One Small Step Quotes & Sayings

The seed of the tree falls into the dark earth. Painfully it breaks open and grows towards the light, the higher principle. Growing is a heaping up of small things, through many moments of struggling, fighting the Holy Wind, the formative powers, to find meaning in life, building awareness one step at a time, until one learns how to go with the Wind, how to transcend the pain of daily existence and shed new seed for a new day. — Wilna Van Der Walt

Sometimes when we read the words of those who have been more than conquerors, we feel almost despondent. I feel that I shall never be like that. But they won through step by step, by little bits of wills, little denials of self, little inward victories, by faithfulness in very little things. They became what they are. No one sees these little hidden steps. They only see the accomplishment, but even so, those small steps were taken. There is no sudden triumph, no spiritual maturity. That is the work of the moment. — Amy Carmichael

The bradys must hold that, on the average, cumulative selection has to add a little information to the genome at each step. But of all the mutations studied since genetics became a science, not a single one has been found that adds a little information. It is not impossible, in principle, for a mutation to add a little information, but it is improbable.
The NDT was an attractive theory. Unfortunately, it is based on the false speculation that many small random mutations could build up to large evolutionary changes. — Lee Spetner

If a problem looks difficult, relax. If it looks impossible, relax even more. Then begin encouraging small changes, putting just enough pressure on yourself to move one turtle step forward. Then rest, savor, celebrate. Then step again. You'll find that slow is fast, gentle is powerful, and stillness moves mountains. — Martha Beck

One small step + desired behavior = high probability of further steps — Stephen Guise

One of the easiest ways to go green is to go small. I want to show people that there's an amazing modern green future, and make it easy for them to step into it. — Graham Hill

Step one in overcoming fears is to make a fear list. Make a list of all the things that you are afraid of. Start out with the small fears and conquer them. — Frederick Lenz

It's scary to make major changes, but we usually have enough courage to take the next right step. One small step and then another. That's what it takes to raise a child, to get a degree, to write a book, to do whatever it is your heart desires. — Regina Brett

One of the greatest evils of the day among those outside of prison is their sense of futility. Young people say, What is the sense of our small effort? They cannot see that we must lay one brick at a time, take one step at a time; we can be responsible only for the one action of the present moment. — Dorothy Day

A good way to take a baby step into the world of animal rights is to make a list of small things you can do to help your issue and work your way up to the big things. Make a promise to do one thing on your list each month. — Jenna Morasca

The initial small step is simple: Rather than making a sweeping determination to tackle the Great Books (all of them), decide to begin on one of the reading lists in Part II. As you read each book, you'll follow the pattern of the trivium. First you'll try to understand the book's basic structure and argument; next, you'll evaluate the book's assertions; finally, you'll form an opinion about the book's ideas. You'll have to exercise these three skills of reading - understanding, analysis, and evaluation - differently for each kind of book. — Susan Wise Bauer

The literary scene is a kind of Medusa's raft, small and sinking, and one's instinct when a newcomer tries to clamber aboard is to step on his fingers. — John Updike

Take great comfort in knowing that ALL great feats are accomplished one small step at a time. — Og Mandino

When primeval man first used flint stones for any purpose, he would have accidentally splintered them, and would then have used the sharp fragments. From this step it would be a small one to break the flints on purpose and not a very wide step to fashion them rudely. — Charles Darwin

She stared at the faded tile floor before her feet, but knew his every step around her small kitchen. When Martin touched the coffee cup patterned curtains he must assume she'd made, her fingers throbbed. When his eyes slid across the flowery aluminum water bottle at the table, her throat cracked with thirst.
The radio clicked off.
The silence of the room soaked up her raspy breaths, her pounding heart, her ache, and stirred them around the one man she ever longed for in a way that changes how you taste the world.
Her desire swirled in a pulsing, betraying, blurry hook, and encouraged him to move closer.
Martin obeyed. — Kim Bongiorno

