Finally Getting There Quotes & Sayings

I had crossed the yard to him slowly, watching him draw closer, baffled by the way my heart was skittering around my chest. Then he'd picked me up and spun me in a circle, and I'd clung to him, breathing in his sweet, familiar smell, shocked by how much I'd missed him. Dimly, I'd been aware that I still had a shard of the blue cup in my hand, that it was digging into my palm, but I didn't want to let go.
When he finally set me down and ambled off to the kitchen to find his lunch, I stood there, my palm dripping blood, my head still spinning, knowing that everything had changed.
Ana Kuya had scoled me for getting blood on the clean kitchen floor. She'd bandaged my hand and told me it would heal. But I knew it would just go on hurting.
In the creaking silence of the cell, Mal kissed the scar on my palm, the wound made so long ago by the edge of that broken cup, a fragile thing I'd thought beyond repair. — Leigh Bardugo

When a writer's whole being is poured into a piece of work, there is never enough. The feeling of finally getting to the end of a piece of work, of making it as good as you can at that moment, is more of a relief than anything else, and then you wait for reviews. — Dani Shapiro

Realizing your goal, resolution, or transformation is a journey. Change, like any meaningful endeavor, proceeds sequentially through steps. The journey begins with the contemplation stage of specifying realistic goals, getting ready, or getting psyched. The planning stage is all about prepping. How exactly will I do this thing? At some point you will jump from preparing and planning to perspiring, the work of implementing the new, desired behavior. Getting there is wonderful, but we need to keep you there, which entails persevering through slips and, finally, persisting over time. — John C. Norcross

The elegant and beautiful Lotus flower must toil through the mud and mire of murky swamps and shadowy waters of darkness before it can finally bloom. Above the fray of struggle yet firmly rooted in rugged beginnings, it ultimately lies pristinely above the water, basking in the sun of triumph. So no matter what you've endured or where you come from...you are no different and no less beautiful. There is simply no greater beauty than when a flower blossoms despite its tough and humble beginnings. ~Jason Versey — Jason Versey

There is so much great talent in the underground, and electronic music is finally getting the props that it's deserved for so long. I feel like now that everyone is discovering it and it's so fresh sounding to so many people. It doesn't get any more rock n' roll than playing EDC or the Staples Center. It's really madness. — Kaskade

If you've as many films as I have, and missed as many opportunities as I have to do good work and been pissed off about it, you say, "Well, now you've got to start getting it right". If you get a chance, you really want to cook. And the tragedy is, when you finally feel that way about yourself, about your work, nobody wants to give you a chance. And that happens to a lot of actors. But I'm feeling very wanted these days, so there must be something in the air. — Burt Reynolds

There is a story of a woman running away from tigers. She runs and runs and the tigers are getting closer and closer. When she comes to the edge of a cliff, she sees some vines there, so she climbs down and holds on to the vines. Looking down, she sees that there are tigers below her as well. She then notices that a mouse is gnawing away at the vine to which she is clinging. She also sees a beautiful little bunch of strawberries close to her, growing out of a clump of grass. She looks up and she looks down. She looks at the mouse. Then she just takes a strawberry, puts it in her mouth, and enjoys it thoroughly. Tigers above, tigers below. This is actually the predicament that we are always in, in terms of our birth and death. Each moment is just what it is. It might be the only moment of our life; it might be the only strawberry we'll ever eat. We could get depressed about it, or we could finally appreciate it and delight in the preciousness of every single moment of our life. — Pema Chodron

Annabeth Thalia and I hadn't seen each other in months but between
the blizzard and the thought of what we were about to do we were too nervous to talk much.
Except for my mom. She talks more when she's nervous. By the time we finally got to Westover Hall it was getting dark and she'd told Annabeth and Thalia every embarrassing baby story there was to tell about me. — Rick Riordan

A lot of people out there working hard and finally building up to getting a pretty good income. Higher tax rates on them, you know, the income rates going up, the dividend rates are going up, the capital gains rates all going up before health care kicks in. — Fred Thompson

