One Minute Quotes & Sayings

Proud families spend fortunes on a one-day wedding ceremony for a marriage that may or may not last, while on the same day, in the same village, people are dying of starvation. A tourist makes a show of giving a ten-dollar tip to the doorman for pushing a revolving door, and the next minute he's bargaining for a five-dollar T-shirt from a vendor who is trying to support her baby and family. — Dzongsar Jamyang Khyentse

When the last autumn of Dickens's life was over, he continued to work through his final winter and into spring. This is how all of us writers give away the days and years and decades of our lives in exchange for stacks of paper with scratches and squiggles on them. And when Death calls, how many of us would trade all those pages, all that squandered lifetime-worth of painfully achieved scratches and squiggles, for just one more day, one more fully lived and experienced day? And what price would we writers pay for that one extra day spent with those we ignored while we were locked away scratching and squiggling in our arrogant years of solipsistic isolation?
Would we trade all those pages for a single hour? Or all of our books for one real minute? — Dan Simmons

How strange it was ... , one minute you were all alone with your thoughts, the next somebody came along who seemed to know the deepest part of you, who could open you like a book. — Justin Cronin

Today you're in a hospital. Or at least this morning. This hour. This minute. Where you'll be three minutes from now is anyone's guess. You've begun to notice, though, that, bit by bit the sense of being outside yourself has diminished with each passing day. A critical mass is reached, and now your soul collapses in upon itself.
You're back inside the vessel of your body.
Just one. Just you. Just an individual.
Me. — Neal Shusterman

That's the remarkable thing about baseball. The game has a way of having you scratch your head one minute and drive you crazy, and then the next, you're entertained beyond your wildest hopes. That's why it's the best game. — Johnny Bench

Friendship is less simple. It is long and hard to obtain but when one has it there's no getting rid of it; one simply has to cope with it. Don't think for a minute that your friends will telephone you every evening, as they ought to, in order to find out if this doesn't happen to be the evening when you are deciding to commit suicide, or simply whether you don't need company, whether you are not in the mood to go out. No, don't worry, they'll ring up the evening you are not alone, when life is beautiful. As for suicide, they would be more likely to push you to it, by virtue of what you owe to yourself, according to them. May heaven protect us, cher Monsieur, from being set upon a pedestal by our friends! — Albert Camus

I'd rather clean all the bathrooms in Grand Central Station with my tongue than spend one more minute with you. — Al Yankovic

Cooking is not about convenience and it's not about shortcuts. Our hunger for the twenty-minute gourmet meal, for one-pot ease and prewashed, precut ingredients has severed our lifeline to the satisfactions of cooking. Take your time. Take a long time. Move slowly and deliberately and with great attention. — Thomas Keller

If it had been any different, if I had been born just one minute later, or been in the wrong pace at the right time or vice versa, the life that I've lived and come to love would not exist. And that is a situation that I would not want to consider in the slightest. — Slash

God's plan for our life is one that continuously unfolds. Minute-by-minute, day-by-day, and step-by-step He guides, all the while unfolding His glorious intentions. — Cheryl Zelenka

One minute I was having a day like any other , and then Whack an this guy didn't have no head Lula Finger Lickin 15 — Janet Evanovich

We said we'd be friends.'
He looks confused. 'Yeah.'
I don't want to be.'
There's space between us, and in that space there's darkness. I take another step, so close that we share a breath. The same one. In and out.
Tess,' he says. I know it's a warning, but I don't care.
What's the worst thing that can happen?'
It'll hurt,' he says.
It already hurts.'
He nods very slowly. And it's like there's a hole in time, as if everything stops and in this one minute, where we look at each other so close, is spread out between us. As he leans towards me, I feel a strange warmth filtering through me. I forget that my brain is full of every sad face at every window I've ever passed. — Jenny Downham

She had never been able to stand her husband, though not for one minute in their married life had she permitted this to make her unhappy. Only people who are fond of somebody can ever be unhappy, she had told her daughter before her wedding. — Anna Seghers

