Quotes & Sayings About Layers

Parker had a young white boy with him-one of the neurotic tribe of the lost- and the kid's eyes were filled with wet layers of tears. One big tear in each eye. They did not drop out. It was fascinating. I had seen women sit and look at me with those same eyes before they got mad and started screaming about what a son of a bitch I was. — Charles Bukowski

A man must be prepared to give 100% to his purpose, fulfill his karma or dissolve it, and then let go of that specific form of living. He must be capable of not knowing what to do with his life, entering a period of unknowingness and waiting for a vision or a new form of purpose to emerge. These cycles of strong specific action followed by periods of not knowing what the hell is going on are natural for a man who is shedding layers of karma in his relaxation into truth. — Deida David

there are between life partners sliding layers of history, tectonic plates of it shifting over the decades together. — Helen Simpson

I am yet to find one reliable friend in this crowd of shifting strangers. I have no true friends only mimicries, users and loopers. People popping in and out, keeping tabs on my life, not adding much credence to my existence yet not abandoning my life entirely because they know that greatness lies beyond the layers of this muck. It is up to me to discover those who are worth taking on this journey towards my destiny and the ones who will only get in my way. — Crystal Evans

Bad things bring out the real you; the person hidden beneath all those layers of comfort. — Innocent Mwatsikesimbe

Madeline Hatter. Her lavender-streaked teal hair exploded around her in messy curls. The polka-dotted, striped, and lacy layers of her skirt were bunched and fluffed. Her teacup hat tilted low over one ear. "Whoops, — Shannon Hale

Was there ever really a chance for us? What is down in the middle of him, his very center? Does he even have a center, or do you just cut away the layers, away, away, away, until you are left with nothing? — R.A. Nelson

He wondered ... if the journey of a life with pain was simply finding more ad more layers of acceptance, that at best the most constant tether would be that he would never really find the bottom, that the bottom had different levels, and that no matter how good he tried to be, sometimes he would sink into a hole. — Heidi Cullinan

Defense leaders should be searching for ways to reform out-of-date procurement processes, to collapse layers of Pentagon bureaucracy, and to restrain the growth in personnel and benefits costs. A critical first step in that process should be to conduct a full Pentagon audit to determine how DOD spends taxpayer dollars. — Pete Hegseth

We think sometimes we're only drawn to the good, but we're actually drawn to the authentic. We like people who are real more than those who hide their true selves under layers of artificial niceties — Elisabeth Kubler-Ross

I love getting older," I muse as I carefully begin to peel the layers away. "You're closer to death, but there are presents. — Abby McDonald

Relationships are two layers of conversations. Adapting and also speaking your mind. — Dee Henderson

Being able to look cute, at all times, while being able to peel off layers is the most essential thing. — Brad Goreski

But the guilt goes even deeper than that. It, too, is dust: Layers and layers of it have accumulated. Because if it weren't for me, Lena and Alex would never have been caught at all.
I told on them.
I was jealous.
God forgive me, for I have sinned. — Lauren Oliver

I believe one of the important differences between creating literature and just telling a story around the campfire is that in literature you're recreating the experience of life, not just relaying a 'this happened, then that happened' kind of narrative. The specific details and layers of depth that make the world of the story - and what the character is experiencing in that world - as real as possible are elements I love as a reader and, consequently, elements I strive to use effectively as a writer. — Lara Campbell McGehee

It's always uncomfortable for me when I take off my shirt. No one else is taking their shift off. Why is everyone else in these movies bundled up in layers of clothing and I'm taking my clothes off all the time? — Taylor Lautner

As a screenwriter, there's so many layers you have to go through in order to tell your story. You have to write the script, get money for the script, shoot it, find distributors, make it into film festivals, all of that just to get to your audience. — Morley

I have always loved really dense, complicated stories with lots of layers, tons of obscure literary references, and a plethora of inside jokes. — Alethea Kontis

I believe that when a loved one has dementia, you experience many layers of grief.

The first wave of grief comes with the diagnosis. The realisation that the person who has supported you all your life, will no longer be able to do so, no matter how hard they try.

Grief the first time they struggle to remember your name or your relationship to each other.

