Old Things Better Quotes & Sayings

I'm convinced that the best solutions are often the ones that are counterintuitive - that challenge conventional thinking - and end in breakthroughs. It is always easier to do things the same old way ... why change? To fight this, keep your dissatisfaction index high and break with tradition. Don't be too quick to accept the way things are being done. Question whether there's a better way. Very often you will find that once you make this break from the usual way - and incidentally, this is probably the hardest thing to do - and start on a new track your horizon of new thoughts immediately broadens. New ideas flow in like water. Always keep your interests broad - don't let your mind be stunted by a limited view. — Nathaniel J. Wyeth

Let's not forget The Things They Do To Make Themselves Happy That Actually Make Them Miserable. This is an infinite list. It includes - shopping, watching TV, taking the better job, getting the bigger house, writing a semi-autobiographical novel, educating their young, making their skin look mildly less old and harboring a vague desire to believe there might be a meaning to it all. — Matt Haig

Most people are chained to their own fear and stupidity and haven't the sense to level a cold eye at just what is wrong with their lives. Most people will continue on, dissatisfied but never attempting to understand why, or how they might change things for the better, and they die with nothing in their hearts but dirt and old, thin blood - weak blood, diluted - and their memories aren't worth a goddamned thing. — Patrick DeWitt

I LOST MY OWN BOY, Treelore, right before I started waiting on Miss Leefolt. He was twenty-four years old. The best part of a person's life. It just wasn't enough time living in this world. He had him a little apartment over on Foley Street. Seeing a real nice girl name Frances and I spec they was gone get married, but he was slow bout things like that. Not cause he looking for something better, just cause he the thinking kind. Wore big glasses and reading all the time. He even start writing his own book, bout being a colored man living and working in Mississippi. — Kathryn Stockett

Let this coming year be better than all the others. Vow to do some of the things you have always wanted to do but could not find the time. Call up a forgotten friend. Drop an old grudge, and replace it with some pleasant memories. Vow not to make a promise you do not think you can keep. Walk tall, and smile more. You will look 10 years younger. Do not be afraid to say, I love you. Say it again. They are the sweetest words in the world. — Ann Landers

It would be a good thing if young people were wise and old people were strong, but God has arranged things better. — Martin Luther

The Engineer is one who, in the world of physics and applied sciences, begets new things, or adapts old things to new and better uses; above all, one who, in that field, attains new results in the best way and at lowest cost. — Henry R. Towne

When someone sees something old they think it's worth more than something new. I'll give them that. The history, imagining who might have stood or sat or eaten at a piece hundreds of years before gives it a value you can't hang a price tag on, but I've never thought it was ten times the value of a new piece. I think some things are better when new, then you can grow old together. — James L. Rubart

Ka-Be is the Lager without the physical discomforts. So that, whoever still has some seeds of conscience, feels his conscience re-awaken; and in the long empty days, one speaks of other things than hunger and work and one begins to consider what they have made us become, how much they have taken away from us, what this life is. In this Ka-Be, an enclosure of relative peace, we have learnt that our personality is fragile, that it is much more in danger than our life; and the old wise ones, instead of warning us 'remember that you must die', would have done much better to remind us of this great danger that threatens us. If from inside the Lager, a message could have seeped out to free men, it would have been this: take care not to suffer in your own homes what is inflicted on us here. — Primo Levi

The three boys, one dark, one light, and one - for lack of a better word - fiery, do not notice the night. Perhaps some part of them does, but they are young, and drunk, and busy knowing deep in their hearts that they will never grow old or die. They also know that they are friends, and they share a certain love that will never leave them. The boys know many other things, but none of them seem as important as this. Perhaps they are right. — Patrick Rothfuss

When you come fact to face with love, and before the sun sets, you become someone you didn't used to be. It makes the old things new. Makes dead things live. Love makes you into something better. — Jonathan Hickman

The Old Testament tells us to love our neighbors, the New Testament to love our enemies. The moral rationale seems to be: Love your neighbors and enemies; that way you won't kill them. But frankly, I don't love my neighbors, to say nothing of my enemies. Better, then, is the following idea: Don't kill your neighbors or enemies, even if you don't love them. . . . What really has expanded is not so much a circle of empathy as a circle of rights - a commitment that other living things, no matter how distant or dissimilar, be safe from harm and exploitation. And — Paul Bloom

Sometimes we self-sabotage just when things seem to be going smoothly. Perhaps this is a way to express our fear about whether it is okay for us to have a better life. We are bound to feel anxious as we leave behind old notions of our unworthiness. The challenge is not to be fearless, but to develop strategies of acknowledging our fears and finding out how we can allay them. — Maureen Brady

