I'm Just Being Quiet Quotes & Sayings

My first step from the old white man was trees. Then air. Then birds. Then other people. But one day when I was sitting quiet and feeling like a motherless child, which I was, it come to me: that feeling of being part of everything, not separate at all. I knew that if I cut a tree, my arm would bleed. And I laughed and I cried and I run all around the house. I knew just what it was. In fact, when it happen, you can't miss it. — Alice Walker

You're quiet." Bodie issued that statement with no small amount of suspicion. "I'm always quiet." As Bodie pulled the car past the gates and out onto the street, he glanced at me just long enough to smirk. "And I'm always perceptive. This quiet is a different quiet." My mind was awash in the day's events. Georgia's visit. Vivvie and the article on Pierce. The two names from Henry's list. Adam's father being the one who had arranged the get-together in that photograph. "I'm fluent in all varieties of Kendrick silences," Bodie declared. "And you and your sister both stare very intently at absolutely nothing when the wheels are turning in here." He lazily reached over and tapped the side of my head. I swatted his hand away. "I have a lot to think about. — Jennifer Lynn Barnes

I'm not prepared to sacrifice my being engaged in the world for just any relationship. — Loreena McKennitt

You can't put your heart into everything; you've just got to show up. And if your heart is worn all over you, then so be it, but you can't pull it out of you and put it in places, or put it in people's hands. Because you are like this wild and quiet and laughing thing and people are like things that stand there and don't understand what's going on; so when you put your heart into things like that, you're going to feel either stupid, or very hurt, or both. And it's not people's faults that they are just standing there. I mean, you're the different one; they're not different; they're all the same. — C. JoyBell C.

I have a real problem with stillness. With just stopping and being quiet. — Gillian Anderson

I just ... I've fantasized about peace and quiet for so long, dreamt about being left alone ... but when the TV was off, and the sun was down ... I'm in a full sob right now. I've just never felt so alone, and I couldn't take it. — Andrea Randall

But the look on his face was so strange that I hadn't the heart to take his story away from him. He believed it, see. He believed the old gods were on Arthur's side just as he believed that winter would follow autumn and the sun would rise tomorrow. And I thought that maybe that believing would make him strong and brave and lucky when the fighting came, and maybe without it he'd be killed, or turn and run away, which was worse than being killed. So I kept quiet. — Philip Reeve

Chicken Soup for the Soul". You've heard of these books, am I right? We've all heard of them. But I wonder if you're aware of just how many "Chicken Soup" books exist on the planet. No offense, but I doubt it. I doubt it because in the time it would take you to come up with a number, the number would have become obsolete. Even as you read this, in some quiet, fecund place, another "Chicken Soup" book is being born. — Marisa De Los Santos

Amal: It isn't sad. When they shut me in here first I felt the day was so long. Since the King's Post Office I like it more and more being indoors, and as I think I shall get a letter one day, I feel quite happy and then I don't mind being quiet and alone. I wonder if I shall make out what'll be in the King's letter?
Gaffer: Even if you didn't wouldn't it be enough if it just bore your name? — Rabindranath Tagore

I usually can't stop babbling, just to fill space, but with Julienne, I can see the appeal of just being. Julienne is quiet, obviously, but that's because she can say what she means to in so few words. She has a commanding presence that's hard to ignore. Julienne doesn't seem to feel the same urgency other people do. Everyone else, myself included, is constantly vying for a space to occupy, just for the sake of it. But when Julienne does share, it's incredible. She has an actual opinion on everything, not just something to say, and I want to hear about all of them. — Pega Rose

Quiet. My body melted heavily into the chair; I heard a cart go up the street. The room grew suddenly big with meaning. Something was about to happen, was happening: each object in the room seemed perfect of its kind, its kind being just its one self. The moment split into Eternity and I went with it: I had neither skin nor bones, but flowed into the world, sacred along with everything else, and was lost. — Maria McCann

I don't have a nanny. I have a chef, and I have my assistant, and that's it. I do it myself. You know, those hours with your child are really important ones, even if it's just the two of you, being quiet in the car together. — Melania Trump

We didn't say or write anything for a long time. Normally silence like that was uncomfortable and awkward. Like you needed to say something to fill the empty space in the air. But it didn't feel like that with Samantha. Maybe it was because I couldn't say anything and fill the quiet, but I thought it was more about two people just being with each other, enjoying the slowdown and the rare sunshine. — Keary Taylor