I am wild, if you like; but I stayed in my burrow a long, long time, - nibbling your straws and snapping at your fingers, but always just a little out of reach. Until at last I got to trust you so much that one day I ventured out for a minute, - and you threw rocks at me. And I will never come out again. — Nancy Milford

It seems that one moment I was this little kid only caring about animals and flowers and stuff, and then the next minute I was this raging stew of hormones. I don't know if you've ever been a raging stew of anything, but I wouldn't particularly recommend it. — Julie Burchill

I naively chose a college that was almost as expensive as Stanford, and all of my working-class parents' savings were being spent on my college tuition. After six months, I couldn't see the value in it. I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life and no idea how college was going to help me figure it out. And here I was spending all of the money my parents had saved their entire life. So I decided to drop out and trust that it would all work out OK. It was pretty scary at the time, but looking back it was one of the best decisions I ever made. The minute I dropped out I could stop taking the required classes that didn't interest me, and begin dropping in on the ones that looked interesting. — Steve Jobs

Okay, my man, in a minute you are gonna hear a bunch of shit that's gonna knock your socks off. So, two seconds to prepare, Ivey is my best friend, outside you my only real one, as you know. What you don't know, she is not my lover. She's my friend. And I'm gay. You tell anyone, I'll shoot you and you know I'm not fucking with you about that. Deal with it. We gotta move on, like, now. — Kristen Ashley

She can love one minute and feel nothing the next, not even anger or pain, because after a while those, too, will pass. — Patricia Cornwell

I don't want another pretty face
I don't want just anyone to hold
I don't want my love to go to waste
I want you and your beautiful soul
You're the one I wanna chase
You're the one I wanna hold
I won't let another minute go to waste
I want you and your beautiful soul — Jesse McCartney

I am struggling, though. It's f-cking hard. So little sleep. It's 23 hours and 59 minutes of exhaustion. They do one little thing in that last minute that is just so compelling and fascinating that it makes the other 23 hours and 59 minutes worthwhile. — Liev Schreiber

He covered her hands with his. "Why the hurry?"
"Seriously?" She stared at him, her jaw dropping. "I'm on fire! If we wait one more minute, I'm certain the sheets will spontaneously combust. I won't be held responsible if your house burns down because you wanted to waste time on foreplay. — Elle James

My heart aches, and a drowsy numbness pains
My sense, as though of hemlock I had drunk,
Or emptied some dull opiate to the drains
One minute past, and Lethe-wards had sunk:
'Tis not through envy of thy happy lot,
But being too happy in thy happiness, - -
That thou, light-winged Dryad of the trees,
In some melodious plot
Of beechen green, and shadows numberless,
Singest of summer in full-throated ease. — John Keats

This is the story of two men who met in a banana republic. One of them never did anything dishonest in his life except for one crazy minute. The other never did anything honest in his life except for one crazy minute. — Preston Sturges

A long time ago, I made the commitment to dedicate at least one song per album to God. He has been very good to me, and never for one minute do I want Him to think I've forgotten, because I haven't. — MC Hammer

What was it about this man that one minute had me wanting to throw myself at him, climb him like a cat to rub up against and the next, wanting to scratch his eyes out while I was up there? — Stephanie Hudson

That's how ye do it,' his brother Ian had told him ... 'Ye find a way to live for that one more minute. And then another. And another ... But after a time, ye find ye're in a different place than ye were. A different person than ye were. And then ye look about and see what's there with ye. Ye'll maybe find a use for yourself. That helps. — Diana Gabaldon

I love the gothic literature. It always has such great stories with characters bigger than life and the stakes are always high. And because there's always a wolf at the door, the emotions are high; the romance, the sexuality, friendships, and relationships. You don't know if the guy kissing you one minute is going to bite you the next. This heightens all of the sensibilities and emotions, and therefore, it sings to me. And that's where the music comes from. — Frank Wildhorn

