Quotes & Sayings About Trying Harder

I always love when everybody else is really bringing their game, because it's only going to make the movie better; it just makes you work harder and they work harder and everybody is trying to get their little bit in. It's competitive in a constructive way. — Jennifer Lopez

It seems like I always had to work harder than other people. Those nights when everybody else is asleep, and you sit in your room trying to play scales. — B.B. King

I am trying to get folks outside the hip-hop culture to understand why, despite the negatives, young people find hope and refuge in hip-hop. I'm hoping that young people immersed in the culture will work harder to capitalize on the possibilities for great social change that hip-hop represents as a national unified cultural youth movement. — Bakari Kitwana

A laugh burst from Nina's lips. Not as awkward as it must be for you. Honey, please. If you bent around any harder trying to let me know you fucked Lex to try and make me feel bad, you'd be a pretzel. Although you're about as smart as one. — Lauren Dane

Yeah, but I kill myself training. It's just about all I do. I get up and train, and run and I split my hands on the punching bag, and I train for hours into the night, and I have to, because there is nothing else special about me and nothing else that matters. All there is, is training and finding out who killed my parents. Because they were the ones who thought I was special, and whoever took them away from me...What I have is trying. I can try harder than anyone else in the world. I can make revenge the only thing I have in my life. I can do that, because I have to. But it means it's all I have. — Cassandra Clare

No amount of determination will bring freedom. We're going to learn to be victorious by surrendering our lives completely to the Spirit of God, not by gritting our teeth and trying harder. — Beth Moore

If the rules of a language are followed, words usually make sense. But these very rules can stir the impulse to rebel. We're obliged to keep trying to convey meaning through correct sentences. After a while, the good-soldier rigidity of polished prose can begin to seem dull, and it gets harder to resist the temptation of nonsense. — Joanna Scott

The Ideas aren't the hard bit. They're a small component of the whole. Creating believable people who do more or less what you tell them to is much harder.And hardest by far is the process of simply sitting down and putting one word after another to construct whatever it is you're trying to build: making it interesting, making it new. But — Neil Gaiman

Page 148- But I did , Hannah. And I wanted to. I could have helped you. But when I tried, you pushed me away. I can almost hear Hannah's voice speaking my next thought for me. "Then why didn't you try harder?"
- I think this quote is so powerful. This entire book is based on the effort of trying for a loved one and I feel as if clay is feeling the entire impact of hannah's suicide. However, I feel like he's placing all the blame on himself rather than seeing that other people had faults in not trying hard enough for Hannah. I think that later on in the book this quote will be acted out in a sense that the mistake of him not trying hard enough for hannah will be acted on someone else.. maybe he'll try harder for someone else? Maybe Hannah made the tape, not to necessarily blame him for her suicide, but so in the future he will help someone rather than them killing themselves. — Jay Asher

No matter what is going on around or within you, everything at some point must change. It's harder to accept when things are great - and a source of strength when change is what you need. Either way, it reminds me to try my best to be fully present in every moment. — Kandyse McClure

I think it's because you're frightened and you feel helpless, and even though you're trying, things continue to get harder and harder - for the both of you. And the more you try, the more hopeless things seem." "Is there any way to stop feeling this way? — Nicholas Sparks

By trying to make things easier for their children, parents can make things much harder for them. — Mardy Grothe

I should be able to look at my accolades and go, "Come on, Paul. That's enough." But there's still this little voice in the back of my brain that goes, "No, no, no. You could do better. This person over here is excelling. Try harder!" It still can be a little bit intimidating. — Paul McCartney

How were you supposed to explain this kind of thing? It seemed stupid to try. Even the memory was starting to seem vague and starry with unreality, like a dream where the details get fainter the harder you try to grasp them. What mattered more was the feeling, a rich sweet undertow so commanding that in class, on the school bus, lying in bed trying to think of something safe or pleasant, some environment or configuration where my chest wasn't tight with anxiety, all I had to do was sink into the blood-warm current and let myself spin away to the secret place where everything was all right. — Donna Tartt

Would you tell a USA Olympic Team hopeful that did not qualify for The Games, to give up and try another sport? No. You would tell them to work harder. Train harder. Try again at the next Olympics.
However, that is not what we hear in life. When did it become okay to tell people to quit trying and give up? When did it become okay to promote hopelessness?
If we all believe that hard work will not pay off, that we cannot try again, that we should give up early ... well then ... imagine all he great things that will never happen.
I believe in hard work. I believe in dreams. I believe that you can fall and still get up. And no one can take that away from me. — Kevin James Breaux

