Quotes & Sayings About Toolbox

Stories are like relics, part of an undiscovered preexisting world. The writer's job is to use the tools in his or her toolbox to get as much of each one out of the ground intact as possible. — Stephen King

I want to use every tool in the toolbox that's at our disposal to help our economy and put people back to work. — Kay Hagan

I believe that Streamline should be part of our toolbox of things that we use at the border. And there needs to be a variety of things that we use at the border to get the most effective enforcement strategy. And so really it's a resource issue more than anything else. — Janet Napolitano

I would never make up a character who didn't exist or an event that didn't transpire. If you're a real writer, you have other tools in your toolbox to build drama. — Koren Zailckas

In all the years i had blundered along in search of my own footing, she had never given me an inkling of this wish. unburdened by the demands of history or anyone else's dreams, i had wandered toward and finally reached a world far outside the plains i loved and loathed. my mother had neither begrudged me this journey nor expected it, certain that i had to make my own way. but she packed my toolbox with her great wit and forbearance before i went, and she stashed there, for long safekeeping, her desire. — Gail Caldwell

Because I didn't go to drama school, I didn't start in the business with any toolbox apart from enthusiasm and instinct. I'd throw everything at a part and sometimes realise that I had hit my limits. — Hattie Morahan

Woman and children behind the lines!' he yelled, and all the girls jumped. Henry froze with his mouth open. 'Bang the drum slowly and ask not for whom the bell's ringing, for the answer's unfriendly!' He threw a fist in the air. 'Two years have my black ships sat before Troy, and today its gate shall open before the strength of my arm.' Dotty was laughing from the kitchen. Frank looked at his nephew. 'Henry, we play baseball tomorrow. Today we sack cities. Dots! Fetch me my tools! Down with the French! Once more into the breach, and fill the wall with our coward dead! Half a league! Half a league! Hey, batter, batter!'
Frank brought his fist down onto the table, spilling Anastasia's milk, and then he struck a pose with both arms above his head and his chin on his chest. The girls cheered and applauded. Aunt Dotty stepped back into the dining room carrying a red metal toolbox. — N.D. Wilson

Intuition is an omnipotent wonder, for it is not bound by the bands of time or space. When we are tune with it, it is a guiding light that can bring our dreams within reach and give us the direction we need to find our way home, when lose our way in this world. It is a precious gift in the spiritual toolbox of life, that we can give to ourselves and others. I can't imagine existing without it. — Jaeda DeWalt

That's right. Ain't no crime to have a teddy bear in your toolbox. — Hamish De'Lamet

That's a great golden nugget that's going in my tactical toolbox — Joe Teti

Women tend to communicate early and often about a problem. Men are more likely to view communication as a tool, and when they see it as the wrong tool for the job, they believe it should be stored neatly in the toolbox. — Shawn T. Smith

Hey, senorita, want to throw back some margaritas with me?"

Maya gave him a scornful look as only Maya could. "Who the hell are you?"

"Your dream come true, sweetheart."

"I might puke." Maya shoved past him, her toolbox just missing his groin. "It's too early in the morning for assholes. — Allyson James

I really loved working with Michael Caine. He's a really skilled and experienced actor. I learn something from everybody, but when you work with somebody like that, you actually learn things you can put in your toolbox, things about craft. Not necessarily life lessons, but actual things he knows that you can pick up. — Bruce McGill

The contents of a Brand Toolbox depend on the specific needs of the company but usually a Brand Toolbox contains An explanation of your brand strategy along with background and rationale so that everyone can understand why you're doing what you're doing, and definitions of key terms so everyone grasps the meaning behind the words Principles and guidelines for delivering brand values and attributes at key touchpoints between your brand and the outside world Sample applications for how the brand should be expressed and delivered Guides that walk people through important decisions, along with outlines that map processes so that people learn how to do things on brand like select a co-marketing partner and screen a new product — Denise Lee Yohn