In India, I was living in a little hut, about six feet by seven feet. It had a canvas flap instead of a door. I was sitting on my bed meditating, and a cat wandered in and plopped down on my lap. I took the cat and tossed it out the door. Ten seconds later it was back on my lap. We got into a sort of dance, this cat and I ... I tossed it out because I was trying to meditate, to get enlightened. But the cat kept returning. I was getting more and more irritated, more and more annoyed with the persistence of the cat. Finally, after about a half-hour of this coming in and tossing out, I had to surrender. There was nothing else to do. There was no way to block off the door. I sat there, the cat came back in, and it got on my lap. But I did not do anything. I just let go. Thirty seconds later the cat got up and walked out. So, you see, our teachers come in many forms. — Joseph Goldstein

Running isn't a sport for pretty boys ... It's about the sweat in your hair and the blisters on your feet. Its the frozen spit on your chin and the nausea in your gut. It's about throbbing calves and cramps at midnight that are strong enough to wake the dead. It's about getting out the door and running when the rest of the world is only dreaming about having the passion that you need to live each and every day with. It's about being on a lonely road and running like a champion even when there's not a single soul in sight to cheer you on. Running is all about having the desire to train and persevere until every fiber in your legs, mind, and heart is turned to steel. And when you've finally forged hard enough, you will have become the best runner you can be. And that's all that you can ask for. — Paul Maurer

I don't know exactly what drove me to stray, but I think there's a certain sadness to finally getting what you want. — Jessica Pan

The only member of the team nobody liked was our 6 o'clock sports guy, a fellow named Howard Cosell. "Monday Night Football" was just getting started and Howard was annoyed at having to be on the same news with mere local personalities, whom he would attack on the air. This was a mistake in the case of Roger Grimsby who was a lot sharper and even more devastating than Cosell, in his own way. I remember one night, at the end of his report, Howard went into a sarcastic putdown of Grimsby that lasted for what seemed like two minutes. Finally, when Howard was finished, the camera switched to Grimsby who was sitting there with his eyes closed, snoring. — Jim Bouton

I find cooking very sensual. I love getting in there with my hands instead of utensils. With all of the textures and everything, it's very erotic. Also the time it takes to prepare, and the anticipation and the buildup, you know. Then finally, you get to eat. — Jacqueline Obradors

Eli's coming with us." I hadn't known until I said it. Silence. "You're crazy," Vick says. "There's no way that kid will last until then." "I know," I tell Vick. He's right. It's only a matter of time before Eli goes down. He's small. He's impulsive. He asks too many questions. Then again, it's only a matter of time for all of us. "So why keep him around? Why bring him along?" "There's a girl I know back in Oria," I say. "He reminds me of her brother." "That's not reason enough." "It is for me," I say. Silence stretches between us. "You're getting weak," Vick says finally. "And that might kill you. Might mean you never see her again." "If I don't look out for him," I tell Vick, "I'd be someone she didn't know, even if she did see me again. — Ally Condie

sister's loan. It's not a detailed plan, and technically I have no idea what I'm getting into. However, it's the only option. Finally I reach the edge of pack territory. You can't miss it because there's a huge sign, white paint on a slab of plywood. PRIVATE PROPERTY. And a drawing of a howling wolf. Then a few meters in, another one with a spotlight shining on it. PRIVATE. NO TRESPASSING. I stop in front of that one. If I'm there to talk to the alpha, then I'm not trespassing, right? Gathering my courage, I set off again, the bike squeaking with every inch of travel. I hear a rustling — Cleo Peitsche

Plot is people. Human emotions and desires founded on the realities of life, working at cross purposes, getting hotter and fiercer as they strike against each other until finally there's an explosion - that's Plot. — Leigh Brackett

In the end, no matter how my records are panned or praised, if there are kids and communities in developing nations that have improved living conditions and are finally getting access to things we all have a basic right to (clean water, education, healthcare) because I am able to advocate, raise awareness or funds in some small way, then my life has achieved something that in the end means far more than having the track or album of the moment. — Brooke Fraser

