If It's Hard Quotes & Sayings

I had to take false steps and go through hard times to come out to where I am now. I can't imagine living without acting. It's not easy, and I don't disrespect anyone who steps out of it after a certain point. Having a family and a house is cool. It's not a betrayal. But if you're going to be an actor, it has to be more than a passing interest. — Marylouise Burke

When I am in situations where I break out of the pattern, it's hard on me. Once you get used to regular scripture study, you miss it if you don't have it. It's like food - you have to have it. I know that I need the scriptures like I need food. I don't miss a regular meal, and I don't miss regular scripture study. — Henry B. Eyring

If the only tool you have is a hammer, it's hard to eat spaghetti. — David Allen

If you're not aligned with God, it's hard to recognize yourself as being of God. The way that you get aligned with God is by being like God, being like Source, being like energy. That means understanding how God works. — Wayne Dyer

My father then presented Honour with a cheque,

"This is from our family for you, only you. Put it in a bank and if my son ever treats you badly, use this to leave the idiot," he said.

I was laughing so hard I had tears in my eyes.

The haque mehr was traditionally given to the bride on the wedding day by the groom, it was an amount that would be hers for her lifetime to keep in case things went wrong and she needed to stand on her own two feet.

Dad had done his little trickery, and in his head and everyone else's, we had done all that was required from a nikah. — Ruth Ahmed

It's hard to know now who, if anyone, in the media has any credibility. — Howard Fineman

Friendship is less simple. It is long and hard to obtain but when one has it there's no getting rid of it; one simply has to cope with it. Don't think for a minute that your friends will telephone you every evening, as they ought to, in order to find out if this doesn't happen to be the evening when you are deciding to commit suicide, or simply whether you don't need company, whether you are not in the mood to go out. No, don't worry, they'll ring up the evening you are not alone, when life is beautiful. As for suicide, they would be more likely to push you to it, by virtue of what you owe to yourself, according to them. May heaven protect us, cher Monsieur, from being set upon a pedestal by our friends! — Albert Camus

There is something I want to do. But it's something to work towards, not something that should be handed to me on a plate. What's the point of doing something if you know you've got someone to rescue you if you fail? I like to work hard at something and then to reap the rewards. I take pride in what I do. What's the point if I know my rich husband will bail me out if I mess up? — Dorothy Koomson

If we continue to think of ourselves mostly as consumers, it's going to be very hard to bring our environmental troubles under control. But it's also going to be very hard to live the rounded and joyful lives that could be ours. This is a subversive volume in all the best ways! — Bill McKibben

That's a hard one because right now it seems that all I'm watching is Teletoons and Nickelodeon. You know what I love? I love Criminal Minds. I love CSI. Those are my kind of shows. I also love Modern Family ... MasterChef, I'm huge into that. I'm a big Gordon Ramsay fan ... I don't get a whole lot of time to watch anything but, if I can, those are some of the ones that I do tend to watch. — Teryl Rothery

The view that we know less than we thought we knew about how to change the human condition came, in time, to be called neoconservatism. Many ... , myself included, disliked the term because we did not think we were conservative, neo or paleo. (I voted for John Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson and Hubert Humphrey and worked in the latter's presidential campaign.) It would have been better if we had been called policy skeptics; that is, people who thought it was hard, though not impossible, to make useful and important changes in public policy. — James Q. Wilson

I know it's hard to write, darling. But it's harder not to. The only way you'll find out if you "have it in you" is to get to work and see if you do. — Cheryl Strayed

It's the sort of hum that makes you feel that you're the actual ground lying under the sky, a blue hum that's all above and around you, but if you think about it too hard it will get too loud or big, and make you feel no more than just a speck. — Colum McCann

The bed creaks as he eases closer. And then I feel it.
Oh, fucking hell. Just no. He can't do this to me.
It's big, it's hard, and it's nudging my ass.
We both freeze. Well, Gabriel freezes. His dick? It nudges me again, that blunt head pushing into the small of my back as if to say hello.
"Involuntary reaction," Gabriel says in a strangled voice. "Ignore it."
His hard-on says otherwise.
I swallow with difficulty. "Your hard dick is poking me in the ass. I can no more ignore it than if you slapped me in the face with it."
He stills, a sound gurgling in his throat. I'm about to apologize for being so crude, when he bursts out laughing. — Kristen Callihan