Grief when you have to accept that you can no longer keep them at home.

Grief as they lose the ability to communicate, as another piece of the jigsaw is lost.

Grief every time they are afraid, agitated or confused. So much grief you don't think you can cope with anymore.

And then the overwhelming tidal wave of grief when they pass, when you would give anything to go back to the first wave of grief. — Emma Haslegrave

He loved me. He was a complex person with layers of percolating emotions, some of them spiritual, some tortured in a more secular way, and he burned for me. This complicated flame of being was mine. — Miranda July

If you peel back the layers of your life-the frenzy, the noise-stillness is waiting. That stillness is you. — Oprah Winfrey

Life was taking its vengeance on me, and that vengeance consisted merely in coming back, nothing more. Every case of madness involves something coming back. People who are possessed are not possessed by something that just comes but instead by something that comes back. Sometimes life comes back. If in me everything crumbled before that power, it is not because that power was itself necessarily an overwhelming one: it in fact had only to come, since it had already become too full-flowing a force to be controlled or contained - when it appeared it overran everything. And then, like after a flood, there floated a wardrobe, a person, a loose window, three suitcases. And that seemed like Hell to me, that destruction of layers and layers of human archaeology. — Clarice Lispector

What we get in punk these days is the 'anti-anti': Someone comes up with something, then the next generation is against that, and then the next generation is against that, and then that thing becomes a problem. There's these layers of anti-, and so many of them are just so self-serving. It's not about larger freedom. — Geoff Rickly

Writing is a tool of transformation and can shine the light on the inside, dispelling darkness, taking us through external layers, bringing us closer to our souls. — Hillary Carlip

I'm hoping that a lifetime of compromise and disappointment will read as extra depth and layers in my work. — Rufus Sewell

She unlocked the door, but before she could turn the knob his hand covered hers. She turned and froze.
"Clay," she warned, but it was too late.
His arm came around her, lifted her feet clear off the floor as he kissed her: hot, demanding, and all encompassing.
His mouth was soft, hot and devastating. Megan let the shock ripple deliciously through her as she clutched his shoulders. There was a small thunk as the house key dropped to the step. Even through the layers of his tuxedo and her coat Meg felt the hardness of his body against her. — Donna Alward

[Trip] "You're a pain in the ass. A wordy pain in the ass."
"Here are two more words for you. Interfering jerk."
"Stubborn idiot."
"Government patsy."
"Bookworm," Trip shot back, and then he had her up against her car, his mouth on hers, his hands on her body, taking as much of her as he could get. She came right back at him, curling her hands into his shirt, trying to drag him closer, which was impossible since the only thing between them was a couple of thin layers of clothing and enough heat to cause spontaneous combustion. — Penny McCall

With my work, I try to delve into the several layers that compose the edifice of history, to take the shadows cast by this model of uniform development to try and understand what lies behind it. — Vhils

It wasn't because you weren't beautiful, talented, funny, creative or had everything in common. It was because some men prefer plain vanilla ice cream. It's predictable and a safe choice. Confident and adventurous men prefer the complexity and layers of a sundae, even the ones sprinkled with a little bit of nuts on top. — Shannon L. Alder

We can have everything we want as long as what we want is a life spent searching for exhausting work that doesn't pay enough, shopping for things we don't need and sticking to a set of social and sexual rules that turn out, once you plough through the layers of trash and adverts, to be as rigid as ever. — Laurie Penny

And though our relationship had many layers, they weren't separate. Like my feelings for him weren't kept in a neat little box beside the one where our friendship was. We swirled together. Like chocolate and vanilla soft serve, like ketchup and mustard on a burger. Our friendship was better because of our love. Our love was better because it blossomed out of friendship. — Cambria Hebert

Selfless-giving burns away the layers of the onion. Purity and humility keep meditation and selfless-giving clear. Love radiates through the entire practice because we do all of it only for love. — Frederick Lenz

SETH said: The natural person is to be found, now, not in the past or in the present, but beneath layers and layers of official beliefs, so you are dealing with an archeology of beliefs to find the person who creates beliefs to begin with. As I have said often, evidence of clairvoyance, telepathy, or whatever, are not eccentric, isolated instances occurring in man's experience, but are representative of natural patterns of everyday behavior that become invisible in your world because of the official picture of behavior and reality. — Jane Roberts

