On You Own Quotes & Sayings

It takes a lot of weapons to do good works (as Richard the Lionhearted could have told us). And this is not just a Somali problem. We have poverty and deprivation in our own country. Try standing unarmed on a street corner in Compton handing out twenty-dollar bills and see how long you last. — P. J. O'Rourke

You look at women like Lena Dunham, you look at how women are kind of crafting their own space on the screen. I want to add to that. — Danai Gurira

My father then presented Honour with a cheque,

"This is from our family for you, only you. Put it in a bank and if my son ever treats you badly, use this to leave the idiot," he said.

I was laughing so hard I had tears in my eyes.

The haque mehr was traditionally given to the bride on the wedding day by the groom, it was an amount that would be hers for her lifetime to keep in case things went wrong and she needed to stand on her own two feet.

Dad had done his little trickery, and in his head and everyone else's, we had done all that was required from a nikah. — Ruth Ahmed

Nothing should be worth more to you than its value in helping you live your life. If you are willing to slough off the past, even at a loss, you are keeping yourself free, and your world continues to grow. If you insist on holding to some abstract valuation, you are being held hostage by that possession, and you are trapped in a prison of your own devising. — Kent Nerburn

Put blinders on to those things that conspire to hold you back, especially the ones in your own head. — Meryl Streep

Seen on her own, the woman was not so remarkable. Tall, angular, aquiline features, with the close-cropped hair which was fashionably called an Eton crop, he seemed to remember, in his mother's day, and about her person the stamp of that particular generation. She would be in her middle sixties, he supposed, the masculine shirt with collar and tie, sports jacket, grey tweed skirt coming to mid-calf. Grey stockings and laced black shoes. He had seen the type on golf courses and at dog shows - invariably showing not sporting breeds but pugs - and if you came across them at a party in somebody's house they were quicker on the draw with a cigarette lighter than he was himself, a mere male, with pocket matches. The general belief that they kept house with a more feminine, fluffy companion was not always true. Frequently they boasted, and adored, a golfing husband. ("Don't Look Now") — Daphne Du Maurier

When you're on your own, you have all the self-censorship that everybody has when they try and write. All the little voices that say, 'No, you can't write that, what will they think of that?' — Nick Cave

It doesn't matter how big a ranch you own or how many cows you brand, the size of your funeral is still gonna depend on the weather. — Harry S. Truman

Sometimes it is good to lose in a game to make the rival happy; when you see the happiness on the face of your rival, you become the winner of your own game! — Mehmet Murat Ildan

In the Lord with all your heart; do not depend on your own understanding. Seek his will in all you do, and he will direct your paths (Proverbs 3:5-6). We can choose to be self-sufficient or to rely on God. We can act on our own understanding regarding life's circumstances, or we can seek God's will in every situation. But only one choice assures us that God will direct our paths. — Francine Rivers

Serpentfire can burn for a very long time if the bagic is strong," said Aldric. "It's hard to handle, that kind of fire, it seems to have a mind of its own, but it can be a good tool if you have nothing else. You never, ever want to use it unless you need it. I keep it around in case of dire circumstances. I hate to admit that anything Serpentine can be useful." Absentmindedly he picked up a Dragon's claw from a pile of them on the tabe, and used it to stratch his neck. — Jason Hightman

On Packing My Own Lunch
You have to pack a sandwich. It can't just be cookies and bullshit ... No, I said if you packed it yourself, you could pack it how you want it, not pack it like a moron. — Justin Halpern

Your unwillingness to change to my view point is purely on the justifiable basis that you have your own strongly held beliefs about important life issues. — Archibald Marwizi

Were you acquainted with me, you would know that my failings are equal to my victories. On my own, I am no more than a pauper. It is the Prince for whom I live and for whom I fight. He raised me from the mire and made me a son. I will aspire to serve Him to the utmost, and perhaps my duty to Him will be fulfilled more as a herald than as a warrior, for if my quill and ink capture your attention and cause you to ponder the chronicles of this great kingdom and the story of the Prince, then I am content. — Chuck Black

I don't care if you are religious or not and I think the message is that at the end of the day, everybody has to mature and everybody has to heal and mend their own injuries, emotional injuries, on their own pace. — Boris Kodjoe

I'm a lot of things, Spatchcock, but 'beloved-of-law-enforcement' is not one of them. They'll just say that it's my own damn fault again and send me on my way. Besides, the last time I was at a police station I was quite rude to them. I think I threw a lamp at the custody sergeant. Do you have a light? — Robert McKelvey

