How To Have A Great Day Quotes & Sayings

I have a great family. I can call them and they don't want to talk just football They want to find out how my day went outside of football. — Ben Roethlisberger

Books have immortalized great minds. Books have kept ancients secrets alive. A world which least value books, least value the real essence of wisdom and least know how to preserve what is precious! — Ernest Agyemang Yeboah

When we recall the great influence which Spenser's poetry has exerted on English poets who have lived and written since his day, we can clearly see how the two kinds of Platonism - a direct Platonism, and a Platonism long ago transmuted and worked right down into the emotions of common people by the passionate Christianity of the Dark and Middle Ages - combined to beget the infinite suggestiveness which is now contained in such words as 'love' and 'beauty'. Let us remember, then, that every time we abuse these terms, or use them too lightly, we are draining them of their power; every time a society journalist or a film producer exploits this vast suggestiveness to tickle a vanity or dignify a lust, he is squandering a great pile of spiritual capital which has been laid up by centuries of weary effort. — Owen Barfield

I have to admit," I said when he finished a lengthy discussion on the types of drivers, "I've been golfing and it's about the most boring thing I've ever done. Old men drive around in golf carts pretending they're sporty and getting grouchy if there's any noise. It's like the nursing-home Olympics."
Nick's mouth dropped open. "It takes great athletic ability to know how to aim and drive the ball that far."
"I get more exercise shopping at the mall," I joked. "I don't come home and tell everyone I won at shopping." Although those red shoes I got on sale the other day felt like a win. — Cindi Madsen

People have these perceptions; maybe they've been here for a day, or have only heard about it. It was like when I first came to work here. You want to see the clean city that is always talked about, how nice the people are, the restaurants, the vibe, how diverse the city is. That's what we want to show: what an enjoyable city it is, what a great city it is. Forget about basketball. — Masai Ujiri

[Julie] had lived a great deal among lies, before plumping for a small life of her own, a sincere and restricted life from which all pretense, even in matters sensual, was banished. How many crazy decisions and allegiances to successive aspects fo the truth! Had she not, one day when her costume for a fancy dress had demanded short hair, cut off the great chestnut mane that fell below her waist when she let it down? 'I could have hired a wig,' she thought. 'I might also, at a pinch, have passed the rest of my life with Becker or Espivant. If it comes to that, I could also have gone on stirring puddings in a saucepan at Carneilhan. The things "one might have done" are, in fact, the things one could not do ... — Colette

yet religion itself, any religion, keeps a person on the right path. Not the fear of God, but upholding your own sense of honour and obeying your own conscience. How noble and good everyone could be if, at the end of each day, they were to review their own behaviour and weigh up the rights and wrongs. They would automatically try to do better at the start of each new day and, after a while, would certainly accomplish a great deal. Everyone is welcome to this prescription; it costs nothing and is definitely useful. Those who don't know will have to find out by experience that 'a quiet conscience gives you strength'! — Anne Frank

That was a memorable day to me, for it made great changes in me. But, it is the same with any life. Imagine one selected day struck out of it and think how different its course would have been. Pause, you who read this, and think for a long moment of the long chain of iron or gold, of thorns or flowers, that would never have bound you, but for the formation of the first link on that memorable day.' Charles Dickens, Great Expectations — David Nicholls

But when you say, "I am beautiful," not only does beauty, youth, and freshness start coming your way, but on the inside your spirit also comes alive. Your self-image begins to improve, and you'll start carrying yourself like you're someone special. You won't drag through the day feeling less than or inferior. You'll have that spring in your step, that "You go, girl!" attitude. Beauty is not in how thin or tall you are, how perfect you look. Beauty is in being who God made you to be with confidence. If you're a size 4, great. If you're a size 24, great. Take what you have and make the most of it. — Joel Osteen

I saw more clearly than ever, that the first great and primary business to which I ought to attend every day was, to have my soul happy in the Lord. The first thing to be concerned about was not, how much I might serve the Lord, how I might glorify the Lord; but how I might get my soul into a happy state, and how my inner man may be nourished ... I saw that the most important thing I had to do was to give myself to the reading of the Word of God and to meditation on it. — George Muller

