You're In My Past Quotes & Sayings

I took a few dragging steps toward the locker-room door. 'You're doing something to me that I wouldn't do to a dog,' I mumbled. 'What you're doing to me is worse than if you were to kill me. You're locking me up in shadows for the rest of my life. You're taking my mind away from me. You're condemning me slowly but surely to madness, to being without a mind. It won't happen right away, but sooner or later, in six months or in a year - Well, I guess that's that.'
I fumbled my way out of the locker room and down the passageway outside, guiding myself with one arm along the wall, and past the sergeant's desk and down the steps, and then I was out in the street.
("All At Once, No Alice") — Cornell Woolrich

You're right," he said, jerking open the portal. "There is one place she's sure to go."
"Yes."
"And you.You should take your own advice and leave this place," Daniel said grimly. "You're rotting in here."
"At least this body's pain distracts me from the pain in my soul," his past self said. "No.I wish you luck, but I won't leave these walls now.Not until she's settled in her next incarnation."
Daniel's wings bristled at his neck. He tried to sort out time and lives and memories in his head, but he kept circling around the same irksome thought. "She-she should be settled now. In conception. Can't you feel it?"
"Oh," his imprisoned past self said softly. He closed his eyes. "I don't know that I can feel anything anymore." The prisoner sighed heavily. "Life's a nightmare."
"No,it's not. Not anymore. I'll find her.I'll redeem us both," Daniel shouted, desperate to get out of there, desperately taking another leap of faith through time. — Lauren Kate

Insanity is always a reasonable diagnosis when you're dealing with writers and artists. Sometimes the only real difference between crazy people and artists is that artists write down what they imagine seeing. In the past few decades, hardly a week has gone by without a reader of my blog questioning my mental health. I understand that; I've read my writing too. — Scott Adams

Not every girl has a bad-boy problem. Some of my friends get into relationships constantly. Others cheat all the time, or run away. Some get jealous. Some think they are too undateable to even try. Our dating pool is a circus of fuckups, misfits, and past mistakes that we keep on making. The brand of baggage you're carrying on your back is the issue. But most of all, I think we fear the same thing. I think that thing is love. Real love. Think of your first love. Think of how Bambi-like you were, prancing around all excited and in love with everything. Then think of how that happiness was beaten to death with a hatchet, spit on, shit on, leaving you cold. If you watch something you care about get destroyed, you're not going to want to go back to that place, no matter how pleasant it ever was. — Alida Nugent

I didn't do it to you, I did it to her. Maybe
your past self thinks it's funny."
"She doesn't."
"That's not my fault. Besides, I'm not a mind
reader. You expect me to realize you're
speaking on behalf of all Lucindas ever, every time you talk.
You never said anything about not razzing
your past lives. It's all in good fun. For me, anyway. — Lauren Kate

Jassaline's little potion seems to have brought up every meal I've had in the past five years." said Locke.
"Nothing left to spit up but my naked soul. Make sure it isn't floating around in one of those before you toss them, right?"
"I think I see it," Jean said. "Nasty, crooked little thing it is too; you're better off with it floating out to sea. — Scott Lynch

I have a mantra that kind of explains my feelings on this subject, which is, "The past is the present is the future." When you're recording something, you're making something that will exist in the future. — Will Oldham

A lot of people feel like they're victims in life, and they'll often point to past events, perhaps growing up with an abusive parent or in a dysfunctional family. Most psychologists believe that about 85 percent of families are dysfunctional, so all of a sudden you're not so unique. My parents were alcoholics. My dad abused me. My mother divorced him when I was six ... I mean, that's almost everybody's story in some form or not. The real question is, what are you going to do now? What do you choose now? Because you can either keep focusing on that, or you can focus on what you want. And when people start focusing on what they want, what they don't want falls away, and what they want expands, and the other part disappears. (Jack Canfield) — Rhonda Byrne

When I'm doing my best is when I'm completely focused ... You completely wipe off any thoughts of the future, there's nothing going on in the past, you're just completely locked in on the moment, and there's no thinking, you're zoned in on this moment in time. — Frank Mir

Love is an afternoon of fishing when I'd sooner be at the ballet.
Love is eating burnt toast and lumpy graving with a big smile.
Love is hearing the words 'You're beautiful' as I fail to squeeze into my fat jeans.
Love is refusing to bring up the past, even if doing so would be a slam dunk to prove your point.
Love is your hand wiping away my tears, trying to erase streaks of mascara.
Love is the warm hug that extinguishes an argument.
Love is a humbly-uttered apology, even if not at fault.
Love is easy to recognize but so hard to define; however, I think it boils down to this ...
Love is caring so much about the feelings of someone else, you sacrifice whatever it takes to help him or her feel better.
In other words, love is my heart being sensitive to yours. — Richelle E. Goodrich

If you didn't already know, we're expecting in about four and a half months." Elliott beamed. The guests raised glasses with congratulations in the air.
"He slipped one past a goalie!" Ryan cheered.
The beer I just sipped came out through my nose. Mia was choking on her water. Serena turned from Ryan to Elliott, smacking him on the chest. Mortification painted her red face.
"Did you teach him that?"
Elliott shrugged with a mischievous grin. — Sadie Grubor

I go out on the porch and gaze up at the stars twinkling above, the random scattering of millions of stars. Even in a planetarium you wouldn't find as many. Some of them really look big and distinct, like if you reached your hand out intently you could touch them. The whole thing is breathtaking. Not just beautiful though
the stars like the trees in the forest, alive and breathing. And they're watching me. What I've done up till now, what I'm going to do
they know it all. Nothing gets past their watchful eyes. As I sit there under the shining night sky, again a violent fear takes hold of me. My heart's pounding a mile a minute, and I can barely breathe. All these millions of stars looking down on me, and I've never given them more than a passing thought before. Bot just stars
how many other things haven't I noticed in the world, things I know nothing about? I suddenly feel helpless, completely powerless. And I know I'll never outrun that awful feeling. (135) — Haruki Murakami