That is, adoration was patient and waiting while love or, if you liked, plain sexual passion banged everything about. It either shouted or thought it knew too much, and it had always left him cold and had not involved his heart. Therefore, if he wanted to get involved now it would be on his own terms and at his own pace. — Bessie Head

Mercy didn't get embarrassed easily, but her cheeks flamed now. Because if Riley knew she was in heat - like a freaking wild cat! - then so did the rest of her own pack. "So what, you followed me hoping I'd lower my standards and sleep with a wolf?" She intentionally made "wolf" sound about as appetizing as "reptile."
Riley's jaw tightened under a shadow of stubble a shade darker than the deep chestnut of his hair. "You want to claw at me, kitty-cat? Come on."
Her hands clenched. She really wasn't this much of a bitch. But goddamn Riley had a way of lighting her fuse. — Nalini Singh

If, on the other hand, you listen to your own inner voice, to your own inner wisdom, which is far greater than anyone else's as far as you are concerned, you will not go wrong, and you will know what to do with your life. Then time is no longer relevant. — Elisabeth Kubler-Ross

The precepts "Love your enemies, do good to them which hate you, bless them that curse you" ... are born from the Gospel's profound spirit of individualism, which refuses to let one's own actions and conduct depend in any way on somebody else's acts. The Christian refuses to let his acts be mere reactions - such conduct would lower him to the level of his enemy. The act is to grow organically from the person, "as the fruit from the tree." ... What the Gospel demands is not a reaction which is the reverse of the natural reaction, as if it said: "Because he strikes you on the cheek, tend the other" - but a rejection of all reactive activity, of any participation in common and average ways of acting and standards of judgment. — Max Scheler

Because I woke up today and could take a breath with my own lungs. That's more than what many people on this planet could do. Today, I took a breath this morning while some took their last. Every moment in life is a special occasion. Being alive. Being surrounded by those who appreciate you is a blessed occasion and it's worth a celebration. — Melody Anne

Reputation is not a treatise you write on your own behavior. Other people write it, and other people keep it. — Calvin Miller

Sometimes it's great, and sometimes it's shit.

These are the things all the great philosophers

just won't tell you flat out about life.

You keep moving, keep living, keep breathing

And you keep writing-creating because that's what you do

And that's who you are. There are no magical voices to guide

You except your own. Make it count.





~ R.M. ENGELHARDT — R.M. Engelhardt

Me. You're here for me, to love me, live life with me, be with me. If you're too tired, I'll carry you through every day until you can walk on your own again. — Jewel E. Ann

Secrets have power. And that power diminishes when they are shared, so they are best kept and kept well. Sharing secrets, real secrets, important ones, with even one other person, will change them. Writing them down is worse, because who can tell how many eyes might see them inscribed on paper, no matter how careful you might be with it. So it's really best to keep your secrets when you have them, for their own good, as well as yours. — Erin Morgenstern

You can meet lots of actors who are in their own world and do their own thing, and they have no idea what's going on and they don't know anyone's name around them. — Richard Madden

I heard a choking sound behind me. When I looked back, Cannoli was hanging from the backpack harness with her hind legs circling frantically in the air. She looked like she was riding a bike just above ground level.
"Cannoli," I yelled. I unhooked her and made sure she was breathing on her own. When I tried to get her back in the backpack, she whimpered. I talked to her soothingly yet firmly, then tried again. This time she started howling like I was hurting her.
People turned and stared as they walked by. "What are you looking at?" I said to one couple. I suddenly felt true remorse for every time I'd stared at a parent with a toddler throwing a tantrum. I made a vow to be a better aunt to Tulia's kids if I ever made it out of this parking garage. I pleaded with Cannoli one more time. — Claire Cook

You can push a person to change, but the only time the change will stick is when it's something they want to achive on their own. — Belle Aurora

I have always been, am, and propose to remain a mere scholar. All that I have ever proposed to myself is to say, this and this I have learned; thus and thus have I learned it; go thou and learn better; but do not thrust on my shoulders the responsibility for your own laziness if you elect to take, on my authority, conclusions the value of which you ought to have tested for yourself. — Thomas Huxley