If I promised you a new car, would you say, "If it's new, it probably won't have an engine, a transmission, doors, wheels, or windows"? No, you'd never make such assumptions. Why? Because if a new car didn't have these things, it wouldn't be a car. Likewise, when Scripture speaks of a new Earth (2 Peter 3, and Revelation 21), we can expect that it will be a far better version of the old Earth, but it will truly be Earth. — Randy Alcorn

I used to write things that might have sounded better coming out of an older person's voice or vision. Hence, "grandpa-boy." I'm an old man, but I'm a boy. A really old boy! — Paul Westerberg

To be young is to be powerless, but to have delusions of power. To believe that one can really change things, make the world better and simpler in good and simple ways. To grow old is to realize that nobody is ever good, nothing is ever simple. That truth is cruel at first, but finally comforting. — Frances Hardinge

Old things are better than new things, because they've got stories in them, Ethan. — Kami Garcia

Come on," Alec said, already stomping down the ramp. "Let's find us a squirrel." He swept the weapon back and forth as he walked, looking for any interlopers. "Or better yet, one of the crazies who might've strayed over here. Too bad these things have to be charged or we could get rid of this virus problem in a jiffy. Sweep these old neighborhoods nice and clean."
Mark joined him on the ground below the Berg, wary that someone might be watching from the ruined homes surrounding them or from the burnt woods beyond those. "Your value of human life brings tears to my eyes," he muttered. — James Dashner

An echo makes good company, Old Margaret said. Whenever I'm lonely, I always try to find one to talk to. They're much better than mirrors. Mirrors say nasty things about you. Echoes are far more supportive. They think whatever you say is completely brilliant. — Gabrielle Zevin

My grandfather always told me, 'You know you're American first, but you're a Greek-American, which makes you a better American.' It sounds sort of old-world and very sweet, but what he meant was that you should embrace those things that are most special and different about you. — Melina Kanakaredes

I speak for an art ... weary of its puny exploits, weary of pretending to be able, of being able, of doing a little better the same old thing, of going a little further along a dreary road. — Samuel Beckett

Things are both getting better and getting worse. The madness is accelerating but an acceleration of the new consciousness is also coming in. However, this latter development is less apparent when you listen to the media. The media still mostly reflects what is happening in the sphere of the old consciousness. — Eckhart Tolle

I'll go to another country, go to another shore,
find another city better than this one.
Whatever I try to do is fated to turn out wrong
and my heart -like something dead- lies buried.
How long can I let my mind moulder in this place?
Wherever I turn, wherever I look,
I see the black ruins of my life, here,
where I've spent so many years, wasted them, destroyed them totally.
You won't find a new country, won't find another shore.
This city will always pursue you.
You'll walk the same streets, grow old
in the same neighbourhoods, turn grey in these same houses.
You'll always end up in this city. Don't hope for things elsewhere:
there's no ship for you, there's no road.
Now that you've wasted your life here, in this small corner,
you've destroyed it everywhere in the world. — Constantine P. Cavafy

A person cannot coast along in old destructive habits year after year and accept whatever comes along. A person must stand up on her own two legs and walk. Get off the bus and go get on another. Climb out of the ditch and cross the road. Find the road that s where you want to go ... The only sermon that counts is the one that is formed by our actions. She would quit drinking and thereby show Kyle life is what you make it. A person can grab hold of her life and change things for the better. This happens all the time. We are not chips of wood drifting down the stream of time. We have oars. — Garrison Keillor

Well, I hate small talk, and I refuse to become one of those old people who spends all their time telling young people how much better and cheaper things used to be. What do you care if the subway used to cost five cents? It don't anymore. — Helen Cox

Nothing is as good as it used to be." I swore I would never talk like that and you know what? Now that I'm an old lady myself, I think that most things are better than they used to be. Look at the computers. Look at your sister, — Anita Diamant

I would never stop watching film. The reason why I say I like the old ones is I like the subject matter better. I thought they had more variety to them, they had more romantic comedies and things that appealed to me more. — Debbie Reynolds

If we loved children, we would have a few. If we had them, we would want them as children, and would love the wonder with which they behold the world, and would hope some of it might open our eyes a little. We would love their games, and would want to play them once in a while, stirring in ourselves those memories of play that no one regrets, and that are almost the only things an old man can look back on with complete satisfaction. We would want children tagging along after us, or if not, then only because we would understand that they had better things to do. — Anthony Esolen

If your goal is to change the world, you can't start by doing things the same old way because it sells better. — Henry Spencer

If your life's at a juncture and you need to think about things, there's nowhere better than home. However old you are. — Sophie Kinsella