I got on with Louis from the word go. We're very similar and I like the fact that he has this ability to be nice to everyone while living totally for the moment. It puts a smile on your face when you see someone like that. I feel I can tell him anything, and I felt like that straight away. He can be really funny one minute, but if someone has a problem he can go into serious mode straight away and he gives really good advice. — One Direction

Years ago when I served as a missionary, we had a visit from Dr. James E. Talmage of the Council of the Twelve
a great student, a great teacher, great theologian, and a great prophet.. Here we sat at his feet every idle minute that we could find and plied him with questions and listened to his counsel.
On one occasion he said to us, I want to tell you missionaries something. The day of sacrifice is not past! The time will come, yet, when many Saints and even Apostles will yet lose their lives in defense of the truth! — Harold B. Lee

Parcifal is one of those corkscrew artifact of culture in which you get the subjective sense that you've learned something from it, something valuable or even priceless; but on closer inspection you suddenly begin to scratch your head and say Wait a minute. This makes no sense. — Philip K. Dick

Khaled, my first teacher, was the kind of man who carried his past in the temple fires of his eyes, and fed the flames with pieces of his broken heart. I've known men like Khaled in prisons, on battlefields, and in the dens where smugglers, mercenaries, and other exiles meet. They all have certain characteristics in common. They're tough, because there's a kind of toughness that's found in the worst sorrow. They're honest, because the truth of what happened to them won't let them lie. They're angry, because they can't forget the past or forgive it. And they're lonely. Most of us pretend, with greater or lesser success, that the minute we live in is something we can share. But the past for every one of us is a desert island; and those like Khaled, who find themselves marooned there, are always alone. — Gregory David Roberts

But what is the greatest evil? If you are going to epitomize evil, what is it? Is it the bomb? The greatest evil that one has to fight constantly, every minute of the day until one dies, is the worse part of oneself. — Patrick McGoohan

She was a free bird one minute: queen of the world and laughing. The next minute she would be in tears like a porcelain angel, about to teeter, fall and break. She never cried because she was afraid that something 'would' happen; she would cry because she feared something that could render the world more beautiful, 'would not' happen. — Roman Payne

Of course, minute as its impact may be in our physical universe, the fact of quantum entanglement is this: If one logically inexplicable thing is known to exist, then this permits the existence of all logically inexplicable things. A thing may be of deeper impossibility than another, in the sense that you can be more deeply underwater
but whether you are five feet or five fathoms from the surface you are still all wet. — Brian McGreevy

You told me once you believed in God. The old man waved his hand. Maybe, he said. I got no reason to think he believes in me. Oh I'd like to see him for a minute if I could. What would you say to him? Well, I think I'd just tell him. I'd say: Wait a minute. Wait just one minute before you start in on me. Before you say anything, there's just one thing I'd like to know. And he'll say: What's that? And then I'm goin to ast him: What did you have me in that crapgame down there for anyway? I couldnt put any part of it together. Suttree smiled. What do you think he'll say? The ragpicker spat and wiped his mouth. I dont believe he can answer it, he said. I dont believe there is a answer. — Cormac McCarthy

IT SEEMS DIFFICULT TO IMAGINE, but there was once a time when human beings did not feel the need to share their every waking moment with hundreds of millions, even billions, of complete and utter strangers. If one went to a shopping mall to purchase an article of clothing, one did not post minute-by-minute details on a social networking site; and if one made a fool of oneself at a party, one did not leave a photographic record of the sorry episode in a digital scrapbook that would survive for all eternity. But now, in the era of lost inhibition, it seemed no detail of life was too mundane or humiliating to share. In the online age, it was more important to live out loud than to live with dignity. Internet followers were more treasured than flesh-and-blood friends, for they held the illusive promise of celebrity, even immortality. Were Descartes alive today, he might have written: I tweet, therefore I am. — Daniel Silva

In another minute or two, those men would have tossed your skirts in that alley right there... if you were wearing skirts!" You should be thanking me for saving your sorry hide! By my calculations, that's twice in one day. — Melissa Lurquette

