Just When You Thought Life Quotes & Sayings

Lincoln," Sam had asked him on one of those nights, the summer before their senior year, "do you think we'll get married some day?"
"I hope so," he'd whispered. He didn't usually think about it like that, like "married." He thought about how he never wanted to be without her. About how happy she made him and how he wanted to go on being that happy for the rest of his life. If a wedding could promise him that, he definitely wanted to get married.
"Wouldn't it be romantic," she said, "to marry your high school sweetheart? When people ask us how we met I'll say, 'We met in high school. I saw him, and I just knew.' And they'll say, 'Didn't you
ever wonder what it would be like to be with someone else? — Rainbow Rowell

...I'm insane, Jorie thought. She saw herself lying in a hospital bed, her wallet and valuables gone. When asked why she got into a car with a woman she didn't know, her reply would land her in the psych ward. Well, you see, I have this fantasy lover because, frankly, they're so much easier to deal with. She never makes a mess, loves my demonic cat, always says the right thing at the right time. I saw this woman, and she was my dream come to life, so I just had to get into the car with her because I'm an idiot... — Robin Alexander

When you start becoming a pop star, you think, Hold on a second, maybe my life is different now - maybe all these people that I thought of as celebrities are going to be normal, and when I walk into a room I'm going to be really cool and so is everyone else. But that's not what happens at all - I was awkward, and then I just retreated from any social engagement for about a year. — Matthew Healy

It's about reaching that moment of pure ecstasy when a drawing just happens. Where every move you make with your hand and every thought you have in your head grows in front of you without any mistakes; no rubbing out, starting again and getting frustrated. It's like being in a trance - it's a fluid - and you almost don't remember doing the picture. Drawing is an escape from all the unnecessary things in life that get in the way of being free. — Jamie Hewlett

Alice kept thinking about that passage from one part of life to another. She kept thinking, Is this it? Will I know if it is? Will I be ready?Will I make it across? Will I chicken out? Will I know when I'm saying goodbye? When I look back, will I still be able to see what I've left behind? She thought she would know when it happened.But now, as she looked around, she wondered if it was really like that at all. Maybe it happened in a million different ways, when you were thinking of it and you weren't. Maybe there was no gap, no jump, no chasm. You didn't forget yourself all at once. Maybe you just looked around one time or another and you thought, Hey. And there you were. — Ann Brashares

Do you have a leather jacket? One for a ten-year-old boy?" I asked the man selling leather jackets and gloves in Covent Garden, London. "Yes, I have one right here!" And the man dug out a fine leather jacket that looked styled and tailored for a young boy. "I'm buying this for my son" I said to him. "I love this jacket, it's perfect, I think I will just come back for it tomorrow, though! I'll be back tomorrow, okay?" And the man reached his arms above his head, and said with a big smile upon his face "You only have one life to live! What is the difference if you do something today, or if you do it tomorrow?" I thought about the man's words. And I bought the jacket. He was right, there is no difference, really, between doing something today and doing something tomorrow, when you only have one life to live! Afterall, tomorrow may never come! All you really have is today! — C. JoyBell C.

I thought that somehow your life would be much different when you're famous ... and it's not. You just buy more stuff. — Nicole Sullivan

Exactly. The dots guy. I've always thought getting older was a bit like looking at those paintings. You're born, and that's when you're standing right up next to the canvas. Nothing makes any sense. There's just a lot of light and color. But as you get older, you begin to back away, and that's when the image starts to cohere. All those little spots of color turn into flowers, or people, or dogs. You gain perspective. — Tommy Wallach

Anyone who meets you and doesn't want to get to know you and be part of your life is stupid. I saw it when I was just a kid."
"No. You thought I was a vampire and you wanted to be my friend so I wouldn't eat you."
"Well, that too. But I found out soon enough you weren't a blood sucker and I still licked you. — Abbi Glines

Cam restored her clothing slowly, his strong hands lifting her from the beech. Crushing her close, he muttered something incomprehensible against her hair. Another spell to bind her, she thought hazily, her cheek pressed to his smooth, hard chest. "You're speaking in Romany," she mumbled.
Cam switched to English. "Amelia, I - " He stopped, as if the right words eluded him. "I can't stop myself from being jealous, any more than I can stop being half Roma. But I'll try not to be overbearing. Just say you'll be my wife."
"Please," Amelia whispered, her wits still scattered, "let me answer later. When I can think clearly."
"You do too much thinking." He kissed the top of her head. "I can't promise you a perfect life. But I can promise that no matter what happens, I'll give you everything I have. We'll be together. You inside me ... me inside you. — Lisa Kleypas

I thought you people were supposed to be good at math."
"Yes, my people all do math for fun, while simultaneously dry-cleaning our karate outfits and giving each other manicures and pedicures, all in between our numerous piano and violin recitals," I said, slamming his book shut. "Do you own freaking work. Although I guess that's a completely foreign concept to you, isn't it? Since you've been deep-throating a silver spoon your whole life."
"That is so hot that you just said that," Camden said, lazily swiggin his Red Bull. "Besides, I'll work one of these days when I have to. I'll either go into real estate like my dad or find some rich old widow who wants...uh...services."
"That doesn't sound like work," I said.
"Of course it is, if she's old," he answered. — Cherry Cheva

Have you ever confused a dream with life? Or stolen something when you have the cash? Have you ever been blue? Or thought your train moving while sitting still? Maybe I was just crazy. Maybe it was the 60's. Or maybe I was just a girl ... interrupted. — Susanna Kaysen

