Lives Are So Important Quotes & Sayings

In order to satisfy one human stomach, so many lives are taken away. We must promote vegetarianism. It is extremely important. — Dalai Lama

All I wanted was to say honestly to people: 'Have a look at yourselves and see how bad and dreary your lives are!' The important thing is that people should realize that, for when they do, they will most certainly create another and better life for themselves. I will not live to see it, but I know that it will be quite different, quite unlike our present life. And so long as this different life does not exist, I shall go on saying to people again and again: 'Please, understand that your life is bad and dreary!' — Anton Chekhov

This is a dynamic and mysterious universe and human life is, no doubt, conditioned by imponderables of which we are only dimly aware. People sometimes say, "the strangest coincidence happened." Coincidences may seem strange, but they are never a result of caprice. They are orderly laws in the spiritual life of man. They affect and influence our lives profoundly. These so-called imponderables are so important that you should become spiritually sensitized to them. Indeed, the more spiritually minded you become the more acute your contact will be with these behind-the-scenes forces. By being alive to them through insight, instruction, and illumination, you can make your way past errors and mistakes on which, were you less spiritually sensitive, you might often stumble. — Norman Vincent Peale

We are all alone, born alone, die alone, and - in spite of True Romance magazines - we shall all someday look back on our lives and see that, in spite of our company, we were alone the whole way. I do not say lonely - at least, not all the time - but essentially, and finally, alone. This is what makes your self-respect so important, and I don't see how you can respect yourself if you must look in the hearts and minds of others for your happiness. — Hunter S. Thompson

Praying with You Lord, so often we are overwhelmed by all the tasks ahead of us. Today help us to turn our eyes to You so that we can discern between the truly important tasks and those that will not add any real value to our lives. May we look to You as our Peace today. Amen. — Sally Clarkson

Gettting to know your characters is so much more important than plotting. Working out every detail of your story in advance, especially when you don't yet know your main characters, always seems a little too much like playing God. You're working out your characters' lives, their destiny, before they've had a chance to discover who they are and what kind of people they want to be. — Alexander Gordon Smith

Children have a ton of mirror neurons when they are babies and kids and they mimic what they see and so heroes are important because we are watching these heroes make a difference in these peoples lives and sacrificing their lives in some cases and I think it is really important to know that it is not just about us but about the community. — John Assaraf

I wish that people would take the time to show people that they are important in their lives, either at work, or at home. Too many times people take others for granted, and I think that needs to change. People are so much nicer and willing to help you if you use those two little words that mean so much ... 'Thank You!' — Gina Gillespie

The questions that we have to ask and to answer about that procession during this moment of transition are so important that they may well change the lives of men and women forever. For we have to ask ourselves, here and now, do we wish to join that procession, or don't we? On what terms shall we join that procession? Above all, where is it leading us, the procession of educated men? ... Let us never cease from thinking
what is this "civilisation" in which we find ourselves? What are these ceremonies and why should we take part in them? What are these professions and why should we make money out of them? Where in short is it leading us, the procession of the sons of educated men? — Virginia Woolf

So that's how we live our lives. No matter how deep and fatal the loss, no matter how important the thing that's stolen from us
that's snatched right out of our hands
even if we are left completely changed, with only the outer layer of skin from before, we continue to play out our lives this way, in silence. We draw ever nearer to the end of our allotted span of time, bidding it farewell as it trails off behind. Repeating, often adroitly, the endless deeds of the everyday. Leaving behind a feeling of immeasurable emptiness. — Haruki Murakami

It is possible to move through the drama of our lives without believing so earnestly in the character that we play. That we take ourselves so seriously, that we are so absurdly important in our own minds, is a problem for us. We feel justified in being annoyed with everything. We feel justified in denigrating ourselves or in feeling that we are more clever than other people. Self-importance hurts us, limiting us to the narrow world of our likes and dislikes. We end up bored to death with ourselves and our world. We end up never satisfied. — Pema Chodron

We are born and we die; and between these two most important events in our lives more or less time elapses which we have to waste somehow or other. In the end it does not seem to matter much whether we have done so in making money, or practicing law, or reading or playing, or in any other way, as long as we felt we were deriving a maximum of happiness out of our doings. — Clarence Darrow

In this changing world around us we can't help but change. Change is what makes our relationships so interesting! without it there wouldn't be anything new happening in our lives. Your job as an equal in your relationship is to look for change in your spouse and embrace it. When you show a devoted interest in every talent, hobby, desire, passion or goal that your spouse tosses on the table, you are telling your spouse that he/she is important to you. The favor will be returned tenfold. Life will become more interesting! — Lindsey Rietzsch

