More Than One Way To Do Things Quotes & Sayings

To invoke Jesus' name is to place yourself in his presence, to open yourself to his power, his energy. The prayer of Jesus' name actually brings God closer, making him more present. He is always present in some way, since he knows and loves each one of us at every moment; but he is not present to those who do not pray as intimately as he is present to those who do. Prayers a difference; 'prayer changes things.' It may or may not change our external circumstances. (It does if God sees that that change is good for us; it does not if God sees that it is not.) but it always changes our relationship to God, which is infinitely more important than external circumstances, however pressing they may seem, because it is eternal but they are temporary, and because it is our very self but they are not. — Peter Kreeft

In terms of professionally what I want to do, I want to play 15-plus more years, get to the Hall of Fame, and win a lot of championships and all that. I'd love to be the owner of a team one day. But it's way bigger than that. For me, my vision is how can I affect somebody positively every day? When you focus on other people, somehow good things happen to you. I think that's my goal. That's my vision. — Russell Wilson

Focus your attention upon yourselves. Do not focus your attention upon other things - that is, what you have cast away from yourselves. Do not return to eat what you have vomited. Do not be moth-eaten, do not be worm-eaten, for you have already gotten rid of that. Do not be a place for the devil, for you have already destroyed him. Do not strengthen what stands in your way, what is collapsing, to support it. One who is lawless is nothing. Treat the lawless one more harshly than the just one, for the lawless does what he does because he is lawless, but the just does what he does with people because he is righteous. Do the Father's will, then, for you are from him. — Marvin W. Meyer

Play more than one game at a time. This is a painless way to learn how to do many things at once. — Marilyn Vos Savant

Your subconscious is like a computer - more complex a computer than men can build - and its main function is the integration of your ideas. Who programs it? Your conscious mind. If you default, if you don't reach any firm convictions, your subconscious is programmed by chance - and you deliver yourself into the power of ideas you do not know you have accepted. But one way or the other, your computer gives you print-outs, daily and hourly, in the form of emotions - which are lightning-like estimates of the things around you, calculated according to your values. If you programmed your computer by conscious thinking, you know the nature of your values and emotions. If you didn't, you don't. — Ayn Rand

There's more than one way to do things. There's always different points of views and styles of pitching. — Tim Hudson

This is the way we love. She said,
if there were more than one moon I wouldn't know
what to do or where to begin.

If the fog never lifts, the city's still
there. She said, some things only know

one way to hide. This is the way we love,

she said, with a shotgun
under the bed. Under your skin the bone is setting.

And her hand smoothed the skin.
And her hand set the bone. — Brian Russell

Normal adult shopping is something I will never actually do, because it's no more possible for me to go shopping like normal adults do than it is for a man with no legs to wake up one day and walk. I can't miss shopping like you'd miss things you once had. I miss it in a different way. I miss it like you would miss a train. — John Darnielle

Lend stood up, shouldering his duffel bag, as I walked back into the living room. "Where do you think you're going?" I snatched his coat away and held it. He just got here. There was no way I was letting him go anywhere else.
"I happen to have very important things to do."
"What on earth is more important than watching Easton Heights??"
"Christmas shopping for you?"
I dropped the coat into his arms and opened the door. "Take your time."
"Glad to know I'll be missed."
"Have fun!" I leaned up and kissed him hard, then shoved him out and sat back on the couch with a sloppy smile on my face. "Best boyfriend ever."
"Shut. Up. Now." Arianna didn't move, eyes fixed on the television. A firm knock sounded on the door. "And tell Lend he can just walk in already!"
"Did you forget something?" I said as I opened the door, surprised to see a short black woman in a suit. And not Lend pretending to be one, either. — Kiersten White

Things happen in baseball, even if, in theory, it's something you don't do. Stats are a tool, but it doesn't mean that's how a game is being played at that moment. There's more than one way to win a game, or have a winning team. — Jon Miller

Solar power was way uneconomical when Nixon was president and the subsidies began. It remains so today. Because of physical limitations having to do with the huge area of solar panels required to produce any significant amount of power, and the fact that we insist on having things like night and clouds, solar is unlikely to ever be more than a niche energy source. And an unreliable one at that. — Anonymous

