Quotes & Sayings About Going Out On A Limb

How love the limb-loosener sweeps me away — Sappho

She never got a chance to fall out of love, to do it properly, slowly and thoroughly, and the result was he was like a phantom limb. Gone but still there. And like a true phantom limb, the preponderance of feelings associated with him were painful. — Sarah Dunn

The gaiaphage. That's the other word they use. 'Gaia,' as in world. 'Phage,' as in a worm or something that eats something up. I'm going to go way out on a limb here and say I don't think something that calls itself a 'world eater' is a good thing. — Michael Grant

I think pain is a very - it's an extremely hard thing to empathize moment to moment. And you often don't remember your own pain, you know, that moment that you broke a limb or you burned yourself or, I think, this is a common thing that women talk about with childbirth, that the memory of the pain is hard to summon up and relive, thankfully. — Hugh Laurie

They're making so few movies that you really just have to make it. It's going to be the only way you end up getting work. I don't believe anyone's going to really go out on a limb and just throw millions of dollars on someone that's not been proven. They're going to have to show somebody something at some point. — Dax Shepard

I think we're out on a limb right now, hanging over a cliff, and we're trying to find a way to get back. — Charlie Manuel

Wearing only his boxers, Marz sat on the edge of the bed and removed his limb. And then he shifted under the covers with her. "Now," he said, "Does hiding under the covers involve covering the head, too?" Or just the body?
Such a sweet, cute mane. "Just the body. Covering the head makes it a fort."
His eyes went wide. "Is that so? Duly noted. — Laura Kaye

To me the Universe was all void of Life, of Purpose, of Volition, even of Hostility; it was one huge, dead, immeasurable Steam-engine, rolling on, in its dead indifference, to grind me limb from limb. Oh vast gloomy, solitary Golgotha, and Mill of Death! Why was the living banished thither companionless, conscious? Why, if there is no Devil; nay, unless the Devil is your God? — Thomas Carlyle

Things that are really offensive make me laugh because I like things that push the envelope, go out on a limb, and are bold. — Courteney Cox

Where is your false, your treacherous, and cursed wife?"
"She's gone forrard to the Police Office," returns Mr Bucket. "You'll see her there, my dear."
"I would like to kiss her!" exclaims Mademoiselle Hortense, panting tigress-like. "You'd bite her, I suspect," says Mr Bucket.
"I would!" making her eyes very large. "I would love to tear her, limb from limb."
"Bless you, darling," says Mr Bucket, with the greatest composure; "I'm fully prepared to hear that. Your sex have such a surprising animosity against one another, when you do differ. — Charles Dickens

I guess what I'm trying to say is I don't think you can measure life in terms of years. I think longevity doesn't necessarily have anything to do with happiness. I mean happiness comes from facing challenges and going out on a limb and taking risks. If you're not willing to take a risk for something you really care about, you might as well be dead. — Diane Frolov

Painted into a corner, caught in a cul-de-sac, out on that final last-chance limb, life scrabbles around, searching for a new way out. — Joseph Chilton Pearce

I'm going to go out on a limb here. I've thought a lot about this one, as a feminist, and as an author. How should traditional roles be portrayed? In fantasy literature there is a school of thought that holds that women must be treated precisely like men. Only the traditional male sphere of power and means of wielding power count. If a woman is shown in a traditionally female role, then she must be being shown as inferior.
After a lot of thought, and some real-life stabs at those traditional roles, I've come to firmly disagree with this idea. For an author to show that only traditional male power and place matter is to discount and belittle the hard and complex lives of our peers and our ancestresses. — Sarah Zettel

I think a solo moves forward the way a song does, because it's reflective of the chords that I'm considering as I'm soloing, and at the same time I'm going as much out on a limb as Frank Zappa used to, in terms of just going crazy on the instrument. — John Frusciante

Catch a vista of maples in that long light and you see Autumn glowing through the leaves ... The promise of gold and crimson is there among the branches, though as yet it is achieved on only a stray branch, an impatient limb or an occasional small tree which has not yet learned to time its changes. — Hal Borland