I was just so afraid ... So afraid of being seen through, of being caught, that I missed the point. I missed the most important fact of it all, which is quite simply ... they want to believe in you up there ... The audience wants to forget who's under the mask. But they don't want to forget because of obfuscation ... no, they want to forget it's you by virtue of the passion of your performance. They want to be transported ... Transported to a world where bigger truths are at work, and anything
anything
can happen. A world where the impossible is possible. Batman can be someone like that for them, Bruce. Someone who defies every damn rule of logic that governs their lives. — Scott Snyder

Both sex and death are eternal themes. You could make thousands of movies on this theme, and whether you have a human being who is painting, singing, making a film, writing, these are the themes that you will come back to and return to. If you don't have any of these artistic expressions, sex is one of the only gifts that nature gave you for free, so it is very important to celebrate it. And then, with death, we are condemned to that. This is absolutely present in our lives. — Pedro Almodovar

The fear of taking a shot at anything in life, lives in the fact that there are no guaranteed outcomes and this notion sadly, paralyzes so many from ever taking a chance, because they can never be certain enough. It's important to understand that the fear will always be there, that's what makes us humans, and those of us that end of leading successful and fulfilled lives have just learned to better tame and dance with that fear more than others. — Chris Hill

Knowing about God is crucially important for the living of our lives. As it would be cruel to an Amazonian tribesmen to fly him to London, put him down without explanation in Trafalgar Square and leave him, as one who knew nothing of English or England, to fend for himself, so we are cruel to ourselves if we try to live in this world without knowing about the God whose world it is and who runs it .The world becomes a strange, mad, painful place, and life in it a disappointing and unpleasant business, for those who do not know about God. Disregard the study of God, and you sentence yourself to stumble and blunder through life blindfold, as it were , with no sense of direction, and no understanding of what surrounds you. This way you can waste your life and lose your soul. — J.I. Packer

Food is such an important part of our lives, and sometimes we tend to diminish the importance of that, because we rely on conveniences or because our lives are so complicated. We forget about those moments that we can actually share around the table with our family, with our friends, with our loved ones. — Thomas Keller

By contrast, a modern person lives surrounded by strangers who are doing things they may not understand. We cannot rely on our instincts and our relationships to keep society working. So it's more important than ever to make sure that we get the rules right. If we want our economy to grow, it means looking for ways to support experimental risk-taking by trading a little more than we may instinctively be comfortable with. It means offering big payoffs to those who are willing to take big risks but also making sure that the unlucky don't starve. In short, it means accepting that a high degree of unpredictability goes with the hunting ground. — Megan McArdle

A side note, if I may. Yes, we're all responsible for our own lives and our individual walk with Christ. But I think a certain responsibility also falls on those who are called to preach and teach. For hundreds of years far too many men and women who have preached to us and taught us God's Word have taken the most important message in all of history and made it dry as sawdust. They've made the Living Word of Life so parched and tasteless it's a wonder anyone still listens. — Diane Moody

He can hum the music in his old man's quivering voice, but he prefers it in his head, where it lives on in violins and reedy winds. If he imagines it in rehearsal he can remember every step of his three-minute solo as if he had danced it only yesterday, but he knows, too, that one time, onstage in Berlin, he had not danced it as he had learned it; this much he knows but cannot recreate, could no recreate it even a moment after he had finished dancing it. While dancing he had felt blind to the stage and audience, deaf to the music. He had let his body do what it needed to do, free to expand and contract in space, to soar and spin. So, accordingly, when he tries to remember the way he danced it on stage, he cannot hear the music or feel his feet or get a sense of the audience. He is embryonic, momentarily cut off from the world around him. The three most important minutes of his life, the ones that determined his fate and future, are the three to which he cannot gain access, ever. — Evan Fallenberg

So I believe in the redeeming power of stories, I believe that stories are incredibly important, possibly in ways we don't understand, in allowing us to make sense of our lives, in allowing us to escape our lives, in giving us empathy and in creating the world that we live in. — Neil Gaiman

Sports programs are an important part of young people's lives but should never over-shadow the true purpose of high school and that is to earn a diploma. So often today sports have become more important than an education. This must be remedied because the true focus must always be toward the student's academic development. — George M. Gilbert

Why are we asked to make the most important decisions of our lives when we are so young, and so prone to mistakes? — Samuel Park