Becoming conscious of three important things:
First, as soon as people decide to confront a problem, they realize that they are far more capable than they thought they were.
Second, all energy and all knowledge come from the same unknown source, which we usually call God. What I've tried to do in my life, ever since I first started out on what I believe to be my path, is to honour that energy, to connect up with it every day, to allow myself to be guided by the signs, to learn by doing and not by thinking about doing.
Third, that no one is alone in their troubles; there is always someone else thinking, rejoicing, or suffering in the same way, and that gives us the strength to confront the challenge before us. — Paulo Coelho

I'll take another stab at talking to her."
"If you can't find a way, get Cooper to do it. You know how he loves controlling things. I'm sure he'll want to help."
"True, but once he starts meddling, he won't stop. I don't need him giving me pointers for the rest of my relationship with Lark."
"Lark," my mother said, testing out the name. "She had such a sweet smile. I could look at that smile for the rest of my life. Yes, go kick fate in the balls and get me a daughter."
"You have a daughter."
"A new one, I meant. Preferably one who likes to visit more than Anna."
Grinning at the thought of my alpha chick sister, I finished my juice and stood up. "I'll focus on a first date then worry about getting you a more compliant daughter. — Bijou Hunter

I've been busy with a long memorandum about the whole of our central Arabian relations, which I've just finished. It will now go to all the High and Mighty in every part. One can't do much more than sit and record if one is of my sex, devil take it; one can get the things recorded in the right way and that means, I hope, that unconsciously people will judge events as you think they ought to be judged. But it's small change for doing things, very small change I feel at times. — Gertrude Bell

I don't resent working long hours. I shouldn't- I'm the one who set up my life this way. I love to work. It's the thing that I get the most satisfaction out of-nd probably what I do best. Not that I don't enjoy days off. I love vacations and loafing around. But I think much of the world has the wrong idea of working. It's one of the good things in life. The feeling of accomplishment is more real and satisfying than finishing a good meal- or looking at one's accumulated wealth. — Jim Henson

Joshua Joseph has no real hatred of modern technology - he just mistrusts the effortless, textureless surfaces, and the ease with which it trains you to do things in the way most convenient to the machine. Above all, he mistrusts duplication. A rare thing becomes a commonplace thing. A skill becomes a feature. The end is more important than the means. The child of the soul gives place to a product of the system ... For anything really important, Joe prefers something with a history, an item which can name the hand which assembled it and will warm to the one that deploys it. A thing of life, rather than one of the many consumer items which humans use to make more clutter; strange parasitic devices with their own little ecosystems. — Nick Harkaway

Sandwiches, and drink mint juleps with the best of them." "If you want to dress in drag and do the job for me, you are more than welcome to," I'd replied in a sweet, syrupy tone. "You're just jealous that I would rock a garden dress way better than you ever could," he'd countered. "I'm frightened that you even know what a garden dress is." "Oh, baby," Finn had crooned. "I know all about the finer things in life - and the ladies who enjoy them. I happen to be one of those finer things, you know." "I think I just threw up a little in my mouth. — Jennifer Estep

Things are always obvious after the fact. The civil servant was a very intelligent person, and this mistake is much more prevalent than one would think. It has to do with the way our mind handles historical information. — Nassim Nicholas Taleb

Richard Dawkins says he can't be sure God doesn't exist. Well, you know what I do when I'm not sure about something? I go on a big crusade about it and write a bunch of books on the subject. No, wait, that sounds more like what someone with a mental disorder would do. That's one of the crazy things about lots of atheists: They're whole movement is supposed to be about being logical and reasonable, yet they tend to rail against religion is a very mindless way that doesn't seem to serve any more purpose than a tantrum. Perhaps I just don't understand their strong faith in not having faith. — Frank J. Fleming