Bodily pain affects man as a whole down to the deepest layers of his moral being. It forces him to face again the fundamental questions of his fate, of his attitude toward God and fellow man, of his individual and collective responsibility and of the sense of his pilgrimage on earth. — Pope Pius XII

Dig a trench through a landfill and you will see layers of phone books like geographical strata or layers of cake ... During a recent landfill dig in Phoenix, I found newspapers dating from 1952 that looked so fresh you might read one over breakfast. — William Rathje

Now she sat in front of him, nearly submerged under layers of thick sweaters and blankets. She looked like a laundry hamper without a head. — Louise Penny

Sometimes an answer doesn't come in one go. Sometimes it has so many layers to it that it takes time for the person to tell you what they really mean. — Carolyn Jess-Cooke

Now, if you will excuse me, a dead woman is trying to convince me to drink something that comes in layers. — Seanan McGuire

You have thousands of selves inside you. Meditation is a process of peeling back the layers of the self. We start with peeling back the personality from this lifetime. — Frederick Lenz

I don't have ideas so much as there are things which constantly evolve ... there are various threads or layers, if you like, which change. — Harrison Birtwistle

When you're working on a game that has a budget of tens of millions of dollars and you have to sell millions and millions and millions of copies to break even, you have a lot more layers between you and the audience. You have a marketing department, and there's a different marketing department for every continent, and the parent company has stockholders, and all that kind of stuff. — Steve Gaynor

I didn't know then that the mind, like the earth, has several layers: a crust, a mantle, a boiling core. — Lauren Slater

We must keep in mind that only a part of memory can be translated into the language-based packets of information people use to tell their life stories to others. Learning to be open to many layers of communication is a fundamental part of getting to know another person's life. — Daniel J. Siegel

One of the most revolutionary concepts to grow out of our clinical experience is the growing recognition that innermost core of man's nature - the deepest layers of his personality, the base of his 'animal nature' - is basically socialized, forward-moving, rational and realistic ... He is realistically able to control himself, and he is incorrigibly socialized in his desires. There is no beast in man, there is only man in man. — Carl Rogers

She gazed out across the rooftops of Ankh-Morpork and reasoned like this: writing was only the words that people said, squeezed between layers of paper until they were fossilized (fossils were well known on the Discworld, great spiraled shells and badly constructed creatures that were left over from the time when the Creator hadn't really decided what He wanted to make and was, as it were, just idly messing around with the Pleistocene). And the words people said were just shadow of real things. But some things were too big to be really trapped in words, and even the words were too powerful to be completely tamed by writing. — Terry Pratchett

That's what memory is like: layers, one overlapping another, and compacting down the way old leaves slowly crumble and turn to a rich peaty soil, nourishing the new things that will grow. It's why it's important, remembering things. It's why it matters, when the memories aren't there, and no one fills in the gaps for you. — Julia Green

Of course, most failures aren't so public in nature. Most failures happen quietly, unspectacularly, and their effects are cumulative. Most of the time failure doesn't reveal itself in a moment but wraps around you over a lifetime, adding heaviness to your step until one day you recognize you've been wearing failure on your face all along, that your failures have decorated your breast like the medallions of an army general's coat, that they've stripped away what's best in you, like rain peeling away the layers of a freshly painted house. — Andrew Lewis Conn

Yet the drive to assess the performance of workers and to measure forms of labor which, by their nature, are resistant to quantification, has inevitably required additional layers of management and bureaucracy. What we have is not a direct comparison of workers' performance or output, but a comparison between the audited representation of that performance and output. Inevitably, a short-circuiting occurs, and work becomes geared towards the generation and massaging of representations rather than to the official goals of the work itself. — Mark Fisher

They'd had fun, for sure. They laughed and enjoyed being together. But if she was painfully honest with herself, something was missing. Something in the way Tim looked at her. She remembered her mom's word. "I saw the way he looked at you ... he adores you." Maybe that was it. Tim looked at her on a surface level. He smiled and seemed happy to see her. But When Cody looked at her, there were no layers left, nothing her didn't reveal, nothing he couldn't see. He didn't really look at her so much as he looked into her. To the deepest, most real places in her heart and soul. — Karen Kingsbury

