead? Do not ask, go along with it. — Friedrich Nietzsche

Chairs are public, and one only needs to seek permission to sit in another's chair if the owner of the room is present; once you were by yourself, any chair was fair game. Except the chairs of really important people - one should not sit on a throne when left unattended in a monarch's throne room; that really was going too far. And yet who would miss such an opportunity? There could surely be little doubt but that visitors — Alexander McCall Smith

Love will never be anywhere except where equality and unity are ... And there can be no love where love does not find equality or is not busy creating equality. Nor is there any pleasure without equality. Practice equality in human society. Learn to love, esteem, consider all people like yourself. What happens to another, be it bad or good, pain or joy, ought to be as if it happened to you. — Meister Eckhart

Your mistake, indeed the mistake of your inherently finite senses, is to view the universe as an extension of yourself. You expect that, like you, it should have a beginning, a middle, and an end. but what you fail to understand is that everything you consider to be you, except for that rather silly imaginary part you call consciousness, is merely bits and pieces borrowed from the universe, and to the universe it will all return. You had no beginning, and you will have no ending. Everything that is you has always been and will always be. — A. Lee Martinez

Live to please the others, and everyone will love you, except yourself. — Paulo Coelho

Is this all the habit you acquired when you studied philosophy, to look to others and to hope for nothing from yourself and your own acts? Lament therefore and mourn, and when you eat be fearful that you will have nothing to eat to-morrow. Tremble for your wretched slaves, lest they should steal, or run away, or die. Live in this spirit, and never cease to live so, you who never came near philosophy, except in name, and disgraced its principles so far as in you lies, by showing them to be useless and unprofitable to those who take them up. — Epictetus

Make life about more than just you. Take the world around you and transform it for the sake of others. Do a good deed for your neighbor; smile at strangers; volunteer for a bigger purpose and don't except anything in return. The first step of redemption is digging yourself out of the hole you dug around yourself and dedicating your time to others. When the world stops revolving around your comfort zone and draws in the needs of others, you may quickly break the chains that hold you down from reaching your ultimate goal. — Leigh Hershkovich

You want to know what I'm afraid of? I'm afraid of every morning when I wake up that this will be the day when I can no longer move for myself. I know it's coming. It's just a matter of time until I have no choice, except to have someone else clothe me, feed me. Change my diaper. And I can't stand it. (Adron)
Then why don't you kill yourself? Why are you still here? (Livia)
Because every time I think of doing that, I can hear my family praying over me while I was in the hospital. I hear my mother weeping, my father begging me not to die on them. I could never intentionally hurt them that way. It would devastate them both, and while I'm a pathetic asshole, I'm not that selfish. (Adron) — Sherrilyn Kenyon

When I heard about these lessons, I thought they would be a dreadful waste of my time. I pictured two very silly girls uninterested in any sort of instruction. But that describes neither Miss Gray nor yourself. I should tell you, I used to train younger Shadowhunters in Madrid. And there were quite a few of them who didn't have the same native ability that you do. You're a talented student, and it is my pleasure to teach you."
Sophie felt herself flush scarlet. "You cannot be serious."
"I am. I was pleasantly surprised the first time I came here and again so the next time and the next. I found that I was looking forward to it. In fact, it would be fair to say that since my return home, I have hated everything in London except these hours with you. — Cassandra Clare

But I never looked like that!' - How do you know? What is the 'you' you might or might not look like? Where do you find it - by which morphological or expressive calibration? Where is your authentic body? You are the only one who can never see yourself except as an image; you never see your eyes unless they are dulled by the gaze they rest upon the mirror or the lens (I am interested in seeing my eyes only when they look at you): even and especially for your own body, you are condemned to the repertoire of its images. — Roland Barthes

Meditate but one hour upon the self's nonexistence and you will feel yourself to be another man, said a priest of the Japanese Kusha sect to a Western visitor.
Without having frequented the Buddhist monasteries, how many times have I not lingered over the world's unreality, and hence my own? I have not become another man for that, no, but there certainly has remained with me the feeling that my identity is entirely illusory, and that by losing it I have lost nothing, except something, except everything. — Emil Cioran