It's strange," I say to Day later, as we both curl up on the floor. Outside, the hurricane rages on. In a few hours we'll need to head out. "It's strange being here with you. I hardly know you. But ... sometimes it feels like we're the same person born into two different worlds."
He stays quiet for a moment, one hand absently playing with my hair. "I wonder what we would've been like if I'd been born into a life more like yours,and you had been born into mine. Would we be just like we are now? Would I be one of the Republic's top soldiers? And would you be a famous criminal?"
I lift my head off his shoulder and look at him. "I never did ask you about your street name.Why 'Day'?"
"Each day means a new twenty-four hours. Each day means everything's possible again.You live in the moment, you die in the moment,you take it all one day at a time." He looks toward the railway car's open door, where streaks of dark water blanket the world. "You try to walk in the light. — Marie Lu

One thing I do personally started 20 years ago. I started meditating, and I know twice a day I can kind of let everything drop. It's just about being quiet, like drawing back the day, and it allows me to have energy. — Hugh Jackman

Her bedroom window overlooked the garden, and now and then, usually when she was "having a bad spell," Mr. Helm had seen her stand long hours gazing into the garden, as though what she saw bewitched her. ("When I was a girl," she had once told a friend, "I was terribly sure trees and flowers were the same as birds or people. That they thought things, and talked among themselves. And we could hear them if we really tried. It was just a matter of emptying your head of all other sounds. Being very quiet and listening very hard. Sometimes I still believe that. But one can never get quiet enough ... ") — Truman Capote

I have no opposition at all to technology. I think technology is a wonderful thing that has to be used thoughtfully, and we can't just assume that every bit of new technology improvesthe quality of life; it's really in how the technology is used. What I am very disturbed about is this trend of everything happening faster and faster and faster and there being more and more general noise in the world, and less and less time for quiet reflection on who we are, and where we're going. — Alan Lightman

Boys", Buffy hissed through clenched teeth, "being quiet is an important part of sneaking."
"Oh, sorry", Xander said, reducing his voice to a whisper.
"Besides, ritual sacrifice is a religious rite", Giles went on quietly. "They wouldn't sacrifice just anyone at random. It's far more likely they'd suspect you of being a Roman spy scouting for the invasion and just outright kill you".
"Oh great! Great! Way to be encouraging Giles. And I suppose you'll just watch that happen, in your Watchery way. — Alice Henderson

Listening is about being present, not just about being quiet. I meet others with the life I've lived, not just with my questions. — Krista Tippett

I began telling stories as a volunteer in my daughters' school. But I grew up hearing stories from Cuban and Southern storytellers, and I learned a great deal by just being quiet and listening. — Carmen Agra Deedy

After the sudden release of the laughter, he was trembling. All his body seemed growing weak. He felt, almost physically, more barriers breaking
those necessary barriers of defense, built up through the months of loneliness and desperation. He must touch another human being, and he put forward his hand in the old conventional gesture of the handshake. She took it, and doubtless as she noticed his trembling, she drew him toward a chair and almost pushed him into it. As he sat down, she patted his shoulder lightly.
She spoke again, once more neither questioning nor commanding: "I'll get you something to eat."
He did not protest, though he had just eaten heartily. But he knew that behind her quiet affirmation lay something more than any call of the body for food. There was need now for the symbolic eating together, that first common bond of human beings
the sitting at the same table, the sharing of bread and salt. — George R. Stewart

My least favorite form of street harassment is when a guy asks why I'm not smiling. It's related to that: Women aren't allowed to be quiet or stoic or shy - or, hell, just in a bad mood - without being criticized. Women are bitchy and frigid if we don't seem accessible at all times, for the most part to men. We're supposed to be perpetually friendly. Who wants to live up to that? And seriously, when was the last time you heard a quiet woman described as "deep"?
Men who are serious are just that - serious. Think laconic cowboys and Clint Eastwood-style movie heroes. Strong and silent is a desirable personality trait for men - women, not so much. Because where silence in men is seen as strength, silence in women (if not seen as bitchy) is seen as weakness - she's shy, a wallflower. — Jessica Valenti

I would be in a room full of people being loud and running around, and I'd be in the corner just playing with the wall. So I was very, very quiet, but when I really got into the arts, that opened me up. — Harry Shum Jr.

You'll be going back to Tokyo before much longer," Midorikawa quietly stated. "And you'll return to real life. You need to live life to the fullest. No matter how shallow and dull things might get, this life is worth living. I guarantee it. And I'm not being either ironic or paradoxical. It's just that, for me, what's worthwhile in life has become a burden, something I can't shoulder anymore. Maybe I'm just not cut out for it. So, like a dying cat, I've crawled into a quiet, dark place, silently waiting for my time to come. It's not so bad. But you're different. You should be able to handle what life sends your way. You need to use the thread of logic, as best as you can, to skillfully sew onto yourself everything that's worth living for. — Haruki Murakami

There in the dark and the quiet I felt I could forget all the tedious particulars and just feel the presence of his mortal and immortal being. — Marilynne Robinson

