Putting You First Quotes & Sayings

Putting lifestyle first is how you find a job --- not a calling. — Paul Kalanithi

Putting on weight is easy all the way through. But after the first couple of weeks, the novelty wears off very quickly, and your body is groaning and starting to really shout at you, saying, 'Why? Why? Why? Why are you doing this?' — Christian Bale

When you do the first season, you're putting your life out there and you're kind of hesitant about it, and then by the time you get around to the second season, you don't care. It's like, "This is who I am - like it, accept it, or don't." There are so many misconceptions that now they can see who I am. — LaToya Jackson

I don't waste time putting money down, I just go straight to who got it and buy it in cash. Pussy so good that you gotta come see me on tour and you gotta fly in first class. — Drake

There are many writing courses, there's plenty of demand for them. The shortage is having something to write about, and that can't be taught in schools. There is no course in finding something to write about.
Many beginners lacked something as fundamental as experience of life. It's a postmodern misconception that you can write first and live later. But many young people want to become writers because they want to live like writers. This is putting the cart before the horse. You must live first, and then decide if you have something to say afterwards. Life itself is a determining factor. Writing is the fruit of life. Life isn't the fruit of writing. — Jostein Gaarder

[Look at] the chair you are lounging in. . . . Could you have made it for yourself? . . . How [would you] get, say, the wood? Go and fell a tree? But only after first making the tools for that, and putting together some kind of vehicle to haul the wood, and constructing a mill to do the lumber and roads to drive on from place to place? In short, a lifetime or two to make one chair! . . . If we . . . worked not forty but one-hundred-forty hours per week we couldn't make ourselves from scratch even a fraction of all the goods and services that we call our own. [Our] paycheck turns out to buy us the use of far more than we could possibly make for ourselves in the time it takes us to earn the check. . . . Work . . . yields far more in return upon our efforts than our particular jobs put in. . . . — Timothy Keller

Starting isn't like that. Starting something is not an event; it's a series of events. You decide to walk to Cleveland. So you take a first step in the right direction. That's starting. You spend the rest of the day walking toward Cleveland, one step at a time, picking your feet up and putting them down. At the end of the day, twenty miles later, you stop at a hotel. And what happens the next morning? Either you quit the project or you start again, walking to Cleveland. In fact, every step is a new beginning. Sure, you're closer than you were yesterday or last week, but you're still ... — Seth Godin

Barack Obama spent his first day as president-elect putting together his transition team. And if you believe MSNBC, by tomorrow he will have chosen all 12 of his disciples. — Jay Leno

She was walking toward the beauty shop when Shay came out the door moving fast. The first thing Jill noticed was Shay's hair and how it appeared really big. As Shay drew closer, Jill realized she looked like she was wearing a mask with big blue streaks over the eyes and giant red pouty lips. "What happened to you?" Jill asked in shock. "I'm not sure," Shay said, looking just as stunned. "One minute, I was reading a magazine, and the next, two women that looked like Dolly Parton descended on me like vultures. They started putting stuff on my face, then they did all kinds of things to my hair." Anne walked out of the shop next; her Napoleon hat 'do rode higher than ever. Ella followed with her little red hair ball reinflated. "Doesn't Shay just look beautiful?" Ella chirped. She looked like a hooker who'd just survived a wind tunnel, but Jill nodded and tried to smile. — Robin Alexander

From this day, you are no longer children. If you have to fight, even if it is a friend, put him down as fast and hard as you possibly can. Kill if you have to, or spare him - but beware putting any man in your debt. Of all things, that causes resentment. Any warrior who raises his fist to you must know he is gambling with his life and that he will lose. If you cannot win at first, take revenge if it is the last thing you do. You are traveling with men who respect only strength greater than theirs, men harder than themselves. Above everything else, they respect success. Remember it. — Conn Iggulden

Michaela began loudly putting her stuff away - in the way the women do when they want you to say, "Oh, don't put your stuff away." I wasn't going to fall for that one; they teach you that on your first day of womanizing school. — Anonymous

You'll never come second by putting God first. — Brian Houston

So give your complete attention to what you feel, and refrain from mentally labeling it. As you go into the feeling, be intensely alert. At first, it may seem like a dark and terrifying place, and when the urge to turn away from it comes, observe it but don't act on it. Keep putting your attention on the pain, keep feeling the grief, the fear, the dread, the loneliness, whatever it is. Stay alert, stay present - present with your whole Being, with every cell of your body. As you do so, you are bringing a light into this darkness. This is the flame of your consciousness. — Eckhart Tolle

The vast majority of you are going to close this tab without, even for a single moment, entertaining the thought of writing something.