If we overcome the pull and "get up and get at it," we will have won a victory. We have kept our own resolve. We can then move to other things, for by small means great things are accomplished. Thus, even this one small step is also in another sense a giant leap. — Stephen Covey

That's one small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind — Neil Armstrong

Procrastination is a common reaction to feeling overwhelmed or fear of failure. Instead of taking on too much at once and overwhelming yourself, break things down and take one small action step at a time. — Lauren Mackler

To my way of thinking and working, the greatest service a piece of fiction can do any reader is to leave him with a higher ideal of life than he had when he began. If in one small degree it shows him where he can be ... gentler, saner, cleaner, kindlier ... it is a wonder-working book. If it opens his eyes to one beauty in nature he never saw for himself and leads him one step toward the God of the Universe, it is a beneficial book ... — Gene Stratton-Porter

Moon-Watcher felt the first faint twinges of a new and potent emotion. It was a vague and diffuse sense of envy
of dissatisfaction with his life. He had no idea of its cause, still less of its cure; but discontent had come into his soul, and he had taken one small step toward humanity. — Arthur C. Clarke

The pirates would kiss Hayden, and sometimes they would cut off a hank of hair - 'as a reminder of yer kisses, me lad' - and one of them even cut off a piece of his earlobe.
This particular pirate was Bill McGregor, and he was the one Hayden feared the most. Bill McGregor was the worst of them - and at night when everyone else was asleep, Bill McGregor would come looking for Hayden, his step slow and hollow on the planks of the deck, his voice a deep whisper.
Boy,' he would murmur. 'where are you, boy?'
After Bill McGregor cut off the piece of Hayden's earlobe, he decided that he wanted more. Every time he caught Hayden, he would cut a small piece off of him. The skin of an elbow, the tip of a finger, a piece of his lip. He would grip the squirming Hayden and cut a piece off of him, and then Bill McGregor would eat the piece of flesh. — Dan Chaon

Desire acts as a honey trap to the unwary male, luring him into unworthy and catastrophic enterprises. The beauty of the Narnian witches isn't ancillary to their evil, but integral to it, one of the weapons in their arsenal. Evil must, after all, appear attractive if it's going to be tempting, and from there it's only a small step further to the conclusion that feminine beauty is inherently wicked. — Laura Miller

Griffin took one step toward the big desk and swiped his arms across the entire top. Pens, papers, books, a small marbel bust, and an ink well all crashed to the floor.
Griffin leaned across the desk, his arms braced on the now-clear top, and stared into Wakefield's outraged eyes. "We seem to be under a confusion of communication. I did not come here to ask for your sisters hand. I came to tell you I will marry Hero, with or without your permission Your Grace. She has lain with me more than once. She may very well be carrying my child. And if you think I'll give up her or our babe, you have not done nearly enough research into my character or history."
Griffin pushed himself off the desk before the other man could utter a word and storde out the door. — Elizabeth Hoyt

Toward seven o'clock every morning, I leave my study and step Out on the bright terrace; the sun already burns resplendent Between the shadows of the fig tree, makes the low wall of coarse Granite warm to the touch. Here my tools lie ready and waiting, Each one an intimate, an ally: the round basket for weeds: The zappetta, the small hoe with a short haft ... There's a rake here as well, at at times a mattock and spade, Or two watering cans filled with water warmed by the sun. With my basket and small hoe in hand, facing the sun, I Go out for my morning walk. — Hermann Hesse

The idea had always struck Shader as bizarre: entrusting the governance of a country to the whims of an uneducated mob. No sense in it. No continuity. Not to mention that a canny would-be tyrant could easily hoodwink the masses into electing him. It was one small step from freedom to dictatorship. — D.P. Prior

Nature is flexible and resilient. Nature likes redundancy and dispersion. It is approximate and deals in gradients. All boundaries are permeable. Nature nests small systems like molecules within larger systems like cells, which in turn are nested in systems called organs, organisms, ecosystems. We grew from ancient one-celled ancestors. Nature likes mergers: we contain multitudes of other life forms within us. We stand at the crest of four billion years, bacteria molded into wondrous form, burning with a slow fire and about to take the next step. — Robert Frenay