Because it's a fucking disaster to be creative when you know you're not Mozart or Keats. Dammit, I got tired of scratching around in my past. There's nothing in me to justify the pretension of creativity. This came before anything, before you, before Raquel, this is a matter of my own emptiness, my awareness of my own limits, maybe my sterility. Does what I'm saying to you seem awful? Now you want to come along and sell me an illusion, which I don't believe in but which does make me believe that either you're a fool or you underestimate my intelligence. Why don't you just leave me alone, so I can fill the emptiness in my own way? Let me see things for myself, learn if something can still grow in my soul, an idea, a faith, because I swear to you, Laura, my soul is more desolate than this rock landscape you see here ... why? — Carlos Fuentes

You're quiet." Bodie issued that statement with no small amount of suspicion. "I'm always quiet." As Bodie pulled the car past the gates and out onto the street, he glanced at me just long enough to smirk. "And I'm always perceptive. This quiet is a different quiet." My mind was awash in the day's events. Georgia's visit. Vivvie and the article on Pierce. The two names from Henry's list. Adam's father being the one who had arranged the get-together in that photograph. "I'm fluent in all varieties of Kendrick silences," Bodie declared. "And you and your sister both stare very intently at absolutely nothing when the wheels are turning in here." He lazily reached over and tapped the side of my head. I swatted his hand away. "I have a lot to think about. — Jennifer Lynn Barnes

When he pulled back, Blay frowned. "You're shaking."
Was it possible he wasn't imagining this? "Am I?"
"Yes."
"I don't care. I love you. I love you so damned much, and I"m sorry that I wasn't male enough to admit
"
Blay stopped him with a kiss. "You're plenty male enough now
the rest of it's in the past."
"I just ... God, I really am shaking, aren't I?
Yeah. But it's okay
I've got you."
Qhuinn turned his face into one of the male's palms. "You always have. You've always had me ... and my heart. My soul. Everything. — J.R. Ward

Don't waste your time lookin' over your shoulder; those loves from the past ain't getting' no closer. When I look in my future, you're all I can see, so honey, don't go lovin' on nobody but me. — Blake Shelton

If you're a writer and you are at all inclined to speak as a Christian in some way, you realize very quickly that the conventional language is pretty much useless. It takes a long time to get past that, or it has taken me a long time. People in conventional Christianity have spoken lightly and sometimes frivolously of God for a long time. It's a word that needs to be used sparingly, in my opinion. — Wendell Berry

This isn't happening to you, princess," Sabine snapped before I could do more than shake my head. "This is happening to us. While you spent the past few months prancing around in ignorant bliss, we were all being possessed, or kidnapped, or stalked by this hellion. So dry your tears and take off the tiara, because this is a call to arms, not a pity party. You're not going to find any sympathy here. — Rachel Vincent

I heard - " I began.
"I let you hear," he cut me off.
I shut my mouth, closed the door, and leaned back against it. The corners of his lips turned up as if at some private amusement, and for a moment I thought we were having one of those silent conversations.
You think it's safe to close yourself in with the Beast?
If you think I'm afraid of you, you're wrong.
You should be afraid.
Maybe you should be afraid of me. Go ahead, piss me off, Barrons. See what happens.
Little girl thinks she's all grown up now.
His mouth moved into a smile that I've grown familiar with over the past few months, shaped of competing tensions: part mockery, part pissed off, and part turned on. Men are so complicated. — Karen Marie Moning

But I don't want to go back. Not yet.
Just because.
Because every once in a while, somebody brings me my lunch tray and my meds and he has a black eye or his forehead is swollen with stitches, and he says:
"We miss you Mr. Durden."
Or somebody with a broken nose pushes a mop past me and whispers:
"Everything's going according to the plan.
Whispers
"We're going to break up civilization so we can make something better out of the world."
Whispers
"We look forward to getting you back. — Chuck Palahniuk

I have a word for you. I know your whole life story. I know every skeleton in your closet. I know every moment of sin, shame, dishonesty and degraded love that has darkened your past. Right now I know your shallow faith, your feeble prayer life, your inconsistent discipleship. And my word is this: I dare you to trust that I love you just as you are, and not as you should be. Because you're never going to be as you should be. — Brennan Manning

If beauty is pain - let me get lost in it. If you're my salvation - I want to earn it. If love is all I have to give - then let me give it. You. It's all for you."
Gabe's eyes opened and locked in on mine.
"How can I prove that what I feel is real? You ask for truth I give you lies. You ask for joy I make you cry. But I don't want to lose you. Not like this. Not when I've left your heart in such a mess. Give me one chance - I'm letting go of the past - but I need you here to know."
"If beauty is pain - let me get lost in it. If you're my salvation - I want to earn it. If love is all I have to give - then let me give it. You, it's all for you." He paused, hitting the last few notes, and the song ended.
Gabe's smile lit up the room.
But I was frozen in place.
Me. He'd sung that to me. — Rachel Van Dyken

But how? How can you just get over these things, darling? ... You've had so much strife but you're always happy. How do you do it?'
'I choose to ... I can leave myself to rot in the past, spend my time hating people for what happened, like my father did, or I can forgive and forget.'
'But it's not that easy.'
He smiled that Frank smile. 'Oh, but my treasure, it is so much less exhausting. You only have to forgive once. To resent, you have to do it all day, every day. You have to keep remembering all the bad things ... I would have to make a list, a very, very long list and make sure I hated the people on it the right amount. That I did a proper job of hating, too: very Teutonic! No' - his voice became sober- 'we always have a choice. All of us.' p.323 — M.L. Stedman

