Thought About Inspirational Quotes & Sayings

The one wholly true thought one can hold about the past is that it is not here. To think about it at all is therefore to think about illusions. — Esther Hicks

Do you have a leather jacket? One for a ten-year-old boy?" I asked the man selling leather jackets and gloves in Covent Garden, London. "Yes, I have one right here!" And the man dug out a fine leather jacket that looked styled and tailored for a young boy. "I'm buying this for my son" I said to him. "I love this jacket, it's perfect, I think I will just come back for it tomorrow, though! I'll be back tomorrow, okay?" And the man reached his arms above his head, and said with a big smile upon his face "You only have one life to live! What is the difference if you do something today, or if you do it tomorrow?" I thought about the man's words. And I bought the jacket. He was right, there is no difference, really, between doing something today and doing something tomorrow, when you only have one life to live! Afterall, tomorrow may never come! All you really have is today! — C. JoyBell C.

One specific, profound moment isn't what you are supposed to spend your life looking for Ellie. Your life should include a billion different instances; ones that include all the people who matter most to you and only you."
He took a deep breath before continuing as a tear fell and slid down one of my cheeks.
"Those moments should be the ones you etch into your mind and think about - not the ones where things were bad or didn't go the way you thought they should. The only moments that matter are those that you give importance too. — C.S. Janey

My grandfather was crying. The kind of quiet that is quiet and a secret. The kind of crying that only I noticed. I thought about him going into my mom's room when she was little and hitting my mom and holding up her report card and saying that her bad grades would never happen again. And I think now that maybe he meant my older brother. Or my sister. Or me. That he would make sure that he was the one to work in a mill. I don't know if that's good or bad. I don't know if it's better to have your kids be happy and not go to college. I don't know if it's better to be close with your daughter or make sure she has a better life than you do. I just don't know. — Stephen Chbosky

The surveillance, he thought, essentially should be maintained. And, if possible, by me. I should always be watching, watching and figuring out, even if I never do anything about what I see; even if I just sit there and observe silently, not seen: that is important, that I as a watcher of all that happens should be at my place. — Philip K. Dick

Louie found the raft offered an unlikely intellectual refuge. He had never recognized how noisy the civilized world was. Here, drifting in almost total silence, with no scents other than the singed odor of the raft, no flavors on his tongue, nothing moving but the slow porcession of shark fins, every vista empty save water and sky, his time unvaried and unbroken, his mind was freed of an encumbrance that civilization had imposed on it. In his head, he could roam anywhere, and he found that his mind was quick and clear, his imagination unfettered and supple. He could stay with a thought for hours, turning it about. — Laura Hillenbrand

I was talking about time. It's so hard for me to believe in it. Some things go. Pass on. Some things just stay. I used to think it's just my rememory. You know. Some things you forget. Other things you never do. But it's not. [...] What I remember is a picture floating around out there outside my head. I mean, even if I don't think it, even if I die, the picture of what I did, or knew, or saw is still out there. [...] Someday you be walking down the road and you hear something or see something going on. So clear. And you think it's you thinking it up. A thought picture. But no. It's when you bump into a rememory that belongs to somebody else. — Toni Morrison

Thinking about - thinking about it - then think again!

- Denis J — Denis John George

A fight is going on inside me," said an old man to his son. "It is a terrible fight between two wolves. One wolf is evil. He is anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, and ego. The other wolf is good. he is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion, and faith. The same fight is going on inside you."
The son thought about it for a minute and then asked, "Which wolf will win?"
The old man replied simply, "The one you feed. — Wendy Mass

Despite not knowing if what he felt from moment to moment would pass or last forever, he entered fully into his shifting states of violent rage, self-pity, longing, heartbreak, cynicism, without losing the ability to think about what was happening to him. That took courage, I thought, living with the suffering in a mindful way, as an artifact of being, neither good nor bad. — Diane Ackerman

Why do we always begin to think about people when they die? I think we should think about people while they're still alive! That way, they can know that we're thinking about them! I always tell people when I'm thinking about them, or that I thought about them, or that I have been thinking about them and it almost always scares them away, but so what, I am practicing the art of life and if that is frightening to them then maybe they need to start living while they're still alive! — C. JoyBell C.