We are all so bent and determined to get what we want, we miss the lessons that could be learned from life's experiences. Many of my AIDS patients discovered that the last year of their lives was by far their best. Many have said they wouldn't have traded the rich quality of that last year of life for a healthier body. Sadly, it is only when tragedy strikes that most of us begin attending to the deeper aspects of life. It is only then that we attempt to go beyond surface concerns-what we look like, how much money we make, and so forth-to discover what's really important. — Elisabeth Kubler-Ross

The object is not so much to get you to keep a journal while you are young, as it is to get you to continue it after you become men and women, even through your whole lives. This is especially needed in the generation in which you live, for you live in as important a generation as the children of men ever saw, and it is far more important that you should begin early to keep a journal and follow the practice while you live, than that other generations should do so. — Wilford Woodruff

Pop music provides not just the soundtrack to our lives, as the cliche goes; it releases our emotions and helps us to articulate them. This is why music is so important to adolescents, who are struggling with questions of identity and self-expression. — Sarah Churchwell

In that inevitable, excruciatingly human moment, we are offered a powerful choice. This choice is perhaps one of the most vitally important choices we will ever make, and it determines the course of our lives from that moment forward. The choice is this: Will we interpret this loss as so unjust, unfair, and devastating that we feel punished, angry, forever and fatally wounded
or, as our heart, torn apart, bleeds its anguish of sheer, wordless grief, will we somehow feel this loss as an opportunity to become more tender, more open, more passionately alive, more grateful for what remains? — Wayne Muller

We are all here on this planet, as it were, as tourists. None of us can live here forever. The longest we might live is a hundred years. So while we are here we should try to have a good heart and to make something positive and useful of our lives. Whether we live just a few years or a whole century, it would be truly regrettable and sad if we were to spend that time aggravating the problems that afflict other people, animals, and the environment. The most important things is to be a good human being. — Dalai Lama

So the bad news is that family breakdown is causing a host of societal and economic ills. But the good news is that, like any cause and effect, those ills can be reversed if what is causing them is changed. Inequities are resolved by living correct principles and values. Brothers and sisters, the most important cause of our lifetime is our families. If we will devote ourselves to this cause, we will improve every other aspect of our lives and will become, as a people and as a church, an example and a beacon for all the peoples of the earth. — M. Russell Ballard

Every contact you make with a human being (or even an animal) is an experiment and a dangerous and therefore important experiment. It is dangerous because it can never be repeated. However serious, however trivial it may be, though you will afterwards make many others, perhaps more unusual, more intimate or more complete - that chance will not come again.
Human contacts are dangerous, too, because they matter so much, and no one knows how much they matter. Even the most trivial meeting makes a difference, slight but lasting, to one or both. Intimate contacts make heaven and hell, they can heal and tear, kill and raise from the dead.
These contacts are the fields on which we succeed or fail. I believe that they matter far more than anything else in life. What we are is written on the people whom we have met and know, touched, loved, hated and passed by. It is the lives of others that testify for or against us, not our own. — Geoffrey Vickers

Many of us have road maps we envision for the course we think our lives should take. It's important to get headed in the right direction, but don't get so caught up in the concerns over your destination that you forget to delight in the scenery of each new day. Remember that some of the secret joys of living are not found by rushing from point A to point B, but by inventing some imaginary letters along the way. — Douglas Pagels

As sons and daughters of our Heavenly Father, we are capable of so much more. For that, good intentions are not enough. We must do. Even more important, we must become what Heavenly Father wants us to be.
Declaring our testimony of the gospel is good, but being a living example of the restored gospel is better. Wishing to be more faithful to our covenants is good; actually being faithful to sacred covenants - including living a virtuous life, paying our tithes and offerings, keeping the Word of Wisdom, and serving those in need - is much better. Announcing that we will dedicate more time for family prayer, scripture study, and wholesome family activities is good; but actually doing all these things steadily will bring heavenly blessings to our lives. — Dieter F. Uchtdorf

We're only given one life, and it's the one we live, she thought; how painful now, to realize that wasn't true, that you would have different lives, depending on how brave you were, and how ready. Love came to her that day - she was twenty-two - and wanted to take her, and she said no.
Why are we asked to make the most important decisions of our lives when we are so young, and so prone to mistakes? Happiness came that day - she knew nothing - and asked her to say yes and she did not. Why did she assume it would come back again, when there were so many others waiting for it to visit? — Samuel Park

A lot of people are not used to having death in their lives or anything like that and I think that's not incredibly natural either. So it definitely can take its toll. At the same time I think it's important to face your own mortality, which I do most every day by doing the show, to realize that your life is short and to take the opportunities that you need to take and be fearless. — Emily Deschanel

