Put Your Foot Down Quotes & Sayings

Once you have lifted your foot, do not be in a hurry to put it down again: who can tell what menacing nest of vipers you might step on. — Amos Oz

When he had joined the Freemasons he had experienced the feeling of one who confidently steps onto the smooth surface of a bog. When he put his foot down it sank in. To make quite sure of the firmness of the ground, he put his other foot down and sank deeper still, became stuck in it, and involuntarily waded knee-deep in the bog. — Leo Tolstoy

When I was growing up, my mother only put her foot down once: She said, 'You are going to college.' And that was a lifesaving moment. But she never talked to me about my clothes or hair. So I learned how to parent my kids through her. — Jada Pinkett Smith

Every persisting marriage is based on fear', said Peregrine. 'Fear is fundamental, you dig down in human nature and what's at the bottom? Mean spiteful cruel self-regarding fear, whether it makes you to put the foot in it or whether it makes you to cower ... — Iris Murdoch

As a teenager, I developed a great interest in not only horse breeding but also horse racing and used to bet based on red-hot tips. I realized that becoming a bookmaker would be very lucrative, but Dad put his foot down, saying it was an inappropriate career. — Cyrus S. Poonawalla

Sheez, Dancer," she breathed, "you do not pick your enemies wisely, do you?" "What can I say? Sometimes you have to put your foot down. Sometimes you have to put it up their asses." She — Sherrilyn Kenyon

I believe the defining moment was when certain persons, who shall remain nameless, objected to my fuchsia silk striped waistcoat. I loved that waistcoat. I put my foot down, right then and there; I do not mind telling you!" To punctuate his deeply offended feelings, he stamped one silver-and-pearl-decorated high heel firmly. "No one tells me what I can and cannot wear!" He snapped up a lace fan from where it lay on a hall table and fanned himself vigorously with it for emphasis. — Gail Carriger

I love men who know when to put their foot down and when not to. — Leah Remini

She reached for the milk and honey soap, then poured it into the puff, but when she started washing him with it, he chuckled.
"Uh, sweetheart?"
"Hmm?" Candice mumbled as she stared at some interesting spot on his arm.
"Real men don't use puffs," he said, amused and turned on by having Candice's undivided attention.
She finally managed to drag her gaze away from his forearm and stared at him as if he'd lost his mind. "You can't be serious?" When he only shrugged, she rolled her eyes. "What does it matter what I use, so long as you're clean?"
"It matters, believe me." Blade knew he sounded absurd but he couldn't help it. It was bad enough he'd let her put bandages on a few measly cuts; if word got out he'd let her use a peach-colored puff and milk-and-honey bath soap he'd never hear the end of it.
A man had to put his foot down somewhere. — Anne Rainey

These three children own the summer. They know the wood as surely as they know the microlandscapes of their own grazed knees;put them down blindfolded in any dell or clearing and they could find their way out without putting a foot wrong. — Tana French

We just need to put our foot down. This is a good time for us to bring this to a place of fairness, and girls need to know that being a feminist is a good thing. It doesn't mean that you hate men. It means equal rights. If you're doing the same job, you should be compensated and treated in the same way. — Charlize Theron

My dear Princess, if you could creep unseen about your City, peeping at will through the curtain-shielded windows, you would come to think that all the world was little else than a big nursery full of crying children with none to comfort them. The doll is broken: no longer it sweetly sqeaks in answer to our pressure, "I love you, kiss me." The drum lies silent with the drumstick inside, no longer do we make a brave noise in the nursery. The box of tea-things we have clumsily put out foot upon; there will be no more merry parties around the three-legged stool. The tin trumpet will not play the note we want to sound; the wooden bricks keep falling down; the toy has exploded and burnt our fingers. Never mind, little man, little woman, we will try and mend things to-morrow — Jerome K. Jerome

I'm a human being, just like everybody else. I'm up some days and down others. Some days, I just refuse comment. If I'm feeling a little down, I won't say anything. But if I'm really up, I'll let it all hang out. I do have a slight propensity to put my foot in my mouth. — Ted Turner

I believe in the basics: attention to, and perfection of, tiny details that might be commonly overlooked. They may seem trivial, perhaps even laughable to those who don't understand, but they aren't. They are fundamental to your progress in basketball, business, and life. They are the difference between champions and near champions.
For example, at the first squad meeting each season, held two weeks before our first actual practice, I personally demonstrated how I wanted players to put on their socks each and every time: Carefully roll the socks down over the toes, ball of the foot, arch and around the heel, then pull the sock up snug so there will be no wrinkles of any kind. — John Wooden