Ronan shifted in the saddle, wishing for the thousandth time his heritage had been different. What would life have been like if he hadna been cursed whilst still in the womb? A great deal shorter. His bitter laugh misted in the cooling air of the early evening wood. Born in A.D. 900, the curse had accompanied him through three centuries searching for the one prophesied to set him free ...
The royal line would die out until the day the young wolf cub discovered how to shift into the form of a man and find the woman possessing three specific qualities: lightness of step, a soothing touch, and sight for the unseen. — Maeve Greyson

When I was growing up, Belfast City Hall was surrounded by security, and we had no access to it. But now, people come in and out of it all the time. On a nice day, office workers and students sit on the lawn outside and have lunch. It's great to see how Northern Ireland has changed. To be part of that is fantastic. — James Nesbitt

One of the great secrets of the day is to know how to take possession of popular prejudices and passions, in such a way as to introduce a confusion of principles which makes impossible all understanding between those who speak the same language and have the same interests. — Niccolo Machiavelli

I have advice for people who want to write. I don't care whether they're 5 or 500. There are three things that are important: First, if you want to write, you need to keep an honest, unpublishable journal that nobody reads, nobody but you. Where you just put down what you think about life, what you think about things, what you think is fair and what you think is unfair. And second, you need to read. You can't be a writer if you're not a reader. It's the great writers who teach us how to write. The third thing is to write. Just write a little bit every day. Even if it's for only half an hour - write, write, write. — Madeleine L'Engle

This is how you've been imprinted to use your relationship to power - to use it against yourself. Every day we create reality based on what we've been programmed to believe. So we spend most of our lives not really thinking clearly and coherently - not initiated thought. We spend a great deal of our lives not really living, but existing in programmed, reactive belief that we call thought. We can blame the oppressor, the predatory mindset, we can blame it forever and it doesn't mind. It doesn't care. We need to use our energy, our intelligence in an alternative way to the way we have been using it. - John Trudell — Kelly Cutrone

Think of trying to balance a pencil vertically on its tip. No matter how we try to balance the pencil, it usually falls down. In fact, it requires a fine-tuning of great precision to start the pencil balanced just right so it doesn't fall over. Now try to balance the pencil on its tip so that it stays vertical not just for one second but for years! You see the enormous fine-tuning that is involved to get Omega to be 0.1 today. The slightest error in fine-tuning Omega would have created Omega vastly different from 1. So why is Omega so close to 1 day, when by rights it should be astronomically different? — Michio Kaku

Celebrities are our heroes and heroines now, discussed the next day over latte or lunch. We have such a strong need to talk to each other, to have some commonality of story, that we're finding it in celebrities. In effect, we're turning reality into fiction. Using actors and actresses, just off duty. And how is this working for us? Not great. It leaves us with a perennially empty feeling. We find the celebrities empty, and at some level, we find ourselves empty for paying them so much attention. We've become reluctant voyeurs, and at some level, we know they're just people trying to live their lives. Our culture begins to lack content, depth, and substance. We miss the richness of human experience that story embodies, reflects, and carries forward. We might have to go back to reading books. Yay! — Lisa Scottoline

one big problem and a great paradox in the arena of life is the problem of where or how a person is now and what, who and where he wants to be or have tomorrow. Had it not be this problem, we would have been relaxing all day long — Ernest Agyemang Yeboah

Everybody is a champion! Everybody has conquered something in life before! You have achieved something great before: your first time of walking. Remember how life would have been should you have failed to challenge and overcome that challenge, even as an infant! If you could do that as an infant, you can conquer great challenges now to leave great and indelible mark before you go! He who thinks failure has a super power over him should remember the first day he took the first step to walk! He who wants to end it all because of failure must think of why he never ended the journey of life just because he tried walking the first time ever and fell, but stood up and tried over and over until he could walk without a fall! Take your courage and be a champion! Dare to conquer life! — Ernest Agyemang Yeboah

When shall we pass a day alone? I have had a thousand kisses, for which with my whole soul I thank love - but if you should deny me the thousand and first - 'twould put me to the proof how great a misery I could live through. — John Keats