People really understand very little of one another. Sometimes when I speak to him, my Cid looks very hard and straight into my face as if in search of something (a city on a map?) like someone who has tumbled off a star. But he's not the one who feels alien - ever, I think. He lives in a small country of hope, which is his heart. Like Sokrates he fails to understand why travel should be such a challenge to the muscles of the heart, for other people. Around every bend of the road is a city of gold, isn't it?
I am the kind of person who thinks no, probably not. And we walk, side by side, in different countries. — Anne Carson

It's always hard, when introducing readers to a new world/set of rules, not to lay it all out manual-style in the opening chapters but make sure to put the action and the characters at the front. If people don't become invested in them and in the story, the world in which it's set will become a burden. — V.E Schwab

I keep telling the screws over and over again, 'If you treat a young boy in prison like a dog, keep him in a cell that is like a cage and constantly beat him and bully him, that boy is going to grow up hating yous and the system.' The only thing on his mind will be revenge, maybe it is not revenge on the screws that so frequently bullied and tortured him, but in the boy's eyes he is getting revenge on the uniform, as it all means the same thing in the boy's or man's eyes. — Stephen Richards

Serpentfire can burn for a very long time if the bagic is strong," said Aldric. "It's hard to handle, that kind of fire, it seems to have a mind of its own, but it can be a good tool if you have nothing else. You never, ever want to use it unless you need it. I keep it around in case of dire circumstances. I hate to admit that anything Serpentine can be useful." Absentmindedly he picked up a Dragon's claw from a pile of them on the tabe, and used it to stratch his neck. — Jason Hightman

Why do the X-Men need another girl telepath?" she asked. "This one has purple hair." "It's all so sexist." Park's eyes got wide. Well, sort of wide. Sometimes she wondered if the shape of his eyes affected how he saw things. That was probably the most racist question of all time. "The X-Men aren't sexist," he said, shaking his head. "They're a metaphor for acceptance; they've sworn to protect a world that hates and fears them." "Yeah," she said, "but - " "There's no but," he said, laughing. "But," Eleanor insisted, "the girls are all so stereotypically girly and passive. Half of them just think really hard. Like that's their superpower, thinking. And Shadowcat's power is even worse - she disappears. — Rainbow Rowell

I'm a jet jockey and I've always escaped ever since I was a kid. I've always been a weekend type runaway person. Work hard, play hard type thing. It's not been a mid-life thing at all, it's been a habit because I think it changes your environment and how you feel even if it's for the day. It's a good thing. — John Travolta

The thing I've learned most about poverty is how expensive it is to be poor. It's super easy to pay rent every month if you earn enough to pay rent and have a decent job. It's super hard to pay rent if you need a coupon from the state and then need to go find an apartment that will accept that coupon and only that coupon. — Nick Hanauer

As a result of things that may have happened in their past, women seem to find it hard to trust anybody. They are so worried that people will somehow dislike them if they have the courage to be themselves. They are convinced by society's idea that you have to be thin to be beautiful. But you know what, my sister? You're beautiful just as you are! — Corallie Buchanan

If you absolutely love it more than anything in the world, don't give up. You gotta keep working hard because it's a lot tougher than it looks. — Riker Lynch

You want a guy to fight. You want him to be willing to go to battle for you. Don't for one second envy a situation you know nothing about. Instead, be at peace with where you're at in life and know that when the right time comes, it will happen. And when it happens, it's going to be hard, and you're going to have to ask yourself if it's worth it. — Rachel Van Dyken

And if you look at all this academic work in the conferences and so on there's a constant theme that terrorism is extremely hard to define and we therefore have to have a deep thinking about it. And the reason it's hard to define is quite simple. It's hard to find a definition that includes what they do to us but excludes what we do to them. That's quite difficult. So it takes a global war on terrorism. — Noam Chomsky

The way she sat now, leaning forward frowning, biting her pink bottom lip, her shirt dipping to reveal a hint of her cleavage ... He wondered idly if he could get her to bend over a little farther ...
"Just what are you staring at, exactly?"
Kadar snapped back to reality. "You. You've been thinking hard for the last five minutes. It's not good for you to strain your pretty little head like that. I'm waiting for the steam to shoot out of your ears to relieve the pressure on your brain."
"Aha." Audrey glanced at Jack and George. "What you have here is a man who was caught gaping at my breasts, and now he's trying to cover it up with rudeness. — Ilona Andrews

