Quotes & Sayings About Saying What You Believe

Holiness must have a philosophical and theological foundation, namely, Divine truth; otherwise it is sentimentality and emotionalism. Many would say later on, 'We want religion, but no creeds.' This is like saying we want healing, but no science of medicine; music, but no rules of music; history, but no documents. Religion is indeed a life, but it grows out of truth, not away from it. It has been said it makes no difference what you believe, it all depends on how you act. This is psychological nonsense, for a man acts out of his beliefs. Our Lord placed truth or belief in Him first; then came sanctification and good deeds. But here truth was not a vague ideal, but a Person. Truth was now lovable, because only a Person is lovable. Sanctity becomes the response the heart makes to Divine truth and its unlimited mercy to humanity. — Fulton J. Sheen

Stressing the necessity of personal holiness should not undermine in any way our confidence in justification by faith alone. The best theologians and the best theological statements have always emphasized the scandalous nature of gospel grace and the indispensable need for personal holiness. Faith and good works are both necessary. But one is the root and the other the fruit. God declares us just solely on account of the righteousness of Christ credited (imputed) to us (2 Cor. 5:21). Our innocence in God's sight is in no way grounded in works of love or acts of charity. Whereas a Catholic might answer the question "What must I do to be saved?" by saying, "Repent, believe, and live in charity,"7 the apostle Paul answers the same exact question with, "Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved, you and your household" (Acts 16:31). Getting right with God is entirely and only dependent upon faith.8 — Kevin DeYoung

I believe politicians should aim to be accurate and truthful in what they say at all times. You can be truthful and inaccurate but what you shouldn't be doing at any time is saying things that are untrue or making commitments that you have no intention of honouring. — Malcolm Turnbull

If you don't have blessings, check what you have been believing and saying. The Bible says you shall have what you believe and say. — Paul Silway

But if you've always wanted to travel, then why don't you?" I very nearly shrugged before I remembered not to. "I can't." "Why not?' "Because . . . because . . . it's just not done. How would I do it? What would I say?" He grinned. "Bon voyage - I'm off to the Continent. That seemed to work for me." "But you're a man." "Yes. Yes, I am." "You can do whatever you want. But I'm a girl - " "Yes, indeed you are!" I frowned. He was teasing me. "Forgive me. As you were saying?" "I cannot just go wherever I want whenever I please. I have to be escorted. And who would escort me abroad?" "I would." I laughed. "I would!" His protest was tinged by his own laughter. "You can't." "And why not?" "Because we aren't - " I was going to say married, but that would have been presumptuous. "Because you can't. It wouldn't be proper." "Far be it from me to know polite from improper, but I believe you just danced your first waltz properly. With your eyes open. — Siri Mitchell

Very few people want to hear the truth. Bogie was like that, my mother was like that, and I'm like that. I believe in the truth, and I believe in saying what you think. Why not? Do you have to go around whispering all the time or playing a game with people? I just don't believe in that. So I'm not the most adored person on the face of the earth. — Lauren Bacall

When someone doesn't show up, the people who wait sometimes tell stories about what might have happened and come to half believe the desertion, the abduction, the accident. Worry is a way to pretend that you have knowledge or control over what you don't
and it surprises me, even in myself, how much we prefer ugly scenarios to the pure unknown. Perhaps fantasy is what you fill up maps with rather than saying that they too contain the unknown. — Rebecca Solnit

Unfortunately, Christians can speak in the same generalities. Again, it's not that we are saying false things (not usually). We just aren't digging deep enough to see what makes the true advice true. "Give it over to God" may be wise counsel, but what does that mean? How exactly do we give something over to him? Or someone else may tell you to "believe in the promises of God." Yes, that's true, but which promises? And how do those promises help me do the right thing right now? — Kevin DeYoung

An imbecile habit has arisen in modern controversy of saying that such and such a creed can be held in one age but cannot be held in another. Some dogma, we are told, was credible in the twelfth century, but is not credible in the twentieth. You might as well say that a certain philosophy can be believed on Mondays, but cannot be believed on Tuesdays. You might as well say of a view of the cosmos that it was suitable to half-past three, but not suitable to half-past four. What a man can believe depends upon his philosophy, not upon the clock or the century. — Gilbert K. Chesterton

Because it's a fucking disaster to be creative when you know you're not Mozart or Keats. Dammit, I got tired of scratching around in my past. There's nothing in me to justify the pretension of creativity. This came before anything, before you, before Raquel, this is a matter of my own emptiness, my awareness of my own limits, maybe my sterility. Does what I'm saying to you seem awful? Now you want to come along and sell me an illusion, which I don't believe in but which does make me believe that either you're a fool or you underestimate my intelligence. Why don't you just leave me alone, so I can fill the emptiness in my own way? Let me see things for myself, learn if something can still grow in my soul, an idea, a faith, because I swear to you, Laura, my soul is more desolate than this rock landscape you see here ... why? — Carlos Fuentes