Money, dished out in quantities fitting the context, is a social lubricant here. It eases passage even as it maintains hierarchies. Fifty naira for the man who helps you back out from the parking spot, two hundred naira for the police officer who stops you for no good reason in the dead of night, ten thousand for the clearing agent who helps you bring your imported crate through customs. For each transaction, there is a suitable amount that helps things on their way. No one else seems to worry, as I do, that the money demanded by someone whose finger hovers over the trigger of a AK-47 is less a tip than a ransom. I feel that my worrying about it is a luxury that few can afford. For many Nigerians, the giving and receiving of bribes, tips, extortion money, or alms
the categories are fluid
is not thought of in moral terms. It is seen either as a mild irritant or as an opportunity. It is a way of getting things done, neither more nor less than what money is there for. — Teju Cole

You teach the reader that he's way smarter than he thought he was. I think one of the insidious lessons about TV is the meta-lesson that you're dumb. This is all you can do. This is easy, and you're the sort of person who really just wants to sit in a chair and have it easy. When in fact there are parts of us, in a way, that are a lot more ambitious than that. And what we need ... is seriously engaged art that can teach again that we're smart. And that's the stuff that TV and movies - although they're great at certain things - cannot give us. But that have to create the motivations for us to want to do the extra work, to get those other kinds of art ... Which is tricky, because you want to seduce the reader, but you don't want to pander or manipulate them. I mean, a good book teaches the reader how to read it. — David Foster Wallace

Uncertainty as to our relationship with God is one of the most enfeebling and dispiriting of things. It makes a man heartless. It takes the pith out of him. He cannot fight; he cannot run. He is easily dismayed and gives way. He can do nothing for God. But when we know that we are of God, we are vigorous, brave, invincible. There is no more quickening truth than this of assurance. — Horatius Bonar

... you know what was really messing me up when I got down there to Pittsburgh? Was how young he seemed. He kept asking me things like what did I think of Kanye West's music, and did I think he should hold on to Kevin Garnett in this fantasy basketball league he was in or trade him. And how he wasn't just in this league; he was commissioner of it. Like that was some big mark of distinction: commissioner of make-believe. And I wanted to slam him, one-handed, against the wall, the way he used to do to me, and scream in his face, 'Stop it! Act your age!' ... I didn't do it, though. I wanted to, but I couldn't. 'Honor thy father,' you know what I'm saying? So instead, I grabbed my car keys, got out of there, and took off. It was messing with my head, you know? You get out of there alive, more or less, wait for your father to come see you at the hospital you're stuck at, and when you finally go to see him, he's younger than you are. — Wally Lamb

The things that the world fills time with are enough to turn the heart to stone, but the goodness of time itself is as untouched by them as the freshness of a spring morning is untouched by yelps from the scaffold. Time is good because the Holy One made it that way and then set the heavenly bodies wheeling through the sky so there would always be a way of marking its passage. Unfortunately, not even the most devout understand this for more than possibly a day or two out of the entire year when everything seems to be going their way. The rest of the year they go around like everybody else rolling their eyes and expecting terrible things to happen. When terrible things do happen, they fail to understand that for the most part they have brought them down on their own heads. They prefer to think that it is time itself that is terrible and that terrible things are only another method by which the Holy One afflicts them for their sins. — Frederick Buechner

I think live music is really, really important. And I think it's very important to do together. It's much more fun to play to music together than the one person listening to their lone iPod Shuffle. I think it's an amazing way to build community and have children do things that are funded that's not a videogame. — Sandra Tsing Loh

How do you get the happy ending? John Irving ought to know. One of my favorite authors, Irving writes these multigenerational epics of fiction that somehow work out in the end. How does he do it? He says, 'I always begin with the last sentence ; then I work my way backwards, through the plot, to where the story should begin.' Thst sounds like a lot of work, especially compared to the fantasy that great writers sit down and just go where the story takes them. Irving lets us know that good stories and happy endings are more intentional than that.
Most 20 something's can't write the last sentence of their lives. But when pressed, they usually can identify things they want in their 30s or 40s or 60s -or things they don't want- and work backward from there. This is how you have your own multigenerational epic with a happy ending. This is how you live your life in real time. — Meg Jay

It was more than childish perversity, of course, or the unexpected confidence she had recently acquired, that made her insist; she had indeed noticed that Gregor needed a lot of room to crawl about in, whereas the furniture, as far as anyone could see, was of no use to him at all. Girls of that age, though, do become enthusiastic about things and feel they must get their way whenever they can. Perhaps this was what tempted Grete to make Gregor's situation seem even more shocking than it was so that she could do even more for him. Grete would probably be the only one who would dare enter a room dominated by Gregor crawling about the bare walls by himself. So — Franz Kafka

