Quotes & Sayings About What You Have Been Through

What we're doing, or, I should say, what you're doing, since no one has taught me any good words, is dropping recipes into people's brains to cause a neurochemical reaction to knock out the filters. Tie them up just long enough to slip an instruction past. And you do that by speaking a string of words crafted for the person's psychographic segment. Probably words that were crafted decades ago and have been strengthened ever since. And it's a string of words because the brain has layers of defenses, and for the instruction to get through, they all have to be disabled at once.'
Jeremy said, 'How do you know this?'
'Do you think I'm smart?'
'I think you're scary,' he said. — Max Barry

But I can be alone without Yoko, but I just have no wish to be. There's no reason on earth why I should be alone without Yoko. There's nothing more important than our relationship, nothing. And we dig being together all the time. Both of us could survive apart but what for? I'm not going to sacrifice love, real love for any whore or any friend or any business, because in the end you're alone at night and neither of us want to be. And you can't fill a bed with groupies. It doesn't work. I don't want to be a swinger. I've been through it all and nothing works better than to have someone you love hold you. — John Lennon

You have been to hell, Ketut?"
He smiled. Of course he's been there.
What's it like in hell?"
Same like in heaven," he said.
He saw my confusion and tried to explain. "Universe is a circle, Liss."
He said. "To up, to down
all same, at end."
I remembered an old Christian mystic notion: As above, so below.
I asked. "Then how can you tell the difference between heaven and hell?"
Because of how you go. Heaven, you go up, through seven happy places. Hell, you go down, through seven sad places. This is why it better for you to go up, Liss." He laughed.
Same-same," he said. "Same in end, so better to be happy in journey."
I said, "So, if heaven is love, then hell is.. "
Love, too," he said.
Ketut laughed again, "Always so difficult for young people to understand this! — Elizabeth Gilbert

A Person spends a whole day, five days a week or more, working hard to make money, but few ever think beyond this fact. They live from pay cheque to pay cheque, drifting through life, and only realize too late that what they have been doing was not wise at all.
As individuals it is now time we take charge of our money and plan for it, otherwise it will plan for you. — Neala Okuromade

I've never been good at writing letters, so I hope you'll forgive me if I'm not able to make myself clear.
I've been thinking about you constantly since I left, wondering why the journey I'm on seemed to have led through you. I know my journey's not over yet, and that life is a winding path, but I can only hope it somehow circles back to the place I belong.
That's how I think of it now. I belong with you.
It is almost as if a part of you is with me. I want to believe that's true. No, change that - I know it's true. Before we met, I was as lost as a person could be, and yet you saw something in me that somehow gave me direction again. It was you, that I had been looking for all along. And it's you who is with me now.
I realize that I miss you more than I've ever missed anyone. In the short time we spent together, we had what most people can only dream about, and I'm counting the days until I can see you again. Never forget how much I love you. — Unknown

I've been in those relationships. You go through years of your life and at a certain point you wake up and you go, god, what am I doing here? What have I spent the last three years doing? Part of it is learning, this process you've gotta go through. You have to recognize the point at which you're not learning anymore, and be able to let it go. — Michael Franti

I've been collecting photos for a long time, I mean since I started making money. But what you have had to go through to find a good photo is like a needle in the haystack sometimes. You'll drive from one gallery to the next gallery to the next gallery. It's not an easy process. It's a very ancient model that just hasn't caught up with the times. — Guy Oseary

There are people out there who have x-ray vision. They can see through my walls, armor and scrims and filters right down to the real me. And the saddest thing in the world? I haven't forgotten who that person is. She's on there and waiting. Like sleeping beauty locked high in a tower, she's been patient and aware of the coma I've been in all these years. I realise the one hitch in having x-ray glasses is that I'm utterly exposed to him. It's one thing to want someone to keep looking, to swim over moats and dodge flaming arrows to find you. It's quite another when you ask yourself, really ask yourself, if you're finally ready to come out into the open. No matter what. — Liza Palmer

Trying to find the proper care in a civilization where only a small part of the population will ever understand what you are going through is a burden many first responders are saddled with. PTSI, injuries, and politics weigh heavily on the officer, yet we continue to turn a blind eye to them. We have made officers into robotic super heroes that aren't allowed feelings, intellect, or human error. They have been ostracized by society and stripped of their basic human behaviors.

We also have yet to admit there are husbands, wives, children, and parents actively involved in these officers' lives hoping to help them cope with their trauma. Families who do more than make sure they get enough sleep, a hot meal and fresh uniforms in the closet. The faces of the families are yet to be seen. — Karen Rodwill Solomon

Your trouble has been what old poets call Daungier. We call it Pride. You are offended by the masculine itself: the loud, irruptive, possessive thing-the gold lion, the bearded bull - which breaks through hedges and scatters the little kingdom of your primness. . . . The male you could have escaped, for it exists only on the biological level. But the masculine none of us can escape. What is above and beyond all things is so masculine that we are all feminine in relation to it. — C.S. Lewis

Hana?" Lena says softly. "Are you okay?"
That single stupid question breaks me. All the metal fingers relax me at once, and the tears they've been holding back come surging up at once. Suddenly I am sobbing and telling her everything: about the raid, and the dogs, and the sounds of skulls cracking underneath regulator's nightsticks. Thinking about it again makes me feel like I might puke. At a certain point, Lena puts her arms around me and starts murmuring things into my hair. I don't even know what she's saying, and I don't care. JUst having her here - solid, real, on my side - makes me feel better than I have in weeks. Slowly I manage to stop crying, swallowing back the hiccups and sobs that are still running through me. I try to tell her that I've missed her, and that I've been stupid and wrong, but my voice is muffled and thick — Lauren Oliver