It was often that way with women, it seemed. One minute Lorie would be drilling holes in him with her eyes, and the next minute she and Clarie would be combing one another's hair and singing tunes. — Larry McMurtry

Any woman can be a siren one minute and in pigtails the next. I am a very complex person with more than just the one facet that television played on. — Toni Tennille

I have been known to buy e-versions of my books because I was in a hotel room and I needed one right away to look up something in it; very handy for that - you can have it just the next minute; you can press the button and just have it. — Margaret Atwood

The entrepreneur explained that she was having a hard time finding people who were willing to work as hard as she was. "I feel I have to do everything myself. I can't count on anyone to take on some of the things that need to be done," said the entrepreneur. "What you have to do," said the One Minute Manager, "is learn to delegate. — Kenneth H. Blanchard

When Qhuinn came back around, for a minute, he thought he had returned to the beginning of the nightmare, that fantasy of Blay sitting across a hospital room in a chair presenting itself once again. "Oh, thank God." "What?" Qhuinn mumbled. Blay jumped up and rushed over even though he had one arm in a sling and was limping like someone had dropped a toolbox on his foot. Qhuinn was about to ask if the male was okay when those beautiful lips were on his and that familiar bonding scent was in his nose - and oh, fuck, this was so much better than that fantasy - — J.R. Ward

Our seats were in the balcony. Nosebleeds. But you don't go to Yo-Yo Ma for the view, and the sound was incredible. That man has a way of making the cello sound like a crying woman one minute, a laughing child the next. Listening to him, I'm always reminded of why I started playing cell in the first place
that there is something so human and expressive about it. — Gayle Forman

I remember. How many minutes do I have left President? About one, one minute. — Hugo Chavez

One of the things I love about books is being able to define and condense certain portions of a character's life into chapters. It's intriguing, because you can't do this with real life. You can't just end a chapter, then skip the things you don't want to live through, only to open it up to a chapter that better suits your mood. Life can't be divided into chapters ... only minutes. The events of your life are all crammed together one minute right after the other without any time lapses or blank pages or chapter breaks because no matter what happens life just keeps going and moving forward and words keep flowing and truths keep spewing whether you like it or not and life never lets you pause and just catch your fucking breath.
I need one of those chapter breaks. I just want to catch my breath, but I have no idea how. — Colleen Hoover

If I feel like I am about to explode, I take a minute to evaluate what it is that I have on my plate, make a to-do list, and start tackling what I need to do, one step at a time. — Chelsea Krost

I'm one of those who doesn't think there is much difference
between an atomic scientist and a man who cleans the crappers
except for the luck of the draw -
parents with enough money to point you toward a more
generous death.
of course, some come through brilliantly, but
there are thousands, millions of others, bottled up, kept
from even the most minute chance to realize their potential. — Charles Bukowski

It was strange how she found out, One moment she didn't know; the next minute she did. One moment her mind was as blank as the desert; the next minute the snake of suspicion had slithered into her thoughts and raised its poisonous head. — Thrity Umrigar

Maybe if you discover the murderer you'll be a hero. At the minute I'm not entirely certain you're anything more than a one-inch newspaper article."

"Treachery! I'm sure we've earnt at least two inches of text. — Lauren James

The river reflected whatever it chose of sky and bridge and burning tree, and when the undergraduate had oared his boat through the reflections they closed again, completely, as if they had never been. There one might have sat the clock round lost in thought. Thought
to call it by a prouder name than it deserved
had let its line down into the stream. It swayed, minute after minute, hither and thither among the reflections and the weeds, letting the water lift it and sink it until
you know the little tug
the sudden conglomeration of an idea at the end of one's line: and then the cautious hauling of it in, and the careful laying of it out? Alas, laid on the grass how small, how insignificant this thought of mine looked; the sort of fish that a good fisherman puts back into the water so that it may grow fatter and be one day worth cooking and eating. — Virginia Woolf

