Work Quietly Quotes & Sayings

If we have chosen the position in life in which we can most of all work for mankind, no burdens can bow us down, because they are sacrifices for the benefit of all; then we shall experience no petty, limited, selfish joy, but our happiness will belong to millions, our deeds will live on quietly but perpetually at work, and over our ashes will be shed the hot tears of noble people. — Karl Marx

I make a habit of setting aside some time each evening to take out my knitting and work quietly on it, happily relaxing. I believe that it prepares me for sleep and washes away the cares of my day.
I will consider that intarsia, or Fair Isle with three or more colors in a row, prepares nobody for sleep and cursing loudly while flinging knitting around the living room is about as far away from soothing as you can get. — Stephanie Pearl-McPhee

I have received no assurance that anything we can do will eradicate suffering. I think the best results are obtained by people who work quietly away at limited objectives, such as the abolition of the slave trade, or prison reform, or factory acts, or tuberculosis, not by those who think they can achieve universal justice, or health, or peace. I think the art of life consists in tackling each immediate evil as well as we can. — C.S. Lewis

Years ago in 1959 when Dellinger was already an editor on Liberation (then an anarchist-pacifist magazine, of worthy but not very readable articles in more or less vegetarian prose) Mailer had submitted a piece, after some solicitation, on the contrast between real obscenity in advertising, and alleged obscenity in four-letter words. The piece was no irreplaceable work of prose, and in fact was eventually inserted quietly into his book, Advertisements for Myself, but it created difficulty for the editorial board at Liberation, since there was a four-letter word he had used to make his point, the palpable four-letter word which signifies a woman's most definitive organ: these editorial anarchists were decorous; they were ready to overthrow society and replace it with a communion of pacifistic men free of all laws, but they were not ready to print cunt. — Norman Mailer

Men should soon make up their minds to be forgotten, and look about them, or within them, for some higher motive in what they do than the approbation of men, which is fame, namely, their duty; that they should be constantly and quietly at work, each in his sphere, regardless of effects, and leaving their fame to take care of itself. — Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

I wasn't, like, this top model; I was quietly doing my work, and when I became an actress, people started doing research, and everybody found out. People dug out photos, and suddenly people became interested - but no one was interested in my photos when I was a model. — Olga Kurylenko

Sometimes in Dohnavur we, who dearly love the little children about us (and the older ones too), have looked up from some engrossing work to see a child beside us, waiting quietly. And when, with a welcoming hand held out, to the Tamil "I have come," we have asked "For what?" thinking, perhaps, of something to be confessed, or wanted, the answer has come back, "Just to love you." So do we come, Lord Jesus; we have no service to offer now; we do not come to ask for anything not even for guidance. We come just to love Thee. — Amy Carmichael

Clubs shook his head. "Kelsier. Gave us a city, made us think we were responsible for protecting it."
"But we aren't that kind of people," Breeze said. "We're thieves and scammers. We shouldn't care. I mean ... I've gotten so bad that I Soothe scullery maids so that they'll have a happier time at work! I might as well start dressing in pink and carrying around flowers. I could probably make quite a bundle at weddings."
Clubs snorted. Then he raised his cup. "To the Survivor," he said "May he be damned for knowing us better than we knew in ourselves."
Breeze raised his own cup. " Damn him," he agreed quietly. — Brandon Sanderson

Always recognize the foces that will shape my life. I let them do their work. Sometimes they tear through my life like a hurricane. Sometimes they simply shift the ground under me, so that I stand on different earth, and something or someone has been swallowed up. I steady myself, in the earthquate. I lie down, and let the hurricane pass over me. I never fight. Afterwards I look around me, and I say, 'Ah, so this at least is left for me. And that dear person has also survived.' I quietly inscribe on the stone tablet of my heart the name which has gone forever. Th inscription is a thing of agony. Then I start on my way again. — Josephine Hart

Humph,' he said, with a disagreeable air, 'the universe does its work very quietly.' ("The Bogey Man") — A.E. Coppard

Where you can starve to death in safety," I mutter. Then I glance quickly over my shoulder. Even here, even in the middle of nowhere, you worry someone might overhear you. When I was younger, I scared my mother to death, the things I would blurt out about District 12, about the people who rule our country, Panem, from the far-off city called the Capitol. Eventually I understood this would only lead us to more trouble. So I learned to hold my tongue and to turn my features into an indifferent mask so that no one could ever read my thoughts. Do my work quietly in school. Make only polite small talk in the public market. Discuss little more than trades in the Hob, which is the black market where I make most of my money. Even at home, where I am less pleasant, I avoid discussing tricky topics. Like the reaping, or food — Suzanne Collins

