Measuring Up Quotes & Sayings

The deepest fear we have, 'the fear beneath all fears,' is the fear of not measuring up, the fear of judgment. It's this fear that creates the stress and depression of everyday life. — Tullian Tchividjian

Sylvia possessed a deeply conditioned respect for authority. She wanted desperately to live up to the expectations of a society that viewed her as a bright, charming, enormously talented disciple of bourgeois conformity. On the other hand, she ached to experience life in all its grim and beautiful complexity. The poetic eye was always at work examining the nuance and measuring obscure detail, turning conversation into ultimatum (Steiner) — Elizabeth Winder

You feel the music needs something but you don't know what. So you start searching, fitting, measuring, trying. Every time you try another angle. And sometimes that's frustrating, especially if you don't come up with something for three days. — Beth Gibbons

The more self-love we have, the less we will experience self-abuse. Self-abuse comes from self-rejection, and self-rejection comes from having an image of what it means to be perfect and never measuring up to that ideal. — Miguel Ruiz

Another very good test some readers may want to look up, which we do not have space to describe here, is the Casimir effect, where forces between metal plates in empty space are modified by the presence of virtual particles.

Thus virtual particles are indeed real and have observable effects that physicists have devised ways of measuring. Their properties and consequences are well established and well understood consequences of quantum mechanics. — Gordon L. Kane

The fear of not measuring up robs us of seeing the value in our influence, and it keeps us on a perpetual quest to be better than others. — Jenni Catron

I think we all waste a lot of time measuring ourselves up against impossible standards in lots of ways. We need to learn a few things, one of which being that physical beauty comes in all shapes and sizes, including a lot that the women's magazines have never even thought of. — Kate Grenville

She made a creche outside the Inn. The natives thought it was wonderful, and Sister Honey was gratified by their numbers.
Why have the devils with wings come to mock at the poor baby?' asked the children, pointing to the angels.
The baby is the Number One Lord Jesus Christ,' Ayah told them.
But he hasn't any clothes on! Aren't they going to give Him anything? Not a little red robe? Not a bit of melted butter?'
This is His Mother,' said Ayah, showing them the little porcelain Virgin in blue and white and pink. 'He is her child.'
That isn't true,' said the women, measuring the baby with their eyes. 'He's too big to be possible. Probably He's a dragon, an evil spirit in the shape of a child, and presently He'll eat up the woman. — Rumer Godden

Speaking of - why the heck am I looking at his figure? My eyes snap up. Sure enough, he's looking, cocky little grin in place like he's God's gift to the female eye and he caught me praising the Lord. — Nyrae Dawn

You never stop the measuring process because these are oceans that are so deep that they have no bottom, and it takes a long time to know that. It only goes to a higher place after you've gone to the depths where you think there's a bottom - and when you find out that there is no bottom, it just rises up into this plume of euphoria. — Kim Basinger

It is youth's felicity as well as its insufficiency that it can never live in the present, but must always be measuring up the day against its own radiantly imagined future — F Scott Fitzgerald

Time is a relationship that we have with the rest of the universe; or more accurately, we are one of the clocks, measuring one kind of time. Animals and aliens may measure it differently. We may even be able to change our way of marking time one day, and open up new realms of experience, in which a day today will be a million years. — George Zebrowski

Suddenly she came racing into the lounge. She wore one of my big blue towels in sarong fashion, and had a white towel wrapped around her head. Her face looked narrow and intent. Her features looked more pointed. "That last trip," she said. "I don't know if it will help. We stopped at some sort of a boat yard in Miami. I can't even remember the name. Something about a new generator. He kept complaining about the noise the generator made. They took up the hatches and got down in the bilge and did a lot of measuring. The man said it would take a long time to get the one Junior Allen wanted. It made him angry. But he ordered it anyway. He left a down payment on it. He ordered some kind of new model that had just been introduced. — John D. MacDonald

I have used the words and expressions which my experiences from Minsk to Kharkov to the Don suggested to me. But I should have reserved those words and expressions for what came later, even though they are not strong enough. It is a mistake to use intense words without carefully weighing and measuring them, or they will have already been used when one needs them later. It's a mistake, for instance, to used the word frightful to describe a few broken up companions mixed into the ground: but it's a mistake that might be forgiven. — Guy Sajer

For the first time, I notice the lax skin at Mrs. Nightwing's jaw, the fine down that lies upon her cheek like the imprint of a childe's hand, and I wonder what it must be like watching yourself soften under the years, unable to stop it. what it's like measuring your days in perfecting girls' curtsies and drinking nightly glasses of sherry, trying to keep up with the world as it pulls you spinning into the furure, knowing you are always one step behind it. — Libba Bray

