Only Get Out What You Put In Quotes & Sayings

Especially for people who are unknown, it's easier to get a TV show because you don't have to put a certain amount of people in movie theaters for a box office weekend. It's really difficult to get a great lead role in some big film, if nobody knows you. — Eve Hewson

Lundin says, "Denniz was an arrangement genius." He adds, "like Steve Jobs, he knew what to take out. 'You can get rid of that, that. Keep it simple.' " As Denniz put it, "A great pop song should be interesting, in some way. That means that certain people will hate it immediately and certain people will love it, but only as long as it isn't boring and meaningless. Then it's not a pop song any longer; then it's something else. It's just music. — John Seabrook

Many people think that if they were only in some other place, or had some other job, they would be happy. Well, that is doubtful. So get as much happiness out of what you are doing as you can and don't put off being happy until some future date. — Dale Carnegie

You have to want to put a competitive, Stanley Cup-caliber team on the ice in contrast to wanting to hopefully someday financially break even. So you have to really balance expenses with revenue. — Henry Samueli

The most worth-while thing is to try to put happiness into the lives of others. — Robert Baden-Powell

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

Be obsessed with Jesus. Breathe, sleep, eat, dream, and live Jesus! The apostle Paul could not have put it any better when he said in Philippians 1:21 that for to me, to live is Christ, and to die is gain. — Pedro Okoro

She knew it should bother her more, being evil and all, but after she put on a little mascara and some lipstick and poured herself another cup of blood-laced coffee, she found that she was okay with it. — Christopher Moore

Sleep well, and stay where I put you. — Melissa Marr

Luc would have put my head on a pike if you'd taken a hit." "How do you know I didn't?" I opened my mouth, then closed it again. "Did you?" His eyes went to sultry slits. "Do you want to look and see?" "Not especially." Liar, liar, pants on fire. — Chloe Neill

Westcliff sees an odd sort of logic in why you would finally be the one to win St. Vincent's heart. He says a girl like you would appeal to ... hmm, how did he put it? ... I can't remember the exact words, but it was something like ... you would appeal to St. Vincent's deepest, most secret fantasy."
Evie felt her cheeks flushing while a skirmish of pain and hope took place in the tired confines of her chest. She tried to respond sardonically. "I should think his fantasy is to consort with as many women as possible."
A grin crossed Lillian's lips. "Dear, that is not St. Vincent's fantasy, it's his reality. And you're probably the first sweet, decent girl he's ever had anything to do with."
"He spent quite a lot of time with you and Daisy in Hampshire," Evie countered.
That seemed to amuse Lillian further. "I'm not at all sweet, dear. And neither is my sister. Don't say you have been laboring under that misconception all this time? — Lisa Kleypas

Yakov spent the whole day playing his fiddle; when it got completely dark, he took the notebook in which he recorded his losses daily, and out of boredom began adding up the yearly total. It came to over a thousand roubles. This astounded him so much that he flung the abacus to the floor and stamped his feet. Then he picked up the abacus, again clicked away for a long time, and sighed deeply and tensely. His face was purple and wet with sweat. He thought that if he could have put that lost thousand roubles in the bank, he would have earned at least forty roubles a year in interest. And therefore those forty roubles were a loss. In short, wherever you turned, there was nothing but losses everywhere.
- Rothchild's Fiddle — Anton Chekhov

The soul that has come to know God fully no longer desires anything else, nor does it attach itself to anything on the earth; and if you put before it a kingdom, it would not desire it, for the love of God gives such sweetness and joy to the soul that even the life of a king can no longer give it any sweetness. — Silouan The Athonite

We don't have titles on our business cards. No one really gets any special treatment. No one gets a corner office to put pictures of their family and their dog in. — Jay Chiat

If you put on a lousy production with white actors, it's lousy. There is a problem, or can be, at this stage of our social evolution, with mixing the casts. It may not be a question of race so much as class. You would rarely find a black man in a high executive position where he was swinging his weight around. — Howard Schultz

