Precariously Perched Quotes & Sayings

Empathy is always perched precariously between gift and invasion ... Empathy isn't just remembering to say 'that must be really hard'
it's figuring out how to bring difficulty into the light so it can be seen at all. Empathy isn't just listening, it's asking the questions whose answers need to be listened to. Empathy requires inquiry as much as imagination ... Empathy means realizing trauma has no discreet edges.p7 — Leslie Jamison

The Element is about discovering your self, and you can't do this if you're trapped in a compulsion to conform. You can't be yourself in a swarm. — Ken Robinson

At the very least we want a witness. We can't stand the idea of our own voices falling silent finally, like a radio running down. — Margaret Atwood

I've been extremely lucky having been in the army when I was a boy of fourteen. — Norman Wisdom

There must be grounds for doubt as well as belief in order to render the choice more truly a choice, and therefore more deliberate and laden with more personal vulnerability and investment. An overwhelming preponderance of evidence on either side would make our choice as meaningless as would a loaded gun pointed at our heads. The option to believe must appear on one's personal horizon like the fruit of paradise, perched precariously between sets of demands held in dynamic tension. Fortunately, in this world, one is always provided with sufficient materials out of which to fashion a life of credible conviction or dismissive denial. We are acted upon, in other words, by appeals to our personal values, our yearnings, our fears, our appetites, and our egos. What we choose to embrace, to be responsive to, is the purest reflection of who we are and what we love. That is why faith, the choice to believe, is, in the final analysis, an action that is positively laden with moral significance. — Terryl L. Givens

That's my thing - keep filled with faith. Keep doing what you can do and I believe God will do what you can't do. — Joel Osteen

True peace can rarely be imposed from the outside; it must be born within and between communities through meetings and dialogue and then carried outward. — Jean Vanier

Hello' said a vague and dreamy voice from behind them. Harry looked up: Luna Lovegood had drifted over from the Ravenclaw table. Many people were staring at her and few people openly laughing and pointing; she had managed to procure a hat shaped like a life-size lion's head, which was perched precariously on her head.
'I'm supporting Gryffindor' said Luna, pointing unnecessarily at her hat. Look what it does ... '
She reached up and tapped the hat with her wand. It opened its mouth wide and gave an extremely realistic roar that made everyone in the vicinity jump.
'It's good, isn't it?' said Luna happily. 'I wanted to have it chewing up a serpent to represent Slytherin, you know, but there wasn't time. Anyway ... good luck, Ronald! — J.K. Rowling

I look for fun and smarts - a witty, strong sexy woman. — Josh Dallas

Unless a woman has an amorous heart, she is a dull companion. — Samuel Johnson

Life is a house of cards, balanced on a tetter-totter,
precariously perched on a roller coaster.
The only thing that should surprise us about our surprises is that we are surprised by them.
Beth Cardall's Diary — Richard Paul Evans

The scientific creation story has majesty, power and beauty. and is infused with a powerful message capable of lifting our spirits in a way that its multitudinous supernatural counterparts are incapable of matching. It teaches us that we are the products of 13.7 billion years of cosmic evolution and the mechanism by which meaning entered the universe, if only for a fleeting moment in time. Because the universe means something to me, and the fact that we are all agglomerations of quarks and electrons in a complex and fragile pattern that can perceive the beauty of the universe with visceral wonder, is, I think, a thought worth raising a glass to this Christmas. — Brian Cox

Hey, boss. Where are you?" she asked.
"I just picked up something to eat. What about professional belly dancers?"
"Um, I don't know, maybe with horseradish. — Darynda Jones

Larry sat with his arm stretched out along the top of the front seat. His shirt cuff was pulled back by his position and displayed his slim, strong wrist and the lower part of his brown arm lightly covered with fine hairs. The sun shone goldly upon them. Something in Isabel's immobility attracted my attention, and I glanced at her. She was so still that you might have thought her hypnotized. Her breath was hurried. Her eyes were fixed on the sinewy wrist with its little golden hairs and on that long, delicate, but powerful hand, and I have never seen on a human countenance such a hungry concupiscence as I saw then on hers. It was a mask of lust. I would never have believed that her beautiful features could assume an expression of such unbridled sensuality. It was animal rather than human. The beauty was stripped from her face; the look upon it made her hideous and frightening. It horribly suggested the bitch in heat and I felt rather sick. — W. Somerset Maugham

I realize that I only have words and that, from time to time, as I hold them in my arms I am less lonely. — Slavenka Drakulic

If I hadn't been President of the United States, I probably would have ended up a piano player in a bawdy house. — Harry S. Truman

People will, in a great degree, and not without reason, form their opinion of you upon that which they have of your friends; and there is a Spanish proverb which says vry justly, 'Tell me whom you live with, and I will tell you who you are.' — Lord Chesterfield

Let it be said that one of the first symptoms of psychosis is that the person feels perhaps he is becoming psychotic. It is another Chinese fingertrap. You cannot think about it without becoming part of it By thinking about madness, Horselover Fat slipped by degrees into madness. I wish I could have helped him. — Anonymous