Quotes & Sayings About What Matters

Markus definitely wasn't comfortable. He was sorry about having long legs; as regrets go, it certainly was a useless one.* Not to mention another fact that amped up his torture: there's nothing worse than being seated next to a woman you're dying with desire to look at. The show was to his left, where she was, not on stage. Not only that, but what was he seeing? It was so-so. The fact that it was a Swedish play wasn't exactly helping matters! Had she done it on purpose? As if that weren't enough, the playwright had studied in Uppsala. Might as well have dinner at his parents'. — David Foenkinos

When incomes and bonuses decrease, revenues falter, and businesses stumble, it's more important than ever to give - not necessarily more, but in a way that matters more. When incomes are down and wallets are stretched, the effectiveness of our giving is what really counts. — Laura Arrillaga-Andreessen

This thing you carry inside you, I don't know what it is. I don't know where you got it. But Harry, the past is the past. You are alive today. That is all that matters. You must remember, because it is who you are, but as it is who you are, you must never, ever regret. To regret your past is to regret your soul. — Claire North

modern humanist education believes in teaching students to think for themselves. It is good to know what Aristotle, Solomon and Aquinas thought about politics, art and economics; yet since the supreme source of meaning and authority lies within ourselves, it is far more important to know what you think about these matters. — Yuval Noah Harari

I am not a weapon. I don't want to be a weapon!
"You are what you are. I am what I am. It matters little what we want. — Amy Harmon

It [money] doesn't have anything have anything to do with the magnificence of a person. It doesn't. What matters is what you make. Whether it's a cake for bingo night or a costume for a saint or a wall of water
whatever you pour into this life is what makes you rich. — Adriana Trigiani

I don't think the amount of belief you have is what's important. I think it's what you have belief in that matters. — P.C. Cast

I hope that by sharing my story, I inspire others to stand for what they believe in and know that their voice matters, even if change doesn't occur overnight. — Dominique Moceanu

What matters is not how many miles you run ... What matters is whether you are having Fun!-RVM — R.v.m.

You never understood it, did you?" I ask him softly and surprisingly without accusation. "Despite any evidence to the contrary I do love you just as much as I loved him. Everything I would have sacrificed to save him I'll willingly sacrifice for you."
"You don't need to do this to prove you love me," he tells me urgently.
Inexplicably under the circumstances his answer irritates me more than Donal's snort of mocking laughter. "Don't you do that Tulloch Sullivan, don't you try and make this about me trying to prove something. I shouldn't have to prove it. You can feel what I feel even if you don't believe it. I'm trying to save your life, nothing more than that, because you are the only thing that matters to me. — Angela Louise McGurk

Poetry or science, what matters is saying it how you see it. Saying precisely what and how you saw, and no more. In science, poetry or describing a journey, accuracy is all you can do. Saying it as you saw. — Ruth Padel

You place too much importance, and you always have done, on the so-called purity of blood! You fail to recognize that it matters not what someone is born, but what they grow to be! Your — J.K. Rowling

Data matters. It's the very essence of what we care about. Personal data is not equivalent to a real person - it's much better. It takes no space, costs almost nothing to maintain, lasts forever, and is far easier to replicate and transport. Data is worth more than its weight in gold - certainly so, since data weighs nothing; it has no mass. Data about a person is not as valuable as the person, but since the data is so much cheaper to manage, it's a far better investment. Alexis Madrigal, senior editor at The Atlantic, points out that a user's data can be purchased for about half a cent, but the average user's value to the Internet advertising ecosystem is estimated at $1,200 per year. Data's value - its power, its meaning - is the very thing that also makes it sensitive. The more data, the more power. The more powerful the data, the more sensitive. So the tension we're feeling is unavoidable. — Eric Siegel