Are you gonna put your shirt back on?" she blurted out.
Chase froze, looking over his shoulder at her with the most maddening smile. "Why? Is this bothering you?"
"I just ... " Andie sputtered, floundering through her response. "I mean, what if we get pulled over or something?"
"If we get pulled over, this could only work in your favor," he said, running his hands over his chest.
Andie tried to stifle a laugh. "My God, you're insufferable. — Priscilla Glenn

How are you going to forget him if you keep talking about him? Darling, when things go wrong in life, this is what you do. You lift your chin, put on a ravishing smile, mix yourself a little cocktail ... and out you go. — Sophie Kinsella

Christ's version of kindness:
I know you are hurt. I contributed to that. Maybe, I should have said more. Done more. Listened. I am sorry for my part in the situation. I am sorry if I caused you any pain or confused you with my actions or words. How can I help you move on? I want you to have peace in your life. Let's end this by communicating.
The world's perverted version of kindness:
You caused your own pain. You get what you get. Get over it and move on. Maybe, one day you will figure out what happiness really means. By the way, I am not responsible for giving it to you. Nor, do I have to put up with people that don't bring me joy or who I can't trust. I am only responsible for myself. I will pray for you because I am a good Christian. — Shannon L. Alder

I'm sure that if woman laid out the rules- requirements- early on, and let her intended know that he could either rise up to those requirements, or just move on. A directive like that signals to a man that you are not a plaything-someone to be used and discarded. It tells him that what you have- your benefits- are special, and that you need time to get to know him and his ways to decide if he DESERVES them.
The man who is willing to put in the time and meet the requirments is the one you want to stick around, because tthat guy is making a conscious decision that he, too, has no interest in playing games and will do what it takes to not only stay on the job, but also get promoted and be the proud beneficiary of your benefits. And you, in the meantime, win the ultimate prize of maintaing your dignity and self-esteem, and earning the respect of the man who recognized that you were worth the wait. — Steve Harvey

I'm going to shoot him," I squeezed through my teeth. "No, that would be murder," Grandma Frida told me, her voice soothing. "You've had a long day. Let's put your magic away. You know what you need? A nice cup of chamomile tea and a tranquilizer . . ." I — Ilona Andrews

By 2014, Reed had calculated, a city of a million people, the tenth largest city in the United States, would be serviced by 1,600 public workers. "There is no way to run a city with that level of staffing," he said. "You start to ask: What is a city? Why do we bother to live together? But that's just the start." The problem was going to grow worse until, as he put it, "you get to one." A single employee to service the entire city, presumably with a focus on paying pensions. "I don't know how far out you have to go until you get to one," said Reed, "but it isn't all that far." At that point, if not before, the city would be nothing more than a vehicle to pay the retirement costs of its former workers. The only clear solution was if former city workers up and died, soon. But former city workers were, blessedly, living longer than ever. This — Michael Lewis

I sometimes work with a communications and media training firm called KNP Communications. It's nice to bring the research to the practitioners; I learn a lot watching how they put it into practice, and I know they like to be on top of what's happening on the research front. — Amy Cuddy

He can't understand people who long to retire. How can anyone spend their whole life longing for the day when they become superfluous? Wandering about, a burden on society, what sort of man would ever wish for that? Staying at home, waiting to die. Or even worse: waiting for them to come and fetch you and put you in a home. Being dependent on other people to get to the toilet. Ove can't think of anything worse. His wife often teases him, says he's the only man she knows who'd rather be laid out in a coffin than travel in a mobility service van. — Fredrik Backman

... as a convention, you get up and walk to the window to make the audience believe that you're looking out. It's for the audience, not for you! And what it means to you is something emotional [...] If you went to the Actors Studio you'd spend six months seeing the snow before you could say, 'Look at the snow.' This takes a terrible burden away from the actor, who thinks he's got to see the woods and the snow. 'Give me my gun! I see a rabbit! Give me my gun!' "

Meisner sounds thrilled at the possibility of a hunt.