The other piece of advice I want to give you before moving on to the next level of the toolbox is this: The adverb is not your friend. — Stephen King

For you, you have a toolbox filled with words. If one doesn't work, you find another one. Or another one. Or another. You change your words like most people change mobile phones. There is no permanence, no commitment, nothing sexy about any word that you use. And that's what I am: I'm your words, Morgan. — Morgan Parker

You can't teach talent, but you can teach people how to read strenuously and mimic the moves of rock-star writers so that they eventually accumulate a toolbox of skills. — Benjamin Percy

For some young artists, it can take a bit of time to discover which tools (which medium, or genre, or career pathway) will truly suit them best. For me, although many different art forms attract me, the tools that I find most natural and comfortable are language and oil paint; I've also learned that as someone with a limited number of spoons it's best to keep my toolbox clean and simple. My husband, by contrast, thrives with a toolbox absolutely crowded to bursting, working with language, voice, musical instruments, puppets, masks animated on a theater stage, computer and video imagery, and half a dozen other things besides, no one of these tools more important than the others, and all somehow working together. For other artists, the tools at hand might be needles and thread; or a jeweller's torch; or a rack of cooking spices; or the time to shape a young child's day ...
To me, it's all art, inside the studio and out. At least it is if we approach our lives that way. — Terri Windling

good writing consists of mastering the fundamentals (vocabulary, grammar, the elements of style) and then filling the third level of your toolbox with the right instruments. — Stephen King

Part of living into postures that nurture a deep reliance on God's leading is that no good tool is tossed out of the toolbox. But if you've come from such a dominant paradigm that you always find yourself reaching for the same tool regardless of the situation, you may need to leave that tool alone as you learn to listen and follow and make use of the right tool in the right situation. — Wendy Vanderwal-Gritter

I think a lot of people become actors because they have a great reservoir and repertoire of many different emotions they felt over their lives. It's like having a toolbox, and you go down into the toolbox and choose one or two of those that you need for a particular scenario, or something that comes up in a line. — Maria Bello

I won't date a guy who doesn't own a toolbox. I'm not saying you need to be able to knock down a wall or build a house or anything like that. But I've been out with a couple of guys who didn't own toolboxes, and they couldn't even change a light bulb. — Kristy Swanson

I'm obsessed with the form of a toolbox. The idea of a portable kit that has everything you might need ignites something inside me. It's like Batman's utility belt. — Adam Savage

I'm always inspired by actresses who are older than me. Because I know that person has lived so much more life than I have. There's a whole other toolbox. — Kate Winslet

"It's a workshop. Nothing but tools."
"So why would it be locked?" I asked.
"I'd love to say it's suspicious," SImon said. "But if this Banks guy had kids around, then I'm not surprised. My dad isn't exactly Mr. Handyman, but he kept a lock on his toolbox. You know parents, Paranoid."
"Yeah," Derek said. "Especially after their son flattens his fingers trying to nail a drawing to the wall."
"Hey, I'm not the genius who suggested it." Simon glanced at me. "Tape wouldn't hold it, and Science Guy explained that the paper was too heavy for the adhesive. So I got some nails."
Derek rolled his eyes. — Kelley Armstrong

A language like Ruby is a toolbox with some really neat little tools that do their job really nicely. JavaScript is a leather sheath with a really really sharp knife inside. That knife can cut anything, and with it you can do anything. You can kill a bear. You can catch fish. You can whittle a piece of wood into a pony. It's even a toothpick. — Nick Morgan

The idea of Juilliard was that it would give you this toolbox full of skills that you could take with you and apply to anything. — Robin Williams

During that reading, the top part of my mind is concentrating on story and toolbox concerns: knocking out pronouns with unclear antecedents (I hate and mistrust pronouns, every one of them as slippery as a fly-by-night personal-injury lawyer), adding clarifying phrases where they seem necessary, and of course, deleting all the adverbs I can bear to part with (never all of them; never enough). Underneath, — Stephen King