Step outside your comfort zone and try something new. Learning the fine rationalist art of CoZE (comfort zone expansion) is a really important life skill, and putting your writing online is a low-risk way to do that. Don't try to cop out with "I don't have any stories." Baloney. Everyone has stories; write up a memory that's important to you. And don't even try to tell me, "Oh, but I don't know how to write!" Neither did I when I started; I learned by doing. So please, set the excuses aside, put something up on the web, and share it with the rest of us. When you do, drop me a PM; I'll leave you your first review, but you have to publish something first.

Well? What are you waiting for? Seriously. Go write one sentence of a new story, write now. — David K. Storrs

A woman has to change her nature if she is to be a wife. She has to learn to curb her tongue, to suppress her desires, to moderate her thoughts and to spend her days putting another first. She has to put him first even when she longs to serve herself or her children. She has to put him first even if she longs to judge for herself. She has to put him first even when she knows best. To be a good wife is to be a woman with a will of iron that you yourself have forged into a bridle to curb your own abilities. To be a good wife is to enslave yourself to a lesser person. To be a good wife is to amputate your own power as surely as the parents of beggars hack off their children's feet for the greater benefit of the family. — Philippa Gregory

If a person calls themself 'autistic' and you tell them they have to use 'person first language' ... you're not putting the person first. — Stuart Duncan

Your objective is to avoid being on a string.
The first step, I think, is to get over the fear of losing a man by confronting him. Just stop being afraid, already. The most successful people in this world recognize that taking chances to get what they want is much more productive than sitting around being too scared to take a shot. The same philosophy can be applied to dating: if putting your requirements on the table means you risk him walking away, it's a risk you have to take. Because that fear can trip you up every time; all too many of you let the guy get away with disrespecting you, putting in minimal effort and holding on to the commitment to you because you're afraid he's going to walk away and you'll be alone again. And we men? We recognize this and play on it, big time. — Steve Harvey

There are two types of codes, ciphers, and true codes. In the first, letters, or symbols that stand for letters, are shuffled and juggled according to a pattern. In the second, letters, words, or groups of words are replaced by other letters, symbols, or words. A code can be one type or the other, or a combination. But both have this in common: once you find the key, you just plug it in and out come logical sentences. A language, however, has its own internal logic, its own grammar, its own way of putting thoughts together with words that span various spectra of meaning. There is no key you can plug in to unlock the exact meaning. At best you can get a close approximation. — Samuel R. Delany

Put another way, if you don't educate your children for metaphysical truth and moral virtue, mainstream culture will do it for you. Absent shared commitment to these spiritual and moral verities, it is hard to see how we renew our families, our communities, and our country with an ethic of duty, self-restraint, stewardship, and putting the needs of people, not the state or corporations, first. — Rod Dreher

Do you remember," he said, "when we first met and I told you I was ninety percent sure putting a rune on you wouldn't kill you - and you slapped me in the face and told me it was for the other ten percent?" Clary nodded.
"I always figured a demon would kill me," he said. "A rogue Downworlder. A battle. But I realized then that I just might die if I didn't get to kiss you, and soon." Clary licked her dry lips. "Well, you did," she said. "Kiss me, I mean."
He reached up and took a curl of her hair between his fingers. He was close enough that she could feel the warmth of his body, smell his soap and skin and hair.
"Not enough," he said, letting her hair slip through his fingers. "If I kiss you all day every day for the rest of my life, it won't be enough. — Cassandra Clare

Being responsible is taking ownership of your life. It means you have taken the first radical step to becoming a complete human being - fully conscious and fully human. In taking responsibility and beginning the journey toward conscious living, you are putting an end to the age-old patterns of assigning blame outward or heavenward. You have begun the greatest adventure life has to offer: the voyage inward. — Sadhguru

When I was very small, I had that first-time-you-see-a-play experience, which immediately made me want to act, because it seemed like this incredible outlet for something I was already doing fairly compulsively anyway, which was putting on hats and costumes and doing funny voices. It was a very natural compulsion for me. — Edward Norton