Above all, be at ease, be as natural and spacious as possible. Slip quietly out of the noose of your habitual anxious self, release all grasping, and relax into your true nature. Think of your ordinary emotional, thought-ridden self as a block of ice or a slab of butter left out in the sun. If you are feeling hard and cold, let this aggression melt away in the sunlight of your meditation. Let peace work on you and enable you to gather your scattered mind into the mindfulness of Calm Abiding, and awaken in you the awareness and insight of Clear Seeing. And you will find all your negativity disarmed, your aggression dissolved, and your confusion evaporating slowly like mist into the vast and stainless sky of your absolute nature. — Sogyal Rinpoche

An icon means nothing to me. I don't understand what it means to anybody actually. It seems like a word of convenience. It seems to attend to the huge success of certain kinds of movies that I did, but there's no personal utility in being an icon. I don't know what an icon does, except stand in a corner quietly accepting everyone's attention. I like to work, so there's no utility in being an icon. — Harrison Ford

Sarra looked at her daughter and said reproachfully, "Speaking of war, I never raised you to be always fighting and killing. That's not woman's work."
"It's needful, Ma. You taught me a woman has to know how to defend herself."
"I never!" gasped Sarra, indignant.
"You taught me when you were murdered in your own house," Daine said quietly. — Tamora Pierce

The hardest part of faith is often simply to wait. And the trouble is, if we don't, then we start to fix the problem ourselves - and that makes it worse. We complicate the situation to the point where it takes God much longer to fix it than if we had quietly waited for his working in the first place. — Jim Cymbala

Mr. Casaubon had no second attack of equal severity with the first, and in a few days began to recover his usual condition. But Lydgate seemed to think the case worth a great deal of attention. He not only used his stethoscope (which had not become a matter of course in practice at that time), but sat quietly by his patient and watched him. To Mr. Casaubon's questions about himself, he replied that the source of the illness was the common error of intellectual men - a too eager and monotonous application: the remedy was, to be satisfied with moderate work, and to seek variety of relaxation. — George Eliot

Now is the time when men work quietly in the fields and women weep softly in the kitchen; the legislature is in session and no man's property is safe. — Daniel Webster

We also have to work, though, sort of the dark side, if you will. We've got to spend time in the shadows in the intelligence world. A lot of what needs to be done here will have to be done quietly, without any discussion, using sources and methods that are available to our intelligence agencies ... That's the world these folks operate in, and so it's going to be vital for us to use any means at our disposal, basically, to achieve our objective. — Dick Cheney

Bessie was News, Leaders, and Gossip; Enid was Features, Make-up and general Sub. Whenever they were at a loss for copy they would mercilessly pillage ancient copies of Punch or Home Chat. An occasional hole in the copy was filled with a ghoulish smudge - local block-making had clearly indicated that somewhere a poker-work fanatic had gone quietly out of his mind. In this way the Central Balkan Herald was made up every morning and then delivered to the composition room where the chain-gang quickly reduced it to gibberish. MINISTER FINED FOR KISSING IN PUBIC. WEDDING BULLS RING OUT FOR PRINCESS. QUEEN OF HOLLAND GIVES PANTY FOR EX-SERVICE MEN. MORE DOGS HAVE BABIES THIS SUMMER IN BELGRADE. BRITAINS NEW FLYING-GOAT. — Lawrence Durrell

Never was I so devout as when I composed The Creation. I knelt down each day to pray to God to give me strength for my work ... When I was working on The Creation I felt so impregnated with Divine certainty, that before sitting down to the piano, I would quietly and confidently pray to God to grant me the talent that was needed to praise Him worthily. — Joseph Haydn

We can not be swallowed up like those little pebbles. We aren't pebbles. We won't just quietly sink to the bottom. We can run, we can fight, and we can work. We are not helpless unless we let ourselves be. — Sook Nyul Choi

I phoned Joe Roth, who was head of the studio at the time, and told him how beautiful the film was, and that I was fully ready to support it, that Michael's work was wonderful and I imagined that Daniel would feel the same. He listened quietly and read between the lines. — Madeleine Stowe

Some people may find material chores irksome; they would prefer to use their time to talk and be with others. They haven't yet realized that the thousand and one small things that have to be done each day, the cycle of dirtying and cleaning, were given by God to enable us to communicate through matter. . . . We are all called to do, not extraordinary things, but very ordinary things, with an extraordinary love that flows from the heart of God.

