Never Be Defined Quotes & Sayings

Let God begin to rewrite your story. Invite him to show you your past through his eyes. Ask him to surface good memories you have forgotten. He would love to do it. There is healing to be had there. There is a replacing of regret with mercy. Though our past has shaped us, we are not our past. Though our failures and sin have had an effect on who we are, we are not defined by our failures or our sin. Though thought patterns and addictions have overwhelmed us, we are not overcome by them and we will never be overcome by them. Jesus has won our victory. Jesus is our victory. — Stasi Eldredge

I am an African-American in America. That will never change. But I don't have to be defined by that. — Robert Griffin III

Our example - and commitment - to freedom has changed the world. But along with the genius of our Declaration of Independence, our Constitution, and our Bill of Rights, is the equal genius of our economic system. Our Founding Fathers endeavored to create a moral and just society like no other in history, and out of that grew a moral and just economic system the likes of which the world had never seen. Our freedom, what it means to be an American, has been defined and sustained by the liberating power of the free enterprise system. — Mitt Romney

Mathematics may be defined as the subject in which we never know what we are talking about, nor whether what we are saying is true. — Bertrand Russell

It is impossible to devise an experiment without a preconceived idea; devising an experiment, we said, is putting a question; we never conceive a question without an idea which invites an answer. I consider it, therefore, an absolute principle that experiments must always be devised in view of a preconceived idea, no matter if the idea be not very clear nor very well defined. — Claude Bernard

For a long time I didn't have a defined Dana doctrine to describe this approach; it was more a ball of string. Then one morning at a hotel I came back to my room for bed after a speaking event, and the hotel staff had placed a Zen card with a Buddhist saying on my pillow (this will make Gutfeld roll his eyes). It read, "Say little. But when you speak, utter gentle words that touch the heart. Be truthful. Express kindness. Abstain from vanity. This is the way." I had an "Aha!" moment when I read those words, because it captured how I was trying to live my life most productively and happily. I carried the card with me for months until I tacked it in my medicine cabinet, and I still see it every morning and night when I brush my teeth. The card is a little worn, but its message never gets old. In the morning it helps set my intention for the day, and at night it reminds me to forgive myself if I haven't lived up to it (usually because I've let Bob Beckel push my buttons). — Dana Perino

He found that love is never to be defined, that it grows and changes with every year of life, that each person knows it as a different miracle ... Nothing can shame it. Nothing can make it more splendid than it already is. Shared, wantoned or hidden forever, it can fill a life. There is no understanding love, and there is no defeat so precious as trying. No aspect of life is more complex, and none so simple. A look, a word, and the heart is torn forever; a touch, and it is mended. Love is brave and cowardly. In the same person it is secret and garrulous. But above all, love establishes its own rules and no man can know its complete manifestation in the heart of another. — James A. Michener

I never wish to be easily defined. I'd rather float over other people's minds as something strictly fluid and non-perceivable; more like a transparent, paradoxically iridescent creature rather than an actual person. — Franz Kafka

Impartial observers from other planets would consider ours an utterly bizarre enclave if it were populated by birds, defined as flying animals, that nevertheless rarely or never actually flew. They would also be perplexed if they encountered in our seas, lakes, rivers, and ponds, creatures defined as swimmers that never did any swimming. But they would be even more surprised to encounter a species defined as a thinking animal if, in fact, the creature very rarely indulged in actual thinking. — Steve Allen

True," Brymmer said, and then found himself wrestling with the old Shall I Argue With The Boss Now problem, which perfectly defined a lose-lose situation. If you argued and were wrong, you would never have a future. If you argued and were right, you would never be forgiven. — Walt Cody

Reality is self-defined as the mob, any mob, writes its own history, never to be contradicted by the quiet statement of truth. — Mike Barnicle

This Apostolic Church never turned from the way of truth nor held any kind of error. It is imperative that nothing of the truths which have been defined be lessened, nothing altered, nothing added, but that they be preserved intact in word and meaning. This is the true rule of faith. — Pope Agatho

I can think of nothing more gallant, even though again and again we fail, than attempting to get at the facts; attempting to tell things as they really are. For at least reality, though never fully attained, can be defined. Reality is that which, when you don't believe in it, doesn't go away. — Peter Viereck