The plain rule is, to do nothing in the dark, to be party to nothing under-handed or mysterious, and never to put his foot down where he cannot see ground. — Charles Dickens

August 1
The harvest season has finally arrived. Today marks its opening. Our next stop on the wheel of the year will be the autumn equinox. I've always seen the opening of the harvest as a kind of stairway we walk down to reach the dark and magickal part of the year where all the good things await. The cool, comforting energy that feels more like home than any place can. Today is the landing at the top of the stairs. All we have to do is put one foot before the other, and before you know it, we'll be watching The Great Pumpkin again. — Damien Echols

I had a burning desire in me to win and started to get him on the back foot. I was looking for that one special shot when I put him down with the famous Horsley Muckspreader right hand ... an unstoppable force. Incredibly, he got up and took the count and the ref waved us to continue. — Stephen Richards

Hippocrates cured many illnesses - and then fell ill and
died. The Chaldaeans predicted the deaths of many others; in
due course their own hour arrived. Alexander, Pompey,
Caesar - who utterly destroyed so many cities, cut down so
many thousand foot and horse in battle - they too departedthis life. Heraclitus often told us the world would end in fire.
But it was moisture that carried him off; he died smeared
with cowshit. Democritus was killed by ordinary vermin,
Socrates by the human kind.
And?
You boarded, you set sail, you've made the passage. Time
to disembark. If it's for another life, well, there's nowhere
without gods on that side either. If to nothingness, then you no
longer have to put up with pain and pleasure, or go on
dancing attendance on this battered crate, your body - so
much inferior to that which serves it.
One is mind and spirit, the other earth and garbage. — Marcus Aurelius

No, you're not going with him."
I crossed my arms. "Who decided that?"
He put on his "I'm alpha and I'm putting my foot down" expression. "I decided. — Ilona Andrews

As I do not live in an age when rustling black skirts billow about me, and I do not carry an ebony stick to strike the floor in sharp rebuke, as this is denied me, I rap out a sentence in my note book and feel better. If a grandmother wants to put her foot down, the only safe place to do it these days is in a note book. — Florida Scott-Maxwell

Music is a male-dominated field. Women are not always taken as seriously as we should be, so sometimes we have to put our foot down. — Missy Elliot

If you don't have a leg to stand on, you can't put your foot down. — Robert Altman

My mother and I looked at each other then, full in the face, more frankly than we'd done since I was small. I realized with a jolt that I was taller than she was by at least half a foot. When on earth had that happened? The realization made me want to sit down on the stairs and cry. It seemed to signify something terrible about the world: something that couldn't - or mustn't- be put into words. And I could see, looking down into her startled, anxious face, that my mother felt exactly the same way. — John Wray

Maybe she's got a Facebook page, like every other kid in America. We could put something on her wall."
Her eyes lit up very briefly before she slumped. "No, she's far too paranoid for that."
"I was joking."
"Yes, but you know how kids are about Facebook."
"But she's hiding from an eight-foot-tall sociopathic werewolf wizard who can call down lightning bolts."
"We're also talking about Facebook."
Tristan contemplated her. "I think I need to feed you. Your blood sugar must be getting low. — Angela Knight

I could run 200 yards at a stretch, I could duck between players, I felt free to make plays that suited me best. It wasn't like football then and basketball today, where coaches tell you what foot to put down. — Jim Brown

You have a point," he conceded. "Shall I put my foot down? How about I issue an ultimatum? Its Dandy or me. What would you say to that, Miss Jayne?"
Her honey-brown eyebrows lifted, "I would probably choose Dandy just to spite you. — Kady Cross

I can play a cat lady. I can't put my foot down and refuse to play anything but playing the perfect, well-adjusted woman, because those people aren't as fun or funny. — Sarah Baker

I'm careful with my heart. I don't take crap from no one these days. I put my foot down. Being a woman, you deserve heaven and earth. — Kelly Rowland

My sign is Leo. A Leo has to walk with pride. When he takes a step, he has to put his foot down. You walk into a room and you want people to know your presence, without you doing anything. — Wesley Snipes

