You Can't Control What Happens Quotes & Sayings

You just make the best movie you can and hope for the best, because you don't have any control over what happens with the movie, whether the movie is misinterpreted. — Gregg Araki

Those who write may think they know their target market. They may even feel they can shape the work to fit it. If this is true of you, you have more control over your creative process than I do. Even so, I humbly submit that you try letting your writing shape your target market instead and see what happens. — Catherine Ryan Hyde

Yes, but the bank is only made of men. No, you're wrong there - quite wrong there. The bank is something else than men. It happens that every man in a bank hates what the bank does, and yet the bank does it. The bank is something more than men, I tell you. It's the monster. Men made it, but they can't control it. The — John Steinbeck

Be true. Be as true and honest with yourself as you can and then you've just got to let it go from there out into the universe. Whatever happens after that, I have no control of, but I do have control of what I'm willing to put out there. — Pegi Young

You know, there are two types of people-ones who live their lives, and ones whose lives live them. You need to be the former, not the latter. And right now, you are letting your life live you. It's crushing you and completely out of control. You can't just let life happen, not if you want some say in what happens to you. — H.M. Ward

Maybe you just do the best you can, 'cause you can't control what happens in the end. — Rob Buyea

No matter what happens, God is in control, and your home is with Him. Nobody can ever take that away from you. — Grant Carroll

No matter what happens to you, you can maintain your own control about what you believe and who you are. — Alexis Wright

I'm gonna hold on to my self-control as long as I fucking can. And when I can't ... "
She held her breath until her lungs burned, but he didn't elaborate. "When you can't? What happens then?"
His mouth brushed the sensitive spot where her neck joined her shoulder. Teeth grazed her skin. "Then Lord have mercy on you, Lexie love. Because I won't. — Kit Rocha

WE CAN'T ALWAYS CONTROL OUR CIRCUMSTANCES BUT WE CAN CONTROL OUR ATTITUDE.
WE MUST BE MORE CONCERNED WITH WHAT WE DO WITH WHAT HAPPENS TO US THAN WHAT HAPPENS TO US.
HAPPINESS DOES NOT DEPEND ON WHAT HAPPENS OUTSIDE OF YOU BUT ON WHAT HAPPENS INSIDE OF YOU. — Marvin J. Ashton

You know, there are so many things you can't control in life, like what
happens to you or how people are going to react to what you do.
It's wasted energy to worry about it. But you can control how you
react. That's the trick. — Katie Kacvinsky

I can control what happens in the chemistry lab. There's a formula and an equation, and I know exactly what the reaction will be when I mix one thing with another. Life, not so much. Love, not at all. No matter what elements you combine, you really have no idea what happens next. It's scary not knowing what comes next. But not knowing might also be the best part. — Laurie Elizabeth Flynn

I believe there's a hand that guides us. It just isn't always a gentle one. Or one that seems fair at the time. But I dunno, I try to trust in it now. When I freak, I just try to ... shit, I guess trust in it. Because at the end of the day, what else can you do? Choice only gets you so far. Reasoning and planning too. The rest ... it's up to someone else. Where we end up, who we know, what happens to the people we love ... we don't have a lot of control over any of it. — J.R. Ward

What happens with your stream of experience if you realize that no one is in control of it? If you see that it is just going along of itself, unpushed and unpulled? (This is what the Chinese writing on this page means: The Tao, the course of nature, flows of itself.) You can get the feel of it by breathing without doing anything to help your breath along. Let the breath out, and then let it come back by itself, when it feels like it. And then out again when it wants to go out. — Alan W. Watts

If you don't have peace, it isn't because someone took it from you; you gave it away. You cannot always control what happens to you, but you can control what happens in you. — John C. Maxwell

Everybody improvises without noticing it. Life is about improvising. You can't control what happens in your life, I mean, you don't know what can happen in your life today. So you somehow improvise. — Hiromi

One of the things I've learned over the years is that you only do what you can do as an actor. You do the best job you can, but you have no control over so many elements that are going to determine the outcome of that film. I never pay attention to what happens after. — Matt Dillon

Sure, cried the tenant men,but it's our land ... We were born on it, and we got killed on it, died on it. Even if it's no good, it's still ours ... .That's what makes ownership, not a paper with numbers on it."
"We're sorry. It's not us. It's the monster. The bank isn't like a man."
"Yes, but the bank is only made of men."
"No, you're wrong there - quite wrong there. The bank is something else than men. It happens that every man in a bank hates what the bank does, and yet the bank does it. The bank is something more than men, I tell you. It's the monster. Men made it, but they can't control it. — John Steinbeck