Yes. I heard that everyone liked you enormously.'
'Yeah,' I said, 'maybe some people did. Maybe they meant in the past, before everything changed. Anyway. It's easy for people to like you when you're dead. It's a pity none of them could see their way to liking me when it mattered to me, when I was alive.'
'You're still alive, Oscar. You're not dead. Had you forgotten?'
'Look, I don't want to talk about whether I'm alive or dead, and I don't want to talk about my old life. I don't want to about any of that.'
'Why not?'
'Because I'm ashamed, I said. — Sarah Moore Fitzgerald

Kota!" I said, stepping away from my sisters and Lucy.
"You can sleep on the couch or in the garage or in the tree house for all I care; but if you don't check your attitude, I'll send you back to your apartment right now! Have some gratitude for the security you've been offered. Need I remind you that tomorrow we're burying our father? Either stop the bickering or go home." I turned on my heel and headed down the hall. Without checking, I knew Lucy was right behind me, suitcase in hand.
I opened the door to my room, waiting for her to come in with me. Once her skirts swished past the frame, I slammed it shut, heaving a sigh. "Was that too much?" I asked.
"It was perfect!" she replied with delight.
"You might as well be the princess already, miss. You're ready for it. — Kiera Cass

Quadruple crap. Why couldn't I control myself? Why did he have this effect on me? "Are you compelling me right now?"
To my surprise, his smile held an edge of sadness. "That would give you a much needed excuse, but I am afraid I am not."
Curse my body for reacting to his. As long as I kept him out of my heart, I would be okay.
"I think it a bit too late for that, my dear."
"You're using old man speak again." I made a face. "It's creepy."
He chuckled. "I'll try to remember that, but I haven't been around humans much in the past hundred years. It's hard to keep up with the changes in common dialect."
"Let's keep on topic, Jett. You were going to teach me how to control my mind. — Christie Rich

As a result of things that may have happened in their past, women seem to find it hard to trust anybody. They are so worried that people will somehow dislike them if they have the courage to be themselves. They are convinced by society's idea that you have to be thin to be beautiful. But you know what, my sister? You're beautiful just as you are! — Corallie Buchanan

I disappear for twenty minutes into Ford Maddox Ford's The Good Soldier while John does the dishes, fighting past my initial irritation all the class nonsense and how no one will say anything of significance because it's simply not done to be explicit. Like in James or Wharton. Those novels where you're screaming at characters to go ahead already and blurt it out, save us a hundred pages of prevarication. — Adam Haslett

When Lea died at the Institute ... I was in a dark woods, blind and lost as Dante before Virgil. But Quinn helped me. Here voice calling me out of misery. She became my home. As she puts it, 'Home isn't where you're from, it's where you find light when all grows dark.' Find your home, Darrow. It may not be in the past. But find it, and you'll never be lost again. — Pierce Brown

I-I'm not making advances," she told him as she flattened herself against his chest. "You're just an available s-source of heat." "So you say," St. Vincent replied lazily, tucking the quilt more tightly around them both. "However, during the past quarter hour you've been fondling parts of my anatomy that no one's ever dared to touch before." "I v-very much doubt that." She burrowed even further into the depths of his coat, and added in a muffled voice, "You've probably been h-handled more than a hamper at Fortnum and Mason. — Lisa Kleypas

Staying in the past does not help, my friend. Everything passes you by while you're trying to relive that one little slice of golden apple that you had. — Ken Dereste Dorcely

It's the Roman numeral for 10. 5/5/89 is my birthday: 5 plus 5 is 10, and this is my tenth year since I got into music. 'X' is the 24th letter in the alphabet, and I will turn 24 when this album comes out. 'X' is also a metaphor, as in 'ex-girlfriend': it implies you're progressing and moving on in life, not holding on to the past and your old ways. — Chris Brown

Dear 2600: I need someone with the abilities to get into my school server and change a few things. I have saved up $3500 over the past year for this and am willing to pay it in cash, as I am from the Winnipeg area.
Desperate doesnt begin to cover it. Whatever your problems, and we certainly wont try to minimize them, they are nothing compared to the world of hurt you'll enter if you do stupid things like offer complete strangers money to help you do illegal things ... ..There should be something in your genetic code that alerts you to the fact that you're doing something extremely stupid and wrong. So we're clear, the offer was in Canadian dollars and not American, right? — Emmanuel Goldstein

The houses have been condemned on Memory Lane
I'm tired of this struggle that leaves everything the same
I've tried so hard to make it work
that I'm dying inside
Well, you can take my past
But you can't have my tomorrow

Promises that remain promises are useless and they're cheap
I wish I could put a price on words so I could make them keep
I put so much faith in you
I lost all my faith in me
Well, you can take my past
But you can't have my tomorrow

I'm giving up on giving up
I can't leave it all to prayer
'Cause the first step in getting better
is knowing what's not there
You said you'd make it better
and that just makes it worse
Well, you can take my past
But you can't have my tomorrow

Yes, I want my life to last
So you can't have my tomorrow
No, you can't have my tomorrow — David Levithan

You're right [Joshua], I have taught you nothing. I could teach you nothing. Everything that you needed to know was already there. You simply needed the word for it. Some need Kali and Shiva to destroy the world so they may see past the illusion to divinity in them, others need Krishna to drive them to the place where they may perceive what is eternal in them. Others may perceive the Divine Spark in themselves only by realizing through enlightenment that the spark resides in all things, and in that they find kinship. But because the Divine Spark resides in all, does not mean that all will discover it. Your dharma is not to learn, Joshua, but to teach."
"How will I teach my people about the Divine Spark?"
...
"You must only find the right word. The Divine Spark is infinite, the path to find it is not. The beginning of the path is the word. — Christopher Moore