We are so small; and what must one hold on to when one no longer recognizes one's own hands, nor one's step, nor even the small dose of everyday despair. — Danielle Collobert

Hank was walking barefoot up the dock, carrying his sweatshirt over a freckled shoulder and his boots clamped between thumb and finger of that maimed hand. Lee marveled at the scamper of small muscles across the narrow white back, at the swing of the arms and the lift of the neck. Did it take that much muscle just to walk, or was Hank showing off his manly development? Every moment constituted open aggression against the very air through which Hank passed. He doesn't just breathe, Lee decided, listening to Hank's broken-nosed puffing, he gobbles the oxygen. He doesn't just walk; he consumes distance step by carnivorous step. Open aggression is what it is all right, he concluded.
Yet couldn't help but notice the way those shoulders seemed to savor the swing of the arms, or the way those feel relished the feel of the dock. These people ... am I one of these people? — Ken Kesey

But can you imagine if the very first time that you fell after pulling yourself up on that coffee table, a voice came thundering down at you, berating you for falling? "I knew you couldn't do it! You fell, you idiot! I can't believe you fell. Everyone else is walking, but not you. You are a pathetic little crawler and you always will be!" No, quite the opposite! Toddlers are met with lavish praise at each minor progression, even steps in the general direction of progress. When the little one pulls herself up, she gets applause. Mom grabs the video camera and calls the grandparents. Can you imagine how different - and by different, I mean better - this journey would be if with every advancement you made, every small, wobbly step you took in the direction toward Hunger Directed Eating (however imperfect it was), you lavished praise, delighted wonderment, and encouragement upon yourself? — Josie Spinardi

Big achievements come one small advantage at a time, one step at a time, one day at time. — Jim Rohn

If you have a story to tell, put it out there. Get the thing done. No excuses. No procrastinating. No apologies. It will never be as good as you want it to be, so forget about perfection. Just be satisfied that you've done the best work you can do at this stage in your life as an author. Then roll the rocket onto the launch pad and fire it off. After that, write another story. Always keep going. Move fast. Stay one step ahead of the forces of distraction and self-doubt. Love your characters enough to give them a good home. Love your readers enough to give them a place of refuge from life's tragedies, big and small. And love the world you live in enough to make it the world of your dreams. — James Hampton

Socrates refused to neatly define the self he had in mind, just as Buddha refused to use a word like "God." Their reasons were the same: it defeats the truth to use words, since words imply that you know what you are looking for. Instead, truth is an experience. It cannot be anticipated, any more than one can anticipate, at age five, what it will be like to go to college, get married, have children. Experience is fresh and new (or should be); thus truth is fresh and new. From there, it's a small step to demanding that God be fresh and new. — Deepak Chopra

There are people who balk at small civilities on account of their manifest insincerity ... It is better and more logical to accept all the polite phraseology which facilitates intercourse, and contributes to the sweetness of life. If we discarded the formal falsehoods which are the currency of conversation, we should not be one step nearer the vital things of truth. — Agnes Repplier

Few do, at first. A small step, the one that determines destiny often is. — Christie Golden

Admittedly, repentance is not always easy; I suppose it would not be true repentance if it were. It can also take a longer time than we think or hope. There can be missteps along the way, when we falter or lose heart, but we can reset our course and move forward again, even if it is only one small step at a time. As well as praying for forgiveness, we can also plead for courage, and it will come. If we do so, steady but surely, we will rise from the miry depths of sin and emerge into the sunny uplands of forgiveness and hope. — David S. Baxter

Dave's gently probing finger takes one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind. — Cameron Vale