There were people I knew that came to college and had never drank before, and never partied, and maybe got a little bit too carried away with it when they did finally get out of the house ... I feel like I got that stuff out of my system when I was sixteen and knew to balance things - but at the same time - it's not like I was out getting my medical degree. Playing in a band, you can still have plenty of fun! — Chris Baio

Side note: Down here, you're either an Amundsen guy, a Shackleton guy, or a Scott guy. Amundsen was the first to reach the Pole, but he did it by feeding dogs to dogs, which makes Amundsen the Michael Vick of polar explorers: you can like him, but keep it to yourself, or you'll end up getting into arguments with a bunch of fanatics. Shackleton is the Charles Barkley of the bunch: he's a legend, all-star personality, but there's the asterisk that he never reached the Pole, i.e. won a championship. How this turned into a sports analogy, I don't know. Finally, there's Captain Scott, canonized for his failure, and to this day never fully embraced because he was terrible with people. He has my vote, you understand. — Maria Semple

The group started getting bigger and bigger, so Al started replacing Brian on the road, and then finally there was a big flare-up with Dave Marks and he left the group. — Bruce Johnston

... It's just so' - she frowned, hunting for the right word - 'relentless. You think you're getting on top of it. You scoop up a few villains, get a result or two, make a night of it in the bar, then next morning you wake up and start all over again. It never bloody stops...
She described the pressures from headquarters, and from her own divisional Superintendent. The never-ending demands to beat performance target after performance target. The blizzards of paperwork. The fact that no one really knew what their political masters were after. They claimed to have priorities, lots of priorities, but in the end you got to realise there were so many that absolutely nothing got to the top of the heap. When it came to working out what politicians wanted, really wanted, she'd finally sussed the truth: that they were all equally clueless.
pg 157 — Graham Hurley

Beautiful features, always immaculately dressed, the kind of woman that makes a great impression. Their hair is always nicely curled. They major in French literature at expensive private women's colleges, and after graduation find jobs as receptionists or secretaries. They work for a few years, visit Paris for shopping once a year with their girlfriends. They finally catch the eye of a promising young man in the company, or else are formally introduced to one, and quit work to get married. They then devote themselves to getting their children into famous private schools. As he sat there, Tsukuru pondered the kind of lives they led. — Haruki Murakami

There was once an abbot who had spent thirty-nine years alone in the temple with cats as his only companions. As someone who believed that faith and willpower could conquer any difficulty, the abbot began training newborn kittens, trying to turn the impossible into the possible. First he put the rattan hoop on the ground for the kittens to crawl through. Then he slowly raised the hoop little by little, day after day, month after month, and year after year. Years went by and the hoop was gradually raised until he finally succeeded in getting the cats to jump through the hoop. An unusual phenomenon occurred. When the kittens saw the older cats jump, they believed they could do it too and so, without much effort, they learned to jump easily through the hoop as well. — You Jin

Not this again," I moaned. "Jonathon, there are more important things in this world than me."
He looked thoughtful. "You're right," he said and I thought I might finally be getting through to him. He continued, "Chocolate gelato," he grinned. — Micalea Smeltzer

But now it seems possible that the truth about getting older is that there are fewer and fewer things to make fun of until finally there is nothing you are sure you will never be. — Jenny Offill

Your only chance of survival, if you are severely smitten, lies in hiding this fact from the woman you love, of feigning a casual detachment under all circumstances. What sadness there is in this simple observation! What an accusation against man! Love makes you weak, and the weaker of the two is oppressed, tortured, and finally killed by the other, who in his or her turn oppresses, tortures, and kills without having evil intentions, without even getting pleasure from it, with complete indifference; that's what men, normally, call love. — Michel Houellebecq