"That happens when you're still sitting there reading. Then when they put in the scenery you move to the window. Isn't that simple? How simple it is to solve the problem of seeing things when you know that it's all in you emotionally, and that walking to the window is only a convention. — Sanford Meisner

Robin is not in your life, you are in her dream, you'll never get out of it. And why does Robin feel innocent? Every bed she leaves, without caring, fills her heart with peace and happiness. She has made her "escape" again. That's why she can't "put herself in another's place," she herself is the only "position"; so she resents it when you reproach her with what she had done. She knows she is innocent because she can't do anything in relation to anyone but herself. — Djuna Barnes

The good thing about the studio is that, when the movie comes out, they will put their marketing and their money behind it, which isn't necessarily true with indie movies, just by the nature of it being an independent film. — Jamie Linden

Journeys become very good metaphors. They always have the character put into circumstances that reveal him. If I had based my characters in New York and had them just sitting and thinking about life, it would be like what contemporary U.S. fiction is about. That is very heavy, literally, for me. It doesn't become mainstream enough because the pages don't turn themselves. — Karan Bajaj

I don't wear much make-up in my non-working life, though I love to dress up and put on a face for a special occasion. As I get older, I see less of the fantasy 'Indian' self I inherited from my father, and I see my mother looking back at me. — Diana Quick

I've often been told you have to play the game to get what you want, give a little of yourself up to get the results you desire. But what if that's all bullshit? What if every time I put a strip of false lashes on and cross my legs on a talk-show stage, I am not getting any closer to creating the change I want to see in the world? What if every pair of Spanx, every morning-TV-ready joke, every Instagram shout-out to the person who made my dress only carries me farther away from my goal? And the goal is big: radical self-acceptance for women everywhere, political change so total it shakes the ground, justice and joy for those who have been used and tossed aside. And the goal is small: utter and unbridled selfhood. — Lena Dunham

Smoke-ccss-b85b07: Tell me about a time when you did something evil. ABlum: oh gee well sometimes i work too hard is that evil? Smoke-ccssb85b07: Sarcasm ignored. ABlum: ok um when i started college, my brother raph pressured me to join the ut austin chapter of his fraternity and i joined, only to discover that fraternities are the stupidest forms of social organization ever invented so, live and learn but at the end of the fall semester, one of my frat brothers offered to pay me to write his final history paper and i did it but i didn't want to get caught, so i read his earlier papers and put a lot of work into imitating his shitty writing which made the paper a d+ at best so he failed the class and i wouldn't give the money back so they made up an honor code violation and kicked me out of the frat and at the time i remember thinking "this has worked out surprisingly well" so, i don't know what you consider "evil" but i'm sure you can find it somewhere in there — Leonard Richardson

Many seniors understand that Social Security is social insurance as opposed to a program where we put money aside for our own retirement. But most elderly individuals think they're getting their money back. So it isn't selfishness as much as a misunderstanding. — Richard Lamm

Some people, he says, they hide themselves away from the eyes of the world. They hunker down and shiver. They find four walls high enough to put between them and everything else. Those people, to them the world is a frightful place. See, you and me, we're different. When we are called on to move, we move. It don't matter the cause or the distance. Revenge or ministration, reason or folly - it's all the same to us. — Alden Bell

I always liked instrumental music, and I think there's a vehicle out there for it. I think a true artist not only records, but you have to perform and you have to have some kind of consistent output. You can't just put out an album every ten years and never play - that's not an artist, that's something else. But I find there's always been a vehicle for what I've done, because I get out there and play all the time. I say 12 hundred shows on my website just in case, because we can't verify it, but it's more like 15 hundred! — Michelangelo

Put you hand before your eyes and remember, you that have walked, the places from which you have walked away, and the wilderness into which you manfully turned the steps of your abandonment ... It is your business to leave all that you have know altogether behind you, and no man has eyes at the back of his head - go forward. — Hilaire Belloc

Politics is a damn expensive business. I had one hell of a time trying to raise money as a candidate. I had to put a second mortgage on our house to get that campaign started, and I ended up spending over $300,000 to get elected. I believe that public financing of federal election campaigns is the only thing that will insure good candidates and save the two-party system. It is the most degrading thing in the world to go out with your hat in your hand and beg for money, but that's what you have to do if you haven't got your own resources. — Joe Biden