He'd set down his drink and leaned in. "Fine. You want me to elaborate, I will. Here's the deal: I'm a guy. Generally speaking, we're pretty simple folk. I know women always want to think we have these deep, romantic, and emotionally angsty thoughts going on in our heads, but in reality? Not so much. You women have layers and you're complicated and mysterious and you say one thing, but you really mean another, and it's this whole tricky package that intrigues us and scares us and challenges us all at the same time. But men aren't like that. You talk about me not letting you in, but maybe what you don't realize is this: there is no in." He pointed to himself. "It's all right here on the surface, Jessica. What you see is what you get. — Julie James

Magical realism allows an artist like myself to inject layers of meaning without being obvious. In American culture, where there is freedom of expression, this approach may seem forced, unnecessary and misunderstood. But this system of communication has become very Iranian. — Shirin Neshat

Oh. It was one those ohs that came packed with layers of meaning - none of which merely meant oh. — Nicki Elson

Some miles to the North, a ring of mountains rose out of the clouds. The peaks were clad in snow and ice, and together they looked like an ancient, jagged crown resting atop the layers of mist. The eastward-facing scarps shone brilliantly in the light of the morning sun, while long blue shadows cloaked the western sides and stretched dwindling into the distance, tenebrous daggers upon the billowy, snow-white plain. — Christopher Paolini

I'd say probably the most expensive costumes I've ever made were the costumes in 'The Planet of the Apes,' because of the research and development that went into them and the amount of layers. — Colleen Atwood

A distant, eerie howl had risen out of the floor, from far beneath. Silent, absolutely still, she waited, and at last it came again, indefinably closer, but muffled, as if layers of stone-rooms, dungeons, cellars-were between her and it. Not human. She crouched down with her ear to the stone slabs. Somewhere down there, unguessable levels below,something prowled. — Catherine Fisher

Layers like a bad Van Gogh. Pella felt little beads — Chad Harbach

I think what's happening with the veterans is a gift from God to show us what happens when you take layers and layers of bureaucracy and place them between the patients and the health care provider. And if we can't get it right, with the relatively small number of veterans, how in the world are you going to do it with the entire population? — Benjamin Carson

Orchestras have become used to the emphasis on the separation of layers, of the ultimate precision and clarity. — Esa-Pekka Salonen

You cannot see clearly, because you are so full of expectations, hopes,desires. Your eyes are covered with many layers of dust: you need a deep cleansing of your eyes. That's what meditation is. Let the thoughts disappear, the hopes disappear, the desires disappear. Then you have a clarity, then your eyes are perfect mirrors. Only then, in that silent state of your vision, will you know the secrets of the beyond. — Rajneesh

I'm looking for richness, complexity, and characters that have different layers and that you don't really get bored of. — Julian Jarrold

When you remove layers, simplicity and speed happen. — Ginni Rometty

As readers, we want not only a strong story, but also characters we can relate to, characters that feel real. We have to find something of ourselves in them. Each character, even those only there to serve the mechanics of the plot, should have a number of layers. The entire world you are stepping into as a reader must feel real. It must have resonance, you must be able to touch the light; smell the smells. — Carlos Ruiz Zafon

The songs came from a more solitary place and I hadn't played them with many people before recording. So I just added the layers of people who are in my life, and built up the songs. — Aoife O'Donovan

As she recited the names and facts, she was recovering not only her memory but also her personality, her desires, her way of seeing life. The idea of suicide, which that morning seemed to be buried beneath several layers of sedatives, resurfaced. — Paulo Coelho

The thing I love about Rome is that is has so many layers. In it, you can follow anything that interests you: town planning, architecture, churches or culture. It's a city rich in antiquity and early Christian treasures, and just endlessly fascinating. There's nowhere else like it. — Claire Tomalin