Just for a minute," she said. He's not half bad, she thought, as far as princes go. "Just to watch the sunset," he agreed. He's not half bad, she thought, as far as enemies go. "Just to see the stars," she conceded. This isn't half bad, she thought, as far as wars go. "Just one day," he said. "You promised." And just to take another look at one small photograph hanging on the wall, she thought. Lennox Gates, what is your Siren story? — Kami Garcia

No one lived forever. But you fought for every minute you could get. Bought a little more with a lot of hard work. — James S.A. Corey

Do ghosts have to be forgiven? All I remember of the funeral is, 'Your husband was a brilliant man.' Was that all the comfort that I had to draw on? I wanted to announce, 'Yes he was a brilliant man and now like all the great minds he is dead.' Sometimes I cry myself to sleep, sniffling, stifling my sobs in my pillows. Sometimes I fall asleep the minute my head hits the pillow and find my arms reaching across the other side of the bed for Kenny so I can whisper sweet nothings in his ear as he falls asleep.

I reached out for the bottle of sleeping tablets on my bedside table and swallowed them one by one. — Abigail George

Telling Mom was one thing. Telling Dad is another.
He's in the living room smoking and watching what he claims is a very important Yankees game. It's in the ninth inning and the teams are tied. I consider backing out, maybe waiting another week or so, but maybe he won't actually care when I tell him. Maybe all that stuff he said when I was younger, about never acting like a girl or playing with any female action figures, will go away once he realizes I am the way I am without any choice. Maybe he'll accept me.
Mom follows me into the living room and sits down on Eric's bed. "Mark, do you have a minute? Aaron has something he wants to talk about."
He exhales cigarette smoke. "I'm listening." He never looks away from the game. — Adam Silvera

One fool can ask more questions in a minute than 12 wise men can answer in an hour. — Vladimir Lenin

Two things are as big as the man who possesses them - neither bigger nor smaller. One is a minute, the other a dollar. — Channing Pollock

The events of your life are all crammed together one minute right after the other without any time lapses or blank pages or chapter breaks because no matter what happens life just keeps going and moving forward and words keep flowing and truths keep spewing whether you like it or not and life never lets you pause and just catch your fucking breath. — Colleen Hoover

Take one minute every day and think hard about your life. You will always change for the best. — Bangambiki Habyarimana

And you do, don't you? Love me just a little? Because I'll say it again. Right now, to your face. I straight up love you, Jess Jordan. I'll shout it if it will help plead my case. But I have to at least get that point across before one more minute passes. — Anne Eliot

My funeral," the Blue Man said. "Look at the mourners. Some did not even know me well, yet they came. Why? Did you ever wonder? Why people gather when others die? Why people feel they should?
"It is because the human spirit knows, deep down, that all lives intersect. That death doesn't just take someone, it misses someone else, and in the small distance between being taken and being missed, lives are changed.
"You say you should have died instead of me. But during my time on earth, people died instead of me, too. It happens every day. When lightning strikes a minute after you are gone, or an airplane crashes that you might have been on. When your colleague falls ill and you do not. We think such things are random. But there is a balance to it all. One withers, another grows. Birth and death are part of a whole.
"It is why we are drawn to babies ... " He turned to the mourners. "And to funerals. — Mitch Albom

You can have terrible things happen in your family. A husband and wife can be having a knock-down, drag-out fight and the minute one of the kids gets hurt, the fight is over and it's about the family. — Sophia Bush

The minute you get a religion you stop thinking. Believe in one thing too much and you have no room for new ideas. — Ray Bradbury

Life is like a cucumber. One minute it's in your hand, the next it's up you ass. — Lawrence Durrell

There is no place for arrogance or complacency in racing because you are up there one minute and on your backside the next. — Tony McCoy

Oh, may your silhouette not be broken in the sand,
oh may your eyelids not fly in the absence:
do not go for one minute, beloved,
because in that minute you will have gone so far
that I will cross all the earth asking
if you will return or if you will leave me dying. — Pablo Neruda