The truth is, Rosemary, that you are capable of anything. Good or bad. You always have been, and you always will be. Given the right push, you, too, could do horrible things. That darkness exists within all of us. You think every soldier who picked up a cutter gun was a bad person? No. She was just doing what the soldier next to her was doing, who was doing what the soldier next to her was doing, and so on and so on. And I bet most of them - not all, but most - who made it through the war spent a long time after trying to understand what they'd done. Wondering how they ever could have done it in the first place. Wondering when killing became so comfortable. — Becky Chambers

Besides, what's in a name? Actually, a lot. Whether taken from a parent or grandparent, some saint, or even the late great Elvis, your name insists another person's dream of what you should have been. The portrait of some ancestral ideal lingers through heirloom names. Gender specific names imply all sorts of expectations. More than just a signifier used to summon, instruct, address, accuse, sometimes praise us, our names define and thereby limit us. They put us in a cage. — Brien Piechos

Interesting how fashion is cyclical," Jaccob said when she came out of the store with two black plastic bags. "Goth was the look when I was young, too."
"It's not a look," Chuck said. "I'm just wearing my feelings on the outside."
"Uh huh." His phone buzzed. "Hang on a second."
He rolled up his sleeve to check his HUD, but the call hadn't come through there.
Huh. He had to pick up his phone and check the read-out, which listed a phone number: an old school page. "That's funny ... "
"Dad, you're doing that thing again," Chuck said.
"What thing?" Jaccob asked.
"That thing where you have to check every single doohickey you carry around."
"I am not." Jaccob took his hand out of his coat pocket, where he'd been reaching to check his police scanner or music player (he hadn't decided which to use first). — Erik Scott De Bie

It's not politically correct to say that you love one child more than you love your others. I love all of my kids, period, and they're all your favorites in different ways. But ask any parent who's been through some kind of crisis surrounding a child
a health scare, an academic snarl, an emotional problem
and we will tell you the truth. When something upends the equilibrium
when one child needs you more than the others
that imbalance becomes a black hole. You may never admit it out loud, but the one you love the most is the one who needs you more desperately than his siblings. What we really hope is that each child gets a turn. That we have deep enough reserves to be there for each of them, at different times.
All this goes to hell when two of your children are pitted against each other, and both of them want you on their side. — Jodi Picoult

In return, Giovanni told me that empathizing Italians say L'ho provato sulla mia pelle, which means 'I have experienced that on my own skin.' Meaning, I have also been burned or scarred in this way, and I know exactly what you're going through. — Elizabeth Gilbert

It wasn't that we didn't know history. Even if you only count the real world, we knew more history than most people. We'd been taught about cavemen and Normans and Tudors. We knew about Greeks and Romans. We knew masses of personal stories about World War II. We even knew quite a lot of family history. It just didn't connect to the landscape. And it was the landscape that formed us, that made us who we were as we grew in it, that affected everything. We thought we were living in a fantasy landscape when actually we were living in a science fictional one. In ignorance, we played our way through what the elves and giants had left us, taking the fairies' possession for ownership. I named the dramroads after places in The Lord of the Rings when I should have recognized that they were from The Chrysalids. — Jo Walton

This was totally influenced by me and the direction that I am writing about and the stuff that I am writing about. There is just no way that you can be as intense as what I have been through in my life over a drum beat machine, sample, or loop; it's just not going to happen. — Vanilla Ice

He kissed her soundly, stealing her breath, before saying, "Tell me what you want, my lovely."
"I-" She stopped, too many words coming at once. 'I want you to touch me. I want you to love me. I want you to show me the life that I have been missing.' She shook her head, uncertain.
He smiled, pressing firmly with his hand against her, watching the wave of pleasure course through her. "Incredible," he whispered against the side of her neck. "So responsive. Go on..."
"I want-" She sighed as he set his lips to the hardened peak of one breast again. "I want... I want you," she said, and, in that moment, the words, so utterly simple in the face of the roiling emotions that coursed through her, seemed enough.
He moved his fingers firmly, deftly against her, and she gasped. "Do you want me here, Empress?"
She closed her eyes in embarrassment, biting her lower lip.
"Are you aching for me here?"
She nodded. "Yes."
"Poor, sweet love. — Sarah MacLean

My lady," Maege Mormont said to her one morning as they rode through a steady rain, "you seem so somber. Is aught amiss?" My lord husband is dead, as is my father. Two of my sons have been murdered, my daughter has been given to a faithless dwarf to bear his vile children, my other daughter is vanished and likely dead, and my last son and my only brother are both angry with me. What could possibly be amiss? — George R R Martin

: Their acts violated our trust. : The secrecy told us we were alone. : The shame swirling through our experience convinced us we didn't deserve the best for ourselves. : Our circumstances twisted our beliefs about what to expect out of life. : Surviving our unpredictable, disempowering childhood left little opportunity to explore our talents or creativity. It's been said, living through childhood sexual abuse is like living in a war zone. Each of us survived by doing the best we could. Now we have the opportunity to celebrate the child we were and all we did to reach this place in life when healing is possible. Now we get to update our information. And this will bring encouraging, empowering, joy-filled changes into our lives. Each time you go back into a memory, you have the opportunity to 'see' what you learned in that moment of trauma. When I was six-years old, playing with my doll with abandon that blocked out all other noise, I found — Jeanne McElvaney

Right at this moment, I only want silence. I believe that the end of life is silence in the love people have for you. I've actually been running through what people have said about the end. Religion says that the end is one thing, because it serves their purpose. But great thinkers alike haven't always agreed. Shakespeare knew how to say it better than anyone else. Hamlet says 'The rest is silence.' And when you think of the noises of everyday life, you realize how particularly desirable that is. Silence. — Vincent Price

Some of the homes that have been built in the last 10 years just appall me. Why do humans need huge homes? I was born poor and I didn't know you bought clothes at anything but the Goodwill until I went to college. Some of our mentality about what it means to have a good life is, I think, not going to help us in the next 50 years. We have to think through how to choose a meaningful life where we're helping one another in ways that really help the Earth. — Elinor Ostrom

I really do think how we frame things determines so much of our experience, and I've been talking to a lot of oncologists, like, why don't we call them transformation suites and give people transformation juice and have guides that support people when they're going through chemo so you could actually burn away what needs to be burned away, as opposed to this dread, terror, horror, which is a very different experience. — Eve Ensler

Barrons Books and Baubles had been ransacked!