Here Mr. Tushman looked up at the audience. "Kinder than is necessary," he repeated. "What a marvelous line, isn't it? Kinder than is necessary. Because it's not enough to be kind. One should be kinder than needed. Why I love that line, that concept, is that it reminds me that we carry with us, as human beings, not just the capacity to be kind, but the very choice of kindness. And what does that mean? How is that measured? You can't use a yardstick. It's like I was saying just before: it's not like measuring how much you've grown in a year. It's not exactly quantifiable, is it? How do we know we've been kind? What is being kind, anyway? — R.J. Palacio

Meanwhile she's coldly interrogating me with her eyes. She's definitely in charge of this house and this moment. This must be Chloe.
She escorts me to a table full of people and presents me. She introduces them briefly. This one's from Morocco, that one from Italy, he's Persian
I'm not exactly sure what that means
this one's from "the UK." They're all in their twenties, poised and dismissive. They don't know or care who I'm supposed to be at home or where I went to school. They're measuring something else I can't see and don't understand.
They nod and turn back to each other. They seem to be waiting for a cue from Chloe to release them from having to feign interest. She introduces herself at substantially more length. Her father is Chinese and her mother is Swiss; she grew up in Hong Kong and "in Europe."
I grew up in Michigan and in Michigan. But she didn't ask. — Kenneth Cain

In most schools, we measure children on what they know. By and large, they have to memorize the content of whatever test is coming up. Because measuring the results of rote learning is easy, rote prevails. What kids know is just not important in comparison with whether they can think. — Sugata Mitra

Like measuring light as a particle or wave makes it what the observer expects, so too does assuming things about reality make it so. I fear the conclusion people gear up for is the wholesale demise of many millions unless this spiritual ennui ceases. How many catastrophes have people expected in the last few decades? How many times have humans expected the End Times? — Thomm Quackenbush

I fear that some of us understand just enough about the gospel to feel guilty
guilty that we are not measuring up to some undefinable standard
but not enough about the Atonement to feel the peace and strength, the power and mercy it affords us. — Sheri Dew

Hugh Laurie was intimidating, but he's the greatest guy. He's so wonderful and smart and funny and serious, and he sets the bar high. So if I was scared, it's because I wasn't measuring up. — Peter Jacobson

I'm with you on measuring this week in letters and the two-day drought we are about to experience. If only there was a way to transport letters faster, through some sort of electronic device that codes messages and sends them through the air. But that's just crazy talk.

Friday from me:

Sending letters through the sky? Like when airplanes attach notes to their tails? I thought they only advertised for going-out-of-business sales. But perhaps our letters would be okay up there as well. I wonder how much they charge per word. — Kasie West

I was learning the hard way that the gospel alone can free us from our addiction to being liked - that Jesus measured up for us so that we wouldn't have to live under the enslaving pressure of measuring up for others. — Tullian Tchividjian

In a straight up movie montage scene, ten things happened around me at once: someone pulled the broom from my hand, another person ripped the shirt off my head, a measuring tape appeared around my boobs, and two women crouched down in front of my legs. HEYO. "Nice tits," one assistant said as she finished measuring my chest. "Uhh, thanks," I replied as she ran in the opposite direction, having acquired the measurement she needed. "Is this your natural color?" a hairstylist asked as she ripped the hat and ponytail from my head. — R.S. Grey

Feelings of despair, anger, hatred, bitterness, stress, and depression stem from the ego's anxiety and insistence on living up to an external standard. The result is the anguish of not measuring up or fitting in properly. The ego will seldom allow you to rest, and demands more and more because it's terrified that you'll be called a failure. When you move beyond ego and make your higher self the dominant force in your life, you'll begin to feel that contentment and inner glow of peace and success that characterizes the extra mile. 2. — Wayne W. Dyer

The revolution here is from hierarchical to lateral power. That's the power shift. So increasingly a younger generation that's grown up on the internet and now increasingly distributing renewable energies, they're measuring politics in terms of a struggle between centralized, hierarchical, top-down and closed and proprietary, versus distributed, open, collaborative, transparent. This shift, from hierarchical to lateral power, is going to change the way we live, the way we educate our children, and the way we govern the world. — Jeremy Rifkin

Home. It's being new and old all rolled into one. Measuring your new against old friends, old ways, old places, Knowing that as long as the old survives, you can keep changing as much as you want without the nightmare of waking up to a total stranger. — Gloria Naylor

What's up with this sudden obsession with Jakes physique? He shoots me a look that asks: Is he measuring me for a coffin? — Huntley Fitzpatrick

