Trying To Live Better Quotes & Sayings

Where I live, there's a lot of canyons. We're climbing constantly - we're like mountain goats. I'm just trying to get better at that. — Joey Santiago

Your life is your spiritual path.
It's what's right in front of you. You can't live anyone else's life. The task is to live yours and stop trying to copy one you think looks better. — Sandy Nathan

I'm trying to dismantle a stereotype that in order to live any kind of creative life, you have to be in torment and suffering. We're addicted to this idea because it makes for good bio pics ... but I actually think it's better to live a life where you're constantly exploring your curiosity and creativity. — Elizabeth Gilbert

People care about animals. I believe that. They just don't want to know or to pay. A fourth of all chickens have stress fractures. It's wrong. They're packed body to body, and can't escape their waste, and never see the sun. Their nails grow around the bars of their cages. It's wrong. They feel their slaughters. It's wrong, and people know it's wrong. They don't have to be convinced. They just have to act differently. I'm not better than anyone, and I'm not trying to convince people to live by my standards of what's right. I'm trying to convince them to live by their own. — Jonathan Safran Foer

Not everyone has to be the Chosen One. Not everyone has to be the guy who saves the world. Most people just have to live their lives the best they can, doing things that are great for them, having great friends, trying to make their lives better, loving people properly. All the while knowing that the world makes no sense but trying to find a way to be happy anyway. — Patrick Ness

I mean that they (students) should not play life, or study it merely, while the community supports them at this expensive game, but earnestly live it from beginning to end. How could youths better learn to live than by at once trying the experiment of living? Methinks this would exercise their minds as much as mathematics. — Henry David Thoreau

I think I'm better at live shows than I used to be because I'm way more comfortable with the uncomfortable pauses between songs. Now, rather than trying to talk or do a costume change, I'll use those moments for myself. I listen to what other people are playing, or just rest, or dance, even though I don't know how to. — Fiona Apple

I'm still of the same mind. For many years I've been ashamed, mortally ashamed, of having been, even with the best intentions, even at many removes, a murderer in my turn. As time went on, I merely learned that even those who were better than the rest could not keep themselves nowadays from killing or letting others kill, because such is the logic by which they live, and that we can't stir a finger in this world without the risk of bringing death to somebody. Yes, I've been ashamed ever since I have realized that we all have the plague, and I have lost my peace. And today I am still trying to find it; still trying to understand all those others and not to be the mortal enemy of anyone. I only know that one must do what one can to cease being plague stricken, and that's the only way in which we can hope for some peace or, failing that, a decent death. — Albert Camus

It is Christlike to assume that people are trying to do the best they can. I know I am a better person when I cultivate empathy, and I have been blessed for having received it from others. As members of the body of Christ, we are each responsible for creating a space not only of acceptance, but of joy and encouragement for our sisters and brothers and the stories they are working so hard to live well. — Ashley Mae Hoiland

When you live in shackles to other people's opinions and moods and judgments, it is the equivalent of becoming a human streamer. And you're better than that. You're meant to be in the driver's seat of your life, not running alongside the car, trying to catch up! — Mandy Hale

We were talking the other evening about the phrases one uses when trying to comfort someone who is in distress. I told him that in English we sometimes say, 'I've been there.' This was unclear to him at first-I've been where? But I explained that deep grief sometimes is almost like a specific loacation, a coordinate on a map of time. When you are standing in that forest of sorrow, you cannot imagine that you could ever find your way to a better place. But if someone can assure you that they themselves have stood in that same place, and now have moved on, sometimes this will bring hope.
'So sadness is a place?' Giovanni asked.
'Sometimes people live there for years,' I said. — Elizabeth Gilbert

Even though we live in a world that people are much more conscience about being politically correct. The truth is if all children were taught from young (at home, church and school) that in our short existence on this planet, that we are all here to help humanity and to not hurt it and that hands are not for hurting but for trying to help all ... our world would be a much better place to live in. — Timothy Pina

One set of circumstances does not complete you. Maybe nothing ever does. So you work on your life and you work on your 'work' and you try to live every single day like it's your last. And you try to be better, to yourself and to others. I don't always succeed. But I try and it's my goal. — Madonna Ciccone

