How To Make Block Quotes & Sayings

Sometimes I would make left turns all the way around a block, and when I returned to the original intersection, I would feel disappointed to find all the drivers were new. It wasn't like a square dance, where you miraculously end up with your original partner, laughing and feeling giddily relieved to find him after dancing with everyone else in the world. Instead, they swung around and kept on going, some people were at work by now, or halfway to the airport. In fact, driving might be the thing most opposite of dancing. — Miranda July

My parents were out of town and sent me to stay at my grandma's house. That's where I learned how to make pancakes. I served them to all the old ladies who lived on her block. After the meal, they each left a $5 bill next to their plates. I thought, 'Hey, I'm onto something here.' — Bill Rancic

If you make believe that ten guys in pin-striped suits are back in a kindergarten class playing with building blocks, you'll get a rough picture of what life in a corporation is like. — Lee Iacocca

Structure influences behavior. Design spaces that make you feel "you are welcome here and that you came to the right place." — Peter Block

The process of transforming the heart can be difficult because as we open it, we inevitably encounter our own pain and become more aware of the pain of others. In fact, much of our personality is designed to keep us from experiencing this suffering. We close down the sensitivity of our hearts so that we can block our pain and get on with things, but we are never entirely successful in avoiding it. Often, we are aware of our suffering just enough to make ourselves and everyone around us miserable. Carl Jung's famous dictum that "neurosis is a substitute for legitimate suffering" points to this truth. But if we are not willing to experience our own hurt and grief, it can never be healed. Shutting out our real pain also renders us unable to feel joy, compassion, love, or any of the other capacities of the heart. — Don Richard Riso

Writers block: when I get it, it's because my subconscious spotted that I'd make a huge structural mistake in constructing a novel before my conscious mind became aware of it, and threw on the brakes. So I've learned not to sweat it: take two days off, then back up a chapter, read through, and try to work out why I'm suddenly uneasy about continuing. — Charles Stross

People know that Mr. Ellison had a tough beginning, they are aware of a little boy who strived for acceptance, who wished to be like all the other little boys on the block, but found himself always falling short. Unlike majority of children who are carried in the arms and guidance of a father; that separate the dark skies to let you see the light of encouragement and a future glimpse of what they believe you can be. He rather grew up drawing in the sands his own image of what he thought he should be. People are determined to make him into a motivational speech, but remove the essence that still remains of the tragedy that brought everything into play. — Avra Amar Filion

Form a clear picture of what you want (which could include more free and leisure time). 2. Identify, eliminate, or reduce fears, beliefs, or doubts that block you. 3. Get rid of the time-wasters and energy-drainers from your life. 4. Strengthen your intuitive and spiritual communication skills so you'll know how to fulfill your goals. 5. Use short chunks of time to make steady progress toward these desires. — Doreen Virtue

There is a fear of peace that I don't understand. Witness the old epithet "peaceniks," the association of peace with weakness. We mistake kindness for weakness in individuals, too. Gandhi found the essence of Christianity to be gentleness, the exaltation of means over ends. Using violence, against us or them, to achieve peace is like beating children to get them to be good. It only works in the short term. Believe in peace, think peace, live peace. Be a building-block of peace. Make it the center of your strength. — Jennifer James

That famous writer's block is a myth as far as I'm concerned. I think bad writers must have a great difficulty writing. They don't want to do it. They have become writers out of reasons of ambition. It must be a great strain to them to make marks on a page when they really have nothing much to say, and don't enjoy doing it. I'm not so sure what I have to say but I certainly enjoy making sentences. — Gore Vidal

No matter how bad things get, you can always see the beauty in them. The worse things get, the more you have to make yourself see the magic in order to survive. — Francesca Lia Block

I've seen some springs that ended up being terrible winters. We human beings are gregarious. We can't live alone. For our lives to be possible, we depend on society. It's one thing to overturn a government or block the streets. But it's a different matter altogether to create and build a better society, one that needs organization, discipline and long-term work. Let's not confuse the two of them. I want to make it clear: I feel sympathetic with that youthful energy, but I think it's not going anywhere if it doesn't become more mature. — Jose Mujica

The world isn't necessarily going to explode. There will just be vast change. There is hope. It is in the rain forests, the healing plants from there, and in sex and the children who are being born. They have different strains of DNA. They aren't really humans. So they will make the difference. — Francesca Lia Block