I want to believe what you're saying. It won't change anything; but at least I won't feel so weak, so incapable. — Paulo Coelho

My grandpa didn't believe in hugging and kissing, or saying I love you. His love had to do with the way he treated you. When he said, We're going here, we're going there, he was telling me about life. That was his love for me. My love for him was listening to what he said, keeping out of trouble, doing right, being fair. — Bill Cosby

When you're delivering information that you don't believe in or are lying about, you manifest the same behaviors as suspects in criminal or espionage cases who are lying to officers or agents." Wright's advice: believe in what you're saying (chapter 1). "If you don't believe what you're saying, your movements will be awkward and not natural. No amount of training - unless you're a trained espionage agent or psychopath - will allow you to break that incongruence between your words and actions. If you don't believe in the message, you cannot force your body to act as though you believe in the message. — Carmine Gallo

Five-hundred years ago people were saying in manuscripts, "Can you believe these kids today?" They were saying that same phrase everyone says now. No one can believe the youth and what they're doing and how culture is going and how it might fall apart. — Joel McHale

There are all the other times when I take a rosary, or misbaha, with thirty-three beads. God has nine-nine names, and if I go around the misbaha three times, God recycles Himself three times. It's a reminder that He shows up in our lives over and over again. He is One with many names, just as we are all One on earth. The difference is God accepts difference and diversity, while we're here trying to walk around like a fluffy holy cloud, each one claiming to know what God knows is best for us. I ask you again, in a different way, wouldn't life be boring if we all walk around like a holy fluffy cloud, saying we are God's mouth? Or perhaps we don't believe in a God, in which case, we simply call ourselves Taylor Swift? — Sadiqua Hamdan

Self persuasion was a concept much loved by evolutionary psychologists. I had written a piece about it for an Australian magazine. It was pure armchair science, and it went like this: if you lived in a group, like humans have always done, persuading others of your own needs and interests would be fundamental to your well-being. Sometimes you had to use cunning. Clearly you would be at your most convincing if you persuaded yourself first and did not even have to pretend to believe what you were saying. The kind of self-deluding individuals who tended to do this flourished, as did their genes. So it was we squabbled and scrapped, for our unique intelligence was always at the service of our special pleading and selective blindness to the weakness of our case. — Ian McEwan

I don't know why people don't paint more warthogs. Warthogs are fantastic. They have the most marvelous faces, like cracked mud with tusks. And the eyelashes! Like many otherwise hideous animals, they have truly spectacular eyelashes. But nooo, it's always the charismatic mammals, like foxes and wolves and tigers. Have you ever smelled a fox? Believe me, the warthog produces a light, airy fragrance suitable for the home or office compared to a fox. Um. What was I saying again? — Ursula Vernon

There is still one of which you never speak.'
Marco Polo bowed his head.
'Venice,' the Khan said.
Marco smiled. 'What else do you believe I have been talking to you about?'
The emperor did not turn a hair. 'And yet I have never heard you mention that name.'
And Polo said: 'Every time I describe a city I am saying something about Venice. — Italo Calvino

I don't believe that saying things because you feel they are what people want to hear is the right way to be in any part of your life. — Ben Elliot

Rigg shrugged. "I know it makes you feel better, but I think it's arrogant to believe in anything anyway."

"Is that so?"

"Yeah," Rigg said, frowning at the clouds. "No one can really know what's out there. People are too small in the grand scheme of things. Saying we know and understand the gods is like a bug saying they know and understand our airships. They don't and they can't."

Hari smiled. "Fair enough. — Ash Gray

Friends can be incredible sometimes, but have you ever had a friend that can be really annoying or really mean to you? Friends shouldn't stab you in the back. Have you ever wondered if your friend has ever said stuff about you to their other friends? It gets pretty intimidating sometimes to think about that. What I'm saying is to find your friends that are real. Don't keep the ones that are fake and are just friends with you for what you have. Be strong. Don't take no for an answer. Never back down. Stand up for what you believe in. Friends are great to have, but just be cautious. (: — Austin Mahone

All right," said Susan. "I'm not stupid. You're saying humans need ... fantasies to make life bearable."
REALLY? AS IF IT WAS SOME KIND OF PINK PILL? NO. HUMANS NEED FANTASY TO BE HUMAN. TO BE THE PLACE WHERE THE FALLING ANGEL MEETS THE RISING APE.
"Tooth fairies? Hogfathers? Little - "
YES. AS PRACTICE. YOU HAVE TO START OUT LEARNING TO BELIEVE THE LITTLE LIES.
"So we can believe the big ones?"
YES. JUSTICE. MERCY. DUTY. THAT SORT OF THING.
"They're not the same at all!"
YOU THINK SO? THEN TAKE THE UNIVERSE AND GRIND IT DOWN TO THE FINEST POWDER AND SIEVE IT THROUGH THE FINEST SIEVE AND THEN SHOW ME ONE ATOM OF JUSTICE, ONE MOLECULE OF MERCY. AND YET - Death waved a hand. AND YET YOU ACT AS IF THERE IS SOME IDEAL ORDER IN THE WORLD, AS IF THERE IS SOME ... SOME RIGHTNESS IN THE UNIVERSE BY WHICH IT MAY BE JUDGED.
"Yes, but people have got to believe that, or what's the point - "
MY POINT EXACTLY. — Terry Pratchett