. . . A community which has a sense of work done well, quietly and lovingly, humbly and without fuss, can become a community where the presence of God is profoundly lived. . . . So the community will take on a whole contemplative dimension. — Jean Vanier

I leaned back on my elbows and basked in the warming spring sun. There was a curious peace in this day, a sense of things working quietly in their proper courses, nothing minding the upsets and turmoils of human concerns. Perhaps it was the peace that one always finds outdoors, far enough away from buildings and clatter. Maybe it was the result of gardening, that quiet sense of pleasure in touching growing things, the satisfaction of helping them thrive. Perhaps just the relief of finally having found work to do, rather than rattling around the castle feeling out of place, conspicuous as an inkblot on parchment. — Diana Gabaldon

To quietly work away at disposing of your own excess is actually the best way of dealing with a family that doesn't tidy. — Marie Kondo

To find the point where hypothesis and fact meet; the delicate equilibrium between dream and reality; the place where fantasy and earthly things are metamorphosed into a work of art; the hour when faith in the future becomes knowledge of the past; to lay down one's power for others in need; to shake off the old ordeal and get ready for the new; to question, knowing that never can the full answer be found; to accept uncertainties quietly, even our incomplete knowledge of God; this is what man's journey is about, I think. — Lillian Smith

When you totally commit yourself to a project and do your work quietly and well, unknown friends will find you and angels will surround you. — Michael Hogan

The Kingdom of God works into us like yeast, and it grows like a seed in good soil. It enters quietly, holistically, radically, joyfully subversive, right into the core of our humanity, unfurling, renewing, and giving work to our hands. It shows up when we live loved and where we love each other well. And the Kingdom of God lasts. — Sarah Bessey

There are people out there who don't actively hold you back as much as they work quietly on your insecurities so that you hold yourself back. — Michael James Jackson

God smiles on those who quietly do his dirty work, my girl. — Laura Bickle

But in the military you don't get trusted positions just because of your ability. You also have to attract the notice of superior officers. You have to be liked. You have to fit in with the system. You have to look like what the officers above you think that officers should look like. You have to think in ways that they are comfortable with.
The result was that you ended up with a command structure that was top-heavy with guys who looked good in uniform and talked right and did well enough not to embarrass themselves, while the really good ones quietly did all the serious work and bailed out their superiors and got blamed for errors they had advised against until they eventually got out.
That was the military. — Orson Scott Card

So ... It's just that I have a problem with voltage. I don't know how to explain it ... I often get the feeling I've got a button missing, you know, some knob for adjusting the volume. I always go too far to one extreme or the other. I can never find the right balance and whatever I take a fancy to - well, it always ends badly." She was surprised at herself. Why was she confiding in him like this? Slightly tipsy, maybe? "When I drink, I drink too much, when I smoke, I fuck myself up, when I love, I go out of my mind and when I work, it's into the ground. Dead. I don't know how to do things normally, quietly, I - — Anna Gavalda

What does that look like to you?" he said. "A forgery." He shrugged, snorted quietly. "That's right, Heller. We have teams of forgers at work creating phony documents just for you." His sarcasm was subtle. "Now do you see? Starting to recognize your brother's modus operandi? Steal a bunch of money, then, when you realize that you've messed with the wrong guys, do the cowardly thing and run? Wonder where he got that from." "Screw you." I no longer felt bad about making up that story about his cigars. "Oh, believe me, it's the truth. Maybe to Victor Heller's sons that's nothing more than loose change you find under your sofa cushions. But not to me. And certainly not to Allen Granger. — Joseph Finder

Bucky's expression wasn't hostile, but it was serious. "Someday I'm going to fight and you won't be at my back."
"Nonsense. I'm your friend. Who I work for doesn't change that."
"If you leave it too long, you won't have a choice anymore. If the Steam Council turns on the people, each of us is going to have to decide where we belong."
"And you're going to play the rebel? You won't even carry a gun," Tobias snapped. "Your father may own an arms factory, but you make toys for a living."
"I don't carry a gun because I'm too good a shot," Bucky said quietly. "But when I fire, I don't miss. I never want to find you in my sights."
"It's not that simple," Tobias shot back, feeling a need for justification.
Bucky shrugged. "No, but the barons are running out of time, and that means we won't have many more chances to talk before everything falls apart. — Emma Jane Holloway

I believe in doing my work quietly and not make a big hullabaloo about it. That is how I operate. I don't see any other reason to be visible for; I like it when people talk about my work - that is what I am here for. — Sonakshi Sinha