Tables were overturned, books torn from shelves and strewn everywhere, baubles broken. Even my little TV behind the counter had been destroyed.

"Barrons?" I called warily. It was night and the lights were on. My illusory Alina had told me more than an hour had passed. Was it the same night, nearly dawn? Or was it the night following our theft attempt? Had Barrons come back from Wales yet? Or was he still there, searching for me? When I'd been so rudely ripped from reality, who or what had come through those basement doors?

I heard footsteps, boots on hardwood, and turned expectantly toward the connecting doors.

Barrons was framed in the doorway. His eyes were black ice. He stared at me a moment, raking me from head to toe. "Nice tan, Ms. Lane. So, where the fuck have you been for the past month? — Karen Marie Moning

Been trading up recently? You have, haven't you? You'll be squawking that you're too rational, too busy and too socially concerned for any of that. But go through the fridge - come to think of it, what about the fridge itself? I bet it's bigger than its predecessor. — Peter York

I pride myself on being able to read whole chapters into a single syllable, you know? What girl doesn't? So when Lennon said "Hi", I ran through a whole list of possibilities. Was it, "Hi, I wish you were Chloe instead of Riley so I could make up with you"? Or did he mean, "You look exactly like the girl I'm totally over, so get out of my sight"? Or was it just, "Hi, I hope you're not as down on me as your sister is and, by the way, could you be careful not to spill anything, either"? But none of those sounded right. Finally I had to admit that he might have just been trying to say hello. Call me crazy, but it could be true! — Megan Stine

This is one of the reasons we watch movies, attend recovery groups, read memoirs, and sit around campfires telling stories long after the fire has dwindled down to a few glowing embers. It's written in the Psalms that "deep calls to deep," which is what happens when you get a glimpse of what someone else has gone through or is currently in the throes of and you find yourself inextricably, mysteriously linked with that person because you have been reminded again of our common humanity and its singular source, the subsurface unity of all things that is ever before us in countless manifestations but requires eyes wide open to see it burst into view. — Rob Bell

What's past is past, nothing to do but smile through teeth that have been kicked in; only the future matters, the decisions you make from this moment on. — Ralph E. Vaughan

Kind of why I can't always go along with everyone's happy attitude all the time. Life sucks sometimes and most people don't get it. They think - well all of the people at this school anyway, they think everything is just handed to them. Real easy, ya know? Like, the day is never something you have to fight through.
I placed my hand on top of Tony's and let it rest there for a moment. What could I say? I was a death giver. Happy to do it. I had been so good at being dead. — Rebecca Maizel

Beneatha: Love him? There is nothing left to love.
Mama: There is always something left to love. And if you ain't learned that, you ain't learned nothing. (Looking at her) Have you cried for that boy today? I don't mean for yourself and for the family 'cause we lost the money. I mean for him: what he been through and what it done to him. Child, when do you think is the time to love somebody the most? When they done good and made things easy for everybody? Well then, you ain't through learning - because that ain't the time at all. It's when he's at his lowest and can't believe in hisself 'cause the world done whipped him so! when you starts measuring somebody, measure him right, child, measure him right. Make sure you done taken into account what hills and valleys he come through before he got to wherever he is. — Lorraine Hansberry

She settled into a sitting position, wincing. "Oh, my poor rear end. I hope you appreciate what I went through to get here."
Alain watched her anxiously. "You have hurt your ... "
"My butt. Yeah." She returned his gaze, puzzled. "I'll survive. Why are you blushing?"
"Blushing?" His face felt warm. What did that mean?
"Yes." Mari laughed. Does talking about my butt embarrass you? I'm sorry. It's nothing special."
"I ... " His face felt even warmer. "I think it is."
"You do, huh? Where have you been all my life?"
This time he gave her a mystified look. "I sent almost all of it inside a Mage Guild Hall. The one in Ihris. You know this."
Mari laughed again. — Jack Campbell

You should never just do something because it's what others expect of you. You have to go out there, find your own voice and forge your own path. It's too easy to walk through the tunnel that's already been dug. — Jim Sullos

You've never been in love?"
He let out a quiet breath,and I felt him shake his head. "Easy to say. Harder to feel." He ran his fingers through my hair and tucked a few strands behind my ear. With a light voice, he said, "Out of curiosity, what would you have said if I wanted to..."
"I would've said no."
"Yeah?"
I nodded. "I'm glad you didn't, because that would have been awkward."
His chest shuddered with laughter. — Brodi Ashton

When you think of a concrete object, you think wordlessly, and then, if you want to describe the thing you have been visualizing you probably hunt about until you find the exact words that seem to fit it. When you think of something abstract you are more inclined to use words from the start, and unless you make a conscious effort to prevent it, the existing dialect will come rushing in and do the job for you, at the expense of blurring or even changing your meaning. Probably it is better to put off using words as long as possible and get one's meaning as clear as one can through pictures and sensations. Afterward one can choose - not simply accept - the phrases that will best cover the meaning, and then switch round and decide what impressions one's words are likely to make on another person. — George Orwell

No matter the organization, the goal, or the mission, you've got to do it through people. It's been that way for me since my first command. I work to understand the people, their views and needs, and how tasks are being carried out.That interaction might cause me to modify my guidance or the way I delegate. It also affords me an opportunity to learn what goals people have and how as their boss I can facilitate their future in ways that not only help them, but also help the ship or the organization. — Michael Mullen

Self-respect isn't something a teacher or a coach or a government can hand you. Self-respect grows through self-created success: not because we've been told we're good, but when we know we're good. Not everyone gets a trophy, because not every performance merits celebration. If we want our children to have a shot at resilience, they must learn what failure means. If they don't learn that lesson from loving parents and coaches and teachers, life will teach it to them in a far harsher way. — Eric Greitens

You are designed for success. Life's tough, but you are greater than its challenges. No matter what you have been through, you're still here. You have a history of victory.