The final vanity. This whole episode has never been about us. Can't you see? If this is happening now, it must have happened over and over. Who knows how many other planets we lost in the past, consumed as weapons of forgotten wars? Maybe all we see, the planets and stars and galaxies, is just the debris of huge wars - on and on, up to scales we can barely imagine. And we're just weeds growing in the rubble. Tell that to the Prime Minister. And I thought we might ask them about their gods! What a fool I've been - the questions on which I've wasted my life, and here are my answers - what a fool." She was growing agitated. "Take it easy, Edith - — Charles Stross

In my past, there's also an opportunity I could have taken advantage of that I didn't, and that I wish I had. There's a thing I got rid of that I really wish I'd kept. But the train never backs up. Never. I missed those things, and I will never get a second chance. Do yourself a favor, right now, and realize two things: 1. You will keep getting older, and then you will die. 2. Everything that's ever entered your experience has lasted and will continue to last for only a brief moment in the life of the universe. This is game time, champ. You're in. You're in, playing, right now, and the clock is ticking. So stop wondering what it all means and how you'll possibly ever do X and what people will think, and get on with your life already. Stop being a pussy and go do something amazing. *** DO EPIC SHIT. — Johnny B. Truant

As members of my cabinet," Alyss calmly explained, "you share in the responsibilty of ensuring a safe furture for Wonderland. I'm sure the four of you will agree that we're in a crisis and that trying times bring out the best in you. What queen wouldn't want such helpful cabinet members by her side in an hour of need? Forgive me for calling you here. I was thinking only of myself and others when I did it. But for the love of your rank if nothing else, advise me. How do you think we should conter this invasion?"
Uh," said the Lady of Clubes.
I know exactly how we should counter it! said her husband. "First and foremost, a decree must be at once ... decreed! All ranking families are to remain indoors and well-protected until it can be guaranteed that every threat is violence is past! It's imperative that nothing inconvenient happen to us, for the population would then have no one to look up to! — Frank Beddor

I couldn't believe my good luck when you came back to the bar," he confessed. His voice sounded hoarse, grinding out past the lump in his throat. "You're even more beautiful now than you were when I met you."

She wasn't all that impressed by his honesty. "You liked that I was only interested in hooking up for one night."

"True. But I wouldn't have said no to a second." He pressed a kiss to her lips, then another for emphasis, and tossed the ball back to her. "I wouldn't say no to one now, either. — Paula Altenburg

He's part of my family."
"You don't have a family, Ella."
Although I had made similar comments in the past, it rankled to hear him say it. "We're individuals bound by a pattern of reciprocal obligation," I said. "If a group of chimps in the Amazon can be called a family, I think the Varners qualify. — Lisa Kleypas

You're probably wondering what you did in a past life to get stuck with us." Catherine says this as she drowns a fry in ketchup, her many rings glinting as she works her fingers.
"Gee, thanks," Brendan murmurs.
She gives him a look. "Don't be so sensitive. You know I adore you."
I lower my mostly uneaten burger. "Of course not. Just glad for anyone who wants to be my friend."
"Hey, Jacinda!" Nathan calls from his table, half rising. He waves and jerks his head, beckoning me over.
Catherine's smile slips. She reaches for another fry, avoiding my gaze. "You've got plenty of people willing to be your friend. Go on. Sit with Nathan. He's a decent guy-unfortunate pink shirt and all. — Sophie Jordan

I hold people at a distance, I know it. I do it because I also know that anyone or anything can be ripped away from you at any time. But you, Becca ... " He shook his head. "I can't - you're in, babe. You're past my walls, past my defenses. If I have to deal with that, so do you. — Jill Shalvis

I still think about the letter you asked me to write. It nags at me, even though you're gone and there's no one to give it to anymore. Sometimes I work on it in my head, trying to map out the story you asked me to tell, about everything that happened this past fall and winter. It's all still there, like a movie I can watch when I want to. Which is never. — Rebecca Stead

But in doing so
moving forward ...
he's still dealing with the past. It's always strung out behind us, innit, attached to our arses like a roll of toilet paper we trail out of the bathroom, pointing the way to the giant shite we just took. It doesn't matter if we flushed it down; Everyone still knows what we did there. So its fine to say it's all done and you have no connection with the past, that you're a new person every second, but silly in my view to pretend that person isn't made of the old one. — Kevin Hearne

It must be around forty, when you're "over the hill." I don't even know what that means and why it's a bad thing. When I go hiking and I get over the hill, that means I'm past the hard part and there's a snack in my future. That's a good thing as far as I'm concerned. — Ellen DeGeneres

I don't give a damn about my reputation. You're living in the past, it's a new generation. — Joan Jett

So, tell me," he whispers. "How fast did you climb those fourteen stories?"
Thomas makes a disapproving sound in his throat, but I break into a grin. Storm's past. Metias loves me again. "Six minutes," I whisper back to my brother. "And forty-four seconds. How do you like that?"
"That must be some sort of record. Not that, you know, you're supposed to do it. — Marie Lu

Telling me I'm pretty is nice and all, but if you really want to make my day, tell me I inspired you to read a book. Say you picked up a novel I've raved about and that you fell in love with it, too. Or tell me the time we spent reading aloud together was one of your favorite moments. Ask me to read to you, and beg for another chapter. This will fill me with indescribable joy and purpose.
And if you really want to make me speechless with wonder, tell me it was MY words and MY story you enjoyed. Tell me you shed tears over the things my characters went through, and that you're just a little bit in love with them, too. I might never recover. I will carry those words around in my heart for the rest of my life, like a talisman against all past and future criticisms.
That's how important stories are to me. — J.M. Richards