You live in a world where you can drive through the drive-thru, flop down in a chair to work all day, and spend your evening on the couch, in front of the TV, before you crawl off to your cozy bed. Even if you work hard all day, your day-to-day living can make your body soft. And that softness is a modern-day killer, the equivalent of the savanna-dweller's lion (actually, the lion was better, since it kept people moving). — Cameron Diaz

I need to see you again."
Her pulse jumped, as if it had nothing to do with the rest of her. "Roarke, what's going on here?"
"Lieutenant." He leaned forward, touched his lips to hers. "Indications are we're having a romance." Then he laughed, kissed her again, hard and quick. "I believe I could have held a gun to your head and you wouldn't have looked as terrified. Well, you'll have several days to think it through, won't you?"
She had a feeling several years wouldn't be enough. — J.D. Robb

It's very singular how hard it is to manage your mind,' said Demi, clasping his hands round his knees, and looking up at the sky as if for information upon his favorite topic. — Louisa May Alcott

Sometimes when I observe contemporary U.S. culture, with its hard fronts and nasty culture wars, I have a strange sense that I've seen something like it before - in the Communist and semitotalitarian state in which I grew up. The issues and positions are very different, but the spirit is strangely familiar. In all public discussion, there was a party line that people had to toe; if you diverged, you were deemed disloyal and suspected of betraying the cause. I sense a similar spirit today among both progressives and conservatives in the United States when it comes to many hot-button issues, including Islam. — Miroslav Volf

The etiquette of blurbs means it's not hard to not blurb something (if it's not by a friend, or student): everyone knows how many books you're deluged with. You can just say you never got to it. — Jim Shepard

If there's one thing every good novelist understands, it's that our inner world is unreliable and yet there's no getting beyond it. Every sense is subject to deception, including the moral sense. What seems at first like the hard surface of spiritual reality is really fathomless when you dive down into it. There is no bottom. We neve know anything for sure. (p. xvi) — Andrew Klavan

After some years of muddled thinking on the subject, he suddenly saw quite clearly what it was he had been running away from; why he had refused Sandy's first invitation, and what the trouble had been with Charles. It was also the trouble, he perceived, with nine-tenths or the people here tonight. They were specialists. They had not merely accepted their limitations, as Laurie was ready to accept his, loyal to his humanity if not to his sex, and bringing an extra humility to the hard study of human experience. They had identified themselves with their limitations; they were making a career of them. They had turned from all other reality, and curled up in them snugly, as in a womb. — Mary Renault

At the end of the day, it's hard to keep relationships with people. I've got my family, my best friends and if a girl's gonna be a part of that then it's got to be good. If not, I'm out. — Miles Teller

If the power to do hard work is not a skill, it's the best possible substitute for it. — James A. Garfield

It's hard to be ambitious if you're content, isn't it? — Tucker Carlson

The what?"
"Lone Wolves." He turned to show me the back of his raggedy jacket. Sure enough, a snarling wolf face stared back at me from the leather.
"Wait a second," I said. "Isn't it supposed to be 'Lone Wolf' as in, you know, one? If there's more than one, then it kind of defeats the purpose of being 'lone', doesn't it?"
The leader squinted hard, as if trying to follow my logic and getting lost. — Jaye Wells

It's hard to tell with these Internet startups if they're really interested in building companies or if they're just interested in the money. I can tell you, though: If they don't really want to build a company, they won't luck into it. That's because it's so hard that if you don't have a passion, you'll give up. — Steve Jobs

God inspired me, because I was blessed with the knowledge that I wanted to do this. And my mother supported it. She said, 'Whatever it is you want to do. If you believe acting or comedy is what you really want to do, I can only tell you it's not easy, it's very hard, but I'll support you.' Her supporting me enabled me to move forward. — Martin Lawrence

Patch's eyes made a slow assessment of me, sharpening to vivid black. "I'm going to have a hard time sending you off with Scott in that dress. Just a heads-up: If you come home and the dress looks even slightly tampered with, I will track Scott down, and when I find him, it won't be pretty."
"I'll relay the message."
"If you tell me where he's hiding, I'll relay it myself."
I had to work not to smile. "Something tells me your message would be a lot more direct."
"Let's just say he'd get the point. — Becca Fitzpatrick