There are things one reads that make you aware that you have lived nothing, felt nothing, experienced nothing up to that time. How can i begin to feel - to feel? I want to fall in love in such a way that the mere sight of a man, even a block away from me, will shake and pierce me. — Anais Nin

I am a firm believer that you can make a difference in someone's life - whether they're thousands of miles away, or on your own block. — Michelle Monaghan

Amazing. You were so attached to it, and it still disappeared for you."
"Attached! I was whocking that cloud with everything I had! Fireballs, laser beams, vacuum cleaner a block high ... "
"Negative attachments, Richard. If you really want to remove a cloud from your life, you do not make a big production out of it, you just relax and remove it from your thinking. That's all there is to it. — Richard Bach

I'm not the most talented writer in the world. I know that. But I also know that I'm disciplined, that I work my butt off, and that I make myself write as much as I can. Writer's block is a luxury I can't afford. I'm a professional writer, which means that I put my butt in the chair each day, and I write. Simple as that. — David B. Coe

to make the sail set properly you must pull the boom down. That'll take those cross wrinkles out." "Is that what those blocks (pulleys) are for hooked to a ring in the kelson close to where the mast is stepped? But they are all muddled up." "Isn't there another ring under the boom, close to the mast?" asked Queen Elizabeth. "Got it," said Captain John. "One block hooks to the ring under the boom, and one to the ring in the bottom of the boat, then it's as easy as anything to haul the boom down. How's that?" "The crinkles in the sail go up and down now, and not across," said Mate Susan. "That's right," said Queen Elizabeth. "The wind will flatten them out as soon as we start sailing. — Arthur Ransome

What the meat industry figured out is that you don't need healthy animals to make a profit. Sick animals are more profitable ...
Factory farms calculate how close to death they can keep animals without killing them. That's the business model. How quickly they can be made to grow, how tightly they can be packed, how much or how little can they eat, how sick they can get without dying ... We live in a world in which it's conventional to treat an animal like a block of wood. — Jonathan Safran Foer

I still find it interesting that there could be a point between a young guy and a girl when they decide to hold hands as they walk down the block. At some point, they decide to make the leap from pushing and insulting each other to doing something tender and possessive and showing the world that. — Amy Heckerling

Meet the bonobos, the rare and marvelous "make love not war" great apes who swing through the trees as well as with each other. — Susan Block

Often, writer's block will occur when I don't understand a character or his/her motivations. So I will make notes analysing characters. — Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni

Maybe you aren't ready yet. I get it. This is a new situation, you want time to explore it, play with a block or two, eat some Play-Doh. I get it. Go wild. But one day, I'm going to make you mine. — Bratniss Everclean

I found the emotion that as an athlete you block out, and it really helped me to understand myself as a person. I'm a really emotional person and it helped make me a better person. — Carl Lewis

Our time here on the earth is short, and our chance to make a difference is tiny. For me the grinding blocks of history came together in such a way that I was able to take what fragile defense I had and hold in place for seventy-six days. If I was able to give much it was only because I had some useful things from my life to give. I am a hotel manager ... my job never changed, even in a sea of fire. — Paul Rusesabagina

You make me feel like I have wings when you touch me. — Francesca Lia Block

A fellow will hack half a year at a block of marble to make something in stone that hardly resembles a man. The value of statuary is owing to its difficulty. You would not value the finest head cut upon a carrot. — Samuel Johnson

No," I said automatically, "don't do anything about Dad. You can't fix my relationship with him."
"I can block or run interference."
"Thanks, Jack, but I don't need blocking, and I really don't need any more interference."
He looked annoyed. "Well, why did you waste all that time complaining to me if you didn't want me to do something about it?"
"I don't want you to fix my problems. I just wanted you to listen."
"Hang it all, Haven, talk to a girlfriend if all you want is a pair of ears. Guys hate it when you give us a problem and then don't let us do something about it. It makes us feel bad. And then the only way to make ourselves feel better is to rip a phone book in two or blow something up. So let's get this straight - I'm not a good listener. I'm a guy."
"Yes you are." I stood and smiled. "Want to buy me a drink at an after work bar?"
"Now you're talking," my brother said, and we left the office. — Lisa Kleypas

