Trying Really Hard Quotes & Sayings

So it's really hard for a horn player to comp. But I'm totally into trying to switch those paradigms around and find a little magic space where that works, and try to mine that. — Charlie Hunter

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

I work really hard at trying to see the big picture and not getting stuck in ego. I believe we're all put on this planet for a purpose, and we all have a different purpose ... When you connect with that love and that compassion, that's when everything unfolds. — Ellen DeGeneres

So much of what we try to do is get to a point where the solution seems inevitable: you know, you think "of course it's that way, why would it be any other way?" It looks so obvious, but that sense of inevitability in the solution is really hard to achieve. — Jonathan Ive

She put a hit on her boyfriend, so it's not like she hasn't murdered someone."
"And you know that how?" Sam asks.
I'm trying really hard to be honest, but telling the whole thing to Sam seems beyond me. Still, the fragments sound ridiculous on their own. "She said so. In the park."
He rolls his eyes. "Because the two of you were so friendly."
"I guess she mistook me for someone else." I sound so much like Philip that it scares me. I can hear the menace in my tone.
"Who?" Sam asks, not flinching.
I force my voice back to normal. "Uh, the person who killed him. — Holly Black

I'm really just tryna bring it home for my city, I'm trying so hard to be the best I can be on every record I do, every feature I do and every different city I go to. — SonReal

What is the art experience about? Really, I'm not interested in making Art at all. I never, ever, think about it. To say the word Art, it's almost like a curse on art. I do know that I want to try to get closer to myself. The older I get, the more indications I have about what it is to get closer to yourself. You try less hard. I just want to be. — Joel Meyerowitz

It's really hard to stay healthy over the long term of making a movie so that's why those things matter when you're trying to keep your health, literally. — Elizabeth Banks

Trying to be a boy is really hard." Mom — Alex Gino

I'm one of those hovering mothers and I know it's really important to have an independent child, so I'm trying to back off, but it's hard. I love him so much, and he's so funny and cute to me. — Selma Blair

I'm always trying to complicate things. For some reason I'll go, "Well, maybe I can get that in," and stuff like that. I always make it really hard for myself. — Jim Carrey

Sense of humor means seeing both poles of a situation as they are, from an aerial point of view. There is good and there is bad and you see both with a panoramic view as though from above. Then you begin to feel that these little people on the ground, killing each other or making love or just being little people, are very insignificant in the sense that, if they begin to make a big deal of their warfare or lovemaking, then we begin to see the ironic aspect of their clamor. If we try very hard to build something tremendous, really meaningful, powerful - "I'm really searching for something, I'm really trying to fight my faults," or "I'm really trying to be good" - then it loses its seriousness, becomes a paper tiger; it is extremely ironic. — Chogyam Trungpa

There's something to that in both directions," said Ekaterin mildly. "Nothing is more guaranteed to make one start acting like a child than to be treated like one. It's so infuriating. It took me the longest time to figure out how to stop falling into that trap."
"Yes, exactly," said Kareen eagerly. "You understand! So - how did you make them stop?"
"You can't make them - whoever your particular them is - do anything, really," said Ekaterin slowly. "Adulthood isn't an award they'll give you for being a good child. You can waste ... years, trying to get someone to give that respect to you, as though it were a sort of promotion or raise in pay. If only you do enough, if only you are good enough. No. You have to just ... take it. Give it to yourself, I suppose. Say, I'm sorry you feel like that, and walk away. But that's hard. — Lois McMaster Bujold

Realistically, there is a danger, of course, when you're going into someone's living room as the same guy every week. But I don't fear it because, I mean, there's really nothing I can do about it. I can try to combat it through the work, and maybe make sure I don't do Sheldon 2.0 in any other projects. But it's just really hard for me to find any negative side effects from this experience. — Jim Parsons

Everything I'm doing musically is for its own sake. I'm recording at my house, trying really hard to write songs with a four-track tape recorder. — Bucky Pope

For anyone who has that calling and is trying also to make a living at it, it is really hard. — Julie Gold

As a kid, I would do all of the plays at my school, and I was notorious for being in five numbers in one show. I'd go onstage, run backstage for a wardrobe change, and then go back out onstage. I'm always trying to do more than I should but when I got my lucky break (or whatever it's called), I was prepared because I studied and worked really hard for it. — Chrissie Fit