Wake up every morning with dreams of a wonderful day. — Debasish Mridha

Now, I have to tell you, this reminds me of a story. Actually, it's an old baseball story. You see, one day, old Lucifer down there from his headquarters called St. Peter in Heaven, said they wanted to challenge him to a baseball game. And St. Peter said, "Sure, let's play. But to be fair, I have to tell you all the great ones are up here. We've got Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Satchel Paige, Roberto Clemente. We've got all the best players, and our manager is the legendary Connie Mack. You won't have a chance." Well, old Lucifer says, "That doesn't matter, we'll win anyway." And St. Peter says, "How do you expect to do that?" "Well," he says, "simple, we've got all the umpires." Luncheon for Representative Connie Mack Miami, Florida June 29, 1988 — Malcolm Kushner

I was lonely, deadly lonely. And I was to find out then, as I found out so many times, over and over again, that women especially are social beings, who are not content with just husband and family, but must have a community, a group, an exchange with others. Young and old, even in the busiest years of our lives, we women especially are victims of the long loneliness.
It was years before I woke up without that longing for a face pressed against my breast, an arm about my shoulder. The sense of loss was there.
I never was so unhappy, never felt so great the sense of loneliness. No matter how many times I gave up mother, father, husband, brother, daughter, for His sake, I had to do it over again.
Tamar is partly responsible for the title of this book in that when I was beginning it she was writing me about how alone a mother of young children always is. I had also just heard from an old woman who lived a long and full life, and she too spoke of her loneliness — Dorothy Day

Jonah has that strange look on his face. He must have another of Maryrose's memories. Probably that she once sang a lullaby on a windy day. OR SOMETHING ELSE TOTALLY USELESS. "Is it about canoeing?" I ask, trying to be positive. He scratches his head. "It is! Maryrose was good at canoeing!" Oh! Yay! "Did she ever stop a boat?" "Yes!" he exclaims. Great! "How?" I ask. "With paddles!" he says. Argh. "Thanks for nothing, Maryrose's memories!" I yell. "We have to stop this canoe! — Sarah Mlynowski

When you have a good friend that really cares for you and tries to stick in there with you, you treat them like nothing. Learn to be a good friend because one day you're gonna look up and say I lost a good friend. Learn how to be respectful to your friends, don't just start arguments with them and don't tell them the reason, always remember your friends will be there quicker than your family. Learn to remember you got great friends, don't forget that and they will always care for you no matter what. Always remember to smile and look up at what you got in life. — Marilyn Monroe

Everyone is gonna have a bad day, everyone is gonna have a bad game. The questions are: How do you recover? What builds your character? I decided one day early on in high school that I wanted to be great at basketball, not just a good basketball player. — Gilbert Arenas

John says I musn't lose my strength, and has me take cod liver oil and lots of tonics and things, to say nothing of ale and wine and rare meat.
Dear John! He loves me very dearly, and hates to have me sick. I tried to have a real earnest reasonable talk with him the other day, and tell him how I wish he would let me go and make a visit to Cousin Henry and Julia.
But he said I wasn't able to go, nor able to stand it after I got there; and I did not make out a very good case for myself, for I was crying before I had finished.
It is getting to be a great effort for me to think straight. Just this nervous weakness I suppose.
And dear John gathered me up in his arms, and just carried me upstairs and laid me on the bed, and sat by me and read to me till it tired my head.
He said I was his darling and his comfort and all he had, and that I must take care of myself for his sake, and keep well. — Charlotte Perkins Gilman

such communities we join with scores of faith-filled women and men to live the great political and theological as ifs. Politically, we live as if our nation were true to its foundational documents of liberty and justice for all; as if people mattered in themselves and not for their economic or social status; as if consumerism and the shopping mall did not determine the meaning of our lives; as if our way of life were not dependent on fossil fuel; as if we were a sister nation among all the other countries of the world; as if right made might and not the other way around. Living out these as ifs in the midst of community creates a prophetic possibility at a local level, the space for modeling how things could be, ought to be, and one day will be. The characteristics of St. Francis's communities on which we have been reflecting give us a blueprint for such as if living. — Marie Dennis

It says in Romans 5:17, "We are to reign in life as kings." When God looks at us He doesn't see us defeated, barely getting by, or just taking the leftover positions. Not at all. God sees you as a king. He sees you as a queen. You have His royal blood flowing through your veins. You and I are supposed to reign in life. Do you know what that word reign means? It means, "time in power." God said we're to reign how long? In life. That means as long as you're alive that is your time in power. You don't have a two-year term like a mayor, a four-year term like a president. Your term is to reign every single day, to be victorious, to rise to new levels, to accomplish great things. — Joel Osteen