The messages you received from your family or your childhood experiences may have caused you to believe that assertiveness is unacceptable or even dangerous. Practice saying the following: I have the right to be treated with respect by others. I have the right to express my feelings and opinions. I have the right to say no without feeling guilty. I have the right to ask for what I want. I have the right to make my own mistakes. I have the right to pursue happiness. — Beverly Engel

She's always saying that being a leader is making the people you love hate you a little more each day." She catches my eye. "Which is something I believe, too."
"So what happened?" I ask. "Why isn't she still in charge?"
"She made a mistake," Corinne says primly. "People who didn't like her took advantage of it."
"What kind of mistake?"
Her permanent frown gets bigger. "She saved a life. — Patrick Ness

Now here's what I'm saying: I've always believed that every other month we hear about compromisation of bank records, I think that's the CIA and the FBI. Now let me tell you why I'm saying this. I don't believe no insignificant pip-squeak is going to be able to pull this off month after month and we can't find out what's going on. — Dick Gregory

I'm sorry, Caulder, but I'm not ready for another relationship. I don't know if I ever will be ready." Saying this to him now hurt as much as a slug to her abdomen. But it had to be said.
"Then we don't have one. We're business partners first, and I'll respect your wishes. I won't stand in your way, and I won't pursue you. I'll pretend I don't want to kiss your lips." His eyes lingered on the aforementioned. "You being in the stands photographing or videotaping my every move will mean nothing to me." He laughed. "Dammit, I don't believe that myself. It is what it is, Velia. — Mary J. McCoy-Dressel

When I was very little, say five or six, I became aware of the fact that people wrote books. Before that, I thought that God wrote books. I thought a book was a manifestation of nature, like a tree. When my mother explained it, I kept after her: What are you saying? What do you mean? I couldn't believe it. It was astonishing. It was like
here's the man who makes all the trees. Then I wanted to be a writer, because, I suppose, it seemed the closest thing to being God. — Fran Lebowitz

I do not believe in the court system, at least I do not think it is especially good at finding the truth. No lawyer does. We have all seen too many mistakes, too many bad results. A jury verdict is just a guess - a well-intentioned guess, generally, but you simply cannot tell fact from fiction by taking a vote. And yet, despite all that, I do believe in the power of the ritual. I believe in the religious symbolism, the black robes, the marble-columned courthouses like Greek temples. When we hold a trial, we are saying a mass. We are praying together to do what is right and to be protected from danger, and that is worth doing whether or not our prayers are actually heard. — William Landay

I have heard, in such a way as to believe it, of your recently saying that both the army and the Government needed a dictator. Of course, it was not for this, but in spite of it, that I have given you command. Only those generals who gain successes can set up as dictators. What I now ask of you is military success and I will risk the dictatorship. — Dale Carnegie

Part of what we're trying to do is lay out what really happened. For example, I've been trying to get across that the intelligence leadership did not just keep the country in the dark. They actively misled the country on key issues. When you have someone who heads the NSA saying we don't hold data at all on US citizens, that's one of the most misleading statements I believe that's ever been made about surveillance policy. And I think that now we're starting to get that message across. — Ron Wyden

For, like desire, regret seeks not to be analysed but to be satisfied. When one begins to love, one spends one's time, not in getting to know what one's love really is, but in making it possible to meet next day. When one abandons love one seeks not to know one's grief but to offer to her who is causing it that expression of it which seems to one the most moving. One says the things which one feels the need of saying, and which the other will not understand, one speaks for oneself alone. I wrote: 'I had thought that it would not be possible. Alas, I see now that it is not so difficult.' I said also: 'I shall probably not see you again;' I said it while I continued to avoid shewing a coldness which she might think affected, and the words, as I wrote them, made me weep because I felt that they expressed not what I should have liked to believe but what was probably going to happen. — Marcel Proust

Some guys
a lot of guys
don't believe what they are seeing, especially if it gets in the way of what they eat or drink or think or believe. Me, I don't believe in God. But if I saw him, I would. I wouldn't just go around saying 'Jesus, that was a great special effect.' The definition of an asshole is a guy who doesn't believe what he's seeing. And you can quote me. — Stephen King

Our [Afghanistan] main problem is education. Over 90 percent of our population is uneducated. So what can you expect? The terrorists come from Syria, Iraq, Pakistan, saying the Quran says this, Quran says that, and the Afghans believe that because they speak Arabic, they think they know the language of Quran, and they know Islam better than us, let's follow them. So they simply follow them. — Najibullah Quraishi