The harder we look at our aches and ailments, the more we will be startled by the painful truths they are trying to convey about our dangerously disembodied way of life. — Marion Woodman

Since there are always two parties in a relationship, the need for space may vary, as each would come with their own set of beliefs about how to spend time together and how much togetherness is too much and how much exclusive time one can claim from their partner. The conflicts arise when one partner feels neglected or left out due to the other's need for space. If a partner expresses their need for space, it might feel like rejection or abandonment to the other. The clingy partner becomes clingier and the partner who is trying to get some space resents it, tries harder to break away, or if that isn't possible, lies about that late office meeting when they have actually been at the pub, having a drink with their friends. — Preeti Shenoy

One thing I want to make clear: I don't think our old maps are bad. They deserve to be honored for their intent to help guide us safely through life. This is one of the reasons why, when we try to "push through" resistance, it seems to get even harder to move forward. After all, if you were trying to save someone by keeping them from running out into a dangerous situation, and they were pulling against you, you'd try to hold tighter, wouldn't you? — Rachel S. Heslin

The seriousness of my situation started to sink in, and again I fought panic. I pushed it down, but it was harder this time, like my insides were an open can of shaken soda and I was trying to keep it from bubbling up out of the top. — Abby Sunderland

Work harder on improving yourself than on trying to forge better relationships. — Mensah Oteh

It's not enough to step in front of people's bullets; you have to be bulletproof too. You have to be harder than anything anyone else can throw at you, and sometimes you risk losing yourself just trying to save yourself. — Anthony Breznican

But trying to be genuine was harder than it seemed — Linkin Park

As you get older, it gets harder to get rid of that belly but I do a lot of cardio to try to stay in shape. — Frank Thomas

I have a friend who says the best boyfriends are ones with intimidating, good-looking older brothers. The boyfriends try harder because they're so insecure. Maybe I'm the female equivalent. — Beth Orton

The harder you try to suppress the truth, the more inevitable it is that it will find a way to come out. — Arianna Huffington

Fury is an entirely appropriate response to a system that sends young people to kill other young people in a war that never should have been waged. Yet the American Right is forever trying to pathologise anger as something menacing and abnormal, dismissing war opponents as hateful and, in the latest slur, wild-eyed. This is much harder to do when victims of wars begin to speak for themselves: no one questions the wildness in the eyes of a mother or father who has just lost a son or daughter, or the fury of a soldier who knows that he is being asked to kill, and to die, needlessly. — Naomi Klein

For me giving up is way harder than trying. — Kanye West

I know, I say, after he says, This is hard, for the third time. This is what happens when you have a TRM, I tell him. You make a mess. It's okay. You just have to try harder next time.
I am trying hard, Dad says.
I know. You get a sticker.
Thank you.
Okay. You get another sticker for being polite. — Kathryn Erskine

When we talk now, we both know we've lost something, and I can feel us trying to fake it and make up what's missing. The faking makes me sad, and the sadness makes the faking harder to do. — Kate Le Vann

Whenever I think about all the things I appreciate in life, I also think about my privileges, as well. Try to keep that all in balance. Gratitude for what I have, trying to be part of movements that make it easy for people who have it harder than they ever should have it. — Emily Saliers

Putting our faith in Christ is not about trying harder; it means transferring our trust away from ourselves and resting in him. — Timothy Keller

I used to feel so far from God, like I had to work my way back to Him after periods of inconsistency ... it's not about trying harder. it's about turning sooner. It's about confessing sin and turning back to God's gift of grace. Grace is God's "undeserved favor." We don't have to earn it, and we cannot lose it when we act undeserving. — Renee Swope

Music has become really important now. It's helped me to open up more and take a chance on loving people. Music is a good reason to care. It's just a vehicle though. It's a way to try and give somebody something that you feel. If trying the best I can isn't good enough, I'll just have to try harder next time ... it's all I can do. If I do the best I can, then at least I did the best I could in this life The way I like to look at it is ... if that's the last time /I ever got to play, I'd better give it everything I've got. — Stevie Ray Vaughan