I think most people are just trying to be happy, and that most of their actions, however misguided, are in line with that goal. Most people just want to feel they belong somewhere, want to be loved, and want to feel they're important to someone. If you really examine all the wrongheaded and messed-up things they do, they can most often be traced back to that basic desire. The abusers, the addicted, the cruel and unpleasant, the manipulators
these are just people who started this quest for happiness in the basement of their lives. Someone communicated to them through word or deed that they were undeserving, so they think they have to claw their way there over the backs of others, leaving scars and creating damage. Of course, they only create more misery for themselves and others. — Lisa Unger

By valuing modesty we are essentially choosing to live humbly so that our lives may reflect our Father instead of pointing to ourselves. Our choice to forsake the traditional value of modesty is a selfish decision that says, "I am the most important person in the room." Modesty often becomes a decision to think of others as better than us by placing their interest above our own. — Tyler Braun

I had to sign the paper to shut down the government. It's terrible ... [But] what the shutdown showed many, many people is the importance of the role of government. And as frustrated [as people get with] Washington, there are so many things [the government does] that are so important to people's lives every day. The panda cam, paying small businesses their loans - these are all things that shut down. — Sylvia Mathews Burwell

It would be a fine thing if ... parents would have in every bedroom in their house a picture of the temple so [their children] from the time [they are] infant[s] could look at the picture every day [until] it becomes a part of [their lives]. When [they reach] the age that [they need] to make [the] very important decision [concerning going to the temple], it will have already been made. — Spencer W. Kimball

There came a moment in this journey when I freely realized that the lives most of lead are small. Important, but small. Our radius reaches family, clients, friends for whom we do selfless and amazing feats. But our sphere of influence is local ... So our illnesses/deaths are small, too. Not unimportant. Just local in nature ... - 209 — Robin Romm

that the human brain expects permanence. The cup is where you put it. The car is where you parked it (if it hasn't been towed away). The wine is still in the refrigerator where you left it. It's only people, the most complex, important, influential, life-changing elements of our lives, who are there and then are shockingly not-there. And it's surprisingly hard to get one's brain around that. So — Nick Alexander

This is the most important thing the humans have taught me. The thing they're teaching us right now. You see, they are all strangers to each other. They live out their entire lives, never truly understanding one another, only making guesses, making mistakes, distorting, deceiving, misunderstanding each other. And yet, though they're permanently strangers, they choose sometimes to trust each other, care for each other so completely that they gladly die to let the other live--that they gladly change themselves to make the other person happy. — Orson Scott Card

So what? German or French, friend or enemy, he's first and foremost a man and I'm a woman. He's good to me, kind, attentive ... that's good enough for me. I'm not looking for anything else. Our lives are complicated enough with all these wars and bombings. Between a man and a woman, none of that's important. I couldn't care less if the man I fancy is English or black - I'd still offer myself to him if I got the opportunity. — Irene Nemirovsky

Our lives are mere flashes of light in an infinitely empty universe. In 12 years of education the most important lesson I have learned is that what we see as "normal" living is truly a travesty of our potential. In a society so governed by superficiality, appearances, and petty economics, dreams are more real than anything anything in the "real world". Refuse normalcy. Beauty is everywhere, love is endless, and joy bleeds from our everyday existence. Embrace it. I love all of you, all my friends, family, and community. I am ceaselessly grateful from the bottom of my heart for everyone. The only thing I can ask of you is to stay free of materialism. Remember that every day contains a universe of potential; exhaust it. Live and love so immensely that when death comes there is nothing left for him to take. Wealth is love, music, sports, learning, family and freedom. Above all, stay gold. — Dominic Owen Mallary

Sadness is a super important thing not to be ashamed about but to include in our lives. One of the bigger problems with sadness or depression is there's so much shame around it. If you have it you're a failure. You are felt as being very unattractive. — Mike Mills

labeled, "high school for the rich and vapid." "'If you want a friend,' he admonished me, 'don't choose the insecure, the envious, or the needy. They're the ones who will sell you out. Those you can trust are confident and secure, men and women who like their lives, and don't have to meet their needs at your expense. So no gossips, back stabbers, or celebrity fuckers. No one who has to tell you who they know, what they own, how important they are, or whose self-concept depends on the acceptance of others. The only people who can truly care about you are those who are sufficient unto themselves. — Richard North Patterson