It doesn't matter what we are. It matters what we do. — Michelle Hodkin

Nevertheless, unless you can prove that you have at least one close Wizarding relative, you are now deemed to have obtained your magical power illegally and must suffer the punishment."
Ron glanced at Hermione, then said, "What if purebloods and half-bloods swear a Muggle-born's part of their family? I'll tell everyone Hermione's my cousin--"
Hermione covered Ron's hand with hers and squeezed it.
"Thank you, Ron, but I couldn't let you--"
"You won't have a choice," said Ron fiercely, gripping her hand back. "I'll teach you my family tree so you can answer questions on it."
Hermione gave a shaky laugh.
"Ron, as we're on the run with Harry Potter, the most wanted person in the country, I don't think it matters. If I was going back to school it would be different. — J.K. Rowling

I don't particularly care about photographic authorship. Whether an astronaut who doesn't even have a viewfinder makes an image, a robotic camera, a military photographer, or Mike Light really doesn't matter. What matters is the context of the final photograph and the meaning it generates within that context. — Michael Light

In the lead-up to the launch of my new book I Was Here, I've seen a lot of discussion about depression and suicide and mental health and YA dealing with such intense matters. What I haven't seen discussed is kittens. — Gayle Forman

It does not matter whether you are a theist or atheist, what matters is sincerity, forgiveness, and compassion. — Dalai Lama

I'm very keenly aware that there aren't very many women writing literary fiction in Ireland and so that gives me a sense that what I say matters, in some small way. — Anne Enright

Try to look less conspicuous," he instructed.
A dog barked, rushed to the end of its lead, and bared its teeth. Gregori turned his head and hissed, exposing white fangs. The dog stopped its aggression instantly, yelped in alarm, and retreated whining.
"What are you doing?" Savannah demanded, outraged.
"Getting a feel for the place," he said absently, his mind clearly on other matters, his senses tuned to the world around him. "Everyone is crazy here, Savannah. You are going to fit right in." He ruffled her hair affectionately. — Christine Feehan

It doesnt matter what you do if you dont do what matters. If you do what matters it doesnt matter what you do. — Thomas Sowell

Fool! The Ideal is in thyself, the impediment too is in thyself: thy Condition is but the stuff thou art to shape that same Ideal out of: what matters whether such stuff be of this sort or that, so the Form thou give it be heroic, be poetic? O thou that pinest in the imprisonment of the Actual, and criest bitterly to the gods for a kingdom wherein to rule and create, know this of a truth: the thing thou seekest is already with thee, 'here or nowhere,' couldst thou only see! — Thomas Carlyle

Years ago I read an interview with Paula Fox in which she said that in writing, truth is just as important as story. Reading that interview was the first time I really understood that there's no point in trying to impress people with my cleverness when I can just try to write honestly about what matters most to me. — Molly Antopol

If you're directing, it doesn't really matter any more if it's going straight to TV - what matters is whether you have the resources to make a story that moves you. — Cary Fukunaga

A silence fell between us. "I loved her, you know," I said. "I loved her." "Yes, I do know," he said, "and, you see, I did not. And so this doesn't matter to me very much. What matters much more is that I love you. — Anne Rice

Your rhythm is what matters to you so much that when you miss it you're resentful of your work ... So find your rhythm, understand what makes you resentful, and protect it.. — Marissa Mayer

All the best novels are about one thing: how we go on. The characters must survive the fallout of their own cowardice, folly, denial or misguided passion. They squander what matters most, and still they pick up the pieces. — Julia Glass

Consciously and unconsciously, an artist engaged in serious work is always raising or dealing with the question, 'What really matters?' — Freeman Patterson

August: You know, somethings don't matter that much ... like the color of a house ... But lifting a person's heart
now that matters. The whole problem with people

Lily: They don't know what matters and what doesn't ...
August: ... They know what matters, but they don't choose it ... The hardest thing on earth is to choose what matters. — Sue Monk Kidd

Talking doesn't mean you have said something. What really matters is the message your words carry, not the sound, but the reveberation it causes on the soul. — Michael Bassey Johnson

I think every person should have some faith inside him, in his heart. What matters is not an external display of this faith, but the inner state of the soul. — Vladimir Putin

Art collectors are pretty insignificant in the scheme of things. What matters and survives is the art. I buy art that I like. I buy it to show it off in exhibitions. Then, if I feel like it, I sell it and buy more art. — Charles Saatchi