Putting yourself first means you will never be last. — Stephen Richards

Calling him a rover is putting it nicely. Baker is a dog when it comes to women, a real libertine type. There isn't a brothel in Elsace that hasn't seen his face. You know they named the Wastrel after him? Started out as a joke after he got his first shanker, but now that he's pissing needles, it's not as funny as it used to be. — Meg Merriet

To have a young person speak back, to hand him the microphone for his first-person utterances, you'd have to have an imagined architecture, otherwise people would say you're putting words in their mouths. — Fred D'Aguiar

Let me clue you in on something. You don't have to make sense. You just have to want to be together and be willing to do whatever it takes to make that happen. It's amazingly simple. That's love, Ev, putting each other first. — Kylie Scott

When our spirit tells us it is time to weep, we should weep. It is part of the ritual, if you will, of putting sadness in perspective and gaining control of the situation ... Grief has a purpose. Grieving does not mean you are weak It is the first step toward regaining balance and strength. Grieving is part of the tempering process. — Joseph M. Marshall III

Putting first things first means organizing and executing around your most important priorities. It is living and being driven by the principles you value most, not by the agendas and forces surrounding you. — Stephen Covey

You do understand that I must find a way to return to Olympus," I said. "This will probably involve many harrowing trials with a high chance of death. Can you turn down such glory?"
"Yeah, I'm pretty sure I can. Sorry."
I pursed my lips. It always disappointed me when mortals put themselves first and failed to see the big picture - the importance of putting me first - but I had to remind myself that this young man had helped me out on many previous occasions — Rick Riordan

First of all, there is a difference between redemption and restoration. What you're talking about is restoration, putting things back as they were before. That is not what redemption is. Christ is the Redeemer because he paid the price for our sins, Joshua. In his sacrifice he took the pain of our sins upon him, he took the effects of our transgressions upon himself. — Gerald N. Lund

Putting yourself first is not selfish. Quite the opposite. You must put your happiness and health first before you can be of help to anyone else. — Simon Sinek

Somedays you have to write even when you think you're putting out crap. You just need to tell yourself that you'll fix the problems later, and by then, they might not even be "problems" anymore. The challenge of writing a novel has always been to let loose with a beautifully flawed first draft, and to constantly fight belief you're chiseling words in stone each time you type. — Christopher Rice

Imagine yourself as a living house. God comes in to rebuild that house. At first, perhaps, you can understand what He is doing. He is getting the drains right and stopping the leaks in the roof and so on; you knew that those jobs needed doing and so you are not surprised. But presently He starts knocking the house about in a way that hurts abominably and does not seem to make any sense. What on earth is He up to? The explanation is that He is building quite a different house from the one you thought of - throwing out a new wing here, putting on an extra floor there, running up towers, making courtyards. You thought you were being made into a decent little cottage: but He is building a palace. He intends to come and live in it Himself. — C.S. Lewis

When I'm writing, it's about the page. It's not about the movie. It's not about cinema. It's about the literature of me putting my pen to paper and writing a good page and making it work completely as a document unto itself. That's my first artistic contribution. If I do my job right, by the end of the script, I should be having the thought, 'You know, if I were to just publish this now and not make it ... I'm done. — Quentin Tarantino

There's a reason you probably haven't heard much about this aspect of the heartland. This kind of blight can't be easily blamed on the usual suspects like government or counterculture or high-hat urban policy. The villain that did this to my home state wasn't the Supreme Court or Lyndon Johnson, showering dollars on the poor or putting criminals back on the street. The culprit is the conservatives' beloved free-market capitalism, a system that, at its most unrestrained, has little use for smalltown merchants or the agricultural system that supported the small towns in the first place ... — Thomas Frank

The moment you have a self at all, there is a possibility of putting yourself first - wanting — C.S. Lewis

Three bricklayers were working on the same building. When asked what they were doing, the first answered grumpily, "I'm laying bricks." The second replied with a bit more vision, "I'm putting up a wall." The third bricklayer's response was different. He replied enthusiastically and with pride, "I'm building a beautiful cathedral. It will be the finest building in town, and it will be a place of peace and comfort for everyone who walks by it!" What a difference knowing why makes. When you know why you do it, even the most mundane work can become meaningful. — Christy Wright