Idea that you cannot control what happens to you, but you can control how you feel about it. Or, as Jean-Paul Sartre put it, Freedom is what you do with what's been done to you. — Eula Biss

How can you regret never having found true love? That's like saying you regret not being born a genius. People don't have control over such things. It either happens or it doesn't. It's a gift - a present that most never get. It's more like a miracle, really, when you think of it. I mean, first you have to find that person, and then you have to get to know them to realize just what they mean to you - that right there is ridiculously difficult. Then ... then that person has to feel the same way about you. It's like searching for a specific snowflake, and even if you manage to find it, that's not good enough. You still have to find its matching pair. What are the odds? — Michael J. Sullivan

You can't always control what happens to you but you can master how you react to it. — Nikki Rowe

That's how a storm with such power happens; you sense the build and darkness, you prepare as best you can, you do what you can to get through it even as it devastates your entire world. Whatever you do, however much you brace yourself, you will still be caught up in forces that you cannot control. So the question is how to navigate through the chaos. It takes thought, and trust, and serenity. — Jessica Park

All that matters is the pressure you put on yourself. External pressures cause people to choke. While you can't control what happens to you, you can control how you react. — John Wooden

You didn't get a choice in what happened to you. Neither did
we. But you have a choice in what happens now. We don't. You're the one in control and all we can do is sit on the sidelines and watch, even if you
keep making the wrong calls over and over again." We're obviously veering into sports metaphor territory. "We're not going to force you to do
anything you aren't ready to do. You've had enough forced on you. But you have to make a decision about how long you're going to let this define
your life. — Katja Millay

Sure, shit happens we can't control, but that's exactly what it is: shit you can't control. You can't control what it is, or sometimes what it does to you. But like I've told you before, you can control how you feel about it, how you deal with it. — Bobby Adair

There can't be anyone, I am sure, who doesn't know what it feels like to be disliked, even rejected, momentarily or for sustained periods of time. Perhaps the feeling is merely indifference, mild annoyance, but it may also be hurt. It may even be that some of us know what it is like to be actually hated - hated for things we have no control over and cannot change. When this happens, it is some consolation to know that the dislike or hatred is unjustified - that you don't deserve it. — Toni Morrison

When the ship suddenly pitched more steeply, the bookworm lost his grip. He came skipping over the toilet seats - his ass made a slapping sound - until he collided with my father at the opposite end of the row of toilets. "Sorry - I just had to keep reading!" he said. Then the ship rolled in the other direction, and the soldier sallied forth, skipping over the seats again. When he'd slid all the way to the last toilet, he either lost control of the book or he let it go, gripping the toilet seat with both hands. The book floated away in the seawater. "What were you reading?" the code-boy called. "Madame Bovary!" the soldier shouted in the storm. "I can tell you what happens," the sergeant said. "Please don't!" the bookworm answered. "I want to read it for myself! — John Irving

We all know that life has ups and downs; you've experienced both. And though you can't always control what happens outside you, you can choose how you will respond. You can treat life as a dance rather than a wrestling match. You can become an active participant rather than a victim of circumstance. — Dan Millman

Loving someone is easy. It's your car and all you have to do is start the engine, give her a little gas and point the thing wherever you want to go. But being loved is like being taken for a ride in someone else's car. Even if you think they'll be a good driver, you always have the innate fear they might do something wrong: in an instant you'll both be flying through the windshield toward imminent disaster. Being loved can be the most frightening thing of all. Because love means good-bye to control; and what happens if halfway or three-quarters of the way through the trip you decide you want to go back, or in a different direction, and you're only the codriver? — Jonathan Carroll

It is not about what happens to you - it is about how you perceive it. How you react to it. That is what you have control over. You can crumple up and die. Or you can be strong. That is what separates girls from women. — Morgan Rice

It's like, you write a book, you want it to be well received, you want it to be at the top of the bestsellers list, but you have limited control over what happens. You can hire a publicist, you can do every interview, you can be prepared, but you have very little control over the marketplace. So you put it out there without attachment, so it has its own life. Everything is like that. — Dan Harris

Charge forward with hope and get the best medical advice you can. Talk to your friends, neighbors, family, and together you attack it. We can't always control what happens to us, but we can always control how we react to it. — Robert Urich

You cannot control what happens to you, but you can control your attitude
toward what happens to you, and in that, you will be mastering change rather
than allowing it to master you. — Brian Tracy