Take an old man's word; there's nothing worse than a muddle in all the world. It is easy to face Death and Fate, and the things that sound so dreadful. It is on my muddles that I look back with horror - on the things that I might have avoided. We can help one another but little. I used to think I could teach young people the whole of life, but I know better now, and all my teaching of George has come down to this: beware of muddle. — E. M. Forster

She stares at her knife and wishes she were smarter about things. Wishes she knew how to say something wise or consoling to him, something that wouldn't sound frightened or awkward. But then she remembers the time after her parents' death, when people would approach her and try to explain her loss to her; they said things that were supposed to cure her of her sadness, but that had no effect at all. And she knew then, even when she was nine years old, that there was no wise or consoling thing to say. There were certain helpful kinds of silences, and some were better than others. — Diana Abu-Jaber

I would tell filmmakers: 'Don't just be seduced by the same old, same old. There are interesting things you can explore that may get your film out there to audiences better than the traditional distribution mechanisms.' — Alex Gibney

Poor Willie - running out - ah well - can't be helped - just one of those old things - another of those old things - just can't be cured - cannot be cured - ah yes - poor dear Willie - good Lord! - good God! - ah well - no worse - no better, no worse - no change - no pain - hardly any - great thing that - nothing like it - pure ... what? - what? - ah yes - poor Willie - no zest - for anything - no interest - in life - poor dear Willie - sleep for ever - marvellous gift - in my opinion - always said so - wish I had it — Samuel Beckett

The Conservative Party mustn't sound like the old man on the park bench who says things were better in 1985, or 1955, or 1855. — George Osborne

advertising 'Discount Sushi'. I can't imagine a better example of Things To Be Wary Of in the food department than bargain sushi. Yet the place had customers. I wonder, had the sign said 'Cheap Sushi' or 'Old Sushi', if they'd still have eaten there. — Anthony Bourdain

The moment I put it on, that suit became an old, familiar, and valued friend - and I became taller and wider across the shoulders. It could not have fit better if it had been made on my body. It knew things about me I wouldn't learn for years yet, and approved of them all. — Robert A. Heinlein

I always wanted to be a zookeeper when I was growing up, and I've wound up a zookeeper! I've been working with the Los Angeles Zoo for 45 years! I'm the luckiest old broad on two feet because my life is divided absolutely in half - half animals and half show business. You can't ask for better than two things you love the most. — Betty White

The good old days needed a lot of improvement. People aren't the only things that get better with age. — David Levithan

She saw that the world was evil and yet craved for happines in it, which she thought to get by being evil herself. And she had no more happiness than I have had -- who chose the other way. There was something that was the same in each of us: we were alike in that we hated the world, and yet saw that it could not have been otherwise. And we both tried to love in spite of this hate: perhaps she was more successful than I. Therefore do not talk lightly of a new start. Evil as the old things were, they were all that we had. And if you feel that they are gone now, be sorrowful -- for it will be a long time before new things come to replace them, and we cannot say how much better they will be. — Laura Riding Jackson

They all agreed that things were better in the old days. Some of them were sad about it and some were bitter, but it was always, 'Nothing is as good as it used to be.' I swore I would never talk like that and you know what? Now that I'm an old lady myself, I think that most things are better than they used to be. Look at the computers. Look at your sister, the cardiologist, and you, graduating from Harvard. Don't talk to me about the good old days. What was so good? — Anita Diamant

The pain in my hip was just short of apocalyptic. And the first five hundred words were uniquely terrifying - it was as if I'd never written anything before them in my life. All my old tricks seemed to have deserted me. I stepped from one word to the next like a very old man finding his way across a stream on a zigzag line of wet stones. There was no inspiration that first afternoon, only a kind of stubborn determination and the hope that things would get better if I kept at it. — Stephen King

I saw that for a long time I had not liked people and things, but only followed the rickety old pretense of liking. I saw that even my love for those closest to me had become only an attempt to love, that my casual relations -- with an editor, a tobacco seller, the child of a friend, were only what I remembered I should do, from other days. All in the same month I became bitter about such things as the sound of the radio, the advertisements in the magazines, the screech of tracks, the dead silence of the country -- contemptuous at human softness, immediately (if secretively) quarrelsome toward hardness -- hating the night when I couldn't sleep and hating the day because it went toward night. I slept on the heart side now because I knew that the sooner I could tire that out, even a little, the sooner would come that blessed hour of nightmare which, like a catharsis, would enable me to better meet the new day. — F Scott Fitzgerald

But I won't bore you any longer on the subject of old men. It won't make things any better and all my plans of revenge (such as disconnecting the lamp, shutting the door, hiding his clothes) must be abandoned in order to keep the peace. Oh, I'm becoming so sensible! ... — Anne Frank

Think what a better world it would be if we all-the whole world-had cookies and milk about three o'clock every afternoon and then lay down with our blankies for a nap. Or if all governments had as a basic policy to always put things back where they found them and to clean up their own mess.
And it is still true, no matter how old you are-when you go out into the world, it is best to hold hands and stick together. — Robert Fulghum

Dream Song 90: Op. posth. no. 13

In the night-reaches dreamed he of better graces,
of liberations, and beloved faces,
such as now ere dawn he sings.
It would not be easy, accustomed to these things,
to give up the old world, but he could try;
let it all rest, have a good cry.

