If You Tried Your Best Quotes & Sayings

Have you ever tried to use your eyes to tell someone that you want them, that because of them you're going to do the best you can to survive but that you're willing to die if that's the cost of putting yourself between them and anything that means them harm? That you don't care if they're playing you, or if what you have is really love, or if the two of you have a shot at lasting, that the very fact that they exist has made you come back to life in some way that's terrifying and exhilarating? A few seconds isn't long enough, especially when the person you're looking at is staring back as if she wants to pull you inside her and crush the two of you into one being. — Elliott James

In Alabama can't - ?" I was indignant. "I do. I guess it's to protect our frail ladies from sordid cases like Tom's. Besides," Atticus grinned, "I doubt if we'd ever get a complete case tried - the — Harper Lee

You young folks today think you invented the world," Aunt Will said. "Still, a dash of unlawful scrumping might work for you. A lot more folks have tried that recipe than my own, even if we don't hear testimonials."
She chuckled naughtily at that suggestion. Jesse giggled a bit herself.
The important thing was that her aunt was nodding and smiling again.
"But beware, DuJess," Aunt Will told her. "Every cure has its side effects. It only seems fair to warn you. I suspect that a regular tonic of Piney Baxley can be potently habit forming. — Pamela Morsi

He held me against his body and his upper arm was close to my face, so I turned and bit him. He was so startled he actually released me and I tried to jab him with the knife, but he gripped my wrist.

"Did you bite me?" he asked as he stared at my teeth marks on his bicep.

"Not hard enough. There isn't even blood," I said. Luca's shoulders twitched once, then again. He was fighting laughter. Not the effect I'd intended when I bit him but I had to admit I loved the sound of his deep chuckle.

"I think you've done enough damage for one day," he said. — Cora Reilly

There's sex, and there's ... this." He met my eyes. "Just being with someone like this. This isn't something that can be bought or sold, and I couldn't manufacture it for someone no matter how much they tried to pay me for it." He ran the backs of his fingers down my cheek. "That's why I'm here tonight. Because I needed this. And here, with you, is the only place I can get it." He swallowed hard. "Or give it. — Lauren Gallagher

I know you've always tried to do your best by me, in your own insufferable, arrogant way. You've been a decent brother, Gray. And a damn good friend."
Gray swore. He looked to the side, then back at his brother. "Fair warning, Joss. If you don't take your hand off me ... I will have to hug you."
Joss laughed. "After that speech, I'd be damn disappointed if you didn't. — Tessa Dare

She tried to swallow, to take a breath, but her eyes met his, and there was nothing but aching intensity in his gaze. And she was drawn in, swept away. — J. Lynn

If you're still in a relationship, remember that just because you can get along with anyone doesn't mean you have to. If you're unhappy after having tried every way to make things work, chances are that you should move on. It's in your best interest to end a dysfunctional relationship rather than get stuck forever with the wrong person just because you're secure. — Amir Levine

Westcliff sees an odd sort of logic in why you would finally be the one to win St. Vincent's heart. He says a girl like you would appeal to ... hmm, how did he put it? ... I can't remember the exact words, but it was something like ... you would appeal to St. Vincent's deepest, most secret fantasy."
Evie felt her cheeks flushing while a skirmish of pain and hope took place in the tired confines of her chest. She tried to respond sardonically. "I should think his fantasy is to consort with as many women as possible."
A grin crossed Lillian's lips. "Dear, that is not St. Vincent's fantasy, it's his reality. And you're probably the first sweet, decent girl he's ever had anything to do with."
"He spent quite a lot of time with you and Daisy in Hampshire," Evie countered.
That seemed to amuse Lillian further. "I'm not at all sweet, dear. And neither is my sister. Don't say you have been laboring under that misconception all this time? — Lisa Kleypas

Things sure have changed. FDR tried to calm us: "Nothing to fear but fear itself." Now politicians encourage the jitters. Panic is the new patriotism. "Today's Threat Level: Duck! — Tim Dorsey