You think too much, Pearl. It's your most irritating flaw, and, let us be honest, given the severity and sheer volume of your flaws, that is saying something. Since this seems to be a time for advice, I suggest you stop thinking entirely.' 'And how might I achieve that? Follow your lead, perhaps?' 'I think neither too much nor too little. I am perfectly balanced - this is what you find so attractive. As a capemoth is drawn to fire.' 'So I am in danger of being burned up?' 'To a blackened, shrivelled crust.' 'So, you're pushing me away for my own good. A gesture of compassion, then.' 'Fires neither push nor pull. They simply exist, compassionless, indifferent to the suicidal urges of flitting bugs. That is another one of your flaws, Pearl. Attributing emotion where none exists.' 'I could have sworn there was emotion, two nights past - ' 'Oh, fire burns eagerly when there's fuel - ' 'And in the morning there's naught but cold ashes. — Steven Erikson

And I'm sorry," he went on, licking his lips, still gazing at me seductively, "if I didn't tell you about me and Rebecca. I wasn't trying to hurt you - I wasn't trying to do anything. All I think about is you, Perry. From the moment I wake up to the moment I go to sleep, and even in my dreams. I don't think about my past anymore. I only think about my future. And you're my fucking future. — Karina Halle

I think of an old sermon my grandfather quoted from time to time - something about not looking back when you're plowing a field, but instead finding a mark in the distance and focusing on that. Otherwise, the rows won't come out straight. — Lisa Wingate

You're right, my problems are the biggest problems ever," George said. "No, honestly, it's horrible to be me. I'm rich, talented, and I make girls cry."
"How do you make girls cry, exactly?"
George turned to her. His blue eyes widened. His lovely face took on a forlorn, deeply troubled expression. He leaned forward, and, in a theatrical whisper, said, "My past is tragic. I wouldn't want to burden you with it. It's a pain I must suffer alone. In the rain. In silence. — Ilona Andrews

I just want to hold you tonight. It's not that I don't want to tear your bra and panties off and dominate you with my manhood until you're screaming my name ... because I do." He presses his erection into my backside to illustrate his point. "Goddammit, I do. But I just want tonight to be about us and this insane, unstoppable need I have to be near you. Around you. To be your friend. To make you smile. To make you laugh. To make you happy. To protect you. I want to learn everything about you, Scout. Your past. Your present. Your future. But there's time for that tomorrow and the day after that. Tonight I just want to fall asleep with you. And tomorrow morning I want to wake up with you. I'm working on the whole living in the moment thing, and now ... this moment, that's all I want. — Kim Holden

All I can do is put in time waiting for the inevitable, observing as the ghost of my past rattle around my vacuous present. They crash and bang and make themselves at home, mostly because there's no competition. I've stopped fighting them. They're crashing and banging around in there now. Make yourselves at home, boys. Stay awhile. Oh, sorry- I see you already have. Damn ghost. — Sara Gruen

In the past I think I had corralled rotten things into groups of three because at some level it gave me the impression I was controlling them, keeping track of them. In my world I believed the universe would only dish out so much shite before it realised it had overdone it and corrected matters.
That, of course, turned out to be nonsense.
The truth is that sometimes the shite just keeps on coming and that is what is so unfair. But here's the thing: it's never all shite. If you can wake up in the morning for just long enough to breathe in and out and see the sun shining, you're already surviving it. You're already if not getting around it, at least getting over it, getting past it.
And who knows what can happen then? — Sarah-Kate Lynch

My idea in terms of managing a narrative, or in thinking in my creative life, is that you could easily argue that the past, the present and the future all occur simultaneously, and if you can postulate that, then you're not strictly bound to a linear narrative. — Tommy Lee Jones

Part of me tingled with excitement. This was it. I was finally going to be with Will. We were going to make love for the first time - after all this time.
But the voices of doubt mocked me. What do you think you're doing? You can't give yourself to him - you've already been had! And by his father.
I reached the landing of the stairs and squeezed my eyes shut, desperately battling the raging war in my mind. If I'm with Will, it can erase the past. Our love is powerful enough to take the rape away. I truly believed I could delude myself into accepting he was my first - that what happened in Coach T's office was false. Yes, once we were together, it would change.
Melanie — Katie Ashley

"You're thinking too much, as usual," I said.
A dismissive snort as he got to his feet. He tried running again, and didn't fall, but did more lurching than loping, his legs threatening to tangle at every step.
"Apparently this could take a while, so how about you practice and I'll head back to the house - "
He darted past me and veered to block my path.
I smiled. "I knew that'd work. So as I right? It's better when you act, not think?"
A sigh whistled out of his nostrils, condensation hanging in the frigid air.
"You hate that, don't you? We should keep a scorecard, see who's right more often: me or you."
He rolled his eyes.
"Not a chance, huh? You'd never live it down if I beat you. But I am right this time. Your body knows how to move as a wolf. You just need to shut your brain off and let your muscles do their thing." — Kelley Armstrong

When you make the schedule, you're not planning on playing deep into every single week, or at least I haven't in the past. I'm not physically or mentally ready to pick up my bags and go to Monte Carlo. I definitely have to look at what's best for my chances at (at the French Open). — Andy Roddick

The costumes help. They make it less real, disguise what it really is both for the actors and for the people who'll see it on the screen. It's like the people who read Anna Karenina, and because it's in Russia they can say, 'Oh, that's not my pain they're talking about.' And Chris is tough. She goes from one thing to the next and doesn't worry about the past. When a cat sits mere purring on your lap, you know for a fact she isn't thinking about her former owner; she's thinking about her dinner. That's Chris. — Barbara Hambly

Living on the Plains"

That winter when this thought came-how the river
held still every midnight and flowed
backward a minute-we studied algebra
late in our room fixed up in the barn,
and I would feel the curved relation,
the rafters upside down, and the cows in their life
holding the earth round and ready
to meet itself again when morning came.