When she had packed all the artifacts that made up their personal history into liquor store boxes, the house became strictly a feminine place. She stood with her hands on her hips, stoically accepting the absence of old Boston Celtics coasters and the tangle of fishing poles, the old dartboard from a Scots pub, the toolbox and downhill skis, the silky patterned ties which sat in the base of one box like a writing mass of snakes. Without these things, one tended to notice the bright eyelet curtains, the vase filled with yawning crocuses, a needlepoint pillow ... Overall, the house looked much like her apartment had eight years ago, before she had met him. — Jodi Picoult

Intuition is the number one tool in the toolbox. — Matthew Mellon

I am sick and tired of folks that are doing everything they can to try to get a bad bill going, and then they vote against it when the bad bill's got the momentum to go through. We should be doing everything, using every tool in our toolbox, to stop bad legislation from happening. — Matt Salmon

Sadly, because of our tribal brains, science carries a hefty cost. Treasured ideas that are loved by the community may be left behind, unable to compete with conflicting observations. Admired heroes may be found to have been mistaken. Years of hard work can amount to nothing thanks to a single observation, making a lifetime of effort seem like a waste of time. For our tribal brain, the philosopher's toolbox is full of double-edged knives, capable of cutting away our hopes with the myths. — Mike McRae

When the only tool you have in your toolbox is a hammer, every problem begins to look like a nail. — Abraham H. Maslow

If I had a pair of pliers on me, I'd rip my ears off so I wouldn't have to listen to this anymore. Unfortunately, Brody doesn't even own a toolbox - I found that out when I first moved in and looked around for tools to fix the leaky kitchen faucet with. Brody had shrugged and said, "Shit leaks, man. Life doesn't always give you tools."

I'd wanted to point out that yes, life does give you tools - that's why we have fucking Home Depot. But arguing with Brody's logic is an exercise in futility — Elle Kennedy

When you are writing a spoken word poem, the tools you're working with are your voice, your body, how it's going to sound to someone when you're saying it out loud. Which is different from when you're writing it on the page. That toolbox becomes how does this look visually on the page, how does this read among pages, how is this in relation to poems that are before it or after it. I don't think one is better or more successful than the other. You've just gotta think about "what are the tools I'm using, and how are they most effective in this form?" — Phil Kay

I don't know how to fix a car. If the car breaks down, and the gas tank does not say "E", I'm screwed. But if the gas tank says "E", I get all cocky - "I've got this one, don't worry." So I get out the toolbox AKA wallet. — Mitch Hedberg

I admire writers who can remain objective and distanced, but that doesn't seem to be in my toolbox, somehow. — Gail Simone

Nature has provided us a spectacular toolbox. The toolbox exists. An architect far better and smarter than us has given us that toolbox, and we now have the ability to use it. — Barry Schuler

You are a toolbox, and you have to add stuff to it and build on it. I think the more tools you have, the better life gets." "I like that idea." "That's my mission in life. To keep adding to the toolbox. — Lang Leav

In front of her, Samuel Rain's spectacles shimmered, and she belatedly realized they weren't old-fashioned at all, but tools to allow him to see to a microcellular level. "Imbeciles." The engineer shut the interface panel, nodded at Vasic to close the protective carapace. "Stealing my work and thinking they know what to do with it. Like monkeys deciding to program a computronic system."
"Can you fix it?" Vasic asked.
"No, I'm brain damaged." With that, he put away the tool, snapped the toolbox shut, and hefted it. "Come back tomorrow."
Ivy stared after the engineer, hope a tight, hard knot in her chest. "He's either mad or brilliant."
"There's often only a razor-thin line between the two."
"And" - Rain called over his shoulder - "bring the dog! — Nalini Singh

The beauty of science and the nature of scientific revelations constitute part of the modern theologian's perspective and toolbox. — Joseph Silk

Me being a shy kid, very closed off, showing vulnerability in a character was sort of a safe space on stage. It's always been in my toolbox, there for me when I need it. — Jesse Tyler Ferguson