Family comes in many shapes and forms. It's a single mom that happily gives up the things she wants or needs in order to provide that extra special something for her child. It's the single father that's trying to be a mother and father to his kids. It's the parents that were never able to have children of their own and adopt a child. Family doesn't show prejudice based on race, age or sex. Family isn't only defined by blood; it's defined by love. Something that Lily and I have in leaps and bounds. Family's what we make it, what we want it to be. — Jennifer Miller

What the fates have writ, men shall not erase . . . . How many times he [Lut] had uttered those words. But what exactly did they mean? That one's fate was inalterably fixed? A man's entire life? Was there no chance for redemption? Though he had never revealed this to anyone, especially not the elders, he'd long entertained the notion that perhaps not all of a man's life was preordained. For, if so, what was the point of living? Perhaps, just perhaps, he dared to imagine, impediments were placed in our paths by the gods, and a man was judged by how well he dealt with those obstacles . . . . Instead of a man being wholly defined by his fate, perhaps a man's very character was defined by his response to the fate that was spun for him. Couldn't it at least be possible? — James Jennewein

People were differentiated by this substance, which was called nganon. Nganon was a concentrate which was defined in each person by nurture and circumstance. She believed that she and a certain few others were not of the same nganon as the rest of Earth's people. At first Deborah had thought that it was only she who was set apart from human kind, but others of the un-dead on D ward seemed to be tainted as she was. All of her life, herself and all her possessions had been imbued with her essence, the poisonous nganon. She had never lent her clothes or books or pencils, or let anyone touch any of her things, and she had often borrowed or stolen from other children at school or camp, delighting, until their stolen nganon wore off them, in the health and purity and grace of the possessions. — Joanne Greenberg

Extroverts never understand introverts, and it was like that in school days. I read recently that all of us can be defined in adult life by the way others perceived us in high school. — Neil Peart

You should never be defined by what you do, by the things you have; you've got to define yourself by who you are and who you impact and how you impact people. And that's the thing I try to get across to my players. — Tony Dungy

It's easy to look back and say if things had been perfect, I could have accommodated all of those things into my life. But as a therapist I do not allow that word to be uttered in my office after the first session, because I believe the only reason for the existence of that word is to make us feel bad. It's the only word in the language (that I know of) that is defined in common usage by what can't be. It sets a vague standard that can't be met because it is never truly characterized. I prefer to think that we're all out here doing our best under the circumstances, looking at our world through the only eyes through which we can look at it: our own. — Chris Crutcher

I am afraid of sex as sex is defined by the dominant culture, as practiced all around me, and projected onto magazine pages, billboards, and movie screens. I am afraid of sex because I am afraid of domination, cruelty, violence, and death. I am afraid of sex because sex has hurt me and hurt lots of people I know, and because I have hurt others with sex in the past. I know that there are people out there who have been hurt by sex in ways that are beyond words, who have experienced a depth of pain that I will never fully understand. And I know there are people who are dead because of sex. Yes, I am afraid of sex. How could I not be? — Robert Jensen

It is important that an aim never be defined in terms of activity or methods. It must always relate directly to how life is better for everyone ... The aim of the system must be clear to everyone in the system. The aim must include plans for the future. The aim is a value judgment. — W. Edwards Deming

Pure mathematics consists entirely of assertions to the effect that, if such and such a proposition is true of anything, then such and such another proposition is true of that thing. It is essential not to discuss whether the first proposition is really true, and not to mention what the anything is, of which it is supposed to be true. [ ... ] Thus mathematics may be defined as the subject in which we never know what we are talking about, nor whether what we are saying is true. People who have been puzzled by the beginnings of mathematics will, I hope, find comfort in this definition, and will probably agree that it is accurate. — Bertrand Russell

Christianity was never meant to be defined by its disciplines, but by its passions. — Bill Johnson

I'm against the idea that rock stars have to live a life that's completely understandable or predictable to their audience ... Maybe I'll just be the mysterious figure that'll never be able to truly be defined. Maybe that's what my thing is. — Debbie Harry

I've never felt the need to be defined by a man. — Cherie Lunghi

Cedric smiled and sat back again. 'You only think that because you think heroes always win. Trust me on this one, James. A hero isn't defined by winning. Loads of heroes die in the effort. Most of them never get any recognition. No, a hero is just somebody who does the right thing when it would be far, far easier to do nothing. — G. Norman Lippert