Easy thing for a spirit to get used to. It is very confining, very limiting. So the child will cry out at suddenly being so limited. Hear this cry. Understand it. And give your children as much of a sense of "unlimitedness" as you possibly can. Next, introduce them to the world you have created with gentleness and care. Be full of care - that is to say, be careful - of what you put into their memory storage units. Children remember everything they see, everything they experience. Why do you spank your children the moment they exit the womb? Do you really imagine this is the only way to get their engines going? Why do you take your babies away from their mothers minutes after they have been separated from the only life-form they have known in all of their present existence? Will not the measuring and the weighing and the prodding and the poking wait for just a moment while the newly born experience the safety and the comfort of that which — Neale Donald Walsch

I think of choosing as a ... both a fun and an effortful activity and I think of choice as something that in order for you to really get what you want out of it you have to put a lot into it and so I'm only willing to do that for a few different things and for the rest I really just try to either satisfy, come up with a simple rule or let somebody else make the choice. — Sheena Iyengar

Soon after you confront the matter of preserving your identity, another question will occur to you: "Who am I writing for?" It's a fundamental question, and it has a fundamental answer: You are writing for yourself. Don't try to visualize the great mass audience. There is no such audience - every reader is a different person. Don't try to guess what sort of thing editors want to publish or what you think the country is in a mood to read. Editors and readers don't know what they want to read until they read it. Besides, they're always looking for something new. Don't worry about whether the reader will "get it" if you indulge a sudden impulse for humor. If it amuses you in the act of writing, put it in. (It can always be taken out, but only you can put it in.) You are writing primarily to please yourself, and if you go about it with enjoyment you will also entertain the readers who are worth writing for. If you lose the dullards back in the dust, you don't want them anyway. This — William Zinsser

Oh good, you're ready."
"No, I've only just got out of the bath. What should I put on?"
"Put on?" he says in obvious mystification.
"Well I've only got a towel on." When he still doesn't get it I sigh. God, he's so dense sometimes. "Charlie, I haven't got any knickers on," I mutter.
His eyes seem to darken and then he starts laughing. "Mabel, I'm shocked. What sort of massages have you been having? I'm not massaging down there however much you expect it. I'm not that type of boy! — Lily Morton

A game at which the liberals have become masters is that of deliberate evasiveness. The question often comes up 'what can you do?'. If you ask him to do something like stopping to use segregated facilities or dropping out of varsity to work at menial jobs like all blacks or defying and denouncing all provisions that make him privileged, you always get the answer - 'but that's unrealistic!' While this may be true, it only serves to illustrate the fact that mo matter what a white man does, the colour of his skin - his passport to privilege- will always put him miles ahead of the black men. Thus in the ultimate analysis, no white person can escape being part of the oppressor camp. — Steve Biko

"Some people develop a love of something and that love is a lifelong love. Like, say, a scientist. He is on a quest for knowledge. He loves theories. He loves testing his theories. He loves this quest for knowledge. And maybe he is only a teacher or a professor but he still loves this knowledge, he loves what he does and he wants to share it with people. Sure, there are some days when he doesn't want to get out of bed in the morning and go to the job but when he stands back and, and... puts it all into perspective... he realizes it's not that bad at all. He likes what he does. On the other hand, you take a man who works in a factory. It's unrealistic to think this man likes putting the same bolt in the same part or whatever for eight to twelve hours a day. He does it for a paycheck so he can support his family or his booze habit or whatever. But every day, when he goes to work, he has to put himself into something like a coma because he hates what he does so much. Do you follow me? — Andersen Prunty

The deep happiness that marriage can bring, then, lies on the far side of sacrificial service in the power of the Spirit. That is, you only discover your own happiness after each of you has put the happiness of your spouse ahead of your own, in a sustained way, in response to what Jesus has done for you. Some will ask, "If I put the happiness of my spouse ahead of my own needs - then what do I get out of it?" The answer is - happiness. That is what you get, but a happiness through serving others instead of using them, a happiness that won't be bad for you. It is the joy that comes from giving joy, from loving another person in a costly way. — Timothy Keller

What. Are. You. Doing. Here?" Day snapped each word this time.