Marcus Flutie slept with just about every girl on the Eastern Seaboard except me. Though, he tried to get into my panties when I was a freshman but turned him down because I refuse to disempower myself just for a few clit twitches. — Megan McCafferty

You're late, asshole!" he said cheerfully. He tried to snatch the six-pack out of Cheyenne's hands but, being shorter by at least half a foot, ended up jumping in the air, his limbs flailing in an exaggerated manner. — Melissa Noel

Sitting on the ground, she looked up at her best friend. "Danke," she said. "Thank you."
Rudy bowed. "My pleasure." He tried for a little more. "No point asking if I get a kiss for that, I guess?"
"For bringing my shoes, which you left behind?"
"Fair enough." He held up his hands and continued speaking as they walked on, and Liesel made a concerted effort to ignore him. She only heard the last part. "Probably wouldn't want to kiss you anyway
not if your breath's anything like your shoes."
"You disgust me," she informed him, and she hoped he couldn't see the escaped beginnings of a smile that had fallen from her mouth. — Markus Zusak

I have always tried to maintain a sense of humanity in my work, to create something that will take on its own personality but also reflect something about our world. — Dean Mitchell

The bedlamite little hats in which American women have tried to out-lunatic each other for the past four years prove conclusively we don't dress to please anyone. We're just docile sheep who accept what's given us. — Beatrice Fairfax

I've always been honest with all my kids. So I - if they did well, they did well. And if they didn't, actually, I asked, did you try your best? And if they tried their best, then, you know, I back out because I expect them to be honest with me or with themselves. And I can't make you go out there and work out hard. — Ryan Lochte

I do not hesitate to say that the road to eminence and power, from an obscure condition, ought not to be made too easy, nor a thing too much of course. If rare merit be the rarest of all things, it ought to pass through some sort of probation. The temple of honor ought to be seated on an eminence. If it be open through virtue, let it be remembered, too, that virtue is never tried but by some difficulty and some struggle. — Edmund Burke

She tried to hear his heartbeat through the fabric of his tuxedo jacket, and the fact that she wasn't sure whether she could hear it made her think about how hard it was for any girl to ever know whether her love was being returned. — Kathryn Davis

I think the question is, how do we live with change? Change in our friends, change in our lovers? Change in me and change in my body, from the stroke. Things have changed this plane of consciousness. We've tried to keep things the same. It causes suffering. This suffering is another step in your spiritual life, in your spiritual journey. — Ram Dass

No! He tried to shout out but the water surged into his mouth and lungs choking his cry. Then darkness. And nothingness. Always the nothingness. Thicker this time as if it had fingers pulling him down and pulling the life out of him. Pulling his soul out of him. — James L. Rubart

Sam," she said.
"I'm trying!"
"Sam," she repeated.
"No," he spat, hearing her tone. "No!"
He began screaming for help then. Celaena pressed her face to one of the holes in the grate. Help wasn't going to come-not fast enough.
"Please," Sam begged as he beat and yanked on the grate, he tried to wedge another dagger under the lid. "Please don't."
She knew he wasn't speaking to her.
The water hit her neck.
"Please," Sam moaned, his fingers now touching hers. She'd have one last breath. Her last words.
"Take my body home to Terrasen, Sam," she whispered. And with a gasping breath, she went under. — Sarah J. Maas

If you want something badly enough, make an attempt. If you want to paint, get a brush and do it. If you want to sing, sing. A lot of people get scared. They're afraid to fail. Take that word out of your vocabulary. You don't "fail." You've "tried your best." — Jane Seymour

When [Imam] Samudra was tried, according to the Sydney Morning Herald, 'His lawyer, Qaidar Faisal, later delivered an official defence submission.' The defense summation praised the Taliban and its version of Islam and concluded with this telling detail: 'Mr. Faisal also quoted from American satirist Michael Moore's book Stupid White Men and other anti-western texts.' — David T. Hardy

I thought it might be a good move to get into a beauty contest so I tried for Miss Pennsylvania and won. I think that helped me get noticed, at least by the people of Pennsylvania. — Sharon Stone