Aelin took a step forward.
One step, as if in a daze.
She loosed a shuddering breath, and a small, whimpering noise came out of her - a sob.
And then she was sprinting down the alley, flying as though the winds themselves pushed at her heels.
She flung herself on the male, crashing into him hard enough that anyone else might have gone rocking back into the stone wall.
But the male grabbed her to him, his massive arms wrapping around her tightly and lifting her up. Nesryn made to approach, but Aedion stopped her with a hand on her arm.
Aelin was laughing as she cried, and the male was just holding her, his hooded head buried in her neck. As if he were breathing her in.
"Who is that?" Nesryn asked.
Aedion smiled. "Rowan. — Sarah J. Maas

One of the blind spots of most Negroes is their failure to realize that small overtures from whites have a large significance ... I now realize that this feeling inevitably takes possession of one in the bitter struggle for equality. Indeed, I share it. Yet I wonder how we can expect total acceptance to step full grown from the womb of prejudice, with no embryo or infancy or childhood stages. — Sarah-Patton Boyle

But you? Are you all right? You're a bit pale."
"Am I?" Small wonder, she thought, but smiled as she enjoyed the sensation of holding a secret inside her. "I don't feel pale. But you..." Swimming in the river of discovery, she leaned down. "You look wonderful.Rough and windblown and sexy."
His narrowed eyes flickered, and he stepped back, a little uneasy when she rubbed a hand over his cheek. There were a half a dozen men milling about, he thought. And every one of them had eyes.
"I was called down to the stables early this morning,didn't take time to shave."
She decided to take this evasive move as a challenge rather than an insult. "I like it.Just a little dangerous.If you've got time later, I thought you might help me out."
"With what?"
"Take a ride with me."
"I could do that."
"Good.About five?" She leaned down again and this time took a fistful of his shirt to yank him a step closer. "And,Brian? Don't shave. — Nora Roberts

You are an adult and you don't understand me and what are the differences between the adult and the kids?
The kids are dreamming to have sex and the adult's already are one step forward, adults take drugs... and from there and kids start, adults kill and then the children start to kill...
So far everything was build by the adults, I see it. An adult has written a book about sex, about the stuff, an adult has created a website and other stuff of pornography.... It hasn't thought by someone this, when you are small and if you don't see it you don't do it!?
You can't do it, without knowing it... can you?
It's now habbit because you have saw it, once, twice, tripple and some fake thoughts even not fake but false thoughts have been planted in your mind and you start doing it... — Deyth Banger

I could live there all alone, she thought, slowing the car to look down the winding garden path to the small blue front door with, perfectly, a white cat on the step. No one would ever find me there, either, behind all those roses, and just to make sure I would plant oleanders by the road. I will light a fire in the cool evenings and toast apples at my own hearth. I will raise white cats and sew white curtains for the windows and sometimes come out of my door to go to the store to buy cinnamon and tea and thread. People will come to me to have their fortunes told, and I will brew love potions for sad maidens; I will have a robin ... — Shirley Jackson

Greatest discoveries start with one small step — Mayur Ramgir

If each person in the room promises that in the twenty-four hours beginning the very next day she or he will do at least one outrageous thing in the name of simple justice, then I promise I will, too. It doesn't matter whether the act is as small as saying, "Pick yourself up" (a major step for those of us who have been our family's servants) or as large as calling for a strike. The point is that, if each of us does as promised, we can be pretty sure of two results. First, the world one day later won't be quite the same.
Second, we will have such a good time doing it that we will never again get up in the morning saying, "WILL I do anything outrageous?" but only "WHAT outrageous act will I do today — Gloria Steinem

She wondered if she was going mad. It felt like a decision she could make. One small step over an invisible line and she could choose lunacy. — Liane Moriarty

The world is changing because we're changing it. And that makes me understand, at least, what kind of person I'd like to be. A person can seek ways, whether big or small, to heal the world. That, to me, is spirituality and one's 'soul.' Not some disembodied eternal wishfulness but a way of being that, most days, I can work on. Life is like walking with a flashlight on a dark night. You can't see your destination, but each step illuminates the next few steps, and, taking one after another, you can get where you need to go. Only now, we'll need to quicken our pace if we are to avoid major upheaval in this century. It's up to us not just as individuals but as citizens of nations and of the world. — Carl Safina