More than just music, the splash of water or a lone footstep can put you in the moment. Sound is just another tool in the developer's toolbox to draw the player further into the game. — Rob Manuel

You know, I can see more than just the future or the past."
"Really?" I asked, paging through through the papers in the file. "Can you also see the present? Because I can do that, too. Like, right now, I sense that I'm in a messy room with a total toolbox. — Rachel Hawkins

Hidden in a toolbox, in the rafters of his four-car garage, was an envelope full of pictures taken by a private detective...They were pictures of a scrawny, boyish looking nine year old with a wide mouth and a tangle of brown hair...Her eyes were oblong and deep set, their color hidden from the camera by the slant of the sun. The angles and planes of her face were oddly beautiful just then, in that moment, frozen on Kodak paper. A hint of the woman she would someday become. — Shirley A. Martin

The real question here is what happens to you, Gunther. In many ways you're a useful fellow to have around. Like a bent coat hanger in a toolbox, you're not something that was ever designed for a specific job, but you do manage to come in useful sometimes. — Philip Kerr

I did a lot of theater, so especially as an on-camera camera actor, there are so many things that aren't in your toolbox. They're somebody else's job. You think about editors and rhythm. Volume isn't even in your control. — Kerry Bishe

I think the emotional toolbox I have is healthy for an actor, as far as the intensity of emotions go. It's other things I have to hone. I can swim in that comfortably. — Shannyn Sossamon

When Qhuinn came back around, for a minute, he thought he had returned to the beginning of the nightmare, that fantasy of Blay sitting across a hospital room in a chair presenting itself once again. "Oh, thank God." "What?" Qhuinn mumbled. Blay jumped up and rushed over even though he had one arm in a sling and was limping like someone had dropped a toolbox on his foot. Qhuinn was about to ask if the male was okay when those beautiful lips were on his and that familiar bonding scent was in his nose - and oh, fuck, this was so much better than that fantasy - — J.R. Ward

Here's a writing craft tool that you can remove from your toolbox and throw away: description. It's the stuff that most readers skim. Even when deftly done using the five senses it's a lead weight. It isn't needed anymore. — Donald Maass

Here's a list of things an intermediate player will have in his chess toolbox: Checkmate patterns involving the Queen, Rooks, Knights and Bishops in combination with each other. King and Queen checkmate. King and Rook checkmate. King and pawn (promotion), then King and Queen checkmate. Pins, skewers, and forks. Understands the principles of the opening. Knows a solid opening for white, and can play a sound opening for black against both e4 and d4 openings. Understands the idea of winning the exchange, and knows what to do after getting up in material. — Ronn Munsterman

Losing is inevitable, make sure you have the tools in your toolbox to deal with it. — Rich Franklin

Fixing a sneer on her face, she deliberately lowered her toolbox and let it fall with a terrible clatter. That he jumped like a rabbit under the gun pleased her.
"Christ Jesus!" he scraped his chair around, thumped a hand to his heart as if to get it pumping again.
"What's the matter?"
"Nothing." She continued to sneer. "Butterfingers," she said sweetly and picked up her dented toolbox again. "Give you a start, did I?"
"You damn near killed me. — Nora Roberts

Reason is not one tool of thought among many, it is the entire toolbox. To advocate that reason be discarded in some circumstances is to advocate that thinking be discarded - which leaves one in the position of attempting to do a job after throwing away the required instrument. — George H. Smith

You must hold on to the sort of finger-painting aspect of music. That's something I learned, particularly from listening to Neil Young. Tom Waits is another one, because Tom's music is incredibly sophisticated and beautifully arranged, but he's using a toolbox that's unlike anybody else's. — Elvis Costello

I get around OK with a toolbox. As a kid, I picked up skills following my dad through the oil fields of Oklahoma and West Texas. My wife Janine is hard to impress, but she does think it's cool when I fix things around the house. — Ronnie Dunn