It's really hard not to think too much. If I try to control the sled too much so that I have perfect lines, I'm really slow. — Katie Uhlaender

The Barbarian Way was, in some sense, trying to create a volatile fuel to get people to step out and act. It's pretty hard to get a whole group of people moving together as individuals who are stepping into a more mystical, faith-oriented, dynamic kind of experience with Christ. So, I think Barbarian Way was my attempt to say, Look, underneath what looks like invention, innovation and creativity is really a core mysticism that hears from God, and what is fuelling this is something really ancient. That's what was really the core of The Barbarian Way. — Erwin McManus

I'm opening up my heart to the idea of dating. It's funny - my friends would always come to me for romantic advice. I know nothing, and things have changed since I was dating in high school! I'm really trying hard to spend this time working on myself. — Olivia Wilde

I mean, why are you trying so hard to impress me? I'm really sorry your mother died, but it doesn't mean much to me ... — Sherman Alexie

If only, I thought, I could talk to Eugene just one more time. This was before I came to understand that you cannot make someone fall in love with you But here's what you can do. By arguing and pleading and screaming and crying and throwing plates and phoning a lot and bringing hot food and sending flowers and buying gifts and doing unsolicited favors and remembering a birthday and being nice and declaring your abiding love and trying hard or sometimes merely by being present, you can make someone who was hitherto lukewarm really detest you. — Patricia Marx

I've been with you all day.
I'm trying to stay calm.
I'm impatient and it's really hard to breathe.
I'm going to empty you and fill you in with me ... — Slipknot

She walked through the underpass at the Elephant and Castle, enjoying the sense that nothing really mattered, not the truth about the past, nor whether they believed her, not Winnie's drinking or Vik's ultimatum. It was the perfect place to escape from a painful past. She could waste years at home trying to make sense of a random series of events. There was no meaning, no lessons to be learned, no moral - none of it meant anything. She could spend her entire life trying to weave meaning into it, like compulsive gamblers and their secret schema. Nothing mattered, really, because an anonymous city is the moral equivalent of a darkened room. She understood why Ann had come here and stayed here and died here. It wouldn't be hard. All she had to do was let go of home. She would phone Leslie and Liam sometimes, say she was fine, fine, let the calls get farther apart, make up a life for herself and they'd finally forget. — Denise Mina

Back off, perv! I have a black belt in taekwondo
and I will fuck you up if you take another step toward
me."
Chase raised his hands in surrender, trying really,
really hard to keep his eyes on hers. "Whoa, there,
crouching tiger. Let's just take this down a notch. — Lorelei James

You want to know how to stop this killer? Forgive yourself, and he'll
disappear from your life forever."
"Thanks. I'll be sure to do that."
And I know:
1. This is almost the same conversation I've had with myself many times
before.
2. Gordon's only trying to help.
But it doesn't matter.
I:
1. Say, "See you later."
2. Step outside.
3. Close the door.
I don't want to, really. I want to go back inside and believe Gordon's words,
like a child believing in a fairy tale, and I want to escape this nightmare forever.
But I can't.
I realize now that it's easy to tell the difference between a real problem and
an imaginary one.
It's just the terror of facing the truth that's hard. — Jeremy C. Shipp

He turned his head to look at her, trying to think of ways to plead his case. Some way to dazzle and beguile her and make her glad that it was him she was here with. Something witty and persuasive, but she turned at precisely the same moment he did, with invitation in her eyes, and all he could come up with was, "Damn, I really want to kiss you."

Her hesitation was a mere fraction of a second. "Me too," she whispered.

It was all he needed to hear, and in an instant she was in his arms. He kissed her, hard, with no prelude, no artful negotiations or seductive machinations. Just hungry kisses that sent his mind spinning and his body following. She kissed him back with equal enthusiasm, with one hand on his chest and the other wrapped tightly around the back of his neck, pulling him closer. Her mouth was sweet, as sweet as he'd imagined, with lips so soft he could have fallen over the edge of that lighthouse and thought the sensation was just from her touch. — Tracy Brogan

I play hard and aggressive. I don't lay out the huge body checks because it's not really the style I play. But I love to be around the net and love battling corners and trying to dish pucks out. — Eric Staal