Don't fall in love with me. Not unless you're ready for a God damn fight. I don't do fragility, or friction and fairy tales. I want you to be irrational because I'm irrational. Be bold. Speak your mind. I want your wildfires and obscenities. I want your passion and priorities. Protect what's yours. I'll defend what's ours. Let us fight against routines and bad habits, and anything typical. And don't you dare quit. Not on us, not on yourself. God help the person who threatens us. Forgive me when I let you down, but don't overlook it, or allow it. We're all insecure about something. Show me yours. We're all terrified sometimes. Turn to me. People come in and out of my life so often and easily that I just look for a love that stays. I don't mind your blemishes or scars, I have a few of my own. Don't be another flash in the pan. Falling for me will be easy. Staying with me will be impossible. But you deserve a love that most people don't believe in anymore. — J. Raymond

My grandfather was crying. The kind of quiet that is quiet and a secret. The kind of crying that only I noticed. I thought about him going into my mom's room when she was little and hitting my mom and holding up her report card and saying that her bad grades would never happen again. And I think now that maybe he meant my older brother. Or my sister. Or me. That he would make sure that he was the one to work in a mill. I don't know if that's good or bad. I don't know if it's better to have your kids be happy and not go to college. I don't know if it's better to be close with your daughter or make sure she has a better life than you do. I just don't know. — Stephen Chbosky

I thought of kissing Astrid under the fire escape. I thought of Norm's rusty microbus and of his father, Cicero, sitting on the busted-down sofa in his old trailer, rolling dope in Zig-Zag papers and telling me if I wanted to get my license first crack out of the basket, I'd better cut my fucking hair. I thought of playing teen dances at the Auburn RolloDrome, and how we never stopped when the inevitable fights broke out between the kids from Edward Little and Lisbon High, or those from Lewiston High and St. Dom's; we just turned it up louder. I thought of how life had been before I realized I was a frog in a pot. I shouted: "One, two, you-know-what-to-do!" We kicked it in. Key of E. All that shit starts in E. — Stephen King

I am a deeply uncertain individual. I often find myself acting like a fool to make the people around me laugh. When they're laughing, they're not watching me quite as closely. I smile to put people at ease. But what if I opened my mouth one day, spoke my actual thoughts, and the people glared at my opinions? What if they thought me disgusting or frightening or ugly because of my words? Would you keep your lips shut for the rest of your life to not face that judgment? Just for the sake of someone else's comfort? For these strangers, who I will never know? If I can't speak then I'll write. These strangers, whose opinions crush me, will be forced to listen. Because when they read my words those words will make a home within their heads. They may even end up using my own opinions against me. But at least I'll be hidden behind the pages of a book. — F.K. Preston

You always hear people talk about how there are moments in your life when you just know that things will never be the same. I always thought that was all horseshit. But here, now, with the feeling of her soft, incredible lips moving with mine, I know that it happens. — Steph Campbell

When an experience is so powerful that it motivates people to change the whole pattern of their lives, we call that a breakthrough, or an epiphany. The value of an epiphany doesn't lie just in some new or exciting insight. You might be walking down the street and pass a stranger. Your eyes meet, and for some reason there is a connection. It isn't sexual or romantic or even a suspicion that this person could mean something in your life. Instead, the epiphany is that you are that stranger - your experiencer merges with his. Call this a feeling or a thought, it doesn't matter which - it's the sudden expansion that counts. You are flung outside your narrow boundaries, if only for a moment, and that makes all the difference. You have tasted a hidden dimension. Compared to the habit of shutting yourself behind the walls of ego, this new dimension feels freer and lighter. You have a sense that your body can't contain you anymore. — Deepak Chopra

So the next day I asked Dan how is it that Bubba can get killed, and what kind of half assed nature law would allow that. He thought about it for a while, and said, 'Well, I'll tell you, Forrest, all of these laws are not specially pleasing to us. But there is laws nonetheless. Like when a tiger pounce on a monkey in the jungle - bad for the money, but good for the tiger. That is just the way it is. — Winston Groom

Carol would not be a bad one to [settle down] with. She's pretty and bright, and maybe this is what love is. She's good company: her interests broaden almost every day. She reads three books to my one, and I read a lot. We talk far into the night. She still doesn't understand the first edition game: Hemingway, she says, reads just as well in a two-bit paperback as he does in a $500 first printing. I can still hear myself lecturing her the first time she said that. Only a fool would read a first edition. Simply having such a book makes life in general and Hemingway in particular go better when you do break out the reading copies. I listened to myself and thought, This woman must think I'm a government-inspected horse's ass. Then I showed her my Faulkners, one with a signature, and I saw her shiver with an almost sexual pleasure as she touched the paper where he signed. Faulkner was her most recent god[.] — John Dunning

When I started to be published I thought about Margaret Bourke-White and the whole journalistic approach to things. I believed I was supposed to catch life going by me - that I wasn't to alter it or tamper with it - that I was just to watch what was going on and report it as best I could. This shoot with John was different. I got involved, and I realized that you can't help but be touched by what goes on in front of you. I no longer believe that there is such a thing as objectivity. — Annie Leibovitz

My life is very monotonous," the fox said. "I hunt chickens: men hunt me. All the chickens are just alike, and all the men are just alike. And, in consequence, I am a little bored. But if you tame me, it will be as if the sun came to shine on my life. I shall know the sound of a step that will be different from all the others. Other steps send me hurrying back underneath the ground. Yours will call me, like music, out of my burrow. And then look: you see the grain fields down yonder? [ ... ] The wheat fields have nothing to say to me. And that is sad. But you have hair that is the color of gold. Think how wonderful that will be when you have tamed me! The grain, which is also golden, will bring me back to the thought of you. And I shall love to listen to the wheat in the wind ... — Antoine De Saint-Exupery

And I've always felt comfortable certainly in a courtroom because you're just performing. And there was a time in my life when I thought when I grew up I'd be a trial lawyer myself. — Scott Bakula

Forgetting who you are and where you are and if you're there. Getting lost in the thought that you might be imagining everything, you might be dreaming your life. You look at your hand in front of your face, surrounded by light, and your heart thrums as you think: I'm dreaming, I'm not even here, I don't exist. It is too fascinating, the thought that you aren't. The thought that if you watch the lake long enough you might disappear into the white flames of light on the blue, which seem to be just inches from your face. It sucks you in, and you stare, only a little afraid. And then you scream, startled, when your mother comes through the door. You crash back to earth. It's dark. It's evening. You're here and your mother is looking at you asking, What? — Marya Hornbacher