Anne Lamott says in Traveling Mercies, I always imagined when I was a kid that adults had some kind of inner toolbox full of shiny tools: the saw of discernment, the hammer of wisdom, the sandpaper of patience. But then when I grew up I found that life handed you these rusty bent old tools - friendships, prayer, conscience, honesty - and said, Do the best you can with these, they will have to do. And mostly, against all odds, they're enough. — Melanie Shankle

It was a lie, of course, and she was prepared to confess it to her priest. But she'd be damned if she'd tell him she'd been playing with his music.
Her pride was worth the penance.
He felt a quiver in his heart that he took for sympathy. "There, Brenna darling. Have you gone and fallen in love on me?"
She jerked, whirled, gaped at him. He was watching her with such - such bloody affection, such patience and sympathy. She could have beaten him black and blue. Instead, she just shoved clear of him and snatched up her toolbox. "Shawn Gallagher, you are truly a great idiot of a man."
With her nose in the air and her tools clanking, she stalked out.
He only shook his head, then went back to his cleaning up. With that little quiver around his heart again, he wondered who it was that O'Toole had set her sights on.
Whoever, Shawn thought, slamming a cupboard door just a little too forcefully, the man had better be worthy of her. — Nora Roberts

The term 'politics of prefiguration' has long been used to describe the idea that if you embody what you aspire to, you have already succeeded. That is to say, if your activism is already democratic, peaceful, creative, then in one small corner of the world these things have triumphed. Activism, in this model, is not only a toolbox to change things but a home in which to take up residence and live according to your beliefs, even if it's a temporary and local place... — Rebecca Solnit

Britta wanted to try to turn a guard. Tamara thought it was idiotic.
"What are you going to do? Buy him beer and tell him about Kropotkin?"
I envisioned the conversation:
Vanguard: Wage Slave, are you aware that you are but a wire nail in the toolbox of capitalism?
Wage Slave: I thought I was a chisel.
Vanguard: No, the petit bourgeois are the chisels.
Wage Slave: What about a washer set? Can I be a washer set?
Vanguard: No, my ferret, run free! For I have unlocked your collar with knowledge!
Wage Slave: I want to be a chisel.
Vanguard pushes screaming ferret through hole in fence cut by the clippers of noblesse oblige.
"Well, maybe we could bribe him," said Britta. Tamara laughed.
"With what? Health insurance? — Vanessa Veselka

Those who rule have always had an interest in shaping the perceptions of those they wish to rule. But never in the history of humanity has their toolbox been so full. Advances in technology and psychology have enabled the messages of the rulers to permeate our consciousness to a degree no prior society could have imagined. — James Rozoff

It's funny: I always imagined when I was a kid that adults had some kind of inner toolbox full of shiny tools: the saw of discernment, the hammer of wisdom, the sandpaper of patience. But then when I grew up I found that life handed you these rusty bent old tools - friendships, prayer, conscience, honesty - and said 'do the best you can with these, they will have to do'. And mostly, against all odds, they do. — Anne Lamott

If Christians do not develop their own tools of analysis , then when issues come up that they want to understand, they'll reach over and borrow someone else's tools- whatever concepts are generally accepted in their general field or in the culture at large.
But when they do that, Os Guiness writes, they don't realize that "They are borrowing not an isolated tool, but a whole philosophical toolbox laden with tools which have their own particular bias to every problem." They may even end up absorbing an entire set of alien principles without even realizing it.
In other words, not only do we fail to be salt and light to a lost culture, but we ourselves may end up being shaped by our culture. — Nancy Pearcey

Maybe its time we get a toolbox that doesnt just count whats easily counted, the tangible in life, but actually counts what we most value, the things that are intangible. — Chip Conley