Good evening, Miss Fairmont."
She saw Black sprawled out in a wingback chair, jacketless, the white shirt he wore unbuttoned to the waist, revealing an enticing view of his chest and the fine black hair that was hidden beneath. "I was beginning to wonder if you would come tonight. It is midnight after all."
On cue the large pendulum clock in the hall began to chime out the hour. Isabella met his gaze, marveled at the dark layers in his eyes. He appeared at once indolent, yet supremely masculine, and in his state of dishabille he was utterly breathtaking. — Charlotte Featherstone

You are so terribly nimble, so clever. I distrust your cleverness. You make a wonderful pattern, everything is in its place, it looks convincingly clear, too clear. And meanwhile, where are you? Not on the clear surface of your ideas, but you have already sunk deeper, into darker regions, so that one only thinks one has been given all your thoughts, one only imagines you have emptied yourself in that clarity. But there are layers and layers
you're bottomless, unfathomable. Your clearness is deceptive. You are the thinker who arouses most confusion in me, most doubt, most disturbance. — Anais Nin

The world needs a new global architecture, additional layers of governance, to deal with issues that neither nations nor traditional forms of intergovernmental organizations can cope with. — Amitai Etzioni

Somewhere there is mystery. It impels one to theosophy: to the worship of a space-god, or a god of light." "Theory dissolves the mystery, though it lays bare a cryptic new stratum. Quite likely there is an endless set of these layers, mystery below mystery. — Jack Vance

We don't have seasons anymore. You know why? We lost the ozone layer. Well, put it on milk cartons - let's find it! — Lewis Black

We are told from childhood onward that everything we want to do is impossible. We grow up with this idea, and as the years accumulate, so too do the layers of prejudice, fear and guilt. There comes a time when our personal calling is so deeply buried in our soul as to be invisible. But know that it's still there. — Paulo Coelho

It is that happy stretch of time when the lovers set to chronicling their passion. When no glance, no tone of voice is so fleeting but it shines with significance. When each moment, each perception is brought out with care, unfolded like a precious gem from its layers of the softest tissue paper and laid in front of the beloved - turned this way and that, examined, considered. — Ahdaf Soueif

All the intervening layers slipped away, and I lost myself in the game within the game. — Ernest Cline

In fact, caucus, a word derived from the Algonquin languages, better reflected the layers of talking circles and the goal of consensus that were at the heart of governance. — Gloria Steinem

Sometimes the purpose of a day is to merely feel our sadness, knowing that as we do, we allow whole layers of grief, like old skin cells to drop off us — Marianne Williamson

Though Jack Nubbins was extremely talented, Quenten Cassidy had viewed the Specter; when he reached down through the familiar layers of gloom and fatigue he generally found more there than a nameless and transient desire to acquire plastic trophies. He and Nubbins were not even in the same ball park. — John L. Parker Jr.

Every human cell, with its thousands of protein chains, is more complex than a 747 or the largest cruise ship, in fact more complex than the two combined. All life on Earth, in its extravagant variety, offers itself for study, but though we probe to ever deeper layers of its structure, the meaning eludes us. — Dean Koontz

Myths, by their definition, involve transformations, struggles through various worlds or layers of reality and of obscuration. — Anne Waldman

I want to discover the deeper layers of His word, understand the tender mercies of His heart. — Rachel Hauck

Someone could cut through the mess in our house and look at it like one might look at rings on a tree or layers of sediment. They'd find the black-and-white hairs of a dog we had when I was six, the acid-washed jeans my mother once wore, the seven blood-soaked pillowcases from the time I skinned my knee. All our family secrets rest in endless piles. — Holly Black

Life is one long struggle to disinter oneself, to keep one's head above the accumulations, the ever deepening layers of objects ... which attempt to cover one over, steadily, almost irresistibly, like falling snow. — Rose Macaulay

Dreaming is risky. While only some dreams can put you at physical risk, all dreams require that you take an emotional risk. By their nature, dreams create a gap between your present reality and the reality you want to have, causing you to question whether you can bridge that gap. This risk alone can be so daunting for people that they prefer to leave their dreams in their childhood or buried away beneath layers of fear, doubt, and resignation. That's why dreaming bigger dreams takes courage; it means risking the possibility that your dreams will not come true. — Margie Warrell

