Over Sharpening Quotes & Sayings

The broad effects which can be obtained by punishment in man and beast, are the increase of fear, the sharpening of the sense of cunning, the mastery of the desires; so it is that punishment tames man, but does not make him "better.". — Friedrich Nietzsche

It always struck Fire, the physical affection between these siblings, who as often as not were at each other's throats over one thing or another. She liked the way the four of them shifted and changed shape, bumping and clanging against one another, sharpening each other's edges and then smoothing them down again, and somehow always finding the way to fit together. — Kristin Cashore

To see the butcher slap the steak before he laid it on the block, and give his knife a sharpening, was to forget breakfast instantly. It was agreeable too - it really was - to see him cut it off so smooth and juicy. There was nothing savage in the act, although the knife was large and keen; it was a piece of art, high art; there was delicacy of touch, clearness of tone, skilful handling of the subject, fine shading. It was the triumph of mind over matter; quite. — Charles Dickens

We serve nature's purpose by culling the herd, and our own by sharpening our skills. We are the predatory swarm! — James Luceno

He never spoke with any bitterness at all, no matter how awful the things he said. Are there really people without resentment, without hate, she wondered. People who never go cross-grained to the universe? Who recognize evil, and resist evil, and yet are utterly unaffected by it? Of course there are. Countless, the living and the dead. Those who have returned in pure compassion to the wheel, those who follow the way that cannot be followed without knowing they follow it, the sharecropper's wife in Alabama and the lama in Tibet and the entomologist in Peru and the millworker in Odessa and the greengrocer in London and the goatherd in Nigeria and the old, old man sharpening a stick by a dry streambed somewhere in Australia, and all the others. There is not one of us who has not known them. There are enough of them, enough to keep us going. Perhaps. — Ursula K. Le Guin

Cicadas, buckling and unbuckling their stomach muscles, yield the sound of someone sharpening scissors. Fall field crickets, the thermometer hounds, add high-pitched tinkling chirps to the jazz, and their call quickens with warm weather, slows again with cool. — Diane Ackerman

He regarded us with dark, evaluating eyes. "This can't be good."
"I'll go first," Dabria began, sucking in a rattling breath.
"Not even close," I shot back. I faced Patch directly, cutting Dabria out of the conversation. "She kissed you! And Dante, who's been tailing you, by the way, caught it on camera. Imagine my surprise when that's what I got an eyeful of earlier tonight. Did you even think to tell me?"
"I told her I kissed you, and that you pushed me away," Dabria protested shrilly.
"What are you still doing here?" I exploded at Dabria. "This is between me and Patch. Leave already!"
"What are you doing here?" Patch echoed to Dabria, his tone sharpening.
"I - broke in," she sputtered. "I was scared. I couldn't sleep. I can't stop thinking about Hanoth and the other Nephilim."
"You have got to be kidding me," I said. — Becca Fitzpatrick

I think Broadway is good for sharpening your skills. It's the best for really reaching the zenith of your talent. You go so far and reach the peak of it and you say, "Maybe this is the best performance I can do." — Michael Jackson

..the Zimmers sharpening their sarcasm. Over an early dinner, they chipped away at each other like little Michelangelos, placing every stroke of the mallet with care and devotion. — Amor Towles

They were young; time hadn't yet rubbed at them, polishing their differences and sharpening their opinions ... — Kate Morton

For everybody in their busy lives, you need to invest in sharpening your tools, and you need to invest in longevity. — Ryan Holmes

No refining of one's taste in matters of art or literature, no sharpening of one's powers of insight in matters of science or psychology, can ever take the place of one's sensitiveness to the life of the earth. This is the beginning and the end of a person's true education. — John Cowper Powys

Of course, when we got home, we found that Dagda had peed on my down comforter. He had also eaten part of Mom's maidenhair fern and barfed it up on the carpet. Then he had apparently worked himself into a frenzy sharpening his ting by amazingly effective claws on the armrest of my dad's favorite chair.
Now he was asleep on a pillow, curled up like a fuzzy little snail.
"God, he's so cute," I said, shaking my head. — Cate Tiernan