If you could not do much in the month of April with five letters, think of what really you can do with the month of May with three letters before you open the door of the month of June with four letters. Which is the break time for the entire twelve months of the year. Until you clearly understand how you are spending the year, you shall finish spending it and ponder over how you spent it, year after year! No one is absolutely free from excuses and the challenges of life. You just have to do something great with each day in the year! — Ernest Agyemang Yeboah

There is such a cool vibe in Nashville. It is has the excitement of a big city, but also has this amazing small town feel. I have definitely come to call it my home, and have my favorite go-to spots. But most of all it's the people. The southern charm, and hospitality. And some great shopping never hurts. As fun as Music City is during the day, the real magic happens at night ... The lights, the energy, the music, how could you not love this town? — Hayden Panettiere

Maybe this is kind of cliche, but animals, well, dogs, are what I do for a living. One reason I like spending time with them so much is they seem to think people are really good. They live with us, and obey our rules, most of which make no sense to them. And the main reason they do it is because they like us. When I watch them, sometimes I'm so blow away by how enthusiastic they are about everything we do that I have to go out and buy them something squeaky or chewy. Just because I love proving to them that it's not a mistake to see the world as a great benevolent place. I hope one day to react to something with as much pure ecstasy as I see in Chuck's face every time I throw the ball. Sometimes he looks so happy, it reminds me of the way blind people smile way too big because they can't see themselves. And if none of this links to anything in you, well ... I think you don't know who I am. — Merrill Markoe

Hm-m," he said. "Lookie, Ma. I been all day an' all night hidin' alone. Guess who
I been thinkin' about? Casy! He talked a lot. Used ta bother me. But now I been thinkin' what he said, an' I can remember-
all of it. Says one time he went out in the wilderness to find his own soul, an' he foun' he didn' have no soul that was his'n. Says he foun' he jus' got a little piece of a great big soul. Says a wilderness ain't no good, 'cause his little piece of a soul wasn't no good 'less it was with the rest, an' was whole. Funny how I remember. Didn't even think I was listenin'. But I know now a fella ain't no good alone. — John Steinbeck

Even if you don't have kids at home, morning time can be great for nurturing your relationship with your spouse, other family members, or your close friends. One of the most disturbing "statistics" I read while researching how people use their time was that dual-income couples could find only 12 minutes a day to talk with each other. — Laura Vanderkam

Nothing will serve you better than a strong work ethic. Nothing. And it's something that you can't teach. You have to be thrown into it, where you're going to sink or swim. It's amazing how self-correcting and how clarifying a good, hard, shitty job can be. Because at the end of the day, any profession I've seen anybody in, when you peer behind the curtains of Oh, wouldn't that be a great job? Wow, what an amazing thing, a philanthropic endeavor! it really just comes down to It's a f**king grind. — Robert Downey Jr.

The fish is my friend too," he said aloud. "I have never seen or heard of such a fish. But I must kill him. I am glad we do not have to try to kill the stars." Imagine if each day a man must try to kill the moon, he thought. The moon runs away. But imagine if a man each day should have to try to kill the sun? We were born lucky, he thought. Then he was sorry for the great fish that had nothing to eat and his determination to kill him never relaxed in his sorrow for him. How many people will he feed, he thought. But are they worthy to eat him? No, of course not. There is no one worthy of eating him from the manner of his behaviour and his great dignity. I do not understand these things, he thought. But it is good that we do not have to try to kill the sun or the moon or the stars. It is enough to live on the sea and kill our true brothers. Now, — Ernest Hemingway,

How can the seed know that by dying in the soil it will become a great tree? It will not be there to witness the happening. How can the seed know that one day, if it dies, there will be great foliage, green leaves, great branches, and flowers and fruits? How can the seed know? The seed will not be there. The seed has to disappear before it can happen. The seed has never met the tree. The seed has to disappear and die. Only very few people have that much courage. It really needs guts to discover truth. You will die as yourself. You will certainly be born. — Rajneesh