Let Randall rest, whom your self-torturing
cannot restore one instant's good to, rest:
he's left us now.
The panic died and in the panic's dying
so did my old friend. I am headed west
also, also, somehow.

In the chambers of the end we'll meet again
I will say Randall, he'll say Pussycat
and all will be as before
whenas we sought, among the beloved faces,
eminence and were dissatisfied with that
and needed more. — John Berryman

Courageous people know that old ways of doing things shouldn't stand in the way of a better solution. — Frank Sonnenberg

Baby!" he hissed. "Silly little bleater! Go home to your mother and drink milk. What do you understand of such things? But the others, listen. Tash is only another name for Aslan. All that old idea of us being right and the Calormenes wrong is silly. We know better now. The Calormenes use different words but we all mean the same thing. Tash and Aslan are only two different names for you know Who. That's why there can never be any quarrel between them. Get that into your heads, you stupid brutes. Tash is Aslan: Aslan is Tash — C.S. Lewis

When I was 50 years old, I actually decided to draw up a list of half a dozen things that I really hadn't done very well, and I was going to make efforts to improve. One of them was skiing, and I really did become a very much better skier. — Edmund Hillary

Only old Benjamin professed to remember every detail of his long life and to know that things never had been, nor ever could be much better or much worse--hunger, hardship, and disappointment being, so he said, the unalterable law of life. — George Orwell

And then," said Sarnac, "I remember that I made a prophecy. I made it - when did I make it? Two thousand years ago? Or two weeks ago? I sat in Fanny's little sitting-room, an old-world creature amidst her old-world furnishings, and I said that men and women would not always suffer as we were suffering then. I said that we were still poor savages, living only in the bleak dawn of civilisation, and that we suffered because we were under-bred, under-trained and darkly ignorant of ourselves, that the mere fact that we knew our own unhappiness was the promise of better things and that a day would come when charity and understanding would light the world so that men and women would no longer hurt themselves and one another as they were doing now everywhere, universally, in law and in restriction and in jealousy and in hate, all round and about the earth. — H.G.Wells

I think when you're 10 years old, it's too much to see something with the threat of death in every episode. Kids are better left naive about certain things. — J.J. Abrams

My True Name is so well known in the Records, or Registers at Newgate, and in the Old-Baily, and there are some things of such Consequence still depending there, relating to my particular Conduct, that it is not to be expected I should set my Name, or the Account of my Family to this Work; perhaps, after my Death it may be better known, at present it would not be proper, no, not tho' a general Pardon should be issued, even without Exceptions and reserve of Persons or Crimes. — Daniel Defoe

There was once a Minecraft Grass Block named Minecraft Grass Block. Minecraft Grass Block liked doing the things most Minecraft Grass Block children did. Minecraft Grass Block wanted to learn how to be a better Minecraft Grass Block, but how would Minecraft Grass Block become a better Minecraft Grass Block than the other Minecraft Grass Blocks who hoped to become better Minecraft Grass Blocks, or at least better Minecraft Grass Blocks than Minecraft Grass Block was at being a Minecraft Grass Block and hopefully even the best Minecraft Grass Blocks a Minecraft Grass Block could possibly become? Just turn the page, and follow the adventures of Minecraft Grass Block in this Minecraft Grass Block Diary of a 12-year-old Minecraft Grass Block named Minecraft Grass Block, a Minecraft Grass Block boy who hopes to become a true Minecraft Grass Block or at least a better Minecraft Grass Block than the other Minecraft Grass Blocks. — Cube Kid

The stark, pedestrian images used by filmmakers (probably out of financial necessity) expressed nothing, symbolically or metaphorically. The only purpose they served was to remind me that a huge chunk of my life is completely over, even though I will probably live 60 more years. There are so many things that will never happen to me again, and I never even noticed when those things stopped occurring. And this does not mean I wish I had my old life back, because I like my new life better; I was just shocked to discover how much of what used to be central to my existence doesn't even matter to me anymore. — Chuck Klosterman