Training is such a vital part of preparation for a game, you really do train to play. It tops up your ability, like sharpening a carving knife. You can get away with not doing it for a while, as long as you have reached a certain standard of fitness. — Graeme Le Saux

I play around with my Japanese Garden. Since Im half way to 70 today I need to start pruning trees and sharpening plants like an old fart. — Jason Bateman

Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening the axe. — Abraham Lincoln

Leaders are passionate learners. Leaders are always seeking ways to improve themselves by sharpening their skills. They fully embrace the fact that growing leaders lead growing organizations. — Gary Rohrmayer

2.3.06.02.087: Unnecessary sharpening of pencils constitutes a waste of public resources, and will be punished as appropriate. — Jasper Fforde

The time that I would spend revisiting my old Get Your War On strips is more profitably spent Googling myself and reading comments about how people hate my pencil-sharpening business. — David Rees

The first bowl sleekly moistened throat and lips, The second banished all my loneliness The third expelled the dullness from my mind, Sharpening inspiration gained from all the books I've read. The fourth brought forth light perspiration, Dispersing a lifetimes troubles through my pores. The fifth bowl cleansed every atom of my being. The sixth has made me kin to the Immortals. This seventh ... I can take no more. — Lu Tong

Grandma Harken was sharpening her garden shears. Her hands slowed on the file and she said finally, "He'll get in trouble and he'll figure it out. Best to do it without us standing over him. It's the only way anybody ever learns to clean up after themselves. — Ursula Vernon

It is our custom
to consume
the person we love.
Taboo flesh: swollen
genitalia nipples
the scrotum the vulva
the soles of the feet
the palm of the hand
heart and liver taste best.
Cannibalism is blessed.

I'll wear your jawbone
round my neck
listen to your vertebrae
bone tapping bone in my wrists.
I'll string your fingers round my waist -
what a rigorous embrace.
Over my heart I'll wear
a brooch with a lock of hair.
Nights I'll sleep cradling
your skull sharpening
my teeth on your toothless grin.

Sundays there's Mass and communion
and I'll put your relics to rest. — Gloria E. Anzaldua

It is, I think, this glamour, this magic, this incomparable keying up of the spirit in a time of mortal conflict, which constitute the pacifist's real problem--a problem still incompletely imagined and still quite unsolved. The causes of war are always falsely represented; its honour is dishonest and its glory meretricious, but the challenge to spiritual endurance, the intense sharpening of all the senses, the vitalising consciousness of common peril for a common end, remain to allure those boys and girls who have just reached the age when love and friendship and adventure call more persistently than at any later time. The glamour may be the mere delirium of fever, which as soon as war is over dies out and shows itself for the will-o'-the-wisp that it is, but while it lasts, no emotion known to man seems as yet to have quite the compelling power of this enlarged vitality. — Vera Brittain

The mutual preference of frankness over flattery is what leads to iron sharpening iron. — Torry Martin

Night wasn't so much falling as sharpening its claws. — Jim Butcher

The natural quality of mind is clear, awake, alert, and knowing. Free from fixation. By training in being present, we come to know the nature of our mind. So the more you train in being present - being right here - the more you begin to feel like your mind is sharpening up. The mind that can come back to the present is clearer and more refreshed, and it can better weather all the ambiguities, pains, and paradoxes of life. — Pema Chodron

Bercelak's kin kept themselves busy by sharpening weapons, reading, talking, or setting things on fire with small bursts of flame. — G.A. Aiken

Concentrate on sharpening your memory and peeling your sensibility. Cut every page you write by at least one third. Stop constructing those piffling little similes of yours. Work out what it is you want to say. Then say it in the most direct and vigorous way you can. Eat meat. Drink blook. Give up your social life and don't think you can have friends. Rise in the quiet hours of the night and prick your fingertips and use the blood for ink; that will cure you of persiflage! — Hilary Mantel