I suppose when the things that give you bad dreams live inside you, there's no point in trying to stop them. They're going to come out whenever they decide it is their time. Better just to close your eyes and hold on tight, the faster to get the things you fear to go back to sleep themselves. — Cameron Dokey

You cannot serve people by giving them orders as to what to do. The real servant of the people must live among them, think with them, feel for them, and die for them ... The servant of the people, unlike the leader, is not on a high horse trying to carry the people to some designated point to which he would like to go for his own advantage. The servant of the people is down among them, living as they live, doing what they do and enjoying what they enjoy. He may be a little better informed than some of the other members of the group; it may be that he as had some experience they have not had, but in spite of this advantage he should have more humility than those whom he serves. — Carter G. Woodson

Sometimes when I'm having a boring interview on the telephone, and I'm trying to think about something else because the questions are too boring, and I start looking around the room where I work, you know, full of books piled up to the sky, all different kinds of topics. I start calculating how many centuries would I have to live reading twenty-four hours a day every day of the week to make a dent in what I'd like to learn about things, it's pretty depressing.[ ... ] You know, we have little bits of understanding, glimpses, a little bit of light here and there, but there's a tremendous amount of darkness, which is a challenge. I think life would be pretty boring if we understood everything. It's better if we don't understand anything ... and know that we don't, that's the important part. — Noam Chomsky

If we really want to live, we'd better start at once to try. — W. H. Auden

Nobody's perfect and I don't want to try and portray that but I'm genuinely doing the best I can out here; trying to support my family the best that I can, trying to make them proud and happy and everybody having the best life they can live. I'm trying to provide a better life for them than I had. — Chris Johnson

The idea that no matter how cold and callous and heartless the world seemed, there was somebody out there who just wanted to make life better. Not better for worlds or countries in some vague way. Just better for people trying to live their lives, even if they didn't know about him. — Peter Clines

And yet, women keep trying. They put off the rent or the utilities to scrape together the $500 for a first-trimester abortion. They drive across whole states to get to a clinic and sleep in their cars because they can't afford a motel. They do not do this because they are careless sluts or because they hate babies or because they fail to see clearly what their alternatives are. They see the alternatives all too clearly. We live, as Ellen Willis wrote, in a society that is "actively hostile to women's ambitions for a better life. Under these conditions the unwillingly pregnant woman faces a terrifying loss of control over her fate." Abortion, wrote Willis, is an act of self-defense.5 — Katha Pollitt

All the books helped him in some way or another. Quenton Cassidy was not enthusiastically going about the heady business of breaking world records or capturing some coveted prize; such ideas would have been laughable to him in the bland grind of his daily lifestyle. He was merely trying to slip into a lifestyle that he could live with, strenuous but not unendurable by any means, out of which if the corpuscles and the capillaries and the electrolytes were properly aligned in their own mysterious configurations, he might do even better what he had already done quite well. He was trying to switch gears; at least that is how he thought of it. And though it was a somewhat frightful thing to contemplate for very long, he was really pulling out all the stops. After this he would have no excuses, ever again. — John L. Parker Jr.

I spent a lot of time, a lot of energy trying to be a better artist and I still [do]. I spend a lot of time focusing on my craft. If you're going to take your passion into something beyond just something for fun on the side, you got to spend a lot of time on it to be great, and then you've got to make smart decisions about who you collaborate with [and] where you live [to] put yourself in the right situations to meet the right people to catch those breaks. — John Legend

The country is in deep trouble. We've forgotten that a rich life consists fundamentally of serving others, trying to leave the world a little better than you found it. We need the courage to question the powers that be, the courage to be impatient with evil and patient with people, the courage to fight for social justice. In many instances we will be stepping out on nothing, and just hoping to land on something. But that's the struggle. To live is to wrestle with despair, yet never allow despair to have the last word. — Cornel West

You live your life, you try to live compassionately, and that's the end of it. You do a little more than you should have to in order to be a good person, but you don't go making big changes in the world, trying to fix things. It presumes too much to do so. There's only this: if everyone acts quietly, compassionately, things will go a little better than they would have otherwise. But people will still suffer. — Jesse Ball

