I Am Exceptional Quotes & Sayings

I am an American, not by accident of birth but by choice. I voted with my feet and became an American because I love this country and think it is exceptional. — Fareed Zakaria

I have learned to keep to myself how exceptional I am. — Mason Cooley

With the exceptional talent that is Guy Sigsworth as producer and collaborator, we have recorded a collection of original songs that sees me moving away from a generic line up and back into the world of a programmer. Born of reconstructed improvisation I like to think of it as Prog-Pop, but I also like to think of big dogs as small horses. So don't hang on to that thought long. Unless, of course, you think it astute of me in which case I am right — Alison Moyet

I started to book good television jobs in 2010. I started to get really close to exceptional jobs in 2011, and then I got 'Arrow' in 2012. I know how lucky I am because just getting the lead in a pilot doesn't guarantee that that pilot is going to turn into something great. — Stephen Amell

I am convinced that, except in a few extraordinary cases, one form or another of an unhappy childhood is essential to the formation of exceptional gifts. — Thornton Wilder

Do not answer to us that these are exceptional cases, for I am ready to prove that this unspeakable degradation and immorality are the normal state of the greater part of the priests of Rome. Father Hyacinthe has publicly declared, that ninety-nine out of one hundred of them, live in sin with the females they have destroyed. And not only the common priests are, for the greater part, sunk in that bottomless pit of secret or public infamy, but the bishops and popes, with the cardinals, are no better. Who — Charles P. Chiniquy

Every time it's the same. It's easy to prove to myself that good pictures are elusive, but I can never quite believe they're also inevitable. It would be a lot easier for me to believe they were if I also believed that they came as a result of my obvious talent, that I was extraordinary in some way. Artists go out of their way to reinforce the perception that good art is made by singular people, people with an exceptional gift. But I don't believe I am that exceptional, so what is this that I'm making? — Sally Mann

I'm not a princess. My mother is, not I. I am the niece of a head of state. And with this status, I have some representational duties - nothing very constraining or very exceptional. — Charlotte Casiraghi

It has become a commonplace that aggressiveness also often has its roots in fear. I am inclined to think that this theory has been pushed too far. [ ... ] The type of aggressiveness that is the outcome of timidity is not, I think, that which inspires great leaders; the great leaders, I should say, have an exceptional self-confidence which is not only on the surface, but penetrates deep into the subconscious. — Bertrand Russell

Who what am I? My answer: I am everyone everything whose being-in-the-world affected was affected by mine. I am anything that happens after I've gone which would not have happened if I had not come. Nor am I particularly exceptional in this matter; each 'I', every one of the now-six-hundred-million-plus of us, contains a similar multitude. I repeat for the last time: to understand me, you'll have to swallow the world. — Salman Rushdie

All that I now hold dear in life began to mature in the mission field. Had I not been encouraged to be a missionary, I would not have the eternal companion or precious family I dearly love. I am confident that I would not have had the exceptional professional opportunities that stretched my every capacity. I am certain that I would not have received the sacred callings with opportunities to serve for which I will be eternally grateful. My life has been richly blessed beyond measure because I served a mission. — Richard G. Scott

Who what am I? My answer: I am the sum total of everything that went before me, of all I have been seen done, of everything done-to-me. I am everyone everything whose being-in-the-world affected was affected by mine. I am anything that happens after I've gone which would not have happened if I had not come. Nor am I particularly exceptional in this matter; each "I", everyone of the now-six-hundred-million-plus of us, contains a similar multitude. I repeat for the last time: to understand me, you'll have to swallow a world. — Salman Rushdie

I have no use for humility. I am a fellow with an exceptional talent. — Jackie Gleason

Nodding, Parker ate. "He's an exceptional kisser."
"He really is. He ... How do you know?" When Parker just smiled, Emma's jaw dropped. "You? You and Jack? When? How?"
"I think it's disgusting," Mac muttered. "Yet another best pal moving on my imaginary ex."
"Two kisses, my first year at Yale, after we ran into each other at a party and he walked me back to the dorm. It was nice. Very nice. But as exceptional a kisser as he is, it was too much like kissing my brother. And as exceptional a kisser as I am, I believe he felt it was too much like kissing his sister. And that's how we left it. I gather that wasn't an issue for you and Jack. — Nora Roberts