Christ remains the most influential figure in history. Any list of world-transforming individuals would no doubt include Moses, Buddha, and Muhammad. Moses, Buddha, and Muhammad, however occupy totally different places in Judaism, Buddhism, and Islam than Christ occupies in Christianity. Moses, Buddha, and Muhammad never professed to perform miracles; indeed they never claimed to be anything more than men. They viewed themselves simply as God's messengers. Christ is the only person in history who has defined a whole religion around his person. — Dinesh D'Souza

I never wanted to be defined by what I did for a living. — Jane Clayson

Many [business] people focus on what is static, black and white. Yet great algorithms can be rewritten. A business process can be defined better. A business model can be copied. But the speed of execution is dynamic within you and can never be copied. When you have an idea, figure out the pieces you need quickly, go to market, believe in it, and continue to iterate. — Gurbaksh Chahal

Success could be defined as the ability to go on persevering even when it seems that there are no possibilities left. Each failure is not truly a failure, just another possibility explored and found wanting. We never truly run out of possibilities for success, just imagination to find them. — Jennifer Megan Varnadore

Peter was dimly aware on some level that with each swing of his arm, the purity by which his youth was defined was shattering all around him, irrevocably so, and he would no more be able to put his soul back together the way it was before than reassemble a broken pane of glass.
After tonight, he knew things would never be the same. — Sean J. Quirk

Having experimented in both poetry and prose, I can say that the two are such loaded words. But neither are quite as weighted as the word "poet". I think some people can write poetry their whole lives, and never truly BE a "poet". Whereas I see poets in the wanderers I encounter, the baristas who serve me, and the truckers I, so, love to talk to.To be a poet in my humble opinion is to be a muse of the human experience. I love that I love the idea, that anything can be poetry, it can't be defined. It's a feeling, like punk rock. I'm not one for form or structure. I say if your words are visceral and honest, it's poetry. If you see the beauty of the world and humanity, and you preach it, you're a poet. — Mallory Smart

I am often tempted to think of success in terms that are defined by others: records sold, popularity gained, album reviews, etc. These are impossible demands, however, and they can never be satisfied. Letting finite others define our worth is a horrible way to live. Only the Infinite Other [God] has the authority to do this. — Jon Foreman

I never wish to be easily defined. — Franz Kafka

Here is a fear for me, I never wanted to be one of those guys that was defined by a body of work 20 years old. — Todd McFarlane

If my mother's intention in whole or in part was to ensure that I never had to suffer any indignity or embarrassment for being a Jew, then she succeeded well enough. And in any case there were enough intermarriages and 'conversions' on both sides of her line to make me one of those many mischling hybrids who are to be found distributed all over the known world. And, as someone who doesn't really believe that the human species is subdivided by 'race,' let alone that a nation or nationality can be defined by its religion, why should I not let the whole question slide away from me? Why - and then I'll stop asking rhetorical questions - did I at some point resolve that, in whatever tone of voice I was asked 'Are you a Jew?' I would never hear myself deny it? — Christopher Hitchens

Woman is not a fixed reality but a becoming; she has to be compared with man in her becoming; that is, her possibilities have to be defined: what skews the issues so much is that she is being reduced to what she was, to what she is today, while the question concerns her capacities; the fact is that her capacities manifest themselves clearly only when they have been realized: but the fact is also that when one considers a being who is transcendence and surpassing, it is never possible to close the books. — Simone De Beauvoir

When you don't have your work clearly defined, there can never be any finish point. — Matt Perman

Peeking into the living room through the bathroom's connecting door, she called out, "You gonna be okay out there, Owen?"
He was lying on his back, long flannel-pajama-clad legs crossed at the ankle and arm up over hi head. Cover off to the side. No shirt. Jeez, his chest was broad and defined, stomach cut with ridges of muscles. He turned a lazy gaze from the fire to where she stood in the doorway.
"I'm god. Thank you, for everything."
Good, indeed. She'd never look at that couch the same way again. She hugged herself. "Okay, well, give a shout if yuo need anything, or just help yourself. G'night. — Laura Kaye