You must determine your goal. What matters most? Winning arguments? Or resembling Christ? Even in the heat of an argument we should be asking ourselves if we are acting like Christ. — Francis Chan

You telephoned me every evening. I was very grateful to you. Sometimes we would talk for five or ten minutes, and sometimes for three-quarters of an hour. I liked to be in bed before you rant at ten o'clock, and I always asked if everything was all right. Of course things were not, and never will be all right, but you were all right with me. That is what matters throughout the whole of the world. "You are all right with me." (22) — Sarah Ferguson

A body is a living entity. It represents life, freedom, sensuality, and it is a mechanism to carry out our thoughts. A body is always beautiful to me. It depends on the individual work and what I do with it and what kind of idea lies behind it - if age matters or not. But in my group works, the only difference is how far people can go if it rains, snows etc. — Spencer Tunick

The point of the resurrection ... is that the present bodily life is not valueless just because it will die ... What you do with your body in the present matters because God has a great future in store for it ... What you do in the present - by painting, preaching, singing, sewing, praying, teaching, building hospitals, digging wells, campaigning for justice, writing poems, caring for the needy, loving your neighbor as yourself - will last into God's future. These activities are not simply ways of making the present life a little less beastly, a little more bearable, until the day when we leave it behind altogether (as the hymn so mistakenly puts it ... ). They are part of what we may call building for God's kingdom. — N. T. Wright

What matters is 'Have you done a better job of making our experiences feel like home on Windows?' That's our real goal, and that's what we're going to stay focused on. — Satya Nadella

Football is just a game. What matters is what you play for. — Ernie Davis

The jokes are great but what really matters for a comedian is his performance, his whole attitude, and the laughs that he gets between the jokes rather than on top of the jokes. — Jack Dee

I think we choose who we are and what we do about life events. Paige, isn't that what you've been doing since Kevin threw you out of the company? You've been stepping out in faith, trusting God to help you make your own life. Working at life is what matters most. What we do for a living is a component. Where we come from, who's in our lives, our families, our pets, and the people we decide we want to grow old with are all about life, but we make our own choices and build from the materials we've been given. — Lynette Endicott

Adults are constantly telling teenagers that it's what's on the inside that matters. It's always painful to find out that adults have lied to you. — Janette Rallison

Never say no. It always depends on what's possible. I don't care so much where it is; it's what I want to do that matters. — Michael Haneke

It didn't help matters that Khalila suddenly broke down in tears. Even Glain seemed emotional. Jess was a little surprised by that. But the real question, Jess thought, is 'why I feel so little and they feel so much.' Maybe it was his upbringing. Maybe it was all the death he'd seen in the smuggling trade.
Or maybe he was just trying to keep it all locked in a small, dark box until he could face what he felt. — Rachel Caine

Behold our refutation of the error. It is not based on documents of faith, but on the reasons and statements of the philosophers themselves. If then anyone there be who, boastfully taking pride in his supposed wisdom, wishes to challenge what we have written, let him not do it in some corner nor before children who are powerless to decide on such difficult matters. Let him reply openly if he dare. He shall find me there confronting him, and not only my negligible self, but many another whose study is truth. — Thomas Aquinas

The true function of logic ... as applied to matters of experience ... is analytic rather than constructive; taken a priori, it shows the possibility of hitherto unsuspected alternatives more often than the impossibility of alternatives which seemed prima facie possible. Thus, while it liberates imagination as to what the world may be, it refuses to legislate as to what the world is — Bertrand Russell

Did you mean what you said? You will pursue this?'
Brisbane sipped at his tea. 'I suppose. I have a few other matters that I must bring to conclusion, but nothing that cannot wait. And I have no other clients questioning either my integrity or my courage at present. — Deanna Raybourn

It matters not what my brain knows, but what my heart feels. — Raneem Kayyali

Did you ever stop and ask God if your current position is the one He has chosen for you, if where you are now is where He wants you to be? It makes no difference what the salary or working conditions are like; what really matters is, has God called you to that job and place? — Terry Nance