In time, the witchers' steel swords earned the name of "swords for men." A foul moniker, though not one conjured out of thin air. A good steel blade is indeed our first line of defense against mankind's hatred, stupidity, or greed. The world is full of those who would happily kill a witcher - out of resentment toward our trade, for fame, or simply to profit by snatching up our hard-earned coin. So the witchers, fully aware of the situation, never hesitated to relieve this world of the burden of dolts who were so thick headed as to threaten their lives. For that reason, in my day we called our steel swords "swords for fools." Unfortunately, seeing as how mendacious the two-faced scoundrels of bitches seem to rule this world, a great many fools have been apparently spared this selection process. — Marcin Batylda

I have become more successful in my forties, but that pales in comparison with the other gifts of my current decade
how kind to myself I have become, what a wonderful, tender wife I am to myself, what a loving companion. I prepare myself tubs of hot salt water at the end of the day, and soak my tired feet. I run interference for myself when I am working, like the wife of a great artist would
'No, I'm sorry, she can't come. She's working hard these days, and needs a lot of down time.' I live by the truth that 'No' is a complete sentence. I rest as a spiritual act. — Anne Lamott

The great triumph (or horrible tragedy, depending on how you look at it) of being human is that our brains have evolved over hundreds of thousands of years to understand our mortality. We are, sadly, self-aware creatures. Even if we move through the day finding creative ways to deny our mortality, no matter how powerful, loved, or special we may feel, we know we are ultimately doomed to death and decay. This is a mental burden shared by precious few other species on Earth. — Caitlin Doughty

We, whoever we are, must have a daily goal in our lives, no matter how small or great, to make that day mean something. — Maxwell Maltz

The combination of an individual[i.e., a client] with a positive idea of living and a good designer is the great force in contemporary decoration. I don't care how good the designer is, I am sure that he [or she] would rahter have a person with definite ideas rahter than have to work with a negative figure as a client. — Van Day Truex

...it was the very government and the way they treated us that started us on that road. For example, in my case, when they beat me in the DIC cells for being a "communist" and an "extremist" and all that, they awoke a great curiosity in me: "What is communism? What is socialism?" Every day they beat me over the head with that. And I began to ask myself: "What's a socialist country? How are problems solved there? How do people live there? Are the miners massacred there?" And then I began to analyze: "What have I done? What do I want? What do I think? Why am I here? I only asked for justice for the people, I only asked for education to be better, I asked that there be no more massacres like the terrible San Juan massacre. Is that socialism? Is that communism? — Domitila Barrios De Chungara

When I went to Pixar, I became aware of a great divide. Tech companies don't understand creativity. They don't appreciate intuitive thinking, like the ability of an A&R guy at a music label to listen to a hundred artists and have a feel for which five might be successful. And they think that creative people just sit around on couches all day and are undisciplined, because they've not seen how driven and disciplined the creative folks at places like Pixar are. On the other hand, music companies are completely clueless about technology. They think they can just go out and hire a few tech folks. But that would be like Apple trying to hire people to produce music. We'd get second-rate A&R people, just like the music companies ended up with second-rate tech people. I'm one of the few people who understands how producing technology requires intuition and creativity, and how producing something artistic takes real discipline. — Walter Isaacson

I have thought I am creature of a day, passing through life as an arrow through the air. I am a spirit come from God and returning to God; just hovering over the great gulf, till a few moments hence I am no more seen. I drop into an unchangeable eternity! I want to know one thing, the way to heaven
how to land safe on that happy shore. God himself has condescended to teach the way: for this very end he came from heaven. He hath written it down in a book. O give me that book! At any price give me the Book of God! I have it. Here is knowledge enough for me. Let me be homo unius libri [a man of one book]. — John Wesley

I have a great deal of respect for the craft, I don't know how much respect it has for me. But it's a precision process. Doing it on stage would be, I think, terrifying. Doing it on film has its own difficulties, because film is not conducive to spontaneity. You might have a run through and get a few chuckles at eight o'clock in the morning, but you don't keep laughing at the same thing all day long. — Colin Firth

Out of the rolling ocean the crowd came a drop gently to me,
Whispering I love you, before long I die,
I have travel'd a long way merely to look on you to touch you,
For I could not die till I once look'd on you,
For I fear'd I might afterward lose you.
Now we have met, we have look'd, we are safe,
Return in peace to the ocean my love,
I too am part of that ocean my love, we are not so much separated,
Behold the great rondure, the cohesion of all, how perfect!
But as for me, for you, the irresistible sea is to separate us,
As for an hour carrying us diverse, yet cannot carry us diverse forever;
Be not impatient--a little space--know you I salute the air, the
ocean and the land,
Every day at sundown for your dear sake my love. — Walt Whitman