I am an exceptional thief, Mrs. McClane. And since I'm moving up to kidnapping, you should be more polite. — Hans Gruber

Knowledge is unsettled by the idea of power. We see how it works in the worlds of business and politics, and we suspect that it works the same in the spiritual world. We presume it's a gift for the exceptional and the few. She can do it, but we cannot, people might say to themselves. He is the chosen one; I am not. He's a master, but I can never be. We have become masters of what we are not. We have made ourselves vulnerable to the belief that others have greater power than we do, because we won't acknowledge the power of us - the truth of us. Power, to the world-dream, is something small and self-serving. Power, from the point of view of creation, is infinite and selfless. — Miguel Ruiz

Every time, it's the same thing, I feel like crying, my throat goes all tight and I do the best I can to control myself but sometimes it gets close: I can hardly keep myself from sobbing. So when they sing a canon I look down at the ground because it's just too much emotion at once: it's too beautiful, and everyone singing together, this marvelous sharing. I'm no longer myself. I am just one part of a sublime whole, to which the others also belong, and I always wonder at such moments why this cannot be the rule of everyday life, instead of being an exceptional moment, during a choir. — Muriel Barbery

But know this: as far as a music culture goes, EDM is the one who will accept the kids on the outliers, the ones who get bullied, the ones who feel like they may not quite fit in. This community is exceptional in its ability to bond all types together, and I am not exaggerating when I say it saves lives. Our audience is intelligent and kind, discriminating only in regards to which sound they like best. Our audience is unprecedented in their drive to proactively support each other. — Kaskade

Extraordinarily excessive sensuality it may be .. but it all comes down to the same thing in the end, and one means is surely as good as another, since the end obtained is always the same. In any case the exceptional, endlessly repeated, is no different than the banal; and unceasing recapitulation can add nothing, in the end, to the sum of experience. I am weary and hopeless three times the dupe. Why have you trained me in the shame of abominable sins? — Remy De Gourmont

How young I seem; I am exceptional;
I think of all I have.
But really no one is exceptional,
No one has anything, I'm anybody,
I stand beside my grave
Confused with my life, that is commonplace and solitary. — Randall Jarell

The right of individual property is no doubt the very corner-stone of civilization, as hitherto understood; but I am a little impatient of being told that property is entitled to exceptional consideration because it bears all the burdens of the state. It bears those, indeed, which can be most easily borne, but poverty pays with its person the chief expenses of war, pestilence, and famine. — James Russell Lowell

I am disturbed by how states abuse laws on Internet access. I am concerned that surveillance programmes are becoming too aggressive. I understand that national security and criminal activity may justify some exceptional and narrowly-tailored use of surveillance. But that is all the more reason to safeguard human rights and fundamental freedoms. — Ban Ki-moon

You know what I am?" he says.
"What?"
"I'm an ordinary person."
"Come on."
"I know. Who isn't an ordinary person? How horribly presumptuous to want to be anything else. But I have to tell you. I've been treated as something special for so long and I've tried my hardest to be something special but I'm not, I'm not exceptional, I'm smart enough, but I'm not brilliant and I'm not spiritual or even all that focused. I think I can stand that, but I'm not sure if the people around me can. — Michael Cunningham

He was a mediocre man. He had led a mediocre life exceptional only in the magnitude of its unexceptionality. Now the world was mediocre, rendering him perfect. He asked himself: How can I die? I was always like this. Now I am more me. He had the ammo. He took them all down. — Colson Whitehead

Corney & Barrow are proud to have the royal warrant, meaning that they provide the Palace with some of the greatest - and necessarily most expensive - wines from around the world. I am pleased to say that they also hold my own warrant, for providing exceptional wines at - surprisingly - modest prices. — Simon Hoggart

I am interested only in the relations of a people to the rearing of the individual man, and among the Greeks the conditions were unusually favourable for the development of the individual; not by any means owing to the goodness of the people, but because of the struggles of their evil instincts.With the help of favourable measures great individuals might be reared who would be both different from and higher than those who heretofore have owed their existence to mere chance. Here we may still be hopeful: in the rearing of exceptional men. — Friedrich Nietzsche