What they say is, life goes on, and that is mostly true. The mail is delivered and the Christmas lights go up and the ladders get put away and you open yet another box of cereal. In time, the volume of my feelings would be turned down in gentle increments to a near quiet, and yet the record would still spin, always spin. There was a place for Rose so deeply within myself that it was another country, another world, with its own light and time and its own language. A lost world. Yet its foundations and edges were permanent-the ruins of Pompeii, the glorious remnants or the Forum. A world that endured, even as it retreated into the past. A world visited, imagined, ever waiting, yet asleep — Deb Caletti

From the beginning, of course, I had known that the pure forcefulness of my argument would not penetrate deep enough to effect any change. It almost never does. It's never worked for me when I've been in therapy. Only when one feels an insight in one's bones does one own it. Only then can one act on it and change. Pop psychologists forever talk about "responsibility assumption," but it's all words: it is extraordinarily hard, even terrifying, to own the insight that you and only you construct your own life design. Thus, the problem in therapy is always how to move from an ineffectual intellectual appreciation of a truth about oneself to some emotional experience of it. It is only when therapy enlists deep emotions that it becomes a powerful force for change. And powerlessness was — Irvin D. Yalom

It [an ethical problem with in vitro fertilization] depends on whether you're talking ethics from the standpoint of some religious denomination or from just truly religious people. The Jewish or Catholic faiths, for example, have their own rules. But just religious people, who will make very devoted parents, have no problem with in vitro fertilization. — Patrick Steptoe

I don't know what position you're talking about, sir. The Gnomon Society has never questioned the rotundity of the earth. Mr. Jimmerson is himself a skilled topographer."
"Excuse me, Mr. Popper, but I have it right here in Mr. Jimmerson's own words on page twenty-nine of 101 Gnomon Facts."
"No, sir. Excuse me but you don't. Please look again. Read that passage carefully and you'll see what we actually say is that the earth looks flat. We still say that. It's so flat around Brownsville as to be striking to the eye."
"But isn't that just a weasel way of saying that you really believe if to be flat?"
"Not at all. What we're saying is that the curvature of the earth is so gentle, relative to our human scale of things, that we need not bother or take it into account when going for a stroll, say, or laying out our gardens. — Charles Portis

I believe that what works for the consumer is to be able to determine what they can pay
even if it is nothing. (Just joking.) Unfortunately, so many depend on credit for living expenses, and the lower payments helped them in the immediate term. I am OK with that. For those who want their minimum to be more, you don't have to wait on your credit issuer to increase the payment
do it on your own. For others, at this time, I think it's a horrible idea. — Trina

He rose, placed another small log on the fire, sat back down in his armchair, and opened his book.
"What are you reading?" Reggie asked.
"On a wild night like this? Agatha Christie, of course. I still feel compelled to see if Hercule Poirot's 'little gray cells' will do their job one more time. It seems to often inspire my own brain, however inferior it might be to the diminutive Belgian's. — David Baldacci

'Presence of God' is really that understanding that sometimes when you step out of your own shoes and just open your ears and listen to what's going on around you, you get answers to the questions you were asking. — Dave Gahan

I loved working when I worked at commercial art and they told you what to do and how to do it and all you had to do was correct it and they'd say yes or no. The hard thing is when you have to dream up the tasteless things to do on your own. — Andy Warhol

Lord, you will have to be our teacher, because the dignity has been drained out of us in so many ways. We have been treated like dirt, and that has stuck on us. We've put ourselves against standards of our own making, because we thought it would give us worth. Please touch each person with how unique they are in your eyes and how their dignity in your eyes is so great that you will not even override them; you will woo them and pursue them and help them to accept that you are seeking them and you will allow yourself to be found by them if they simply cry out for help. I pray that great freedom will come across them because of their awareness of where they stand in your kingdom. That will make Jesus very happy, and the angels in heaven will jump up and down. And so we say, Let it be so, and that's what we mean by amen. Amen. Dallas Willard — Dallas Willard

I'm not worried about her coming between us," I told him truthfully. "I'm worried about her hurting you and Jesse. Hurting the pack. But that's better than letting her face whatever it is on her own. — Patricia Briggs

I love these dudes, but I don't know what they're doing with all that facial hair these days. There's a lot of peach fuzz going on. They called me up to go to a Kanye West concert, and I was like 'hold on I'll call Kanye.' So I called him and they got into the show, and I called Kanye later and said, 'Yo did you see my dudes from Panic! at the show?' and he was like 'Nah they mst not have been dressed like they were from the 1700's'. But I back them. They have their own unique style, which is cool. — Pete Wentz