I want to get the joke to work without having to put any words or to say anything. I just want the person to look at it, and quietly in their brain, they can just put it together and say, "Cool, that one works". — Demetri Martin

Ungrace does its work quietly and lethally, like a poisonous, undetectable gas. A father dies unforgiven. A mother who once carried a child in her own body does not speak to that child for half its life. The toxin steals on, from generation to generation. — Philip Yancey

I hope to work, support my children and die quietly without pain. — Sean Connery

You will not get to steal quietly into heaven, into Christ's company, without a conflict and a cross. I find crosses to be Christ's carved work that he marks out for us and that with crosses he portraits us to his own image, cutting away pieces of our ill and corruption. Lord cut - Lord carve - Lord wound - Lord do anything that may perfect thy Father's image in us and make us ready for glory. — Samuel Rutherford

Gradually the idea for a book began to take shape. It was to be a wildly ambitious and intolerant work, a kind of 'Anatomy of Restlessness' that would enlarge on Pascal's dictum about the man sitting quietly in a room. The argument, roughly, was as follows: that in becoming human, man had acquired, together with his straight legs and striding walk, a migratory 'drive' or instinct to walk long distances through the seasons; that this 'drive' was inseparable from his central nervous system; and, that, when warped in conditions of settlement, it found outlets in violence, greed, status-seeking or a mania for the new. This would explain why mobile societies such as the gypsies were egalitarian, thing-free and resistant to change; also why, to re-establish the harmony of the First State, all the great teachers - Buddha, Lao-tse, St Francis - had set the perpetual pilgrimage at the heart of their message and told their disciples, literally, to follow The Way. — Bruce Chatwin

The next time you are trying to be creative in a meeting, gently lean forward and pull against the table. When the going gets tough, cross your arms to help perseverance in the face of failure. If that doesn't work, lie down. If anyone accuses you of being lazy, quietly explain that you are employing your locus coeruleus in the war against rigid thinking. — Richard Wiseman

Nurses quietly go about their work in a noble profession, uncelebrated soldiers toiling through the days and nights in service to the sick, the injured and the dying. — Steve Lopez

University, he said quietly. It sounded like a dream; it tasted like damnation. — Nora Sakavic

Let me tell you-no, let me quietly explain to you: the percentage of this school is no higher than that at your present school; the only difference is that this group TRIES harder, therefore it achieves more. You, as most mortals in this world do, fall into a middle or average category with respect to brains, abilities or what have you - and that is not the worst place to be, believe me. However when you join a school or group of this caliber, your work patterns and efforts automatically move up in such a way that you hardly notice because YOU ARE GOING ALONG WITH THE TIDE - one that is NOT going out. — G. Kingsley Ward

She's a woman. Like a chameleon does, a woman quietly blends into all the parts of her life. Sometimes you can hardly tell she's there, she's so quiet going on about her business. Feed the baby. Muck the stables. Make soup from stones. Make a sheet into a dress. She doesn't count on destiny for anything. She knows its her own hands, her own arms, her own thighs and breasts that have to do the work. Destiny is bigger in men's lives. Destiny is a welcome guest in a man's house. She barely knocks and he's there to open the door. "Yes, yes. You do it," he says to destiny and lumbers back to his chair. — Marlena De Blasi

We don't give up, even when things are bad.
We pay our debts.
We work hard.
We act decently.
We help our neighbours if they need it.
We do what we say we will do.
We don't want much attention.
We look after our own.
We are proud of what we do.
We try to be quietly smart.
We take chances sometimes to get on.
We will fail sometimes.
We will be affected by the wider world...
But we hold on to who we are. — James Rebanks

Don't hate anyone," Beata said quietly. "It's too much work. And it only poisons you. — Danielle Steel

What, are you, crazy?' 'It's a possibility I haven't ruled out yet', said Zaphod quietly. 'I know as much about myself as my mind can work out under its current conditions. And its current conditions are not good. — Douglas Adams

I don't want you to kill anyone at all," I say. "Not just Adam."
Warner laughs a sharp, strange laugh. He looks almost relieved. "Do you have any other stipulations?"
"Not really."
"You don't want to fix me, then? You don't have a long list of things I need to work on?"
"No." I stare out the window. The view is so bleak. So cold. Covered in ice and snow. "There's nothing wrong with you that isn't already wrong with me," I say quietly. "And it I were smart I'd first figure out how to fix myself. — Tahereh Mafi