You best keep to yourself, except you never can. — Marilynne Robinson

Some people will mess with you, whenever they want, and for no reason except that they can. But hurting yourself is giving those people all the power, and they don't deserve it. Why would they deserve to have control over your life? Because they're cool? Because they're pretty? That's completely illogical. — Leila Sales

You do realize, Kilmartin,' Colin said, his voice so soft it was almost chilling, 'that there is no reason you can't marry her. None at all. Except, of course,' he added, almost as an afterthought, 'the reasons you manufacture for yourself. — Julia Quinn

I beg to differ on Charles Bukowski, who says nothing can save you, except writing. Sometimes, absolutely nothing will save you, not the nights you end up wasting waiting for something grand to happen, not the mornings where coffee has no taste and you wake up knowing the day will not be a blast, not the plans and schemes you write down on your imaginary flipchart to make the world go round. You end up stuck, alone and in the disparate points of chaos that drag you down, you have to come up with something to save yourself. Then you make six impossible wishes before breakfast, start walking and working and learn to seize what you call paranormal activity when it comes true. — Ioana-Cristina Casapu

You learn nothing form your successes except to think too much of yourself. It is from failure that all growth comes, provided you can recognize it, admit it, learn from it, rise above it, and then try again. — Dee Hock

You are not who you think you are. You are not your fears, your thoughts, or your body. You are not your insecurities, your career, or your memories. You're not what you're criticized for and you're not what you're praised for. You are a boundless wealth of potential. You are everything that's ever been. Don't sell yourself short. Every sunset, every mountain, every river, every passionate crowd, every concert, every drop of rain - that's you. So go find yourself. Go find your strength, find your beauty, find your purpose. Stop crafting your mask. Stop hiding. Stop lying to yourself and letting people lie to you. You're not lacking in anything except awareness. Everything you've ever wanted is already there, awaiting your attention, awaiting your time. — Vironika Tugaleva

When you're in the wild, there's nothing to hide behind. No bars or credit cards or movie theatres or cell phones or credentials or security. You're just alone with yourself. You look around and lose yourself in the mountains, rivers, forests or tundra, but you can see nothing except for the chaos in your own mind. It is fucking terrifying and peaceful at the same time. — Shannon Mullen

In Ireland, you go to someone's house, and she asks you if you want a cup of tea. You say no, thank you, you're really just fine. She asks if you're sure. You say of course you're sure, really, you don't need a thing. Except they pronounce it ting. You don't need a ting. Well, she says then, I was going to get myself some anyway, so it would be no trouble. Ah, you say, well, if you were going to get yourself some, I wouldn't mind a spot of tea, at that, so long as it's no trouble and I can give you a hand in the kitchen. Then you go through the whole thing all over again until you both end up in the kitchen drinking tea and chatting.
In America, someone asks you if you want a cup of tea, you say no, and then you don't get any damned tea.
I liked the Irish way better. — C.E. Murphy

You are not going to find yourself anywhere except right where you are. — Vanna Bonta

Information can be passed from one to another, like a silver dollar. There's absolutely no wisdom except what you learn for yourself. — Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings

Teaching ... particularly in the 1990s, teaching what is far and away the dumbest generation in American history, is the same as walking up Broadway in Manhattan talking to yourself, except instead of eighteen people who hear you in the street talking to yourself, they're all in the room. They know, like, nothing. — Philip Roth

So, you see, you will have to learn to listen to more of the radio music of life. It'll do you good. You are uncommonly poor in gifts, a poor blockhead, but by degrees you will come to grasp what is required of you. You have got to learn to laugh. That will be required of you. You must apprehend the humor of life, its gallows-humor. But of course you are ready for everything in the world except what will be required of you. You are ready to stab girls to death. You are ready to be executed with all solemnity. You would be ready, no doubt, to mortify and scourge yourself for centuries together. Wouldn't you? It is time to come to your senses...You are to live and to learn to laugh. You are to learn to listen to the cursed radio music of life and to reverence the spirit behind it and to laugh at its distortions. So there you are. More will not be asked of you — Hermann Hesse