Every individual believer is precious in the sight of the Lord, a shepherd would not lose one sheep, nor a jeweller one diamond, nor a mother one child, nor a man one limb of his body, nor will the Lord lose one of his redeemed people. However little we may be, if we are the Lord's, we may rejoice that we are preserved in Christ Jesus. — Charles Haddon Spurgeon

I've been watching you drink," he says. "Think it's a good idea to put your liver through this?"
"What are you the public service message fairy?"
"Just being polite."
"Well I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that you, sir, have taken the being polite thing too far. Why don't you just ask me out already so I can refuse and you can leave me the fuck alone? — Sam Hunter

It's way easier to stay in the comfort zone, especially when things are going good than to go out on a limb and take some risks. My philosophy is exactly the opposite: Sometimes it's risky not to take a risk. — Harvey MacKay

A surgeon will cut off a limb in order to protect the body from disease. And a commander-in-chief should pull out of a war that cannot be won in order to protect a nation. — Michael Huffington

First I shake the whole Apple tree, that the ripest might fall. Then I climb the tree and shake each limb, and then each branch and then each twig, and then I look under each leaf. — Martin Luther

I have observed that there always exists some strange relationship between the appearance of a man and his soul, as if with the loss of a limb, the soul lost one of its senses. — Mikhail Lermontov

Here, just like in my own world, popularity was power; survival required the occasional sacrifice of a damaged limb - or a damaged cousin - and alliances were crucial. — Rachel Vincent

If prayer works, why can't God cure cancer or grow back a severed limb? Why so much avoidable suffering that God could so readily prevent? Why does God have to be prayed to at all? Doesn't He already know what cures need to be performed? Dossey also begins with a quote from Stanley Krippner, M.D. (described as "one of the most authoritative investigators of the variety of unorthodox healing methods used around the world"): [T]he research data on distant, prayer-based healing are promising, but too sparse to allow any firm conclusion to be drawn. This after many trillions of prayers over the millennia. — Carl Sagan

slammed my door shut, a bit edgy. "Frankie's my friendly ghost, the one who tunes me in to the other side," I said, going out on a limb. The words hung between us, making me uncomfortable. — Angie Fox

This fear was unbearable. It unwrapped who she was, as neatly as he'd unwound her bandage, leaving too much pain and ugliness exposed.
Nerve endings; he'd said they were the problem [causing phantom pain in the amputated limb]. Things that cut off, that ended abruptly or died
like parents and marriages
kept hurting forever. — Kristin Hannah

I buy onions every time I'm in the grocery store, not because I need them, but because I fear not having an onion when I do need it. Not having an onion in the kitchen is like working with a missing limb. — Michael Ruhlman

I'm going to go out on a limb here and guess we're going to a party."Her mood suddenly lifts and she grins impishly. "What gave it away?"I eye her outfit and count down on my fingers."Four things: leather shorts, pink highheels,knee high socks,and a sparkling top. "She sticks out her hip and pops up her foot, striking a pose. "Come on, admit it,I look
hot.""You look like a - "She tosses a pillow at me."Watch that dirty mouth of yours, Death Girl. — Jessica Sorensen

Leaders know that the fruit of life is out on a limb. — Orrin Woodward

I am hopelessly divided between the dark and the good, the rebel and the saint, the sex maniac and the monk, the poet and the priest, the demagogue and the populist. Pen to paper, I've put it all down, every bit from the heart.
I'm going out on a limb here, so watch my back. — Billy Idol

I'm really sorry, Jess, but she's going to have to have your room.'

'My room?' exploded Jess. 'There's a perfectly good spare room upstairs!'

'Yes, but you see, darling, Granny can't manage stairs quite so easily anymore. Since Grandpa died and she had that fall, you know- well, her house is too much for her to manage on her own. [...] Granny has to be on the ground floor, love. She can use the groundfloor loo, and we'll convert the old coal shed at the back into a bathroom.'