You're just going to leave me here?" I shout after her.
"I'm not leaving you here, Emma. You're keeping yourself here." She leaves me with those crazy words, and then she's gone.
I am paralyzed on the beach in my school clothes. I can't help but feel that I'm in huge trouble. But why should I? She was babysitting me, not the other way around, right? It's not like I can chase her down and follow her. Her fins have already gone a distance I can't cover with my puny human legs. Besides, these are my favorite jeans; the salt water would be unforgiving.
Except ... There is that shiny new jet ski sitting there. I could close the distance between us, put my foot in the water, and find her. She would sense me, come back to see why I was in the water. Wouldn't she? Of course she would. Then I could talk her into staying here, not leaving me alone to drive myself crazy. I could manipulate her into feeling sorry for me.
Unless she's the complete sociopath I think she is. — Anna Banks

The first time I saw adult chimpanzees in these five-by-five foot cages ... tears began to trickle down under my mask, and [JoJo, a chimp,] just reached out this gentle finger and wiped them away ... And then the veterinarian came. He knelt down beside me and put his arm around me. He said, I have to face this every day. — Jane Goodall

She (my ex-wife) wanted me to stop being Evel Knievel. I am who I am. I'm not going to change. I'll settle down the day they put me in a six-foot pine box. — Evel Knievel

Never put a foot down in the middle of a foot rub. — Craig Benzine

When I first seed Cholly, I want you to know it was like all the bits of color from that time down home when all us chil'ren went berry picking after a funeral and I put some in the pocket of my Sunday dress, and they mashed up and stained my hips. My whole dress was messed with purple, and it never did wash out. Not the dress nor me. I could feel that purple deep inside me. And that lemonade Mama used to make when Pap came in out the fields. It be cool and yellowish, with seeds floating near the bottom. And that streak of green them june bugs made on the trees the night we left from down home. All of them colors was in me. Just sitting there. So when Cholly come up and tickled my foot, it was like them berries, that lemonade, them streaks of green the june bugs made, all come together. Cholly was thin then, with real light eyes. He used to whistle, and when I heerd him, shivers come on my skin. — Toni Morrison

Even though Liz might have been at the bottom of our class in P&E, she is the best person I've ever seen at getting me out of bed, which is saying something, considering the woman who raised me. Macey was asleep in her headphones, so Liz felt free to yell, "We're doing this for you!" as she pulled on my left leg and Bex went in search of breakfast. Liz put her foot against the mattress for leverage as she tugged. "Come on, Cam. GET. UP. " "No!" I said, burrowing deeper into the covers. "Five more minutes. " Then she grabbed my hair, which is totally a low blow, since everyone knows I'm tender-headed. "He's a honeypot. " "He'll still be one in an hour, " I pleaded. Then Liz dropped down beside me. She leaned close. She whispered, "Tell Suzie she's a lucky cat. " I threw the covers aside. "I'm up! — Ally Carter

The time has come for someone to put his foot down, and that foot is me. — John Vernon

Whitney eyed him, wary of a wolfdog sneak attack. Please.
Recently, I'd been working on Coop's begging. Kit had put his foot down - no four-leggers tableside during meals. No exceptions.
Coop obeyed me most of the time. When it suited him.
I didn't mind if Coop ruffled Whitney's feathers - she was a self-important, dog-hating whiner. But it put Kit in a tight spot. Best not to make waves.
Another accommodation for the bimbo. — Kathy Reichs

But I made an issue of the precise wording of the vows. I wanted liberalized ones, with no outmoded Pauline nonsense exacting from the bride the promise to 'obey' the groom. Here I put my foot down, rather in the manner of a husband determined to show at the outset who was boss. 'I'll have no obedience around here!' I said, banging the table. 'Is that clear?'
'Is it an order?'
'Yes. — Peter De Vries

For somewhere," said Poirot to himself, indulging in an absolute riot of mixed metaphors, "there is in the hay a needle, and among the sleeping dogs there is one on whom I shall put my foot, and by shooting the arrows into the air, one will come down and hit a glass house! — Agatha Christie

You see things vacationing on a motorcycle in a way that is completely different from any other. In a car you're always in a compartment, and because you're used to it you don't realize that through that car window everything you see is just more TV. You're a passive observer and it is all moving by you boringly in a frame. On a cycle the frame is gone. You're completely in contact with it all. You're in the scene, not just watching it anymore, and the sense of presence is overwhelming. That concrete whizzing by five inches below your foot is the real thing, the same stuff you walk on, it's right there, so blurred you can't focus on it, yet you can put your foot down and touch it anytime, and the whole thing, the whole experience, is never removed from immediate consciousness. — Robert M. Pirsig

There's all these people involved, and it becomes this huge machine - it stops being just me making my own little songs for myself, or for the world. And it's hard to stop the machine. If you want to take time to write a record, they're like, "OK, tour through March, April, and June, then you can take a few weeks off to record in July before getting back on the road for the European festival circuit." After a while, I had to put my foot down. — Zachary Cole Smith