Surround yourself with what matters. — H. L. Balcomb

Fiction, like sculpture or painting, begins with a rough
sketch. One gets down the characters and their behavior any
way one can, knowing the sentences will have to be revised,knowing the characters' actions may change. It makes no difference
how clumsy the sketch is - sketches are not supposed
to be polished and elegant. All that matters is that, going over
and over the sketch as if one had all eternity for finishing one's
story, one improves now this sentence, now that, noticing
what changes the new sentences urge, and in the process one
gets the characters and their behavior clearer in one's head,
gradually discovering deeper and deeper implications of the
characters' problems and hopes. — John Gardner

In practical matters the end is not mere speculative knowledge of what is to be done, but rather the doing of it. It is not enough to know about Virtue, then, but we must endeavor to possess it, and to use it, or to take any other steps that may make. — Aristotle.

When you learn to listen to your fear, you've found a compass that can show you what matters. — Seth Godin

You can't live life waiting for things to go wrong, because then you're not really living. Everyone is going to die. That is part of the journey of living. What matters most is living each day you do have like it might be yout last. — Missy Johnson

Failure to summon forth the courage to risk a nondogmatic and nonevasive stance on such crucial existential matters can also blur our ethical vision. If our actions in the world are to stem from an encounter with what is central in life, they must be unclouded by either dogma or prevarication. Agnosticism is no excuse for indecision. If anything, it is a catalyst for action; for in shifting concern away from a future life and back to the present, it demands an ethics of empathy rather than a metaphysics of fear and hope. — Stephen Batchelor

What matters most has an ultimate metallic quality of death. The chasuble and the wagon wheel, the razor and the prickly beards of shepherds, the bare moon, a fly, humid cupboards, rubble piles, the images of saints covered in lace, quicklime, and the wounding edges of the rooflines and watchtowers. — Federico Garcia Lorca

It matters more how one gives than what one gives. — Pierre Corneille

We work our whole lives trying to get rich so we can impress the world with our fancy houses and cars, but in the end it doesn't matter how much money we make. What matters most are the choices we make, and unfortunately I made some very bad choices. — J.S. Bailey

Being one step ahead of a fashion trend is not so important to me. What matters is to always forge ahead. — Sonia Rykiel

The way I feel about suicide is, I like knowing it's there. I like having it as an option. Because if I'm going to kill myself, then nothing really matters, so I might as well stick around for one more day. Just to see what happens. Out of curiosity. If I'm going to die anyway, then nothing is of particular consequence, so why not see what happens next? That way all I have to do is live until tomorrow. I know I can always handle one more day. — Nina De Gramont

But any book that is any good must be, to some extent, autobiographical, because one cannot and should not fabricate emotions; and although style and narrative are crucial, the bulwark, emotion, is what finally matters. With luck, talent, and studiousness, one manages to make a little pearl, or egg, or something ... — Edna O'Brien

It comes from a deep-rooted conviction that if there is anything worthwhile doing for the sake of culture, then it is touching on subject matters and situations which link people, and not those that divide people. There are too many things in the world which divide people, such as religion, politics, history, and nationalism. If culture is capable of anything, then it is finding that which unites us all. And there are so many things which unite people. It doesn't matter who you are or who I am, if your tooth aches or mine, it's still the same pain. Feelings are what link people together, because the word 'love' has the same meaning for everybody. Or 'fear', or 'suffering'. We all fear the same way and the same things. And we all love in the same way. That's why I tell about these things, because in all other things I immediately find division. — Krzysztof Kieslowski

What matters here is that the moment Cleopas and his friend recognized Jesus in the breaking of bread, his bodily presence was no longer required as a condition for their new hope. — Henri J.M. Nouwen

You don't have to do everything; just do what really matters. — Denise Austin

I'm beginning to think that maybe it's not just how much you love someone. Maybe what matters is who you are when you're with them. — Anne Tyler

It doesn't matter that Bush scares the hell out of me. What matters is that he scares the hell out of a lot of very important people in Washington who can't speak out, in the military, in the intelligence community. — Seymour Hersh