Our minds automatically seek explanations for things, so when we don't know something for sure, we make assumptions. For someone with ADHD, her symptoms are clear but the explanation isn't, so everyone makes assumptions about why she doesn't do better. Of course, all the old familiar explanations are used - she just needs to try harder, she's irresponsible, she doesn't care enough, she wants to do badly. This very much adds insult to injury. Not only doesn't it help her do better, but it just makes her question herself: "Huh. I thought I tried my best on that, but maybe I didn't." Initially most people tend to fight back against these accusations, but over time the accusations begin to sink in and influence how people see and feel about themselves. — Ari Tuckman

The other two things are ... well, I had a huge appetite for old black and white movies on BBC 2. At the weekends they used to run matinees, and the more romantic the better. — Ewan McGregor

I want to go to bed with you every night and wake up next to you in the morning and do boring, everyday things, cuddle on the sofa and watch old movies, and all that stupid shit couples do. And if you can't love me back, I'll deal, but if this is all bullshit and you just want to get rid of me, you better come out with it straight, because otherwise, I won't let you fuck this up. — Lou Harper

Don't be in a hurry about finding your work in the world for yourself - you are not old enough to judge for yourself yet; but just look about you in the place you find yourself in, and try to make things a little better and honester there. — Thomas Hughes

Years ago I sang on a track using that voice and someone asked, 'Who is that terribly depressed man' ... But Patrick loved it. He said, 'You sound like a young boy, like a child, like an old woman, like an old man,' and really, we all have all of those things inside of us. I don't do any vocal gymnastics to make the voice better as I age. If it comes out rougher, then it's true to what's happening. Singing is who I am. I didn't train for it, any more than I trained for anything else I did. I probably should take better care of myself physically, but it goes against the grain. — Lisa Gerrard

All I'm saying is that your happiness is in your hands and those of your nearest and dearest. And if you think I'm going to show up two decades or so down the line to collect your soul in my moldy old pocketbook, you'd better think again. The souls of humans have become poor and transparent things. — Stephen King

The mere man of pleasure is miserable in old age, and the mere drudge in business is but little better, whereas, natural philosophy, mathematical and mechanical science, are a continual source of tranquil pleasure, and in spite of the gloomy dogmas of priests and of superstition, the study of these things is the true theology; it teaches man to know and admire the Creator, for the principles of science are in the creation, and are unchangeable and of divine origin. — Thomas Paine

It is presumptuous, personally and historically, to assume that one is a part of a "saving remnant." One had better doubt that one deserves such a distinction, and had better understand that there may, after all, be nothing left to save. Even so, if one wishes to save anything not protected by the present economy - topsoil, groves of old trees, the possibility of the goodness or health of anything, even the economic relevance of the biblical tradition - one is a part of a remnant, and a dwindling remnant too, though not without hope, and not without the necessary instructions, the most pertinent of which, perhaps, is this, also from Revelation: "Be watchful, and strengthen the things which remain, that are ready to die. — Wendell Berry

When you look at what C.S. Lewis is saying, his message is so anti-life, so cruel, so unjust. The view that the Narnia books have for the material world is one of almost undisguised contempt. At one point, the old professor says, 'It's all in Plato' - meaning that the physical world we see around us is the crude, shabby, imperfect, second-rate copy of something much better. I want to emphasize the simple physical truth of things, the absolute primacy of the material life, rather than the spiritual or the afterlife.

[The New York Times interview, 2000] — Philip Pullman

It's unfashionable these days to talk about sin, and it's even less fashionable to talk about idolatry. The world likes to tell us that we're beyond that now. When we honestly discuss the sinful attitudes behind our actions, we are often shushed: "You're not that bad! Everyone does those things! You need to have better self esteem!" But the human heart is the same now as it was in biblical times. We don't have to bow down to a golden statue to worship idols. When we trust in anything other than God for peace and happiness we are essentially practicing idolatry. Only when we see the idols yet in our hearts can we truly "put off the old self" and "put on the new self" (Colossians 3:5-10). — Staci Eastin

New things are always better than old things. — Andy Warhol

I only believe in the easy things, like red lipstick
and coffee before noon and writing essays in pen.
I make my mind up about boys and then I unmake it,
compare us to continental drift, two ships passing.
I hit the snooze button too often. Write disposable
poems on napkins and old homework, try to discipline
myself when it comes to removing my makeup
before bed. I am trying to understand men better,
cut them some slack, write about them less. I dream
about oceans and mountains and wolves. I do not
always love myself. I do not always forgive myself.
I write apology letters and do not send them. Usually,
I do not mean it when I tell someone goodbye. — Kristina Haynes