Ove stomped forward. The cat stood up. Ove stopped. They stood there measuring up to each other for a few moments, like two potential troublemakers in a small-town bar. Ove considered throwing one of his clogs at it. The cat looked as if it regretted not bringing its own clogs to lob back. — Fredrik Backman

The bus made its way slowly through Sydney traffic and out to the electorate of Reid. It was a hat-trick of medical centres: three in three days. Outside we waited as rain fell. A large truck with the huge face of Labor's local candidate Angelo Tsirekas plastered on the side, honked as it drove past the national media. Minutes later a bigger truck, bearing the face of the Liberal candidate Craig Laundy, drove slowly past, mugging it up for the cameras. There were a few giggles. Then, as if the whole thing had been co-ordinated, both trucks returned driving past the medical centre, up the street and around the corner, one after the other. A staff member of the medical centre leant over to his friend and spoke out of the side of his mouth: "Well isn't this the lamest dick-measuring contest you've ever seen. — Mark Di Stefano

She kept the wish to herself, as she should have, and simply blew out the candle.I clapped and whistled and then dove into my own cupcake, dying to know how my creations tasted. And seeing as I'd done the hard work - frosting and decorating - I felt like I could take credit and call them my creations. All Cassie had done was get the ingredients, come up with the recipe, and do all the measuring and mixing. — Richelle Mead

Every Forsaken in a mile radius can probably hear you. You're just asking for trouble if you two don't stop whipping out the measuring stick."
"It's his fault," Avery snaps, pointing at Julian.
"Shut up, ya wanker."
They start in on each other again. They yell as if they both have megaphones to their mouths, standing inches apart. Each vulgar insult is more illogical than the last. — Laura Kreitzer

It is not a lack of spiritual experience that leads to failure, but a lack of working to keep our eyes focused and on the right goal. At least once a week examine yourself before God to see if your life is measuring up to the standard He has for you. Paul was like a musician who gives no thought to audience approval, if he can only catch a look of approval from his Conductor. — Oswald Chambers

Of course, physics prevents us from dividing things beyond a certain limit, determined by what is called the Planck constant. This is because, according to physicists, it is actually impossible to measure a distance smaller than 10-34m without creating a black hole that would swallow up the measuring device. — Marcus Du Sautoy

Short of hiring a new staff, consider giving subpar workers a chance to improve. Tell them why they're not measuring up and give them a set amount of time to make specific improvements. — Danny Meyer

So there are to be no obsequies. There is to be no mention of that which was to have conquered the world, and after the world, death. Not one of all these martyrs nailed to every tree in the western hemisphere will find favour in the editor's measuring eye. On the amusement page, to fill up space, one inch and a half, perhaps, of those who were forced to die. Butter is up ten cents. The human being is down. — Elizabeth Smart

Reality had a disappointing habit of not measuring up to my memories. — Jennifer Bradbury

In mathematics, by placing our fingers on a given problem, no matter how trite or pedestrian it apparently seems, we may end up measuring the pulse of the universe. p. 119 — G. Arnell Williams

You're literally sized up with measuring tape as a 13- or 14-year-old girl. I wanted to opt out of that experience. — Mary Elizabeth Winstead

Eddie gave a long suffering sigh as he bent down to pick up his bedazzled bag. "Glory be, why do I debase myself with ignoramuses like you? The Kinsey scale is a very basic way of measuring where you fit in terms of hetero versus homo." he pulled his coat on and held his hands out at a distance, fingers straight, like he was measuring a fish. "Imagine a line. At one side you have hetero, at the other you have homo. And then there is everything in the middle. It's not actually that basic. In fact it's far more complicated, but I don't have time to tell you now since I need to walk home before I get any drunker. — Micaela Vee

At least once a week examine yourself before God to see if your life is measuring up to the standard He has for you. — Oswald Chambers

To sacrifice a hair of the head of your vision, a shade of its colour, in deference to some Headmaster with a silver pot in his hand or to some professor with a measuring-rod up his sleeve, is the most abject treach ery, and the sacrifice of wealth and chastity which used to be said to be the greatest of human disasters, a mere flea-bite in comparison. — Virginia Woolf

Bite me, Goth princess," Shane called from the back. "Not literally or anything."
"Maybe you should say that to Michael."
"Not funny, Eve," Michael said.
Eve raised her eyebrows and held her fingers up, measuring off about an inch. "Little bit," she said. — Rachel Caine

It is often to the wary that the events in life are unexpected. Looser types-people who are not busy weighing and measuring every little thing-are used to accidents, coincidences, chance, things getting out of hand, things sneaking up on them. They are the happy children of life, to whom life happens for better or worse. — Laurie Colwin