Would you like to save the world from the degradation and destruction it seems destined for? Then step away from shallow mass movements and quietly go to work on your own self-awareness. If you want to awaken all of humanity, then awaken all of yourself. If you want to eliminate the suffering in the world, then eliminate all that is dark and negative in yourself. Truly, the greatest gift you have to give is that of your own self-transformation. — Lao-Tzu

Most people live uncomplicated lives. They have work and quietly rear their children. There is an order and sanity about them that keeps the world going. There is an outer disorder and insanity about my life which makes me a victim. One of the disorders is that they won't give us citizenship here ... — Bessie Head

One must be without error out here. Walk in single file. Work quietly. Pack an extra number 2 pencil. Make no mistakes. But you are human and you will make mistakes. You will misjudge. You will yell. You will drink too much. You will hang out with people you shouldn't. Not all of us can always be Jackie Robinson - not even Jackie Robinson was always Jackie Robinson. — Ta-Nehisi Coates

The boy is destined for greatness, but with you, he is in danger. You are linked, the two of you. You must leave him. This is what I have seen."
I grew frustrated. "Is he in danger because of me?"
"He will die before his time with you by his side, unless you let him go. Fate or chance? Coincidence or destiny? I cannot say." Her voice had turned soft.
Soft and sad.
A fist closed around my heart. I tried to let him go once before. It didn't work.
"I can't," was all I said to her, and quietly.
"Then you will love him to ruins," she said, and let my hands go. — Michelle Hodkin

In our town - our town of shadows, our town of mystery - it seems our buildings have, without reason, begun to disappear completely. Still full of their loyal inhabitants, the buildings and the people all disintegrate soundlessly. The air has been hard to breathe, full of regret and the glassy voices of the unsurprised dead. Our commuters have begun carrying photographs of their loved ones with them to work. On the bus, we look at each other, pictures of our sad wives and doubtful children huddled close to our chests, quietly imagining the silent elaborations of our own deaths. We are disappointed coming home that evening because the many photos betray our cowardice: We live in a town that is disappearing, and worse, like the buildings, our hope is gone and we are no longer surprised by anything. — Joe Meno

And the artist, Jaume Plensa's philosophy?" "No, not that." Philippe continued, his voice becoming quietly intimate. "I read an interview with him that touched me deeply. The feeling he expresses through this work is that letters are like bricks. They help us to construct our thoughts. He described his belief that our skin is permanently and invisibly tattooed with the text of our life experiences, and then someone comes along - a friend, a lover - who is able to decipher these tattoos." Biting — Patricia Sands

I thank all missionaries, men and women who quietly work hard for the Lord and their brothers and sisters. — Pope Francis

I love to sit and eat quietly and enjoy each bite, aware of the presence of my community, aware of all the hard and loving work that has gone into my food. — Nhat Hanh

Top Secret: I am not really a writer, I'm a magician (I'm a hustla'). While I wave my words with one hand in an attempt to distract you, I'm slowly and quietly reaching inside of you, to try to pull out your deepest emotions related to love ...
Be it a smile or a sigh.
There, did it work?
Did you forget I was writing?
Did you forget it was a magic act?
Did I succeed?
Did you smile?
I did.
There, now you did!
See ... — Jose N. Harris

I think governments are quietly terrified. There's massive unemployment, a recession they don't know how to deal with, and the measures they've taken are not working yet, and maybe they're not going to work. There's a prospect of significant social disorder. — Simon Critchley

What a delight it is to think that you are quietly & philosophically at work in the pursuit of science ... rather than fighting amongst the crowd of black passions & motives that seem now a days to urge men every where into action. What incredible scenes every where, what unworthy motives ruled for the moment, under high sounding phrases and at the last what disgusting revolutions. — Michael Faraday

Day made quick work of drying his body, brushed his teeth, and walked back into the bedroom. God was already in bed, his large form taking up the entire right side of the California king-size mattress. The starch white sheet was draped loosely over his lower half. Day walked over and grabbed the two bottles of water and set them on his nightstand just in case he needed it. He climbed onto the tall bed and was grabbed by strong hands and settled on top of his naked lover.

"Cash," Day moaned.

"Shhh. Just need to hold you," God said quietly as he rested his chin on top of Day's wet hair and squeezed him hard against him, protecting him as if someone might come in the middle of the night and try to snatch him away.