Have you ever tried to talk to a baby or a toddler? They never look you square in the eyes, they know about three words, and God forbid they ever ask you how you're doing. It's all about them! — Jen Kirkman

Nutt was technically an expert on love poetry throughout the ages and had discussed it at length with Miss Healstether, the castle librarian. He had also tried to discuss it with Ladyship, but she had laughed and said it was frivolity, although quite helpful as a tutorial on the use of vocabulary, scansion, rhythm and affect as a means to an end, to wit getting a young lady to take all her clothes off. At that particular point, Nutt had not really understood what she meant. It sounded like some sort of conjuring trick. — Terry Pratchett

I didn't know that people compared Bill Hicks and I but certainly I'm flattered if they do. I knew Bill a bit. We had dinner a couple of times and played guitar together once. I really tried to keep my distance from him professionally. — Marc Maron

No one had ever said anything like that to Evie. Her parents always wanted to advise or instruct or command. They were good people, but they needed the world to bend to them, to fit into their order of things. Evie had never really quite fit, and when she tried, she'd just pop back out, like a doll squeezed into a too-small box. — Libba Bray

I tried to write how I felt. The pen remained frozen. The paper stayed white and empty,
while my brain was dark and full — Tina J. Richardson

He pulled her mirror out of his other pocket. "You left your mirror on my table." He extended it toward her.
"You can keep it," she said quietly. "We have lots of mirrors here."
"I'll keep it, then."
"Good. I'm glad."
He'd never rushed headlong into a battle, but he figured this time, it might be the best approach. "I spent a lot of time studying it. The back is real pretty with all the gold carving. Took me about an hour to gather up the courage to turn it over and look at the other side."
"And what did you see?"
" Aman who loves you more than life itself."
Closing her eyes, she dropped her chin to her chest.
"I wouldn't blame you if you hated me. I haven't held your feelings as precious as I should have."
"I don't hate you," she whispered hoarsely. "I tried to, but I can't."
-Houston and Amelia — Lorraine Heath

It never really crossed my mind that I was ever going to win a major. I always said that if you win a major, that's fine. If you don't, you tried your best. — Vijay Singh

I've never had a very quiet voice. I tried in choir to make it smaller, and it just didn't work out. And I listened to a lot of soul music when I was growing up on my own accord. But I was mostly into Mama Cass and Gladys Knight, and they all had big voices too; just different than mine. — Beth Ditto

Give it your best shot. Go for it. If it's what you really want to do, go for it. Even if you don't make it, you will never look back and have regrets. You can always say, "Hey, I went for it. I tried my hardest. It was an awesome experience." — Carmen Rasmusen

I had a dream about you. You were crying, and I couldn't tell if it was because you were sad or because you'd been laughing too hard. So I decided to find out by telling you that I'd just heard from the cops, and your mother had been murdered. Before I got to the punch line you started sobbing in a different manner, so I realized you'd been laughing earlier. By that time the mood had changed, and I decided it best not to deliver the punch line after all. So I sat down next to you and put my arm around you and tried to console you for your perceived loss. — Dora J. Arod

She done mellowed plenty since this marriage. Soft around the edges without getting too soft at the center. You fear that sometimes for women, that they would just fold up and melt away. She'd seen it happen so much in her time, too much for her to head on into it without thinking. Yes, that one time when she was way, way young. But after that, looking at all the beating, the badgering, the shriveling away from a lack of true touching was enough to give her pause. Not that she mighta hooked up with one of those. And not that any man - even if he tried - coulda ever soaked up the best in her. But who needed to wake up each morning cussing the day just to be sure you still had your voice? A woman shouldn't have to fight her man to be what she was; he should be fighting that battle for her. — Gloria Naylor

If you dont speak, they will know you know more than you're telling them. And if they know that, they'll find a way to get what you know out of you. Believe me, they'll get everything out, Willie. Don't have any qualms about it
make your story good and make it believable. Silence won't work! This was an expert giving me the best advice she could. From that point on, I worked hard not to remember the people I loved, to try instead to create another life, a false life ... I tried to become a person concerned only with very simple things
and scared. I tried to become the woman I needed to be in order to live. — Diet Eman