It concerns me when I see a small child watching the hero shoot the villain on television. It is teaching the small child to believe that shooting people is heroic. The hero just did it and it was effective. It was acceptable and the hero was well thought of afterward. If enough of us find inner peace to affect the institution of television, the little child will see the hero transform the villain and bring him to a good life. He'll see the hero do something significant to serve fellow human beings. So little children will get the idea that if you want to be a hero you must help people. — Peace Pilgrim

Logan thought for a minute. "Well, if you enjoy life while you have it, then it doesn't matter how long you have it for. No one knows how long they get to live. It's like a deal you make when you're born, you know, to accept what happens to you."
"Is that what you do, just accept what happens?"
Logan shrugged. "I guess so. What else can you do?"
"Well, you can dwell on it and play it over in your head a hundred different ways."
Logan tilted his head. "Does that help?"
Miles sighed. "No. — Wendy Mass

People, by nature, have a tendency to snap. We get upset at things. We get angry. I'm sure everybody has said, once or twice in their life, "God, I just want to kill you!" That's just a thought that we have. That's a natural thought. It is only when people act upon that, that it becomes this huge deal. — Edwin Hodge

Pico Iyer: And at some point, I thought, well, I've been really lucky to see many, many places. Now, the great adventure is the inner world, now that I've spent a lot of time gathering emotions, impressions, and experiences. Now, I just want to sit still for years on end, really, charting that inner landscape because I think anybody who travels knows that you're not really doing so in order to move around - you're traveling in order to be moved. And really what you're seeing is not just the Grand Canyon or the Great Wall but some moods or intimations or places inside yourself that you never ordinarily see when you're sleepwalking through your daily life. I thought, there's this great undiscovered terrain that Henry David Thoreau and Thomas Merton and Emily Dickinson fearlessly investigated, and I want to follow in their footsteps. — Krista Tippett

I said, "I don't think I can give you that kind of emotion." And he [Hitchcock] sat there and said, "Ingrid, fake it!" Well, that was the best advice I've had in my whole life, because in all the years to come there were many directors who gave me what I thought were quite impossible instructions and many difficult things to do, and just when I was on the verge of starting to argue with them, I heard his voice coming to me through the air saying, "Ingrid, fake it!" It saved a lot of unpleasant situations and waste of time. — Ingrid Bergman

You scared me the moment I saw you, and I think it's because I knew, I just knew, I was going to fall in love you. I didn't know our worlds were already intertwined, but my heart somehow knew it belonged to you from the start. I didn't believe a pain so deep existed while we were apart, but I also didn't believe a love like ours existed. You've shown me it does. You've shown me good when there was bad. You've given me pleasure above all of my pain. You've given me life when I thought I was dead. — Gail McHugh

Just when I thought life was over you came into my life. — Jon Jones

You have a very peculiar expression on your face,' he commented drowsily.
'I was just thinking.'
'About what?'
'About how we know what's real. How we wake out of a timeless place and recognize time. How you know me here, now, even when nothing or anyone else in this place is familiar. I might have been wandering through your dream, but you knew immediately which of me will bring you paper.'
He was silent for so long, still clasping her wrist, that she thought he must have fallen asleep without knowing it. He said finally, 'Say that again.'
'I can't,' she answered helplessly. 'It was just a thought. I gave it to you.'
'Something about dreams coming to life--'
'That's not what I said. — Patricia A. McKillip

Annabeth," he said hesitantly, "in New Rome, demigods can live their whole lives in peace."
Her expression turned guarded. "Reyna explained it to me. But, Percy, you belong at Camp Half-Blood. That other life - "
"I know," Percy said. "But while I was there, I saw so many demigods living without fear: kids going to college, couples getting married and raising families. There's nothing like that at Camp Half-Blood. I kept thinking about you and me ... and maybe someday when this war with the giants is over ... "
It was hard to tell in the golden light, but he thought Annabeth was blushing. "Oh," she said ...
"I'm sorry," he said. "I just ... I had to think of that to keep going. To give me hope. Forget I mentioned - "
"No!" she said. "Gods, Percy, that's so sweet. — Rick Riordan

A city finds its life through the humans who inhabit it. When they go, what is truly left? Just silent stones, witnesses to the history but mute in its telling, remaining thus while slowly turning to rubble. It saddens me that life's moments are thus lost, that one cannot experience the past in the same rich vibrancy as the present. You live the moments and then relegate them to memory, now just two-dimensional shadows, pictures without depth, stripped of their purest emotion, their tactile connections no longer accessible. You try to recall, but can bring back only a fraction of the event lived. The rest is gone, never to be as full and complete as it was in that one place at that one time. That was what I thought as I studied these stone remains; that all the tangible things experienced here abide somewhere in time, but can never again be wholly re-animated, now just ghosts imbedded in the crumbling walls and in the fading memories of those who once lived here. — Michael Puttonen

Just another day in my life. This was one of those days when I thought that maybe a new life, a different life, wouldn't be so bad. But where the hell had I put the receipt, and could you return something that was over twenty years old? Where do you go to get a new life when your old one has you so puzzled you don't know how to fix it? Wish I knew. — Laurell K. Hamilton

It doesn't matter," Min said. "That's what I'm trying to tell you, it doesn't matter what you do or say. I'm going to love you till the end of time."
Cal looked at her, stunned.
"I know," Min said. "It's really un-PC. I just thought you should know that you can't screw this up."
"I can't?" Cal said, wanting to believe her.
"No," Min said. "Which doesn't mean I'm not going to tell if you make me mad again. I will shout and slam doors. I just won't be on the other side of the door when I slam it. You've got me for life."
He lost his breath and put his forehead against her shoulder. "God, I love you. — Jennifer Crusie