Take care of the small circle around you. When you have succeeded with them, then move outwards, one small step at a time. — Audrey Hepburn

Each one of us has some goal we want to reach, and we must work toward that goal one step at a time. You can't reach toward that goal and expect it on the first try. All your small steps will bring you just a little closer. You must continue to work toward this goal. You may take a few steps back or be at a standstill, but you will be learning from each step. Through hard work, self-confidence and motivation, you will find ways to move ahead. You alone can help yourself to move ahead in life and gain personal satisfaction. You only get out of life what you put into it. — Sid Luckman

God is calling you to change the world one life at a time and one small step at a time. Begin today where you are. — Dillon Burroughs

From Senegalese chauvinism to Wolof tribalism, there is but one small step. And consequently, wherever the petty-mindedness of the national bourgeoisie and the haziness of its ideological positions have been incapable of enlightening the people as a whole or have been unable to put the people first, wherever this national bourgeoisie has proven to be incapable of expanding its vision of the world, there is a return to tribalism, and we watch with a raging heart as ethnic tensions triumph. Since the only slogan of the bourgeoisie is "Replace the foreigners," and they rush into every sector to take the law into their own hands and fill the vacancies, the petty traders such as taxi drivers, cake sellers, and shoe shiners follow suit and call for the expulsion of the Dahomeans or, taking tribalism to a new level, demand that the Fulani go back to their bush or back up their mountains. — Frantz Fanon

It is true, I never stop wanting to learn the hard eucharisteo for deathbeds and dark skies and the prodigal sons. But I accept this is the way to begin, and all hard things come in due time and with practice. Yet now wisps of cheese tell me gentle that this is the first secret step into euchaisteo's miracle. Gratitude for the seemingly insignificant - a seed - this plants the giant miracle. The miracle of eucharisteo, like the Last Supper, is in the eating of crumbs, the swallowing down one mouthful. Do not disdain the small. The whole of life - even the hard - is made up of the minute parts, and if I miss the infinitesimals, I miss the whole. (Page 57) — Ann Voskamp

I have a lot of time to think. To look at the strands of the past weave themselves into the knots of the present, and to imagine how the future might unfold from them. So many possibilities. Like a game of chess. And you, my little pawn, you are the catalyst, walking through the board one small step at a time, towards ... what? What sort of endgame will you bring us all, Orphan? — Lavie Tidhar

The distance between one historical period and another is a very small step in comparison to the huge metaphysical gap we must leap to understand the perspective of another person in any time or place. — E.D. Hirsch Jr.

It would be a grand thing for any community, large or small, to set aside even five minutes of the day for serious contemplation. If nothing more were to result than the recognition of such a feeling as "community" it would be a great step forward. If it be true that we have not yet accepted the fact that we are members of "one world," or even of one nation, how much more true it is that we are not even members of the little communities to which we belong. We become more and more atomized, more and more separate and isolate. We hand our problems over to our respective governments, absolving ourselves of duty, conscience, and initiative. We do not believe in personal example, though we profess to worship that great exemplar Jesus the Christ. We hide from the face of reality: it is too terrible, we think. Yet it is we, only we, who have created this hideous world. And it is we who will change it - by changing our own inner vision. — Henry Miller

Don't be afraid to take a big step if one is indicated. You can't cross a chasm in two small jumps. — David Lloyd George

I will persist until I succeed. Always will I take another step. If that is of no avail I will take another, and yet another. In truth, one step at a time is not too difficult ... I know that small attempts, repeated, will complete any undertaking. — Og Mandino