At times I feel that I am playing around the edges of things, getting nowhere. An extreme and callow youth playing with philosophy must be a pitiable things from your point of view. Today was a long day, the hours went by so slowly that I thought of many things and finally went into a mental sleep. I sat on a pipe and watched, and spoke in monosyllables to those who were about me, and I knew so many things which they did not know, there were so many worlds open to me whose existence was beyond their powers of comprehension, and I such a young lad. — John Steinbeck

I saw what I had been fighting for: It was for me, a scared child, who had run away a long time ago to what I had imagined was a safer place. And hiding in this place, behind my invisible barriers, I knew what lay on the other side: Her side attacks. Her secret weapons. Her uncanny ability to find my weakest spots. But in the brief instant that I had peered over the barriers I could finally see what was finally there: an old woman, a wok for her armor, a knitting needle for her sword, getting a little crabby as she waited patiently for her daughter to invite her in. — Amy Tan

Writing is finally about one thing: going into a room alone and doing it. Putting words on paper that have never been there in quite that way before. And although you are physically by yourself, the haunting Demon never leaves you, that Demon being the knowledge of your own terrible limitations, your hopeless inadequacy, the impossibility of ever getting it right. No matter how diamond-bright your ideas are dancing in your brain, on paper they are earthbound. — William Goldman

Every time I think I'm getting smarter I realize that I've just done something stupid. Dad says there are three kinds of people in the world: those who don't know, and don't know they don't know; those who don't know and do know they don't know; and those who know and know how much they still don't know.
Heavy stuff, I know. I think I've finally graduated from the don't-knows that don't know to the don't-knows
that do. — Karen Marie Moning

I was actually pretty miserable in high school. I couldn't wait for it to be over. And when it finally was, I remember sitting at graduation with all these classmates getting nostalgic and emotional already and all I could think was, "Get me out of here. I never want to see you people again." So it's ironic that I spend half my day putting myself back there by choice [while writing]. — Sarah Dessen

Getting a handle on why wolves do what they do has never been an easy proposition. Not only are there tremendous differences in both individual and pack personalities, but each displays a surprising range of behaviors depending on what's going on around them at any given time. No sooner will a young researcher thing, 'That's it, I've finally got a handle on how wolves respond in a particular situation,' than they'll do something to prove him at least partially wrong. Those of us who've been in this business for very long have come to accept a professional life full of wrong turns and surprises. Clearly, this is an animal less likely to offer scientists irrefutable facts than to lure us on a long and crooked journey of constant learning. — Douglas W. Smith

Finally, imagine that you've really worked hard on yourself and become a level 10 person. Now, is this same level 5 problem a big problem or a little problem? The answer is that it's no problem. It doesn't even register in your brain as a problem. There's no negative energy around it. It's just a normal occurrence to handle, like brushing your teeth or getting dressed. — T. Harv Eker

Breaking up could sit in front of you for a while. It was a ring of fire you had to at last decide to run through. You finally got tired of standing there, looking at it, feeling the heat, tired enough to finally just let go. Getting burned at last seemed better than the waiting to get burned. — Deb Caletti

Still, Lindsay stops getting dressed, even though he's only half-done, because he gets this urge to ambush the kid with a hug. Just that, nothing else. He wraps his arms around Valentine's skinny body and pulls him close and rests his cheek on the still-damp hair and inhales the cherry-almond scent of his shampoo, and Valentine says, "Oh!" in a really odd way, like he's just read a particularly interesting fact on the back of a Penguin biscuit wrapper. Lindsay's got his eyes shut but he can feel the kid's hands creeping up his bare arms, over his shoulders. One stays there and the other comes to rest on the back of his neck, fingers playing idly with the ends of his hair, and several minutes pass without sound or movement, just the gentle thud of heartbeats.
"What's that for?" Valentine asks, when Lindsay finally lets him go.
"Don't know. Nothing. Just seemed the kind of thing you'd like. BAM, surprise ninja cuddles. — Richard Rider

There are many things in this world that are an outrage, to be sure, but death at our current life expectancy doesn't strike me as one of them. Maybe I sound like some Victorian who felt that forty years ought to be enough for any man, but one of the marks of a life well lived has to be reaching a state of finally getting it, of not needing more, and of being able to sign off with something approaching peace of mind. — David Rakoff