The couple bubble is an agreement to put the relationship before anything and everything else. It means putting your partner's well-being, self-esteem and distress relief first. And it means your partner does the same for you. You both agree to do it for each other. Therefore, you say to each other, "We come first." In this way, you cement your relationship. It is like making a pact or taking a vow, or like reinforcing a vow you already took with one another. — Stan Tatkin

And it's not my place to chase around after you, fixing stuff. What I know's what I know, and it don't include putting the world back the way it out to be. It's too late for that. Way too late for heroes, champions, miracles. Don't matter what our heritage was maybe meant for - your side got hold of it first, and you won long ago. No undoing that, Esau, I ain't fool enough to think otherwise. I'm still sorry for you, but I know your side's won, this side of the grave. — Peter S. Beagle

In Maslow's pyramid of needs, Abraham Maslow demonstrates the hierarchy of human requirements, most basic at the bottom, in a diagram. If you ask me, putting people's most basic requirements in a pyramid is bloody exclusive in the first place.They're extremely difficult to build, only pharoahs are allows in them and Indiana Jones was very nearly killed trying to get the treasure out. — Russell Brand

Indeed, this is how 99 percent of people select their jobs: pay, work environment, hours. But that's the point. Putting lifestyle first is how you find a job - not a calling.) As — Paul Kalanithi

Love was actions more than words. And not just easy actions like hugs and kisses. It was hard ones, like sticking by someone in bad times, not just in good. It was working for them, even when you were tired. It was putting their needs first, even before your own. It was taking care of them when they were sick. It was forgiving them when they disappointed you. It was protecting them and teaching them. — Gayle Rosengren

One of these days, hopefully one of these days soon, you're going to realize you don't have to stay with a girl just because she was the first person you fucked. Putting your dick into Cora didn't commit you to her for the rest of your life, man ... you're allowed to move on and be with a girl you actually like. — Linda Kage

How to walk to Cleveland Shipping is an event. There's life before you ship and then there's the moment you ship. And then there's life after you ship. Starting isn't like that. Starting something is not an event; it's a series of events. You decide to walk to Cleveland. So you take a first step in the right direction. That's starting. You spend the rest of the day walking toward Cleveland, one step at a time, picking your feet up and putting them down. At the end of the day, twenty miles later, you stop at a hotel. And what happens the next morning? Either you quit the project or you start again, walking to Cleveland. In fact, every step is a new beginning. Sure, you're closer than you were yesterday or last week, but you're still heading toward Cleveland. Keep starting until you finish. — Seth Godin

Hunter held out the gun, stock first. "You want to just shoot me and save Dad the time?"
Jay smiled and took the weapon, checking the magazine before putting it back on the wall. "He's not going to shoot you."
"That would be too quick? — Brigid Kemmerer

I'm not saying that putting on makeup will change the world or even your life, but it can be a first step in learning things about yourself you may never have discovered otherwise. At worst, you could make a big mess and have a good laugh. — Kevyn Aucoin

First, no qualms. Not the thinnest sliver of misgiving about the value of his work. He was able to feel that the most important job in the world was putting over Monsoon. In the second place, he was as uninhibited as a performing seal. He never questioned his right to monopolize conversations or his ability to do it entertainingly. And then there was his colossal lack of perspective. This was one of his most valuable gifts, for perspective doesn't always pay. It can slow you down. — Budd Schulberg

Please give me a chance to make you happy. I make this promise to you in this beautiful garden you fought so hard for, that I will spend every day putting you first. — Amy Andrews

I took ethics classes in college, and it always amazes me how they [tabloids] will blatantly say something that I did not say, in quotation marks. The first thing that we learned in ethics is that you better have it right. If you're putting quotation marks around something, it better be exactly what that person said. — Carrie Underwood

Tell me she doesn't have her hand in his back pocket. That is so lame."
"I don't care," I tell her, easing any worries she might have about me being upset. "If they want to date, all the more power to them."
She's only doing it because she wants everything you had. It's a competition thing with her. First taking your position on the squad, now putting her claws into Colin. Next thing you know she'll want to change her name to Brittany."
"Very funny."
"You say that now," she says, then moves in close and whispers, "it won't be so funny if she wants Alex next."
"Now that's not funny. — Simone Elkeles