So ignore the haters, the doubters, and free yourself from the emotional saboteurs. Don't ever forget that you are beautiful, you are capable, you are worthy... you are enough.

Set healthy standards and stick to them. Don't settle. Set healthy goals and follow them. Let your behavior speak the love and passion in your heart. Live life to the fullest... make each day worth remembering... Dream BIG & dare to go for it... Be unapologetically you! — Steve Maraboli

Godly character is what you are when you've been tried and proven. It is not what you say you are, or what people think you are but, instead, it is what shines through after you have suffered and have endured. It is the proof of your genuineness. — Robin Bertram

My muscles informed me they did not want to go through any more exercise today. So I suggest that maybe he should let me off this time. He laughed, and I'm pretty sure it was at me ... not with me.
"Why is that funny?"
"Oh," he said, his smile dropping. "You were serious."
"Of course I was! Look, I've technically been awake for two days. Why do we have to start this training now? Let me go to bed." I whined. "It's just one hour."
"How do you feel right now?"
"I hurt like hell."
"You'll feel worse tomorrow."
"So?"
"So, better get a jump on it while you still feel ... not as bad."
"What kind of logic is that?" I retorted. — Richelle Mead

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.

In my career as a director, there's always been some point where you get halfway through it, or three-quarters, and you go: 'What is this thing all about, and why am I telling the story? Does anybody really care about seeing this?' At that time you have to say: 'OK, forget that and just go ahead.' — Clint Eastwood

And you're everything I don't want." Julie pushed away, breaking his embrace, and shook her head. "If you loved me, you couldn't have done this. You couldn't have been so careless with me. You know pain, and loss, and hurt better than anyone." She hated each word as it came out of her mouth. "And that's what you gave me. I know that it's not the same. I know yours is worse. I'm so sorry for you, Matt. For your whole family. You've all been through hell. And you've been braver than anyone could. But I hurt now, too. And I can't love you. — Jessica Park

What followed was a great treat for me. This was Irish traditional music as I had hoped to see and hear it, spontaneous and from the heart, and not produced for the sake of the tourist industry. As I sat there with my pint in my hand, enjoying the jigs and the reels, I watched the joy in the player's faces and in those around them who tapped their feet and applauded enthusiastically. Music the joybringer. No question of being paid, or any requirement to perform for a certain amount of time. Just play for as long as it makes you feel good. This was self expression, not performance. Someone would begin playing a tune and the fellow musicians would listen to it once through, hear how it went and join in when they felt comfortable, until, on its last run through, it was being played with gusto by the entire ensemble. This process provided each piece with the dynamic of a natural crescendo which could almost have been orchestrated. — Tony Hawks

So," Riley asked, "what have you got for me?" Taking his hand, she placed it palm-down over her heart. It would hurt like a bitch, she thought, but he was hers to protect as much as she was his.
"Me." And she opened up her soul, laid herself bare. The mating bond shoved through her body like white lightning, hot and wild and right. Incredibly, wonderfully right. His energy was different from hers - wolf, not leopard - but it laced itself with her own until their combined strength was far greater than either would've ever been alone.
"Wow." He blinked, swaying on his feet. "Damn. — Nalini Singh

War is being declared tomorrow here so perhaps you can understand that I have been working under difficulties, but difficulties negligible compared with what others have to go through. — Malcolm Lowry

Well, people have been wondering what's going to happen to the novel for two hundred years; its death has been announced many times. You know, I think the novel keeps redefining the world we live in. What you should look for in a novel is a window nobody else is looking out of, that nobody else can look through. What you look for is a voice. You pick up a novel by someone such as Faulkner or Hemingway and you just read three pages and you know who wrote it. And that's what one should demand of a novelist. — Mordecai Richler

I understand and get when kids and teenagers feel like they're alone and it's not going to get better. My advice is that there is a support system out there, there are a lot of people who have been through what you're going through and are going through it now. — Brittany Snow

There are many of us here. A whole street. That's what it's called--Chernobylskaya. These people worked at the station their whole lives. A lot of them still go there to work on a provisional basis, that's how they work there now, no one lives there anymore. They have bad diseases, they're invalids, but they don't leave their jobs, they're scared to even think of the reactor closing down. Who needs them now anywhere else? Often they die. In an instant. They just drop--someone will be walking, he falls down, goes to sleep, never wakes up. He was carrying flowers for his nurse and his heart stopped. They die, but no one's really asked us. No one's asked what we've been through. What we saw. No one wants to hear about death. About what scares them.

But I was telling you about love. About my love...