I am glad that at such a moment my young man turned out to be not so reasonable; the time will come for an intelligent man to be reasonable, but if at such an exceptional moment there is no love to be found in a young man's heart, then when will it come? — Fyodor Dostoyevsky

There was no special event that made me decide. I had collected some photos and the idea was in the back of my mind for a long time. It was growing and growing, so finally I said, 'I must paint this.' I come from East Germany and am not a Marxist, so of course at the time I had no sympathy for the ideas, or for the ideology that these people represented. I couldn't understand, but I was still impressed. Like everyone, I was touched. It was an exceptional moment for Germany. — Gerhard Richter

And are you going to explain why you consider competing with me to be the most sincere form of compliment?"
"Of course I am," Lightsong said. "My dear, have you ever known me to make an inflammatorily ridiculous statement without providing an equally ridiculous explanation to substantiate it?"
"Of course not," she agreed. "You are nothing if not exhaustive in your self-congratulatory made-up logic."
"I am rather exceptional in that regard. — Brandon Sanderson

Being lonely as a kid might well have been necessary for me," I told audiences in my talks. "If I'd had the friends I dreamt of, I'd never have spent the time to become the machine aficionado I am today. Now that I'm grown I can put that in perspective. The world is full of friendly people with no technical skills. The few of us who see into machines like others see into humans are singularly uncommon, and we're valued for that. If we use a technology like TMS to help a lonely teen today, will we be taking that exceptional ability away from him tomorrow? Should we trade friends in seventh grade for designing a working spaceship at age twenty-five? — John Elder Robison

I'm fully aware that I am a lucky, lucky man. This Oscar belongs to all of those people around the world battling ALS. It belongs to one exceptional family, and I will be it's custodian and I promise you that I will polish him, and wait on him hand and foot. — Eddie Redmayne

It's happened many times before. Usually it results in an exceptional and gifted human. Some of the greatest figures in Earth's history were actually the product of humans and the Loric, including Buddha, Aristotle, Julius Ceasar, Alexander the Great, Genghis Khan, Leonardo da Vinci, Isaac Newton, Thomas Jefferson, and Albert Einstein ... Aprodite, Apollo, Hermes, and Zeus were all real, and had one Loric parent — Pittacus Lore

She wondered then if she had ever been on the right track. She had been reticent all her life, because it turned out that her opinions were different from what others expected. 'That proves either that I am an exceptional idiot, or the reverse. — Nuruddin Farah

I am not the Juliet to his Romeo.
I am not the lodestar around which he orbits.
I am not the trade wind by which he sets the course of his sails.
I am not essential or exceptional.

I was his Monday girl.
Shitty, really, since he was my whole damn week. — Julie Johnson

All my moral and intellectual being is penetrated by an invincible conviction that whatever falls under the dominion of our senses must be in nature and, however exceptional, cannot differ in its essence from all the other effects of the visible and tangible world of which we are a self-conscious part. The world of the living contains enough marvels and mysteries as it is - marvels and mysteries acting upon our emotions and intelligence in ways so inexplicable that it would almost justify the conception of life as an enchanted state. No, I am too firm in my consciousness of the marvelous to be ever fascinated by the mere supernatural which (take it any way you like) is but a manufactured article, the fabrication of minds insensitive to the intimate delicacies of our relation to the dead and to the living, in their countless multitudes; a desecration of our tenderest memories; an outrage on our dignity. — Joseph Conrad

If ever I did a man any goodof course it was something exceptional and insignificant compared with the good or evil which I am constantly doing by being what I am. — Henry David Thoreau

To what or whom does Lizzie Harris direct the imperative title of her startling first book, Stop Wanting? To the reader, the narrator, to desire itself, or to lack? This is a work of complexly, ambiguously layered narratives and identities. The opening poem asserts I want to say what happened / but am suspicious of stories. These lines become an ars poetica for the whole of this painful and exceptional collection in which the unspeakable is stubbornly confronted by a searing eloquence. This is a commanding debut. — Lynn Emanuel

Mr Brown is a politician of exceptional experience and ability, and I am sure he will discharge the office of Prime Minister with distinction — Bertie Ahern