When you are born," the golem said softly, "your courage is new and clean. You are brave enough for anything: crawling off of staircases, saying your first words without fearing that someone will think you are foolish, putting strange things in your mouth. But as you get older, your courage attracts gunk, and crusty things, and dirt, and fear, and knowing how bad things can get and what pain feels like. By the time you're half-grown, your courage barely moves at all, it's so grunged up with living. So every once in awhile, you have to scrub it up and get the works going, or else you'll never be brave again. — Catherynne M Valente

The main shift, you see, is from placing self at the center of our thoughts to putting others there. It is-what do you say?-a paradox that the more we can focus our thoughts on the well-being of others, the happier we become. The first one to benefit is oneself. I call this being wisely selfish. — David Michie

Making excuses instead of putting yourself and your dreams first only leads to a life of mediocrity and regret. And you don't deserve that, nobody does. But to stop the excuses it's going to take getting hard-core and figuring out exactly what you want. So push yourself to ignore all those excuses that pop into your head, and accept the truth that you are the master of your ship, the author of your life, and that your adventure is only as awesome as you can imagine it. Once you stop talking yourself out of doing what you really want, you'll find the shiniest version of you and experience a sense of accomplishment that rivals any accolades. — Alexis Jones

That's the problem with putting others first; you've taught them you come second. — Anonymous

It's like putting on new clothes, Sam had told him. The fit feels strange at first, but once you've worn them for a while you get to feeling comfortable. — George R R Martin

She wasn't afraid of difficulties; what frightened her was being forced to choose one particular path.
Choosing a path meant having to miss out on others. She had a whole life to live and she was always thinking that, in future, she might regret the choices she made now.
'I'm afraid of committing myself,' she thought to herself. She wanted to follow all possible paths and so ended up following none.
Even in that most important area of her life, love, she had failed to commit herself. After her first romantic dissappointment, she had never again given herself entirely. She feared pain, loss and separation. These things were inevitable on the path to love, and the only way of avoiding them was by deciding not to take that path at all. In order not to suffer, you had to renounce love. It was like putting out your own eyes in order not to see the bad things in life. — Paulo Coelho

As we've seen, there are only two tasks involved - discarding and deciding where to keep things. Just two, but discarding must come first. Be sure to completely finish the first task before starting the next. Do not even think of putting your things away until you have finished the process of discarding. Failure to follow this order is one reason many people never make permanent progress. In the middle of discarding, they start thinking about where to put things. As soon as they think, "I wonder if it will fit in this drawer," the work of discarding comes to a halt. You can think about where to put things when you've finished getting rid of everything you don't need. — Marie Kondo

I was aware that we were both silently making those inevitable comparisons, putting our relationship in context. She is more this and less that. He is better or worse in these ways. It is human nature to do this
unless its your first relationship, which might be the very reason that your first relationship feels special and remains forever sacred. But the older you get, the more cynical you become, and the more complicated and convoluted the exercise is. You begin to realize that nothing is perfect, that there are trade-offs and sacrifices. The worst is when someone in your past trumps the person in the present, and you think to yourself: if I'd known this, then maybe I wouldn't have let him go. — Emily Giffin

Putting your hand into a river, you simultaneously touch the last of what is passing and the first of what is coming. — Leonardo Da Vinci

Guess it didn't go so well, huh?"

"What was your first clue?" I turned my head slightly, then went back to staring blankly out at the city street below.

"Did your really expect it to? I mean the two of you together make no sense at all. It's like putting the Easter Bunny together with a crocodile. At first everyone's all nervous and shit like 'Oh, how cute. Look how they're getting along.' And then of course the predicable happens, the rabbit's a reptile snack and all the kids are cryin' 'cause Easter ain't comin' next year. — Michelle Mankin

It's funny, the roles we play, the way we have to give up the old ones before we have room for the new ones. The first-first love stuff never goes away in here" she said, pointing to her head. "It makes you who you are. But in here," putting her hand on her chest, "time lets that grow and change. You'll see — Kristen-Paige Madonia

The key to success is letting the relationships in your life grow to the highest levels they possibly can ... not putting yourself first in life and remembering that the more you give away, the more you have. — Christopher Reeve