"You're not the only one that can track your lover," God said smugly while holding up his phone with the application still open.

Day's mouth fell open and the shade of red he turned was priceless. He decided to get rid of their excess company and take Day back with him. God looked at Day's date and put on his best run-for-your-life face and spat menacingly. "Leave. Now."

"No," Day spoke before his date could move. "You don't have to go anywhere, Mick."

God looked back to Day and spoke in a harsh growl without moving his eyes from his partner's. "Mick, I say leave now. He says to stay. Whatever will you do?"

Mick turned and ran so fast his image turned into a blur.
"That takes care of that," God said.

Day pushed God out of his space and turned to walk away without another word. — A.E. Via

I want to do good work. I want the opportunity to work with good people, and the only way I'm gonna do that is to commit 110% - you get out what you put in. — Christian Bale

Dear You, The odds of your reading this are slim to none. Who would choose uncertainty and vaguely worded warnings over a new life of wealth and luxury? I can only assume that you were put under a massive amount of stress, touched someone's skin, and they were paralyzed. Or blinded. Or lost the ability to speak. Or befouled themselves. Or one of several other effects that I won't outline right now. In any case, I know what it's like the first time it happens. It's like a door opening up inside of you, isn't it? Like you've been hit by a truck. It can't be ignored. So even if you would have preferred to open up the other box (which, by the way, would have had you living out the rest of your life as Jeanne Citeaux), I'm glad you made this choice. Take both suitcases with you and go to the address below. The key in this envelope will get you in, and you should be safe there. It has no connection to me, officially. Open the next envelope when you are established. Try not to be followed. — Daniel O'Malley

Still I can't get it out of my mind what a discrepancy there is between ideas and living. A permanent dislocation, though we try to cover the two with a bright awning. And it won't go. Ideas have to be wedded to action; if there is no sex, no vitality in them, there is no action. Ideas cannot exist alone in the vacuum of the mind. Ideas are related to living: liver ideas, kidney ideas, interstitial ideas, etc. If it were only for the sake of an idea Copernicus would have smashed the existent macrocosm and Columbus would have foundered in the Sargasso Sea. The aesthetics of the idea breeds flowerpots and flowerpots you put on the window sill. But if there be no rain or sun of what use putting flowerpots outside the window? — Henry Miller

You only get out of it what you put into it. If you are a sheep in this world, you're not going to get much out of it. — Greg Norman

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

Then one day when I was in my mid-teens I woke up and realized that the new era was never going to begin. The revolt hadn't been put down, it had just dwindled away into a fashion statement. Can I have been the only person in the world who was disillusioned by this? Bewildered by this? It seemed so. Everyone else seemed to be able to pass it off with a cynical grin that said, "Well, what did you really expect? There's never been any more than this and never will be any more than this. Nobody's out to save the world, because nobody gives a damn about the world, that was just a bunch of goofy kids talking. Get a job, make some money, work till you're sixty, then move to Florida and die. — Daniel Quinn

And I have to credit David Jacobs with the opportunities he gave me. He was totally into sharing the creation of characters. David put together a show that told the story of people over many years' time and that was greatly enjoyable. Though nowadays that is frowned upon. — William Devane

My identity is mostly as a songwriter and lyricist and singer. I also have a lot of production ideas but I have my own limitations in terms of what instruments I'm actually proficient at and what I can do myself, so I really love working with people on the production end; just really going for it with orchestration and instrumentation and production. That's where I see myself going: maintaining my integrity and abilities as a songwriter, but applying it to different contexts, to where I can put on a huge feathered costume and roll around in the ocean. — Mirah

That's because love is never stationary. In the end, love doesn't just keep thinking about it or keep planning for it. Simply put: love does. — Bob Goff

But pain and anguish were everywhere anyway. Might as well put them to good use. — Naomi Shihab Nye