There are certain men and women who, from the minute they step in front of a camera, that's exactly where they belong. Connery's one. — F. Murray Abraham

It is only through meditation that we can get lasting peace, divine peace. If we meditate soulfully in the morning and receive peace for only one minute, that one minute of peace will permeate our whole day. And when we have a meditation of the highest order, then we really get abiding peace, light and delight. We need meditation because we want to grow in light and fulfill ourselves in light. If this is our aspiration, if this is our thirst, then meditation is the only way. — Sri Chinmoy

Death is the lot of us all, and the only way that the human race has ever conquered death is by treating it with contempt. By living every golden minute as if one had all Eternity. — Robert A. Heinlein

Next minute you'll be telling me there's nothing wrong,' he said softly. 'One of the all time favourite lies women employ when they're hiding huge grievances. — Lindsay Armstrong

I had crossed fifty years of my life, and come across uncountable females as son, husband, father, friend in my life. Coming across several women I carefully studied most of them, and feels that I got master knowing female. But every time when my heart comes across to a female, my all knowledge on female goes to a vain. What they want? , What are they looking for? When their mind changes? When their priority changes? No one knows, in a minute they use to change decisions, if someone ask, they says it's a little thing. They never think, little things makes big or if they can't stick on little things how they can stand in important decisions. They never show they are weak, but every time they are compromising themselves. It's their big heart but impacting every around. They always think they can do anything by doing nothing. — Nutan Bajracharya

Well, Alexander thought, any minute now, one of the girls he had carelessly discarded was going to come by the barracks with a gun and blow his brains out and on his tombstone the epitaph would read, Here lies Alexander, who couldn't remember the name of any girl he had fucked. — Paullina Simons

The sad truth is that what I could recall in five seconds all too soon needed ten, then thirty, then a full minute - like shadows lengthening at dusk. Someday, I suppose, the shadows will be swallowed up in darkness. There is no way around it: my memory is growing ever more distant from the spot where Naoko used to stand - ever more distant from the spot where my old self used to stand. And nothing but scenery, that view of the meadow in October, returns again and again to me like a symbolic scene in a movie. Each time it appears, it delivers a kick to some part of my mind. "Wake up," it says. "I'm still here. Wake up and think about it. Think about why I'm still here." The kicking never hurts me. There's no pain at all. Just a hollow sound that echoes with each kick. And even that is bound to fade one day. — Haruki Murakami

If you're playing a one-minute game, I could squeeze in five to six games before anybody walked by my cubicle. So I got really good at blitz, one-minute chess games. But that's kind of like the cheap chess version. — Paul Banks

For the last year his grandma had been slipping in and out of reality. One minute she was as clear as a bell and the next she was calling him Simon. Who was Simon? He had no idea. — Suzanne Collins

Fate forces its way to the powerful and violent. With subservient obedience it will assume for years dependency on one individual:Caesar, Alexander, Napoleon, because it loves the elemental human being who grows to resemble it, the intangible element. Sometimes, and these are the most astonishing moments in world history, the thread of fate falls into the hands of a complete nobody but only for a twitching minute. — Stefan Zweig

Always preoccupied with his profound researches, the great Newton showed in the ordinary-affairs of life an absence of mind which has become proverbial. It is related that one day, wishing to find the number of seconds necessary for the boiling of an egg, he perceived, after waiting a minute, that he held the egg in his hand, and had placed his seconds watch (an instrument of great value on account of its mathematical precision) to boil!
This absence of mind reminds one of the mathematician Ampere, who one day, as he was going to his course of lectures, noticed a little pebble on the road; he picked it up, and examined with admiration the mottled veins. All at once the lecture which he ought to be attending to returned to his mind; he drew out his watch; perceiving that the hour approached, he hastily doubled his pace, carefully placed the pebble in his pocket, and threw his watch over the parapet of the Pont des Arts. — Camille Flammarion