Sespian opened his mouth, paused, closed it, then shook his head ruefully. "It's very easy to be drawn into what you're saying, and I catch myself wanting to nod and agree. Maybe I should take notes on your technique."
Amaranthe blushed and felt like she should stutter an apology, but she hadn't done anything to be embarrassed about, had she?
"It's her eyes", Sicarius said, startling her..
Yara glanced over her shoulder at him, apparently, surprised to hear him speak, but soon turned her attention back to the tracks. She seemed to be believe she should remain silent for the discussion.
Sespian scratched his jaw. "Yes, maybe so. They're like a doe's. Warm and earnest and ... "
"Wholesome. Sicarius's eyes glinted, and Amaranthe scowled at him. — Lindsay Buroker

Oh, you're willing to concede God's existence, but that's not what I meant. I mean believe in him the way a mother means it when she says to her son, I believe in you. She's not saying she believes that he exists
what is that worth?
she's saying she believes in his future. She trusts that he'll do all the good that is in him to do. She puts the future in his hands. That's how she believes in him. — Orson Scott Card

You have to take risks on policy. You can't be a politician, wringing your hands, worried about what the public opinion polls are saying or worried about the negative attacks. If you believe in something, go fight for it. — Scott Pelley

I do believe in the old saying 'What does not kill you makes you stronger.' Our experiences, good and bad, make us who we are. By overcoming difficulties, we gain strength and maturity. — Angelina Jolie

I just said, you know, this is a great track but this lyric, I don't believe it. It sounds like I'm trying to say something, instead of it naturally coming out of me, like I was saying something that I already knew. Anyway, I can't remember what it was. And either I threw it all out or I threw 90 percent of it out, and kept a line or two. That's happened a couple of times to me. Not too often, but a couple of times. Very aggravating when it does happen. — Paul Simon

Saying what you believe others want to hear is, of course, a form of lying. — Karl Ove Knausgard

English people are famous for never speaking out but only saying what they really feel about you behind your back. Americans believe the shortest distance between two points is a straight line. I like exploring those, er, differences in national snippiness. — Rachel Johnson

No matter what heaven you believe in, your time on this earth will end. What I'm saying is that you should listen - really listen - to the slosh of the waves and the distant call of Pacific birds. You should feel a boy's pulse against your cheek; you should fill your lungs with ocean air. While you can, I mean. You should do these things while you still can. — Emery Lord

Gnosis in Greek means knowledge, or to know. This does not refer to factual knowledge, but to an intuitive or spiritual understanding that comes from experience. The early Gnostics were mystics, people who knew that you could experience God for yourself instead of going into a church and being told what to believe. In Hebrew, to know means to experience - so, according to the Hebrews, knowing God means to experience Him. This is what most all early Hebrews and Christians were striving to do. Unfortunately, the Church got in the way of personal experience, by creating "organized religion." There's a saying which states, "Religion is for the masses, and mysticism is for the individual." If you want to be a sheep and follow along with the masses to get a generic, candy-coated version of your spirituality, then follow the teachings of the Christian fathers. If you want to explore your own individual spirituality, you must go deeply inside yourself, instead of through church doors. — Jordan Maxwell

If you believe Karma, believe that you are looked at by an eternal. What is logical in saying to be punished for something same you did it to others? — Bhavik Sarkhedi

You have to live among rich liberals to understand what they're saying. You'll never believe what they mean by 'middle class.' They mean themselves. — Joel Stein

You're missing the point. It's not that I believe in what Lee's saying; it's that I hope he's right. I really, really hope he's right, because what's the alternative? — Alexandra Bracken

The ethics of excellence are grounded in action - what you actually do, rather than what you say you believe. Talk, as the saying goes, is cheap. — Price Pritchett

I matched my heated tone with one of pure ice. "I believe I did attempt to relate to you the facts of my calls and you interrupted me with a rather magnificent display of temper much as you are doing now. If you do not have all the facts of the case perhaps you have no one but yourself to blame." Brisbane opened his mouth and shut it with a snap. His mouth remained closed but I could hear him muttering under his breath. "What are you saying?" "I am counting. To one hundred. In Cantonese. — Deanna Raybourn

I want to use songs that everybody knows or thinks they know. I want to show them a different side of it and open up that world in a more unique way. You have to believe what the words are saying and the words are as important as the melody. Unless you believe the song and have lived it, there's little sense in performing it. I never wanted to be a singer that — Bob Dylan

What else? I also believe that if someone comes up behind you on the freeway and flashes their lights to get you to move into the slow lane, they deserve whatever punishment you dole out to them. I promptly slow down and drive at the same speed as the car beside me so that I can punish Speed Racer for his impertinence.
Actually, it's not the impertinence I'm punishing him for, it's that he let other people know what he wanted.
Speed Racer, my friend, never ever let people know what you want. Because if you do, you might as well send them engraved invitations saying, Hi, this is what I want you to prevent me from ever having. — Douglas Coupland