I'm originally from southern California, so I, like, say 'like', like, a lot. I've been trying to scrub any traces of Valley Girl from my speech since I moved to New York, but it's, like, totally way harder than anyone thinks, you know? — Mara Wilson

Things just happen in the right way, at the right time. At least when you let them, when you work with circumstances instead of saying, 'This isn't supposed to be happening this way,' and trying harder to make it happen some other way. — Benjamin Hoff

Cam starts laughing, "Oh, I love it when she reads." He turns to Lucy who's face is starting to contort and turn to a bright shade of red, "She reads these smutty books, like full on dirty shit, full of sex and like ... bdsm shit."
"I'm not joking boys, they're like full on pornographic. Talking about silky shafts and veiny dicks and shit," Logan is now on the ground holding his side from the pain of laughing too hard.
"Sometimes she'll be reading, then all of sudden she'll put her book down and look at me like she wants to eat me, literally eat me!" he yells, laughing harder, still swatting away her hands that are trying to shut him up, "I mean I don't mind it, not at all. It's hot as fuck. And she wants to try everything she reads in these books. Like ... everything. She learns everything from these books ... so I don't give a shit when, of how much she reads, I get rewards. — Jay McLean

Chronicler picked up his pen, but before he could dip it, Kvothe held up a hand. Let me say one thing before I start. I've told stories in the past, painted pictures with words, told hard lies and harder truths. Once, I sang colors to a blind man. Seven hours I played, but at the end he said he saw them, green and red and gold. That, I think, was easier than this. Trying to make you understand her with nothing more than words. You have never seen her, never heard her voice. You cannot know. — Patrick Rothfuss

Basically, I'm going to take what you did, the bare-bones structure of what you were trying to do, how you were attacking the song, and attack it in pretty much the same way, just with more intensity to show you that you could've come harder. Like, I've been in situations where I've had to tell a cat how to rhyme his rhyme. — Bun B.

Trying to follow in the footsteps of the masters, but it's a lot harder than it looks because even though they had the same size feet as us, they weren't looking down the whole time while they walked to make sure they were doing it right — Brian Andreas

There are rumors that your Lantsov prince has been sighted."

I drifted nearer, trying to keep my voice casual. "Where?"

He glanced up, his lips curling in a slight smile. "Do you like him?"

"Does it matter?"

"It's harder when you like them. You mourn them more."

"Tell me, Alina," said the Darkling. "Has he claimed you yet?"

"Claimed me? Like a peninsula?"

"No blushes. No averted eyes. How you've changed. What about your faithful tracker? Will he sleep curled at the foot of your throne? — Leigh Bardugo

There is nothing harder than working 50 pages a day, working 16 hours a day, trying to be good with only shooting rehearsals. — Robert Kazinsky

When I work on something I'm not excited about or not as proud of it as I'd like to be, then I try to work even harder to make the next one and address those insecurities, I tackle insecurities rather than run from them. — David Gordon Green

We were having everyone over to the house tonight for game night, since Jillian and Benjamin were home from Amsterdam. We knew it would be harder to plan these once the baby came, so we wanted to all get together while we still could. "Why do we always get stuck hosting this night?" Simon asked, poking his head around the door to the bathroom, where I was trying to get ready. "Because we have the biggest house now, the best entertaining space. — Alice Clayton

Take them off!" I told him, grabbing the front of his jeans. "Take everything off!"
"I'm trying!"
"Try harder! — Karen Chance

By trying so hard to provide the perfectly happy childhood, we're just making it harder for our kids to actually grow up, — Lori Gottlieb

What would it hurt for me to give that homeless guy a couple bucks? Who the hell cares if he spends it on beer? Maybe beer is a step up for him from the harder stuff that knocked him onto the streets in the first place. Maybe, just maybe, he's actually going to spend it on food (homeless people do eat, right?). Maybe, he really is a desperate human being who is trying to change his situation. — Dan Pearce

I was trying to remember what birds did before there were telephone wires. It would have been much harder for them to roost in the sunlight, which is a thing they clearly enjoy doing. — Marilynne Robinson

My motto in life is that nothing is impossible, no target unachievable - one just has to try harder and harder. — Kiran Bedi

And "weak" wasn't really the right word for what Shade meant. What he was trying to say was harder to express. It was giving in to feelings other people thought you were supposed to have about things that shouldn't have happened to you in the first place, but were not like the actual feelings you did have. There wasn't a word for that in Raksuran or Altanic or Kedaic or any other language Moon knew. Moon said, "It's not weak." The — Martha Wells