Living your life without goals and plans is like trying to send a letter to somewhere without adding the correct the address ... The letter may get elsewhere in some days; so your life too goes somewhere else without better goals! — Israelmore Ayivor

By doing something positive in this world, you're helping people and the future. We're all trying to help the world ... make it a better place to live. We're actually still changing the world, aren't we? — Rick Danko

You're trying to help them ... that's a good thing. But you can't always count on seeing their gratitude," he said wanting to comfort her before he added a grain of salt. "You know what Tolstoy said ... if you are unhappy with your life, you can change it in two ways ... either improve the conditions you live in or improve your inner spiritual state. The first isn't always possible but the second is ... In the end, Alex, people need to go directly to the source of Grace for themselves. — Paul Alkazraji

I live, I live, with an absolutely continuous sense of failure. I am always defeated, always. Every book is the wreck of a perfect idea. The years pass and one has only one life. If one has a thing at all one must do it and keep on and on and on trying to do it better. — Iris Murdoch

My agenda is trying to help people live a better life. — Jillian Michaels

How could youths better learn to live than by at once trying the experiment of living? — Henry David Thoreau

But one of the progressions I've made is from being a depressed teenager who saw how powerless she was to change all the ills around her to being a mostly cheerful fifty-something who realizes there are all kinds of ways of working towards positive change. I am not as active in doing so as my conscience would have me be, but I am not at all passive, or powerless. And that's because I'm not alone. I've learned I can trust that humans in general will strive to make things better for themselves and their communities. Not all of us. Not always in principled, loving, or respectful ways. Often the direst opposite, in fact. But we're all on the same spinning ball of dirt, trying to live as best we can. — Nalo Hopkinson

One of the biggest, and possibly the biggest, obstacle to becoming a writer ... is learning to live with the fact that the wonderful story in your head is infinitely better, truer, more moving, more fascinating, more perceptive, than anything you're going to manage to get down on paper. (And if you ever think otherwise, then you've turned into an arrogant self-satisfied prat, and should look for another job or another avocation or another weekend activity.) So you have to learn to live with the fact that you're never going to write well enough. Of course that's what keeps you trying
trying as hard as you can
which is a good thing. — Robin McKinley

I'm only trying to make you see beyond men's acts to their motives. A man can appear to be a part of something not-so-good on its face, but don't take it upon yourself to judge him unless you know his motives as well. A man can be boiling inside, but he knows a mild answer works better than showing his rage. A man can condemn his enemies, but it's wiser to know them ... Have you ever considered that men, especially men, must conform to the demands of the community they live in simply so they can be of service to it? — Harper Lee

Nothing is so unpopular as positive change amongst friends. It seems when you change for the better, the people around you will be inspired to change ... But only after trying their hardest to make you stop. Live your truth and don't EVER let anyone dilute your power to change! — Steve Maraboli

He's kissing me, quick desperate kisses, like I'm something he needs to live; and I'm kissing him back, crazy with the ache I feel for him, trying to kiss him better, trying to fix him. I'm touching his face, feeling the roughness of his beard, the wet of his tears, feeling the tremors passing through his body, hearing his ragged breathing. And each kiss is a failure. A failed attempt to escape from all that's happening. And I only know this when he slows, drawing it out, letting me taste regret, letting things linger. He pulls away, and I'm saying "Don't, don't, don't", trying to bring him back, kissing his face. But I've lost him. — Kirsty Eagar

I firmly believe that all we send into the lives of other does indeed come back into our own. I also believe that Christmas is that wondrous time of year when each of us renews our faith that a better world is possible. By trying to live Christmas 12 months a year, we CAN make this world a better place to live - for others and for ourselves. — Mary Kay Ash

When you're sending emails, you live and die by your subject line. Making it personal or funny can increase your open rate 10 times or more. At the very least, try to pitch some value rather than pointless bragging. 'Work Faster!' is better than 'Version 10.4 now available!' — John Wall

It's human nature to work on ourselves, to get better in mind, body, and spirit, so there's nothing wrong with trying to live life to your fullest potential. — Josh McDermitt