I wrote poetry from the time I could write. That was the only way I could begin to express who I was but the poems didn't make sense to my teachers. They didn't rhyme. They were about the wind sounds, the planets' motions, never about who I was or how I felt. I didn't think I felt anything. I was this mind more than a body or a heart. My mind photographing the stars, hearing the wind. — Francesca Lia Block

To give such joy is to experience it yourself. For the rest of my days, I am indebted to Libby for sharing hers with me. It is such an easy thing to do, to make our dogs happy: a ride in the car, a walk around the block, a bite of pizza crust, a place on the couch. Oh, that we could experience pure bliss. — Jean Ellen Whatley

It's not the plant-based foods that will make you ill, it's the meat and the liquid meat (i.e.: dairy) that can lead to sickness and death. Consider this: If your food had a face or a mother (or comes from something that did), then it also has varying amounts of artery-clogging, plaque-plugging, and cholesterol-hiking animal protein, animal cholesterol, and animal fat. These substances are the building blocks of the chronic diseases that plague Western society. — Rip Esselstyn

The same thing happened to me that, according to legend, happened to Parmeniscus, who in the Trophonean cave lost the ability to laugh but acquired it again on the island of Delos upon seeing a shapeless block that was said to be the image of the goddess Leto. When I was very young, I forgot in the Trophonean cave how to laugh; when I became an adult, when I opened my eyes and saw actuality, then I started to laugh and have never stopped laughing since that time. I saw that the meaning of life was to make a living, its goal to be- come a councilor, that the rich delight oflove was to acquire a well-to-do girl, that the blessedness of friendship was to help each other in financial difficulties, that wisdom was whatever the majority assumed it to be, that enthusiasm was to give a speech, that courage was to risk being fined ten dollars, that cordiality was to say "May it do you good" after a meal, that piety was to go to communion once a year. This I saw, and I laughed. — Soren Kierkegaard

Hendrix was back there with a few of the others who were like my training wheels ... hearing him as a teenager taught me to look at the guitar in a different way - and how to tap into that thing inside of me that was already leaning toward improvisation. You learn other players' licks at first; then you take off the training wheels and start using the licks as building blocks to make your own thing. That's how influences work. somewhere in whatever I do, there's a little bit of Hendrix - plus about a hundred others — Junior Brown

Studies are one thing, but then there's just the way bonobos make you feel. They're so "almost-human" on so many levels that science doesn't even know how to test yet. Just look into any bonobo's big brown eyes, and you may well feel like you're connecting with a living version of the Missing Link. — Susan Block

Life was invented for kids. But then we all grow up, and society imposes filters that block the joy of silliness and sponging up pointless little things that make childhood the magic time for which it is widely known. — Tim Dorsey

I believe that our ability to worship God, to reaffirm our covenants and receive the healing power of the Holy Ghost, to receive the instruction we need in order to make personal progress - all of these things are greatly affected by how secure and safe we feel in our Church environment during the three-hour block of time on Sundays. If we have to spend our energy dealing with feelings that we are not accepted, being concerned about our appearance, or worrying that what we do or say will be judged harshly, in other words that the fellowship of our ward members is anything but "fixed, immovable, and unchangeable", we certainly won't be able to make the kind of progress we could make otherwise. — Virginia H. Pearce

The instructors demonstrated the use of each weapon, the vibro-axes and shock staffs and force pikes and resonator maces, elaborating at length on the respective strengths and weaknesses of each and when and how to employ them to best effect. They explained the composite alloys used to make the weapons, how some of the equipment was strong enough to block even a lightsaber. FN-2187 wondered about that - not whether it was true but whether or not they would ever be expected to fight someone who used a lightsaber. According to the First Order, the Jedi were extinct. — Greg Rucka

Open your eyes. Block all escape routes. Eliminate all noise. The common will capture your attention as long as it's allowed in the room. Whatever you are used to, whether cigarettes, shopping, or Twitter, must be eliminated in the quest to get into the ring. You must make a sacrifice on the altar of greatness and perform acts that others will not. If you aren't willing to sacrifice your comfort, you don't have what it takes. — Julien Smith

Why was fabulousness important? The world was a scary, sad place and adornment was one of the only ways she knew to make herself and the people around her forget their troubles. That was why she had opened her store almost five years ago. Everyone who entered the little square white house with miniature Corinthian columns, cherub statues, and French windows seemed to leave carrying armloads of newly handmade and well spruced-up recycled vintage clothing, humming sixties girl-group songs, seventies glam and punk, eighties New Wave one-hit wonders, or nineties grunge, doing silly dances, and not caring what anyone thought.
Weetzie loved the old dresses she found and sold, because they had their own secret histories. She always wondered where, when, and how they had been worn. What they had seen. Old dresses were like old ladies. — Francesca Lia Block