I hate the concept of luck, especially when people try to apply it to me. Yes, it's true: Hundreds of thousands of businesses fail. Mine succeded. Was that all just because I "got lucky"? I don't really think so.
What I hate about luck is that it implies being devois of responsibility. It implies that you can do nothing and the step into success as easily as stepping into a pile of dog poop on the sidewalk. It implies that success is something given to a knighted and often undeserving few. Luck tells us that we don't control our own fate, and that our path to succes of failure is written by someone, or something, entirely outside overselves. Luck let us believe that whatever happens, whether good or bad, it's not to our credit or our fault. That is why I don't buy luck. But I do buy magic. — Sophia Amoruso

As a writer you're holding a dog. You let the dog run about. But you finally can pull him back. Finally, I'm in control. But the great excitement is to see what happens if you let the whole thing go. And the dog or the character really runs about, bites everyone in sight, jumps up trees, falls into lakes, gets wet, and you let that happen. That's the excitement of writing plays-to allow the thing to be free but still hold the final leash. — Harold Pinter

Change your attitude and you change your life.
You cannot control what happens to you in your life, but you can always control how you respond to it. The way you choose to respond is a reflection of your attitude. By changing your attitude, you also change your perspective and change your life. — Roy Bennett

You can't control what happens, but you can control how you choose to respond. You can do everything right and still fail! - Ken Ravizza — Chris Riddoch

You can't even kill yourself if it isn't your time to go. People have no control whatsoever over what happens to them, and they are beginning to realize this. The future lies in the time of living. Your doing something will get you into tomorrow, if you want to call it tomorrow. If you want to make those distinctions at all. — Richie Havens

I can be changed by what happens to me. But I refuse to be reduced by it.
(Popular misquote of "You may not control all the events that happen to you, but you can decide not to be reduced by them.") — Maya Angelou

you can't control the wind, but you can adjust your sails. It was his way of reminding us that you can't control most of what happens in life. You can only control your reaction to it. — Kristen Proby

No matter what happens in your life always try your best to stay in the moment. You can never control another persons emotions but you can always control yours. — Timothy Pina

Sometimes people feel they need to control everything, as if they could! Matters of life and death are out of your hands. The more you come to realize this, the harder you try to prove that you can control SOMETHING, anything. All you can really control is your response to what happens. You cannot control matters of life or death and because of this you are not accountable. You cannot be held liable for anything that you have no power over. Guilt, shame and blame make no sense when circumstances are beyond your control. — Kate McGahan

You can be surrounded by people all the time, but you feel so alone. I think that's when you can lose perspective and lose control of what you're doing. It's almost as if you have no fear and you don't really care about what happens to yourself. — Ladyhawke

You always hope for the best when you put something out and try to make the best music you can make, but you can't control what happens after that. — Chris Stapleton

The only guys that make it through are the guys that make it through are the guys that have a complete control of their ego where they tap out in the beginning, all the time, you're always losing in the beginning ... Your ego can get bruised if you don't have control of it. So what ends up happens is Jiu Jitsu is the ultimate douchebag filter. — Eddie Bravo

Functional analysis: learn your ABC's In addition to monitoring, try to track the events that immediately precede and follow your problem behavior. Do you drink more when something makes you feel angry? Lonely? Happy? What happens right after an angry outburst? Does the other person give in? Do you have a drink? Or do you withdraw to be alone? What makes you crave a piece of cake? How does eating it make you feel? This "functional analysis" can illuminate what is controlling the parts of your life that seem out of control. It is easy as A (antecedents) B (behavior) C (consequences). Antecedents can trigger a problem behavior, while the consequences reward or strengthen it, no matter how maladaptive it is. — James O. Prochaska

You cannot control all of what happens to you, but you can control your attitude toward all of what happens to you ... You can choose to be happy and grateful rather than disappointed and bitter, by focusing on how it could have turned out worse but didn't, rather than how it could have turned out better but didn't. — Brian Tracy

It occurred to me that when a person chooses certain behaviors, they have complete, 100% control over their choices. But once the behavior is chosen, therein lies the extent of the effects of that choice. One has 0% control over what happens to them or to their body as a result of that choice. You can choose how you respond to the consequences, but control is relinquished. Choose carefully! — Mary L. Page

I don't know what happened, but I do know this. It's not going anywhere. When you light up it waits for you to come down. You have to confront whatever's bothering you and look it straight in the eye. It's alright to forgive yourself, and it's okay to fight back, because if you don't kick the shit out of it, then it kicks you. It's a dog world, but you can control it, if you want to. A lot of people are going to try to make you feel like shit, but that doesn't mean you are. You are who you decide to be. I hope you're the kind of person that fights, because that's the only way to win. — E.M. Youman