I think that sometimes when you get used to a bad thing
like being in prison or getting kidnapped by fairies
it's better to live with that bad thing than trying to change it. Because what if you get to chance to change it and you mess up? What if it's your last chance? — Carol Goodman

Try to cut down drastically on plastic. Recycle. Use less energy and more renewable energy. We can all live better by doing better for ourselves and the sea! — Carl Safina

What do you expect - not indifference or ingratitude?' (-Miss Benson) 'It is better not to expect or calculate consequences. The longer I live, the more fully I see that. Let us try simply to do right actions, without thinking of the feelings they are to call out in others. We know that no holy or self-denying effort can fall to the ground vain and useless; but the sweep of eternity is large, and God along knows when the effect is to be produced. We are trying to do right now, and to feel right; don't let us perplex ourselves with endeavoring to map out how she should feel, or how she should show her feelings.' (-Thurstan) — Elizabeth Gaskell

I necessarily fear change except that it's so seldom for the better. It's just that I can live with any number of things going straight to hell as long as these streams continue to hold up. If this amounts to living in a fool's paradise, don't waste your time trying to explain that to the fool. — John Gierach

Without living, there will be no learning. Without learning, there will be no growth. Without growth, there will be no change. The only way you learn is by trying. You may make mistakes but you have to remember that doing so will lead to change. Be willing to learn from experiences, grow and live to become better not bitter. — Kemi Sogunle

I checked out all types of tobacco trying to find one that would be easiest to live with, I ended up using pipe tobacco. It burned slower, and it wasn't as harsh on my throat ... It also smelled better. — David Strathairn

You know i was just thinking that it's better to die trying [to live your bravest dream] than to live sleeping. — Robin Sharma

God's dreams might be bigger and better and something completely unexpected. So I just try to follow what He's go day in and day out. I'm here to live for Him no matter what that looks like or where I might be. — Luke Zeller

There's a void inside most people.
It's been created by not being contented with who we are, not being happy with what we have, not being present and looking for something more, better, more exciting out there.
And we've always been trying to fill this void with something external. — Lidiya K.

And that's the great thing about living the Christian life and trying to live by faith, is you're trying to get better every day. You're trying to improve. — Tim Tebow

May be, Churchill had pointed out, I should stop trying so hard not to love Hardy, and accept the some part of me might always want him. "Some things," he said, "you just have to learn to live with."
"But you can't love someone new without getting over the last one."
"Why not?"
"Because then the new relationship is compromised."
Seeming amused, Churchill said that every relationship was compromised in one way or the other, and you were better off not picking at the edges of it.
I disagreed. I felt I needed to let Hardy go completely. I just didn't know how. I hoped someday I might meet someone so compelling that I could take the risk of loving again. But I had serious doubts such a man existed. — Lisa Kleypas

The important things in life always happened by accident. At fifteen she didn't know much, in fact, with each passing year she was a lot less clear about most things. But this much she did know. You could worry yourself sick trying to be a better person, spend a thousand sleepless nights figuring out how to live clean and decent and honest, you could make a plan and bolt it in place, kneel by your bed every night and swear to God you'd stick to it, hell, you could go to church and promise properly. You could cross your heart seven times with your eyes tight shut, cut your thumb and squeeze it and pen solemn vows on a rock with your own blood then throw it in the river at the stroke of midnight. And then, out of the black beyond, like a hawk on a rat, some nameless catastrophe would swoop into your life and turn everything upside down and inside out forever. — Nicholas Evans

A little guilt has made more than a few men live better than they would have done - trying to even the scales before they cross the river. — Conn Iggulden

God is home to us. He is where we were made to be. He is what we were made for. We just forget all that while we are trying to be good and independent. Pretending to be good halts God's movement in our life. Legalism or religion helps us feel better about ourselves, puffs us up, gives us the posture to be critical and judgmental and prideful. Oh, and everything human about us loves that. It feels better to live that way. It feels better to walk independently and all grown-up, not holding hands with your mom on the River Walk when you want to feel cool and like an adult. We want to not need God. — Jennie Allen