More than once I've had discussions with persons who say things based on a misunderstanding. 'Oh you Catholics worship images.' No we don't, 'yes you do,' no we don't, 'yes you do,' no we don't! The final retort to that is: I have a doctorate in Catholic theology that I have earned the hard way - by sitting in university classrooms for twelve years. I know what we believe! You get a doctorate in Catholic theology? What do you know about it? Nothing! You don't know anything about it. You're saying things that are born of misunderstanding or ignorance. — John Corapi

He thinks you're pretty." Genevieve yawned. "Guys always think you're pretty."
"Well people think you look like me," I
responded.
"They're only being nice." Her voice was hurt as she curled closer to me.
"They aren't being nice. You're beautiful, smart, and you know who you are. You're never afraid of saying what you believe in. I never want you to forget that, Genevieve," I spoke tenderly as I watched her eyes start to sag. "I love you, Genevieve. — Ottilie Weber

The people at my label are always endorsing what I say. They say, 'You see the truth, so speak it.' They believe in me. They respect my opinion. At least I have an opinion, and I'm not trying to play it safe. I don't go around saying, 'I think everyone is great, and the world is fantastic.' Everyone has opinions. They just don't say it. — Estelle

I would give anything not to have to spend the next twenty minutes sitting across from her, because she doesn't believe in letting silence go. No, she has to fill it up with talk. I want to tell her that's what the voices in your head are for, to get you through all the silent parts. But she doesn't want to be with her thoughts unless she's saying them out loud — John Green

There are those who believe knowledge is something that is acquired - a precious ore hacked, as it were, from the grey strata of ignorance.
There are those who believe that knowledge can only be recalled, that there was some Golden Age in the distant past when everything was known and the stones fitted together so you could hardly put a knife between them, you know, and it's obvious they had flying machines, right, because of the way the earthworks can only be seen from above, yeah? and there's this museum I read about where they found a pocket calculator under the altar of this ancient temple, you know what I'm saying? but the government hushed it up ...
Mustrum Ridcully believed that knowledge could be acquired by shouting at people, and was endeavouring to do so. — Terry Pratchett

I believe that what makes the psychedelic experience so central is that it is a connection into a larger modality of organization on the planet, which is a fancy way of saying it connects you up to the mind of Nature Herself. — Terence McKenna

Religious faith is the only area of discourse where immunity through conversation is considered noble . It's the only area of our lives where someone can win points for saying, There's nothing that you can do to change my mind and I'm taking no state of the world ultimately into account in believing what I believe. There's nothing to change about the world that would cause me to revise my beliefs. — Sam Harris

The Fraud Police are the imaginary, terrifying force of 'real' grown-ups who you believe - at some subconscious level - are going to come knocking on your door in the middle of the night, saying:
We've been watching you, and we have evidence that you have NO IDEA WHAT YOU'RE DOING. You stand accused of the crime of completely winging it, you are guilty of making shit up as you go along, you do not actually deserve your job, we are taking everything away and we are TELLING EVERYBODY. — Amanda Palmer

They would have been still more amazed if they had seen what Beth did afterward. If you will believe me, she went and knocked at the study door before she gave herself time to think, and when a gruff voice called out, "come in!" she did go in, right up to Mr. Laurence, who looked quite taken aback, and held out her hand, saying, with only a small quaver in her voice, "I came to thank you, sir, for ... " But she didn't finish, for he looked so friendly that she forgot her speech and, only remembering that he had lost the little girl he loved, she put both arms round his neck and kissed him. — Louisa May Alcott

What I'm saying is, when different experiments give you the same result, it is no longer subject to your opinion. That's the good thing about science: It's true whether or not you believe in it. That's why it works. — Neil DeGrasse Tyson

My parents always told me that life is about asking questions which I didn't understand that until more recently. See the truth is like life is like a collection of questions really if you think about it. Or at least the ones we choose to acknowledge. See within those questions that we choose to acknowledge we answer them for ourselves because we have the need to and in those answers I believe that we find our own meaning, we find our own definition, we define what is we stand for, you know what I'm saying; who we are as people, as individuals, what we believe in. And that's how we celebrate our individuality. Now you would think that individuality would separate us but on the contrary the truth is we all answer pretty much the same basic questions for ourselves, they're not complicated questions you know. They're very simple, basic universal questions and that's why I wrote this song — Miguel

The saying "the business of art is different than the purpose of art" makes sense, and what are you going to do about that? You have some obligation to get the work out there, you believe in it enough that it should be out in the public, but of course it goes through a system that takes it pretty far away from the reasons you made them. — Eric Fischl

I don't care if the whole world is against you or teasing you or saying you are not gonna make it. Believe in yourself, no matter what. — Michael Jackson