When I spoke to a colleague about Joe's report, her face registered surprise. She said, "Is it possible for a death in a nursing home to be premature?"
Joe told me, "If it were happening in any other kind of institution, to any other part of the population - workers, say, or children - there'd be an outcry, media, inquiries, swift intervention. The truth is we do not value the last months or years of a person's life. The remaining life of someone old. Particularly if they are in residential care."
If we are all just economic units who lift or lean, then very little is "lost" when a nursing home resident or anyone getting on in their years dies prematurely. In fact money might be saved - one less nursing-home bed to fund, and the kids can finally get their hands on the house. — Karen Hitchcock

The water temperature finally rose, so I stepped in, and he followed me. It shouldn't have surprised me that our primary focus wasn't on getting cleaned up. We let the water run over us, and there was some soap involved, but mostly, we just lazily made out while we ran soap-slick hands over each other's bodies. I was too exhausted to get turned on, and he probably was too, but this? This was absolute heaven. Wet, slippery skin against wet, slippery skin, our mouths moving together like we planned to do this all night - it didn't get any better than this. — L.A. Witt

His noise is getting quieter, but I can still see it there still-
See how he feels the skin of my hand against his, see how he wants to take it and press it against his mouth, how he wants to breathe in the smell of me and how beautiful I look to him, how strong after all that illness, and how he wants to just lightly touch my neck, just there, and how he wants to take me in his arms and-
"Oh, God," he says, looking away suddenly. "Viola, I'm sorry, I didn't mean-"
But I just put my hand to the back of his neck-
And he says, "Viola-?"
And I pull myself towards him-
And I kiss him.
And it feels like, finally. — Patrick Ness

He finessed his way through it all, playing the "I don't recall" game. He played the same game when asked about how Betty and UD officers had inserted Betty's name on their official visitors' log when it was Monica who actually visited, so as not to betray the president. It was yet another obvious lie on his part. I knew that game. Everyone with eyes could see it. He never recalled how she came to him with letters or papers. There was a back-and-forth on how the Clintons had garnered a lawyer for Monica so she could obfuscate matters and not implicate the president in his defense in Paula Jones's civil sexual harassment case. They discussed how unethical that was, and that's when the president had the nerve to blame the debacle on the information's getting leaked, not that it actually happened. Finally it came down to blaming Monica. — Gary J. Byrne

In a poor organization, on the other hand, people spend much of their time fighting organizational boundaries, infighting, and broken processes. They are not even clear on what their jobs are, so there is no way to know if they are getting the job done or not. In the miracle case that they work ridiculous hours and get the job done, they have no idea what it means for the company or their careers. To make it all much worse and rub salt in the wound, when they finally work up the courage to tell management how fucked-up their situation is, management denies there is a problem, then defends the status quo, then ignores the problem. — Ben Horowitz

Silly stuff could tickle him no end. Chris loved practical jokes, even when they weren't planned.
One day he brought home a large kudu head to keep for a friend. (Kudus are large African antelopes; this one had been shot and mounted as a trophy.) I was in the kitchen getting something out of the refrigerator. I heard a noise and looked up-there was a beast in my house!
I screamed.
Chris appeared behind the head. For a brief moment his face was tight with concern and worry.
It was a very brief moment. When he realized he'd scared me with the silly head, he began laughing so hard the house shook.
"I'm sorry," he said, gasping for air. "I didn't mean to scare you."
He laughed some more.
"Oh, I'm sorry," he said when he managed to stop momentarily. "I'm sorry."
Another five minutes of hysterical laughter. By now it was contagious, and I started laughing, too.
"I didn't mean to do it," he said finally. "But it couldn't have worked out better. — Taya Kyle

It's terrible sometimes, inside," he said, "that's what's the trouble. You walk these streets, black and funky and cold, and there's not really a living ass to talk to, and there's nothing shaking, and there's no way of getting it out- that storm inside. You can't talk it and you can't make love with it, and when you finally try to get with it and play it, you realize nobody's listening. So you've got to listen. You got to find a way to listen. — James Baldwin