There seemed never to be a moment when he was not haunted by the fear of being thought lacking by his British colleagues. And yet it seemed to be universally agreed that he was one of the most successful Indians of his generation, a model for his countrymen. Did this mean that one day all of India would become a shadow of what he had been? Millions of people trying to live their lives in conformity with incomprehensible rules? Better to be what Dolly had been: a woman who had no illusions about the nature of her condition; a prisoner who knew the exact dimensions of her cage and could look for contentment within those confines. — Amitav Ghosh

Unscripted, unedited, and wholly authentic people are almost universally admired, especially if they have flaws, are not afraid to make live, red-blooded mistakes, and rather than trying are busy simply being. Which is something you should consider hiring a tattoo artist to script across the palm of your hand: Be, Don't Try. "Oh my God, I can't do that. I would totally mess up." You better pray to the corn god that you do. Messing up is how you tell other people, "It's okay to like me, because I'm just like you." Everybody feels a bit like a dented can inside. Even the slickest, most polished person you can think of is more aware of their shortcomings and flaws than their talents and gifts. — Augusten Burroughs

Living through art is a better way to live - not necessarily making art, but being surrounded by art. I think it's just as banal as trying to show my version of the beauty in the world. It's about beauty at the end of the day. — Ragnar Kjartansson

You're better equipped for this world than I am," she said. "I'm always trying to change the world. You know how to live in it. — Tom Robbins

I wasn't trying to invent better and better homes, but to show her that homes didn't matter, we could live in any home, in any city, in any country, in any century, and be happy, as if the world were just what we lived in. — Jonathan Safran Foer

At the root of everything that we're trying to accomplish is the belief that America has a mission. We are a nation of freedom, living under God, believing all citizens must have the opportunity to grow, create wealth, and build a better life for those who follow. If we live up to those moral values, we can keep the American dream alive for our children and our grandchildren, and America will remain mankind's best hope. — Ronald Reagan

My, my, and you accuse the Dardanos of trying to run the world. As you so succinctly put it, you have no desire to be a part of my life, which means you have no say in where I choose to live, sunshine. I, on the other hand, made no such declaration."
"God, I hate you," Bree seethed.
Alessandro smiled and tapped the end of her nose playfully, resisting the urge to tear her thick coat off of her and take her right against the wall. "You keep telling yourself that, love. We both know better. — E. Jamie

Hodge had given up a long time ago trying to live a better life or a different one;
all he wanted was not to be afraid, and so he was afraid all the time — Cassandra Clare

What we are doing in educating students is trying to prepare them to live more fulfilling lives for the decades after they graduate. And trying to provide a better, richer, fairer, more decent society for the generations after. — Derek Bok

Sometimes, there just isn't the opportunity or willingness to make things better. Sometime you can't simply have another go. You make a choice, and its a bad one, and you're left with it. No amount of trying again will fix it. Don't expect anyone to feel sorry for you, to cut you slack; you made a mistake and you'll have to live with it. — Dan Abnett

I do think trying to live each day as a bunch of moral occasions, did I live up to what I would hope, and, if I didn't, what can I do tomorrow to be a little better, I do think we can improve. We get better at life as we get older. — David Brooks

When I wake up, I expect things to be good. If they're not, then I try to set about trying to make them as good as I can 'cause I know I'm gonna have to live that day anyway. So why not try to make the most of it if you can? Some days, they pan out a little better than others, but you still gotta always just try. — Dolly Parton

I can't function here anymore. I mean in life: I can't function in this life. I'm no better off than when I was in bed last night, with one difference: when I was in my own bed - or my mom's - I could do something about it; now that I'm here I can't do anything. I can't ride my bike to the Brooklyn Bridge; I can't take a whole bunch of pills and go for the good sleep; the only thing I can do is crush my head in the toilet seat, and I still don't even know if that would work. They take away your options and all you can do is live, and it's just like Humble said: I'm not afraid of dying; I'm afraid of living. I was afraid before, but I'm afraid even more now that I'm a public joke. The teachers are going to hear from the students. They'll think I'm trying to make an excuse for bad work. — Ned Vizzini

I take very seriously this notion that my highest job is to live a better life, all the time and to the best of my ability. I need to monitor my own progress - take my own inventory - and clean my own closet. I am trying to do all that. — Marianne Williamson

Men are always trying to make the world better or worse while most women are content just to live in it. — Howard W. Koch