You must have had such a great childhood with a man like that for your father. (Delphine)
Yeah. All puppy dogs and rainbows and those weird furry people with padded coat hangers on their heads that look like space aliens on acid. (Jericho)
You mean the Teletubbies? (Berith)
The fact that you know what they're called, Berith, truly scares me. (Jericho)
As a demon of torture, it behooves me to know all things that are deeply annoying. You'd be amazed how many people in the modern age no longer fear zombies as much as Teletubbies. (Berith)
Not really. I'd rather battle a brain-eating zombie any day than hear them sing. (Jericho) — Sherrilyn Kenyon

I did not have an answer for the maestro that day. Instead my answer has been the labor of my life, principally my Discourses on the First Decade of Titus Livy but also my little Prince. Despite what so many say, I did not embark upon this voyage to show men how evil can triumph, but to demonstrate that evil surely will triumph if good men do not strive to learn well its lessons. And now that my usefulness, if not my life itself, has ended, I can say before God and man that I have met the challenge of the great maestro of revered memory issued on the road to Cesenatico. For in my life's work, I crossed the unknown sea and charted a route for all men to follow, should they wish to live in peace and security. — Michael Ennis

Writing keeps me at my desk, constantly trying to write a perfect sentence. It is a great privilege to make one's living from writing sentences. The sentence is the greatest invention of civilization. To sit all day long assembling these extraordinary strings of words is a marvelous thing ...
For me, a line has to sing before it does anything else. The great thrill is when a sentence that starts out being completely plain suddenly begins to sing, rising far above itself and above any expectation I might have had for it. That's what keeps me going on those dark December days when I think about how I could be living instead of writing. — John Banville

Like all other self-respecting peoples, we have no intention of paying our debts. Or, to be more nearly accurate, the capitalists who expect to exploit us " for all time and eternity " have no intention of permitting us to pay our debts. They trump up new schemes to cause us to go more deeply into their debt. They intoxicate us with the strong fumes of "world power." They tell us how fine a thing it is to be reckoned among the great nations of the world. They cause us to maintain great military establishments and to build more and greater dreadnoughts. Thirty years ago we spent almost nothing on the navy and little more on the army. Now we are spending $300,000,000 a year on the army and navy. Almost a million dollars every week-day. Sixty-five cents of every dollar that is raised by the American government by taxation is spent for wars past or to come - for pensions, battleships or soldiers. — Anonymous

I don't need to critique things, or have an opinion, or pose, with John - we just go around being alive, and pointing at things. We're just, simply, in the world. It had never occurred to me what a wonderful thing this was. Or perhaps it did, a long time ago - but I had forgotten. I am full of how great life is. I am so happy to be alive. That point of life is joy - to make it, to receive it. That the Earth is a treasure box of people and places and song, and that every day you can plunge your arms in and find a new, ridiculous, perfect delight. — Caitlin Moran

Well, I'm gonna get out of bed every morning ... breathe in and out all day long. Then, after a while I won't have to remind myself to get out of bed every morning and breathe in and out ... and, then after a while, I won't have to think about how I had it great and perfect for a while.
- Sleepless in Seattle — Nora Ephron

Oakheart," Crookedpaw explained. "He's my littermate." Bluepaw stretched up on her hind legs to get a better view of the tom, but could see only the reddish-brown tips of his ears. "He's great," Crookedpaw purred. "He caught a fish on his first day as an apprentice." I caught a squirrel. Bluepaw found herself competing. "He says that when he becomes leader, he'll make me deputy." How modest! "I have a sister," Bluepaw announced. She nodded toward Snowpaw, who was sitting beside Sparrowpelt, a tail-length away. "She's a brilliant hunter, too." "Maybe if they both became leader we could be deputies together," Crookedpaw mewed. Deputy? What was the point of being deputy? "I want to be the leader!" Crookedpaw looked at her in surprise, then broke into a purr. "Of course." Bluepaw — Erin Hunter