She tried to teach her children to be positive
to dream but to also do it with their feet on the ground. If you let loose that balloon, you will lose sight of it, she said. The best way to enjoy it is to hold tight to the string and plant your feet on a good solid path. — Jill McCorkle

Give it your best shot, have a good time and if it doesn't work at least you tried! — Melanie Chisholm

If you wait this long to put an album out, you'd better be sure you tried your best. — Nelly Furtado

You must accept that you might fail; then, if you do your best and still don't win, at least you can be satisfied that you've tried. If you don't accept failure as a possibility, you don't set high goals, you don't branch out, you don't try - you don't take the risk. — Rosalynn Carter

My hand is in his before I realize it. "We'll be going then," he says, and I nod. Of course, I will go with him. He's pretty, so very, very, pretty, and I would be a fool to say no to anything he asks of me.
I blink. No, I think. And then I manage to say it out loud.
"No."
He sits back with an angry huff, now exhausted with dark circles under his eyes. It's as though a fog has been lifted from my brain. Magic! He tried to use magic on me! And I realize it is not the first time. "If you ever try that again," I say, taking a sip of chocolate to wet my suddenly parched throat, "I will beat you silly with your own cane."
"This is the best day of my life," Eleanor says.
I cannot agree with her. — Kiersten White

Bastien rolled his eyes, "Calm down, Hauk. All you're going to do is hurt yourself."
He glared at Bastien. "If you want to see exactly how angry someone can get, tell them to calm down when they're already pissed off!" Bellowing, he tried his best to break free.
"Is that helping? I just gotta know."
"When I get loose, Cabarro, your ass is the first one I'm kicking."
"Oh good. Hope you get out soon. Been awhile since I had a good ass-kicking." Bastien made a kissy face at him.
"Says the man who's so bruised, he looks like a two-year old banana."
"Now that's just mean and hurtful."
"Telise! He's awake again."
She moved forward and kicked Hauk in the face. "I wouldn't do that," Bastien warned. "Don't motivate the Andarion for murder. It ain't going to work out well for any of us. 'Specially me, since mine's the first ass he's planning to come after. — Sherrilyn Kenyon

I will accept only the best from you, Percy Jackson. I took a deep breath. I picked up the mythology book. I'd never asked a teacher for help before. Maybe if I talked to Mr. Brunner, he could give me some pointers. At least I could apologize for the big fat F I was about to score on his exam. I didn't want to leave Yancy Academy with him thinking I hadn't tried. I walked downstairs to the faculty offices. Most of them were dark and empty, but Mr. Brunner's door was ajar, light from his window stretching across the hallway floor. I was three steps from the door handle when I heard voices inside the office. Mr. Brunner asked a question. A voice that was definitely Grover's said " ... worried about Percy, sir." I froze. I'm not usually an eavesdropper, but I dare you to try not listening if you hear your best friend talking about you to an adult. I inched closer. — Rick Riordan

And your people tried to kill my best friend, so you'll forgive me if I'm not overly keen on learning the secret handshake."
She shook her head sadly. "You should be going on dates and hanging out at the mall. Not wearing stakes on your belt."
I shrugged one shoulder. "The mall sucks. — Alyxandra Harvey

If you're a waiter, the worst thing you can do is go to work resenting your job. This will sound trite - but it's the reality, and part of my personality - yet when I was a waiter, I tried to be the best waiter, and when I was a bingo-caller I tried to be the best bingo-caller. — Russell Crowe

Everybody wants to feel that you're writing to a certain demographic because that's good business, but I've never done that ... I tried to write stories that would interest me. I'd say, what would I like to read? ... I don't think you can do your best work if you're writing for somebody else, because you never know what that somebody else really thinks or wants. — Stan Lee

Some tried to kill him; there were assassination attempts. Some hated him ... this is par for the course. — Frederick Lenz

I too tried to look at matter from a more generous perspective: I didn't succeed. but now I've gained courage; I've reached the depths and discovered that there is light at the bottom. — Paulo Coelho

