We Follow Directions Quotes & Sayings

I have always been tormented by the image of multiplicity of selves. Some days I call it richness, and other days I see it as a disease, a proliferation as dangerous as cancer. My first concept about people around me was that all of them were coordinated into a WHOLE, whereas I was made up of multiple selves, of fragments. I know that I was upset as a child to discover that we had only one life. It seems to me that I wanted to compensate for this by multiplying experience. Or perhaps it always seems like this when you follow all your impulses and they take you in different directions. In any case, when I was happy, always at the beginning of a love, euphoric, I felt I was gifted for living many lives fully. It was only when I was in trouble, lost in a maze, stifled by complications and paradoxes that I was haunted or that I spoke of my "madness," but I meant the madness of the poets. — Anais Nin

Office reformers are pulled in two directions. They either follow Frederick Taylor (the father of scientific management) and the successive waves of management scientists who thought that with enough overhead cameras, spreadsheets, computing power, and analysis, they could "solve" the organization and its problems. Or they follow the dreamers of the 1970s and '80s, who, inspired by the cybernetic-counterculture movement, thought that by getting rid of that same organizational infrastructure, they could free workers to reach their full potential by embracing chaos, complexity, new technology, or all three. — Ray Fisman

Life's greatest tragedy is not that it will someday end, but that most only live to follow directions and sometimes we end up totally lost. — Alex Gaskarth

A fact was the hard outer cover of meaning, and meaning was the soft living stuff inside a fact. Fact and meaning were the driving cogs of living. If the gear of fact drove the gear of meaning, then they revolved in opposite directions, but put the gear of fantasy between the two and they both revolved in the same direction. Fantasy was and is important; it leads to heaven knows where, but follow it and see. Sometimes it pays off. — Fynn

We have allowed brain thinking to develop and dominate our lives.
As a consequence, we are at war within ourselves.
The brain desiring things which the body does not want, and the body desiring things which the brain does not allow; the brain giving directions which the body will not follow, and the body giving impulses which the brain cannot — Alan Watts

I am dragged along by a strange new force. Desire and reason are pulling in different directions. I see the right way and approve it, but follow the wrong. — Ovid

To reach your destination, follow the directions of your heart. It knows the way. — Debasish Mridha

I hope that you choose ultimately to follow your heart, and learn that whatever your plans, your goals, your dreams, life will take you in directions you haven't even dreamed of. Be open to the path not chosen, the door unopened, welcome your fear, and the choices that allow you that fear ... Through all the changes, through all the disappointments, the unexpected turns, the victories, and the pain, the losses that you will experience, there will always be a constant, along with your breath, there will always be one thing that you will know, that you have the ability to choose your heart. — Paul Michael Glaser

Most men, if you just tell them what to do in a businesslike fashion, will follow directions without thinking about it. One proceeds on the assumption that they'll do as they're told, and they do. — Lynne Reid Banks

The part of the brain most affected by early stress is the prefrontal cortex, which is critical in self-regulatory activities of all kinds, both emotional and cognitive. As a result, children who grow up in stressful environments generally find it harder to concentrate, harder to sit still, harder to rebound from disappointments, and harder to follow directions. And that has a direct effect on their performance in school. — Paul Tough

Life draws us in different directions, sometimes simultaneously. When you follow the direction that life draws you in, if you stay in a very powerful state of mind, then you'll see eternity. — Frederick Lenz

Baking calms me; it's stabilizing. It's what I do when I don't want to think about anything hard. It is an activity that requires very little from you - you just follow the directions, and then at the end you have created something. From ingredients to an actual dessert. It's like magic. Poof, deliciousness. — Jenny Han

I could crawl inside the lyrics and know each note intimately. They would claw at my soul, until I could no longer fight the emotions that took me to a place I couldn't experience. But, it was the possibility that made every verse a heart filled prediction and every beat a direction to follow. — Shannon L. Alder

I don't really believe in 'directions' in art; the rope twists as you follow it, that's all. — Graham Nelson

How many of us would really leave our families, our jobs, our education, our friends, our connections, our familiar surroundings, and our homes if Jesus asked us to? If He just showed up and said, 'Follow Me'? No explanation. No directions. You could follow Him straight up a hill to be crucified. Maybe He would lead you to another country, and you would never see your family again. Or perhaps you would stay put, but He would ask you to spend your time helping people who will never love you back and never show gratitude for what you gave up. Consider this carefully- have you ever done so? Or was your decision to follow Christ flippant, based solely on feelings and emotion, made without counting the cost? — Francis Chan

That is just one more thing I love about cooking. Recipes are certain. Use good ingredients, follow the directions, be sure your oven temperature is true and monitor your stove properly, and you are assured success. There are not many variables once you understand how cooking works.
Life, on the other hand, is full of variables. Nothing is predictable. Not the weather, not other people, not traffic, not even our own bodies. We are like seaweed, whipped around in the current of an erratic ocean. — Beth Harbison

Cats have enormous patience with the limitations of the human mind. They realize ... that we have an infuriating inability to understand, let alone follow, even the simplest and most explicit of directions. — Cleveland Amory