Never, never marry, my friend. Here's my advice to you: don't marry until you can tell yourself that you've done all you could, and until you've stopped loving the woman you've chosen, until you see her clearly, otherwise you'll be cruelly and irremediably mistaken. Marry when you're old and good for nothing ... Otherwise all that's good and lofty in you will be lost. It will all go on trifles. Yes, yes, yes! Don't look at me with such astonishment. If you expect something from yourself in the future, then at every step you'll feel that it's all over for you, it's all closed, except the drawing room, where you'll stand on the same level as a court flunkey and an idiot ... — Leo Tolstoy

For awakened human beings, there was no obligation - none, none, none at all - except this: to search for yourself, become sure of yourself, feel your way forward along your own path, wherever it led. — Hermann Hesse

When you open a book," the sentimental library posters said, "anything can happen." This was so. A book of fiction was a bomb. It was a land mine you wanted to go off. You wanted it to blow your whole day. Unfortunately, hundreds of thousands of books were duds. They had been rusting out of everyone's way for so long that they no longer worked. There was no way to distinguish the duds from the live mines except to throw yourself at them headlong, one by one. — Annie Dillard

Nothing can bring joy in your life except yourself. — Debasish Mridha

There's that kind of money in the world. It aggravates you to have it, makes you miserable to spend it, and you hate yourself when it's gone. And when you hate yourself, you feel like spending money. Except there's no money left. And no hope. — Haruki Murakami

Your first pregnancy you have nothing to do except sleep and take care of yourself and go to prenatal yoga or whatever. Now I have a full-time job, I have a four-year-old, I've got a life that is demanding my attention, so I've gone to prenatal yoga once. It's such a bummer. — Busy Philipps

The unfortunate thing about working for yourself is that you have the worst boss in the world. I work every day of the year except at Christmas, when I work a half day. — David Eddings

A technician who uses the term "glitch" is like a
Doctor who tells you you're suffering from a "thingy," except the doctor won't tell you to go home and try turning yourself on and off again. — John Connolly

You have people out here trying to tell you to accept imperfections and that nobody is perfect (except for a dead/make-believe entity?) but if you are telling yourself that you are not perfect, aren't you downgrading your own character? Why would you keep telling yourself you are less than what you are? Why destroy your pride? People, raise your heads and gain some vanity. If you are the best in the world at what you do, and the best in the world in who you are, you are certainly perfect. The only way you are not perfect, is if you let everyone fool you into believing you are not perfect; that you are the same as everyone else - less than what you are and could be. — Lionel Suggs

Which is just another way of blaming, and perhaps the best way, because there is solace and a certain stoical peace in blaming everything on the rain, and then blaming something as uncontrollable as the rain on something as indifferent as the Arm of the Lord.
Because nothing can be done about the rain except blaming. And if nothing can be done about it, why get yourself in a sweat about it? — Ken Kesey

The mystique of rock climbing is climbing; you get to the top of a rock glad it's over but really wish it would go on forever. The justification of climbing is climbing, like the justification of poetry is writing; you don't conquer anything except things in yourself ... . The act of writing justifies poetry. Climbing is the same: recognizing that you are a flow. The purpose of the flow is to keep on flowing, not looking for a peak or utopia but staying in the flow. It is not a moving up but a continuous flowing; you move up to keep the flow going. There is no possible reason for climbing except the climbing itself; it is a self-communication. — Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

You can permit yourself any liberty in the opening except the luxury of a passive position. — Grigory Sanakoev

Her's what I tell myself now. That it's vital to learn how to make the best of things. That there is no tenderness without bravery. That if things hadn't been so bad they could never have gotten so good. And that it's always better to have what you have than to get what you wanted. Except for this: Every now and then, when you are impossibly lucky you rise above yourself-and get both. — Katherine Center

In oneself lies the whole world and if you know how to look and learn, the door is there and the key is in your hand. Nobody on earth can give you either the key or the door to open, except yourself. — Jiddu Krishnamurti

You have no enemy except yourself. — Debasish Mridha