Day rose and fell slightly with God's steady breaths. It was only nine thirty but it wasn't long before Day's exhaustion had him drifting off to sleep. — A.E. Via

I think the best results are obtained by people who work quietly away at limited objectives, such as the abolition of the slave trade, or prison reform, or factory acts, or tuberculosis, not by those who think they can achieve universal justice, or health, or peace. — C.S. Lewis

Jesus gave us a model for the work of the church at the Last Supper. While his disciples kept proposing more organization - Hey, let's elect officers, establish hierarchy, set standards of professionalism - Jesus quietly picked up a towel and basin of water and began to wash their feet. — Philip Yancey

Grace works ahead of us to draw us toward faith, to begin its work in us. Even the first fragile intuition of conviction of sin, the first intimation of our need of God, is the work of preparing, prevening grace, which draws us gradually toward wishing to please God. Grace is working quietly at the point of our desiring, bringing us in time to despair over our own unrighteousness, challenging our perverse dispositions, so that our distorted wills cease gradually to resist the gift of God. — Thomas C. Oden

I've had the opportunity to work with so many great directors. Different styles, as well, like Gus Van Sant. He just does the casting and the milieu and let's you do your thing, quietly. Bertolucci, who can talk to you about your internal world in quite a creative way or just say, 'Well, put your hand over here.' — Keanu Reeves

Do the elevators work?" I ask Uriah, as quietly as I can. "Sure they do." says Zeke, rolling his eyes, "You think I'm stupid enough not to come here early and turn on the emergency generator?" "Yeah," says Uriah. "I kinda do. — Veronica Roth

I don't really listen to my work. If I have to DJ and I play something, I hear it. But I don't sit quietly and listen to my work; I'm always off to do the next thing. — Q-Tip

No, there wouldn't be," Holden said. "It'd be entirely different." Sally looked at him; he had contradicted her so quietly. "It wouldn't be the same at all. We'd have to go downstairs in elevators with suitcases and stuff. We'd have to call up everyone and tell 'em goodbye and send 'em postcards. And I'd have to work at my father's and ride in Madison Avenue buses and read newspapers. We'd have to go to the Seventy-second Street all the time and see newsreels. Newsreels! There's always a dumb horse race and some dame breaking a bottle over a ship. You don't see what I mean at all." "Maybe I don't. Maybe you don't, either," Sally said. Holden stood up, with his skates swung over one shoulder. "You give me a royal pain," he announced quite dispassionately. — J.D. Salinger

He who believes in God is not careful for the morrow, but labors joyfully and with a great heart. "For He giveth His beloved, as in sleep." They must work and watch, yet never be careful or anxious, but commit all to Him, and live in serene tranquility; with a quiet heart, as one who sleeps safely and quietly. — Martin Luther

Those who are excellent at their work have learned to comfortably coexist with failure. The excellent fail more often than the mediocre. They begin more. They attempt more. They attack more. Mastery lives quietly atop a mountain of mistakes. — Eric Greitens

And so he did his endless work,' I continued quietly, 'without feeling, without pity, without rest, for to open his heart to these would be to open his heart to his loneliness and longing and that was beyond bearing. — Martine Leavitt

Sit down, Lanie, and eat. It's getting cold."
I took two steps into the room, stopped and said quietly but firmly, "I don't have the energy to spar with you tonight. I've been working for five hours and although not physically taxing, it's been mentally draining. I just want a quiet night." I shook my head and amended, "No, I need a quiet night."
"Then it's good we're just gonna watch TV. And when I fuck you later, you're golden. I'll do all the work. — Kristen Ashley

You don't need to wait another day to figure out your calling. You're living it, dear one. Your gifts have a place right now, in the job you have, in your stage of life, with the people who surround you. Calling is virtually never big or famous work; that is rarely the way the kingdom comes. It shows up quietly, subversively, almost invisibly. Half the time, it is unplanned - just the stuff of life in which a precious human steps in, the good news personified. — Jen Hatmaker

You nightmare, gasped and jerk up all at once where I bolt too, hand flown to rest on his kidneys. Confused bedclothes, the sulphurous dark. Worse for you, the same war, another battle so undoing that in daylight you won't admit it, nothing, nothing, avert and work. His purple-circled eyes could have been anywhere. She sets a pan, quietly, of biscuits. Bring me morning's water bucket, then turn wordless out. Finished enough, now I will out too, Mr. Whitman in scandalous hand with a leaf to hold my place. Rivering. Greening. It all stops, water too silty and feet booted, she crooks in a moss-tree and is lost, forgets even to ask for moccasins. I have wrapped fear into linen and hoped it into lavender, saved for funerary. At noon he looks; returns, admits. Across the tablecloth can ask Where did you come from. — JSA Lowe