She wanted to remind him, whether his family was there or not. She wanted. And wanted. And endured in her wanting: the damp seat, the dry chicken, more champagne, the headache the champagne brought, the midges, the chat, his failure, no refusal, to look, look at me, I caused a thunderstorm with my passion and I sit here shaking under my skin and you don't notice because you're trying so hard not to notice, but all the people at the table there are really only you and me and you know it, the air is charged with it, it's a heat, a hot wind, and Marina and Seely are a sham next to it, Annabel ceases to exist, is simply obliterated in the gale of it, this isn't a fantasy, not my imagination, I can tell by the way you lift your fork, by the set of your jaw, by that sixth cigarette you are smoking me, or would if you could; but how long can we sustain it, how long till eruption, till the storm returns again and they can all see what it is, what it really is? — Claire Messud

I don't know why I'm trying to hide my reaction from him, but isn't that what people do? We try so hard to hide everything we're really feeling from those who probably need to know our true feelings the most. People try to bottle up their emotions, as if it's somehow wrong to have natural reactions to life. — Colleen Hoover

As for the temperature of Hell, Miss Gray," he said, "let me give you a piece of advice. The handsome young fellow who's trying to rescue you from a hideous fate is never wrong. Not even if he says the sky is purple and made of hedgehogs."
He really is mad, Tessa thought, but didn't say so; she was too alarmed by the fact that he had started toward the wide double doors of the Dark Sisters' chambers.
"No!" She caught at his arm, pulling him back. "Not that way. There's no way out. It's a dead end."
"Correcting me again, I see." Will turned and strode the other way, toward the shadowy corridor Tessa had always feared. Swallowing hard, she followed him. — Cassandra Clare

Mom and Zacharov?"
I shrug. "I know. It's weird, right? I'm trying really hard not to think about it."
"You mean about the part that if Zacharov and Mom got married, that would make you and Lila brother and sister? — Holly Black

I tried so hard to fix what I'd ruined. I tried every single day to be what they wanted. I tried all the time to be better but I never really knew how.
I only know now that the scientist are wrong.
The world is flat.
I know because I was tossed right off the edge and I've been trying to hold on for 17 years. I've been trying to climb back up for 17 years but its nearly impossible to beat gravity when no one is willing to give you a hand.
When no one wants to risk touching you. — Tahereh Mafi

You know, my goal is not to convince you that I'm right or that you're wrong. About homophobia. Gun violence. Racism. Whatever the issue. I'm really trying hard with you - and others - to have a respectful discussion, debate about these issues. — Steven Petrow

Second, clarify what you really don't want. This is the key to framing the and question. Think of what you are afraid will happen to you if you back away from your current strategy of trying to win or stay safe. What bad thing will happen if you stop pushing so hard? Or if you don't try to escape? What horrible outcome makes game-playing an attractive and sensible option? — Kerry Patterson

I used to get really ticked about preachers who talked too much about grace, because they tempted me to not be disciplined. I figured what people needed was a kick in the butt, and if I failed at godliness it was because those around me weren't trying hard enough. — Donald Miller

I don't know if I have a brand. I just see myself as an athlete and a competitor, someone who just works really hard at trying to get better at golf. I guess I'm kind of the feel-good story who's seen every level of professional golf. — Zach Johnson

I spent so much of my life reading about spirituality and reading about neuroscience and trying different meditation practices. It's a really big part of my life. But it's sometimes hard to talk about. There are so many people in the world who don't live in Southern California and don't spend their time meditating. — Moby

Heroes in drama are people who try hard to reach a virtuous ideal. And whether they succeed or fail really doesn't matter - it's the trying that counts. — Aaron Sorkin

The idea of getting old is horrific, but I don't want to make it worse by becoming a grotesque caricature. A lot of people have made that mistake of trying so hard to hang on to their looks that they make themselves look really scary. — Jerry Hall

My idea about collections is that you write as hard as you can for some period and what you're really doing during that time is hyper-focusing on the individual pieces - trying to make each one sit up and really do some surprising work. — George Saunders

My sister is my little star, and I'm excited for her and proud of her. With her, I'm protective, but also I don't want to be that sister who's really pushy and thinks they know everything and making her feel like she doesn't know what she's doing. I'm trying to be that cool older sister and not the mom, but it's hard. — Gigi Hadid

Call you up in the middle of the night. It's awful hard trying to make love long distance, but I really need stimulation. — Billy Joel

When you're doing a comedy and you want to somehow satirise people who are taking themselves seriously, I think the most serious genre is the thing you're going to get the most out of. If you're trying to satirise a comedy, it's hard to do that - it doesn't really work as well. But I love the war movie genre and I'm a fan of all those movies that are part of what this movie is. — Ben Stiller