To conquer, you must endure not just your own suffering but the suffering of others. Indifference is the ultimate evolutionary achievement, the highest rung on nature's ladder. — Rick Yancey

want to either. We take what is offered us on this earth and live life to the fullest. No one can predict their own future, though many have tried. What will be is what will be in the end. You cannot change the course of time." The king patted Nicholas — Robyn Neeley

We think we have to prove our allegiance to God by being poor. Many years ago, my own psychic development teacher taught me that to be on a spiritual path meant that you needed to be poor, because that was proving your allegiance to God. So growing up with that kind of teaching from her was a real struggle for me, also. — Echo Bodine

First of all, I was running scams when you were at keggers at Kappa Kappa Werewolf. You don't know much about me but I am way smarter than Gabriel was. I'm a consummate liar. I can street fight with the best of them and I can cheat at cards like nobody's business. This on top of my computer skills. I may not howl at the moon and have superhuman strength but I can hold my own. — Lauren Dane

Jesus, Dean. I don't know why you have me around with her watching your back"
"You're just jealous. But don't worry. One day you too will have your very own little Amazon."
"I'll just settle for a woman."
"If you're lonely, you can have the inflatable sex doll Blue gave me for my birthday. I don't want the two
of you to miss out on an opportunity for love."
"You didn't like her?"
"I wasn't man enough to satisfy her cravings. I'm sure you'll be different. — Marjorie M. Liu

I'm the guy who will persist in his path. I'm the guy who will make you laugh. I'm the guy who strives to be open. I'm the guy who's been heartbroken. I'm the guy who has been on his own, and I'm the guy who's felt alone. I'm the guy who holds your hand, and I'm the guy who will stand up and be a man. I'm the guy who tries to make things better. I'm the guy who's the whitest half Cuban ever. I'm the guy who's lost more than he's won. I'm the guy who's turn, but never spun. I'm the guy you couldn't see. I'm that guy, and that guy is me. — Blake Jenner

If you reflect often on how His Atonement has changed you, and if you give thanks often, you will find that your witness of Him gains power to touch the hearts of others. When those you invite out of your own testimony feel that witness, they will come to accept Him as their Lord and Savior. — Henry B. Eyring

It's easy to run to others. It's so hard to stand on one's own record. You can fake virtue for an audience. You can't fake it in your own eyes. Your ego is your strictest judge. They run from it. They spend their lives running. It's easier to donate a few thousand to charity and think oneself noble than to base self-respect on personal standards of personal achievement. It's simple to seek substitutes for competence
such easy substitutes: love, charm, kindness, charity. But there is no substitute for competence. — Ayn Rand

And what I said was I'll miss you,
What I meant to say was that I love you,
What I wanted to say was that I meant what I said
I miss you like I miss my own bed
after too many nights of sleeping on couches
or hardwood floors
Or sitting silently behind the doors
Of hotel rooms became wounds
Breathing life in to this loneliness
I miss you
Like a burn victim must miss their own skin
I miss you like a sad ending
Must miss someplace new to begin
Because some say that the highway becomes a flat line
if you travel it for too long
I can't tell if that's true or false,
But I'm racing down it towards you trying to find my
Pulse. — Shane Koyczan

You guys own the Muppets, and you're just kind of sitting on 'em. I really love the Muppets, and I think I know how to bring the franchise back. — Jason Segel

I'm not big on sequels; I've done them, but I like doing little things that have their own timelessness to them, classic type things, and then you go onto something new. — John Travolta

Yet instead of drowning in the darkness that had threatened to suck her under, Brenna had said "fuck you" to the monster who'd hurt her, and she'd chosen to live. She'd not only wrenched back control of her own life, she'd taken on an Arrow and claimed him as her mate. — Nalini Singh

Think back for a moment on your own history
not just where you were born or where you grew up, but the circumstances that contributed to your being right here, right now. What were the moments along the way that wounded or scared you? Chances are, you've had a few. But here's what's remarkable: You are still here, still standing. — Oprah Winfrey

Here's how a child listens: you tell him something, and he puts his own interpretation on what you said. That's what he hears. No one has ever heard you. — Byron Katie

If you decide to go on a Buddhist path, you have to be careful if you start mixing a lot of different traditions you are not totally familiar with - mixing this kind of meditation with that kind of practice or this kind of visualization with that kind of mantra. Then you really are concocting your own thing, and you have no idea what is going to happen. — Sakyong Mipham