My brothers are idiots.
Anyone can see that under the scars and the attitude, Isabeau is more fragile than she looks. And as a reclusive Hound princess, her first introduction to the royal family shouldn't be a dose of Hypnos and four idiots gawking at her.
If I'd managed not to gawk, they sure as hell could have. She was beautiful, fierce, and utterly unlike anyone I'd ever known.
It was really hard not to gawk.
Much better to pace outside her door with one of our Bouviers sitting at the top of the stairs watching me curiously.
"This sucks, Boudicca," I told her. "I don't think we inherited Dad's diplomacy."
She laid her chin on her paws. I could have sworn she rolled her eyes. — Alyxandra Harvey

They just change. Their body changes. Their abilities - the things they do that make them who they are - leave, sometimes temporarily, sometimes forever. Every day they wake up with that big what if?
And nothing is scarier than a life filled with what ifs - living by day without predictability and control. Some people end up losing feeling. Some have uncontrollable spasms. Some can't function. Some end up blind or in a wheelchair. Some end up bedridden and paralyzed.
It's hard to know who "some people" will be. — Lindsey Leavitt

If you owe too much on American Express,
and your Diner's Club notes are too hard,
take a loan on your Visa,
and pay it off with your MasterCard! — Nipsey Russell

If there is anything I want you to understand at the end of this book, it's this: don't settle for a secondhand relationship with God. That's not the life of passion He is calling you to. Knowing God will keep you stable in hard times. It will make you secure and enable you to press past fear. It will cause you to know He is always with you whether you feel His Presence or not. You can know His forgiveness and mercy, His restoration and favor; truly knowing God will fuel your passion for life. When we see how beautiful and wonderful He really is, and realize all He has done for us in love, how can we not pursue Him and His will passionately? — Joyce Meyer

It's a hard thing for me to wrap my mind around the C word: celebrity. Rock stars are celebrities because they're larger than life. As an actor, you have to play the everyman and the everygirl. If you start treating people in the real world like assistants, that's not a good look. But my friends keep me grounded. — Channing Tatum

Having no expectations for some people in your life can be depressing, if not devastating. But with others, it's what is necessary. The hard part is not just figuring out which one applies, but accepting it. — Sarah Dessen

I guess the hard part is more in the development stage when we're writing it. The logic is hard. You come up with a great idea and you get all excited that it's going to work and then you go down two hours and then one guy turns to everyone and goes, 'Wait, that makes absolutely no sense because if he was there, then this wouldn't have happened, then this,' and it completely implodes. — Dean Israelite

This can't happen again, Wyatt. We're done. It's over."

A palm slapped against the door, right next to her head, so hard she jumped.

"I don't think so."

"If you think I can spend the next thirteen days seeing you, hearing you, smelling you"--he inhaled deeply and growled a little--"without touching you, you're very, very mistaken."

"It's not over, Faith. It's just begun."

~Wyatt — Sydney Croft

I don't hate you, Jace."
"I don't hate you, either."
She looked up at him, relieved. "I'm glad to hear that - "
"I wish I could hate you," he said. His voice was light, his mouth curved in an unconcerned half smile, his eyes sick with misery. "I want to hate you. I try to hate you. It would be so much easier if I did hate you. Sometimes I think I do hate you and then I see you and I - "
Her hands had grown numb with their grip on the blanket. "And you what?"
"What do you think?" Jace shook his head. "Why should I tell you everything
about how I feel when you never tell me anything? It's like banging my head on a
wall, except at least if I were banging my head on a wall, I'd be able to make myself stop."
Clary's lips were trembling so violently that she found it hard to speak. "Do you think it's easy for me?" she demanded. — Cassandra Clare

When the surf is really good, it's hard for me to concentrate on work. So I really have to watch when and where I surf - I won't get anything done if I get the fever. Then it's like I come into work and I'm wet and waterlogged and ready for lunch. — Chris Carter

Perhaps we should spice up our next wager."
A wary look entered her blue eyes. "How?"
"By wagering your mother's necklace against ... your clothing."
She froze, her arms over her head, her eyes wide. "My clothing?"
"Yes. Your gown-against your mother's neckace." His body was already hard at the thought of her standing before him in nothing but her chemise and stockings.
Sophia lowered her arms with a teasing smile. "I doubt it will fit you."
A surprised laugh broke from him. "That would be a sight. But to be crystal clear, if I win this hand, you will disrobe for me. — Karen Hawkins