I feel so fortunate, Because some people think, well you're just relegated to the sideline. But I feel valued there. They trust me. We work very, very hard at making it worthwhile. We are not going to just be down there spewing a bunch of blah. With our halftime talking to the coaches we are really trying to get something meaningful there and something that helps spin the game forward. — Michele Tafoya

begins. Like Adam and Eve, you don't really understand your true identity. The enemy knows that as long as he can keep you away from understanding who you truly are, then you will continue to work really hard all of your life to somehow reach the same reality of the Garden. Yet all along, even though you don't realize it, what you are trying to reach outside is already within you. — Pablo Giacopelli

Let's be honest. Most of the time we don't find ourselves in horrible situations we must simply endure. Rather, we face some minor disadvantage or get stuck with some less-than-favorable conditions. Or we're trying to do something really hard and find ourselves outmatched, overstretched, or out of ideas. Well, the same logic applies. Turn it around. Find some benefit. Use it as fuel. — Ryan Holiday

Like running trying to live a good life has to hurt a little bit, or we're not running hard enough, not really trying. — June Jordan

It's really easy to insist that people read the manual. It's really easy to blame the user/student/prospect/customer for not trying hard, for being too stupid to get it, or for not caring enough to pay attention. — Seth Godin

I want that perfect ending. But I've learned the hard way, that some stories don't have a clear beginning, middle and end. My life has not been about knowing or figuring everything out. It's been about having to deal with change, about taking a moment and making the best of it, even if I knew I'd have to take a big risk. Life is really about trying to move forward without knowing exactly what is going to happen next. — Jose N. Harris

It was really hard coming to terms with the Nazi history. Then in my twenties I was traveling to Germany. There was a lot of poetry activity and some of my first readings abroad and trying to relate with people my own age there and what they were discovering and learning had to examine in terms of their backgrounds. Then so many of my friends had family who had either perished in the holocaust or survived in the holocaust. It was very palpable. — Anne Waldman

Sarah Michelle Gellar's made some really good choices. She's had some bad breaks. She goes with the independent, interesting young filmmakers and then they get slammed, like 'Southland Tales.' I'm proud of what she's trying to do. It's hard. — Joss Whedon

You didn't like him, did you, Dad?"
"It wasn't that I didn't like him," my dad says slowly. "It was just that he lives in a completely different world, and I worried that he didn't really approve of you the way you are, that he was trying to change you into something else."
God, I never realized my dad was that perceptive..
"You see, the thing is," he says after we've both sat for a while in the sunshine, "the thing is that love is really the most important thing. I know it's hard for you to see it now" - he chuckles quietly- "but when I first laid eyes on your mother I thought she was fantastic, and I've never stopped loving her, not for a second. Oh yes, we've had our rough patches, and she can be a bit of an old battle-ax at times, but I still love her. That in-love feeling at the beginning settles down into a different, familiar sort of love, but it has to be there right from the start, otherwise it just won't work. — Jane Green

Why am I feeling guilty? Why is he so mad? I peek up at him. "Well, you know a lot more about me now," he snaps, his mouth presses into a hard line. "I knew you were inexperienced, but a virgin!" He says it like it's a really dirty word. "Hell, Ana, I just showed you ... " he groans. "May God forgive me. Have you ever been kissed, apart from by me?" "Of course I have." I try my best to look affronted. Okay ... maybe twice. "And a nice young man hasn't swept you off your feet? I just don't understand. You're twenty-one, nearly twenty-two. You're beautiful." He runs his hand through his hair again. Beautiful. I flush with pleasure. Christian Grey thinks I'm beautiful. I knot my fingers together, staring at them hard, trying to conceal my goofy grin. — E.L. James

I see so many bands, that are trying really hard to write for a person that they've never met. I get the idea behind it and the idea of helping people, but I feel you help people more by exposing yourself. — Andy Biersack

Walker and Timothy sat quietly for a very long time. "Why do so many people make it so hard for anyone to help them or to love them?" Walker asked finally.
Timothy chuckled. "Ah, Walker - if I could explain all of humanity's foibles, I'd be a rich man indeed, at least as far as money goes. I believe people are like that because of fear. They fear being loved because they fear that if they're loved, they'll have to love back. And if they love back, they may get hurt. And many people aren't ready to put their hearts on the line like that. Mostly because they don't have anything to fall back on. It's quite a shame, really, because they hurt themselves by trying to avoid getting hurt. But we have to be willing to die many times if we're ever going to get on with this business of living. — Tom Walsh