Things did get better after that, though never like they were before the small blue baby boy was put into the earth. Catherine's mother wasn't a girl anymore, singing at any chance like she used to. She was old with a young face, walking slowly and watching the trees when she could stop and lean on her broom. Catherine thought that her brother was always with her ma, never quite letting her go, and it made her ma tired to carry him, too. — Rachel Devenish Ford

Here lies Morris, a good man and friend. He enjoyed the finer points of civilized life but never shied away from a hearty adventure or hard work. He died a free man, which is more than most people can say, if we are going to be honest about it. Most people are chained to their own fear and stupidity and haven't the sense to level a cold eye at just what is wrong with their lives. Most people will continue on, dissatisfied but never attempting to understand why, or how they might change things for the better, and they die with nothing in their hearts but dirt and old, thin blood - weak blood, diluted - and their memories aren't worth a goddamned thing, you will see what I mean. — Patrick DeWitt

People change as they get older ... grow wiser, make better decisions ... i am very old,Laurel. Anyone who lives as long as I have can't help but collect regrets along the way ... things they did in the past ... things they wish they'd done differently. — Kate Morton

There's an old Weight Watchers saying: "Nothing tastes as good as thin feels." I for one can think of a thousand things that taste better than thin feels. Many of them are two-word phrases that end with cheese (Cheddar cheese, blue cheese, grilled cheese). Even unsalted French fries taste better than thin feels. Ever eat fries without salt on them? I always think, These could use some salt, but that would mean I'd have to get up and move. I guess I'll just imagine there's salt on them. — Jim Gaffigan

Creativity, innovation, and nontraditional ways of solving problems are feared by noncreative, uninnovative, and traditional people. It causes them apprehension and consternation. They cope with their fear by criticizing people who do things differently. If nothing can ever change, nothing can ever get any better. If you don't create new ways to solve old problems, you'll always be stuck with the old problems. — Maggie Righetti

Don't we all discover, at some stage or another that there are some things we'll never get any better at, even though we have no idea why and hardly ever notice it when it happens, even though we may have enjoyed these things and might not have been lagging behind last time we checked? Learning to draw, for instance, was a familiar catastrophe - all of a sudden, unaware, you just stop getting any better at it, your drawings never progress beyond those of a four-year-old or a six-year-old, you're left behind by those who "can draw," condemned to producing flat, doughy figures on the page, with no sense of perspective to them and (this was what really struck me) no resemblance to the outside world: condemned by your ruined self to a shameful childhood. — Jean-Christophe Valtat

There is within the human heart a tough fibrous root of fallen life whose nature is to possess, always to possess. It covets 'things' with a deep and fierce passion. The pronouns 'my' and 'mine' look innocent enough in print, but their constant and universal use is significant. They express the real nature of the old Adamic man better than a thousand volumes of theology could do. They are verbal symptoms of our deep disease. The roots of our hearts have grown down into things, and we dare not pull up one rootlet lest we die. Things have become necessary to us, a development never originally intended. God's gifts now take the place of God, and the whole course of nature is upset by the monstrous substitution. — A.W. Tozer

I felt guilty that I hadn't thought of Kizuki right away, as if I had somehow abandoned him. Back in my room, though, I came to think of it this way: two and a half years have gone by since it happened, and Kizuki is still seventeen years old. Not that this means my memory of him has faded. The things that his death gave rise to are still there, bright and clear, inside me, some of them even clearer than when they were new. What I want to say is this: I'm going to turn twenty soon. Part of what Kizuki and I shared when we were sixteen and seventeen has already vanished, and no amount of crying is going to bring that back. I can't explain it any better than this, but I think that you can probably understand what I felt and what I am trying to say. — Haruki Murakami

There was no sense to life, to the structure of things. D.H. Lawrence had known that. You needed love, but not the kind of love most people used and were used up by. Old D.H. had known something. His buddy Huxley was just an intellectual fidget, but what a marvelous one. Better than G.B. Shaw with that hard keel of a mind always scraping bottom, his labored wit finally only a task, a burden on himself, preventing him from really feeling anything, his brilliant speech finally a bore, scraping the mind and the sensibilities. It was good to read them all though. It made you realize that thoughts and words could be fascinating, if finally useless. — Charles Bukowski

You'll need coffee shops and sunsets and road trips. Airplanes and passports and new songs and old songs, but people more than anything else. You will need other people and you will need to be that other person to someone else, a living breathing screaming invitation to believe better things. — Jamie Tworkowski

We can never skip growing old. As we grow older, we understand old things and things of old times better! — Ernest Agyemang Yeboah

Other people - store clerks, burger flippers, software engineers, the whole vocabulary of meaningless jobs that make up Life in America - other people just rely on plain old competition. Better flip your burgers or debug your subroutines faster than your high school classmate two blocks down the strip is flipping or debugging, because we're in competition with those guys, and people notice these things.
What a fucking rat race that is. — Neal Stephenson