I can see it, hear it, feel it, taste it - but I can never be on the inside of it with you. I cannot even be sure whether I really know what it is like. Is it 'like' my own? Or incomparable? Just as I can never know if what you see at any given moment is exactly the same as what I see. We look at a colour. We both call it red. But it is only because we have been taught to call it by that name. There is no guarantee - not ever - that we see it in the same way, that your red is my red. — Andre Brink

You never compete with the people in your crew; you have your own team. Competition is only with those people whose film is releasing alongside on Friday and never with one's own team. — Emraan Hashmi

I find it very difficult to do anything on my own now because people recognize me. This has never happened to me before because I haven't really done television before. But I suppose if you're in people's rooms all the time, I don't know - I was thinking the other night with people like DiCaprio and, you know, those big stars and Cate Blanchett, and you just think how did they exist? It's so difficult. And I think now it's very intrusive because of these cellphones, you know, with cameras. — Maggie Smith

I will miss myself in relation to others. The rareness. The exceptional differences. I will miss the gift that comes with hardship and paying the price. I will miss the tragedy of my own life. As I once spoke...emphatically, but I now repeat here, quietly - the pain, the pain is what made it so God damn beautiful. I endured. You can wait a lifetime for thirty seconds, five minutes, or for an hour to come into your life - a brief interval that makes all the suffering purposeful. In such moments of splendor and rapture - even if the rapture be stilled, the private hours and years of reckoning are unloaded, a burden lifted and the spirit feels as it did on the happiest day of its life when it was young and untormented Or rather, unconscious of the torment waiting to be ignited. — Wheston Chancellor Grove

Do you know that when one who has influence with youth- be he teacher, leader or parent- seriously weakens the foundations upon which a young person has built, by faith-destroying challenges the youngster is not yet equipped to meet, he fashions a disciple who has been effectively cut loose from fundamentals at a time when he needs most to rely on them? The challenger may himself be a moral, educated, well-meaning person of integrity, doing what he does in the name of honesty and truth. His own character may have been formed in an atmosphere of faith and conviction which, through his influence, he may now help to destroy in his young follower. "Disenchanted" himself in his mature years, he turns his powers on an immature mind and leaves it ready prey for nostrums and superstitions and behavior he himself would disdain. — Marion D. Hanks

Sometimes being let down my a human being is the direct cause for you finding your own strength & depending only on Allah. — Omar Suleiman

I do not know who coined the statement "an idle mind is the devil's playground," but it is true. When camping in dangerous places, it is often recommended that you keep a campfire going to keep the predators away. When we set our hearts on fire, demonic predators stay out of our camp, which is my main point in this chapter. The apostle Paul put it best: "Love never fails" (see 1 Corinthians 13:8). We have spent several chapters talking about how to win spiritual battles in our own lives and in the lives of others. But when all else fails, remember this: Love cannot be defeated. — Kris Vallotton

But pure, unadulterated feelings are dangerous in their own way. It is no easy feat for a flesh-and-blood human being to go on living with such feelings. That is why it is necessary for you to fasten your feelings to the earth - firmly, like attaching an anchor to a balloon. — Haruki Murakami

You can never know about about your own destiny: are the people you meet there to play a part on your oun destiny, or do you exist just to play a role in theirs? — Libba Bray

We're baseball players. We don't need guys telling us, 'Hey, you need to hurry. Hey, you need to do this. Hey, you need to step up.' We are professionals, we can do that without anybody telling us. I'm OK with it, but we need to do it on our own. — Bengie Molina

What shall I do?" she asked in a small voice.
"Forget your own self," he said.
"But all these years," she urged, "I have so carefully fulfilled my duty."
"Always with the thought of your own freedom in your mind," he said.
She could not deny it. She sat motionless, her hands folded on the pearl-gray satin of her robe. "Direct me," she said at last.
"Instead of your own freedom, think how you can free others," he said gently.
She lifted her head.
"From yourself," he said still gently. — Pearl S. Buck

Imagine that the whole world belongs to you. The birch trees in New Hampshire's White Mountains are yours, and so are the cirrus clouds in the western sky at dusk and the black sand on the beaches of Hawaii's big island.
You own everything, my dear sovereign - the paintings in all the museums of the world, as well as the internet and the wild horses and the roads. Please take good care of it all, OK? Be an enlightened monarch who treats your domain with reverent responsibility. And make sure you also enjoy the full measure of fun that comes with such mastery. Glide through life as if all of creation is yearning to honor and entertain you. — Rob Brezsny