Kay very calmly and sweetly said, "You know, Pat, how much better do you think Lea Henry and Cindy Noble are going to get at this point?" She was saying ease up - it's enough. I had reached the point of diminishing returns. "I think they are both trying really hard to please you, but how much more can they possibly do?" she said. "I just wonder if you've really thought about that. — Pat Summitt

Music is like a conversation. One person says one thing that speaks with a harmonica, with a bass, with a drum. They're all conversating, and we're just trying to find a way to make conversation rather than blah, blah, blah. But it's not really so hard a thing to do if you know the way to approach it. — Stephen Marley

We needed to make a sound that's not gonna fit in with everything else - we wanted to make something that was completely unique and individual to us. We spent a lot of time trying to make a sound that was a One Direction sound. At first it was quite hard to do that, but I'm really happy with the sound. — Zayn Malik

I don't go through a torturous intellectual process to decide what to direct. I know what I want to direct the second I read something or hear a story. I just know when it grabs me in a certain way I want to direct it. And then I spend the next four to six months trying to talk myself out of it, because directing is really hard! But it's true, I know essentially when and what I want to do next ... it's an undeniable feeling I get and it's not the same feeling I get when I wind up producing something. — Steven Spielberg

It's kind of like when you look at yourself in the mirror and you say your name. And it gets to a point where none of it seems real. Well, sometimes I can do that, but I don't need an hour in front of a mirror. It just happens very fast, and things start to slip away. And I just open my eyes, and I see nothing. And then I start to breathe really hard trying to see something, but I can't. It doesn't happen all the time, but when it does, it scares me. — Stephen Chbosky

Yes, I'm obsessed with health, which has been an interesting journey. I went down the raw-food diet route, but got ill. It was really hard, especially in Britain in winter, trying to survive on raw carrots. I became so ill and anemic, so I stopped that and became a vitamin junkie. I just ate lots of vegetables, exercised and breathed. — Naomie Harris

I'm trying to use people like Meredith Monk and Philip Glass and Terry Riley as the backing tracks for new pop songs. It's really hard trying to use the format and write a pop song on top of avant-garde music, so we'll see. It could be cool, or it could totally flop. — Autre Ne Veut

It was the way your sweet, soft hands wiped away my tears, and the way your body just curved into mine when you let me hold you. It all made me feel, for just an instant, that everything really was going to be all right. No one has ever comforted me like that ... except my mom." What the fuck? Did I just say all that out loud? I shook my head furiously from side to side as the room started spinning me like a Tilt-a-Whirl at the county fair back home.
Abby grabbed my shoulders to steady me. I blinked my eyes trying to focus on her blurry, but beautiful image. "Most of all, it's that I want someone like you to want me - just for me, not for Jake Slater the singer of Runaway Train." I smacked my hand hard against my chest. "For what's really inside me. — Katie Ashley

Right away when I got to college, I realized that being a politician sucks. It's really hard! It wasn't for me. B.J. Novak is convinced that I will run for mayor of Chicago at some point. He begs me to do it. It'd be a tough gig, but I was always very attracted to the idea of helping people and trying to make the city a better place. — Ike Barinholtz

I keep thinking about this river somewhere, with the water moving really fast. And these two people in the water, trying to hold onto each other, holding on as hard as they can, but in the end it's just too much. The current's too strong. They've got to let go, drift apart. That's how it is with us. It's a shame, Kath, because we've loved each other all our lives. But in the end, we can't stay together forever. — Kazuo Ishiguro

I live a pretty balanced life. As hard as I do work & as many things that I do ... I take a lot of time to stay physically strong. I really just try to get the proper rest. I don't run myself into the ground. — Rob Dyrdek

Once I'm in the editing room, forget about what I intended to shoot. I take a cold, hard look at what I really did shoot, and then I edit that because, if you try to edit what you intended and you missed somewhere, that will show up. — Doug Liman

I have to stop watching the Olympics. It just reminds me that I forgot to try really hard at something. — Greg Fitzsimmons

Stop trying to be different. Just do what you are good at, and work really hard. You have to work hard to be chaos. — Frederick Lenz