At breakfast while my mother stirred the cereal
she said, "You're studying too hard,"
and I would include her face and hands in my glance
and then look past my father's gaze as
he told again our great race through the stars
and how the world can't keep up with our dreams. — William Stafford

We broke up, and my first reaction was 'Fine - I've been through this too many times. I can't change your mind. I can't live your life for you. You're gone in your direction. I'm going to pick up; I'm going to go in my direction. I'm not going to live in the past. I'm not going to embrace the pain. You go, I'll go, and that will be it.' And I felt that way for an hour and 10 minutes. — Dana Gould

You remain so silent,as carried away,
through mist of your thoughts,so dark and so deep,
and even awake same as when asleep,
waiting for enlightenment of a newborn day.

I'm bound to your silence,to the core i'm bound,
to delicate stillness,so cruel and so tender,
that despite of danger,soul yearns to surrender,
to that mesmerizing absence of the sound.

I resign everything i once knew so clear,
throwing in the wind fragments of my past,
they are worth so little,they're nothing but dust,
nothing to remember,and nothing to fear... — Aleksandra Ninkovic

You're the only girl I have looked at these past few months and imagined my dick sliding into. I haven't fucked since the night I fucked you, Elle, and you're the last one I will ever fuck. Tonight will be the first night anyone has slept in that bed and in this place. I couldn't sleep here until you were in the bed beside me where you fucking belong. — Sarah Brianne

I think that in the past, in the '50s and '60s, after the existentialists and beatniks and hippie movements, the big deal was, Don't sell out. We live in a society that by virtue of the speed we communicate and sell, everything sells. The danger is buying in; that your concern becomes success, rather than fulfillment. They're two different beasts, and my feeling is that you should seek fulfillment. You should not measure your worth in how much you have or how popular you are, but how happy you are with what you do. — Guillermo Del Toro

The gut wrenching howling as they informed me, "dead on arrival. Baby could not survive outside her mother's womb." Every finite detail of the worst night of my life played through my mind in HD Technicolor. Somewhere in the haze between past and reality, I heard a soft voice. "Nik? Can you hear me? Come back, you're scaring me, — Lora Ann

You're the only one I've ever been able to open up to like this. See, there you go. Another sign. And damn it, I don't believe in signs like this, but they all point to you. I wish I'd opened up a lot more to you in the past, but I never wanted to bombard you with my crazy life. So I always focused on you." He sank to his knees before her. "I want to give you everything. I want you to know me, all of me. So know that I'll try. It's weird to bare my deepest thoughts to anyone, but I'm ready to with you. — Nikki Lynn Barrett

I don't want you to have to handle it. That's the horror of my past. But you ... you're the reality of my present. You're the proof I survived. The prize in the cereal box. — J. Kenner

Any issue and any problem, no matter what height you look at it from, no matter how much you extend past the first fractal, it's still a fractal of something that emanates from within your consciousness - from within the human consciousness. And it'll move on and manifest itself externally, and then those are what we pick up as societal ills. But all these battles we're fighting are internal. For me, it's reconciling hope with dread and trying to cut out some place in my mind where my heart can be protected a little bit. — El-P

I continued down the hallway, past the library, with my eyes downcast, not wanting to talk to anyone. So immersed was I in my misery that I recoiled at the sound of a male voice emanating from just a few paces in front of me.
"I know feet are fascinating, Alera, but it's much more sensible to pay attention to where you're going."
Steldor stood outside the door to our quarters wearing a cocky and irritating grin, and for the thousandth time that day, I felt myself turning crimson. I stared at him, struggling for a witty rejoinder but unable to produce one.
"Did you want something, my lord?" I finally asked, forcing a smile that felt like a grimace.
"I simply wanted to see my beautiful wife," he said, countenance still smug, although his eyes had softened and I suspected the compliment was sincere. — Cayla Kluver

That's like the tenth time you've looked at your reflection in the past five minutes." Chuito narrowed dark eyes at her as he leaned forward from his seat in the back and contemplated Jules. "Do you have a crush on me?"
...
Chuito got out of the car, studying Jules fussing with her outfit. "I was joking, but now you got me scared. You're not really after me, are you?"
Jules rolled her eyes. "No."
"Thank God. That'd be like doing it with my mother. — Kele Moon

I knew it! I knew you'd hate my body!" She slammed her hands on her hips, marched over to the bed, and glared down at him. "Well, for your information, mister, all those cute little sex kittens in your past might have had perfect bodies, but they don't know a lepton from a proton,and if you think that I'm going to stand here and let you judge me by the size of my hips and because my belly's not flat, then you're in for a rude awakening." She jabbed her finger at him. "This is the way a grown woman looks, buster! This body was designed by God to be functional, not to be stared at by some hormonally imbalanced jock who can only get aroused by women who still own Barbie dolls"
"Damn. Now I've got to gag you." With one swift motion, he pulled her down on the bed, rolled on top of her, and covered her lips with his own. — Susan Elizabeth Phillips

After you reach a certain age, they think you're over. Well, I will never be over. I'll be making records if I have to sell them out of the trunk of my car. I've done that in my past, and I'd do it again. — Dolly Parton

I keep saying that backwards is all you can see. You can't see front. My wife says, "Stop, you're always in the past." She sees me sort of daydreaming. — Tom Courtenay

You are my life. It doesn't matter what I am, or what I've done, as long as you're mine. Nothing in the past matters. There is you, and nothing else." He didn't look at me but kept his eyes on his work. A cluster of taller buildings appeared ahead, and he headed for them. "My one job," he said, holding up a finger, "is to make sure you know how to protect yourself when they finally kill me. — C.D. Reiss