When I was younger, I thought you had to be in control of your own life. That takes a lot of discipline, hard work and focus. You just can't let it all fall by the wayside. Later on, I learned that God is really in control of everything. But you still have to put your best foot forward and be the best you can possibly be. — Janet Jackson

Sometimes, when I play music, I feel as if I am giving life ... It isn't just notes on the paper anymore: you are recreating the thought, transmitting it. It becomes shareable, but it can never be kept. You go through and at the same time you let go of the experience. That is part of the wonder of music: it can never be kept; it is ephemeral and at the same time enduring. — Hephzibah Menuhin

I thought I knew this world. I thought I could control it. But just when you think you've got your life by the reins, that's when it's most likely to run away from you. — Jodi Picoult

I had never thought I could love another person this much. I also never thought I'd live in such fear of losing another person. Was this how everyone in love felt? Did they all cling tightly to their beloved and wake up terrified in the middle of the night, afraid of being alone? Was that an inevitable way of life when you loved so deeply? Or was it just those of us who walked on a precipice who lived in such panic? — Richelle Mead

When I decided to follow Jesus that night in Atlanta, I assumed that becoming a Christian would make life easier. I thought the rest of my life would be smiling and smooth sailing. I assumed I wouldn't be tempted by women and partying and acceptance and all the things that I'd been a slave to for so many years. I thought I would walk around with a continual inner peace and serenity like Gandhi or something. This turns out to be a lie that too many people believe. You'll actually experience more temptation, not less, after you become a Christian. Following Jesus doesn't mean you'll start living perfectly overnight. It certainly doesn't mean that your problems will disappear. Rather than ridding you of problems or temptations, following Jesus just means that you have a place - no, a person - to run to when they come. And the power to overcome them. — Lecrae Moore

I kept thinking of an old Robert Mitchum cowboy movie where he goes back to see the farmhouse where he was born and finds the house falling apart and an old man living in it by himself. "Lonely place," Robert Mitchum says. The old man says, "Nothing wrong with a lonely place as long as it's private. That's why I never married. Marriage is lonely, but it ain't private." That was always my most intense fear about getting married: When everything sucked and I was by myself, I thought, Well, at least I don't have another miserable person to worry about. I figured if you gave up your private place and it still turns out to be lonely, you're just screwed. — Rob Sheffield

I knew you could know the words but not match them with the life. But to be able to do it right said something about you. And I didn't know if my judgment was good enough, or exactly what was good or bad. Though there must be times, I thought, when there was no right thing to know, just as there were times when there was no right thing to do. — Richard Ford

What's your name again?"
"Peter. Peter Granford."
Lewis opened up his mouth to speak, but then just shook his head.
"What?" The boy ducked his head. "You just, uh, looked like you were going to say something
important."
Lewis looked at this namesake, at the way he stood with his shoulders rounded, as if he did not
deserve so much space in this world. He felt that familiar pain that fell like a hammer on his
breastbone whenever he thought of Peter, of a life that would be lost to prison. He wished he'd
taken more time to look at Peter when Peter was right in front of his eyes, because now he would be
forced to compensate with imperfect memories or-even worse-to find his son in the faces of
strangers.
Lewis reached deep inside and unraveled the smile that he saved for moments like this, when there
was absolutely nothing to be happy about. "It was important," he said. "You remind me of someone
I used to know. — Jodi Picoult

If you constantly go back over your life and focus on the difficulties from the past, you are just bringing more difficult circumstances to you now.
When you think back over your life, let go of all the things you don't love about your life, let go of all the things you don't love about your childhood and keep only the things you love. Let go of the things you don't love about your adolescent and adult years and keep only the good things. When you do, you'll discover that you begin to feel happier and happier.
The more positive thoughts you entertain, the more you notice the things that you love and that make you feel good, and the happier you become.

Like attracts like, and when you're happy, you attract happy people, circumstances, and events into your life. This is how your life changes - one happy thought at a time! — Rhonda Byrne

I will tell you what I have learned myself. For me, a long five- or six-mile walk helps. And one must go alone and every day. I have done this for many years. It is at these times I seem to get re-charged. If I do not walk one day, I seem to have on the next what van Gogh calls "the meagerness.""The meagerness," he said, "or what is called depression." After a day or two of not walking, when I try to write I feel a little dull and irresolute. For a long time I thought that the dullness was just due to the asphyxiation of an indoor, sedentary life (which all people who do not move around a great deal in the open air suffer from, though they do not know it). — Brenda Ueland

Truth is, life is going shake you, it will rip you right out of your comfort zone;just when you feel settled, it will shock you with some trauma and make you face adversity in the most undesirable of ways ... And here is the question of it all? What's it all for ... Not many search long enough to know but the wise ask you.. Are you going to be a slave to your journey or the pioneer to your dream, if God handed you a lesson ;he knew before your time, your strength could endure i. so next time you doubt another thought or feed your heart with negative emotions think about it ... You are here, alive, breathing and if that's not enough than you should think about what is. — Nikki Rowe

Be careful, Alexandra, you're beginning to sound like the type of young lady who wants all those things typical young females want," Ella said with warning in her voice, her nose wrinkled, "marriage, children, a house in Surrey." "What's wrong with wanting marriage and children?" Vivi asked. "I want those things. Not Surrey," she said with a raised finger, "but the rest." "True, but with you, it's different. You're pining after The One." Ella said the last with an exaggerated swoon, which Vivi ignored. "Well, maybe Blackmoor is Alex's One." Ella turned an incredulous look on Alex. "Really?" They both turned questioning looks on Alex, who thought for a moment before speaking. Was Gavin The One? Could she imagine spending the rest of her life with him? Certainly, his mere presence set her heart racing. When he flashed one of his private, conspiratorial grins, she wanted to stop whatever she was doing and just bask in the glow of his attention. — Sarah MacLean