If you could once make up your mind never to undertake more work ... than you can carry on calmly, quietly, without hurry or flurry ... and if the instant you feel yourself growing nervous and ... out of breath, you would stop and take a breath, you would find this simple common-sense rule doing for you what no prayers or tears could ever accomplish. — Elizabeth Prentiss

Freeman had exercised what the dapper man called his best talent: Sitzfleisch. Freeman had explained that this German word had no equivalent in English, and literally translated as "Sitflesh." It meant the ability to sit still and work quietly. — Gregory Benford

It struck me how comfortable I felt with him, as if we were old friends or had already done this many times over, him handing me pages with his heart on his sleeve - he couldn't pretend this work didn't mean everything to him - me reading his words, quietly amazed by what he could do. — Paula McLain

Sit quietly, on your own or with others, and decide where you wish to send the energy and what quality you wish to send. 2. Place your hands in front of you as if they were holding a ball. 3. Ask the angels to work with you. 4. Focus on seeing the quality that you wish to send filling the ball you are holding. As you do so, hum softly and imagine a colour expanding the ball. 5. When your humming ball is vibrating with the qualities and love you wish to offer, picture the person to whom you are projecting it, and imagine them receiving it. (You can also mentally throw humming balls to places, situations or people you have never met.) 6. Close down by touching each chakra in turn, and placing a cross or other symbol of protection that is meaningful to you, over them. — Diana Cooper

The immigrant artist shares with all other artists the desire to interpret and possibly remake his or her own world. So though we may not be creating as dangerously as our forebears - though we are not risking torture, beatings, execution, though exile does not threaten us into perpetual silence - still, while we are at work bodies are littering the streets somewhere. People are buried under rubble somewhere. Mass graves are being dug somewhere. Survivors are living in makeshift tent cities and refugee camps somewhere, shielding their heads from the rain, closing their eyes, covering their ears, to shut out the sounds of military "aid" helicopters. And still, many are reading, and writing, quietly, quietly. — Edwidge Danticat

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

Whether at home or at work, ISTJs are nothing if not reliable, particularly when it comes to inspecting the people and things in their jurisdiction-quietly seeing to it that uniform quality of product is maintained, and that those around them uphold certain standards of attitude and conduct. — David Keirsey

See the flower, how generously it distributes perfume and honey. When it's work is done, it falls away quietly. Try to be like the flower, unassuming despite all it's qualities. — A. P. J. Abdul Kalam

The spark of life is not gain. Nor is it luxury. The spark of life is movement. Color. Love. And furthermore ... if you really want to enjoy life, you must work quietly and humbly to realize your delusions of grandeur. — Mark Helprin

Some of the most relaxing weekends I have ever enjoyed were those I spent quietly with a sense of all work to date completed, and an absorbing mystery. — Aung San Suu Kyi

You know, we're a victim of our own success," the former senator said quietly. "We've managed to handle every nation-state that ever crossed us, but these invisible bastards who work for their vision of God are harder to identify and track. — Tom Clancy

Indeed you do love all the brethren throughout Macedonia. But we exhort you, brethren, to do so more and more, 11to aspire to live quietly, to mind your own affairs, and to work with your hands, as we charged you; * 12so that you may command the respect of outsiders, and be dependent on nobody. — Anonymous

Personally, I have nothing against work, particularly when performed, quietly and unobtrusively, by someone else. I just don't happen to think it's an appropriate subject for an 'ethic.' — Barbara Ehrenreich

If we can't forget, how can we forgive? I believe that forgiving can't be done by willpower alone. I can will myself to write out my own memories and feelings. I can will myself to imagine onto the page how someone else may have felt. I can will myself to research someone else's life in order to better understand what happened. But I don't think I can forgive by simply willing to forgive. Forgiving happens to us when our hearts are ready. Sometimes it takes the form of working on our own story until quietly, often surprisingly, we simply let go of the hurt. Sometimes forgiving makes it possible to pick up the pieces of a broken relationship and begin again. Sometimes it means letting a relationship go. We can't forgive through willpower. What we can do is work toward readiness of heart. Writing as a spiritual practice can be that kind of work.
When our heart is ready, we often don't even know it until forgiveness happens within us. It is a gift. — Pat Schneider

When I was young, all I wanted and expected from life was to sit quietly in some corner doing my work without the public paying attention to me. And now see what has become of me. — Albert Einstein