Real is...just being you. It's not letting yourself be defined by other people's opinions of you, of who they think you are, or what they expect you to be. It's refusing to let them squash you into the box they've built for you, and just being yourself, no matter what anyone else thinks. Because you're never going to matter to everyone, just like everyone's never going to matter to you. So you choose the people whose opinions you care about, and you be real for them. — Kate Lattey

The elements of trial and error, similar to earth and sky, and fire and water, delineates the constituent modules of our lives. Living robustly includes more failures than successes. We achieve adeptness to living by exhibiting a willingness to make good faith mistakes and learn from each misadventure. Every effort that fails to achieve our expected result is understandably frustrating. The fact is that without ideas and dreams and devoid of occasional crash landings, a person can never hope to achieve any worthy acts to temper resounding personal disappointment. Meaningful success is ultimately defined when a person dies, when an entire life's work devoted to performing passionate and compassionate enterprises can be judge as a whole unit. — Kilroy J. Oldster

What was I hoping to gain from this? ... Was I trying to confirm the ties that make it possible for me to exist here and now. Was I hoping to be woven into some new plot, to be given some new and better defined role to play? No, he thought, that's not it. What I was chasing in circles must have been the tail of darkness inside me. I just happened to catch sight of it, and followed it, and clung to it, and in the end let it fly into still deeper darkness. I'm sure I'll never see it again. — Haruki Murakami

I was not especially enthusiastic about opera when I was young, and I thought I would never write one. I felt it was an art form of the past, with expensive singers exposing their high notes, and bad theater, and ridiculous stories which don't concern us. But then little by little I realized that it can be defined very differently, that on the contrary opera can be something profound and not superficial - a wonderful meeting point for all the other arts. — Kaija Saariaho

From the beginning I felt that there were only two ways to create change for black people in this country - either politically or by open armed revolution. Malcolm defined it succinctly - the ballot or the bullet. Since I believe that human life is uniquely valuable and important, for me the choice had to be the creative use of the ballot. I still believe I was right. I hope America never succeeds in changing my mind. — Shirley Chisholm

I hate that word, CAN'T. I wish it had never been dreamed
up, spoken, or defined. I wish the concept of CAN'T could be
eradicated not only from language, but more importantly from
the psyche of a girl who I know is filled with so much CAN it seeps out of her pores and scents the air. — Tiffanie DeBartolo

The vital difference between dreamers and achievers boils down to some very basic, simple habits. People with clear, *written-out* goals who consistently honor their defined priorities tend to get results faster than others, and enjoy a greater level of happiness and long-term success in all areas of life. Yet most of us have never been formally taught a system of goal-setting and mastery that can be applied to health and fitness. — Chalene Johnson

War is a simple matter compared with revolution. War is an applied science, with well-defined principles tested in history; analogous solutions may be found from ballista to H-bomb. But every revolution is a freak, a mutant, a monstrosity, its conditions never to be repeated and its operations carried out by amateurs and individualists. — Robert A. Heinlein

When you judge a woman by her appearance, it doesn't define her, it defines you. Ladies, never allow yourself to be defined by someone's inability to appreciate your unique beauty. — Steve Maraboli

You always have to be worried about something that is considered a so-called 'scientific theory' that fits every scenario. Climate change, as they've defined it, can never be disproved. — Ted Cruz

The sacred cannot be precisely defined. Each of us perceives it through the lens of a unique personal history. For me, sacredness is an experience of the inner radiance of life, the unseen force that transforms and nourishes the physical world but is never limited by it. There is something more to it, a mystery that is never totally grasped. — Anthony Lawlor

As a feminist, I think you never want to have your characters defined by the relationships that they're in, and it did give her a chance to be a sophomore in college without a boyfriend. — Caroline Dries

You never believed in the meaning of this world, and you therefore deduced the idea that everything was equivalent and that good and evil could be defined according to one's wishes. You supposed that in the absence of any human or divine code the only values were those of the animal world - in other words, violence and cunning. Hence you concluded that man was negligible and that his soul could be killed, that in the maddest of histories the only pursuit for the individual was the adventure of power and his own morality, the realism of conquests. — Albert Camus

If we are defined by what we have lost, James and I will never really be found. — Kiersten White

He had never been a religious person. Even as a child he had found the notion of an omnipotent creator who punished his crations inconsistently for minor infractions of a vaguely defined moral code to be unthinkable to anyone with an ounce of sense. — Michael Thomas Ford