-- Lyudmila, Ignatenko,
wife of deceased fireman, Vasily Ignatenko — Svetlana Alexievich

You can't show somebody what it's like to experience loss, but you can soundtrack it and help them experience their own loss. I am so lucky to have this venue to be able to say and talk about all the stuff I've been through. — Zachary Cole Smith

Youth who have been exposed to immoral images at a very early age are terrified that they may have already disqualified themselves for missionary service and sacred covenants ... I want to assure you young people [that] through repentance you can qualify for all the blessings of heaven. That is what the Savior's Atonement is all about. — Quentin L. Cook

Burn wounds always elicited pain more terrible than anything else he had ever endured. He didn't relish the idea of forcing himself to suffer through such agony. But it was necessary. Earth depended on them taking possession of the key. "It's the only way out," Andrew reminded him.
"I understand that, but - "
"The trials we have faced thus far have been minimal," Andrew said, cutting off Sebastian's retort. "What we seek is the key to the universe. You didn't expect it to be easy, did you? — Laura Kreitzer

You've been giving me the full-court press since you got here, and we know what'll happen if I let you through that door. But you're leaving. And when you do, I'll be the one who's hurt afterward. So why start something you have no intention of finishing?
- Lexie — Nicholas Sparks

You don't think I know that?" Puck was shouting now, green eyes feverish. "You don't think I regret what I did, every single day? You lost Ariella, but I lost you both! Believe it or not, I was kind of a mess, too, Ash. It got to a point where I actually looked forward to our random duels, because that was the only time I could talk to you. When you were freaking trying to kill me!"
"Don't compare your loss to mine," I snarled. "You have no idea what I went through, what you caused."
"You think I don't know pain?" Puck shook his head at me. "Or loss? I've been around a lot longer than you, prince! I know what love is, and I've lost my fair share, too. Just because we have a different way of handling it, doesn't mean I don't have scars of my own."
"Name one," I scoffed. "Give me one instance where you haven't - "
"Meghan Chase!" Puck roared, startling me into silence. — Julie Kagawa

I get so much as a whiff of you not doing what you should be doing to get her through this, I have no problem stepping back in. She deserves someone who will treat her right." "I feel you," I said, nodding. Maybe a lesser man would have been pissed. He had outright just declared that if I slipped up, he planned on stealing my woman out from under me. But, that being said, no woman could be stolen if she was being treated right. — Jessica Gadziala

We're not going to make it, I said.
The words caught in my throat, choking me. What was it Leslie had said to me when we were discussing Shannon's and Antoinetta's disappearance? 'You're beginning to sound like one of the characters in your books, Adam.' She'd been right. If this were a novel my heroes would have arrived just in the nick of time and saved the day. But real life didn't work like that. Real life had no happy endings. Despite our best efforts, despite my love for Tara [his wife] and my determination to protect her, and after everything we'd been through at the LeHorn house, fate conspired against us. We were still nine or ten miles from home, and night was almost upon us. By the time we got there it would already be too late. I fought back tears. I had the urge just to lie down in the middle of the road and let the next car run over me. — Brian Keene

Getting to this point hasn't always been easy; it took me years to really learn to silence my mind. But as you move through your career and your life, you will have to learn that if you're not what you do, then what you do has no business keeping you entertained at night. — Kelly Cutrone

Ah, Toulouse, you have travelled too much. You know the gods of a hundred lands, those of the trees and mountains, the sky and sea, the stars and planets, of demons and angels, and even the Master of the Cosmos. But I am speaking of God. There are others, I'm sure, but only one God who created even great Zeus and Rama. Yet travel is like philosophy: a few years of it will perk the eye to differences, which you shall be able to notice with ease. Yet living as I have, travelling to lonely lands and through a thousand metropolises and hidden woods, you rather see the similarities. All becomes one, and God too becomes one. Not the sum of all those gods here, but beyond them, a being few philosophers have truly grasped. He has always been one, but he is severed in our minds. So it is up to us to piece him back together. If our souls possess a clarity beyond what our mortal nature can bestow, we shall see him. — Mary-Jean Harris

Did you seriously jerk off just now?" I demand.

He nods as if it's no biggie. "What, you think I can sit through a whole movie with blue balls?"

I gawk at him. "So you can't have sex with anyone while I'm in the house, but you can go upstairs and do that?"

A wolfish grin stretches his mouth. "I could've done it down here, but then you would've been too tempted to take over for me. I was trying to be nice."

It's hard not to roll my eyes. So I don't bother fighting the urge. "Trust me, I would have kept my hands to myself."

"With my cock right there in the open? No way. You wouldn't be able to help yourself." He arches a brow. "I have a great cock. — Elle Kennedy

I dare say you are planning on a late repentance. You do not know what you are doing. You are planning without God. Repentance and faith are the gifts of God, and they are gifts that He often withholds, when they have been long offered in vain. I grant you true repentance is never too late, but I warn you at the same time, late repentance is seldom true. I grant you, one penitent thief was converted in his last hours, that no man might despair; But I warn you, only one was converted, that no man might presume. I grant you it is written, Jesus is 'Able to save completely those who come to God through him' (Hebrews 7:25). But I warn you, it is also written by the same Spirit, 'Since you rejected me when I called and no one gave heed when I stretched out my hand, I in turn will laugh at your disaster; I will mock when calamity overtakes you' (Proverbs 1:24-26).

Believe me, you will find it no easy matter to turn to God whenever you please. — J.C. Ryle

Instead of being ashamed of what you've been through, be proud of what you have overcome! — Phil McGraw

Those who endure the hardest preparation are called on to finish the greatest tasks. I don't know what you've been called to, but rest assure, you won't have to go through it alone. — D.L. Fowler

And that brings me to one last point. I've got a simple message for all the dedicated and patriotic federal workers who have either worked without pay, or who have been forced off the job without pay for these last few weeks. Including most of my own staff. Thank you. Thanks for your service. Welcome back. What you do is important. It matters. You defend our country overseas, you deliver benefits to our troops who earned them when they come home, you guard our borders, you protect our civil rights, you help businesses grow and gain footholds in overseas markets. You protect the air we breathe, and the water our children drink, and you push the boundaries of science and space, and you guide hundreds of thousands of people each day through the glories of this country. Thank you. What you do is important, and don't let anybody else tell you different. — Barack Obama