I've said more nonsex words to Harlow in the past five minutes than I did the entire time she was in Canada, but I'm surprised to find that not only is she easy to talk to, she's fun. "And, my impression of you is ever evolving, now that you aren't just a pretty face in my lap."
"You're one classy motherfucker, Finn."
"This speaking thing does wonders for expanding our horizons. — Christina Lauren

In My Secret Life"
"I saw you this morning,
you were moving so fast.
Can't seem to loosen my grip
On the past.
And I miss you so much,
there's no one in sight.
And we're still making love
In my secret life.
I smile when I am angry,
I cheat and I lie,
I do what I have to do
to get by,
In my secret life. — Leonard Cohen

Look, this island is an attempt to re-create a natural environment from the past. To make an isolated world where extinct creatures roam freely. Correct?" "Yes." "But from my point of view, such an undertaking is impossible. The mathematics are so self-evident that they don't need to be calculated. It's rather like my asking you whether, on a billion dollars in income, you had to pay tax. You wouldn't need to pull out your calculator to check. You'd know tax was owed. And, similarly, I know overwhelmingly that one cannot successfully duplicate nature in this way, or hope to isolate it. — Michael Crichton

This past Thanksgiving, my father was at the farm, and I had all 11 dogs in the house with a father who never allowed dogs in the house. And he got up to leave the table and came back and Solomon was in his chair. And he says, "This dog is in my chair." And I said, "It's the other way around, you're sitting in his chair." — Oprah Winfrey

Fair warning: You might get stared at," Zoe says as we walk through the security scanner. There are more people in the hallways up ahead now than there were earlier--it must be time for them to start work. "Your face is a familiar one here. People in the Bureau watch the screens often, and for the past few months, you've been involved in a lot of interesting things. A lot of the younger people think you're downright heroic."
"Oh, good," I say, a sour taste in my mouth. "Heroism is what I was focused on. Not, you know, trying not to die."
Zoe stops. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to make light of what you've been through. — Veronica Roth

My dad says stop thinking that way. "You be lookin' backward all the time, Brady, you're gonna have one heck of a crook in the neck." He smiles when he says that. But I know what he means deep down, and it's not funny. You can't keep dwelling on the past when you can't undo it. You can't make it happen any different than it did. — Priscilla Cummings

... When you're in the darkness, know that the light will come. We are light and dark, sun and moon, male and female, yin and yang; life is composed of opposites, in a continuing cycle of change ... . When you are in the light, don't step back into the darkness. Live in that light, and breathe it in fully. I've spent so much of my life going over and over the sadness and fear of the past. But we don't need to go there when we're not there. When we are in the light, be here, now. — Kathryn E. Livingston

Bluntly and quietly, in a series of simple, forthright sentences, she dismantled the architecture of unhappiness that had been growing up around us for the past several days. She was calling from the office she said, and had to talk in a low voice, 'but if you can hear me, Sid' she began, 'there are four things I want you to know. First, I haven't stopped thinking about you since I left the house this morning. Second, I've decided to have the baby, and we're never going to use the word "abortion" again. Third, don't bother to make dinner. [ ... ] Fourth, make sure Mr. Johnson's ready for action. I'm going to attack you the minute I walk in the door, my love, so be prepared. — Paul Auster

Natural,my ass! The worst poison known to man comes from a tree frog in South America. You cannot imagine how small an amount would be necessary to kill you.and it's natural.Calling something NATURAL is a MEANINGLESS MARKETING PLOY."
"All right,calm down! Maybe I like alternative medicine because it's been in use for more than six thousand years.After all that time,they have to know what they're doing."
"You mean the wacky idea that somehow in the distant past people had more scientific wisdom than they do today?That's both crazy and counterintuitive.Six thousand years ago people thought thunder was a bunch of gods moving around furniture."
-Conversation btw Dr.Jack Stapleton and Vinnie — Robin Cook

Why would you care what happened to me? That's all in the past." Jagger bent down and touched his forehead to hers. "Because you're mine. And 'mine' means you have my protection. 'Mine' means I'll look after you. It means nothing happens you don't want to happen and no one touches you without your consent. It means your life is in my hands and I will do everything in my power to ensure you are safe and secure and your needs are met. It means something happened to you that twisted your perception so bad, you look at us and you see only them. I'll make that right. I'll give you justice. I'll give you back whatever was taken from you. — Anonymous

I was going to go to bed early and maybe read for a little bit."
"Reading. Wow. Not sure I know many girls who do that."
Her brows rose. "Then you're hanging out with the wrong girls."
"No doubt. I most definitely have been ... in the past, but I've raised my standards a bit recently. — Cat Johnson

In the past, I would've listed things such as common interests, mutual attraction, worldliness, and higher education. My freedom above all else. If I had found love, it would have had to be the kind that overwhelmed and overpowered all else.

I passed a hand between Ray and Me. "Once you told me that this," I said "is a beginning." I searched his face. "But how do you know, Ray? How do you know it's the beginning of something good?"