The script changed so much over seven months and just had loads and loads of re-writes. I tried to tailor things to what I was interested in, like the relationship with the dad changed quite a lot because I thought one of the things when you're a young guy one of your biggest fears is this irrational fear of walking in your dad's footsteps and living the same life as him. I thought, even if your dad's a good guy, you just want to assert your independence on everything and it causes these irrational sort of rages. — Robert Pattinson

Akinli, this strange boy whose life at the moment seemed to be hanging on this, pushed himself from the bed.
Julie gasped, watching as his arms trembled under his weight, even as thin as he was. He crushed his eyes together in concentration, willing himself up.
I heard Ben whisper to himself, "Come on, come on, come on."
When Akinli, breathing as if he truly had just run a marathon, was fairly close to upright, he held out an arm for me.
I fell into it fearlessly.
We leaned into each other, neither of us strong enough to stay up on our own.
"I thought I'd never see you sit up again," Julie cried.
We both turned to her, smiling at the happy tears on her face. — Kiera Cass

A sentimentalist is simply one who wants to have the luxury of an emotion without paying for it. We think we can have our emotions for nothing. We cannot. Even the finest and most self-sacrificing emotions have to be paid for. Strangely enough, that is what makes them fine. The intellectual and emotional life of ordinary people is a very contemptible affair. Just as they borrow their ideas from a sort of circulating library of thought - -the Zeitgeist of an age that has no soul - -and send them back soiled at the end of each week, so they always try to get their emotions on credit, and refuse to pay the bill when it comes in. You should pass out of that conception of life. As soon as you have to pay for an emotion you will know its quality, and be the better for such knowledge. And remember that the sentimentalist is always a cynic at heart. Indeed, sentimentality is merely the bank holiday of cynicism. — Oscar Wilde

Be spontaneous! When was the last time you did something completely out of character? You have to open yourself to trying new things, especially those that you may previously never have thought of doing, or had been too hesitant to attempt. This is how you open doors of opportunity for positive growth. When we try new experiences, we allow ourselves to feel again. Everything in life can't be planned. Sometimes you just need to let your hair down and live in the moment. Being spontaneous will keep your life interesting and exciting. So instead of saying no, start saying yes! — Anonymous

But there was a discipline, it was just that we didn't understand. We thought he was formless, but I think now he was tormented by order, what was outside it. He tore apart the plot - see his music was immediately on top of his own life. Echoing. As if, when he was playing he was lost and hunting for the right accidental notes. Listening to him was like talking to Coleman. You were both changing direction with every sentence, sometimes in the middle, using each other as a springboard through the dark. You were moving so fast it was unimportant to finish and clear everything. He would be describing something in 27 ways. There was pain and gentleness everything jammed into each number. — Michael Ondaatje

He thought that maybe when you're making your way forward into your life, it just looks higgledy-piggledy, the way, if you were a fly walking across one of Beautiful Girl's drawings all you'd be able to see was green, then blue, then yellow. Only if you got in the air before the swat came down would you see the colors belonged to a big drawing, with the green for this part of the picture, the blue and yellow for others, every color being just where if was meant to be. Could that be what life was? — Rachel Simon

Our lives are so short and during that short period there is nothing to learn about the whole field of the psyche, which is the movement of memory; we can only observe it. Observe without any movement of thought, observe without time, without past knowledge, without the observer who is the essence of the past. Just watch. Watch those clouds shaping and reshaping, watch the trees, the little birds. It is all part of life. When you watch attentively, with diligence, there is nothing to learn; there is only that vast space, silence and emptiness, which is all-consuming energy. — Jiddu Krishnamurti

We'd already talked in the stacks, and I knew you were different from any other girl I'd met. And you told me that your parents were dead, and I thought that you were so ... lost and vulnerable. So when I saw you in the physics lab ... and I saw you try and take care of someone that you thought who had been through what you'd been through; could be that ... well, generous, and thoughtfull ... " Guy said.
"But you hardly knew me." said Willow
"I know ... I didn't know that we'd even talk again, or that if we did, if we'd get along, or maybe you were seeing someone else ... I just knew that the way you tried to protect someone's life that, especially given your situation ... I just ... I though that you had to be the most special girl I would ever meet ... — Julia Hoban

I moved here when I was 20 to go to college. After I moved here, I became much more aware of the importance of the culture and literature to my life. Sometimes when you're immersed in something, you just don't notice it very much. Moving away makes you appreciate your culture. Living here, I've thought more and more about India, and what being Indian-American means to me. And it's made me incorporate things from Indian literature into my own writing. — Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni

He rolled her over, rising above her, cupping her cheek. "I wasn't lying, Loree. I've always heard the music in my heart ... but I lost the ability to do that when I went to prison. It was like the music just shriveled up and died. I thought I'd never hear it again. How could I play the violin if I couldn't hear the music? Then lately, I started going crazy because I'd hear snatches of music - when you'd look at me or smile at me. But I couldn't grab onto it, I couldn't hold it. Then last night, you told me that you loved me and I heard the music, so sweet, so soft. It scared me to hear it so clearly after I hadn't for so long.
"Tonight, I hurt you - again. I was going to let you go, Loree. I was gonna take you back to Austin. But I heard my heart break ... and I knew that's all I'd hear for the rest of my life. Don't leave me, Sugar."
Joy filled her and she brushed the locks of hair back off his brow. "I won't."
-Austin and Loree — Lorraine Heath

How did I think of that?" I wondered. I didn't feel like I had thought of it. It's a sort of flow that happens when you are completely in the moment and not getting in your own way. Not trying so hard, not planning ahead, just getting out of your own head and letting the magic happen. You could apply this to any activity, of course. You could apply it to life. — Rachel Dratch

The loneliest moment in life is when you have just experienced that which you thought would deliver the ultimate, and it has just let you down. — Ravi Zacharias