To free humanity of time. For time is the great enslaver of us all. Time that ages us, time that limits us. Think how often you have wished to have more time for something, or wished you could go back a day and do something differently. When humanity is freed of time, old wrongs can be corrected before they are done. — Robin Hobb

I open up my violin case every day, and have one of the great creations. It is very inspiring. It makes you want to practice. How can you open up a case and look at a violin that was made in 1713 by one of the greatest artists in history and then say, "No, I don't feel like practicing today." — Joshua Bell

Instead of using their vastly increased material and technical resources to build a wonder-city, they built slums; and they thought it right and advisable to build slums because slums, on the test of private enterprise, "paid", whereas the wonder-city would, they thought, have been an act of foolish extravagance, which would, in the imbecile idiom of the financial fashion, have "mortgaged the future"; though how the construction to-day of great and glorious works can impoverish the future, no man can see until his mind is beset by false analogies from an irrelevant accountancy. — Richard Davenport-Hines

Repeat to yourself every day and as often as you can: 'O Lord, have mercy on all those who will appear before You today.' For every hour, every second, thousands of men leave this world and their souls appear before the Lord, and no one knows how many of them leave this earth in isolation, sadness, and anguish, with no one to take pity on them or even care whether they live or die. And so your prayer for such a man will rise to the Lord from the other end of the earth, although he may never have heard of you or you of him. But his soul, as it stands trembling before the Lord, will be cheered and gladdened to learn that there is someone on earth who loves him. And the Lord's mercy will be even greater to both of you, for, however great your pity for the man, God's pity will be much greater, for He is infinitely more merciful and more loving than you are. — Fyodor Dostoyevsky

To have come on all this new world of writing, with time to read in a city like Paris where there was a way of living well and working, no matter how poor you were, was like having a great treasure given to you. You could take your treasure with you when you traveled too, and in the mountains where we lived in Switzerland and Italy, until we found Schruns in the high valley in the Vorarlberg in Austria, there were always the books, so that you lived in the new world you had found, the snow and the forests and the glaciers and their winter problems and your high shelter in the Hotel Taube in the village in the day time, and at night you could live in the other wonderful world the Russian writers were giving you. — Ernest Hemingway,

They had always been accustomed to eat a great deal of smoked sausage, and how could they know that what they bought in America was not the same - that its color was made by chemicals, and its smoky flavor by more chemicals, and that it was full of "potato flour" besides? Potato flour is the waste of potato after the starch and alcohol have been extracted; it has no more food value than so much wood, and as its use as a food adulterant is a penal offense in Europe, thousands of tons of it are shipped to America every year. It was amazing what quantities of food such as this were needed every day, by eleven hungry persons. A — Upton Sinclair

About things you merely like? Would you rather learn how to plant a garden, work with friends to paint a house, or just have a great day with — Barbara Sher

I've been surprised by how many of you actually seem to believe that what you have is perfection. [ ... ] A great many of you consciously or unconsciously think of evolution as a process of inexorable improvement. You imagine that humans began as a completely miserable lot but under the influence of evolution very gradually got better and better and better and better until one day the became what you are now, complete with frost-free refrigerators, microwave ovens, air-conditioning, minivans, and satellite telivision with six hundred channels. [ ... ] In its root sense, 'wealth' isn't a synonym for 'money', it's a synonym for 'wellness'. — Daniel Quinn

I was thrilled and grateful to be safely away from that maniac. Do you have any idea what it's like to wake up and realize that no one is going to rape you that day? How wonderful it is to see the sunlight pouring through your window? How great it is to just walk around without a heavy chain on your wrist or ankle? It feels amazing. And once you have that feeling, you want your full independence. In other words, you want your whole life back. — Michelle Knight

For years I didn't realize this because so many others had more. We were surrounded by extreme affluence, which tricks you into thinking you're in the middle of the pack. I mean, sure, we have twenty-four hundred square feet for only five humans to live in, but our kids have never been on an airplane, so how rich could we be? We haven't traveled to Italy, my kids are in public schools, and we don't even own a time-share. (Roll eyes here.) But it gets fuzzy once you spend time with people below your rung. I started seeing my stuff with fresh eyes, realizing we had everything. I mean everything. We've never missed a meal or even skimped on one. We have a beautiful home in a great neighborhood. Our kids are in a Texas exemplary school. We drive two cars under warranty. We've never gone a day without health insurance. Our closets are overflowing. We throw away food we didn't eat, clothes we barely wore, trash that will never disintegrate, stuff that fell out of fashion. — Jen Hatmaker