But the most terrible thing was that the shame didn't simply sear my heart, it also mingled into a single whole with the pleasure I was getting from what was going on.
It was something quite unimaginable - truly beyond good and evil. It was then that I finally understood the fatal abysses trodden by De Sade and Sacher-Masoch, who I had always thought absurdly pompous. No, they weren't absurd at all - they simply hadn't been able to find the right words to convey the true nature of their nightmares. And I knew why - there were no such words in any human language.
'Stop,' I whispered through my tears.
But in heart I didn't know what I wanted - for him to stop or to carry on.
I couldn't hold back any longer and I started crying. But they were tears of pleasure, a monstrous, shameful pleasure that was too enthralling to be abandoned voluntarily. — Victor Pelevin

Every time Valentine's Day came around, I'd hold out the stupid hope that maybe there'd be some guy who had a secret crush on me and would buy me a rose to finally declare his love. Then the day would come, and of course, nobody bought me a rose, and I'd end up getting really depressed, looking at all the pretty girls in my homeroom with their roses. — Alice Wasser

The sulky, defensive expression she used to pull as a child no longer fits her face. In the last year or two her cheeks have most some of their softness. Her eyebrows have grown fuller and seem to sit on top of her eyes with a permanently hurt expression she can't shift. Her skin is less soft, the salt is finally getting in there too. She's grown tall and strong and with it she's grown petulant. — Jeremy Page

What were you going to make for Christmas dinner?" one of my
older children asked in a very reasonable tone. I cleared my throat,
but couldn't speak. There was no real explanation for my behavior. I'd been so intent on getting through this first Christmas without David. I'd found new rituals to replace the old, wrapped gifts, and even made cutout sugar cookies. I'd modified Christmas in order to endure it. What I hadn't done was plan on or prepare a Christmas meal. Everyone was looking at me expectantly by this point, including my sweet, hungry grandchildren.
"I forgot all about Christmas dinner," I finally admitted. No one batted an eye. — Mary Potter Kenyon

I was already planning to return home because it's getting harder and harder to hide my morning sickness.If there were another option,guess what? I'd take it just to spite you! But marriage to the most unfaithful skirt-chaser in London isn't an option, and you've already had my answer. It's not going to happen."
"It will," he insisted.
"Ha!"
"You don't think so? Then I guess you won't mind when your pregnancy is announced in the newspapers."
She sucked in her breath, livid with rage. "Why would you do that?"
"Because you've finally inserted some doubt in my mind,and as long as there's even a speck of it,let me assure you, I will be damned before I allow any child of mine to go to strangers."
"Why don't you just be damned! — Johanna Lindsey

In your hands
The dog, the donkey, surely they know
They are alive.
Who would argue otherwise?
But now, after years of consideration,
I am getting beyond that.
What about the sunflowers? What about
The tulips, and the pines?
Listen, all you have to do is start and
There'll be no stopping.
What about mountains? What about water
Slipping over rocks?
And speaking of stones, what about
The little ones you can
Hold in your hands, their heartbeats
So secret, so hidden it may take years
Before, finally, you hear them? — Mary Oliver

finally it became obvious that my talents lay with flies. That's a fate that takes some getting used to. Anyway, the hoverflies are only props. No, not only, but to some extent. Here and there, my story is about something else. Exactly what, I don't know. Some days I tell myself that my mission is to say something about the art and sometimes the bliss of limitation. And the legibility of landscape. Other days are more dismal. As if I were queueing in the rain outside confessional literature's nudist colony, mirrors everywhere, blue with cold. But — Fredrik Sjoberg

And then there are difficulties. Computers are famous for difficulties. A difficulty is just a blockage from progress. You have to try a lot of things. When you finally find what works, it doesn't tell you a thing. It won't be the same tomorrow. Getting the computer to work is so often dealing with difficulties. — Ward Cunningham