I wanted to tell him that all the awful things that happened in the old world were dead. And the new world, the world we lived in now, the world we were creating, that world would be better. But I didn't say it, because I wasn't sure it was true. — Benjamin Alire Saenz

My stove is old. My wallpaper is old. It's the same wallpaper from when I moved here and I never changed it. Why would I change it? I just keep it clean. If you take better care of things, you can hold onto them longer. That's how I still run things. If it works, I keep it. If it doesn't, I see if I can use it for something else. If I can't, and I usually can, I toss it. — Clara Cannucciari

Things repeat themselves: people, life, death. But here God is the cameraman's boss, Thomas Alva Edison, he who has done the old biblical Lord one better: made sound that outlasts the life of the voice, light that knows no darkness, and now has made people who do not die, whose images shall remain forever on the earth in celluloid. And, from that which he has created, the light and the phonograph and the moving pictures and so much else, he has made what any true God must make here in America. Money. Piles of the stuff" (343-44). — Jonathan Lowy

The key difference between a geek and a critic is that a
critic digs deep and tries to get behind the surface of things,
for better or worse, while a geek is interested in his own hedonism,
the thrill of discovery.A geek is expansive and associative
and doesn't necessarily care what a film or a scene 'means'. It's
the difference between the encyclopaedia and the scholar. A
critic likes an interesting association, a nice phrase; the geek
admires the beau geste, a pulpy story and its codes of honour
taken seriously.
Tarantino rather combines those two roles. He is encyclopaedic
but also interpretive. He is a human Rolodex of
credits. His films are like stuffed overnight bags breaking at the
seams. The Handel of filmmakers, he takes the whole of
cinema as his resource. But he also provides new meanings,
new interpretations of old moments by the way he recontextualizes
them. — D.K. Holm

What can I do but stand with my mouth open, no sound emerging? My lips move and I wave my arms making gestures from the other side of the glass, which I can't penetrate.
... people can speak out of anything, though the struggle takes years. The problem is, whatever I say about the present feels false-nothing contains it all, or catches the depth of things, or their terrible one-dimensionality.
What am I living on? Someone said the other day, "that old irrepressible-impossible- hope." And I thought no, this doesn't feel like hope. But maybe that's what hope is, no shining thing but a kind of sustenance, plain as bread, the ordinary thing that feeds us. How could we confuse this optimism, when it has nothing to do with expecting things to get better?
Hope has to do with continuing, that's all ... I can imagine now, where I couldn't before, this long erosion of faith, this steady drawing from one's strength, until what's left is tenuous, transparent. — Mark Doty

Things are NEVER what they seem, Pa, I thought. I used to think they were, but I was wrong or stupid or blind or something. Old folks are forever complaining about their failing eyesight, but I think your vision gets better as you get older. Mine surely was. — Jennifer Donnelly

You can forgive a young cunt anything. A young cunt doesn't have to have brains. They're better without brains. But an old cunt, even if she's brilliant, even if she's the most charming woman in the world, nothing makes any difference. A young cunt is an investment; an old cunt is a dead loss. All they can do for you is buy you things. But that doesn't put meat on their arms or juice between their legs. — Henry Miller

I don't believe the old statement, "If it ain't broke, don't fix it." If that were the case, then Cadillacs and Jaguars and Mercedes would never make a change. I've always looked for ways to make things better. — Vic Bubas

A proverb in the Old Testament states: 'He that is slow to anger is better than the mighty; and he that ruleth his spirit than he that taketh a city'.
It is when we become angry that we get into trouble. The road rage that affects our highways is a hateful expression of anger. I dare say that most of the inmates of our prisons are there because they did something when they were angry. In their wrath they swore, they lost control of themselves, and terrible things followed, even murder. There were moments of offense followed by years of regret ...
So many of us make a great fuss of matters of small consequence. We are so easily offended. Happy is the man who can brush aside the offending remarks of another and go on his way. — Gordon B. Hinckley

Old age teaches you in a very unkind way that things won't necessarily get better. Not in this life. In fact, you can pretty much count on things degenerating. Being content is not a lack of ambition. It's being able to rest and relax and know that your worth doesn't come from what others think of you or even what you think of you. — Chris Fabry

Being with a friend in great pain is not easy. It makes us uncomfortable. We do not know what to do or what to say, and we worry about how to respond to what we hear. Our temptation is to say things that come more out of our own fear than out of our care for the person in pain. Sometimes we say things like 'Well, you're doing a lot better than yesterday,' or 'You will soon be your old self again,' or 'I'm sure you will get over this.' But often we know that what we're saying is not true, and our friends know it too.
We do not have to play games with each other. We can simply say: 'I am your friend, I am happy to be with you.' We can say that in words or with touch or with loving silence. Sometimes it is good to say: 'You don't have to talk. Just close your eyes. I am here with you, thinking of you, praying for you, loving you. — Henri J.M. Nouwen