I realized that you don't try on a pair of pants, fart in them, and then put them back on the shelf, and the same rough politeness applied here, too. Plain and simple, I bled on it, I bought it. — Laurie Notaro

Put glibly:
In science if you know what you are doing you should not be doing it.
In engineering if you do not know what you are doing you should not be doing it.
Of course, you seldom, if ever, see either pure state. — Richard Hamming

Ed Koch will never 'rest in peace.' That was not his way. He was always nervously squirming, while making others squirm as well. Comfort was not his goal. He understood that to be a proud and assertive Jew meant never being able to leave a sigh of relief and say, 'It's over, we are at peace, we can now put down our guard and relax.' — Alan Dershowitz

Too often, we put up with mediocrity, telling ourselves that later in life we'll do what we want. — Daniel Willey

It's one thing to make a choice. It's another to put that choice into practice. — John C. Maxwell

I know I might look like a ball of fluff," she said, "but I'm not. Not even close. And the fact that I get up each morning and put a damn smile on my face is the same as ... Batman putting on his cape."
"I
"
"I'm not done. It's ... protection. It's my shield. It's me waving my middle finger to the world because I choose to be happy. The bottom line, Luke, is that I know what matters and what doesn't. — Jill Shalvis

Laughter is spiritual health. And laughter is very unburdening. While you laugh, you can put your mind aside very easily. For a man who cannot laugh the doors of the buddha are closed. To me, laughter is one of the greatest values. No religion has ever thought about it. They have always been insisting on seriousness, and because of their insistence the whole world is psychologically sick. — Rajneesh

I know I have to do the right thing. And the sooner you do the right thing, the better. You get it over with, and you don't have to worry about it anymore. But who does that in real life? Instead, you procrastinate and think about it and put it off and think about it some more until that one little pebble grows into a giant block inside your head. — Candace Bushnell

Our mother had faith in literature the way others had faith in God or America; she put herself in its hands the way patients did their physicians; she prescribed it, she preached it. — Antonya Nelson

So why are you here?" Watts asked Santo.
"Because, Paul, is it Paul? I'm here to put the f in freedom. — Richard House

Let me put it this way: You cannot live in the world without being in pain, spiritual and physical pain. We have developed mechanisms to deal with these pains, to overcome them somehow. Therapy, religion and spirituality, relationships, material success. All this can work, but also become a problem itself.
The pursuit of happiness has even been put into the American constitution a couple centuries ago. Today we're so rich, we own much more than we need, we have liberties unknown before, even though they are endangered in the current political climate in the US - and we forget how wonderful it nevertheless is, compared to most other political and economic systems. We have a saying that goes: Give a man enough rope and he hangs himself. — David Foster Wallace

When you're at a lunch, enjoy being - I'm always on my phone when I'm at lunch or with things here or there. I've learned to put the phone down and be present. — Khloe Kardashian

Robert Frost's triumph was not being at John Kennedy's inauguration ceremony, but the day when he put the last period on West-Running Brook. — Joseph Brodsky

The idea of gas engines was by no means new, but this was the first time that a really serious effort had been made to put them on the market. They were received with interest rather than enthusiasm and I do not recall any one who thought that the internal combustion engine could ever have more than a limited use. All the wise people demonstrated conclusively that the engine could not compete with steam. They never thought that it might carve out a career for itself. That is the way with wise people
they are so wise and practical that they always know to a dot just why something cannot be done; they always know the limitations. That is why I never employ an expert in full bloom. If ever I wanted to kill opposition by unfair means I would endow the opposition with experts. They would have so much good advice that I could be sure they would do little work. — Henry Ford

Have a vision. Communicate it clearly. Pick the right people and put them in the right jobs. — Rick Levin

Put one foot in front of the other, focus on the little goal right in front of you, and almost anything is possible. — Joe De Sena