The art of reading, it occupies your mind no matter at any situation or mood you're in..bringing you to completely different world, the enchanting world of the characters..giving you the best feeling after reading it..the art of writing, it shows who you are, what are your real passions, what you've been through..inviting other people to see and experience your own world..hoping they have the best feeling that you have when writing it. As much as the feeling you always have when you read the books you've read before.. — Asrie Budiasriati

PREFACE TO THE PAPERBACK EDITION How much work did you do today that you will be proud of tomorrow? I don't mean just how you handled the big things, but also how you addressed the little, seemingly insignificant ones. Did you make progress on what matters most to you, or did you allow the buzz, busyness, and expectations of others to squelch your passion and focus? I've been asking these questions of others and myself each day for more than a decade, and they are the main reason I originally felt compelled to write Die Empty. Through my work I've encountered many teams of brilliant, sharp, amazing, talented people who have at some point "settled in" or begun coasting on past success. Unfortunately, — Todd Henry

I think you're freaked about what happened at Cambridge. I think it scared you."
"I've been through worse, Bex," I said, joining her on the lower stairs. "Way worse."
"Oh, not the attack." Bex raised her finger in contradiction. "What happened before the attack. I think you saw the future. Which is kind of freaky when - two months ago - you didn't think you were going to have one. — Ally Carter

I have to say from an actor's perspective, to work with a director who has been an actor through most of their career is a pleasure. They generally have a very deep understanding of the process of what you're doing, of how you are building and exploring the character. — Karen Allen

There is nothing but water in the holy pools. I know, I have been swimming there. All the gods sculpted of wood or ivory can't say a word. I know, I have been crying out to them. The Sacred Books of the East are nothing but words. I looked through their covers one day sideways. What Kabir talks of is only what he has lived through. If you have not lived through something, it is not true. — Kabir

But if you have derived any benefit from the reproaches and wrongs which you have received, if they have put you upon examining your own heart, if they have made you more careful how you conduct, if they have convinced you of the value of a sanctified temper; will you not forgive them? Will you not forgive one who has been instrumental of so much good to you? What though he meant it for evil? If through the Divine blessing your happiness has been promoted by what he has done, why should you even have a hard thought of him? — John Flavel

I slammed the back door shut and gave Caspian a look.
He put both hands up in the air, "What? I didn't do anything."
"No. But you wanted to. And besides, we don't really know yet what can you do."
"Well, I know I can't make people disappear," he muttered darkly "or else he would have been gone a half an hour ago"
I was shocked at how serious he sounded, and then I looked into his eyes, "You're jealous!"
"He wanted to kiss you!"
Now I was dumbfounded, "How do you know that?"
"Because," he said, running a hand through his hair and pushing it back "It's what I'd want to do — Jessica Verday

[N]early every creationist debater will mention the second law of thermodynamics and argue that complex systems like the earth and life cannot evolve, because the second law seems to say that everything in nature is running down and losing energy, not getting more complex. But that's NOT what the second law says; every creationist has heard this but refuses to acknowledge it. The second law only applies to closed systems, like a sealed jar of heated gases that gradually cools down and loses energy. But the earth is not a closed system
it constantly gets new energy from the sun, and this (through photosynthesis) is what powers life and makes it possible for life to become more complex and evolve. It seems odd that the creationists continue to misuse the second law of thermodynamics when they have been corrected over and over again, but the reason is simple: it sounds impressive to their audience with limited science education, and if a snow job works, you stay with it. — Donald R. Prothero

I prefer the gradual path My feeling is that mythic forms reveal themselves gradually in the course of your life if you know what they are and how to pay attention to their emergence. My own initiation into the mythic depths of the unconscious has been through the mind, through the books that surround me in this library. I have recognized in my quest all the stages of the hero's journey. I had my calls to adventure, my guides, demons, and illuminations. — Joseph Campbell

It's 11 am and I'm sitting in a restaurant
3 beers in. Believe me, even I'm surprised
I'm still alive sometimes.
I have been drinking about you for 2 days.
Lately you remind me of a wild thing
chewing through its foot. But you
are already free and I don't know what to do
except trace the rough line of your jaw
and try not to place blame.
Here is the truth: It is hard to be in love
with someone who is in love someone else.
I don't know how to turn that into poetry. — Clementine Von Radics

In the re-creation of combat situations, and this is coming from a director who's never been in one, being mindful of what these veterans have actually gone through, you find that the biggest concern is that you don't look at war as a geopolitical endeavor. — Steven Spielberg

How easy it is for me to live with you, Lord!
How easy it is for me to believe in You!

When my mind is distraught
and my reason fails,
when the cleverest people do not see further
than this evening and do not know
what must be done tomorrow -
You grant me the clear confidence,
that You exist, and that You will take care
that not all the ways of goodness are stopped.

At the height of earthly fame I gaze
with wonder at that path
through hopelessness -
to this point, from which even I have been able to convey
to men some reflection of the light which comes from You.

And you will enable me to go on doing
as much as needs to be done.
And in so far as I do not manage it -
that means that You have allotted the task to others. — Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

The empowerment journey that is critical to your healing - and to your life - comes from progressing through the deep waters of your dark passions and continuing onward to discover not what has been taken from you, but what you have yet to give and who you have yet to become. — Caroline Myss

Some of you may feel that if you don't do something soon to change your life, you will be left by the roadside, alone, homeless and in despair. But is the despair not there as you reach and grapple to create or manifest your desires through your own effort and will? What happens if or when those things appear in your life? Joy? Peace? Or a temporary sense of relief?