I don't fit into any demographic, I never really have. But that's true of lots of us, especially people my age and younger who've grown up with complicated identities, because life has gotten more complicated, and in which we don't want to be defined by any single one of them, but are happy to present many facets of our interests and personalities. — Andrew Sullivan

The sense of fear and loss that accompanies the letting go of dreams that will never be is best described by the German word torschlusspanik, defined as "panic at the thought that a door between oneself and life's opportunities has shut. — KathleenA. Brehony

I never wanted to stay in one genre; I never wanted to be pigeon-holed or defined as the actor who only worked in one genre. I want to be able to work in all different genres. For me it's fun, and that's how I grow as an actor. — Dwayne Johnson

The basis of almost every argument or conclusion I can make is the axiom that the short story can be anything the author decides it shall be; ... In that infinite flexibility, indeed lies the reason why the short story has never been adequately defined. — H.E. Bates

You see, as Americans we're not defined by class, and we will never be told our place. What makes our nation exceptional is that anyone, from any background, can climb the highest of heights. — Rick Perry

We're never really taught that we have to think about our work before we can do it; much of our daily activity is already defined for us by the undone and unmoved things staring at us when we come to work, or by the family to be fed, the laundry to be done, or the children to be dressed at home. — David Allen

The process of writing a novel is like taking a journey by boat. You have to continually set yourself on course. If you get distracted or allow yourself to drift, you will never make it to the destination. It's not like highly defined train tracks or a highway; this is a path that you are creating discovering. The journey is your narrative. Keep to it and there will be a tale told. — Walter Mosley

Remorse is a violent dyspepsia of the mind, But it is very difficult to treat because it cannot even be defined, Because everything is not gold that glisters and everything is not a tear that glistens, And one man's remorse is another man's reminiscence — Ogden Nash

A design style is defined by a set of microdecisions. A clear style reflects a consistent set. A clear style may not be a good style; a muddled one never is. — Fred Brooks

Jesus never allowed himself to be defined by the political conflicts of his day, and neither should we. — Gregory A. Boyd

Though our collective level of knowledge may always be defined by a certain set of answers, we are never limited by the questions we may pose. — Todd William

What we encounter in works of art and philosophy are objective versions of our own pains and struggles, evoked and defined in sound, language or image. Artists and philosophers not only show us what we have felt, they present our experiences more poignantly and intelligently than we have been able; they give shape to aspects of our lives that we recognise as our own, yet could never have understood so clearly on our own. They explain our condition to us, and thereby help us to be less lonely with, and confused by it. — Alain De Botton

If a serious statement is defined as one that may be made in terms of waking life, poetry will never rise to the level of seriousness. It lies beyond seriousness, on that more primitive and original level where the child, the animal, the savage, and the seer belong, in the region of dream, enchantment, ecstasy, laughter. To understand poetry we must be capable of donning the child's soul like a magic cloak and of forsaking man's wisdom for the child's. — Johan Huizinga

Looking at those photographs, I remembered how my parents had never said "I love you" to each other. How they had said only "I miss you." At the time, I hadn't been able to figure out what this meant. But now it seemed clear: this was how they defined their love - by how deeply they missed each other when they were together. They felt the loss before it happened, and their love was defined by that loss. They hungered even as they ate, thirsted even as they drank. My mother once told me to live my life as if I were already dead. "Live each day as if you know it's gonna be gone tomorrow," she had said. That was how my parents loved each other, with a desperate, melancholy love, a fierce nostalgia for the present. — Danzy Senna

I want to be in the arena. I want to be brave with my life. And when we make the choice to dare greatly, we sign up to get our asses kicked. We can choose courage or we can choose comfort, but we can't have both. Not at the same time. Vulnerability is not winning or losing; it's having the courage to show up and be seen when we have no control over the outcome. Vulnerability is not weakness; it's our greatest measure of courage. A lot of cheap seats in the arena are filled with people who never venture onto the floor. They just hurl mean-spirited criticisms and put-downs from a safe distance. The problem is, when we stop caring what people think and stop feeling hurt by cruelty, we lose our ability to connect. But when we're defined by what people think, we lose the courage to be vulnerable. Therefore, we need to be selective about the feedback we let into our lives. For me, if you're not in the arena getting your ass kicked, I'm not interested in your feedback. — Brene Brown