At its most intense, the admissions process didn't force kids to be Lisa Simpson; it turned them into Eddie Haskell. ("You look lovely in that new dress, Ms. Admissions Counselor.") It guaranteed that teenagers would pursue life with a single ulterior motive, while pretending they weren't. It coated their every undertaking in a thin lacquer of insincerity. Befriending people in hopes of a good rec letter; serving the community to advertise your big heart; studying hard just to puff up the GPA and climb the greasy poll of class rank - nothing was done for its own sake. Do good; do well; but make sure you can prove it on a college app. So — Andrew Ferguson

Look at the children of the land leaving in droves, leaving their own land with bleeding wounds on their bodies and shock on their faces and blood in their hearts and hunger in their stomachs and grief in their footsteps. Leaving their mothers and fathers and children behind, leaving their umbilical cords underneath the soil, leaving the bones of their ancestors in the earth, leaving everything that makes them who and what they are, leaving because it is no longer possible to stay. They will never be the same again because you cannot be the same once you leave behind who and what you are, you just cannot be the same. — NoViolet Bulawayo

I must exist in shadows, while you live under exquisitely blue skies, and yet I don't hate you for the freedom that you take for granted-although I do envy you.
I don't hate you because, after all, you are human, too, and therefore have limitations of your own. Perhaps you are homely, slow-witted or too smart for your own good, deaf or mute or blind, by nature given to despair or to self-hatred, or perhaps you are unusually fearful of Death himself. We all have burdens. On the other hand, if you are better-looking and smarter than I am, blessed with five sharp senses, even more optimistic than I am, with plenty of self-esteem, and if you also share my refusal to be humbled by the Reaper ... well, then I could almost hate you if I didn't know that, like all of us in this imperfect world, you also have a haunted heart and a mind troubled by grief, by loss, by longing. — Dean Koontz

Success is not something you own; it's something you rent, and the rent is due every day. When you stop paying rent on success, you start paying the rent on failure. — Tom Black

Jesus, I'm sorry. I have wasted your time with a fake deal. I acknowledge that this means you are of the case, and that I am now totally on my own in saving the family from destruction. I shall go back to not believing in you again. We will revert to our former positions. Sorry about all that. Take care. Lots of love to God. Amen. — Caitlin Moran

As adults we choose our own reading material. Depending on our moods and needs we might read the newspaper, a blockbuster novel, an academic article, a women's magazine, a comic, a children's book, or the latest book that just about everyone is reading. No one chastises us for our choice. No one says, 'That's too short for you to read.' No one says, 'That's too easy for you, put it back.' No one says 'You couldn't read that if you tried
it's much too difficult.'
Yet if we take a peek into classrooms, libraries, and bookshops we will notice that children's choices are often mocked, censured, and denied as valid by idiotic, interfering teachers, librarians, and parents. Choice is a personal matter that changes with experience, changes with mood, and changes with need. We should let it be. — Mem Fox

As survivors, we've been conditioned to be victims sexually. Many of us have never learned to say no or to set limits on our sexual activities ... To heal, it's important that we take control, that we make active choices concerning if, when, and how we want to explore sexuality. Especially in the beginning, you need to put your own needs about sex ahead of anyone else's. — Ellen Bass

The only authentic responsibility is towards your own potential. Values have not to be imposed on you. They should grow with your awareness, in you. — Rajneesh

So Captain Jack's come a-courtin'." Her hands stilled on the basket. "Who?" "The tall Shawnee who come by your cabin." The tall one. Lael felt a small surge of triumph at learning his name. Captain Jack. Oddly, she felt no embarrassment. Lifting her shoulders in a slight shrug, she continued pulling the vines into a tight circle. "He come by, but I don't know why." "Best take a long look in the mirror, then." Lael's eyes roamed the dark walls. Ma Horn didn't own one. "Beads and a blanket, was it?" She nodded and looked back down. "I still can't figure out why some Shawnee would pay any mind to a white girl like me." Ma Horn chuckled, her face alight in the dimness. "Why, Captain Jack's as white as you are." "What?" she blurted, eyes wide as a child's. Ma Horn's smile turned sober. "He's no Indian, Shawnee or otherwise, so your pa says. He was took as a child from some-wheres in North Carolina. All he can remember of his past life is his white name - Jack. — Laura Frantz

If you get to the top on your own, who'll take the picture? — Thomas Dewar, 1st Baron Dewar