Block has a list of questions that she aims to cover with sick patients in the time before decisions have to be made: What do they understand their prognosis to be, what are their concerns about what lies ahead, what kinds of trade-offs are they willing to make, how do they want to spend their time if their health worsens, who do they want to make decisions if they can't? A decade — Atul Gawande

It's not good for me to run away from honest opinions. I can't let that block my writing. Otherwise, I'll never learn how to write more interesting stories. I enjoy writing books, but it isn't easy. But that's why I want to do the best I can. One day, I want to make everyone say, 'What a good book.' (spoken by Hisami Hishishii) — Hideyuki Kurata

Lost Wax"

My love gives me some wax,
so for once instead of words
I work at something real;
I knead until I see emerge
a person, a protagonist;
but I must overwork my wax,
it loses it's resiliency,
comes apart in crumbs.

I take another block;
this work, I think, will be a self;
I can feel it forming, brow
and brain; perhaps it will be me,
perhaps, if I can create myself,
I'll be able to amend myself;
my wax, though, freezes
this time, fissures, splits.

Words or wax, no end
to our self-shaping, our forlorn
awareness at the end of which
is only more awareness.
Was ever truth so malleable?
Arid, inadhesive bits of matter.
What might heal you? Love.
What might make you whole? Love. My love. — C. K. Williams

I am sorry for you tonight, Mr. President. You are facing one of the greatest decisions of your career. Upon what you decide depends on whether or not you are going to get your canal. If you fall back upon the old methods of sanitation you will fail, just as the French failed. If you back up Dr. Gorgas and his ideas, and you let him make his campaign against mosquitoes, then you get your canal. I can only give you my advice; you must decide for yourself. There is only one way of controlling yellow fever and malaria, and that is the eradication of the mosquitoes. But it is your canal; you must do the choosing and you must choose tonight whether you are going to build that canal. — Thomas W. Martin

Some folks may be really bummed to find that "God bless America" does not appear in the Bible. So often we do things that make sense to us and ask God to bless our actions and come alongside our plans, rather than looking at the things God promises to bless and acting alongside of them. For we know that God's blessing will inevitably follow if we are with the poor, the merciful, the hungry, the persecuted, the peacemakers. But sometimes we'd rather have a God who conforms to our logic than conform our logic to the God whose wisdom is a stumbling block to the world of smart bombs and military intelligence. — Shane Claiborne

God's righteousness and His unchangeable law make Christianity a stumbling block for many. Organizations and individuals carry a political and moral agenda that aims to remove all obstacles to their sin. Their goal is to 'break God's bands asunder and cast away His cords.' They counsel together to rid themselves of the law of God; anyone who preaches the gospel or stands for righteousness stands in the way of their agenda. — Carman

Steve Jobs made the case to Xerox PARC execs directly that they had great technology but that Apple knew how to make it affordable enough to change the world. This was very open. In the end, Xerox got a large block of Apple stock for sharing the technology. That's not stealing outright. — Steve Wozniak

Write with abandon and no constraints for first draft. Cut brutally and save in separate files on second draft. Add conflict; don't be afraid to make your characters suffer. Read what you love. Write what you love. Love. — Francesca Lia Block

People always say that digital cameras are much more stable than film cameras, but the truth is that digital cameras, or any kind of digital technology, is one of the most unstable things in the world. A film camera can last decades if you know how to look after it, but digital things can break down instantly. A violent storm, a nuclear bomb, even something as minor as a cracked screen or the releasing of newer models, can make a digital product just a block of useless metal. — Rebecca McNutt

Make up your mind to this. If you are different, you are isolated, not only from people of your own age but from those of your parents' generation and from your children's generation too. They'll never understand you and they'll be shocked no matter what you do. But your grandparents would probably be proud of you and say: 'Theres a chip off the old block,' and your grandchildren will sigh enviously and say: 'What an old rip Grandma must have been!' and they'll try to be like you. — Margaret Mitchell