It is not what happens to you that matters; it is how you feel about it that does. — Shannon L. Alder

What matters is this: Being fearless of failure arms you to break the rules. In doing so, you may change the culture and just possibly, for a moment, change life itself. — Malcolm McLaren

It's not what you know-or when you see-that matters. It's about the journey. — Jessica Park

There are three states of matter but what state one is in that matters. — Amit Abraham

Most philosophers do not want intellectual matters to reduce to a question of morality (obedience or rebellion to God's Word). They want to hold the intellect or reason to be above matters of moral volition. They hold that truth is obtainable and testable no matter what ethical condition the thinker is in.
Hence, they maintain that all disputes must be rationally resolvable, and a rational case for a philosophic position relies on a valid chain of discursive argumentation that takes us back to incontestable first principles or facts. — Greg L. Bahnsen

Devote yourself to your partner's sense of safety and security and not simply to your idea about what that should be. What may make you feel safe and secure may not be what your partner requires from you. Your job is to know what matters to your partner and how to make him or her feel safe and secure. — Stan Tatkin

Diamonds are held under tons and tons of pressure, extremely high temperatures of fire and shuffled under shifting of tectonic plates, for a long, long time! Yet when they come out from there and are put on display for their beauty; does anybody stop to evaluate the diamond based upon all the shit it's been through and say "Remember that disgusting hole it used to be in? I bet it was hell in there!" No, people don't remember where a diamond has come from; they just see the beauty of it now. But it wouldn't have become so beautiful, you know, if not for all of that! So why should we look at other people, or at ourselves and evaluate them/ourselves based upon their/our pasts? Shouldn't we forget that? And only see the beauty that is in front of our eyes? Whatever it was, it made you beautiful! And that is what matters! — C. JoyBell C.

I know I might look like a ball of fluff," she said, "but I'm not. Not even close. And the fact that I get up each morning and put a damn smile on my face is the same as ... Batman putting on his cape."
"I
"
"I'm not done. It's ... protection. It's my shield. It's me waving my middle finger to the world because I choose to be happy. The bottom line, Luke, is that I know what matters and what doesn't. — Jill Shalvis

When I see someone not performing, I am frank enough to tell the person that it's not working out. I request him or her to leave or change jobs within the group. But I see many of our senior colleagues, including my brothers, sons and nephews, empathetic towards non-performers. They don't want to face the issue. They tend to become comfortable with such people and they get protection. They tend to choose people who become personally loyal to them rather than to the company. I think it's important to be professional about such matters. Protecting a non-performer is not good for the business and also the person being protected. This is unprofessional too. The non-performer may be in the wrong job and thus not doing what he or she is best at doing. Empathy that results in protection would lead to a negative result for the employee as well. He or she might be better off in another job within the group or elsewhere. — Subhash Chandra

Life is about deciding what matters. It's about the fantasy that determines the reality. — Claire Messud

For at the end of the day, what matters is never the wine, it's always the moment; it's always the people. — Olivier Magny

It's not whether your glass is empty or full, it's what you do with it that really matters. — Sue Nelson Buckley

But I see no reason why a woman should not grow and develop in all those outlets which are suited to her nature, it matters not at all what they may be. — Agnes Smedley

Democracy, freedom and liberty do not make us more than what we are; it is our commitment that matters. — M.F. Moonzajer

I'm afraid too many of us Christians don't know what we really believe. Like a cork in the ocean, driven and tossed by the waves, we bounce from opinion to opinion ... We've become activity junkies, seldom stopping long enough to decide what really matters to us, too busy to determine what's really worth living for, let alone worth dying for. — Dennis Rainey

In life, everybody gets the same three chords. It's what you do with them that matters. — Greg Kihn

If what matters in a person's existence is to accept the inevitable consciously, to taste the good and bad to the full and to make for oneself a more individual, unaccidental and inward
destiny alongside one's external fate, then my life has been neither empty nor worthless. — Hermann Hesse

What matters here are the works - finally without them his life would be uninteresting. What matters, that is, are the astonishing things that he left behind. If we can get the life in relation to the works, then it can take off. — Stephen Greenblatt