Actually, Wilson's art can't fit into these neat categories. My own take is that the best way to think of Wilson is as an outsider musician, but one who actually happens to have a huge amount of talent. Much like, say, Wesley Willis, Wilson is focussed on having huge commercial success, but has little to no idea what actually counts as commercial. He's very easily swayed by people around him, so if he's told he should be doing three-minute pop songs, he does three-minute pop songs, and if he's told he should do epic suites about the American Dream, he does those. But at all times there are two things that remain true about him: he has an unerring ability as an arranger, and a directness that makes his music more communicative than any other music I've ever heard. — Andrew Hickey

At the time, I prayed to God only intermittently, and then mainly to ask for things, such as: "Please let me get an A on my next test." "Please let me do well in Little League this year." "Please let my skin clear up for the school picture." I used to envision God as the Great Problem Solver, the one who would fix everything if I just prayed hard enough, used the correct prayers, and prayed in precisely the right way. But when God couldn't fix things (which seemed more frequent than I would have liked), I would turn to St. Jude. I figured that if it was beyond the capacity of God to do something, then surely it must be a lost cause, and it was time to call on St. Jude. — James Martin

I know no surer way of shaking off the dreary crust formed about the soul by the trying to do one's duty or the patient enduring of having somebody else's duty done to one, than going out alone, either at the bright beginning of the day, when the earth is still unsoiled by the feet of the strenuous and only God is abroad; or in the evening, when the hush has come, out to the blessed stars, and looking up at them wonder at the meanness of the day just past, at the worthlessness of the things one has struggled for, at the folly of having been so angry, and so restless, and so much afraid. Nothing focusses life more exactly than a little while alone at night with the stars. What are perfunctory bedroom prayers hurried through in an atmosphere of blankets, to this deep abasement of the spirit before the majesty of heaven? And as a consecration of what should be yet one more happy day, of what value are those hasty morning devotions, — Elizabeth Von Arnim

One of the things that I've worked my way out of doing, and I knew that I needed to, was comparing myself to other people. That just poisins everything. It all of a sudden dtermines even clothes you're going to choose to wear that day or what you're going to do with a music production or how you're going to sequence it. It poisinseverything. Your real job in the world is to be you. Comparing yourself to other people I think that hurt me more than anything. Allowing myself to go there so much in my head hurt me. — India.Arie

How do you know which one's the queen?'
'She's bigger than the others,' said Mel.
'That doesn't always help,' Petey said, 'I can't always find her.'
'Because she's not that much bigger, said Mel. 'You don't rely on her size as much as you try to use the way she moves. It's hard to describe. It's as if she walks in a more determined way' She pulled off her hat and smoothed her long, straight hair. 'She's got a big job. Babies to bear. Workers to inspire. A colony to manage. She moves like that. Like she's a woman with a plan. The best way to see her is to let your eyes lose their focus, let things get a bit fuzzy on you. See the bees as a whole rather than individuals. When you do that, you understand the entire pattern. The queen's movements will stick out because they're so different from everyone else's. — Laura Ruby

It had to do with the knowledge that the world was as it was because of what men believed it was ... year by year, these past three or four generations, the minds of men had been hardened to believing that there was one God, one world, one way of describing reality, and that all things which intruded on the realm of that great one-ness must be evil and of the fiends, and that the sound of the bells and the shadow of their holy places would keep the evil afar. And as more and more people believed this, it was so, and Avalon no more than a dream adrift in an almost inaccessible other world — Marion Zimmer Bradley

To see takes time, like having a friend takes time. It is as simple as turning off the television to learn the song of a single bird. Why should anyone do such things? I cannot imagine - unless one is weary of crossing days off the calendar with no sense of what makes the last day different from the next. Unless one is weary of acting in what feels more like a television commercial than a life. The practice of paying attention offers no quick fix for such weariness, with guaranteed results printed on the side. Instead, it is one way into a different way of life, full of treasure for those who are willing to pay attention to exactly where they are. — Barbara Brown Taylor