As soon as the doors were closed, Amelia went to her sister with her hands raised. At first Cam thought she intended to shake her, but instead Amelia pulled Beatrix close, her shoulders trembling. She could barely breathe for laughing.
"Bea ... you did it on purpose, didn't you? ... I couldn't believe my eyes ... that blasted lizard running along the table ... "
"I had to do something," the girl explained in a muffled voice. "Leo was behaving badly - I didn't understand what he was saying, but I saw Lord Westcliff's face - "
"Oh ... oh ... " Amelia choked with giggles. "Poor Westcliff ... one moment he's def-fending the local population from Leo's tyranny, and then Spot comes s-slithering past the bread plates ... "
"Where is Spot?" Twisting away from her sister, Beatrix approached Cam, who deposited the lizard in her outstretched palms. "Thank you, Mr. Rohan. You have very quick hands."
"So I've been told." He smiled at her. — Lisa Kleypas

And it always will be this side of heaven. What I'm saying is, He's the One, the only One, you can rely on. Not yourself. Not whether you stay here now or get on back. Not any lifestyle you might choose, no matter how healthy you may believe it is. If you don't learn to trust the One who created it all, then nothing else really matters. You give that some thought." She — Kathryn Cushman

I've had the time to go through all the life phases with my parents, from being a bratty teenager, pushing them away, to saying later on, 'Oh my God, I can't believe what you did for me - thank you. I love you so much.' — Marcia Cross

If you believe that saying no will get you shot, well, what a fine way to go. — Peter Block

I'd think there are degrees of greatness," Adam said.
"I don't think so," said Samuel. "That would be like saying there is a little bigness. No. I believe when you come to that responsibility - that hugeness - you are alone to make your choice. On one side you have warmth and companionship and sweet understanding, and on the other cold, lonely greatness. There you make your choice. I'm glad I chose mediocrity, but how am I to say what reward might have come with the other? — John Steinbeck

Although, fanciful's origin circa 1627 made me still love the word, even if I'd ruined its applicability to my connection with Snarl. (I mean DASH!) Like, I could totally see Mrs. Mary Poppencock returning home to her cobblestone hut with the thatched roof in Thamesburyshire, Jolly Olde England, and saying to her husband, "Good sir Bruce, would it not be wonderful to have a roof that doesn't leak when it rains on our green shires, and stuff?" And Sir Bruce Poppencock would have been like, "I say, missus, you're very fanciful with your ideas today." To which Mrs. P. responded, "Why, Master P., you've made up a word! What year is it? I do believe it's circa 1627! Let's carve the year
we think
on a stone so no one forgets. Fanciful! Dear man, you are a genius. I'm so glad my father forced me to marry you and allow you to impregnate me every year. — Rachel Cohn

There you are. It's what I've been saying all along. You have too much latitude. And that makes you extravagant. The result is, the minute you acquire something you like, you want the next thing. But when something you like gets away, you stamp your feet in chagrin."

"When have I ever behaved that way?"

"Believe me, you have. You're behaving that way now. It's the price you pay for your latitude. And it's what gives me the keenest pleasure. It's the Karma principle, poverty taking its revenge on affluence. — Soseki Natsume

A good many times I have been present at gatherings of people who, by the standards of the traditional culture, are thought highly educated and who have with considerable gusto been expressing their incredulity of scientists. Once or twice I have been provoked and have asked the company how many of them could describe the Second Law of Thermodynamics. The response was cold: it was also negative. Yet I was asking something which is the scientific equivalent of: Have you read a work of Shakespeare's?
I now believe that if I had asked an even simpler question
such as, What do you mean by mass, or acceleration, which is the scientific equivalent of saying, Can you read?
not more than one in ten of the highly educated would have felt that I was speaking the same language. So the great edifice of modern physics goes up, and the majority of the cleverest people in the western world have about as much insight into it as their neolithic ancestors would have had. — C.P. Snow

I'm not denying that what you're going through is real. What I'm saying is that you need to decide what you believe about memories. They aren't who you are. They aren't who you have to be. Even if things like this keep happening, and they likely will, you have to decide how much you will internalize them. — Rod Dreher

The biggest and first obstacle any artist faces is not believing they can do something. You have the talent. Just believe you are capable of doing it, because you are. Writing anything, for anyone, regardless of expertise, is like crossing the Atlantic in a canoe. What you are doing is saying "I don't know how to row". Start rowing, you will get there. Just know it will take time and perseverance, but you will get there! — Aaron Denius Garcia

I believe many people feel like God is mad at them. One day I put a post on Facebook that said, 'God is not mad at you.' Within a few hours, we literally had thousands of positive responses from people saying things like, 'That is exactly what I needed to hear today.' Obviously, this is a message we need to hear. — Joyce Meyer

You know that man's story already. He's just starting to believe what Day's been saying to him for years, but he's scared as fuck. If you hurt him in any way, Day will hurt you." Johnson stopped grinning and looked back at God. "I thought Day hated him?" "Day is complex, Johnson. He's crazy about Ronowski, that's why he rides the man so hard." "I get that," Johnson responded. "All right. I don't mind doing the slow thing. We'll start with wings and a game tonight." Johnson shrugged and started inching toward his car. "Next week, maybe dinner and a movie." "Sounds good, bro." God waved and climbed in his truck. Now that he was done playing Chuck Woolery and there were no more love connections to be made. He was going home to his sweetheart. — A.E. Via

Never believe what they say; they always lie. I have a saying: Whatever they say, do the opposite, and you'll never go wrong. — Tom Upton

You're a little trickier...." Johnny Hands narrowed his eye at Ivy. "Something small like you, perhaps? Or something quick and lethal?"