Ildiko had been tempted more than a few times to cross her eyes and watch their reaction.
"Don't even think about it, wife. You'll notice half of them are sharpening or cleaning their weapons. All I need is for someone to inadvertently slice themselves open because you startled them. — Grace Draven

Patch's eyes made a slow assessment of me, sharpening to vivid black. "I'm going to have a hard time sending you off with Scott in that dress. Just a heads-up: If you come home and the dress looks even slightly tampered with, I will track Scott down, and when I find him, it won't be pretty."
"I'll relay the message."
"If you tell me where he's hiding, I'll relay it myself."
I had to work not to smile. "Something tells me your message would be a lot more direct."
"Let's just say he'd get the point. — Becca Fitzpatrick

Connor smiled sadly at me. "Go on, that's where you belong."
My fangs were already sharpening when I returned his smile. "Just don't try to pet me. — Andrea Cremer

Taking stock of this challenging new landscape, 99U's Manage Your Day-to-Day assembles insights around four key skill sets you must master to succeed: building a rock-solid daily routine, taming your tools (before they tame you), finding focus in a distracted world, and sharpening your creative mind. — Jocelyn K. Glei

Since learning causes our brains to grow new synapses, I like to believe that the road is sharpening my mind and lengthening my life with surprise. — Gloria Steinem

If there is pain, use it as an awareness, as meditation, as a sharpening of the soul. And when pleasure is there, use it as a droning, as a forgetfulness. Both are ways to reach God. One is to remember yourself totally, and one is to forget yourself totally. — Rajneesh

There is a flickering spark in us all which, if struck at just the right age ... can light the rest of our lives, elevating our ideals, deepening our tolerance, and sharpening our appetite for knowledge about the rest of the world. Educational and cultural exchanges ... provide a perfect opportunity for this precious spark to grow, making us more sensitive and wiser international citizens through our careers. — Ronald Reagan

On the other side of the curtain, children were squabbling, a baby was crying, and there was the smell of rat-and-cabbage casserole. Someone was sharpening an axe. And someone else was snoring. For a dwarf in Ankh-Morpork, solitude was something that you had to cultivate on the inside. Books — Terry Pratchett

Fire on the mountain," the granny woman said. "They up there sharpening they swords." Then she said that word again: freedom. — Terry Bisson

You enhance the beauty of your life by sharpening your awareness and deepening your consciousness. — Debasish Mridha

It's iron that can sharpen iron; wood cannot do that. — Israelmore Ayivor

Simon looked for his friend Jace, who was kneeling by himself in the overgrown grass and sharpening a short blade against a stone. Simon assumed Jace had his reasons for this; or possibly he just knew he looked cool doing it. Possibly he and Isabelle could do a joint photo shoot for Badass Monthly. — Cassandra Clare

In that moment, Lisette loved that man.
Loud complaints erupted, accomplished by the usual slurs slung at the immortal black sheep.
Bastien shrugged them off as his gaze met hers.
Thank you, she told him telepatheically.
His lips tilted up the tiniest bit.
Unfortunately, Seth and David both picked up on the thought and turned back to her with matching frowns, gazes sharpening.
Merde.
"Why haven't you been around lately?" Seth queried. — Dianne Duvall

Like a butcher sharpening knife on knife
I sharpen heart on heart inside me. — Yehuda Amichai

I talked to people in the pencil industry and I talked to people as I was sharpening their pencils about the frustrations they have with pencils, so I really did do my research and I do know more about pencils than most people. — David Rees

I thought of Al in his dream, looking nothing like this, more like an elegant bat. Broken? Perhaps, but I had put his butterfly back together with my blood. "I never liked the movie Titanic," I said, and he grunted, his gaze sharpening on me. "They both could have gotten on that damn door. — Kim Harrison