If we're wrapping ourselves up to conceal any vulnerability, whatever happens to us has to go through all those extra layers. Sometimes love doesn't even reach where we truly live. — Alexandra Katehakis

Red onions are especially divine. I hold a slice up to the sunlight pouring in through the kitchen window, and it glows like a fine piece of antique glass. Cool watery-white with layers delicately edged with imperial purple ... strong, humble, peaceful ... with that fiery nub of spring green in the center ... — Mary Hayes-Grieco

A brane is a distinct region of spacetime that extends through only a (possibly multidimensional) slice of space. The word "membrane" motivated the choice of the word "brane" because membranes, like branes, are layers that either surround or run through a substance. — Lisa Randall

He pulls me close, too close. I'm frozen in five hundred layers of fear. Stunned in grief, in disbelief. — Tahereh Mafi

Little did she know then, a stolen moment, a sweatshirt, many bottle caps, and few layers peeled back later, her life would never be the same. — Gail McHugh

In that moment I know exactly what I want; I want to peel away all the layers of clothing between us, strip away everything that separates us, the past and the present and the future. — Veronica Roth

You really care for them, don't you? I wouldn't have expected it."
"Well, to paraphrase a famous fictional ogre, dragons are like onions - we have layers. — Julie Kagawa

I think anything which promotes heterogeneity on the Internet promotes stability. Diversity in services, service providers, and separating the layers of the networking stack are all important. — David Ulevitch

There is no subterfuge in you, Miss Adeline. Why is that?" Color came and went in her cheeks. "Everyone has layers. Even me." He leaned closer as his son neared and allowed a curl to wrap his finger. "I look forward to peeling back those layers. — Colleen Coble

Humanity is a very interesting phenomenon. If you peel back the layers, if you're brave enough, you realize it's something that's not for the faint of heart-" Angel M.B. Chadwick — Angel M.B. Chadwick

Carlisle wondered if it was still possible for him to live alongside civilization and yet be somewhat apart from it. Find a slice of quiet in the layers of noise, conduct a rain into the noise now and then for some work, take the gold and run like hell back to the quiet place....Flight was no good. You couldn't escape it, whatever 'it' was. — Robert James Waller

I remember, the first time I saw a [Andrei] Tarkovsky film, I was shocked by it. I didn't know what to do. I was fascinated, because suddenly I realized that film could have so many more layers to it than what I had imagined before. Then others, like Kurosawa and Fellini, were like a new discovery for me, another country. — Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu

The world's governments have many classified layers and outsiders rarely gain access to their hidden secrets. And certainly no common man can get confirmation of the existence of exotic technologies. — Takaaki Musha

I don't want the viewer to be able to peel away the layers of my painting like the layers of an onion and find that all the blues are on the same level. — Chuck Close

Sometimes life has its way with you. It peels back the layers of your existence like the skin of an onion until the real you glows underneath, raw and painful to the touch. It's in those moments, in that hour, you look to those that give you strength - for me, — Addison Moore

Staring and staring into the mirror, it sees many faces within its face - the face of the child, the boy, the young man, the not-so-young man - all present still, preserved like fossils on superimposed layers, and, like fossils, dead. Their message to this live dying creature is: Look at us - we have died - what is there to be afraid of?
It answers them: But that happened so gradually, so easily. I'm afraid of being rushed. — Christopher Isherwood

No one could see her out here, no one could judge her. She looked at herself in the mirror and saw the animal that she was trapped inside, that grew and fed and wanted. She wished above all else to look ordinary so that people's eyes just slid over her. Because Mum was wrong. It wasn't about believing this or that, it wasn't about good and evil and right and wrong, it was about finding the strength to bear the discomfort that came with being in the world. Clouds scrolled high up. She couldn't get Melissa out of her head. Something magnetic about her, the possibility of a softness inside, the challenge of peeling back those layers. — Mark Haddon

Really?" Catherine didn't look at all appalled. "What was it like to wear trousers in public?"
"Quite ... liberating, actually."
"I daresay, I think we wear far too many layers of clothes."
"I agree," both men said at once.
Olivia and Catherine giggled like young girls. — Lorraine Heath