Keep your heart and mind open, Taylor. Don't make any rash decisions that you might regret later on. Sometimes things in life aren't as clear as we would like them to be, especially in the beginning. When the time is right, you'll know it. Just don't burn the bridge before you ever get the chance to cross it. — Rose Wynters

You sing songs hundreds of times over and over, but certain ones just morph and naturally, as you age and get life experience, take on a different form as well. When I was looking at songs for the album, I thought, "Which are the ones that connect with me the most? What do I think would work in album form?" Almost all of them I've done in shows. — Cheyenne Jackson

It's the typical mid-life crisis kind of thing, where you just stop and wonder, 'Should I go back to university and get a law degree?' I kind of looked around me and thought, 'What kind of idiot am I that I've just spent the last 10 years writing novels? Financially, I'm pretty much where I was when I was 28.' — Lynn Coady

Just when you've squared up to the solemn realisation that life is a bitch, it turns round and does something nice, just to confuse you. - Emily Spitzer, The Better Mousetrap — Tom Holt

You don't know. You've never been married and divorced. Everything is insurmountable when you're married. The fact that you want to talk at the breakfast table and he insists on reading his paper is insurmountable. Leaving the seat up on the toilet is insurmountable. Getting peanut butter in the jelly jar is insurmountable. People don't change just because they're married. All those little habits and personality quirks that you previously thought were trivial become the bane of your existence. And the major problems, like different outlooks on life, are crushing. — Janet Evanovich

Some days my mantra was I will stay in this marriage because I am a Christian and Christians stay, but other days, I thought: if the choices are Christianity or divorce then I will just have to embrace secular humanism because I am not even sure I believe any of this anymore and it is one thing to devote twenty minutes every morning to praying when you are not sure you believe anything anymore and it is another thing to organize your whole life around a marriage you don't want to be in because a God who may or may not exist says let no man put asunder. — Lauren F. Winner

But he came back to his idea.
"My life is very monotonous," the fox said. "I hunt chickens; men hunt me. All the chickens are just alike, and all the men are just alike. And, in consequence, I am a little bored. But if you tame me, it will be as if the sun came to shine on my life. I shall know the sound of a step that will be different from all the others. Other steps send me hurrying back underneath the ground. Yours will call me, like music, out of my burrow. And then look: you see the grain-fields down yonder? I do not eat bread. Wheat is of no use to me. The wheat fields have nothing to say to me. And that is sad. But you have hair that is the color of gold. Think how wonderful that will be when you have tamed me! The grain, which is also golden, will bring me back the thought of you. And I shall love to listen to the wind in the wheat ... "
The fox gazed at the little prince, for a long time. — Antoine De Saint-Exupery

This is the third night you've kept me up crying. Thought I'd give your mother a rest. Right now you haven't mastered English yet so I thought I'd put this on film for you. I want to show you something. Tony, see that? I built that for you and someday you're going to realize that it represents a lot more than just people's inventions. It represents my life's work. Someday you'll figure it out, and when you do, you'll do even bigger things with your life. I just know it. You're the future. I've created so much in y life, but you know what is the thing I'm proudest of? You. My son. The secret to the future is here! — Alex Irvine

I had created sufficient age when I started out January 1, 1953, and I said, that's enough. From that time on I thought of myself as being ageless and in radiant health, and I am. I haven't gotten younger, but I see no point in getting younger. I can get along just fine as I am, and if you have learned the lessons of the seasons of life before, you really have no wish to return to a prior season of life. — Peace Pilgrim

Outside, the ocean was crashing, waves hitting sand, then pulling back to sea. I thought of everything being washed away, again and again. We make such messes in this life, both accidentally and on purpose. But wiping the surface clean doesn't really make anything neater. It just masks what is below. It's only when you really dig down deep, go underground, that you can see who you really are. — Sarah Dessen

Tiffany got up early and lit the fires. When her mother came down, she was scrubbing the kitchen floor, very hard.
"Er ... aren't you supposed to do that sort of thing by magic, dear?" said her mother, who'd never really got the hang of what witchcraft was all about.
"No, Mum, I'm supposed not to," said Tiffany, still scrubbing.
"But can't you just wave your hand and make all the dirt fly away, then?"
"The trouble is getting the magic to understand what dirt is," said Tiffany, scrubbing hard at a stain. "I heard of a witch over in Escrow who got it wrong and ended up losing the entire floor and her sandals and nearly a toe."
Mrs. Aching backed away. "I thought you just had to wave your hands about," she mumbled nervously.
"That works," said Tiffany, "but only if you wave them about on the floor with a scrubbing brush. — Terry Pratchett

I was influenced by the Beats because I actually just began to commit adolescence around 1955, when "Howl" and Rebel Without a Cause and a lot of other new things were popping up. (Again I'm trying to give you a finite version of this career.) And then I came under the sway of Wallace Stevens when I was in college and graduate school, and basically set as a life goal the ambition of writing third-rate Wallace Stevens. I thought I would be completely content if I was recognized at some later point in my life as a third-rate Wallace Stevens. — Billy Collins

He loved Clara. I miss a lot in life," said Gilbert. "But I have a nose for love." "Like a truffle pig," said Beauvoir, then regretted it when he saw the asshole saint's reaction. Then, unexpectedly, Gilbert smiled. "Exactly. I can smell it. Love has an aroma all its own, you know." Beauvoir looked at Gilbert, amazed by what he'd just heard. Maybe, he thought, this man was - "Smells like compost," said Gilbert. - an asshole after all. — Louise Penny

"I don't know. I spent most of my life moving around. My dad and I had just settled in one place when all this happened. I ... " She shrugged. "I guess I'm hoping it doesn't last much longer. I want a home." She glanced over her shoulder. "I know you do, too, even if you don't like to admit it."
I thought she was talking to me. Then Derek stepped into the doorway.
"He wasn't eavesdropping," she said to me. "He just doesn't like me being alone with strangers in the house." She aimed a pointed look his way. "Even if I end up rescuing him from danger as often as he rescues me." — Kelley Armstrong