As it turned out, almost every notion I had on my 13th birthday about my future turned out to be a total waste of my time. When I thought of myself as an adult, all I could imagine was someone thin, and smooth, and calm, to whom things ... happened. Some kind of souped-up princess with a credit card. I didn't have any notion about self-development, or following my interests, or learning big life lessons, or, most important, finding out what I was good at and trying to earn a living from it. I presumed that these were all things that some grown-ups would come along and basically tell me what to do about at some point, and that I really shouldn't worry about them. I didn't worry about what I was going to do. What I did worry about, and thought I should work hard at, was what I should be, instead. I thought all of my efforts should be concentrated on being fabulous, rather than doing fabulous things. — Caitlin Moran

I really like Barack Obama. I think that he's working very hard. He's trying to rebuild our reputation throughout the world. The previous administration was a total disaster, a total catastrophe. He was handed a pretty bad deck of cards. And I'm not saying I agree with everything he's doing. He's a champion. I mean, he won against all odds. When he first announced, people were giving him virtually no chance. And he's just done something that's amazing. — Donald Trump

From the beginning, I've always had a knack for catchy melodies. But I went through a period when I was trying to be rock n' roll and have a rock n' roll attitude. I was fighting my nature by trying to play really hard and sing really hard. But at a certain point, I realized that I loved syrupy pop music with tons of harmony. — Juliana Hatfield

It's been great, I have to dig deep for really raw emotions and at the same time I have to use my intellect to say the ridiculous medical jargon while acting and treating a patient and then I have to try to have a personality and emotions as well. So it is definitely hard work. — John Leguizamo

My father cared a lot about me, but he never gave me the satisfaction of really knowing it. Hitting .390 wasn't enough for him. Nothing seemed to be. He was not trying to be mean. He was just seeing to it that I never got self-satisfied, that I worked hard to get the most out of what I had. — George Brett

Check this out," Nine says. He holds up a small purple stone and then places it on the back of his hand. The stone slides into his hand - through it. Nine turns his hand over just as the stone pops out in his palm. "Pretty cool, right?" he asks me, waggling his eyebrows.
"Uh, but what is it supposed to do?" Eight asks, looking up from his own Chest.
"I dunno. Impress girls?" Nine looks over at me. "Did it work?"
"Um ... " I hesitate, trying not to roll my eyes too hard. "Not really. But, I've seen guys teleport so I'm kind of hard to impress."
"Tough crowd. — Pittacus Lore

A lot of people are like, "What do you do to get pumped up for a fight?" Like, really? You're locked in a cage with someone trying to kill you in front of thousands of people. It's not too hard to get pumped up ... You've got to calm everything down, you've got to remind yourself to relax. — Stephan Bonnar

It's hard to not get typed in Hollywood. They really want to type you. I'm trying to avoid that, because I want to do a lot of things. I know what I'm capable of. I forgive them because they don't know. They haven't seen me play Hamlet. They're not going to cast me as an English aristocrat. I'm going to have to prove that on my own. That's okay. That's what you have to fight for if you want to be an artist. — Sam Rockwell

Kids who are least impressive in my class are the ones who only listen to one kind of music. They only listen to country or only to rap or to gospel or anything. It's a sad thing. I try really hard to get them to go out and listen to things. It's amazing what you learn ... I'm still trying to learn. It's not like I'm going to be a calypso singer. That's not going to happen, but I'm sure there's something in that, that I can learn from and apply to my own work. — Andy Wilkinson

What I'm finding is that when I'm hungry, lots of times what I really want more than food is an external voice to say, "You've done enough. It's OK to be tired. You can take a break. I'll take care of you. I see how hard you're trying." There is, though, no voice that can say that except the voice of God. The work I'm doing now is to let those words fall deeply on me, to give myself permission to be tired, to be weak, to need. — Shauna Niequist

Peabody, with me."
She waited until they were back in her office. "Don't hover over McNab like that."
"Sir?"
"You hover over him, you're going to make him think you're worried."
"I am worried. The twenty-four-"
"Worry all you want, dump on me if you need to. But don't let him see it. He's starting to fray, and he's trying hard not to show it. You try just as hard not to show it. If you need to vent, go out there on the kitchen terrace. Scream your lungs out."
"Is that what you do?"
"Sometimes. Sometimes I kick inanimate objects. Sometimes I jump Roarke and have jungle sex. The last," she said after a beat, "is not an option for you."
"But I think it would really make me feel better, and be a more productive member of the investigative team."
"Good, humor is good. Get me coffee. — J.D. Robb