If you've gone along with Morgan's plan enough to get this note, then I presume you're planning to go through with it. Let me give you some friendly advice about the toys in this case. First, if you don't know what it is, don't even think about using it. Second, if you don't know how to use it properly, don't even think about using it. (Hint: You don't know how to use the crop, the flogger, or the paddle, even if you think you do.) Third make sure Morgan always has a way to signal she wants to stop, and respect the signal if she gives it. And last but not least, if you ignore my advice, I'm going to come over there personally and kick your ass! Don't think because I'm gay I can't do it. Respect and treasure the power she's putting in your hands, and don't abuse it. (Dominic) — Jenna Black

If there is a regulation that says you have to do something-whether it be putting in seat belts, catalytic converters, clean air for coal plants, clean water-the first tack that the lawyers use, among others things, and that companies use, is that it's going to drive the electricity bill up, drive the cost of cars up, drive everything up. It repeatedly has been demonstrated that once the engineers start thinking about it, it's actually far less than the original estimates. We should remember that when we hear this again, because you will hear it again. — Steven Chu

To all ladies who like offering sex to a man in the first few weeks of dating, this is what happens: Once he penetrates you, he will start seeing invisible spots on your face, which means that the honor and respect is gone! And now he would be targeting another cheap meat, and if he can buy it, then he concludes that all women are whore. If he continues to exploit women, then your name will be among the list of his thousand of whores. — Michael Bassey Johnson

THE FIRST FEW WORDS of every story are always the hardest to write. It's almost as if pulling them out, putting them on paper, commits you to seeing it all through. As if once you start, you are required to finish. And how do you finish when some things never end? — Amy Harmon

I'm going to have to start you off easy. Can't pull out the big guns on the first night. I'd just set myself up for failure on the second date."
Putting her hands on her hips, she tilted her head. "Is that what you did last night in bed? I thought you were holding out on me."
"What the hell, Ash!"
She burst out laughing.
"That is not what you are supposed to tell a man! Repeat after me: I ruined you for all men, all the while fulfilling your every fantasy. — Aly Martinez

No matter what Sandra says," he told her, "I want you to remember this." Lily stared up at him. "What?" she asked as he pulled her close. She could feel the brass buttons on his paneled shirt pressing against her bosom. Instead of answering, Caleb bent his head and kissed her, his mouth gentle at first, then fierce. She struggled for a moment before giving herself up to the hurricane of sensation his lips and tongue created within her. She couldn't breathe when he let her go; it was as though he had been her air supply. He smiled at her disgruntled expression and kissed her forehead lightly. "I'll see you at dinner, Lily-flower," he said. And then he was putting on his hat and walking away. Lily — Linda Lael Miller

Ardour in well-doing is a misleading and a treacherous thing. It cries out loudly for employment; you can't satisfy it at first; it wants more and more; it is eager to move mountains and divert the course of rivers. It isn't content till it perspires. And then, too often, when it feels the perspiration on its brow, it wearies all of a sudden and dies, without even putting itself to the trouble of saying, I've had enough of this. — Arnold Bennett

Putting love first means knowing that the universe supports you in creating the good, the holy, and the beautiful. It means knowing that you're on the earth for a purpose, and that the purpose itself will create opportunities for its accomplishment. — Marianne Williamson

When you go into the psych ward, you can't have anything with you except colored pencils. You can't have any electronics. If you have a drawstring on your pants, a belt, shoelaces, a hood, or extra-long fabric, your very clothes are ripped off your back. They search you with a metal detector like you're a criminal, doing everything short of putting their hand up your butt. Before you go through those cold, automatic, barred doors, you know your life is not your own. This is especially true during the first week, while you stare at florescent lighting and wait impatiently for your meds to kick in. I wish I had remembered the psych ward prison cell a week ago. If I had, maybe I wouldn't be wearing this hospital gown that they gave me until I can get more compliant clothes. — Jacquelyn Nicole Davis

Brain surgery is a fairly aggressive process. There's a lot to get through. There's the beautiful, delicate shaving first, which is really lovely. There's a wonderful ceremony of putting all the covers on, so only the little bit you're operating on is revealed. But once they make the incision and tear the skin back, the drill comes out. — James Nesbitt

When you're first learning how to do eyeliner, it's really hard to get both lids the same. A good tip for when you're putting it on, is to make sure your elbow is on a table. Make sure your arm's really stable. And make sure you have an eye makeup q-tip to get that really sharp line. — Becky G