I'm trying not to wet myself with excitement," I murmur back. "It's harder after having the triplets. — Kristan Higgins

I knew that coming from a family with an unhealthy social origins, things would be harder for me. Nonetheless, in my heart, hope never died. However, over time, I had learned that trying never died either. Trying was one thing I always had to do more than others, because, in the self-proclaimed society of equals, we were made to be less equal than many of the families around us. — Teodor Flonta

For me personally, I'm constantly trying to really re-negotiate how I'm going to make a living because I can't make a living solely off editorial. And I'm also still trying to tell long feature stories that are harder and harder to get assigned, you know. — Lynsey Addario

Are tou trying to be annoying?" I demanded. My patience was not waning, but entirely gone. "Because if you are, then be assured, you have succeeded."
Jared and Wes looked at me with shocked eyes.
"I am female," I complained. "That 'it' business is really getting on my nerves."
Jared blinked in surprise, then his face settled back into harder lines. "Because of the body you wear?"
Wes glared at him.
"Because of me," I hissed.
"By whose definition?"
"How about by yours? In my species, I am the one that bears young. Is that not female enough for you?"
That stopped him short. I felt almost smug.
'As you should', Melanie approved. 'He's wrong and he's being a pig about it'.
Thank you.
'We girls have to stick together'. — Stephenie Meyer

Pedigree matters: if you break your shoulder trying to open a door, it's much harder to play the game once you get in the room. — Audra McDonald

The essence of loving living as a follower of Jesus isn't in trying harder but in enjoying more. I'm not saying you can change without trying. I'm saying that enjoyment empowers effort. Pleasure in God is the power for purity. — Sam Storms

I'm trying to fix my pain with certainty, as if I'm one right choice away from relief. I'm stuck in anxiety quicksand: The harder I try to climb my way out, the lower I sink. The only way to survive is to make no sudden movements, to get comfortable with discomfort, and to find peace without answers. — Glennon Doyle Melton

I could probably throw harder if I wanted, but why? When they're in a jam, a lot of pitchers ... try to throw harder. Me, I try to locate better. — Greg Maddux

Try or cry. Choose! — Heenashree Khandelwal

Over and over, people try to design systems that make tomorrow's work easy. But when tomorrow comes it turns out they didn't quite understand tomorrow's work, and they actually made it harder. — Ward Cunningham

The park grass looked greener, the park benches looked better and the flowers were trying harder. — Charles Bukowski

When my husband died, people kept telling me not to cry. People kept trying to help me to forget. But I didn't want to forget ... So I realize, that if it's hard for me, how much harder it must be for you. — Katherine Paterson

Trying every day to tell the truth is hard. There are harder things, of course - arguably, living with lies and meaninglessness, living in despair is harder, but it's hardship disguised as luxury and easier perhaps to grow accustomed to, since truth is usually the enemy of custom. There are harder things than writing, being President Obama, for instance, and having to deal with House Republicans, or trying to fix the leak at the Fukushima reactor, these are harder, but writing is hard. — Tony Kushner

Being Benedictine--a monastic or an oblate--means trying a little harder to show the courtesy of love for one another, to see Christ in the people with whom, we live, work and pray--and to look for Him even in the people with whom we disagree. — Benet Tvedten

I searched his face and smiled as a soft grin formed along his
lips as he said, I truly don't deserve you, but I'm grateful every single day
that you're mine. I know it's frustrating at times, and I appreciate that even
through all the bullshit you still stick around. I didn't realize how much my
bottled-up problems bothered you. I promise to work harder at it. Just know
that I am trying. — E.L. Montes

What do you miss about being alive?" The sound of my mom singing, a little off-key. The way my dad went to all my swim meets and I could hear his whistle when my head was underwater, even if he did yell at me afterward for not trying harder. I miss going to the library. I miss the smell of clothes fresh out of the dryer. I miss diving off the highest board and nailing the landing. I miss waffles" - p. 272. — Laurie Halse Anderson

Yet we must try the harder, the less the prospect of success. — Henry David Thoreau