If I am good enough and quiet enough, perhaps after all they will let me go; but it's not easy being quiet and good, it's like hanging on to the edge of a bridge when you've already fallen over; you don't seem to be moving, just dangling there, and yet it is taking all your strength. — Margaret Atwood

Okay. Let me rephrase. Sometimes being crazy is a demon. And sometimes the demon is me. And I visit quiet sidewalks and loud parties and dark movies, and a small demon looks out at the world with me. Sometimes it sleeps. Sometimes it plays. Sometimes it laughs with me. Sometimes it tries to kill me. But it's always with me. I suppose we're all possessed in some way. Some of us with dependence on pills or wine. Others through sex or gambling. Some of us through self-destruction or anger or fear. And some of us just carry around our tiny demon as he wreaks havoc in our mind, tearing open old dusty trunks of bad memories and leaving the remnants spread everywhere. — Jenny Lawson

I felt very unstressed on my wedding day. I'm very grateful for that ... spending the day on my own, being super quiet and happy and just puttering around doing my own thing. — Sonya Walger

Are there any other questions?"
I cleared my throat. "Yeah," I replied, raising my voice. "Can I get paid for being the repeat victim in these practice runs? It's not easy, you know, getting tied up or stuffed inside
something, while everyone figures out what catchphrases to use when destroying people."
For a few seconds, Magnifiman was quiet. "Okay, are there any other questions?" he asked.
I sighed, my shoulders drooping. "I'll have to take this up with my union," I said. Of course, I just needed to form one. — Hayden Thorne

I'd write and read and let myself, a little at a time, step down into myself- like a stairway down into a dark, intimate kiva- where the work of vigil is taking place, the necessary attending. I imagine there's a little fire burning in there, a few steadily glowing embers, and a quiet chant going on, from me, from some singer in me, honoring and accompanying W's soul, which is with him as he is making his passage..there's a leavetaking in process, a movement towards increasing simplicity, away from complexity, activity, expectation. The bout of paranoia, with a childlike quality of being threatened, seems part of that-like a day or two when he couldn't just let go and float on the energies of other people, who are bearing him up-but had to doubt them, struggle. So much better when he can trust and float. There's enough love around him to carry him now ... — Mark Doty

I remember being forced to go to Sunday school for a number of years, even though my parents were not religious. No one was really religious; it was just the framework. There was no passion for it. No passion for anything. Just a quiet, kind of floaty, kind of semi-oppressive, blank palette that youre living in. — Tim Burton

I've got to be able to get my time off whether it's just enjoying my house or the peace and quiet of my family and being there and cooking for them. I love doing that. I also love doing leisure things. I ride horses. I love to shop. I love to drive! — LisaRaye McCoy-Misick

We sat on the picnic bench, not talking, not looking at each other, but being quiet and okay. The rain was almost gone, nothing but a thin chilly fog. For now, I just wanted to sit on the picnic bench with him and not be anything but fine and uncomplicated. — Brenna Yovanoff

To me the great divide is between the talkative and the quiet. Do they just say everything that's on their minds, even before it's on their minds? Sometimes I think I could just turn up my head like a Walkman so what's going on there could be heard by others. But there would still be a difference. For inside the head they are talking to people like them, and I am talking to someone like me: he is quiet and doesn't much like being talked at; he can't conceal how easily he gets bored. — James Richardson

Sometimes being crazy is a demon. And sometimes the demon is me. And I visit quiet sidewalks and loud parties and dark movies, and a small demon looks out at the world with me. Sometimes it sleeps. Sometimes it plays. Sometimes it laughs with me. Sometimes it tries to kill me. But it's always with me. I suppose we're all possessed in some way. Some of us with dependence on pills or wine. Others through sex or gambling. Some of us through self-destruction or anger or fear. And some of us just carry around our tiny demon as he wreaks havoc in our mind, tearing open old dusty trunks of bad memories and leaving the remnants spread everywhere. Wearing the skins of people we've hurt. Wearing the skins of people we've loved. And sometimes, when it's worst, wearing our skins. — Jenny Lawson

Losing this part of my life, this time of being a mother to growing children, is indeed an ending. For months, I've carried that quiet sorrow, getting used to its heaviness, the way one learns to live with the chronic soreness of a joint, a tenderness in wrist or knee. What I long to do now is to let the sadness go as well, to have faith that even as my sons graduate from high school and leave home, and this phase of our family life draws to a close, there will be new beginnings not just for them, but for all of us. — Katrina Kenison