We seek your blessings and we seek your support. On one side there is the Shahzada and on the other side there is a tea seller. There is Namdaar and there is a Kamdaar. But we assure that after assuming responsibility we will not rest for a minute. All the time will be for the people. — Narendra Modi

Flash Floods are about as predictable as a crazy dream after one too many fish tacos - one minutes you're fine, and the next minute a moose is floating past you wearing a fishing hat and ladies' pajamas. — Doreen Cronin

It was the purest heavens in the midst of the worst hell, and I loved every minute of it, even though it was all underpinned by a lie--my lie - and I knew one day it would burn down around me. — Sierra Simone

Sometimes you're pushing and what you want to do is not coming with ease; doors are not opening. A lot of times we're pushing against resistance. If one looks closely, there is often a message in that resistance: "Wait a minute, maybe it's not what you're supposed to be doing." — Farrah Gray

I need to give you one last bit of advice in the off chance this rather extraordinary and enviable situation in which you find yourself is actually true- that somehow you've fallen deep down into a Cordova story. I stared back at him. Be the good guy, he said. How do I know I'm the good guy? He pointed at me, nodding. A very wise question. You don't. Most bad guys think they're good. But there are a few signifiers. You'll be miserable. You'll be hated. You'll fumble around in the dark, alone and confused. You'll have little insight as to the true nature of things, not until the very last minute, and only if you have the stamina and the madness to go to the very, very end. But most importantly- and critically- you will act without regard for yourself. You'll be motivated by something that has nothing to do with the ego. You'll do it for justice. For grace. For love. Those large rather heroic qualities only the good have the strength to carry on their shoulders. And you'll listen. — Marisha Pessl

It was one of those rare times of shared happiness, of perfect contentment. We had a feeling of expectation, that what was already wonderful would only get better and better as time went on. These moments are one of the rarest, most fragile things in the world. You have to seize the day; you have to recall all the rotten, dirty things you endured to earn this peace. You have to remember to enjoy each minute, each hour, because although you may feel like it's going to last forever, the world plans otherwise. You want to be grateful for every precious second, but you simply can't do it. It's not in human nature to live life to the fullest. Haven't your ever noticed that equal amounts of pain and joy are not, in fact, equal in duration? Pain drags on until you wonder if life will ever be bearable again; pleasure, though, once it's reached its peak, fades faster than a trodden gardenia, and your memory searches in vain for the sweet scent. — George Alec Effinger

Don't order any of the faerie food," said Jace, looking at her over the top of his menu. "It tends to make humans a little crazy. One minute you're munching a faerie plum, the next minute you're running naked down Madison Avenue with antlers on your head. Not," he added hastily, "that this has ever happened to me. — Cassandra Clare

She is often the broken-winged one, who does everything all wrong until people realize she's been doing it ... pretty right all along. She's the poor girl who never dressed right, who had torn hose, and they were all baggy around her ankles. She's the Raggedy Ann of the sophisticated world, who pulls it out at the last minute, flies by the seat of her pants, cackling all the way home. She is the late bloomer, the late start, the autumn bush, the winter holly. She is Baubo, all the classical Greek goddesses. She is the old girl who still blushes, and laughs, and dances. She's the truth teller, maybe that people hate to hear, but they learn to listen to. She is not dumb and in some ways is not shrewd. She works on passion, and the doll in her pocket, and the intuition that leads her into and through all the world. — Clarissa Pinkola Estes

For everything is history: What was said yesterday is history, what was said a minute ago is history. But, above all, one is led to misjudge the present, because only the study of historical development permits the weighing and evaluation of the interrelationships among the components of the present-day society. — Claude Levi-Strauss

The whole incident could not have taken as much as half a minute. Not to let one's feelings appear in one's face was a habit that had acquired the status of an instinct, and in any case they had been standing straight in front of a telescreen when the thing happened. Nevertheless it had been very difficult not to betray a momentary surprise, for in the two or three seconds while he was helping her up the girl had slipped something into his hand. — George Orwell