Courage is called for on a day-to-day, moment-to-moment basis, even when there's nothing urgent at stake. It is up to us to create our lives consistent with who we know ourselves to be - making what's at stake that which we say is at stake. It's the stand we take on ourselves. That stand then becomes who we are. Saying that something is at stake is always a purely existential act. This business about freedom, this business about power, is really a product of a place to stand - not something that is out in front of us, that we're working on or measuring ourselves against. When we live consistent with what we say, we are being true to ourselves. — Nancy Zapolski

I can't say that I was my happiest on court, but I felt completely free. Free from family obligations, free from my own torment. In a real sense I was a different person. It was a place where I could not tolerate the idea of being beaten. I psyched myself up into a state where I felt something close to hatred towards my opponent, a state where I detested the idea of someone making his name at the expense of Jimmy Connors. I was in my element on court, measuring myself against someone else. I was not competitive for show. It came from deep within. — Jimmy Connors

I've been coming to this circle for about five years, and measuring
it. The diameter and the circumference are constantly changing, but
the radius stays the same. Which brings me to the number 5. There are
five letters in the word Blaine. Now, if you mix up the letters in the
word Blaine, mix 'em around, eventually, you'll come up with Nebali.
Nebali. The name of a planet in a galaxy way, way, way... way far
away. And another thing. Once you go into that circle, the weather
never changes. It is always 67 degrees with a 40% chance of rain. — David Cross

The little hand on time's clock trips away as though measuring seconds; but God knows how much time it is covering when it whisks round heedless of the divisions it passes over! So much is certain, that we have been up here for years. Our brains reel, surely this is an evil dream, though dreamed with nor hashish nor opium; a censor of morals would rebuke us for it. — Thomas Mann

We have the need to be accepted and to be loved by others, but we cannot accept and love ourselves. The more self-love we have, the less we will experience self-abuse. Self-abuse comes from self-rejection, and self-rejection comes from having an image of what it means to be perfect and never measuring up to that ideal. Our image of perfection is the reason we reject ourselves the way we are, and why we don't accept others the way they are. — Miguel Angel Ruiz

Don't get caught up in how many hours you work. Judge success based on having goals and measuring your results. Hard work, and lots of it, is certainly needed, but focus on what you get done. — Mark Cuban

You know, when you're trying to get better at golf, you're always measuring your game up against other people to see what you've got to do to get better and to see if you can compete with them. — Lucas Black

The philosopher Odo Marquard has noted a correlation in the German language between the word zwei, which means 'two,' and the word zweifel, which means 'doubt' - suggesting that two of anything brings the automatic possibility of uncertainty to our lives. Now imagine a life in which every day a person is presented with not two or even three but dozens of choices, and you can begin to grasp why the modern world has become, even with all its advantages, a neurosis-generating machine of the highest order. In a world of such abundant possibility, many of us simply go limp from indecision. Or we derail our life's journey again and again, backing up to try the doors we neglected on the first round, desperate to get it right this time. Or we become compulsive comparers - always measuring our lives against some other person's life, secretly wondering if we should have taken her path instead. — Elizabeth Gilbert

What do you think? More cheese? Less cheese? Different cheese?" Keith held up a measuring cup of shredded mozzarella and looked inquiringly at Veronica across the kitchen island. She was slicing tomatoes but paused mid chop to look up with one raised brow. "When is the answer ever less cheese?" "Fair point." He dumped the entire cup into the mixing bowl and started to stir. — Rob Thomas

Even as our world is being daily transformed by breathtaking innovations in science and technology, many people continue to imagine that math and science are mostly a matter of memorizing formulas to get "the right answer." Even engineering, which is in fact the process of creating something from scratch or putting things together in novel and non-self-evident ways, is perplexingly viewed as a mechanical or rote subject. This viewpoint, frankly, could only be held by people who never truly learned math or science, who are stubbornly installed on one side of the so-called Two Culture divide. The truth is that anything significant that happens in math, science, or engineering is the result of heightened intuition and creativity. This is art by another name, and it's something that tests are not very good at identifying or measuring. The skills and knowledge that tests can measure are merely warm-up exercises. — Salman Khan

What I saw as the negative effect on women's minds of such mundane "tracking" activities as calorie counting, I had sensed that the reason so many tasks women are expected to do in society involve this kind of thinking (e.g. scanning, list making, judging themselves critically, "measuring up") had something to do with the suppressive effect this kind of thinking has on other, bolder kinds of intellectual or emotional leaps. — Naomi Wolf

The measuring tape and saw Michael standing alone on the small rise. The man seemed a part of the scenery as he stood, hands on hips, his hair whipped by the wind like the meadowsweet at his feet, his jaw set like the granite rocks. "He must love his job," she said to Bobby. Bobby looked up and followed her gaze to his brother, standing — Mary Alice Monroe