I'm one of those people that thinks the world changes in smaller and in more mysterious ways than a lot of people like to think. A lot of traditional charities and organizations do things that on the surface seem like a good idea, but it doesn't change the way that people think about interacting with other people. — Misha Collins

All things end. They rarely end as we would like them to and often do so before we are ready. We transition in a way that gives our loss honor; we grieve with a love and true appreciation for what we have no longer. It was clear that my mom was ready to go; it was her time. My love of her and my desperation to keep her in my life were of no consequence to that fact, any more than my relentless attempts to improve The Lyon's Den kept it from cancellation. Both personally and professionally I was swamped with the message: Your plan pales compared to the larger one. — Rob Lowe

Surely there was at least one other girl on campus not sporting a French pedicure (do girls really think we're fooled by the little white lines painted across their toenails?), who had some black in her wardrobe, and actually thought about things. You know, someone who knew the word French could imply more than just a way to kiss. — Veronica Wolff

Bathing is even more embarrassing, because I have to strip down to my birthday suit in front of a nurse. Now, there are some things that never die, so even though I'm in my nineties my sap sometimes rises. I can't help it. They always pretend not to notice. They're trained that way, I suppose, although pretending not to notice is almost worse than noticing. It means they consider me nothing more than a harmless old man sporting a harmless old penis that still gets uppity once in a while. Although if one of them took it seriously and tried to do something about it, the shock would probably kill me. — Sara Gruen

The failure of a political enterprise intended to bring about a fundamental change in the order of society can have one of three different effects on a man who has undertaken it. He may go on trying to do the same thing in the same way, always hoping that he will have better luck next time. Or he may come to the conclusion that his whole effort is futile and that he may as well accept the established order of things. Or he may continue to adhere to his faith, but recognize that the difficulties are greater than he had previously supposed and that he must adopt a more gradual method of approach to a goal which has receded into the far distance. — Geoffrey Francis Hudson

David Foster Wallace: I think one of the insidious lessons about TV is the meta-lesson that you're dumb. This is all you can do. This is easy, and you're the sort of person who really just wants to sit in a chair and have it easy. When in fact there are parts of us, in a way, that are a lot more ambitious than that. And what we need, I think - and I'm not saying I'm the person to do it. But I think what we need is seriously engaged art, that can teach again that we're smart. And that there's stuff that TV and movies - although they're great at certain things - cannot give us. — David Lipsky

One of the greatest myths in the world - & the phrase 'greatest myths' is just a fancy way of saying 'big fat lies'
is that troublesome things get less & less troublesome if you do them more & more. People say this myth when they are teaching children to ride bicycles, for instance, as though falling off a bicycle & skinning your knee is less troublesome the fourteenth time you do it than it is the first time. The truth is that troublesome things tend to remain troublesome no matter how many times you do them, & that you should avoid doing them unless they are absolutely urgent. — Lemony Snicket

I'm learning so many different ways to be quiet. There's how I stand in the lawn, that's one way. There's also how I stand in the field across from the street, that's another way because I'm farther from people and therefore more likely to be alone. There's how I don't answer the phone, and how I sometimes like to lie down on the floor in the kitchen and pretend I'm not home when people knock. There's daytime silent where I stare, and a nighttime silent when I do things. There's shower silent and bath silent and California silent and Kentucky silent and car silent and then there's the silence that comes back, a million times bigger than me, sneaks into my bones and wails and wails and wails until I can't be quiet anymore. That's how this machine works. — Ada Limon

He smiled against my cheek and kissed me again. "Talking with you would be much more enjoyable than talking with Talia, Lilly." His eyes scanned the floor by my feet. "She's paint by number; you're watercolor." Things like that, moments like those, how do you explain to other people that no one else in the world can make you feel this way? — Amber L. Johnson

In one area in Serbia two villages have been reduced to ashes. In Greece 220 men of one village have been shot. In France there are extensive shootings while I write. Certainly more than a thousand people are murdered in this way every day and another thousand German men are habituated to murder. May I know this and yet sit at my table in my heated flat and have tea? What shall I say when I am asked: And what did you do during that time? How can anyone know these things and still walk around free? — Helmuth James Graf Von Moltke