Just when you thought the mafia novel was dead, Tod Goldberg breathes new life into it. Gangsterland, the best mafia novel in years, is a dark, funny, and smart page-turning crime story. It's also a moving, thoughtful meditation on ethics, religion, family, and a culture that eats itself. I loved this book. — Sara Gran

There comes a moment in every woman's life when something she was tightly holding on to - just slips from her hands. Sometimes it's a dream. Sometimes it's a place . . . a person . . . a purpose. Sometimes it's the life you always thought you'd be living. — Kristen Welch

I have learned that we may change the very nature of our thoughts, by changing the tone of voice we are thinking in! No one has ever paid attention to what tone of voice they are speaking in, during the time that their words are going on in their heads! People only pay attention to their tones of voice when their words are on their tongues! But it is the tone of voice we think in, that is responsible for creating the energy we emit. You may be screaming on the inside and even though you are calm on the outside, you are going to create the energy of your thoughts. If you want real change in your life, in your mind - really, just change the tone of voice that you think in! — C. JoyBell C.

If he was a ghost in the life he remembered, Jeff thought, he was also a ghost in his present life, just the same way. Except, in all the fourteen years, just a couple of times. With Melody that first summer he had felt alive. On the beach on the island. And when he played the guitar. Most of the time, he thought, he practiced not being anybody. If you weren't anybody then nobody could - what? Hurt you or leave you behind? Make you unhappy? But then they couldn't make you happy either, could they? If you played it safe, then you kept safe. Jeff figured he was pretty good at keeping safe - he didn't even look in mirrors because he didn't want to see Melody's eyes. But one result of that was that Jeff didn't know anything about himself. And he thought, sitting in the little boat, alone on the creek, alone with the creek and the sky and the marshes, that he might want to know more. — Cynthia Voigt

But to return to your question, Vidanric's tendency to keep his own counsel ought to be reassuring as far as people hopping out with embarrassing words are concerned. If I were you
and I know it's so much easier to give advice than to follow it
I'd sit down with him, when no one else is at hand, and talk it out."
Just the thought of seeking him out for a private talk made me shudder. "I'd rather walk down the mountain in shoes full of snails."
It was Nee's turn to shudder. "Life! I'd rather do almost anything than that
— Sherwood Smith

When my mouth meets hers, I swear that from that second on, she has me. You always hear people talk about how there are moments in your life when you just know that things will never be the same. I always thought that was all horseshit. But here, now, with the feeling of her soft, incredible lips moving with mine, I know that it happens.-pg 16 — Steph Campbell

Just when you thought that you already learned the way how to live, life changes - and you're left the same as you begun. — Robert Fulghum

Notwithstanding how uncanny moments of life might be, you never walk backwards. Once you take a step, you move forward by a step with a step. That is life! Even a child would never crawl backward and so would streams hardly flow backward. Just keep moving when it is a must to move! — Ernest Agyemang Yeboah

I crave you, mi amor. More than I ever thought a man should a woman. Just when I think I can make it on my own, you say these things that call me home to you. I want to leave, I want to run and never look back, and I'm terrified. Terrified of the feelings that control me and the moments where I simply can't exist without you in my arms.
I deserve a second chance. We deserve a second chance. — Nadege Richards

In time, the hurt began to fade and it was easier to just let it go. At least I thought it was. But in every boy I met in the next few years, I found myself looking for you, and when the feelings got too strong, I'd write you another letter. But I never sent them for fear of what I might find. By then, you'd gone on with your life and I didn't want to think about you loving someone else. I wanted to remember us like we were that summer. I didn't ever want to lose that. — Nicholas Sparks

Why didn't you dare it before? he asked harshly.
When I hadn't a job? When I was starving? When I was just as I am now, as a man, as an artist, the same Martin Eden? That's the question. I've been asking myself for many a day. My brain is the same old brain. And what is puzzling me is why they want me now. Surely they don't want me for myself, for myself the same olf self they did not want. They must want me for something else, for something that is outside of me, for something that is not I. Shall I tell you what that something is? It is for the recognition I have recieved. That recognition is not I. Then again for the money I have earned and am earnin. But money is not I. And is it for the recognition and money, that you now want me? — Jack London

When I get frustrated that there aren't enough hours in a day, that I can't do enough or be enough or experience everything I want to just exactly right now, my mom reminds me in her gentle way that this is not where she thought she'd be at sixty, and that the best is yet to come. She teaches me, through her words and her actions, that if you take the next right step, if you live a life of radical and honest prayer, if you allow yourself to be led by God's Spirit, no matter how far from home and familiarity it takes you, you won't have to worry about what you want to be when you grow up. You'll be too busy living a life of passion and daring. — Shauna Niequist

Sometimes life was hard, she thought, walking across the grass to be with her friends. Just when you least expected it, you had to start over. There was pain in that, but also satisfaction. With or without her wanting it to, life moved on. And she would, too. — Susan Mallery

When anything is blocking my head or there's worry in my life, I just go sit on Mars or something and look back here at Earth. All you can see is this tiny speck. You don't see the fear. You don't see the pain. You don't see thought. It's just one solid speck. Then nothing really matters. It just doesn't. — Heath Ledger

Thought subsides when you pet your dog or you have a purring cat on your chest. Even just watching an animal can take you out of your mind. It is more deeply connected with the source of life than most humans, and that rootedness in Being transmits itself to you. Millions of people who otherwise would be completely lost in the conceptual reality of their mind are kept sane by living with an animal. — Eckhart Tolle