I think this is the first time I've altered a book based on what you guys told me. So it's an occasion! Soon I'll be putting up polls to choose between plots, and then it's a short stop to accepting anonymous contributions and stapling them together while I sip margaritas on the deck of a Pacific cruise ship. — Max Barry

Crayfish," I said. I dumped out a tin of water. "Really?" I nodded. "Big ones?" "Not these. You can find them, though." "Can I see?" She dropped down off the bank just like a boy would, not sitting first, just putting her left hand to the ground and vaulting the three-foot drop to the first big stone in the line that led zigzag across the water. She studied the line a moment and then crossed to the Rock. I was impressed. She had no hesitation and her balance was perfect. I made room for her. There was suddenly this fine clean smell sitting next to me. Her eyes were green. She looked around. To all of us back then the Rock was something special. It sat smack in the middle of the deepest part of the brook, the water running clear and fast around it. — Jack Ketchum

Let's go back to the train station,' she said. 'Or,
rather, let's come back to this room, to the day when we sat here together for the first time
and you recognised that I existed and gave me a gift. That was your first attempt to enter my
soul, and you weren't sure whether or not you were welcome. But, as you say in your story,
human beings were
once divided and now seek the embrace that will reunite them. That is our instinct. But it is
also our reason for putting
up with all the difficulties we meet in that search.I want you to look at me, but I want you to take care
that I don't notice. Initial desire is important because it is hidden, forbidden, not permitted.
You don't know whether you are looking at your lost half or not; she doesn't know either,
but something is drawing you together, and you must believe that it is true you are each
other's other half — Paulo Coelho

I am not really sure that Diana Vreeland did Yves Saint Laurent a favor, as opposed to the world, by putting that exhibition at the Met in 1983. Because I'm sure that Saint Laurent started looking back at his own work. You see that with artists, don't you? Once they get their first retrospective, it's really hard for them to push ahead. — Suzy Menkes

When you're part of an illegal government conspiracy, your actual job description gets hazy. [...] If you're working off the books, but the books don't officially exist in the first place, have you really gone rogue, or are you just putting in unpaid overtime? — Craig Schaefer

You have to develop that peace of mind within yourself by which you can become the witness of yourself first. You should be able to witness yourself and see what are the things, which are putting you down. — Nirmala Srivastava

A lot of people never find the person God created them to be. They're too busy trying to live up to other people's expectations, or they try to create themselves in the image of a person they admire or envy. Just because we respect someone or think their life might be more exciting than ours doesn't mean God created us to be just like them. Sometimes we have to ignore the people in our lives so we can hear the voice of God ... But making a decision to put someone else first out of love isn't the same thing as putting them first out of fear. Because you're afraid they won't love you if you don't act the way they might want you to. — Nancy Mehl

If you are looking to outer, passing, mutable things for either happiness or security, you are not putting God first. — Emmet Fox

If you continually diet, you are putting your body in a quasi-famine situation. It slows your metabolism down and breaks the thermostat. Diets don't work. They don't help you understand why you're eating more than your body wanted in the first place. — Susie Orbach

We got a call from across the street that a black woman had broken into this house."
"And you were going to arrest her without even knocking on the door?"
"We had to secure her first. Um. Are you okay, ma'am?"
"Of course I am. Don't you see me?"
"Because we have her in custody. You don't have to be afraid."
"I'm not afraid of my daughter-in-law, Mrs. Theon Pinkney. She's the one who should be afraid. Four big men grabbing her and putting her in chains. What's wrong with you?"
The police stood there, slightly confused. I could see that they felt justified, even righteous, for grabbing me in Marcia's driveway. There was no question in their minds that I was a criminal and that they were on the side of the Law.
Marcia glanced at me then. We'd spent hours together but it was as if she hadn't really gotten a good look at me until seeing the tableau in her driveway. — Walter Mosley

Women right now kind of have this idea of success - putting your career first and then having kids. On one side, it's perfect and it's a great plan, but on the other side, they don't explain to you that after age 35, you start losing eggs. — Thalia

Pack is for comfort when you hurt, I thought, putting my head back down. And for the first time in a long time, maybe the first time ever, I appreciated being a part of one. — Patricia Briggs

She committed suicide by putting her extremities down the garbage disposal-first one arm and then, kind of miraculously if you think about it, the other arm. — David Foster Wallace