My Papa's Waltz: The whiskey on your breath Could make a small boy dizzy; But I hung on like death: Such waltzing was not easy. We romped until the pans Slid from the kitchen shelf; My mother's countenance Could not unfrown itself. The hand that held my wrist Was battered on one knuckle; At every step you missed My right ear scraped a buckle. You beat time on my head With a palm caked hard by dirt, Then waltzed me off to bed Still clinging to your shirt. — Theodore Roethke

Meanwhile, things continue to slide: standards slip, curricula are politicized and watered down, and, despite all the emphasis on schooling at every level of society, the dance of education remains locked into the dreary choreography of one step forward, two steps back. Education remains education, which is to say a fairly private affair. No matter how much more widespread so-called higher education has become, only a small - one is inclined to say an infinitesimal - minority seems capable of taking serious advantage of it, at any rate during the standard years of schooling. — Joseph Epstein

Here's a two step formula for handling stress. Step number one: Don't sweat the small stuff. Step number two: Remember it's all small stuff. — Tony Robbins

If you find yourself getting nervous stop and relax for three full breaths. Then take one small step, then another. That is how people get to the top of Everest. — Martha Beck

To change the world, Start with one step. However small, the first step is hardest of all. — Dave Matthews

Our father came to sleep in our house that night. He carried a small suitcase with a black mourning suit and a pair of polished shoes. Corrigan stopped him as he made his way up the stairs. 'Where d'you think you're going?'Our father gripped the bannister. His hands were liverspotted and I could see him trembling in his pause. 'That's not your room,' sad Corrigan. Our father tottered on the stairs. He took another step up. 'Don't,' said my brother. His voice was clear, full, confidant. Our father stood stunned. He climbed one more step and then turned, descended, looked around, lost.
'My own sons,' he said.
We made a bed for him on a sofa in the living room, but even then Corrigan refused to stay under the same roof; he went walking in the direction of the city center and I wondered what alley he might be found in later that night, what fist he might walk into, whose bottle he might climb down inside. — Colum McCann

There is always more after the ending. Always the next morning, and the next. Always changes, losses and gains. Always one step after the other. Until the one true ending that none of us can escape. But even that ending is only a small one, larges as it looms for us. There is still the next morning for everyone else. For the vast majority of the rest of the universe that ending might as well not ever have happened. Every ending is an arbitrary one. Everything ending is from another angle, not really an ending. — Ann Leckie

A small step forward is better than one back. — Jeff Talarigo

He sidestepped down the alley and into another one connected to a small garage, where a raccoon with matching black eyes just like his own halted in mid-step next to a trash can.
They stared at each other, not moving or making a sound.
'There there, friend. I am not here to interrupt your nightly activity just as you are not here to interrupt mine.'
They continued their separate ways, who would be caught and who would not remained a mystery. — Jackie Sonnenberg

It is easy to slip into self-absorption, and it is equally fatal. When one becomes absorbed in himself, in his health, in his personal problems, or in the small details of daily living, he is, at the same time losing interest in other people; worse, he is losing his ties to life. From that it is an easy step to losing interest in the world and in life itself. That is the beginning of death. — Eleanor Roosevelt

Replace "This project is so big and important" with "I can take one small step. — Neil A. Fiore

The true gospel is radically exclusive. Jesus is not a way; He is the way, and all other ways are no way at all. If Christianity would only move one small step toward a more tolerant ecumenicalism and exchange the definite article the for the indefinite article a, the scandal would be over, and the world and Christianity could become friends. However, whenever this occurs, Christianity ceases to be Christianity, Christ is denied, and the world is without a Savior. — Paul Washer

Running has taken me on adventures great and small, at home and around the world. It has provided me with hope and perseverance on days when I had none-and even, once every great while, warmed me with that fleeting ray of sunshine known as glory. Running has taught me that I can do anything, just so long as I keep putting one foot in front of the other. Sometimes that notion is metaphorical and sometimes not. In this way, I have been inspired to attempt things I would have never dreamed possible. And it all started with a single step. — Martin Dugard

Seurity!" I yelled. "I'm being harassed!"