Lethal? Ivy couldn't believe he was saying this. She was eleven. What did she want with a lethal weapon? — Jennifer Bell

I don't know what position you're talking about, sir. The Gnomon Society has never questioned the rotundity of the earth. Mr. Jimmerson is himself a skilled topographer."
"Excuse me, Mr. Popper, but I have it right here in Mr. Jimmerson's own words on page twenty-nine of 101 Gnomon Facts."
"No, sir. Excuse me but you don't. Please look again. Read that passage carefully and you'll see what we actually say is that the earth looks flat. We still say that. It's so flat around Brownsville as to be striking to the eye."
"But isn't that just a weasel way of saying that you really believe if to be flat?"
"Not at all. What we're saying is that the curvature of the earth is so gentle, relative to our human scale of things, that we need not bother or take it into account when going for a stroll, say, or laying out our gardens. — Charles Portis

Imagine what it would be like if you didn't know that the evening news was funded primarily by 'Big Pharma.' You would actually believe the stuff that they're saying. You might even think those are the stories that matter. — Douglas Rushkoff

Never confuse your right to say what you believe with a right to never be disagreed with and ridiculed for saying what you believe. — Ricky Gervais

What bugs me is that you believe what you're saying. What bothers me is that you don't know how you feel. What scares me is that while you're telling me stories, you actually believe that they are real. — Ani DiFranco

I don't say you're self-censoring - I'm sure you believe everything you're saying; but what I'm saying is, if you believed something different, you wouldn't be sitting where you're sitting. — Noam Chomsky

How can you tell there's anything out there?" said the man politely. "The door's closed."
"But you know there's a whole Universe out there!" cried Zarniwoop. "You can't dodge your responsibilities by saying they don't exist!"
The ruler of the Universe thought for a long while while Zarniwoop quivered with anger.
"You're very sure of your facts," he said at last. "I couldn't trust the thinking of a man who takes the Universe - if there is one - for granted."
Zarniwoop still quivered, but was silent.
"I only decide about my Universe," continued the man quietly. "My Universe is my eyes and my ears. Anything else is hearsay."
"But don't you believe in anything?"
The man shrugged and picked up his cat.
"I don't understand what you mean," he said. — Douglas Adams

I believe in clear-cut positions. I think that the most arrogant position is this apparent, multidisciplinary modesty of "what I am saying now is not unconditional, it is just a hypothesis," and so on. It really is a most arrogant position. I think that the only way to be honest and expose yourself to criticism is to state clearly and dogmatically where you are. You must take the risk and have a position. — Slavoj Zizek

If you asked me what makes the world go round, I would say self-deception. Self-deception allows us to create a consistent narrative for ourselves that we actually believe. I'm not saying that the truth doesn't matter. It does. But self-deception is how we survive. — Errol Morris

He lowered his voice. "You are a true shield-maiden; you do not turn from a scar on a man's face."I looked at him and did not lower my eyes. "My father was an ealdorman, and his brother ealdorman after him. He taught me that a scar is the badge of honour of the warrior, and this I believe."He regarded me for a long moment. "I think I am glad we did not face your father and his brother in battle," he said, "for they were of better stuff than what we have found here."In saying this, he gave my dead kinsmen much praise. I felt that praise came rarely from the Danes, and took a strange pleasure in hearing him say this. I did not speak, but he lifted his cup to me, and I again took up mine. - Sidroc the Dane to Ceridwen — Octavia Randolph

What about you? What are you going to be?" I knew immediately I shouldn't have asked. His smile faded, and he looked down at his hands in his lap. I'd about had enough of tiptoeing around his illness. "How do you expect God to heal you if you don't even believe it?" I spoke firmly to make sure my own heart got the message as well. "I believe that you, Matthew Doyle, are going to be fine someday. So when I ask you what you want to do with your life, I ask cause I know you're going to have a life! I'm tired of all this moping around waiting to die malarkey." He raised his eyebrows and pushed himself forward in the chair. "I know what you believe, Ruby. You been saying it since the day you got here. And I ain't getting any better. You're just putting me in a position of disappointing you, and I can't hardly stand that. Don't you think I want a life?" "I don't know. Do you?" "Of course I do! — Jennifer H. Westall