Life sure can hit you hard! Suddenly, when you least expect it, WHAM; life has a knack for challenging you in ways that you don't feel prepared for. I feel like life sometimes tests and shapes you in a manner in which you feel least equipped. It seems you don't get to choose the exercise equipment God challenges and builds your strength with. When this is happening, it's easy to drop into a victim mindset. It's easy to feel stuck, defeated, and like you are a losing player in the game of life. This victim mindset argues (very loudly) that we have lost; that nothing good is on the horizon. Never forget that the volume of an argument does not reflect the validity of the argument. Just because the victim mentality argues that we are losing, doesn't mean that it's true. In fact, I have come to realize that during the times in my life where I thought I was losing, I was actually winning. — Bryant McGill

I don't get scared very often," he said finally. "I was scared the first morning I woke up and you weren't here. I was scared when you left me after Vegas. I was scared when I thought I was going to have to tell my dad that Trent had died in that building. But when I saw you across the flames in the basement ... I was terrified. I made it to the door, was a few feet from the exit, and I couldn't leave.
"What do you mean? Are you crazy?" I said, my head jerking up to look into his eyes.
"I've never been so clear about anything in my life. I turned around, made my way to that room you were in, and there you were. Nothing else mattered. I didn't even know if we would make it out or not, I just wanted to be where you were, whatever that meant. The only thing I'm afraid of is a life without you, Pigeon."
I leaned up, kissing his lips tenderly. When our mouths parted, I smiled. "Then you have nothing to be afraid of. We're forever. — Jamie McGuire

He walked away from me, and I swallowed, trying to keep the tears at bay. Travis stopped and came back, leaning into my face. "That's why you said I wouldn't miss you after today! You knew I'd find out about you and Parker, and you thought I'd just ... what? Get over you? Do you not trust me, or am I just not good enough? Tell me, damn it! Tell me what the fuck I did to you to make you do this!"
I stood my ground, staring straight into his eyes. "You didn't do anything to me. Since when is sex so life or death to you?"
"Since it was with you! — Jamie McGuire

Certain coincidence is wonderful. Certain meetings are memorable. Sometimes you meet some people for just a moment and they leave indelible footprints on your mind. They give you the reasons to ponder over and over. They become your food for thought. Though they go, their presence is felt within the innermost of the heart and the soul; especially when such people were a reason for a smile, or they were a perfect fit for a vacuum or probably they were a heavenly sent or maybe they were an epitome of a great union; when their light could shine to brighten the dark side of our lives; when they knew how to arouse interest even in the face of dull atmosphere; when they did understand silence and know the value and power of words; when even their absence is felt more than their presence. You can't just forget about such people. Though they leave, they live within our hearts, mind, body and soul. — Ernest Agyemang Yeboah

Phoebe asked me, "Tell me, what do you think of the afterlife?"
I was a bit nonplussed. I had no idea what she thought, but I knew that the question must be of greater interest to someone of her age than to me. But our conversation had been completely honest, and before I could speak, honesty and tact had joined hands in my answer. "I have no faith at all," I said, "but sometimes I have hope."
I rather think," she replied, "that total annihilation is the most comfortable position."
I was shaken. The horse clopped on. The children laughed behind us.
When I die," she said, "I don't expect to see any of my loved ones again. I'll just become a part of all this." She waved her hand at the surrounding countryside. "That's all right with me. — Sena Jeter Naslund

Join the mob or go for what you want. Give yourself plenty of quiet time alone in order to get in touch with who you are ... Focus power of thought. Remind yourself that the world is yours for the asking. The non-risker does not grow, you just get older. When you have decided which ideas, beliefs, relationships, and situations no longer work for you, it is time to release them. Let go of negative thoughts - view them as a flight of birds crossing your path. See them fly into view and continue on their way.' - from Joan Root's diary — Mark Seal

This isn't about validation, this is about having someone's hand to hold when I'm walking through the creepy forest. I really thought of that tonight. Life is sometimes one great big creepy forest, and as much as I love you, we are both getting to the age where each other just isn't enough. — Davee Jones

It used to be that when I made mistakes like this or came close to losing my life, I would just call Miguel. He'd drop it all to come to me - his movies, media engagements no matter how big they were, and even his criminal activities went on hold for me. It made me think he cared.
Miguel canceled an appearance on the Dave Letterman show just because he called me and thought my voice sounded like something was wrong.
He directed his gaze to the bruises decorating my face. "You said you weren't hurt."
With those big arms, he picked me up and slammed the door behind us. "When I ask you if you're okay, you tell me the truth. — Kenya Wright

But finally, when they stopped to sleep, not bothering with a tent, just bedding down in a hollow they'd trampled in the tall grass with their boots, Arin spoke. He slid a hand under her tunic to touch her bare back, then stopped. "Is this all right?"
She wanted to explain that she hadn't thought she'd ever bear anyone's touch on her scarred back, that it should revolt him and revolt her. Yet his touch made her feel soft and new. "Yes."
He pushed the shirt up, seeking the lash marks, tracing their length. She let herself feel it, and shivered, and thought of nothing. But a tension grew. He was still, but for his hand.
Kestrel said, "What's wrong?"
"Your life would have been easier if you had married the Valorian prince."
She drew herself up so that she could face him. The scent of black powder clung to them both. His skin smelled like a blown-out candle. "But not better," she said. — Marie Rutkoski

I thought, man, if you could run 100 miles, you'd be in this Zen state. You'd be the f**king Buddha. Bringing peace and a smile to the world. In my case, it didn't work. I'm the same old punk ass as ever. But there's always this hope that it'll turn you into the person you want to be. You know, like a better, more peaceful person. And when I'm out on a long run, the only thing in life that matters is finishing the run. For once, my brain isn't going 'bleh bleh bleh bleh.' Everything just quiets down, and the only thing going on is pure flow — Jenn Shelton

Destiny was funny stuff, he knew. You couldn't trust it. Often you couldn't even see it. Just when you knew you had it cornered, it turned out to be something else - coincidence, maybe, or providence. You barred the door against it, and it was standing behind you. Then just when you thought you had it nailed down it walked away with the hammer. — Terry Pratchett