After 'Freaks and Geeks,' I dealt with several producers who wanted to cover up all my beauty marks, every single mole on my body. They tried to cover them on my first two episodes of 'Dawson's Creek,' and it just looked ridiculous, so I had to put my foot down. But it's not something I'm insecure about. — Busy Philipps

Sometimes we have to put our foot down, ... but before we deliberately make children unhappy in order to get them to get into the car, or to do their homework or whatever, we need to weigh whether what we're doing to make it happen is worth the possible strain on our relationship with them. — Alfie Kohn

I think this industry can be tough on everyone. You have to surround yourself with supportive people and know when to put your foot down and do what's best for you and your family. The first few years in the music industry can be a steep learning curve, and I've definitely developed a thicker skin! — Rebecca Ferguson

I'm a really good driver. I've been driving since I was very small, and I do like driving fast. I remember the first time my dad taught me that when you go into a corner you change down then put your foot right down on the way out. I'm very competitive about driving. — Jennifer Saunders

I raised my foot and deliberately stomped on the bridge. This is my foot. I put it down. Deal with it. — Ilona Andrews

I jumped up from the bed and paced the small space in front of Romeo. He was absolutely nuts.
"Why the hell would you do that?" I asked.
Then I stubbed my toe on the edge of my desk.
"Ow!" I hissed and doubled over while bouncing around on one foot.
"You're like a one-woman show," Romeo remarked from behind me. His voice was clearly amused.
"I need my glasses," I muttered, hopping around and reaching for them somewhere near my bed. I knocked something over and it fell to the floor.
"Whoa there, graceful," Romeo said and scooped me up in his arms.
I let out a little squeak in surprise. "Put me down."
"No," he said mildly. "You are a danger to yourself."
I made a hmph sound and he snickered.
- Rimmel & Romeo — Cambria Hebert

Human life is a passage - it's simply a crossing to somewhere else. Most people stay on the highway, but some choose to go off-road.

Don't ever be afraid to drive off the road and into the grass. You never know what you might find there. And don't regret your choices. We all make mistakes, and sometimes they'll be huge ones. But don't despair. In the long run you'll travel so far down the road that you won't be able to see those mistakes behind you. Just put one foot in front of the other, and you'll do just fine. — Marie Simas

My two young producers, Fernando Perdomo and Chris Price, had to explain to me that there's a division right now between the two sides. They took three living, breathing percussionists to do the beats on the song "Intensity". We've got all kinds of layers, because I kept saying we didn't get all the beats. If you hear a synth, it's because I put my foot down. But I had to fight for it because they wanted it all totally organic. — Linda Perhacs

Stay down if you know what's good for you." Colin said. He put his foot on the man's neck and applied a little weight.
The man coughed into the dirt. "Who...who are you?"
Who am I?" Colin replied. He had been waiting for this moment. "I'm the the one bogeyman is afraid of. I'm the new face of justice. I'm your worst nightmare."
He crouched down, leaning closer to the man. "You'd better warn the rest of your low-life friends that there's a new hero in town. You and your kind wont be tolerated any longer."
Colin stood up and folded his arms. He wished there was a breeze that would make his cape fly a little. "Who am I? I am Titan."
And that was when one of the other muggers hit Colin across the back of his head with a plank of wood. — Michael Carroll

Put your foot down, Fred! yelled Ron, and the car shot suddenly toward the moon. — J.K. Rowling

I enjoy dating. I love first dates. I think they're incredibly fascinating studies in human psychology. When you sit down across from someone on a first date and things are going alright, you talk objectives. We want to win each other over, so how do you win someone over? You have to put the best foot forward. — Chris Pine

Negotiating small differences is part of being a grownup; no one can tell you in advance where to put your foot down. — Susan Neiman

Howie rose and smiled down at her. "I just eat what's put before me without being picky. I know everything you make will make my tastebuds bless the day you set foot in Morgan's Crossing" he drawled, waiting to see the adorable look of confusion that crossed her face when he flirted.
Bertha lowered her gaze and looked up at him through her eyelashes.
"Only your tastebuds? — Debra Holland

Become very clear about your intentions and desires, know that you deserve them, and then firmly put your foot down to the universe commanding these changes (while simultaneously surrendering control over how this will occur). All the doors will open for you as a result! — Doreen Virtue

I often say songwriting is like trying to climb down a ladder at night. You put your foot on the next rung and test it out and make sure it holds and then you reach for the next one. — Crowder