Are you over him?" I asked. We both knew the him I referred to was not Benny, but the him who broke Langston's heart so devastatingly. Langston's first love. "In some ways, I think I'll never be over him," Langston said. "That is such an unsatisfying answer." "That's because you're interpreting it the wrong way. I don't mean it as a wistful, overdramatic declaration. I meant that the love I felt for him was huge and real, and, while painful, it forever changed me as a person, in the same way that being your brother reflects and changes how I evolve, and vice versa. The important people in our lives leave imprints. They may stay or go in the physical realm, but they are always there in your heart, because they helped form your heart. There's no getting over that." My — Rachel Cohn

The answer to that is we have to pray specifically when there is a specific need. We are not only praying for our adult children to be open to all the Holy Spirit wants to do in them, we are also praying for the Holy Spirit to set them free from something in particular. The challenging part is that the Holy Spirit will not do what someone resists Him doing. He will pour out His Spirit on our lives, but He will not force His liberation upon us. He will not set us free if we don't want to be. This is why praying for our adult children is so important. We can't force them to want to be free. And let's face it, there may be things we as parents want our adult children to be free of, but they don't see it the same way. They like their bad habit, bad influence, or bad choice. Our prayers for our adult children can help them recognize that they do need to be free and what they need to be free of, and our prayers can open their hearts up to want that freedom. — Stormie O'martian

The sad truth is, John and I and the kids only took Route 66 once on our trips to Disneyland. Our family, like the rest of America, succumbed to the lure of faster highways, more direct routes, higher speed limits. We forgot about taking the slow way. It makes you wonder if something inside us knows that our lives are going to pass faster than we could ever realize. So we run around like chickens about to lose our heads. Which makes our little two- or three-week vacations with our families more important than ever...
As for the time that elapsed between those vacations, that's another thing altogether. It seems to have all passed breathlessly, like some extended whisper of days, months, years, decades. (pp.39-40) — Michael Zadoorian

But if we live for others, we will gradually discover that no one expects us to be "as gods." We will see that we are human, like everyone else, that we all have weaknesses and deficiencies, and that these limitations of ours play a most important part in all our lives. It is because of them that we need others and others need us. We are not all weak in the same spots, and so we supplement and complete one another, each one making up in himself for the lack in another. Only when we see ourselves in our true human context, as members of a race which is intended to be one organism and "one body," will we begin to understand the positive importance not only of the successes but of the failures and accidents in our lives. — Thomas Merton

So words play a very important part in our lives. Our life, it appears, is a network of complicated, interrelated words. Words have a great impact upon us, like 'god', 'democracy', 'freedom', 'totalitarianism'. These words conjure up familiar images. The words 'wife' and 'husband' are part of our everyday currency. But the word 'wife' is not actually the living person, with all her complexities and troubles. So the word is never the actual.

When the word becomes all-important, the living, the actual is neglected. — Jiddu Krishnamurti

You may think that you are insignificant in the great plan of God, but you are not. You are tremendously important to God - so much so that Jesus died for you, and the Holy Spirit lives in you. You may seem small in your own eyes, and this is good; because God resists the proud but gives grace to the humble. However, don't let your humility become sin by making you believe you can do nothing for God. God can use you to help Him accomplish His will on this earth. — Warren W. Wiersbe

Growing up seems easier for men, maybe because their rites of passage are clearer. They perform acts of bravery on the battlefield or show they're men through physical labor or by making money. For women, it's more confusing. We have no rites of passage. Do we become women when a man first makes love to us? If so, why do we refer to it as a loss of virginity? Doesn't the word 'loss' imply that we are better off before? I abhor the idea that we become women only through the physical act of a man. No, I think we become women when we learn what is important in our lives, when we learn to give and to take with a loving heart. — Suzanne Elizabeth Phillips

are experts at taking care of everybody around us, do we doubt our ability to take care of ourselves? What is it about us? Many of us learned these things because when we were children, someone very important to us was unable to give us the love, approval, and emotional security we needed. So we've gone about our lives the best way we could, still looking vaguely or desperately for something we never got. Some of us are still beating our heads against the cement trying to get this love from people who, like Mother or Father, are unable to give what we need. The cycle repeats itself until it is interrupted and stopped. It's called unfinished business. — Melody Beattie

If we are living under the assumption that we are only one way or another, inside a limited spectrum of human qualities, then we would have to question why more of us aren't wholly satisfied with our lives right now. Why do we have access to so much wisdom yet fail to have the strength and courage to act upon our good intentions by making powerful choices? And most important, why do we continue to act out in ways that go against our value system and all that we stand for? We will assert that it is because of our unexamined life, our darker self, our shadow self where our unclaimed power lies — Deepak Chopra