Perhaps defining a self begins with simply making the first choice, simply rising up and deciding what you desire, and then methodically, like writing, putting one word after the other until you have created a whole self and a whole life in the process. — Michele Rosenthal

It's a matter of choosing what is most important to you and putting that first. Once you have recognized your true purpose in life, this becomes much easier. — Clarence Clemons

Education is the ability to retrieve information at will and analyze it. But you can't have higher-level learning- you can't analyze-without retrieving information.' And you can't retrieve information without putting the information in there in the first place. The dichotomy between "learning" and "memorizing" is false, Matthews contends. You can't learn without memorizing, and if done right, you can't memorize without learning. — Joshua Foer

She clung to the ropes. "I should go back. This was a stupid idea."

"Wait until you see Savannah from up here." He clasped her other wrist, too. "Let go, Skye. I won't let you fall."

She looked up into his eyes. "Putting my life in your hands is more trust than I intended on a first date."

His lips twitched into a tentative smile. "Didn't know we were on a date. — Lisa Kessler

[Professor Kinnerton] Has the fact that we have about 97 percent of our DNA in common with chimpanzees escaped you? How can you still argue we are special and have a soul when we are so obviously animals? ... [Al Gleeson] With due respect sir, the 97 percent is precisely the problem. Are chimpanzees 97 percent of the way to splitting the atom? Are they 97 percent of the way to writing their first sonnet? Someone tittered at the back of the room. Are bonobos 97 percent of the way to putting the first bonobo on the moon? Is there an orangutan somewhere with a simian Mona Lisa 97 percent finished? — Peter Kazmaier

I was probably 15 when I started going to the studio with the older cats in my neighborhood. They heard me rap outside one time; I was just freestyling. And they invited me to the studio. It's good when you're accepted, no matter what crowd. That's the first step of believing you can do whatever you feel like putting your mind to. — Nayvadius Cash

Did you ever see a chameleon catch a fly? The chameleon gets behind the fly and remains motionless for some time, then he advances very slowly and gently, first putting forward one leg and then the other. At last, when well within reach, he darts his tongue and the fly disappears. England is the chameleon and I am that fly. — Lobengula

Love isn't a competition. It's not about coming in first or second or last. It's not about how much they love you back or making sure that they love you the most. When you truly love someone, you care more about their happiness than your own. If your mom finds someone else that she can love and who will love her back and make her happy, then I will be glad. Love isn't about coming in first place, Gemma. Love is about putting someone else first in front of yourself. — Natalie Palmer

I had a dream about you. At first you were a mannequin, and I was a fashion designer. Then, inexplicably, we switched roles and I became the mannequin. But instead of putting clothes on me, you laughed at my nakedness, and you sold me to the owner of a sex shop. — Dark Jar Tin Zoo

The girls I dream of are the gentle ones, wistful by high windows or singing sweet old songs at a piano, long hair drifting, tender as apple blossom. But a girl who goes into battle beside you and keeps your back is a different thing, a thing to make you shiver. Think of the first time you slept with someone, or the first time you fell in love: that blinding explosion that left you cracking to the fingertips with electricity, initiated and transformed. I tell you that was nothing, nothing at all, beside the power of putting your lives, simply and daily, into each other's hands. — Tana French

For podcasting: In the first 3 to 9 months, you should be honing your craft and putting out increasingly better work. "Good content is the best SEO," as Robert Scoble originally told me. You — Timothy Ferriss

If you *stop* putting off homemaking until your hope of marriage develops into a reality, and *start* to develop an interesting home right now, it seems to me two things will happen: first, you will develop into the person you could be as you surround yourself with things that express your own tastes and ideas; and second, as you relax and become interested in areas of creativity, you will develop into a more interesting person to be with. — Edith Schaeffer

Now you've got people who don't really have the skills, because technology hides it, going out and putting these crappy singles out, and because that's all there really is, people basically eat it like hamburgers. It's become very, very commercialized. Which wouldn't bother me as much if people actually had talent. When I listen to something and the first thing I notice is that it's been turned into crap, I shut it off and throw it out the window of my car. Like it's the most offensive thing to me. — Corey Taylor

In the time between when you first read a script and are offered the role and the time when you begin to shoot, I really love putting in the time and work on that and getting a solid backstory to a character and researching all that I can about what that person does for a vocation or their upbringing or where they're from. — John Hawkes