I promise you, a lot of it is luck. But you make your own luck by working really hard and trying lots and lots of things. — Kevin Systrom

Atticus said that Jem was trying hard to forget something, but what he was really doing was storing it away for a while, until enough time passed. Then he would be able to think about it and sort things out. When he was able to think about it, Jem would be himself again. — Harper Lee

Thus the 'fortune-teller' is trying to foresee something that is really quite unforeseeable. This is characteristic of all forms of foreseeing. And precisely because what they 'see' is so vague, it is hard to repudiate fortune-tellers' claims. — Jostein Gaarder

That's the problem with college kids. I blame Hollywood for skewing their perspective. Life is just a big romantic comedy to them, and if you meet cute, happily-ever-after is a foregone conclusion. So there we were, the pretty blond girl milking her very slight congenital limp in order to seem damaged and more interesting, and the nervous boy with the ridiculous hair trying so hard to be clever, the two of us hypnotized by the syncopated rhythms of our furiously beating hearts and throbbing loins. That stupid, desperate, horny kid I was, standing obliviously on the fault line of embryonic love, when really, what he should have been doing was running for his life. — Jonathan Tropper

I think that you have to present an image that is ... true to you, and ... the way you would like to be perceived, so I think that through the years I've worked really hard at trying to create an image that is true to me. — Kristanna Loken

But, you're his son," I said, trying really hard to hate him. "You're the son of Satan. Literally."
"And you are the stepdaughter of Denise Davidson."
Wow. That was a bit harsh, but, "Okay, point taken. — Darynda Jones

I'm going to Queen Mary's [university] in East London and I am trying to juggle it. Sometimes, it's really hard. — Yasmin Paige

Besides," Shea continued, ignoring his words and trying hard not to feel what he was making her feel, "you don't want me either. Not really. You're just intrigued because I'm the only set of ovaries in town that doesn't flutter my eyelashes at you and giggle incessantly." ~ Shea — Sibylla Matilde

It's really easy with makeup to look like you're trying too hard, like a clown. That's not what you want! — Becky G

I feel more like I am in the Middle East than in any recognizable part of Europe. There really are wild dogs everywhere, and they cry all night long. There is a least a miserable, bohemian glamour to the life here. There are a ton of outdoor cafes with people smoking and drinking rakia. Gypsies leading dancing bears around on leashes, attractive people, glue-sniffing teenage gangs - contradictions everywhere. My email is hard-wired into a big, gaping hole in the apartment wall and ants and little spiders keep crawling out. I am trying to keep an open mind. — Annie Ward

I don't forget you. Really.
I was just trying too hard to get you out off my mind. — Nina Ardianti

We have a society that is going through life not talking about what's really hard about life and trying to pretend like everything's great when it's not. As a result, people feel more and more isolated. — Deborah Reber

I didn't fit.
I was a different size, a different shape. I kept trying to squeeze into a body, a skin suit, that was too small. It rubbed me the wrong way. I blistered. I callused. I scarred over and it kept hurting. I would never fit.
But, really, I didn't want to fit. That's why it was hard. — Laurie Halse Anderson

(Personal Note: I'm trying really hard to keep a straight face at this point) — Kieran Scott

Mizzy gave me a little wave, but otherwise completely abandoned me as I was pulled through the crowd. To the dancing. I guess that's what you'd call it. It looked like everyone had insects in their shirts and were trying really hard to get them out. I'd seen dancing in movies, and it had looked a lot more ... coordinated than this. — Brandon Sanderson

One of my biggest influences of all time would probably be one of my soccer coaches, Coach Darlington, from high school. He was always trying to get me to push myself really hard. No excuses. I always hated him, but it paid off. I think that's what life is all about ... when you push through the hard stuff and it pays off. — Jonny Weston

Every time I'm home from tour I try to write some new songs, but it can get really hard trying to keep up with normal life, I always get so behind. — Tim Lambesis

When I first had a child, I really had a hard time trying to figure out how it was all going to fit together. Because I felt like, when I was with him, I wanted to be writing and I should be writing. And when I was writing, I felt like I should be with him, and wanted to be with him. So I was unhappy a lot. — Jennifer Egan

Trying to coordinate everything, it can be really hard to balance. — Lindsey Vonn