David tried to give a form to the beast at the heart of the poem but found that he could not. It was more difficult than it appeared, for nothing quite seemed to fit. Instead, he could only conjure up a half-formed being that crouched in the cobwebbed corners of his imagination where all the things that he feared curled and slithered upon one another in the darkness. — John Connolly

Psychoanalysis comes down to the process itself - the self, and life. I think I can say that I'm friends with the unconscious life, but I've never tried to make a painting directly from a dream. — Malcolm Morley

It's strange how things happen, Mauricio Silva, known as the Eye, always tried to escape from violence even at the risk of being considered a coward, but the violence, the real violence, can't be escaped, at least not by us, born in Latin America in the 1950s, those of us who were around twenty years old when Salvador Allende died. — Roberto Bolano

I never knew anything other than wanting to be an entrepreneur. I tried my first business when I was 6 years old, and I started another business when I was 8. I don't think I knew anything besides that. — Daymond John

I've tried many other hairstyles, but it just doesn't work. — Rod Stewart

A hack writer who would have been considered fourth rate in Europe, who tried out a few of the old proven 'sure-fire' literary skeletons with sufficient local color to intrigue the superficial and the lazy. — William Faulkner

As President Franklin Delano Roosevelt learned when he tried to pack the Supreme Court, the three branches of government are coequal for a reason. Neither the executive branch or the legislative branch should use the third branch to a pursue a partisan agenda. — Dan Pfeiffer

As adults we choose our own reading material. Depending on our moods and needs we might read the newspaper, a blockbuster novel, an academic article, a women's magazine, a comic, a children's book, or the latest book that just about everyone is reading. No one chastises us for our choice. No one says, 'That's too short for you to read.' No one says, 'That's too easy for you, put it back.' No one says 'You couldn't read that if you tried
it's much too difficult.'
Yet if we take a peek into classrooms, libraries, and bookshops we will notice that children's choices are often mocked, censured, and denied as valid by idiotic, interfering teachers, librarians, and parents. Choice is a personal matter that changes with experience, changes with mood, and changes with need. We should let it be. — Mem Fox

On the lawn one late summer day, her pale hair tangled because she'd cry if anyone tried to brush it, spinning around and around until she got so dizzy she fell in a pile of bare feet and dandelions and sundress. — Holly Black

You see, Yousef, you can't force someone in their hearts to believe the way you do. They all tried and failed. They judged by their own convictions
not even by the truth of the teachings of Isa. No one is above God's judgment. No one has the right to judge for him. — Pola Muzyka

My second album was written while I was on the road promoting the first record. I tried to take my personal experiences and elevate them to universal experiences, so that I wasn't writing songs about living on a tour bus or being on a TV set for the first time. — Kate Voegele

I tried very hard. But I can't help it. The Fates are cruel. They sent you to me, my brave one, knowing that you would break my heart. — Rick Riordan

I am mad again, he thought. Tears brimmed. He swallowed in a tightened throat. I don't want to be. I'm tired, I'm tired and horny, I'm so tired I can't make sense out of any of it and my mind won't work right half the time I try. I'm thirsty. My head's all filled with kapok coffee wouldn't clear. Still, I wish I had some. Where am I going, what am I doing, stumbling in this smoking graveyard? It's not the pain; only that the pain keeps going on. He tried to let all his muscles go and stepped aimlessly from sidewalk to gutter, his mouth dryer and dryer and dryer. Well, he thought, if it hurts, it hurts. It's only pain. — Samuel R. Delany

I'm disappointed in myself. In my life. All my life, everything I tried, I only got halfway there. You try to take advantage of the time you have. That's what they tell you to do. But when you're old, you look back and you see all you did, with all that time, is waste it. All you have is a story of things you never started or couldn't finish. Things you fought with all your heart to build that didn't last or fought with all your heart to get rid of and they're all still around. I'm ashamed of myself. — Michael Chabon

Lastly, they must be men of honest report, whose life and sound conversation are by their deeds perfectly tried and sufficiently witnessed of unto the people: and finally, they must be such as bear authority, and not be despised as rascal and vile knaves. — Heinrich Bullinger

he was tried and hanged at Northampton on July 23. (During his trial he claimed that his pet cat had become possessed by the devil and incited him to his crimes. The cat was also hanged.) But — Dan Jones