I believe that every paper in the country should have one headline that when you read it, you laugh so hard you can't stand it. It has to be that way. What about a headline like this: 'Hippo Eats Dwarf'? How good is that? You read that headline, and you immediately close the paper and say, 'Wow, it's gonna be a great day. — Lewis Black

Fear thou the judgments of God, fear greatly the wrath of the Almighty. Shrink from debating upon the works of the Most High, but search narrowly thine own iniquities into what great sins thou hast fallen, and how many good things thou hast neglected. There are some who carry their devotion only in books, some in pictures, some in outward signs and figures; some have Me in their mouths, but little in their hearts. Others there are who, being enlightened in their understanding and purged in their affections, continually long after eternal things, hear of earthly things with unwillingness, obey the necessities of nature with sorrow. And these understand what the Spirit of truth speaketh in them; for He teacheth them to despise earthly things and to love heavenly; to neglect the world and to desire heaven all the day and night. — Thomas A Kempis

It would be a grand thing for any community, large or small, to set aside even five minutes of the day for serious contemplation. If nothing more were to result than the recognition of such a feeling as "community" it would be a great step forward. If it be true that we have not yet accepted the fact that we are members of "one world," or even of one nation, how much more true it is that we are not even members of the little communities to which we belong. We become more and more atomized, more and more separate and isolate. We hand our problems over to our respective governments, absolving ourselves of duty, conscience, and initiative. We do not believe in personal example, though we profess to worship that great exemplar Jesus the Christ. We hide from the face of reality: it is too terrible, we think. Yet it is we, only we, who have created this hideous world. And it is we who will change it - by changing our own inner vision. — Henry Miller

seriously, listen up because this is important and this is where we'll leave it. Your boy, my guess is he never stopped thinkin' you were beautiful. The only thing that changed was he started worrying that other people didn't think you were. So now he's gonna spend his life with a gorgeous, boring woman who'll make him miserable, all so that he can wear her on his arm to parties, thinkin' that'll show other people how great he is. He'll pick the career and car and mansion that he thinks other people expect him to have, put all his energy into building up that front. Then one day he'll find out his life is all wrapping paper and no gift. — David Wong

I know very well you can't help me," he said. "But I tell you, because unsuccessful and superfluous people like me find their salvation in talking. I have to generalise about everything I do. I'm bound to look for an explanation and justification of my absurd existence in somebody else's theories, in literary types - in the idea that we, upper-class Russians, are degenerating, for instance, and so on. Last night, for example, I comforted myself by thinking all the time: 'Ah, how true Tolstoy is, how mercilessly true!' And that did me good. Yes, really, brother, he is a great writer, say what you like!" Samoylenko, who had never read Tolstoy and was intending to do so every day of his life, was a little embarrassed, and said: "Yes, all other authors write from imagination, but he writes straight from nature. — Anton Chekhov

If I'm having a really bad day, I always have a girlfriend - or even a guy friend - who I can call. They'll listen to me wallow for a minute and then be like, 'Okay, let's stop. Everything's great. Let's figure out how to fix whatever's bothering you.' — Emma Roberts

When you consider how great and immediate is the problem of existence, this ambiguous, tormented, fleeting, dream-like existence - so great and so immediate that as soon as you are aware of it, it overshadows and obscures all other problems and aims; and when you then see how men, with a few rare exceptions, have no clear awareness of this problem, indeed seem not to be conscious of it at all, but concern themselves with anything rather than this problem, and live on taking thought only for the day and for the hardly longer span of their own individual future, either expressly refusing to consider this problem or contenting themselves with some system of popular metaphysics.. — Arthur Schopenhauer

Theologians will protest that the story of Abraham sacrificing Issac should not be taken as literal fact, and the appropriate response is two-fold. First, many, many people, even to this day, do take the whole of their scripture to be literal fact, and they have a great deal of political power over the rest of us, especially in the United States and in the Islamic world. Secondly, how should we take the story? As an alagory? Then an alagory for what? Surely nothing praiseworthy. As a moral lesson? Then what kind of lesson could be derived from this appalling story? — Richard Dawkins