I think that people with autism are born outside the regime of civilization. Sure, this is just my own made-up theory, but I think that, as a result of all the killings in the world and the selfish planet-wrecking that humanity has committed, a deep sense of crisis exists. Autism has somehow arisen out of this. Although people with autism look like other people physically, we are in fact very different in many ways. We are more like travelers from the distant, distant past. And if, by our being here, we could help the people of the world remember what truly matters for the Earth, that would give us a quiet pleasure. — Naoki Higashida

We can quiet our minds enough to tune in to what our bodies are telling us - I believe in angels - and we need to listen to the messages being sent. They are real messages - just as real as a human saying something to you. — Zoe McLellan

I am a really quiet person. I just like to be with my children and my family and being home. I live one day at a time, enjoying the best of life, just living. — Miguel Cotto

I am most grateful for company this evening, even of the quiet variety. I am no great conversationalist, myself."
Gray snorted. Not a conversationalist. The girl had coaxed the life story out of every sailor in this ship.
She had just picked up her spoon again when Joss spoke.
"You do not find the voyage too tedious, Miss Turner?" Joss asked. "I regret that you are left to entertain yourself, being the sole passenger."
She laid down her spoon. "Thank you, Captain, but I find sufficient activity to occupy my hands and my mind. Reading, sketching, walking the deck for fresh air and healthful exertion. I'm surprisingly content, living at sea."
Gray's heart gave an odd kick. — Tessa Dare

Personally, I felt pretty safe. Librarians are like priests. You can tell them you want information on just about any subject and they never look at you weird. It's like a rule or something. I figured even in a small town like this, my question wouldn't be the strangest one the librarian had heard. I didn't know if librarians had any sort of official privacy code, but I was counting on confidence. They're not big talkers. It comes from being forced to be quiet all the time. — Eileen Cook

I could stand in the middle of Front Street shrieking like a banshee and nobody would notice me. You don't need magic to be invisible in a town like this. Being poor works just the same. So stand behind me and think quiet thoughts. — C.M. Hayden

Truth is, I'm generally happiest when it's just me. It's okay to be madly in love with yourself. — Richelle E. Goodrich

I believe I'm not in the press, just in terms of being photographed and paparazzi all the time, or looking for that sensationalistic type of side or anything like that, so I keep things very quiet. — Dwayne Johnson

It was beautiful not despite but because of the friction it has had to endure. It had been thrashed around, but instead of being destroyed, it was improved with every scratch and scrape, sculpted. In fact, the scuffs themselves are what gave it its quiet splendor; they are responsible for turning a simple piece of glass (which could have just as easily been trash) into a gem. It wouldn't be the same without the wear and tear; it wouldn't be something pretty enough to be turned into jewelry if it hadn't been damn near broken. I closed my fist around this tear-shaped gem and thought about my own uneven edges, my own abrasions, and things I have endured that have, instead of breaking me, completed me, prepared me for the next tumble. Its odd beauty was hard-won. It came from reinventing itself. From having risen to the top of the discard pile. Like a phoenix, from victim to victor. (325) — Wendy Blackburn

I have got so low that I have asked to be hospitalized and for deep narcosis (sleep). I cannot stand being awake. The pain is too much ... Something has happened to me, this vital spark has stopped burning - I go to a dinner table now and I don't say a word, just sit there like a dodo. Normally I am the centre of attention, keeps the conversation going, - so that is depressing in itself. It's like another person taking over, very strange. The most important thing I say is 'good evening' and then I go quiet. — Spike Milligan

I remember as a very young child being warned that libraries and bookstores were quiet places where noise wasn't allowed. Here was yet another thing the adults had gotten wrong, for these book houses pulsed with sounds; they just weren't noisy. The books hummed. The collective noise they made was like riding on a large boat where the motor's steady thrum and tickle vibrated below one's sneakers, ignorable until you listened, then omnipresent and relentless, the sound that carried you forward. Each book brimmed with noises it wanted to make inside your head the moment you opened it; only the shut covers prevented it from shouting ideas, impulses, proverbs, and plots into that sterile silence. — Wendy Welch

Listening Without Thought I do not know whether you have listened to a bird. To listen to something demands that your mind be quiet - not a mystical quietness, but just quietness. I am telling you something, and to listen to me you have to be quiet, not have all kinds of ideas buzzing in your mind. When you look at a flower, you look at it, not naming it, not classifying it, not saying that it belongs to a certain species - when you do these, you cease to look at it. Therefore, I am saying that it is one of the most difficult things to listen - to listen to the communist, to the socialist, to the congressman, to the capitalist, to anybody, to your wife, to your children, to your neighbor, to the bus conductor, to the bird - just to listen. It is only when you listen without the idea, without thought, that you are directly in contact; and being in contact, you will understand whether what he is saying is true or false; you do not have to discuss. JANUARY 4 — Jiddu Krishnamurti