If it's an abomination, Dad, you're just doing it wrong. Bear down hard, then release. It'll fit better. — Tiffany Reisz

Walker and Timothy sat quietly for a very long time. "Why do so many people make it so hard for anyone to help them or to love them?" Walker asked finally.
Timothy chuckled. "Ah, Walker - if I could explain all of humanity's foibles, I'd be a rich man indeed, at least as far as money goes. I believe people are like that because of fear. They fear being loved because they fear that if they're loved, they'll have to love back. And if they love back, they may get hurt. And many people aren't ready to put their hearts on the line like that. Mostly because they don't have anything to fall back on. It's quite a shame, really, because they hurt themselves by trying to avoid getting hurt. But we have to be willing to die many times if we're ever going to get on with this business of living. — Tom Walsh

If it makes you feel any better, he's been all sad doll lately too."
"What are you talking about, Chels?"
Chelsea stopped walking and stared at Violet.
"Jay. I'm talking about Jay, Vi. I thought you might want to know that you're not the only one who's hurting. He's been moping around school, making it hard to even look at him. He's messed up ... bad." Just like the other night in Violet's bedroom, something close to ... sympathy crossed Chelsea's face.
Violet wasn't sure how to respond.
Fortunately sympathetic Chelsea didn't stick around for long. She seemed to get a grip on herself, and like a switch had been flipped, the awkward moment was over and her friend was back, Chelsea-style: "I swear, every time I see him, I'm halfway afraid he's gonna start crying like a girl or ask to borrow a tampon or something. Seriously, Violet, it's disgusting. Really. Only you can make it stop. Please make it stop. — Kimberly Derting

If you're a working mom, you're still expected to be a super-mom at home, buy organic food, put dinner on the table every night, and do all the research into preschools. It's really hard. — Joe Swanberg

Anything I do has to have integrity, so if you just want to make music, it's not difficult finding support. The hard part for a publicist or manager is making a star. — Esperanza Spalding

If you're John Muir you want trees to
live among. If you're Emily, a garden
will do.
Try to find the right place for yourself.
If you can't find it, at least dream of it.
When one is alone and lonely, the body
gladly lingers in the wind or the rain,
or splashes into the cold river, or
pushes through the ice-crusted snow.
Anything that touches.
God, or the gods, are invisible, quite
understandable. But holiness is visible,
entirely.
Some words will never leave God's mouth,
no matter how hard you listen. — Mary Oliver

It's hard to keep going when it seems like you're not getting anywhere, but you'll never succeed if you stop. Those of us with a dream that seems so far from being realized must remember that the road is long, but only those who stay on the path will reach their destination. — Thomas Mann

I think if the writing comes too easily, it shows - it's usually hard to read. — Tracy Kidder

That's all right! That's all right!' But for a minute or two it wasn't really. All feminine claws, he said to himself, are sheathed in velvet; but they can hurt a good deal if they touch you on the sore places of the defects of your qualities - even merely with the velvet. He added: 'Your mother works you very hard. — Ford Madox Ford

I have no ideas, myself! Not a one! there's nothing more vulgar, more common, more disgusting than ideas! libraries are loaded with them! and every sidewalk cafe! ... the impotent are bloated with ideas! ... they dazzle youth with ideas! they play the pimp! ... and youth is ever ready, as you know, Professor, to gobble up anything, to go OOH! and AAH! by the numbers! How those pimps have an easy job of it! the passionate years of youth are spent getting a hard on and gargling ideeaas! ... philosophies, if you prefer! ... yes sir, philosophies! youth loves sham just as young dogs love those sticks, like bones, that we throw and they run after! they race forward, yipping away, wasting their time, that's the main thing! — Louis-Ferdinand Celine

Whenever I tell people I'm a misanthrope they react as though that's a bad thing, the idiots. I live in London, for God's sake. Have you walked down Oxford Street recently? Misanthropy's the only thing that gets you through it. It's not a personality flaw, it's a skill.
It's nothing to do with sheer numbers. Move me to a remote cottage in the Hebrides and I'd learn to despise the postman, even if he only visited once a year. I can't abide other people, with their stink and their noise and their irritating ringtones. Bill Hicks called the human race 'a virus with shoes', and if you ask me he was being unduly hard on viruses; I'd consider a career in serial killing if the pay wasn't so bad. — Charlie Brooker