"I know." His breath was warm on my face as he moved in closer." Because someday, you're bound to forgive yourself. — Ann Howard Creel

Let me try," he said, and he took the ends and positioned
himself in front of her mirror.
She watched him for about two seconds before declaring,
"You're going to have to go home."
His eyes did not leave the reflection of his neckcloth in the
mirror. "I haven't even got past the first knot."
"And you're not going to."
He gave her a supercilious look, brow quirked and all.
"You're never going to get it right," she pronounced. "I must
say, between this and your boots, I am revising my opinion on the
impracticalities of couture, male versus female."
"Really?"
Her gaze dropped to his boots, polished to a perfect shine. "No
one has ever had to take a knife to my footwear."
"I wear nothing that buttons up the back," he countered.
"True, but I may choose a dress that buttons in the front,
whereas you cannot go out and about without a neckcloth. — Julia Quinn

I don't live in either my past or my future. I'm interested only in the present. If you can concentrate always on the present, you'll be a happy man. Life will be a party for you, a grand festival, because life is the moment we're living now. — Paulo Coelho

You don't understand," getting mad. "You guys, you're like Puritans are about the Bible. So hung up with words, words. You know where that play exists, not in that file cabinet, not in any paperback you're looking for, but - " a hand emerged from the veil of shower-steam to indicate his suspended head - "in here. That's what I'm for. To give the spirit flesh. The words, who cares? They're rote noises to hold line bashes with, to get past the bone barrier around an actor's memory, right? But the reality is in this head. Mine. I'm the projector at the planetarium, all the closed little universe visible in the circle of that stage is coming out of my mouth, eyes, sometimes other orifices also. — Thomas Pynchon

Ah, dear Reader, is there a married man living who hasn't purged his drawers and closets of premarital memorabilia, only to have one more incriminating relic from yester-life rear its lovely head? Kristy contends that old flames never die, not completely. They smolder for years in hidden places. They flare up again just when you think you're over them. They can burn you if you don't deal with them. Such is the price I've had to pay for not rooting out the evidence of my life B.C. (Before Contentment). Or, perhaps, for having planted it too well.
But that, you see, is no longer an issue. Shall I tell you the crux of this argument? A man with a past can be forgiven. A man without one cannot be trusted. If there were no pictures in my drawer for Kirsty to uncover, I would have had to produce some. — Ted Gargiulo

I shook again, tasted plum, and suddenly the words were pouring out of me."She said I sang before I spoke. She said when I was just a baby she had the habit of humming when she held me. Nothing like a song. Just a descending third. Just a soothing sound. Then one day she was walking me around the camp, and she heard me echo it back to her. Two octaves higher. A tiny piping third. She said it was my first song. We sang it back and forth to each other. For years."I choked and clenched my teeth.
"You can say it,"Auri said softly."It's okay if you say it."
"I'm never going to see her again,"I choked out. Then I began to cry in earnest.
"It's okay,"Auri said softly."I'm here. You're safe. — Patrick Rothfuss

Whiskey was still looking some place past Patrick's shoulder, and suddenly his brown eyes met
Patrick's with a sort of inscrutable intensity. Patrick, this isn't over, okay? You and me? You want to
stay here, you want to keep sleeping in my bed, that's fine. I like you there. You're warm and you're kind,
and it's comfortable, having you there. But I'm going to want you, and you're going to want me, and if you
don't want to follow through on that, that's fine too. But you'll need to decide which way you want it, and
you need to make it clear when you make your decision. I'm, like, twelve years older than you, and I don't
sleep around. I'm not going to hit on you just because you're cute and you're here. I need to know it's
something you want, and it's something you need, and you're not just doing it because you think you need
to put out because I'm being human to you. You don't. All you need to do is be human back. — Amy Lane

That I wrote six books about my past is the red herring; nothing I have written has in any way altered the past or healed me clean, so no scar remains. Perhaps the process of writing - being fully in the moment, while I write letter by letter - has soothed me because it's kept me busy. When you're busy, you lack the time to fondle your emotional baggage. And if that sounds too reductive, remember we crawled from the swamp. Simple isn't such a terrible thing to be in this respect. — Augusten Burroughs

Now i believe that the way to anyone's heart is through their stomach, and, my boy, i'm here to tell you, we ware in the heart business. we're going to reach deep past the menu and into the emotional power of food because a person comes back to a restaurant again and again for one reason only - to fee their soul. — Joan Bauer

Certain lines can't be uncrossed,
Certain maps will get you lost,
Once you're past the border, then you'll have to play the game.
Roll the dice but count the cards,
Break the glass but keep the shards.
The world is out of order. It's been broken since you came.
The broken doors are hidden in the blood and in the bone.
My darling child, be careful now, and don't go out alone. — Mira Grant

am late for my afternoon coffee with Linda Leaming, an American who has lived in Bhutan for the past nine years. Asia has attracted its share of spiritual seekers, or lama lickers as they're sometimes called, but Bhutan was closed to outsiders until the 1970s. Even after that, it was not an easy country to get to. You had to want it. — Eric Weiner

Fine." My fingers felt cold and clumsy as I fumbled to untie the straps that held my sword to the side of the pack. Suddenly I felt something harshly cold against my neck. I turned my head in slow motion and looked up the length of a very sharp blade.
"Lovely." Kieran's voice dripped with sarcasm. "I'm sure an enemy would have too much honor to attack you until you're ready. That must be why you're completely unprotected and paying no attention whatsoever." He glared at me for a long punishing moment. Then he eased the sword back and inch. "Lesson one. Stay on guard." Reaching past me, he flicked the tip of his sword and easily sliced the ties on my pack. — Sharon Hinck

Near-death experiences release a lot of endorphins, resulting in a natural high," Tod whispered. "And it's totally true that one passion feeds another."
"You know we're way past 'near-death', right?"
"My endorphins aren't listening to you. — Rachel Vincent

Most people tell themselves these excuses - I've always been this way, this is my nature, I can't help it - that are just memes. They're belief systems that keep you from being able to become all that you are intended to become. They're impediments to reaching God-realization, or Tao-centeredness. People lose track of their purpose, because they are so back there - living in their past. Byron Katie speaks about this: Who would you be without your story? Carlos Castaneda used to say if you don't have a story, you don't have to live up to it. So get rid of your story. — Wayne Dyer