They went to the tree. Daemon dismounted and leaned against the tree, staring in the direction of the house. The stallion jiggled the bit, reminding him he wasn't alone. "I wanted to say good-bye," Daemon said quietly. For the first time, he truly saw the intelligence - and loneliness - in the horse's eyes. After that, he couldn't keep his voice from breaking as he tried to explain why Jaenelle was never going to come to the tree again, why there would be no more rides, no more caresses, no more talks. For a moment, something rippled in his mind. He had the odd sensation he was the one being talked to, explained to, and his words, echoing back, lacerated his heart. To be alone again. To never again see those arms held out in welcome. To never hear that voice say his name. To ... Daemon gasped as Dark Dancer jerked the reins free and raced down the path toward the field. Tears of grief pricked Daemon's eyes. The horse might have a simpler mind, but the heart was just as big. — Anne Bishop

No one's fated or doomed to love anyone.
The accidents happen, we're not heroines,
they happen in our lives like car crashes,
books that change us, neighborhoods
we move into and come to love.
Tristan and Isolde is scarcely the story,
women at least should know the difference
between love and death. No poison cup,
no penance. Merely a notion that the tape-recorder
should have caught some ghost of us: that tape-recorder
not merely played but should have listened to us,
and could instruct those after us:
this we were, this is how we tried to love,
and these are the forces they had ranged against us,
and these are the forces we had ranged within us,
within us and against us, against us and within us. — Adrienne Rich

I have never tried, in even one single little instance, to help cultivate the cultivated classes. I was not equipped for it either by native gifts or training. And I never had any ambition in that direction, but always hunted for bigger game
the masses. - Mark Twain, a Biography — Mark Twain

I never tried to use anything besides my own sweat and blood and talent to get somewhere. — Olivia Munn

Acting became important. It became an art that belonged to the actor, not to the director or producer, or the man whose money had bought the studio. It was an art that transformed you into somebody else, that increased your life and mind. I had always loved acting and tried hard to learn it. But with Michael Chekhov, acting became more than a profession to me. It became a sort of religion. — Marilyn Monroe

I started by writing short stories, but they weren't very good; I tried them on various magazines, and none of them was published. People were nicer then about turning you down, and so I didn't lose heart - I kept on writing and wrote a lot of books, one or two of which I finished, and others I didn't. — Ruth Rendell

We could sit around and talk if you'd like."
"Okay." She crossed her arms and tried to look casual. "So what's up?"
"Considering what you're wearing beneath that sheet, and what we just heard in the hallway, you might want to rephrase that particular statement. — Jill Shalvis

Came Honker's trip to Slice City along about then: our sax-man got a neck all full of the sharpest kind of steel. So we were out one horn. And you could tell: we played a little bit too rough, and the head-arrangements Collins and His Crew grew up to, they needed Honker's grease in the worst way. But we'd been together for five years or more, and a new man just didn't play somehow. We were this one solid thing, like a unit, and somebody had cut off a piece of us and we couldn't grow the piece back so we just tried to get along anyway, bleeding every night, bleeding from that wound. ("Black Country") — Charles Beaumont

Even if you look at the 'Paranormal Activity' movies, at the end of the movie things get really crazy and nutty, but they all start in a very mundane situation that people can relate to, and that's also to some degree what we tried to do in 'Chernobyl Diaries.' — Oren Peli

If I could, I would take you with me," he said, his voice barely more than a whisper.
She tried to pull away from him. "You would not. You would grow tired of me in a few weeks."
He shook his head, pulling her tight against him. "No ... I could never grow tired of you."
"How can you be so sure?" she asked.
He brushed tendrils of hair from her face. "I have craved to know you for years ... even just to hear you speak my name ... a single touch of your hand on mine ... "
He kissed her softly, his lips tasting hers. "I want you to be mine ... I want you always."
- 'unknown script' 2012 — Faye Hall