Directions to our apartment should always end with " ... and follow the sound of screaming children". — Jim Gaffigan

I knew now: love and destiny were two wild horses that could not be curbed. They galloped in different directions and ran down different paths where streams of desire and hope would not converge. To follow one was to betray the other. To make one happy was to break the other's heart. Yet I supposed that was part of life, a lesson we had to learn. To grow up was also to give up, and to build the future was to dissolve the past. The only thing we could do was hope for the best, to believe that the horse we chose would find us a safe destination. — Weina Dai Randel

I'm trying to get an acting gig on 'CSI' or something like that, so we'll see how that works out. I'm a singer, definitely not an actor, so I just follow directions. — Jason Aldean

I tried to make rice the other day, and it was a disaster." David tilted his head. "Just follow the directions on the box." The look of disgust that Raymond aimed at David dragged an unexpected laugh out of me. David looked between us in confusion, and Raymond shook his head. "White people. — Santino Hassell

School success is not predicted by a child's fund of facts or a precocious ability to read as much as by emotional and social measures; being self-assured and interested: knowing what kind of behavior is expected and how to rein in the impulse to misbehave; being able to wait, to follow directions, and to turn to teachers for help; and expressing needs while getting along with other children. — Daniel Goleman

Seek to know God in your closets, call upon him in the fields. Follow the directions of the Book of Mormon, and pray over, and for your families, your cattle, your flocks, your herds, your corn, and all things that you possess [see Alma 34:18-27]; ask the blessing of God upon all your labors, and everything that you engage in. — Joseph Smith Jr.

Never mind that I hadn't a clue which path to follow or whether, to echo Robert Frost, the one I took would make all the difference. The truth is, I'd bailed out of the right choice-wrong choice mentality a long time ago. It seemed so clear to me
since I'd wised up to the idea that life is not a straight road with no exit ramps
that life presented opportunities all along the way for a person to change directions. Besides, over the last ten years, I'd grown to like the idea of not knowing where a choice might lead me. — Alice Steinbach

I'm going to break one of the rules of the trade here. I'm going to tell you some of the secrets of improvisation. Just remember - it's always a good idea to follow the directions exactly the first time you try a recipe. But from then on, you're on your own. — James Beard

All my life people have assumed I'm stupid because I'm quiet, I never interrupt, and I follow directions. But I'm quiet because saying less is always more. — C.D. Reiss

The passion for philosophy, like that for religion, involves a
certain danger. Although it aims to correct our behaviour
and wipe out our vices, it may - through not being handled
properly - end up merely encouraging us to carry on in
directions that we're already naturally inclined to follow. — David Hume

The meek are those who quietly submit themselves to God, to His Word and to His rod, who follow His directions, and comply with His designs, and are gentle toward all men. — Matthew Henry

If you feel like yelling because no one is listening to you, burst into song instead. You can even turn it into a joke - "You guys know how terrible my singing is. If you don't follow my directions the first time, I'm going to have to sing them. Loudly. — Angela Watson

Many Christians have been taught that the Bible is Truth downloaded from heaven, God's rulebook, a heavenly instructional manual - follow the directions and out pops a true believer; deviate from the script and God will come crashing down on you with full force. If anyone challenges this view, the faithful are taught to "defend the Bible" against these anti-God attacks. Problem solved. That is, until you actually read the Bible. Then you see that this rulebook view of the Bible is like a knockoff Chanel handbag - fine as long as it's kept at a distance, away from curious and probing eyes. — Peter Enns

School doesn't teach you much. School teaches you how to follow directions, that's what school is for. — Vince Staples

Don't follow someone else's map. You should glean teachings from all directions, keeping true to those that bring progress yet remaining open to changes in yourself. — Deepak Chopra

Children aren't helped to become caring members of a community, or ethical decision-makers, or critical thinkers, so much as they're simply trained to follow directions. — Alfie Kohn

N]ow, even more than in the past, creativity is a key to economic success. We no longer need people to follow directions in robot-like ways (we have robots for that), or to perform routine calculations (we have computers for that), or to answer already-answered questions (we have search engines for that). But we do need people who can ask and seek answers to new questions, solve new problems and anticipate obstacles before they arise. These all require the ability to think creatively. The creative mind is a playful mind." - PETER GRAY, PH.D., Research Professor, Boston College — Robin Landa

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

The newborn infant is now seen to be wired with awesome precision ... This marvelous robot will be launched into the world under the care of its parents ... But to what extent does the wiring of the neurons, so undeniably encoded in the genes, preordain the directions that social development will follow? — E. O. Wilson

Just follow that one road the whole time! ... I hope they don't get lost, I'm so bad at giving directions.. — Gregory Maguire

You have the Savior of the world on your side. If you seek His help and follow His directions, how can you fail? — Gary E. Stevenson

The capacities that develop in the earliest years may be harder to measure on tests of kindergarten readiness than abilities like number and letter recognition, but they are precisely the skills, closely related to executive functions, that researchers have recently determined to be so valuable in kindergarten and beyond: the ability to focus on a single activity for an extended period, the ability to understand and follow directions, the ability to cope with disappointment and frustration, the ability to interact capably with other students. — Paul Tough