People need to know you have to walk through that rejection, and it's only going to fuel you. If you can somehow look at it like it's a gift, you're just going to regroup, and work harder, and go deeper. So just embrace it. — Jeremy Piven

So the professor takes the student's point seriously, and responds with a concise but adequate argument in defence of the disputed equation. The professor tries hard to show no sign of being irritated by criticism from so lowly a source. Most of the questions from the floor will have the form of criticisms which, if valid, would diminish or destroy the professor's life's work. But bringing vigorous and diverse criticism to bear on accepted truths is one of the very purposes of the seminar. Everyone takes it for granted that the truth is not obvious, and that the obvious need not be true; that ideas are to be accepted or rejected according to their content and not their origin; that the greatest minds can easily make mistakes; and that the most trivial-seeming objection may be the key to a great new discovery. — David Deutsch

...like my own granddad used to say, if you get down to the nub of it, people don't change.

That's not true, Katie thought. Not at all. Everyone changed, all the time. That was what was so hard. — Megan Abbott

More often than not, at the end of the day (or a month, or a year), you realize that your initial idea was wrong, and you have to try something else. These are the moments of frustration and despair. You feel that you have wasted an enormous amount of time, with nothing to show for it. This is hard to stomach. But you can never give up. You go back to the drawing board, you analyze more data, you learn from your previous mistakes, you try to come up with a better idea. And every once in a while, suddenly, your idea starts to work. It's as if you had spent a fruitless day surfing, when you finally catch a wave: you try to hold on to it and ride it for as long as possible. At moments like this, you have to free your imagination and let the wave take you as far as it can. Even if the idea sounds totally crazy at first. — Edward Frenkel

For a long moment there was only the sound of her soft, half-gasping little breaths, and the thud of his heart, loud in his ears. He had never felt this ... this liberation, this unfettered contentment. Not with another woman, not after a hard day of accomplishment, not after a brilliant business maneuver, not even after beating his brothers at anything. His body was wrung out with physical satisfaction, his mind fely fogged and sluggish, but his head ...
'If this be madness,' came Francesca's weak voice from behind the shining veil of her hair, 'lead me to Bedlam.'
'Perhpas tomorrow. I don't think I can make it further than the bed. — Caroline Linden

You are not to take it, if you please, as the saying of an ignorant man, when I express my opinion that such a book as ROBINSON CRUSOE never was written, and never will be written again. I have tried that book for years - generally in combination with a pipe of tobacco - and I have found it my friend in need in all the necessities of this mortal life. When my spirits are bad - ROBINSON CRUSOE. When I want advice - ROBINSON CRUSOE. In past times when my wife plagued me; in present times when I have had a drop too much - ROBINSON CRUSOE. I have worn out six stout ROBINSON CRUSOES with hard work in my service. On my lady's last birthday she gave me a seventh. I took a drop too much on the strength of it; and ROBINSON CRUSOE put me right again. Price four shillings and sixpence, bound in blue, with a picture into the bargain.
— Wilkie Collins

I guess in all of the obvious ways. I can afford more diapers for my children. If I want to buy a complete set of Garbage Pail Kids on Ebay I don't have to ask my wife so hard. For the most part, it's mostly the same. I keep my head down and I just work on comics for most of the time. — Robert Kirkman

Careers are built on relationships. Even if it's a bad movie, even if I know it's a bad movie, even if it's a team of filmmakers that I know are going to be difficult, that I know are going to really make me work extra hard, it's fundamentally the same process. — Christophe Beck

If you want to be in fashion you have to absolutely love what you do, because it's more than a job - it's your life. This is a very intense and hard business. But don't worry, trust life. Anything you want, you are capable of getting, it just takes a combination of effort and grace. — Lori Goldstein

Knowledge curses us, if we find it hard to imagine what it was like not to know it. And it becomes difficult to share our knowledge with others because we can't readily re-create our listener's state of mind. — Chip Heath

If one of my players ever wants to hit me, he better do it really hard because otherwise, I'll find a rock, a stick, or a piece of wood - and believe me, it's gonna be a brawl. — Pat Burns

We are doomed to repeat the mistakes of the past, and no amount of education gleaned from our propensity for self-destruction and misguided thinking ever teaches us anything. Not anything that we remember for more than a generation or two.
I think maybe we learn a few things each time that we don't forget. A few things that stick with us. It's just hard to pass those things on to those who come after us because if they didn't live through it, they don't view it the same way we do. If you don't experience something firsthand, it's a lot harder to accept. Terry Brooks, Bearers of the Black Staff, p 89 — Terry Brooks