I've been thinking a lot about the word "everything." Whenever something horrible happens, you hear people say they "lost everything." They lost their house or their car or their stuff or whatever, and to them it feels like everything. But they have no idea what it's like to lose everything. I thought I knew, but now I realize even I haven't lost everything, because I still have that polka-dot swimsuit in my memory. I still have those ice cream nights and the scorpion that scared Marin and the Barking Bulldogs sweatshirt and the robins-egg-blue nail polish. Somehow having those things makes the other things matter less.
I'm wondering if it's even possible to lose "everything" or if you just have to keep redefining what "everything" is. — Jennifer Brown

Each day that comes is not a privilege to think about wrong people and things in a negative way and disturb not just your mind, but your heart as well! Each day is however, a great privilege to be thankful to God and mind the business of your life; how to summon all challenges, limit your mistakes and improve your staying power, and how to move your footsteps to live noble and indelible footprints! — Ernest Agyemang Yeboah

Oh, Anyone can make a quilt,' she said modestly. 'It's just scraps, from the clothes you've sewn.'
'Yes, but the talent is in joining the pieces, the way you have.'
'Look,' Om pointed, 'look at that - the poplin from our very first job.'
'You remember,' said Dina, pleased. 'And how fast you finished those first dresses. I thought I had two geniuses.'
'Hungry stomachs were driving our fingers,' chuckled Ishvar.
'Then came that yellow calico with orange strips. And what a hard time this young fellow gave me. Fighting and arguing about everything.'
'Me?Argue?Never.'
...
He steeped back, pleased with himself, as though he had elucidated an intricate theorem. 'So that's the rule to remember, the whole quilt is much more important than the square'. — Rohinton Mistry

If, at the time when the mind is praying it is distracted by any extraneous thought or worry about anything, then this prayer is not called pure. — Isaac Of Nineveh

I learned late on in life that it was the beliefs about myself that dictated how I felt, how I thought and what actions I took, and to change my life for the better I just needed to change my beliefs. — Steven Aitchison

I had thought about forgiveness more and more ... I knew it wasn't a light that could be switched on in an instant-it grew day by day, week by week, month by month-but something was changing inside me now during the hours when I sat alone and tried to calm my feelings. A seed had been sown, and I sensed that, just as I'd once faced a choice about whether to use violence on the night when I stared at the gun, I know had another choice: to remain trapped in the bitterness of the past or to find peace in the present. — Emmanuel Jal

Nini was looking at her face, so pure, so innocent, and so angelic. He was wondering about the man that she thought he was. He wanted so much to be that man. He felt like he never wanted to leave her dream. — Stevan V. Nikolic

Accept the past as the past and realize that each new day you are a new person who doesn't need to carry old baggage into the new day with you. It's amazing how many people ruin the beauty of today with the sorrows of yesterday. Yesterday doesn't exist anymore! For example, if ever I feel foolish or guilty about something I've done, I learn from it and attempt to do better the next time. Shame or guilt serves no one. Such feelings actually keep us down, often lowering the vibrations of those around us, as well. Living in the present moment is the recurring baptism of the soul, forever purifying every new day with a new you. — Alaric Hutchinson

The wine god sighed. 'Oh Hades if I know. But remember, boy, that a kind act can sometimes be as powerful as a sword. As a mortal, I was never a great fighter or athlete or poet. I only made wine. The people in my village laughed at me. They said I would never amount to anything. Look at me now. Sometimes small things can become very large indeed.' He left me alone to think about that. And as I watched Clarisse and Chris singing a stupid campfire song together, holding hands in the darkness, where they thought nobody could see them, I had to smile. — Rick Riordan

Once upon a time she had liked to dance. When she had been about the same age as the little brunette out there who kept lifting her dress up over her head. Now that was living. Just lift your dress if you wanted to get down and don't worry what anyone thought. — Erin McCarthy

You gave me a soul touch. A touch beyond physical. The most powerful of touch. I thought it was about you but I was wrong it was about me. In me. It took me a lifetime to realize it was me, not you. Thank you for showing me my soul. — Renae A. Sauter