What if it is relief from the wanting you have been craving for so long, not the outcome, but the relief from the constant wanting. — Kelly Martin

Jesus said, "Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them" (Mt 5:17). Yet Paul could say, "Christ is the end of the law" (Rom 10:4); "you also died to the law through the body of Christ" (Rom 7:4); and "Now that faith has come, we are no longer under the supervision of the law" (Gal 3:25). Hebrews states, "By calling this covenant 'new,' he has made the first one obsolete; and what is obsolete and aging will soon disappear" (Heb 8:13), and "The law is only a shadow of the good things that are coming" (Heb 10:1). The Matthew text is the key one, for Jesus is asserting that the Torah has not been abrogated and in fact is intact in him. — Grant R. Osborne

It was partly the war, the revolution did the rest. The war was an artificial break in life
as if life could be put off for a time
what nonsense! The revolution broke out willy-nilly like a sigh suppressed too long. Everyone was revived, reborn, changed, transformed. You might say that everyone has been through two revolutions
his own, personal revolution as well as the general one. It seems to me that socialism is the sea, and all these separate streams, these private, individual revolutions, are flowing into it
the sea of life, the sea of spontaneity. I said life, but I mean life as you see it in a great picture, transformed by genius, creatively enriched. Only now people have decided to experience it not in books and pictures, but in themselves, not as an abstraction but in practice. — Boris Pasternak

Do you know that when one who has influence with youth- be he teacher, leader or parent- seriously weakens the foundations upon which a young person has built, by faith-destroying challenges the youngster is not yet equipped to meet, he fashions a disciple who has been effectively cut loose from fundamentals at a time when he needs most to rely on them? The challenger may himself be a moral, educated, well-meaning person of integrity, doing what he does in the name of honesty and truth. His own character may have been formed in an atmosphere of faith and conviction which, through his influence, he may now help to destroy in his young follower. "Disenchanted" himself in his mature years, he turns his powers on an immature mind and leaves it ready prey for nostrums and superstitions and behavior he himself would disdain. — Marion D. Hanks

I've been a Cub all my life. I came up here when I was 20 years old and spent my whole career here in Chicago. I've always been an optimist; I believe you have to be in order to survive, to be honest with you - in health, with what I've been through. That's the way I am. — Ron Santo

Mary got pregnant from a kid named Tom
Who said he was in love
He said 'Don't worry about a thing, baby doll
I'm the man you've been dreaming of,'
But three months later
He said he won't date her or return her call
And she sweared 'God damn, if I find that man
I'm cutting off his balls,'
And then she heads for the clinic
And she gets some static walking through the doors
They call her a killer, and they call her a sinner
And they call her a whore

God forbid you ever had to walk a mile in her shoes
Cause then you really might know what it's like to have to choose — Everlast

If there is no continuity what is there? There is nothing. One is afraid to be nothing. Nothing means not a thing - nothing put together by thought, nothing put together by memory, remembrances, nothing that you can put into words and then measure. There is most certainly, definitely, an area where the past doesn't cast a shadow, where time, the past or the future or the present, has no meaning. We have always tried to measure with words something that we don't know. What we do not know we try to understand and give it words and make it into a continuous noise. And so we clog our brain which is already clogged with past vents, experiences, knowledge. We think knowledge is psychologically of great importance, but it is not. You can't ascend through knowledge; there must be an end to knowledge for the new to be. New is a word for something which has never been before. And that area cannot be understood or grasped by words or symbols: it is there beyond all remembrances. — Jiddu Krishnamurti

At the moment, he is in shock," said Magnus. "He has believed one thing for five years, and now he has realized that all this time he has been looking at the world through a faulty mechanism - that all the things he sacrificed in the name of what he thought was good and noble have been a waste, and that he has only hurt what he he loved."
"Good God," said Woolsey. "Are you quite sure you've helped him? — Cassandra Clare

Like a comet pulled from orbit,
As it passes a sun.
Like a stream that meets a boulder,
Halfway through the wood.
Who can say if I've been changed for the better?
But because I knew you,
I have been changed for good

It well may be,
That we will never meet again,
In this lifetime.
So let me say before we part,
So much of me,
Is made of what I learned from you.
You'll be with me,
Like a handprint on my heart.
And now whatever way our stories end,
I know you have re-written mine,
By being my friend...

Like a ship blown from its mooring,
By a wind off the sea.
Like a seed dropped by a skybird,
In a distant wood.
Who can say if I've been changed for the better?
But because I knew you,
Because I knew you,
I have been changed for good. — Stephen Schwartz

Afterwards
Mostly you look back and say, "Well, OK. Things might have been different, sure, and it's not too bad, but look - things happen like that, and you did what you could."
You go back and pick up the pieces. There's tomorrow. There's that long bend in the river on the way home. Fluffy bursts of milkweed are floating through shafts of sunlight or disappearing where trees reach out from their deep dark roots.
Maybe people have to go in and out of shadows till they learn that floating, that immensity waiting to receive whatever arrives with trust. Maybe somebody has to explore what happens when one of us wanders over near the edge and falls for awhile. Maybe it was your turn. — William Stafford

Catherine," said the Marquess, placing one hand on Cath's shoulder and one on his wife's. "We know you've been through some . . . difficult things recently."

Anger, hot and throbbing, blurred in her vision.

"But we want you to be sure . . . absolutely sure this is what you want." His eyes turned wary beneath his bushy eyebrows. "We want you to be happy. That's all we've ever wanted. Is this what's going to make you happy?"

Cath held his gaze, feeling the puncture of Raven's talons on her shoulder, the weight of the rubies around her throat, the itch of her petticoat on her thighs.

"How different everything could have been," she said, "if you had thought to ask me that before."