Where are you going?" Millie whispered, although why she was whispering was a bit of a mystery since the sound of yelling, along with a lot of cursing, was flowing into the house. "I'm not just going to sit here while everyone else is fighting my battle." She made it all the way to the door, crawling on her stomach, no less, before she was forced to stop when she encountered a pair of shoes. They were nice shoes, a little dusty, and unfortunately, they belonged to none other than Bram. "You weren't trying to sneak out to help, were you?" he asked, squatting down next to her. "I might have been." "There's no need. Silas has been secured." Lucetta frowned. "He came down here on his own?" Holding out a hand, Bram helped her to her feet before he smiled. "Apparently, yes. I imagine those women he hired weren't too keen to travel the country with him. Aiding and abetting men on the run usually results in a stint behind bars, and they must have decided he wasn't worth that." "I — Jen Turano

Whatever you do in life, don't give up on your own dreams. — Nicole Kidman

You have to have the service mentality in the sense that you subjugate your own ego, and you subjugate a large part of your own life to really helping other people, being successful on their behalf. — Herb Kelleher

Nine Principles Never have a wicked heart. Train not by thought, but by practice. Learn a wide variety of arts and skills, and do not fix on only one. Know not only your own techniques but also those of many others. Find out rationally what is an advantage and what is a disadvantage. Foster an intuitive ability to judge all things. Feel an essence that you cannot see on the surface. Pay attention to the very smallest of phenomena. (Everything takes its own course, and sometimes we get unexpected results.) Do nothing in vain, for the energy and time we have is limited. — Kazumi Tabata

I want you to start a brand-new section in your notebooks and call it Mr. Browne's Precepts." He kept talking as we did what he was telling us to do. "Put today's date at the top of the first page. And from now on, at the beginning of every month, I'm going to write a new Mr. Browne precept on the chalkboard and you're going to write it down in your notebook. Then we're going to discuss that precept and what it means. And at the end of the month, you're going to write an essay about it, about what it means to you. So by the end of the year, you'll all have your own list of precepts to take away with you. — R.J. Palacio

You're my hero, Rhage."
Ears pricked up, Rhage watched her closely. Anything she said was important to him, and how lovely was that?
"I always thought I'd grow up and find my own hero." Rainie grimaced at herself in the mirror. Obviously she shouldn't have wasted her youth on reading and daydreaming. "But I gave up; I'm not holding out for a hero anymore. — Cherise Sinclair

Improvising, I participated in the discussion, and questioned another woman in the group. I asked her how old she was and she answered, "Thirty." I replied, "No, you are not thirty but instead eighty and lying on your deathbed. And now you are looking back on your life, a life which was childless but full of financial success and social prestige." And then I invited her to imagine what she would feel in this situation. "What will you think of it? What will you say to yourself?" Let me quote what she actually said from a tape which was recorded during that session. "Oh, I married a millionaire, I had an easy life full of wealth, and I lived it up! I flirted with men; I teased them! But now I am eighty; I have no children of my own. Looking back as an old woman, I cannot see what all that was for; actually, I must say, my life was a failure! — Viktor E. Frankl

You don't have to place your hand on Mary's heart to get strength and consolation and rescue, and all the other things we need to get through life. You can place it right here on your own heart. Your own heart. — Sue Monk Kidd

[Libertarians] don't denounce what the state does, they just object to who's doing it. This is why the people most victimized by the state display the least interest in libertarianism. Those on the receiving end of coercion don't quibble over their coercers' credentials. If you can't pay or don't want to, you don't much care if your deprivation is called larceny or taxation or restitution or rent. If you like to control your own time, you distinguish employment from enslavement only in degree and duration. — Bob Black

I want you to think back to when you were a kid. Remember the day you learned you could burn ants with a magnifying glass? Oh, what a great day that was! You got to be God. You decided who lived, who died. I must've burned ants for an hour, just laughing. Then I saw one on my arm. Let me tell you something, when you burn yourself with a magnifying glass, you're on your own. You can't even tell your mom, because she gives that face, Oh, he is that stupid. — Bill Engvall

Who do you want them to think you are? How do you think people see you? Or don't you let them near enough to see. You make up their minds for them. Do you think you succeed in convincing people that you are what you seem to be? You make people meet you on your own territory. You don't help them. You let them verbally hang themselves and then feel better about yourself, your power, your own sense of worth. You have the power to alienate them and if they allow it, you might even manage to make them feel awkward and foolish--foolish for letting you affect them at all. Do you want them to like you? Or are you one of those people who "don't care what people think." You're not living your life for them, so why should you give a fuck what people think? You make people come to you and, when they eventually do, you punish them with your smugness. Nothing ever out of character. — Carrie Fisher