I will never go home, I thought with a finality that made me catch my breath, and then I walked on, my mind emptying into nothing but the effort to push my body to the bald monotony of the hike. There wasn't a day on the trail when that monotony didn't ultimately win out, when the only thing to think about was whatever was the physically hardest. It was a sort of scorching cure. — Cheryl Strayed

The promise of God is that you are His son. Her offspring. Its likeness. His equal. Ah ... here is where you get hung up. You can accept "His son," "offspring," "likeness," but you recoil at being called "His equal." It is too much to accept. Too much bigness, too much wonderment-too much responsibility. For if you are God's equal, that means nothing is being done to you-and all things are created by you. There can be no more victims and no more villains-only outcomes of your thought about a thing. — Neale Donald Walsch

Any fact facing us, however difficult, even seemingly hopeless, is not so important as our attitude towards that fact. How you think about a fact may defeat you before you ever do anything about it. You may permit a fact to overwhelm you mentally before you deal with it actually. On the other hand, a confident and optimistic thought pattern can overcome or modify the fact altogether. — Norman Vincent Peale

I never thought of it like that. I always thought of you as a part of me, like my own eyes or my own hands. You don't go around thinking 'I love my eyes, I love my hands', do you? But think what it would be like to live without your eyes or your hands. To be mad, or to be blind. I can't talk about it. It's how I feel. — Elizabeth Marie Pope

Say you are at the brink of killing yourself and someone tries to talk you out of it. You've already thought about it and your life is not worth living. Someone else comes along and tries to convince you not to kill yourself. Is there someone out there that can convince you not to kill yourself? What can they possibly say to convince you that your life, the one you have firsthand knowledge of, is worth living? There is that one answer. No one! There is that other answer. Nothing! — Dew Platt

Communication is a major key to building any strong relationship, whether it is the relationship one has with oneself or with others. Sinful communication weakens yourself, weakens those you care about, and thus weakens your team. — Shay Dawkins

There was something else that [Christopher] Reeve told me privately, off camera, and it made me grin. While he was lying in the hospital, just becoming conscious with tubes connected to all parts of his body, a doctor in a white coat came in and with a Russian accent, commanded: "Turn over!"
Are you nuts? Reeve thought.
I said: 'Turn over!'" the doctor repeated.
As Reeve was about to answer "the imbecile", he realized there was something familiar about the man in the white coat. He wasn't a doctor at all. He was Reeve's old buddy from acting school at Julliard, Robin Williams. Reeve waited for a breath, and almost choked with laughter. He realized, he told me, "If I can laugh, I can live. — Barbara Walters

I had always had a little problem looking out for myself in love. I was afraid people would leave me. So I sort of clung and did everything possible to keep someone around. I didn't have a hard talk with myself about who I was keeping around. Doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure that out. I clung to people like human life preservers. I thought i'd die if someone left me. Its ironic because now I'm the one who's leaving. — Deb Caletti

Everybody has a soul." I turn to Pelly. "And that means you, too."
"I'm not so sure of that," he says. "What does it feel like?"
"Having a soul?" I look at Maxine, but she only shrugs. "I don't know," I tell Pelly. "I don't have anything to compare it to- you know, what not having a sould would feel like."
We fall into a kind of awkward silence. I don't know about the others, but I'm working on what a soul is and not coming up with a whole lot. I mean, I just always thought of it as me- what I feel like being me. But surely Pelly feels like himself, so that means he's got a soul right? But if that's not your soul, then what is?
It's weird and not something you really think about, is it? — Charles De Lint

I felt as if I were walking with destiny, and that all my past life had been but a preparation for this hour and for this trial ... I thought I knew a good deal about it all, I was sure I should not fail. — Winston S. Churchill

I had dreams, and they were not about ending up a speck. I didn't dream of becoming a star, but I thought I might have a small nonspeaking role in a grand epic, an epic with a touch of artistic credentials. I didn't dream of becoming a giant - I wasn't that delusional or arrogant - but I wanted to be more than a speck, maybe a midget. — Rabih Alameddine