Jess was too furious to speak. No, wait, she wasn't. 'Where am I supposed to sleep then?' she snapped. 'Out on the pavement? — Sue Limb

The older I get, for me it's about fear. If I read something and it scares the hell out of me, that's what I want to do. If it's a challenge and a massive risk and I'm going out on a limb ... those are the ones I want. And they are few and far between. I don't work very much because I'm very specific about what I want to do. — Alaina Huffman

It's difficult to put your own bare ass out on the limb every time you sit down to write a poem. But that's really sort of the ideal. Because if we don't discover something about ourselves and our world in the making of a poem, chances are it's not going to be a very good poem. So what I'm saying is that a lot of our best poets could be better poets if they wrote less and risked more in what they do. — Sam Hamill

Jacob remained by Mollie's side throughout the night, clinging to her hand as well as to her vow. She wasn't going to leave him. She'd given her word, and Mollie never broke a promise. He prayed. He tended the cuts she'd suffered from the blackberry brambles when she'd fallen. The vines had grown entangled within a cedar's branches, and as best he could tell, she'd climbed the tree in order to reach the ripe berries that other pickers had left behind. Unfortunately, the limb she'd shimmied out on had been weak and had broken beneath her weight. "You know, this tree climbing and dropping through busted church floors is going to have to stop after we're married. My heart won't be able to take the stress." He smiled and ran the back of his finger down the smooth line of her cheek. "Not that I expect any dictate I give you to have much effect. My only hope is that you'll grow to care enough about me that you'll take pity on me and cease taking unnecessary risks with your life. — Karen Witemeyer

The feeling of being a digression not the link in the argument,
a new direction, an offshoot, the limb going on elsewhere,
and liking that error, a feeling of being capable because an error,
of being wrong perhaps altogether wrong a piece from another set
stripped of position stripped of true function
and loving that error, loving that filial form, that break from perfection
where the complex mechanism fails, where the stranger appears in the clearing,
out of nowhere and uncalled for, out of nowhere to share the day. — Jorie Graham

A whole section of the family tree is pruned and primped and assessed as I politely sit there. Overall, I detect that the tree is fine: its leaves gently turning in the breeze of life. We have no scandal blight, no limb-wrenching storms of fate, no bad apples. I wonder what it is like when the Kennedys sit around for a disk check like this. — Padgett Powell

People don't have any mercy. They tear you limb from limb, in the name of love. Then, when you're dead, when they've killed you by what they made you go through, they say you didn't have any character. They weep big, bitter tears - not for you. For themselves, because they've lost their toy. — James Baldwin

Why not go out on a limb? Isn't that where the fruit is? — Frank Scully

Wicked ecclesiastics who show the worst example to the people," and, above all, nobles who empty the purses of the poor by their extravagance, and disdain them for "lowness of blod or foulenesse of body," for deformed shape of body or limb, for dullness of wit and uncunning of craft, and deign not to speak to them, and who are themselves stuffed with pride - of ancestry, fortune, gentility, possessions, power, comeliness, strength, children, treasure - "prowde in lokynge, prowde in spekyng, ... prowde in goinge, standynge and sytting." All would be drawn by fiends to Hell on the Day of Judgment. — Barbara W. Tuchman

It would hurt someone normal," I whispered. "I'm not normal. It isn't like a phantom limb, something you had, used, needed and missed when it was gone. I never had that. I never had love. Devotion. Loyalty. You can't miss something you've never had. — Kristen Ashley

Without excuse and self-consideration of health or limb or life, true soldiers fight, live to fight, love the thickest of the fight, and die in the midst of it. — William Booth

Look: if a bird were to rub its beak on a limb, you'd hear it - sure - and if a piece of water were to move an unaccustomed way, you'd feel it - that's right - and if a fox were to steal a hen, you'd see-you'd see it - even in the middle of the night; but, heaven help you, if a friend a friend - god - were to slit your throat with his - his love - hoh, you'd bleed a week to notice it. — William H Gass

He accepted me for who I was, scabs and all. But he refused to accept that that was all I was. And when someone believes in you, goes out on a limb for you when they have no obligation to do shit - it has an impact. It made me want to look in the mirror and see the man he knew I could be. And — Emma Chase

She suffered from the opposite of "phantom limb" syndrome; something essential appeared to be present, but it was not. — Amy Bloom

Is it possible to love any human being without being torn limb from limb? — Cyril Connolly