Not one word about proposals, no matter how much she pushes," I told my friends. "No matter what she says or how loud she cries, don't try to throw that up as a distraction."
Gabriel's lips twitched. "I don't think it's going to be that bad. It's one woman against five supernatural creatures ... And Zeb."
"You laugh because you haven't heard my mother's thirty-minute verbal dissertation on appropriate seasonal flower choices. We're better off letting her yell at us for being dirty, premarital fornicators. — Molly Harper

Austin stood. "All right, I will." He walked to the door and stopped, his hand on the latch. He gazed back over his shoulder. "That woman you love ... Do I know her?"
Houston forced himself to meet his brother's gaze. The boy only knew one woman, if he didn't count the whores in Dusty Flats. "Yeah, you do."
"She never left your side, not for one minute."
"She should have."
"Well, I'm not learned in these matters, but I'd like to think if a woman ever loved me as much as that one loves you ... I'd crawl through hell to be by her side. — Lorraine Heath

I would rather have one minute at this age than a month at 21. — William Holden

When you have a bad year, there is this need to package it up and write it off-as I have done in the past. I hope, in 2014, when things go badly-people create themselves a New Years's day the moment they need it. Don't make 12 resolutions in January but one with every breath. Don't wait until December 31st to start anew.You can divide time with months and days and weeks-but each minute is only a minute long and belongs completely to itself. What you do in those tiny moments that seem so inconsequential are what will define not only your year-but your life — S.K. Munt

Well, have you ever known someone who is nice and nasty, who makes you love them one minute and hate them the next? Who makes you feel wonderful and terrible and you never know which one it is going to be? — Daisy Goodwin

When you feel you cannot continue in your position for another minute, and all that is in human power has been done, that is the moment when the enemy is most exhausted, and when one step forward will give you the fruits of the struggle you have borne — Winston Churchill

Every minute we were together, I felt like I was wandering in the dark through a strange house, groping for a light switch. And then, whenever I found one and turned it on, the bulb was dead. — Tom Perrotta

The physical heart, which houses the spiritual heart, beats about 100,000 times a day, pumping two gallons of blood per minute and over 100 gallons per hour. If one were to attempt to carry 100 gallons of water (whose density is lighter than blood) from one place to another, it would be an exhausting task. Yet the human heart does this every hour of every day for an entire lifetime without respite. The vascular system transporting life-giving blood is over 60,000 miles long - more than two times the circumference of the earth. So when we conceive of our blood being pumped throughout our bodies, know that this means that it travels through 60,000 miles of a closed vascular system that connects all the parts of the body - all the vital organs and living tissues - to this incredible heart. — Hamza Yusuf

If the only one who can kill an angel can't do it, then who can?'
It's a good question, one that takes me a minute to come up with an answer. 'Obadiah West can. Him and his freedom fighters. I'm just a teenager.'
'History is filled with teenagers who lead the fight. Joan of Arc. Okita Soji, the samurai. Alexander the Great. They were all teenagers when they began leading their armies. I think we're back to those times again, kid. — Susan Ee

The best minute I spend is the one I invest in people. — Kenneth H. Blanchard

From my experience in my country, America over and over again takes itself right to the brink, it puts one foot over but it never goes over. It wakes up at the last minute and says woah, and then pulls back. — Robert Redford

My gaze lands on the digital clock on my nightstand as it flicks to 12:01 AM. Hours spent in Orane's world, and one minute has passed in mine. — Erica Cameron

The brain has an attentional mode called the "mind wandering mode" that was only recently identified. This is when thoughts move seamlessly from one to another, often to unrelated thoughts, without you controlling where they go. This brain state acts as a neural reset button, allowing us to come back to our work with a refreshed perspective. Different people find they enter this mode in different ways: reading, a walk in nature, looking at art, meditating, and napping. A 15-minute nap can produce the equivalent of a 10-point boost in IQ. — Daniel Levitin

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