About a hundred million years ago, the dinosaurs had everything their own way. They thought they knew all the answers. They thought they could hear the grass growing. Maybe they could. But according to Titsling and Boukanowski, their social life was a disgrace. They changed their sex every other month and used profane language, and at the age of three, at the very tender age of three, they would go steady in no uncertain manner and bring forth eggs as large as footballs! Without benefit of clergy or city hall. Extinction! That's what they asked for, that's what they got. — Brother Theodore

Living is about capturing the essence of things. I go through my life every day with a vial, a vial wherein can be found precious essential oils of every kind! The priceless, fragrant oils that are the essence of my experiences, my thoughts. I walk inside a different realm from everybody else, in that I am existing in the essence of things; every time there is reason to smile, I hold out my glass vial and capture that drop of oil, that essence, and then I smile. And that is why I have smiled, and so you and I may be smiling at the same time but I am smiling because of that one drop of cherished, treasured oil that I have extracted. When I write, I find no need to memorize an idea, a plot, a sequence of things: no. I must only capture the essence of a feeling or a thought and once I have inhaled that aroma, I know that I have what I need. — C. JoyBell C.

There's a school of thought today that rejects patriotism. People are made nervous by that intense allegiance to a country. They think it can only lead to war and bloodshed and that fights can be avoided if we all just compromise and get along. And, of course, compromise and getting along are great things as long as you're not sacrificing essential values. But I believe there's a line in the sand, some things that you have to be willing to stand up for, even if it means trouble. Charlie's patriotism is not blind, flag-waving jingoism: it's an intense allegiance to the American concept of liberty. He's through and through. He can talk about it and explain it. And he's shown he's willing to give everything for it. I admire him for that. — Andrew Klavan

And now the thought came to me that I lived much of my life through the pages of books as well. That perhaps I, too, was only a paper figure. A cut-out, or silhouette. Flat.
I always thought I knew the shape of my life. Of course I thought I knew about life, thought I knew all I needed - or wanted - to know. And yet, like the opening left when a burning star falls from its perch, now an unexpected hole was left in what was once a solid curtain of understanding... ( )... Sitting under the cold stars, I understood that it was death that made me recognize life, and the existence, or pherhaps the non-existence of my own beeing. — Linda Holeman

I want to write stories that are different from the ones I've written so far, Junpei thought: I want to write about people who dream and wait for the night to end, who long for the light so they can hold the ones they love. But right now I have to stay here and keep watch over this woman and this girl. I will never let anyone-not anyone-try to put them into that crazy box- not even if the sky should fall or the earth crack open with a roar. — Haruki Murakami

I never understood why you cared what those morons thought. They weren't your friends. They didn't know shit about you, so what did their opinions matter? — Bijou Hunter

The most rapid way to change a root thought, or sponsoring idea, is to reverse the thought-word-deed process. Do the deed that you want to have the new thought about. Then say the words that you want to have your new thought about. Do this often enough and you'll train the mind to think a new way. — Neale Donald Walsch

Be inspired; you have seen another day! Smile; you have another chance! Take a step; you can do it again! Move; you can't continue like this! Do something for that is all life is about! Impact makers take steps. Impact makers face challenges. Impact makers overcome challenges. Each day is a new day to have a different view of the real purpose why we live. Each day is another chance to add take a step towards a great end. Each day is another day to choose courage or fear! Each day is another moment of time to dare tactically or to do anything! When you wake up, do something! Make each day count! — Ernest Agyemang Yeboah

I thought about keeping the money," Ove whispered at long last, and took his father's hand in a firmer grip, as if he was afraid of letting go.

"I know," said his father, and squeezed his hand a little harder.

"But I knew you would hand it in, and I knew a person like Tom wouldn't," said Ove.

His father nodded. And not another word was said about it.

Had Ove been the sort of man who contemplated how and when one became the sort of man one was, he might have said this was the day he learned that right has to be right. But he wasn't one to dwell on things like that. He contented himself with remembering that on this day he'd decided to be as little unlike his father as possible. — A Man Called Ove

Tonight I saw Jesus with the eyes on my face. He looks half lion and half man. But not more like a lion and not more like a man, rather the same, I have never seen anything like the face of Jesus before, %100 one thing but %100 another thing: a lion man!" "Where did you see Him at?" "On the surface of my blanket as I lay in bed. He was suddenly drawn onto it, like a sketch, and that same moment I knew He was showing His face to me, finally." "Why do you think He did that?" "I think He thought it was about time. — C. JoyBell C.