Give me the artist who breathes it like a native, and goes about his work in it as quietly as a common man goes about his ordinary business. Mozart did so; and that is why I like him. Even if I did not, I should pretend to; for a taste in his music is a mark of caste among musicians, and should be worn, like a tall hat, by the amateur who wishes to pass for a true Brahmin. — George Bernard Shaw

I love playing and chatting with children ... feeding and putting them to bed with a little story, and being away from the family has troubled me throughout my ... life. i like relaxing at the house, reading quietly, taking in the sweet smell that comes from the pots, sitting around a table with the family and taking out my wife and children. when you can no longer enjoy these simple pleasures something valuable is taken away from your life and you feel it in your daily work. — Nelson Mandela

One day a man came to watch him work on a painting he was doing of Jesus and his disciples. The man sat there all day, and Leonardo only made one stroke the whole time. 'You stood there all day and only made one stroke,' the man said. Leonardo just looked at him. 'Yeah, but it was the right stroke,' he said." Dan sat quietly for a second. I was not sure if he was angry or if he didn't see the relevance of the analogy. Then, all of a sudden, he burst out laughing. "That's pretty good, Nerburn," he said. He reached over and pushed me playfully. "What was that guy's name?" "Leonardo da Vinci." "I've got to remember that. Leonardo Duvishhi. You sure he wasn't an Indian?" "Might have been Wapashaw's long-lost uncle," I said. Dan laughed heartily. "This is a good day, Nerburn. I'm glad you came to visit me." The hawk cut great arcs against the towering sky. The eastern horizon was filling with pinks and lavenders. "So am I, Dan," I said. "It's been too long. — Kent Nerburn

The purpose of the salt in the steak is to do its work so quietly that it changes the nature of what it invades without calling attention to itself. Salt must get into something in order to have effect, where it indelibly stamps its own character upon what it invades. — George O. Wood

No matter what you write, no matter how meticulous and painstaking the creation process, someone is going to laugh, scorn, and dissect your work with criticism while another quietly falls in love with it. — Richelle E. Goodrich

Militant
Let all who will
Eat quietly the bread of shame.
I cannot,
Without complaining loud and long,
Tasting its bitterness in my throat
And feeling to my very soul
It's wrong.
For honest work
You proffer me poor pay,
For honest dreams
Your spit is in my face,
And so my fist is clenched
Today
To strike your face. — Langston Hughes

George" she practically squealed, and once again he shushed her.
"You never learn, do you?" he murmured against her skin.
"You're the one who's making me scream."
"That wasn't a scream," he said with a cocktail smile.
she eyed him with alarm. "I didn't mean it as a dare."
He laughed aloud - although more quietly than she'd done - at that. "Merely planning for the future, when volume is not an issue."
"George, there are servants!"
"Who work for me."
"George!"
"When we are married," he said, lacing his fingers through hers, "we shall make as much or as little noise as we wish."
Billie felt her face go crimson.
he dropped a teasing kiss on her cheek. "Did I make you blush?"
"You know you did," she grumbled.
He looked down at her with a cocky smile. "I probably shouldn't take quite so much pride in that."
"But you do."
He brought her hand to his lips. "I do. — Julia Quinn

there's nothing better after a gruelling day of work than to have multiple orgasms. Now, as we all know, most guys aren't capable of giving us MOs and, just quietly, they really should fucking teach that shit in high school Sex Ed. But," she sighed, disappointedly, "they don't, and because it's a skill possessed by the unicorns of the world, we need to have with us - at all times - a BOB. So please, for me, pack your fucking vibrator. — K.M. Golland

Man has learned to fly like the birds. Now all he has to do is work out how to do it quietly. — Bill Vaughan

What did you work at?" Colum asked, shifting a bit on the bench to look more directly at me.
"I was in service," I said quietly, more quietly than I intended. I wondered if maybe the answer had gotten lost in the rumble of the engines. It didn't.
"Honest work," Colum said. I knew that that was what people say about work they consider beneath them. Hauling and scrubbing and digging are "honest work." Grubbing and mucking? "Honest work." Tell someone you're a doctor or a mill owner, and they never say "honest work. — Susan Lynn Peterson

Hadn't I wanted this? I had actively participated in every moment of the creation of this life. So why didn't I see myself in any of it? The only thing more impossible than staying was leaving. I didn't wanna hurt anybody, I wanted to slip quietly out the back door and not stop running until I reached Greenland. Instead I made a decision: to pray.. you know ... like ... to God. And it was such a foreign concept to me that I swear I almost began with: I'm a big fan of your work. — Elizabeth Gilbert