If you are an [American] politician it's very hard to imagine "now we are going to treat these guys as our equals? That's ridiculous. What have they ever done to deserve that?" — Hooman Majd

Military is a great place for a jock. That's the first thing they test you, they test you physically. If you can run, if you can do the pushups, it's not as hard a transition. If you can't do that, you're going to have a problem because they're going to really work it out of you or work it into you. — Ice-T

When I use people I know, all of my instincts seem to go dead, and if I'm getting anywhere near myself then I can't do it. It's actually a real weakness! I hate writing personal essays, I don't think I'm especially good at it. I like just encountering [my characters], discovering them. I love the escape of just being surrounded by all these people who are nothing like people I know. But I don't find it hard to be in the middle of a different life, with a different set of habits and way of thinking and talking. That seems to come easily to me. — Jennifer Egan

I just want to do musicals. it's hard enough just to do musicals. No matter how hard I try, I think it's only getting harder. Even If I try harder, there are problems that I just can't deal with. I don't know why it's become like this. — Cheon Eunbi

If I could give one message to the bullied, it would be this: You are not alone. You are strong. You have a voice. You are beautiful. You are intelligent. There are many kids who want to speak up for you, but they don't because they are afraid of becoming bullied themselves. There are many of us in the world who love you. I love you. You have the power to end this now. That power is in your voice. Find it. Once you use your voice, bullies want no part of you. If you feel that you lack the courage, fake it until you do. Finally, I know it's hard to see a life that exists beyond high school. It is there, and it is beautiful. — Dan Pearce

People need me. I fill them. If they can't see me for a while they get desperate, they get sick. But if I see them too often I get sick. It's hard to feed without getting fed. — Charles Bukowski

If I get even five per cent of my ideas out and documented before I die, I'll be lucky. I'm not in danger of running out of riffs or ideas anytime soon. They overwhelm me and it's hard to find time to deal with them. — Jello Biafra

Something hit me very hard once, thinking about what one little man could do. Think of the Queen Mary - the whole ship goes by and then comes the rudder. And there's a tiny thing at the edge of the rudder called a trimtab.
It's a miniature rudder. Just moving the little trim tab builds a low pressure that pulls the rudder around. Takes almost no effort at all. So I said that the little individual can be a trimtab. Society thinks it's going right by you, that it's left you altogether. But if you're doing dynamic things mentally, the fact is that you can just put your foot out like that and the whole big ship of state is going to go.
So I said, call me Trimtab. — R. Buckminster Fuller

But what if it's a trap?' she repeated.
Joe gave her a hard stare.'Of course it's a fucking trap,' he said. — Chris Ryan

We've started and won two atomic wars since 2022! Is it because we're having so much fun at home we've forgotten the world? Is it because we're so rich and the rest of the world's so poor and we just don't care if they are? I've heard rumors; the world is starving, but we're well fed. Is it true, the world works hard and we play? Is that why we're hated so much? I've heard the rumors about hate, too, once in a long while, over the years. Do you know why? I don't, that's sure! — Ray Bradbury

There is nothing so nice as supposing. It's almost like being a fairy. If you suppose anything hard enough it seems as if it were real. — Frances Hodgson Burnett

Don't make stuff because you want to make money - it will never make you enough money. And don't make stuff because you want to get famous - because you will never feel famous enough. Make gifts for people - and work hard on making those gifts in the hope that those people will notice and like the gifts.
Maybe they will notice how hard you worked, and maybe they won't - and if they don't notice, I know it's frustrating. But, ultimately, that doesn't change anything - because your responsibility is not to the people you're making the gift for, but to the gift itself. — John Green

O'Shaughnessy is hitting Denholt on the side of his head with his free arm, great, walloping, pile-driver blows. The two of them stagger together, like partners in a crazy dance. Glass is breaking all around them. Gray smoke from the six shots, pink-and-white dust from the chipped brick-and-plaster walls, swirl around them in a rainbow haze. Something vividly green flares up from one of the overturned retorts, goes right out again. O'Shaughnessy tears the emptied gun away, flings it off somewhere. More breaking glass, and this time a tart pungent smell that makes the nostrils sting. The crunch of pulverized tube glass underfoot makes it sound as if they were scuffling in sand or hard-packed snow. ("Jane Brown's Body") — Cornell Woolrich