Bryce looked like a California underwear model. Not that I'd thought about him in his underwear.
Much.
He was talking with his friend Nathan. Where Bryce had the whole tan, blond, hazel-eyed thing going on, Nathan was fair with dark hair and dark eyes. They looked like opposite sides of the same coin. A really hot, totally unreachable coin that a collector would keep in a special locked case, which normal girls like myself were not allowed to touch. — Chris Cannon

My war - and I have yet to win a decisive battle - is with the modes of thought and conditioned feelings that prevail in psychology and therefore also in the way we think and feel about our being. Of these conditions none are more tyrannical than the convictions that clamp the mind and heart into positivistic science (geneticism and computerism), economics (bottom-line capitalism), and single-minded faith (fundamentalism). — James Hillman

Here is the prime condition of success: Concentrate your energy, thought and capital exclusively upon the business in which you are engaged. Having begun on one line, resolve to fight it out on that line, to lead in it, adopt every improvement, have the best machinery, and know the most about it. — Andrew Carnegie

I'd always thought of myself as an open-minded person. I had no patience with anyone who put down other kids because of their race, religion, or sexuality. But that's just one kind of open-mindedness. There's another kind, too, the kind that's willing to see people for who they really are and admit when you were wrong about them. That's the part I still need to work on. — Kelley Armstrong

Of course, I am interested, but I would not dare to talk about them. In talking about the impact of ideas in one field on ideas in another field, one is always apt to make a fool of oneself. In these days of specialization there are too few people who have such a deep understanding of two departments of our knowledge that they do not make fools of themselves in one or the other. — Richard Feynman

To him, freedom was greater than love.
She hated that.
Because she had always thought that love was freedom. — Tessa Shaffer

Your Life is always a result of your thoughts about it-including your obviously creative thought that you seldom get what you choose. — Neale Donald Walsch

I think my Mama and Savannah must be special people in the Lord's eyes, as they have gone about doing generous and loving things without even a second thought. For me, it seems like the only thing that comes natural is aggravation and hard word — Nancy E. Turner

I pity you Juliet. You don't know what love is. You think it's Valentine's Day, and weekends in Italy. You think it's drinking champagne in some expensive restaurant and being bought stupid bloody underwear. But that's just the trimmings. The decoration. They're just gestures. Without trust, and respect, and kindness, they don't mean shit. I thought love was about caring about someone day in and day out, about being there when it's rucking amazing and still wanting to be there when it feels like crap, I thought it was about forever. — Alexandra Potter

If we actually thought about every decision we made, we'd be paralyzed ... You have to decide which decisions you're actually going to make, and then you have to let the rest of them go. — David Levithan

He loved constantly, instantly, spontaneously, without thought or words. That's what he taught me. Love is not something you think about, it is a state in which you dwell. That was his gift. — Christopher Moore

Somehow, we were passing the boundaries of language and finding clarity in shared thought, even if we were just talking about beer! — Gerry Abbey

Nothing can change the past, including thought. However, dwelling on thoughts about the past does change our experience of the Now. When we drag the past into the present, everything else that belongs to the Now is marginalized and overlooked. All we see is the past or, more accurately, our story about it. All we can ever have of the past is our story about it, and that story is very unsatisfying. Our stories about the past don't feed our soul like the Now does. And worse, any story is usually a sad tale that keeps us caught up in negative feelings, and then those feelings become our current experience of life. — Gina Lake

If everyone, every morning, thought about peace just for a few minutes instead of thinking about what to eat for breakfast we would have peace in the world. — Debasish Mridha

Don't be fooled. Charlie remembers things exactly the way he wants to remember them. I suppose we all do ... And then we spend the rest of our lives basing the way we think about our families on what we THOUGHT happened
instead of what really did. — Janette Oke

You can't think about how much you have left to do because that's just one thought, one sad thought, that'll make you bummed out all day long. Instead you've got to think about how much you've already done. — Catherine Gilbert Murdock

God is funny. He had a funny day when he made me. A funny, thoughtful, crazy day. He gave me a physique by which I would be so easily and so quickly judged, then gave me a mind by which I would so deeply magnetize, He put within me a heart with small, fast wings that I can hardly, barely handle, and then gave me a voice that hides behind everything in whispers. Oh, and also put a pen in my hand which writes me into madness! How can anyone possibly understand me? But I don't think God cared about that thought, when He made me! How ridiculously unfair! — C. JoyBell C.