Oh, it's nothing to be ashamed of. Slaying a villain in the service of your king is the stuff of legends and what heroes are made of." [Fanen told Myron]
"It didn't feel very heroic. It made me sick. I don't even know why I ... no, that's a lie. I really have to stop doing that." [Myron said]
"Doing what?"
"Lying. ( ... ) It's evidence of self loathing. You see, when you are so ashamed of your actions, thoughts, or intentions, you lie to hide it rather than accept yourself for who you really are. The idea of how others see you becomes more important than the reality of you.
"It's like when a man would rather die than be thought of a coward. His life is not as important to him as his reputation. In the end, who is the braver? The man who dies rather than be thought of as a coward or the man who lives willing to face who he really is?" [Myron finished]
"I'm sorry, you lost me there" Fanen said with a quizzical look. — Michael J. Sullivan

People who are obsessed with Jesus live lives that connect them with the poor in some way or another. Obsessed people believe that Jesus talked about money and the poor so often because it was really important to Him. — Francis Chan

It is therefore of supreme importance that we consent to live not for ourselves but for others. When we do this we will be able first of all to face and accept our own limitations. As long as we secretly adore ourselves, our own deficiencies will remain to torture us with an apparent defilement. But if we live for others, we will gradually discover that no expects us to be 'as gods'. We will see that we are human, like everyone else, that we all have weaknesses and deficiencies, and that these limitations of ours play a most important part in all our lives. It is because of them that we need others and others need us. We are not all weak in the same spots, and so we supplement and complete one another, each one making up in himself for the lack in another. — Thomas Merton

Modern Western culture, you've been brainwashed by what is called "the secular worldview." In this view of the world, what's real, or at least what's important, is the physical here-and-now. When we're brainwashed by this worldview, we experience the world as though God did not exist, for we habitually exclude him from our awareness. We may still believe in God, of course, but he's not real to us most of the time. Because of this we go about our day-to-day lives as functional atheists. We may pray and worship God on occasion, but these are "special times," isolated from our "normal," secular day-to-day life. So thoroughly are we brainwashed by the secular mind-set that the very suggestion that we could routinely experience the world in a way that includes God strikes us as impossible. — Gregory A. Boyd

In Buddhism, both learning and practice are extremely important, and they must go hand in hand. Without knowledge, just to rely on faith, faith, and more faith is good but not sufficient. So the intellectual part must definitely be present. At the same time, strictly intellectual development without faith and practice, is also of no use. It is necessary to combine knowledge born from study with sincere practice in our daily lives. These two must go together. — Dalai Lama

NO. No no no. I don't want to screw you. I just love you. When did who you want to screw become the whole game? Since when is the person you want to screw the only person you get to love? It's so stupid, Tiny! I mean, Jesus, who even gives a fuck about sex?! People act like it's the most important thing humans do, but come on. How can our sentient fucking lives revolve around something slugs can do. I mean, who you want to screw and whether you screw them? Those are important questions, I guess. But they're not that important. You know what's important? Who would you die for? Who do you wake up at five forty-five in the morning for even though you don't even know why he needs you? Whose drunken nose would you pick?! — John Green

Our lives are so important to us that we tend to think the story of them begins with our birth. First there was nothing, then I was born ... Yet that is not so. Human lives are not pieces of string that can be separated out from a knot of others and laid out straight. Families are webs. Impossible to touch one part of it without setting the rest vibrating. Impossible to understand one part without having a sense of the whole. - Vida Winter — Diane Setterfield

Philosophy is a necessary activity because we, all of us, take a great number of things for granted, and many of these assumptions are of a philosophical character; we act on them in private life, in politics, in our work, and in every other sphere of our lives
but while some of these assumptions are no doubt true, it is likely, that more are false and some are harmful. So the critical examination of our presuppositions
which is a philosophical activity
is morally as well as intellectually important. — Karl Popper

Life in New Orleans is all about making the present--this moment, right now--as pleasant as possible. So New Orleanians, by and large, aren't tortured by the frenzy to achieve, acquire, and manage the unmanageable future. Their days are built around the things that other Americans have pushed out of their lives by incessant work: art, music, elaborate cooking, and--most of all--plenty of relaxed time with family and friends. Their jobs are really just the things they do to earn a little money; they're not the organiing principle of life. While this isn't a worldview particularly conducive to getting things done, getting things done isn't the most important thing in New Orleans. Living life is. Once you've tasted that, and especially if it's how you grew up, life everywhere else feels thin indeed. — Dan Baum