Compound actions on shared state, such as incrementing a hit counter (read-modify-write) or lazy initialization (check-then-act), must be made atomic to avoid race conditions. Holding a lock for the entire duration of a compound action can make that compound action atomic. However, just wrapping the compound action with a synchronized block is not sufficient; if synchronization is used to coordinate access to a variable, it is needed everywhere that variable is accessed. Further, when using locks to coordinate access to a variable, the same lock must be used wherever that variable is accessed. — Brian Goetz

I didn't make it one goddamn block yesterday, Ruby." He swiped an impatient hand through his hair. "Look, we're both stubborn hotheads, and we're going to fight. Early and often. But I will never make it more than one block before I come back. That is my promise to you. And I don't break my promises, either." Hands on hips, he breathed deeply as if attempting to calm himself. "If I let my fear of losing you keep us apart, I get the same damn result. The only way I can fight that fear is if you fight it with me. — Tessa Bailey

There is a difficulty with only one person changing. People call that person a great saint or a great mystic or a great leader, and they say, 'Well, he's different from me - I could never do it.' What's wrong with most people is that they have this block - they feel they could never make a difference, and therefore, they never face the possibility, because it is too disturbing, too frightening. — David Bohm

If you're having problems with someone on the Internet, simply block the person and move on. And if you do want to meet people from online, make sure you do your research to make sure you're talking to the person you want to be talking to. — KSI

You could block things from your mind for years at a time. You could make them go away because you know that if you let them in, the pain could nearly kill you. — Diane Chamberlain

If a bacterium is trying to infect you, it won't secrete alone, because your immune system will block it. Bacteria will hide until they can all act together and make an impact. — Bonnie Bassler

The context needs to be that the goal is a healthy mom. Because mothers never make decisions without thinking about that healthy baby. And to suggest otherwise is insulting and degrading and disrespectful. — Jennifer Block

Language is possible due to a number of cognitive and physical characteristics that are unique to humans but none of which that are unique to language. Coming together they make language possible. But the fundamental building block of language is community. — Daniel Everett

Being Jewish myself, I somehow didn't see the problem: who cares what a mentally ill (but strangely likable) individual says? If he didn't make some money at chess, I could see him becoming a street person, shaking his fists at cars as they passed by his corner of the block. Isn't it preferable to have him in a self-sufficient position rather than as a liability of the state? — Jeremy Silman

Make Sperm Wars, Not Real Wars! — Susan Block

Remember ...
Keystrokes are hammer taps. Get words on paper. Don't worry about connections, character or plot. Work for an hour. Promise yourself an hour. Do nothing else but move your fingers. Make coarse shapes. Follow any emotion that pops up but never impose emotion, never fake it, and don't make up your mind or your heart ahead of time. Understand you don't know what you're doing. That's why you're here. Rough it out. Anything goes. You can decide later what any piece of text looks like, what it might mean. Don't stop. Don't question. Don't quit. Don't stop to read what you wrote. Move your fingers. You mind will have no other option but to keep up. Remember that writer's block is merely the cold marble waiting for the chisel to heat up. — Bob Thurber

There will be setbacks and false starts. There are many who won't agree with every decision or policy I make as president. And we know the government can't solve every problem.
But I will always be honest with you about the challenges we face. I will listen to you, especially when we disagree. And, above all, I will ask you to join in the work of remaking this nation, the only way it's been done in America for 221 years
block by block, brick by brick, calloused hand by calloused hand. — Barack Obama

Well, I get my subject on Wednesday night; I think it out carefully on Thursday, and make my rough sketch; on Friday morning I begin, and stick to it all day, with my nose well down on the block. — John Tenniel

Every big castle was once started with a single block; despise no small beginnings. A little step taken every day builds up the hope of greater accomplishments. Do something every day! — Israelmore Ayivor

One of the strangest things is the act of creation.
You are faced with a blank slate - a page, a canvas, a block of stone or wood, a silent musical instrument.
You then look inside yourself. You pull and tug and squeeze and fish around for slippery raw shapeless things that swim like fish made of cloud vapor and fill you with living clamor. You latch onto something. And you bring it forth out of your head like Zeus giving birth to Athena.
And as it comes out, it takes shape and tangible form.
It drips on the canvas, and slides through your pen, it springs forth and resonates into the musical strings, and slips along the edge of the sculptor's tool onto the surface of the wood or marble.
You have given it cohesion. You have brought forth something ordered and beautiful out of nothing.
You have glimpsed the divine. — Vera Nazarian