At seventeen, the smallest crises took on tremendous proportions; someone else's thoughts could take root in the loam of your own mind; having someone accept you was as vital as oxygen. — Jodi Picoult

Who helped you most? Most often they (suffering people) answer by describing a quiet, unassuming person. Someone who was there whenever needed, who listened more than talked, who didn't keep glancing down at a watch, who hugged and touched, and cried. In short, someone who was available, and came on the sufferer's terms and not their own. — Philip Yancey

However, as Gordon Fee has argued, it is doubtful whether Paul ever uses the language of "spirit" without some reference to the Holy Spirit. Here, then, while the immediate reference may be, indeed, to Paul's own "spirit," it is his spirit as taken up into the Holy Spirit. His "presence" with the Colossians, then, is not a simple "you will be in my thoughts and prayers," but involves a profound corporate sense of identity, based on and mediated by the Spirit of God. — Douglas J. Moo

God's mark of approval, whenever you obey Him, is peace. He sends an immeasurable, deep peace; not a natural peace, "as the world gives," but the peace of Jesus. Whenever peace does not come, wait until it does, or seek to find out why it is not coming. If you are acting on your own impulse, or out of a sense of the heroic, to be seen by others, the peace of Jesus will not exhibit itself. — Oswald Chambers

He limped slowly over to his own wooden sword and stooped awkwardly to pick it up. Trailing it on the ground behind him, he limped toward the queen, and the courtyard quieted as he approached and was silent again as he dropped to his knees before her and laid the sword across her lap.
"My Queen," he said.
"My King," she said back.
Only those closest saw him nod his rueful acceptance. He lifted his hand to brush her cheek softly. As the entire court listened breathlessly, he said, "I want my breakfast."
The queen's lips thinned, and she shook her head as she said, "You are incorrigible. — Megan Whalen Turner

There was no one for you to impress and no one for you to offend. You were right there and I was afraid of how real you were, which made me question my own level of authenticity. I'd take off my clothes on the beach or spill my guts to a girl I'd never met on the bus, thinking I was uncensored and open, but I wasn't always real if I wanted someone to like me. I gravitated to those who withheld or told me who they thought I was. — Mary-Louise Parker

Politics is like watching football. Yes, you can see it directly on your screen, but I think a lot of people want to have some understanding of what's happening, why the play is unfolding the way it is, and I think that's where it can help them, not to render judgments but to help people make their own judgments in a more informed way. — David Gergen

Consider a lighthouse. It stands on the shore with its beckoning light, guiding ships safely into the harbor. The lighthouse can't uproot itself, wade out into the water, grab the ship by the stern and say, "Listen, you fool! If you stay on this path you may break up on the rocks!" No. The ship has some responsibility for its own destiny. It can choose to be guided by the lighthouse. Or, it can go its own way. The lighthouse is not responsible for the ship's decisions. All it can do is be the best lighthouse it knows how to be. — Randi Kreger

No human government has a right to enquire into private opinions, to presume that it knows them, or to act on that presumption. Men are the best judges of the consequences of their own opinions, and how far they are likely to influence their actions; and it is most unnatural and tyrannical to say, "as you think, so must you act. I will collect the evidence of your future conduct from what I know to be your opinions." — Charles James Fox

Arms stop me from crumpling like a rag doll. Sometimes you don't need to talk things out. Sometimes, with the right person, things just need some time to percolate on their own, without the messy lunge and parry of discussion to hinder them. — Jonathan Tropper

I think cultural criticism and long-form critique have their place and their purpose. But for a creator, it's so easy for the discussion surrounding a phenomenon to usurp the phenomenon itself. It's worse, of course, with comment sections on websites and blogs, particularly anonymous comments, or the incessant chatter and opinions on social media. Everyone gets to write a headline, and when you or the thing you do is being talked about, you get to feel like a headline - an addicting feeling for sure, but also a pernicious one. The discourse builds its own body, and it's usually a monster. — Carrie Brownstein

I have a much wider, freer view about spirituality. I feel that people need to pursue it on their own, personally. You know, let it be theirs - a personal relationship with their soul, or their God, or with their church. — Peter Jurasik