...the experience of reading a novel has certain qualities that remind us of the traditional apprehension of mythology. It can be seen as a form of meditation. Readers have to live with a novel for days or even weeks. It projects them into another world, parallel to but apart from their ordinary lives. They know perfectly well that this fictional realm is not 'real' and yet while they are reading it becomes compelling. A powerful novel becomes part of the backdrop of our lives, long after we have laid the book asie. It is an exercise of make-believe that, like yoga or a religious festival, breaks down barriers of space and time and extends our sympathies, so that we are able to empathise with others lives and sorrows. It teaches compassion, the ability to 'feel with' others. And, like mythology, an important novel is transformative. If we allow it to do so, it can change us forever. — Karen Armstrong

Timing is so important! If you are going to be successful in dance, you must be able to respond to rhythm and timing. It's the same in the Spirit. People who don't understand God's timing can become spiritually spastic, trying to make the right things happen at the wrong time. They don't get His rhythm - and everyone can tell they are out of step. They birth things prematurely, threatening the very lives of their God-given dreams. — T.D. Jakes

they feel ignored, unappreciated, and unloved. That's because their context-blind Aspie family members are so poor at empathic reciprocity. As we have learned, we come to know ourselves in relation to others. This doesn't just apply when children are developing self-esteem. Throughout our lifespan, we continue to weave and re-weave the context of our lives, based on the interactions we have with our friends, coworkers, neighbors and loved ones. This is why it is so important for an NT parent/partner to get feedback from their spouse. A smile, a hug, a kind word, a note of encouragement: These are messages that reinforce the NT's self-esteem and contribute to a healthy reciprocity in the relationship. Without these daily reminders from their loved ones, NTs can develop some odd defense mechanisms. One is to become psychologically invisible to others and even to themselves. — Kathy J. Marshack

Every person needs to feel significant. We want our lives to count. We yearn to believe that in some way we are important and that hunger for significance-a drive as intense as our need for oxygen-doesn't come from pride or ego. It comes from God because he wants each of us to understand how important we are ... We must seek our roots, our origin, and our destiny so that we can know our present value ... We can help each other realize that we are persons of significance being made in the image of God. — R.C. Sproul

Keep this in mind, for it is very important advice, so do not neglect it until you find you have such a fixed determination not to offend the Lord that you would rather lose a thousand lives and be persecuted by the whole world, than commit one mortal sin, and until you are most careful not to commit venial sins. — Teresa Of Avila

People today have forgotten they're really just a part of nature. Yet, they destroy the nature on which our lives depend. They always think they can make something better. Especially scientists. They may be smart, but most don't understand the heart of nature. They only invent things that, in the end, make people unhappy. Yet they're so proud of their inventions. What's worse, most people are, too. They view them as if they were miracles. They worship them. They don't know it, but they're losing nature. They don't see that they're going to perish. The most important things for human beings are clean air and clean water. — Akira Kurosawa

All good teachers will tell you that the most important quality they bring to their teaching is their love for the children. But what does that mean? It means that before we can teach them, we need to delight in them. Someone once said that children need one thing in order to succeed in life: someone who is crazy about them. We need to find a way to delight in all our students. We may be the only one in their lives to do so. We need to look for the best, expect the best, find something in each child that we can truly treasure ... If children recognize that we have seen their genius, who they really are, they will have the confidence and resilience to take risks in learning. I am convinced that many learning and social difficulties would disappear if we learned to see the genius in each child and then created a learning environment that encourages it to develop. — Steven Levy

It is so important that our lives are built not on our feelings or circumstances, but on the word of God, and songs can really help us to meditate on and retain truth. I know from the correspondence I regularly receive that if you can express in songs the profound truth of the gospel in a poetic yet accessible way, they really can have an impact in people's lives. — Stuart Townend

She's afraid to tell me anything important, knowing I'll only turn around and write about it. In my mind, I'm like a friendly junkman, building things from the little pieces of scrap I find here and there, but my family's started to see things differently. Their personal lives are the so-called pieces of scrap I so casually pick up, and they're sick of it. More and more often their stories begin with the line "You have to swear you'll never repeat this." I always promise, but it's generally understood that my word means nothing. — David Sedaris

So the best defense against porn, for every member of our family, is a full life--the kind of life that technology cannot provide on its own. This is why the most important things we will do to prevent porn from taking over our own lives and our children's lives have nothing to do with sex. A home where wisdom and courage come first; where our central spaces are full of satisfying, demanding opportunities for creativity; where we have regular breaks from technology and opportunities for deep rest and refreshment (where devices "sleep" somewhere other than our bedrooms and where both adults and children experience the satisfactions of learning in thick, embodied ways rather than thin, technological ways); where we've learned to manage boredom and where even our car trips are occasions for deep and meaningful conversation--this is the kind of home that can equip all of us with an immune system strong enough to resist pornography's foolishness. — Andy Crouch