Security officers swarm around me and one orders me to step inside the small office area.

"What's the problem here?" the man behind the desk asks the TSA officer.

"She's harassing me, and I feel that I'm being discriminated against because of my intelligence level," I say.

The man looks at me. "What?"

"This woman attempted to engage me in idiotic conversation and I'm psychologically incapable of reacting in a positive way to such foolishness and we had an altercation after she threatened to throw away my ChapStick. — Stephanie McAfee

Crossing over from Mexico to the United States was a big step, but that part was easy. Big things are like that
easy to identify, and, with a deep breath, done all at once. As life turned out, it was the small that was difficult. The small things
which is all the opposite of what one might think. — Alberto Alvaro Rios

Our heart mends as our inner self - the central or innermost part of our identity - is wrapped around the Light inside of us, rather than around the people who have harmed us. This one small step changes the way we see things. — Suzanne Eller

The cause of it all was a slight oversight, one small operation out of order. Sure, it was her fault, her responsibility, if it came to that, but from where I stood it seemed like a common enough mishap. A momentary lapse and - glitch! Could have happened to anyone. But not to her. A tiny crack in her head widened into a fissure, eventually becoming a gaping chasm. She wouldn't, she couldn't take another step. At a total loss for words, she froze in place. She was a sorry sight, a ship sinking slowly in the night sea. — Haruki Murakami

What is one small step I could take to improve my health (or relationships, or career, or any other area)? — Robert Maurer

There was a small part of me that was still childish, stubborn in her hope, thinking I could somehow have everything.

...That I could be all the versions of me, stacked inside one another, and find someone who would want them all. But that's childhood. Before you realize that every step is a choice. That something must be given up for something to be gained. Everything on a scale, a weighing of desires, an ordering of which you want more--and what you'd be willing to give for it. — Megan Miranda

Can I have this dance?"
He held out his arms expectantly, waiting as she grappled with her feelings. She gazed up into his eyes. One heartbeat later she slipped into his arms and he pulled her close. Her palm against his was heady, sending all sorts of tingles coursing up and down her arm. His other hand, on the small of her back, kept her close. They were awkward at first, but kept at it. He hummed as they moved around in a circle, her skirt swishing against her legs and sometimes tangling between his. A slow burn started on her neck. When they finished he let her go and took a small step back.
"Charlie, I..."
"Stop talking, Nell."
His eyes closed and his lips covered hers. The kiss was gentle as he pulled her tighter against him, driving all thought from her mind. His hands moved down and bracketed her waist and he tilted his head, deepening the kiss. — Caroline Fyffe

Love is a decision," I answered. "Choose your love and then love your choice". Shared values and attitudes are much more important to a long term compatibility than common activities or backgrounds. One day at a time, one small step at a time, and it's suddenly 36 years later. The — Michelle Mras

When Winston Churchill wanted to rally the nation in 1940, it was to Anglo-Saxon that he turned: "We shall fight on the beaches; we shall fight on the landing grounds; we shall fight in the fields and the streets; we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender." All these stirring words came from Old English as spoken in the year 1000, with the exception of the last one, surrender, a French import that came with the Normans in 1066
and when man set foot on the moon in 1969, the first human words spoken had similar echoes: "One small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind." Each of Armstrong's famous words was part of Old English by the year 1000. — Robert Lacey

But you are crazy."
"I know." She lifted a small box from the basket. "Do you know how I know?"
Scarlet didn't answer.
"Because the palace walls have been bleeding for years, and no one else sees it." She shrugged, as if this were a perfectly normal thing to say. "No one believes me, but in some corridors, the blood has gotten so thick there's nowhere safe to step. When I have to pass through those places, I leave a trail of bloody footprints for the rest of the day, and then I worry that the queen's soldiers will follow the scent and eat me up while I'm sleeping. Some nights I don't sleep very well." Her voice dropped to a haunted whisper, her eyes taking on a brittle luminescence. "But if the blood was real, the servants would clean it up. Don't you think? — Marissa Meyer