Put your vocabulary on the top shelf of your toolbox, and don't make any conscious effort to improve it... One of the really bad things you can do to your writing is to dress up the vocabulary, looking for long words because you're maybe a little bit ashamed of your shot ones. This is like dressing up a household pet in evening clothes. The pet is embarrassed and the person who committed this act of pre-meditated cuteness should be even more embarrassed. Make yourself a solemn promise right now that you'll never use 'emolument' when you mean 'tip' and you'll never say 'John stopped long enough to perform an act of excretion' when you mean 'John stopped long enough to take a shit'. If you believe 'take a shit' would be considered offensive or inappropriate by your audience, feel free to say 'John stopped long enough to move his bowels'... — Stephen King

What use could the humanities be in a digital age? University students focusing on the humanities may end up, at least in their parents' nightmares, as dog-walkers for those majoring in computer science. But, for me, the humanities are not only relevant but also give us a toolbox to think seriously about ourselves and the world. — Nicholas Kristof

When Bowie yelps that he could do better than that, I hear another young person stuck somewhere, looking out of the window and imagining how much better they would invent the world, if they were just given the chance to lay their hands on the machinery. If they could just bust into the engine room for twenty-four hours with a toolbox. — Caitlin Moran

Men are fixers. They see women crying so they bring in their toolbox and follow Steps 1, 2, 3, and 4 to make it better. Yet they can't understand why there are no directions on the Internet for Dealing with a Crying Female and even if there were, why they're not working, dammit! And, finally, why scratching their balls while staring at us helplessly isn't helping matters. — Rachel Thompson

Her toolbox is full. She has learned to not let go of the pieces of herself that she needs in order to be what someone else wants. She's learned not to compromise. She's learned not to settle. She's learned, as difficult as it is, how to be her own sun. — Shonda Rhimes

Then, you know, the other more-traditional role of the producer in, like, the kind of Quincy Jones sense is kind of part arranger. So you're coming up with, like, these - you hear these songs that are quite bare-bones, and you dream up what's the band doing? What's the rhythm section doing? What's the guitars, strings, pianos - that sort of thing. It's almost like a little toolbox. — Mark Ronson

We were tools in their toolbox, and when things go well they promote it. They inflate their roles. — Mark Owen

Psychedelics are extraordinary tools, when used with psychotherapy, because in one day you can let go of so much, and have insight into so much. Sometimes more than in a year of traditional psychotherapy. I think they should be used in psychotherapy. But I don't know who should be entrusted with the toolbox - priests or psychiatrists? That is the difficulty. — Laura Huxley

Pathos and poignancy are, to me, tactics and techniques; in my work as a writer, I fetch them from my toolbox and use them as required. — Michel Faber

The handyman who'd helped rescue them was sitting at the front desk, his arm propped on his toolbox as he listened to a handheld radio, and he waved when he saw them. "How were the stairs?"
Better than the elevator," Owen said. "Any news?"
"No power until tomorrow at the earliest," he reported, his mustache twitching. "They're saying it goes all the way up into Canada." He paused for a moment, then shook his head. "It must be quite a sight from up in space. — Jennifer E. Smith

The first is that good writing consists of mastering the fundamentals (vocabulary, grammar, the elements of style) and then filling the third level of your toolbox with the right instruments. The second is that while it is impossible to make a competent writer out of a bad writer, and while is equally impossible to make a great writer out of a good one, it is possible, with lots of hard work, dedication, and timely help, to make a good writer out of a merely competent one — Stephen King

In one of his most beautiful poems, Richard Wilbur writes, "Odd that a thing is most itself when likened." And this is true no matter the thing: a book becomes more fully itself when we see both how it resembles and how is differs from other books; one discipline of study takes on its proper hues only when we see its relations to other disciplines that stand close to it or very far away. My repertoire of analogies is my toolbox, or my console of instruments, by which I comprehend and navigate the world. It can't be too large; every addition helps, at least a bit. — Alan Jacobs

I want to suggest that to write to your best abilities, it behooves you to construct your own toolbox and then build up enough muscle so you can carry it with you. Then, instead of looking at a hard job and getting discouraged, you will perhaps seize the correct tool and get immediately to work. — Stephen King