I feel very strongly about putting questions; it partakes too much of the style of the day of judgement. You start a question, and it's like starting a stone. You sit quietly on the top of a hill; and away the stone goes, starting others; and presently some bland old bird (the last you would have thought of) is knocked on the head in his own back garden, and the family have to change their name. No, sir, I make it a rule of mine: the more it looks like Queer Street, the less I ask. — Robert Louis Stevenson

But I can't control my dreams. I can't even remember them. For all I know I'm having the time of my life when I sleep, but I just can't remember. So I'm forced to live in a life I have no control over. A life where I'm either numb to everything or terrified of every thought that crosses my mind. If this is all just a dream, then it sure is a disappointing one.

But I still have time to try and control my dreams. I have time to try and make my dreams a reality in this waking life as well. The one bloody thing I have is time. I've got to remember that. I still have time. And despite everything, there is something reassuring about that. — F.K. Preston

I thought maybe a day was coming when I'd stop constantly worrying about how to live. Maybe at some point I'd just start living, no questions asked. — John Corey Whaley

No matter where you are, you are just one thought away from happiness. Forget everything; just think about happiness and everything will change. — Debasish Mridha

She placed her hand on her chest and thought, 'So this is what the poets write about'. — Kamand Kojouri

Awareness is not an idea about awareness, as it is not thought at all. Awareness allows you to feel life as it's happening, as it is in perception that consciousness and all spiritual qualities are manifest. — Belsebuub

A story once went the rounds of Israel to the effect that Ben-Gurion described me as 'the only man' in his cabinet. What amused me about is that he (or whoever invented the story) thought that this was the greatest compliment that could be paid to a woman. I very much doubt that any man would have been flattered if I had said about him that he was the only woman in the government! — Golda Meir

He thought about his long life and gave thanks for all the bounty and joy that he had been given. To want more, to wish for yet more, he knew, would be petty. He sighed happily, and listened to the wind sweeping down from the mountains, to the chirping of night birds. — Khaled Hosseini

Making success deliberate means that you must make success a habit; and habits are a product of the subconscious mind. We call them habits because we can actually do them without being conscious of what we are doing. Things we end up doing without sitting down to think because we have done them so many times, thought about them so many times they are now imprinted onto our subconscious mind. If we could think about success so much, practice it so much more, then we imprint thoughts and seeds of success onto our subconscious that it becomes a habit. — Archibald Marwizi

I thought how you can never tell just by looking at them what they were thinking or what was happening In their lives. Even when you got daft people or drunk people on buses, people that went on stupid and shouted rubbish or tried to tell you all about themselves, you could never really tell about them either ... I knew if somebody looked at me, they'd know nothing about me, either. — David Almond

She now saw that she wanted a boy to do more than follow her in blind devotion. She wanted a boy to challenge her, to tell her about things she'd never thought of, to show her new points of view. — Anna Godbersen

The humans were protecting their heritage, or so they thought. Strange that Mud Men seem more concerned about the past than the present. — Eoin Colfer

You should have a little "too much personality," be a little "too focused" on your goals, be a little "too different," be a little "too confident," take "too many" chances, go after your dreams a little "too much," be a little "too strong," be a little "TOO RELENTLESS" in the PURSUIT of WHAT YOU WANT, and be a little "TOO PASSIONATE" about the LOVE you feel towards YOUR LIFE and your TEAMMATES so that YOU begin to FEEL a little "TOO ALIVE!" AYYYYYY! — Shay Dawkins

If it's not exactly like you thought it would be, you think it's a failure. What about the spectrum of colors in between. — Sara Evans