That's one small step for a man ... but a really big step ... for a baby. — Harlowe Pilgrim

We tend to think of imagination and foresight like we are prone to think of life (sometimes) -- as an inscrutable flash of something from the outside that magically takes us over some large boundary in one atomic step. We even call it a flash (of insight), a eureka moment, a light bulb in our heads that suddenly turns on. But if you reflect on this phenomenon for a moment, you know you don't go suddenly from a blank mind to a fully formed solution. You were already thinking about the problem, and other near solutions that don't work, when suddenly you see a new connection that enables you to reuse familiar things on a novel way. Insight comes in small increments, leveraging what was already there. — M..

But forget that for a moment," Nash went on, "because man is even insignificant here on this very planet. Let's take this whole argument down to just earth for a moment, okay?" She nodded. "Do you realize that dinosaurs walked this planet longer than man?" "Yes." "But that's not all. That would be one thing that would show that man is not special - the fact that even on this infinitesimally small planet we haven't even been kings the majority of the time. But take it a step farther - do you realize how much longer the dinosaurs ruled the earth than us? Two times? Five times? Ten times?" She looked at him. "I don't know." "Forty-four thousand times longer." He was gesturing wildly now, lost in the bliss of his argument. "Think about that. Forty-four thousand times longer. That's more than one hundred and twenty years for every single day. Can you even comprehend it? Do you think we will survive forty-four thousand times longer than we already have?" "No, — Harlan Coben

For the first time since she'd pieced her heart back together, she felt a small tug at one of the strings. She dropped her hands to her sides and took a step back. The one word she'd waited to hear could destroy her carefully constructed life.
"Don't."
Don't make me forget. Don't make it better. Don't make me love you again.
- Autumn Haven — Rachel Gibson

There is only one inborn erroneous notion that we exist in order to be happy So long as we persist in this inborn error the world seems to us full of contradictions. For at every step, in great things and small, we are bound to experience that the world and life are certainly not arranged for the purpose of maintaining a happy existence hence the countenances of almost all elderly persons wear the expression of disappointment. — Arthur Schopenhauer

He laced his fingers through mine and lifted my hand to his lips. I had gloves on, but he kissed exactly where I wore his ring.
"Why are you so sweet?" I asked, my voice small. My heart beat rapidly, and every star peeping through the clouds seemed to be shining just for me.
"I don't think I'm that sweet. I mean, I just told you to be quiet. That's one step away from asking you to wash my laundry and make me a sandwich."
"You know what I mean."
Seth pressed another kiss to my forehead. "I'm sweet because you make it easy to be sweet. — Richelle Mead

Movement from Brenda grabbed Thomas's attention. He looked to see her drop the knife away from Minho and step back, absently wiping the small trace of blood there on her pants. "I really would've killed you, ya know," she said in a slightly scratchy voice. Almost husky. "Charge Jorge again and I'll sever an artery."
Minho wiped at his small wound with his thumb, then looked at the bright red smear. "That's one sharp knife. Makes me like you more. — James Dashner

People say, what is the sense of our small effort? They cannot see that we must lay one brick at a time, take one step at a time. A pebble cast into a pond causes ripples that spread in all directions. Each one of our thoughts, words and deeds is like that. No one has a right to sit down and feel hopeless. There is too much work to do. — Dorothy Day

All of this, you and me, is brand new, you're right. Let's just take this one small step at a time."
"These small steps include sex, right? — Karina Halle

Nobody had ever even stepped out onto the surface, she read in school, leading to a broken line of memorable first statements. "That's one small step for a man; one giant leap for mankind," on Luna, "I wish that the peace I see here could bless the Earth again," from Mars, "This one's for you, Mark Twain," on Halley's Comet. And from the only manned landing on Venus, "Oh my holy fucking shit I think we're on the fucking ground! Get us up we're gonna fucking die! — Ari Bach