I think I'm holding on to a limb to keep from falling into a hole, but the limb turns out to be nothing but a twig, and the hole looks like the Grand Canyon. — Cassandra King

Our conviction is that human life and limb are a very special possession given by God to man and that no one has the right to take that away, in any cause, however just ... — Cesar Chavez

I'm not afraid to go out on a limb, style-wise or with lyrics. I don't ever want to be afraid to cut those types of songs because radio might not play it. — Lee Ann Womack

I know that it's easier to portray a world that's filled with cynicism and anger, where problems are solved with violence. What's a whole lot tougher is to offer alternatives, to present other ways conflicts can be resolved, and to show that you can have a positive impact on your world. To do that, you have to put yourself out on a limb, take chances, and run the risk of being called a do-gooder. — Jim Henson

Jeff [the werewolf] cocked his head and stared at me like I had just turned into a were-rabbit. Admittedly, this was a tremendous improvement over wanting to tear me limb from limb. Well, shave my ass and call me a poodle. How the hell did you manage that? — Jim C. Hines

I can't imagine ever not doing [acting]. I would feel like I would have lost a limb. But I am older now, and sometimes I wonder who I would have been and what about me would have changed had I not had these experiences as a young person — Jodie Foster

The space center's proximity to my backyard came to signify an intersection between heaven and hell. Florida was somewhere between the two; it was America's phantom limb, a place where spaceships were catapulted out into the cosmos. Alligators emerged from brackish water. Vultures and hawks circled above. Mosquitoes patrolled the atmosphere at eye level. We shared an ocean with sharks and dolphins. There were no seasons, only variations of humidity. Time slithered, festering in a damp wake of recollections.

I believed in the Bermuda Triangle. I thought it would move in over Florida one night. By dusk an unknown force would vaporize us through a tear in the atmosphere. We'd be stuck, wandering in a parallel version of the same place, unaware that we were dead but dreaming.

People came here to vanish. — Paul Kwiatkowski

His eyes so dim, so wasted each limb, that, heedless of grammar, they all cried, that's him! — Richard Harris Barham

Boundaries come after grace, because compassion minds the fragile places but boundaries keep them from compromising the rest. Brokenness may have legitimate origins, but left unchecked, a wound becomes infected and poisons the whole body (and subsequently, everyone around). Wounds must be attended to heal. With an unhealthy limb, the rest of the body overcompensates through manipulation, aggression, or blaming. Boundaries here are kind. Better to apply direct pressure to the wound than pretend it is well; this may get worse before better, but it is way of healing. — Jen Hatmaker

Etiquette is about all of human social behavior. Behavior is regulated by law when etiquette breaks down or when the stakes are high - violations of life, limb, property and so on. Barring that, etiquette is a little social contract we make that we will restrain some of our more provocative impulses in return for living more or less harmoniously in a community. — Judith Martin

He felt something move in his chest, as though an organ had been removed and something unfamiliar left in its place. A sentiment he had never suspected the existence of bloomed in him. It traveled from his chest along his veins to every limb. It swelled in his head, muffled his ears, stilled his voice, and collected in his feet and fingers. Having no language for it, he remained silent, but felt it root, become permanent. — Diane Setterfield

You never know when people's dreams are connected to you before you're gone and then there's nothing to do, but watch them die in a different way, slow, limb by limb, system by system. — Marlon James

In form and feature, face and limb, I grew so like my brother That folks got taking me for him And each for one another. For one of us was born a twin And not a soul knew which ... — Henry Sambrooke Leigh

Cara communicates only through a series of grunts, inching her way, limb by limb, toward coffee. — Veronica Roth

Like what, baby? Like that you miss me?" She started to protest but he cut her off. "Do not say a word. Just listen a minute, if you can. I miss you too, like a fucking phantom limb, do you understand? You are a crucial, functioning part of me, always will be. But I get it. I'm a shit. I won't deny. But I'll never, ever be happy or complete without you. — Liz Crowe

While I have very little to say in favor of sex (it's vastly overrated, it's frequently unnecessary, and it's messy), it is greatly to be preferred to the interminable torments of romantic agony through which two people tear one another limb from limb while professing altruistic devotion. — Quentin Crisp