I do talk and think a lot about the legacy before me. I feel like if I didn't know that people had been in Montgomery sixty years ago trying to do similar things that I'm trying to do, with a lot less, with fewer resources, with less security, with less encouragement, with less opportunity - if I didn't know that, then I think doing what I do would be much, much harder. — Bryan Stevenson

With Twitter, it's a little harder to tell jokes that somebody hasn't heard already. You have all these people out there sharing their opinions and telling jokes in real time, and by the time you get on, somebody's already done some version of what you're trying to do. — Frank Caliendo

I have a name," I grumped, my stomach pinching me harder.
"Yes, but it has no pizzazz. Ra-a-a-a-chel. Rach-e-e-e-eel," he said, trying it out in different ways. "No one will tremble in terror at that. Oh my God!" he said in a high falsetto. "It's Rachel! Run! Hide! — Kim Harrison

[Life]It is what you make it. If you think you can't change the world, then go on and follow the path already carved out for you. But there are other roads to choose, they're just harder to trudge through. Changing the world is'nt easy, but I sure as hell am going to keep trying. Are you? — Simone Elkeles

I have found that to tell the truth is the hardest thing on earth. Harder than fighting in a war, harder than taking part in a revolution.
"If you try it, you will find that at times sweat will break upon you. You will find that even if you succeed in discounting the attitudes of others to you and your life, you must wrestle with yourself most of all. Fight with yourself. Because there will surge up in you a strong desire to alter facts, to dress up your feelings.
"You'll find that there are many things you don't want to admit about yourself and others.
"As your record shapes itself, an awed wonder haunts you. And yet there is no more exciting an adventure than trying to be honest in this way. The clean, strong feeling that sweeps you when you've done it makes you know that. — Richard Wright

Writing is like trying to escape quicksand. The harder you try the faster you sink. — Alane Adams

Tatiana sat on the bench by the bay, by the morning water, and watched her son push himself on a tire swing. Her arms were twisted around her stomach. She was trying not to rock like Alexander rocked at three o'clock in the morning. Has he left me? Did he kiss my hand and go? No. It wasn't possible. Something's happened. He can't cope, can't make it, can't find a way out, a way in. I know it. I feel it. We thought the hard part was over - but we were wrong. Living is the hardest part. Figuring out how to live your life when you're all busted up inside and out - there is nothing harder. Oh dear God. Where is Alexander? — Paullina Simons

Of course there's pressure, and it's still there with every book. Each one is harder to write than the last, basically because you're always trying to write a better book. You won't always succeed, of course, but that has to be what you're shooting for. — Mark Billingham

I used to love reading, but since I've started writing, it's harder for me to immerse, because I spend so much time looking at how the story is structured and trying to see what the author is doing behind the curtain. — Paolo Bacigalupi

When you believe without knowing you believe that you are damaged at your core, you also believe that you need to hide that damage for anyone to love you. You walk around ashamed of being yourself. You try hard to make up for the way you look, walk, feel. Decisions are agonizing because if you, the person who makes the decision, is damaged, then how can you trust what you decide? You doubt your own impulses so you become masterful at looking outside yourself for comfort. You become an expert at finding experts and programs, at striving and trying hard and then harder to change yourself, but this process only reaffirms what you already believe about yourself
that your needs and choices cannot be trusted, and left to your own devices you are out of control (p.82-83) — Geneen Roth

This is a good plan for life in general. If you have two choices, choose the harder. If you're trying to decide whether to go out running or sit home and watch TV, go running. Probably the reason this trick works so well is that when you have two choices and one is harder, the only reason you're even considering the other is laziness. You know in the back of your mind what's the right thing to do, and this trick merely forces you to acknowledge it. — Paul Graham

The harder you try to control your girlfriend the further you'll drive her away, so stop acting like a dumbbell. — Jeanne Phillips

Failure is not an option if success is just a matter of trying harder — W. Bruce Cameron

Most of what we've done at SurveyMonkey is create a market, which I would say is much harder than trying to enter a market that already exists. But if you get it right, it can become a great business. — Dave Goldberg

It's usually very, very hard for me to pick up a script that was written and try and see myself as a part of that, especially when you're used to performing all your own material. It's OK with drama, I like being handed great material but I think with comedy it's far more personal and probably a lot harder for me to find a fit. — Eric Bana

It's harder when people are playing along, because it's just not as funny. They're trying to be funny, and it sort of cancels out the whole joke. — Steve Carell