They kept on hollering, and I simply had to put my foot down. I said, 'I'm the governor and I say the ignorant in this state have to learn, blacks as well as whites.' And they learned. — Huey Long

It was then that I began to understand that everything in the room had stopped, like the watch and the clock, a long time ago. I noticed that Miss Havisham put down the jewel exactly on the spot from which she had taken it up. As Estella dealt the cards, I glanced at the dressing-table again, and saw that the shoe upon it, once white, now yellow, had never been worn. I glanced down at the foot from which the shoe was absent, and saw that the silk stocking on it, once white, now yellow, had been trodden ragged. Without this arrest if everything, this standing still of all the pale decayed objects, not even the withered bridal dress on the collapsed form could not have looked so like grave-clothes, or the long veil so like a shroud. — Charles Dickens

Some ex-lovers you see from time to time, and it's great to run into them; and some you'd like to run into, but they seem to avoid the stretch of road you're on when you put your foot down... — Bronwyn Angela White

Black people comprehend the South. We understand its weight. It has rested on our backs ... I knew that my heart would break if ever I put my foot down on that soil, moist, still, with old hurts. I had to face the fear/loathing at its source or it would consume me whole. — Maya Angelou

Then Mom got very upset and tried to get out of bed to see where they were going, but the farting nurse put her very big arms on Mom to keep her down in the bed. They were practically fighting, because Mom was hysterical and the farting nurse was yelling at her to stay calm, and then they both started screaming for the doctor. But guess what? He had fainted! Right on the floor! So when the farting nurse saw that he had fainted, she started pushing him with her foot to get him to wake up, yelling at — R.J. Palacio

true. Put your foot down and demand it! — Doreen Virtue

Nothing is ever solved, or created, by standing still. Movement is the process of the Universe. So move. Do something. Anything. But do not stand still. Do not fence sit. Put your foot down on one side or the other, swing the opposite leg over and start walking. You'll know before you take ten steps if you're going in the right direction. — Neale Donald Walsch

Not a week after Annie put her foot in Mrs. Huffmaster's duff, the Captain upped and laid down the date. — James McBride

I think that the board is a lot more intuitive than people assume. You get on it and all you have to do is put one foot on the tail and one foot on the nose and rock it up and down and that will get you into the tricks or wheelies or manuals. It's not about the balance so much as it is about the timing. — Tony Hawk

It was a dark and clouded night, but the tracks led to the lake like a broad path. Sylvie walked in front of me. We stepped on every other tie, although that made our stride uncomfortably long, because stepping on every tie made it uncomfortably short. But it was easy enough. I followed after Sylvie with slow, long, dancer's steps, and above us the stars, dim as dust in their Babylonian multitudes, pulled through the dark along the whorls of an enormous vortex
for that is what it is, I have seen it in pictures
were invisible, and the moon was long down. I could barely see Sylvie. I could barely see where I put my feet. Perhaps it was only the certainty that she was in front of me, and that I need only put my foot directly before me, that made me think I saw anything at all. — Marilynne Robinson

...one of those people who, if you say 'don't look now', would immediately swivel his head like an owl on a turntable. These are the same people who, when you point out, say, an unusual crocus just beside them, turn round aimlessly and put their foot down with a sad little squashy noise. If they were lost in a trackless desert you could find them by putting down, somewhere on the sand, something small and fragile like a valuable old mug that had been in your family for generations, and then hurrying back as soon as you heard the crash. — Terry Pratchett

The stuff of nightmare is their plain bread. They butter it with pain. They set their clocks by deathwatch beetles, and thrive the centuries. They were the men with the leather-ribbon whips who sweated up the Pyramids seasoning it with other people's salt and other people's cracked hearts. They coursed Europe on the White Horses of the Plague. They whispered to Caesar that he was mortal, then sold daggers at half-price in the grand March sale. Some must have been lazing clowns, foot props for emperors, princes, and epileptic popes. Then out on the road, Gypsies in time, their populations grew as the world grew, spread, and there was more delicious variety of pain to thrive on. The train put wheels under them and here they run down the log road out of the Gothic and baroque; look at their wagons and coaches, the carving like medieval shrines, all of it stuff once drawn by horses, mules, or, maybe, men. — Ray Bradbury

plunge ahead, put one foot in front of the other, straighten your back and your shoulders and everything else that is likely to slump, buck up and go forward, and in this way, every obstacle, be it physical or only imaged, falls face down in obeisance and in absolute defeat... — Jamaica Kincaid