I write the words God put on my mind. — Lailah Gifty Akita

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

Minor vices lead to major ones, but minor virtues stay put. — Mignon McLaughlin

Histories of the Kennedy Space Center acknowledge without exaggeration that the obstacle posed by the mosquitoes was so serious that NASA quite literally could not have put a man on the moon by Kennedy's "before the decade is out" deadline without the invention of DDT. In this way, the challenges of spaceflight reveal themselves to be distinctly terrestrial. — Margaret Lazarus Dean

Most of us have had that experience - at around puberty - of realising that, despite whatever efforts we put into our chosen sports, we will become at best competent. — Will Self

I knew that Clara kept Carax's book in a glass cabinet by the arch of the balcony. I crept up to it. My plan, or my lack of it, was to lay my hands on the book, take it out of there, give it to that lunatic, and lose sight of him forever after. Nobody would notice the book's absence, except me. Carax's book was waiting for me, as it always did, its spine just visible at the end of a shelf. I took it in my hands and pressed it against my chest, as if embracing an old friend whom I was about to betray. Judas, I thought. I decided to leave the place without making Clara aware of my presence. I would take the book and disappear from Clara's life forever. Quietly, I stepped out of the library. The door of her bedroom was just visible at the end of the corridor ... I walked slowly up to the door. I put my fingers on the doorknob. My fingers trembled. I had arrived too late. I swallowed hard and opened the door. — Carlos Ruiz Zafon

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

What does Karl Marx put on his pasta? Communist Manipesto! — Stephen Colbert

Stephens resumed speaking as the crowd quieted. He referred to one final "improvement" the Confederate Constitution had introduced, a brief but crucial clause that banned forever any "bill of attainder, ex post facto law, or law denying or impairing the right of property in negro slaves." "The new Constitution has put at rest, forever, all the agitating questions relating to our peculiar institutions - African slavery as it exists among us - the proper status of the negro in our form of civilization." This question, Stephens baldly admitted, "was the immediate cause of the late rupture and present revolution."20 Stephens then referenced — Don H. Doyle

Diamonds are held under tons and tons of pressure, extremely high temperatures of fire and shuffled under shifting of tectonic plates, for a long, long time! Yet when they come out from there and are put on display for their beauty; does anybody stop to evaluate the diamond based upon all the shit it's been through and say "Remember that disgusting hole it used to be in? I bet it was hell in there!" No, people don't remember where a diamond has come from; they just see the beauty of it now. But it wouldn't have become so beautiful, you know, if not for all of that! So why should we look at other people, or at ourselves and evaluate them/ourselves based upon their/our pasts? Shouldn't we forget that? And only see the beauty that is in front of our eyes? Whatever it was, it made you beautiful! And that is what matters! — C. JoyBell C.

He would measure the world against the rigid grid of his heart and put each man in charge of a domain no more and no less than his just deserts. — Ken Liu

Yessir, it's a hard taskmaster, that guilt. I say, feel it, and wriggle a little bit if you have to, but then put it away. Get on with what you can change. — LaVyrle Spencer

Ecologist Paul Ehrlich stressed that people who hold opposing opinions need to engage in open discussion with well-reasoned dissent. Positions should be questioned and criticized, not the people who hold them. Personal attacks preclude open discussion because, once someone is put on the defensive, fruitful exchanges are impossible, at least for the moment. — Marc Bekoff

What Tyler says about the crap and the slaves of history, that's how I felt. I wanted to destroy something beautiful I'd never have. Burn the Amazon rain forests. Pump chlorofluorocarbons straight up to gobble the ozone. Open the dump valves on supertankers and uncap offshore oil wells. I wanted to kill all the fish I couldn't afford to eat, and smother the French beaches I'd never see. I wanted the whole world to hit bottom. Pounding that kid, I really wanted to put a bullet between the eyes of every endangered panda that wouldn't screw to save its species and every whale or dolphin that gave up and ran itself aground — Chuck Palahniuk

People generally have three reactions to the gospel, to hearing the name of Jesus; they either are drawn to it like fireflies drawn to a flame, they run away from it for fear that the light will expose their own sin and shame, or they try to put out the light like someone throwing something at a lamp to break it. — Lisa Bedrick