I'm just saying that I ... I regret that everybody else has nineteen chances, and only I am limited to a single chance for my genes to continue."
"Because you believe your genes would confer a great blessing upon the human race."
Ram thought about this for a moment, "I suppose that's what every adolescent male believes with his whole heart. — Orson Scott Card

We can quiet our minds enough to tune in to what our bodies are telling us - I believe in angels - and we need to listen to the messages being sent. They are real messages - just as real as a human saying something to you. — Zoe McLellan

Miss Dartle,' I returned, 'how shall I tell you, so that you will believe me, that I know of nothing in Steerforth different from what there was when I first came here? I can think of nothing. I firmly believe there is nothing. I hardly understand even what you mean.' As she still stood looking fixedly at me, a twitching or throbbing, from which I could not dissociate the idea of pain, came into that cruel mark; and lifted up the corner of her lip as if with scorn, or with a pity that despised its object. She put her hand upon it hurriedly - a hand so thin and delicate, that when I had seen her hold it up before the fire to shade her face, I had compared it in my thoughts to fine porcelain - and saying, in a quick, fierce, passionate way, 'I swear you to secrecy about this!' said not a word more. — Charles Dickens

On any given morning, I might not be able to list for you the facts I know about God. But I can tell you what I wish to commit myself to, what I want for the foundation of my life, how I want to see. When I stand with the faithful at Holy Comforter and declare that we believe in one God . . . I am saying, Let this be my scaffolding. Let this be the place I work, struggle, play, rest. I commit myself to this. — Lauren F. Winner

If you ask the religious person "What do you believe in?" he will tell you about one thing. But if you ask him "What do you not believe in?" he will tell you about many, many things! And if you ask an atheist "What do you believe in?" he will say "Nothing." The only difference between an atheist and a religious person, is one thing. If one thing isn't there, there would be no difference at all! When I say I am losing my religion, I am not saying that I'm losing my belief; but I am saying that I'm losing my disbeliefs. — C. JoyBell C.

I look back at things I said when I was younger - it was bulls - t. You do what you have to do to go where you have to go, but I look back and I don't believe what that guy was saying. — Nikki Sixx

It's my responsibility to communicate to you what I'm feeling and what's too much, and it's your responsibility to be receptive to that communication. I don't necessarily believe the best way for that to happen is me saying 'banoffee pie. — Alexis Hall

F you expect to be successful, you will eventually be successful. If you expect to be happy and popular, you will be happy and popular. If you expect to be healthy and prosperous, that is what will happen ... Always think and talk positively about the future. Start every morning by saying: 'I believe something wonderful is going to happen to me today.' Then, throughout the day, expect the best. — Brian Tracy

Forget what you might have heard. There are no separate corps of angels for agnostics, atheists, Catholics, Protestants, Jews, Muslims, Mormons, Buddhists, Unitarians, Hindus, Druids, Shintoists, Wiccans, and so on. To put a spin on the old saying, it's okay if you don't believe in angels.
We believe in you. — Cynthia Leitich Smith

You know, the primary process itself is very confusing. But in the end, I guess I believe what Winston Churchill said, which is that democracy is the worst form of government except for all the others. And that phrase of his, which I always have previously thought to be kind of acute, more recently I've thought of it in this way, to say well, you know what, he's also saying it's the worst form of government - except for all of the others. — Geoffrey Cowan

It was easy to find things she would like. Our taste was the same, it had been from the first. It would be impossible to live with someone otherwise. I've always thought it was the most important single thing, though people may not realize it. Perhaps it's transmitted to them in the way someone dresses or, for that matter, undresses, but taste is a thing no one is born with, it's learned, and at a certain point it can't be altered. We sometimes talked about that, what could and couldn't be altered. People were always saying something had completely changed them, some experience or book or man, but if you knew how they had been before, nothing much really had changed. When you found someone who was tremendously appealing but not quite perfect, you might believe you could change them after marriage, not everything, just a few things, but in truth the most you could expect was to change perhaps one thing and even that would eventually go back to what it had been. — James Salter

When you're the first person whose beliefs are different from what everyone else believes, you're basically saying, "I'm right, and everyone else is wrong." That's a very unpleasant position to be in. It's at once exhilarating and at the same time an invitation to be attacked. — Larry Ellison

Freeman denied the claim that he was a "man of God", saying that "the question of faith is whatever you actually believe is. We take a lot of what we're talking about in science on faith; we posit a theory, and until it's dis-proven we have faith that it's true. If the mathematics work out, then it's true, until it's proven to be untrue. — Morgan Freeman

My father has the irritating habit of saying the same thing whenever something bad happens. "This, too, shall pass," he says. What annoys me is that he's always right about it. What annoys me even more is that he always reminds me later when it does pass, as a smug "I told you so."

He doesn't say it to me anymore because Mom told him it was trite. Maybe it is, but I find that I say it to myself now. No matter how bad I'm feeling, I make myself say it, even if I'm not ready to believe it. This, too, shall pass. It's amazing how little things like that can make a big difference. — Neal Shusterman