I was raised to believe that you had to do things better than white people in order to succeed. The old black shows were better than the white shows. The Jeffersons was a lot better. Good Times was way funnier. Sanford and Son. Now, though, everyone thinks we're equal, so we submit the same s ... that everyone else submits. And then we get mad when they won't air it. You got to go back to the old attitude of it has to be twice as good. — Chris Rock

Lord Peter Wimsey: Facts, Bunter, must have facts. When I was a small boy, I always hated facts. Thought they were nasty, hard things, all nobs.
Mervyn Bunter: Yes, my lord. My old mother always used to say ...
Lord Peter Wimsey: Your mother, Bunter? Oh, I never knew you had one. I always thought you just sort of came along already-made, so it were. Oh, excuse me. How infernally rude of me. Beg pardon, I'm sure.
Mervyn Bunter: That's all right, my lord.
Lord Peter Wimsey: Thank you.
Mervyn Bunter: Yes indeed, I was one of seven.
Lord Peter Wimsey: That is pure invention, Bunter, I know better. You are unique. But you were going to tell me about your mater.
Mervyn Bunter: Oh yes, my lord. My old mother always used to say that facts are like cows. If you stare them in the face hard enough, and they generally run away.
Lord Peter Wimsey: By Jove, that's courageous, Bunter. What a splendid person she must be.
Mervyn Bunter: I think so, my lord. — Dorothy L. Sayers

I have lost years that I will never get back. Only now am I just beginning to live, on the verge of old age. It is painful and unfair. But today I have a different attitude to life: it can't be constructed from superficial things, no matter how attractive they may appear. Neither wealth not appearances have any importance now.
Pain gave me new life. It took a long time for me to die as Malika, General Oufkir's eldest daughter, the child of a powerful figure, of a past. I've gained an identity. My own identity. And that is priceless.
If there had not been all that waste, all that horror ... I'd almost venture to say that my suffering made me grow. In any case, it changed me. for the better. It's as well to make the best of things. — Malika Oufkir

The mind of a little child is fascinating, for it looks on old things with new eyes-but at about twelve this changes. The adolescent offers nothing, can do nothing, say nothing that the adult cannot do better. — F Scott Fitzgerald

Everything in this world was so new, so wonderful and strange
like things in my old world, but better []For sixteen years my soul had been drawn towards this place, this alien homeland, toward its rainbow sunrises and whispering trees
Breena Bitter Frost (on the brink of discovery; about why she never quite felt like she belonged in the land over the Crystal River) — Kailin Gow

My one-time roommate Claire had inherited the house from her uncle, and when she went off to bigger and better things, she'd left it in my care. And it needed a lot of it.
Most importantly, it needed a new roof. There was a worrying stain on the ceiling of my bedroom that had started out roughly the shape of Rhode Island, but now looked more like North Carolina. Another few more days of rain and it was going to be Texas. And then it wouldn't be anything at all because the battered old shingles were going to cave in on my head. — Karen Chance

I want to be six years old again - just for a day.
It's not that things were so much better back then. They sucked.
But I was the kind of kid who knew how to laugh about it all.
That's what I want. I want to laugh. — Jaye Murray

It was madness to leave without your useless shit. You came in with it, you left with it
that was how it worked. What would you use to clutter a new office with if not your useless shit? We could remember Old Brizz with this box of useless shit, shifting the box from arm to arm as he talked with the building guy. Of course, Old Brizz never had an office again. His useless shit really was useless. He had cause to leave his useless shit behind. But his was a rare case. All things considered, it was better to take your useless shit with you. — Joshua Ferris

A lot of people say, 'Wow, you're a single father of twin boys, that's crazy!' Two toddlers can get hectic, but I wouldn't change it for anything. Every day they teach me different things. The love is there. When you have a two-year-old saying every other hour, 'Papi, te amo. Papi, I love you,' it can't get better. — Ricky Martin

And now my old dog is dead, and another I had after him, and my parents are dead, and that first world, that old house, is sold and lost, and the books I gathered there lost, or sold- but more books bought, and in another place, board by board and stone by stone, like a house, a true life built, and all because I was steadfast about one or two things: loving foxes, and poems, the blank piece of paper, and my own energy- and mostly the shimmering shoulders of the world that shrug carelessly over the fate of any individual that they may, the better, keep the Niles and Amazons flowing. — Mary Oliver