When you live life for yourself it's hard on everyone. And that hasn't changed. For me, if anything, it's gotten worse. — John Mellencamp

If your only motive is to be loved, to ingratiate yourself with the crowd, you're bound to fall into bad habits, and eventually the public will grow tired of you. You have to keep testing yourself, pushing yourself as hard as you can. You do it for yourself, but in the end it's this struggle to do better that endears you to your fans. — Paul Auster

Yessir, it's a hard taskmaster, that guilt. I say, feel it, and wriggle a little bit if you have to, but then put it away. Get on with what you can change. — LaVyrle Spencer

If you don't have jobs, it's hard to have other things like health and education. — Michael Dell

What's wrong?" "It's hard. It's too fucking hard. I don't know if this is going to work. We might as well cut our throats. Just cut our own throats." "You mustn't talk like that." "Yeah. Right. — Neil Gaiman

No, I don't work here, I'm taking pictures of messy bathrooms for a photo essay on the American West. But I'm always up for clean, so if you want to pitch in, I've got Pine Sol and a sponge in my car ... It's that VW microbus parked next to the dumpster, and you don't need a key, just pull hard. — Pansy Schneider-Horst

I knew that Clara kept Carax's book in a glass cabinet by the arch of the balcony. I crept up to it. My plan, or my lack of it, was to lay my hands on the book, take it out of there, give it to that lunatic, and lose sight of him forever after. Nobody would notice the book's absence, except me. Carax's book was waiting for me, as it always did, its spine just visible at the end of a shelf. I took it in my hands and pressed it against my chest, as if embracing an old friend whom I was about to betray. Judas, I thought. I decided to leave the place without making Clara aware of my presence. I would take the book and disappear from Clara's life forever. Quietly, I stepped out of the library. The door of her bedroom was just visible at the end of the corridor ... I walked slowly up to the door. I put my fingers on the doorknob. My fingers trembled. I had arrived too late. I swallowed hard and opened the door. — Carlos Ruiz Zafon

If you work hard, whatever you want, it will come to you. I know that's easier said than done, but keep trying. — Beyonce Knowles

Dallas traced her jaw and put the tip of his finger under her chin. I'm feeling possessive tonight, Lexie love, so here's your choice. I can untie you and we can have a little tease and cuddle ... or you can stand up and go into the bedroom. If you do that, I'm going to play with you until you think you can't take it anymore, and then I'm going to ride you so hard your legs won't work in the morning. Pick one. — Kit Rocha

Yes, I am scared of prison. It's the last thing if you are after building up a business over 38 years and you are approaching your 66th birthday and you never owed a man a penny and you feel hard done by and you try to protect yourself and your family and go to prison - if that is the society we are living in, I am happy to accept that. — Sean Quinn

The thing about the Lexington International Bank ladder was that it was very long, and climbing it was very exhausting, and so Andrew Brown didn't have a lot of time to think about whether he really wanted to get to the top of it - and besides, since so many other people were climbing too, the view from the top must be worth it.
So he kept going. He worked hard. He put his heart and mind and soul into it. There was an opening for a position half a rung higher than he already was. With a promotion, he might get two hours a week of a secretary's time. He'd go to more important meetings, with more senior people, and have the opportunity to impress them, and if he did he might be promoted again and then ... well, of course eventually he'd be running the whole office. It's important to have a dream: otherwise you might notice where you really are. — Naomi Alderman

It took a lot of guts to change it and say 'I don't like the life that I'm living and I don't like the swimmer I am', so let's change it completely and say 'Look, I've got to learn to love myself'. And that's been a really hard thing to do because when you've done a performance that you're not proud of and the public and the media have criticized you ... people are really quick to make judgements so it was tough to say 'Well I don't care what you have to say. I'm going to do this for myself and if you don't like me after this, well then, it's too bad'. — Leisel Jones

Money actually becomes even more difficult than other things because it's very hard to imagine what the benefits are to saving. So, imagine that you see a new bicycle, a new pair of shoes, or something today. You know exactly what you are giving up if you are not buying it, what are you gaining in the future if you are not getting it. So, you are giving up the bicycle today, what is it in the future? What will happen if you send another $1,000 to your retirement fund? What difference will it make? It is very, very hard to figure out. — Dan Ariely