She shrugged his arm away and pushed between them. She didn't look back. — Marissa Meyer

Girls have always been told that their value is tied to their appearance; their accomplishments are always magnified if they're pretty and diminished if they're not. Even worse, some girls get the message that they can get through life relying on just their looks, and then they never develop their minds. [ ... ]
Being pretty is fundamentally a passive quality; even what you work at it, you're working at being passive. — Ted Chiang

Knowing I might never visit the archives again, I had hit on a solution to get at Mezzofanti's proficiency: I'd count the letters he received in each language. If he got many, he must have been writing a lot, and that, maybe, pointed to a great deal of practice, then to a high degree of proficiency. It was a fair social science hypothesis.
I told Pasti about my plan. The librarian smirked at me. "You're a positivist, I think," he said. A positivist is someone who believes you can get at truths only through what can be counted, measured, and observed. I was shocked - I've been called names before, but never that. — Michael Erard

Livingston: Why did users like Viaweb? Graham: I think the main thing was that it was easy. Practically all the software in the world is either broken or very difficult to use. So users dread software. They've been trained that whenever they try to install something, or even fill out a form online, it's not going to work. I dread installing stuff, and I have a PhD in computer science. So if you're writing applications for end users, you have to remember that you're writing for an audience that has been traumatized by bad experiences. We worked hard to make Viaweb as easy as it could possibly be, and we had this confidence-building online demo where we walked people through using the software. That was what got us all the users. — Jessica Livingston

NO!" She shouted through my lips.
Jared caught her hands, then caught me against the wall before I could fall. I sagged, my body confused by the conflicting directions it was receiving.
"Mel? Mel!"
"What are you doing?"
He groaned in relief. "I knew you could do it! Ah Mel!"
He kissed her again, kissed the lips that she controlled, and we could both taste the tears that ran down his face.
She bit him.
Jared jumped back from both of us, and I slid to the floor, landing in a wilted heap.
He started laughing, "That's my girl. You still got her, Wanda?"
"Yes," I gasped.
What the hell, Wanda? She screeched at me.
Where have you been? Do you have any idea what I've been going through trying to find you?
Yeah, I can see that you were really suffering. — Stephenie Meyer

I always know God is there, but He confuses me still at times. It is hard when you go through a valley. Just remember, 'I'm going to learn something in this valley that I would not have otherwise learned, and I am who I am today because of what I have been through, — Nick Vujicic

When I finish a song, I thank God for bringing me through. You have to press on and know your calling. That's what I've been doing for all my life. I just went forward. — Andrae Crouch

Luck is one thing. It has always been there, it has always been a part of my success. It's a part of everyone's success. Without it, you can't be successful. But luck is something you have to stimulate, something you have to nurture through the choices you make ... That's why things have always worked out for me. Things work out not just because I'm lucky, but because I plan ahead. I figure out what I want and I go for it. I've always spent a lot of time trying to surround myself with the right people, the kinds of teammates who could lead me to my goals. — Valentino Garavani

Fairy tales have always been about getting through the worst of everything, the darkest and the deepest and the bloodiest of events. They are about surviving, and what you look like when you emerge from the trial. The reason we keep telling fairy tales over and over, that we need to keep telling them, is that the trials change. So the stories change too, and the heroines and villains and magical objects, to keep them true. Fairy tales are the closets where the world keeps its skeletons. — Catherynne M Valente

It shouldn't have happened at all, but their friendship had been cemented in only the time it took to get to school that morning - Adam demonstrating how to fasten the Camaro's ground wire more securely, Gansey lifting Adam's bike halfway into the trunk so they could ride to school together, Adam confessing he worked at a mechanic's to put himself through Aglionby, and Gansey turning to the passenger seat and asking, What do you know about Welsh kings? — Maggie Stiefvater

In that sense, this is not a standard book of interviews. Nor is it what you might call a book of 'celebrity conversations.' What I was searching for - with increasing clarity as the sessions progressed - was something akin to the heart's natural resonance. What I did my best to hear, of course, was that resonance coming from Ozawa's heart. After all, in our conversations I was the interviewer and he was the interviewee. But what I often heard at the same time was the resonance of my own heart. At times that resonance was something I recognized as having long been a part of me, and at other times it came as a complete surprise. In other words, through a kind of sympathetic vibration that occurred during all of these conversations, I may have been simultaneously discovering Seiji Ozawa and, bit by bit, Haruki Murakami. — Haruki Murakami

All of the great leaders down through history have told us we become what we think about. In fact, they have been in complete and unanimous agreement on this point while they disagree on almost every other point. Unfortunately, the vast majority of people rarely think, they simply accept what they see or hear. The next time someone gives you a suggestion, rather than simply accepting and acting on the suggestion - THINK - exercise your reasoning factor. Ask yourself if the suggestion will improve the quality of your life. — Bob Proctor

Do you remember that piece of footage on the local news, just as the first tower comes down, woman runs in off the street into a store, just gets the door closed behind her, and here comes this terrible black billowing, ash, debris, sweeping through the streets, gale force past the window ... that was the moment, Maxi. Not when 'everything changed.' When everything was revealed. No grand Zen illumination, but a rush of blackness and death. Showing us exactly what we've become, what we've been all the time."
"And what we've always been is ... ?"
"Is living on borrowed time. Getting away cheap. Never caring about who's paying for it, who's starving somewhere else all jammed together so we can have cheap food, a house, a yard in the burbs ... planetwide, more every day, the payback keeps gathering. And meantime the only help we get from the media is boo hoo the innocent dead. Boo fuckin hoo. You know what? All the dead are innocent. There's no uninnocent dead. — Thomas Pynchon

Finally his father looks at him. "Are you satisfied now? Are you happy with the results of your actions?"

Lev has imagined this conversation between him and his father a hundred times. In each of those mental confrontations, Lev has always been the one making accusations, not the other way around. How dare he? How dare he? Lev wants to lash out, but he refuses to take the bait. He says nothing.

"Do you have any idea what you've put this family through?" his father says. "The shame? The ridicule?"

Lev can't maintain his silence. "Then maybe you shouldn't surround yourself with people as judgmental as you. — Neal Shusterman