Right now, the biggest shared value that I can think of is that you should treat others the way you want to be treated, and just have some good sense about what matters to you. — Craig Newmark

If you dread tomorrow it's because you don't know how to build the present, and when you don't know how to build the present, you tell yourself you can deal with it tomorrow, and it's a lost cause anyway because tomorrow always ends up being today don't you see ... We have to live with the certainty that we'll get old and that it won't look nice or be good or feel happy. And tell ourselves that it's now that matters: to build something now at any price using all our strength. Always remember that there's a retirement home waiting somewhere and so we have to surpass ourselves every day, make every day undying. Climb our own personal Everest and do it in such a way that every step is a little bit of eternity. That's what the future is for: to build the present with real plans made by living people. — Muriel Barbery

I am not concerned about results. The only thing I am concerned about is the process. How you tried to achieve something matters more than what you achieved. — Sharad Vivek Sagar

Looking and seeing are two different things. What matters is the relationship with the subject. — Christophe Agou

What matters is the value we've created in our lives, the people we've made happy and how much we've grown as people. — Daisaku Ikeda

I used to think that I needed to be part of a story, a big story, one with trials and villains and temptations and rewards. That's how I would conquer it, conquer death."
She sighed again, and nestled in closer to me. "All that matters, in the end, is the little things. The way Mim says my name to wake me up in the morning. The way Bee's hand feels in mine. The way the sun cast my shadow across the yard yesterday. The way your cheeks flush when we kiss. The smell of hay and the taste of strawberries and the feel of fresh black dirt between my toes. This is what matters, Midnight. — April Genevieve Tucholke

I think what's important for kids to know is that your decisions here on earth matter, your behavior matters and how you treat other people matters. — Matt Damon

My dad used to have an expression - 'It is the lucky person who gets up in the morning, puts both feet on the floor, knows what they are about to do, and thinks it still matters.' — Joe Biden

Scripts are what matter. If you get the foundations right and then you get the right ingredients on top, you stand a shot ... but if you get those foundations wrong, then you absolutely don't stand a shot. It's very rare-almost never-that a good film gets made from a bad screenplay. — Tim Bevan

If we're all saying that rap is an art form then we gotta be more responsible for our lyrics. If you see everybody dying because of what you're saying, it don't matter that you didn't make them die, it just matters that you didn't save them. — Tupac Shakur

And you know what? Maybe Michael didn't write those notes. And maybe he doesn't
think I'm the Josiest girl in school.But he thought I looked nice in my pink dress. And that's all that matters to me. — Meg Cabot

I have always regarded Paine as one of the greatest of all Americans. Never have we had a sounder intelligence in this republic ... It was my good fortune to encounter Thomas Paine's works in my boyhood ... it was, indeed, a revelation to me to read that great thinker's views on political and theological subjects. Paine educated me, then, about many matters of which I had never before thought. I remember, very vividly, the flash of enlightenment that shone from Paine's writings, and I recall thinking, at that time, 'What a pity these works are not today the schoolbooks for all children!' My interest in Paine was not satisfied by my first reading of his works. I went back to them time and again, just as I have done since my boyhood days. — Thomas A. Edison

The people are what matters. — Chris Brogan

what matters the most is a mix of strategy, cunning, honesty, patience, and the readiness to grab every opportunity. Above all, a girl must always be willing to do what is necessary. ACCIDENTS — Amy Tan

If you want to succeed in your life, remember this phrase: That past does not equal the future. Because you failed yesterday; or all day today; or a moment ago; or for the last six months; the last sixteen years; or the last fifty years of life, doesn't mean anything ... All that matters is: What are you going to do, right now? — Tony Robbins

Profit maximization may be the 'end' but the means to achieve this end, is what matters, and that distinguishes a company in the corporate world and the market — Henrietta Newton Martin

Melody." His voice was a tormented whisper on his lips.
"Yes," I said.
"If you ever need to escape, come to me."
"What?" I asked.
"Just come. I won't ... I would never hurt you."
"But - "
"You're all that matters to me. — Kenya Wright