You're at your most purest, most innocent, pure state when you're doing something you've never done before. You're scared a little, you're a little vulnerable, you're kind of trying, and then you're also better, because you're trying harder than you maybe would try. — Alicia Keys

I just want to do musicals. it's hard enough just to do musicals. No matter how hard I try, I think it's only getting harder. Even If I try harder, there are problems that I just can't deal with. I don't know why it's become like this. — Cheon Eunbi

Whenever you compete, trying harder is truly the game of diminishing returns and a losing one at that — Jan Garavaglia

Journalism is being pushed into a space where I don't think it should ever go, where it's trying to support the monetization model of the Web by driving page views. So what you have is a drop-off of long-form journalism, because long-form pieces are harder to monetize. — Mike McCue

In fact, the harder the mind struggles to get rid of the pain, the greater the pain. The mind can never find the solution, nor can it afford to allow you to find the solution, because it is itself an intrinsic part of the "problem." Imagine a chief of police trying to find an arsonist when the arsonist is the chief of police. You will not be free of that pain until you cease to derive your sense of self from identification with the mind, which is to say from ego. The mind is then toppled from its place — Eckhart Tolle

A saint isn't somebody who tries harder, but someone who trusts more. — Peter Kreeft

You're not just trying to do something marginally, incrementally better. You're doing something that is a fundamental paradigm shift, that will have exponential impact. That means it's harder to do, but ultimately, if it's successful, the impact it has is far greater. — Steve Case

It's always been most important for me to figure out "my space" rather than trying to check out what everyone else is up to, minute by minute. Technology is making it easier to connect to other people, but maybe harder to keep connected to yourself
and that's essential for any artist, I think. — Jay-Z

I find it harder to write the lyrics afterwards because then you're just trying to fit them into something that's already there. — King Tuff

Trying harder only withholds our good from us. This Universe does not thrive on hard work and more effort. It thrives on going with the flow. When you go with the flow, everything just flows and you feel inspired to move to and create from a higher place. Everything just feels right and ideas flow to you. The path lights up for you. — Richard Dotts

It is more likely that the paths others have chosen influence the paths I choose. This suggests that the simplest way to help others make different choices is to make them myself, and to do it openly. As I shift the patterns of my own participation in the systemps of privilege, I make it easier for others to do so as well, and harder for them not to. Simply by setting an example - rather than trying to change them - I crate the possibility of their participating in change in their own time and in their own way. In this way I widen the circle of change without provoking the kind of defensiveness that perpetuates paths of least resistance and the oppressive systems they serve. — Allan G. Johnson

Someone told me that their child was diagnosed with ADHD. They wanted to know how I handle the day to day. It's hard on me but it's harder on them. I cry sometimes which means they probably do to. I worry that the world will never give them the chance they deserve but I am. I get frustrated when they are treated badly but they feel worse. I keep trying, I keep learning, and I keep telling their story. Just love your child and don't give up. They need you to be the person that understands. — Brenda Lochinger

The most important thing that each of us can do is to try even harder to see the world through our neighbor's eyes. — Hillary Clinton

If trying harder doesn't work, try softer. — Lily Tomlin

I'm the company philosopher and the burr in the saddle. I'm the one who says we need to try harder, improve the quality of our products, become a part of the political process, help elect people who are good for the environment. — Yvon Chouinard

In a longitudinal study of college students, freshmen were evaluated for fixed mindsets or growth mindsets and then followed across their four years of enrollment. When the students with fixed mindsets encountered academic challenges such as daunting projects or low grades, they gave up, while the students with growth mindsets responded by working harder or trying new strategies. Rather than strengthening their skills and toughening their resolve, four years of college left the students with fixed mindsets feeling less confident. The feelings they most associated with school were distress, shame, and upset. Those with growth mindsets performed better in school overall and, at graduation time, they reported feeling confident, determined, enthusiastic, inspired, and strong. — Meg Jay

Though I imagine in your case, trying not to fall just made you fall harder. — Meg Cabot

Now I was also trying to understand how someone could end such intense desire without leaving a trace. If you had really loved something, wouldn't a little bit of it always linger? A couple of houseplants? A dinky Home Depot Phalaenopsis in a coffee can? I personally have always found giving up on something a thousand times harder than getting it started, but evidently Laroche's finishes were downright and absolute, and what's more, he also shut off any chance of amends. — Susan Orlean