We have a finite amount of time and energy in our lives. Time and energy spent on soul-sucking cretins is lost forever. That's life wasted. Life is too short to waste it on people who think we need fixing or that we are there to be their slaves. Love yourself enough to spend your life wisely, giving generously to people who deserve it and avoiding people who suck you dry. Your life is no less important than anyone else's, so do not waste it on someone who thinks it is. — Tess M. Stevens

You are probably familiar with the statement, "To thine own heart be true." One of the ways we make our lives so complex is when we veer off course and ignore what is really important to us. If we put aside our own hearts and follow what the world thinks we should and ought to do, we will find ourselves unfulfilled and empty. Life will be tasteless. We will go through the motions, but nothing will satisfy us. What do you want out of life? What do you believe God's will is for you? Some people spend so much time meeting what they think their obligations are that they don't even know what they want. They never ask themselves because they figure it is way out of reach. When I ask what you want out of life, I am not talking about selfish desire; I am talking about heart desire. There is something deep in your heart God has planted there. — Joyce Meyer

It is so important to see that we are all converted, that we have in our hearts a conviction concerning this great work. It is not a matter of the head only. It is a matter of the heart. It is being touched by the Holy Spirit until we know that this work is true, that Joseph Smith was verily a prophet of God, that God lives and that Jesus Christ lives and that they appeared to the boy Joseph Smith, that the Book of Mormon is true, that the priesthood is here with all of its gifts and blessings. — Gordon B. Hinckley

The abbot told me once that lying was a betrayal to one's self. It's evidence of self-loathing. You see, when you are so ashamed of your actions, thoughts, or intentions, you lie to hide it rather than accept yourself for who you really are. The idea of how others see you becomes more important than the reality of you. It's like when a man would rather die than be thought of as a coward. His life is not as important to him as his reputation. In the end, who is the braver? The man who dies rather than be thought of as a coward or the man who lives willing to face who he really is? — Michael J. Sullivan

Why are our inner lives so important? One reason is because our thoughts determine our actions. — Billy Graham

(On talking about her three autistic sons).. I'm a better person because of them. They have showed me what it's like to struggle in life. They have showed me what is important in life. They are the strongest people I know. They have endured so much in their short lifespans already that most people haven't done in their entire lives. — Anonymous

We give our children everything, because they are the most important things in our lives. They are why we exist, to give life to others so that they can carry forward what we have started. — David Jackson

I'm trained as an architect; writing is like architecture. In buildings, there are design motifs that occur again and again, that repeat
patterns, curves. These motifs help us feel comfortable in a physical space. And the same works in writing, I've found. For me, the way words, punctuation and paragraphs fall on the page is important as well
the graphic design of the language. That was why the words and thoughts of Estha and Rahel, the twins, were so playful on the page ... I was being creative with their design. Words were broken apart, and then sometimes fused together. "Later" became "Lay. Ter." "An owl" became "A Nowl." "Sour metal smell" became "sourmetal smell."
Repetition I love, and used because it made me feel safe. Repeated words and phrases have a rocking feeling, like a lullaby. They help take away the shock of the plot
death, lives destroyed or the horror of the settings
a crazy, chaotic, emotional house, the sinister movie theater. — Arundhati Roy

The Law of Attraction ensures that you start attracting more of what you want into your life instead of what you don't want or instead of what always has been. The highest functioning people never even put their energy on what is if they don't like what is. That's an important difference, because most people who have a lot of "problems" in their life are constantly talking about them and focusing on them, so they just keep attracting more of those circumstances into their lives because that's where their thoughts are. — Wayne Dyer

The narrow path of the righteous is an extremely difficult path to travel. The rough road to victory is a very challenging endeavor that pushes the limits of endurance. Enormous mountains of hardship, boisterous storms of adversity, and several other elements of confrontation are there in their various forms of operation to test our faith. So it's very important for us to apply the word of our God to our lives, and believe it with unwavering faith. Then no form of adversity can keep us back from a successful advancement into a deeper progression where greater achievements are obtained. — Calvin W. Allison

There are some groups that for years and years have not gotten the rights that the majority of human beings have, and it's important to continue to draw these parallels so that when we think about our future we can change some of the lives of people who love differently than we do, look different than we do, who come from a different class. It's all about bringing awareness to how important it is to be accepting of people, and there will be oppression if one group thinks they're more important or superior. — Janelle Monae