To Forgive All

-Sometimes, I feel the past and the future pressing so hard on either side that there's no room for the present at all.

-An artist must be a reactionary. He has to stand out against the tenor of the age and not go flopping along.

-Art is the symbol of the two noblest human efforts: to construct and to refrain from destruction.

-I put the words down and push them a bit.

 -Words should be an intense pleasure, just as leather should be to a shoemaker.

-To understand all is to forgive all.

Quotes by Evelyn Waugh

Among the Winds at Play

-If you desire faith, then you have faith enough.

-Light tomorrow with today.

-My sun sets to rise again.

-What is genius but the power of expressing a new individuality?

-The little cares that fretted me,
I lost them yesterday
Among the fields above the sea,
Among the winds at play.

Quotes by Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Get Used To It

I believe that if you show people the problems and you show them the solutions they will be moved to act.

Is the rich world aware of how four billion of the six billion live? If we were aware, we would want to help out, we'd want to get involved.

Success is a lousy teacher. It seduces smart people into thinking they can't lose.

Life is not fair; get used to it.

The Internet is becoming the town square for the global village of tomorrow.

Quotes from Bill Gates

Wider Than our Views

What lies behind us and what lies ahead of us are tiny matters compared to what lives within us.

Most men lead lives of quiet desperation and go to the grave with the song still in them.

If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where they should be. Now put the foundations under them.

I would rather sit on a pumpkin, and have it all to myself, than be crowded on a velvet cushion.

However mean your life is, meet it and live it; do not shun it and call it hard names.

Rather than love, than money, than fame, give me truth.

The universe is wider than our views of it.

Quotes by Henry David Thoreau

Make One Music

Let the great world spin for ever down the ringing grooves of change.

My strength is as the strength of ten,
Because my heart is pure.

The greater man, the greater courtesy.

Come friends, it's not too late to seek a newer world.

I am a part of all that I have met.

I must lose myself in action, lest I wither in despair.

Knowledge comes, but wisdom lingers.

Let knowledge grow from more to more,
But more of reverence in us dwell;
That mind and soul, according well,
May make one music as before,
But vaster.

Quotes by Alfred Lord Tennyson

Taught Me to Understand

Have a heart that never hardens, and a temper that never tires, and a touch that never hurts.

No one is useless in this world who lightens the burdens of others.

A wonderful fact to reflect upon, that every human creature is constituted to be that profound secret and mystery to every other.

Suffering has been stronger than all other teaching, and has taught me to understand what your heart used to be. I have been bent and broken, but - I hope - into a better shape.

We need never be ashamed of our tears.

Quotes by Charles Dickens

The Desire to Achieve

Do not let your fire go out, spark by irreplaceable spark in the hopeless swamps of the not-quite, the not-yet, and the not-at-all. Do not let the hero in your soul perish in lonely frustration for the life you deserved and have never been able to reach. The world you desire can be won. It exists.. it is real.. it is possible.. it's yours.

 The question isn't who is going to let me; it's who is going to stop me.

 Learn to value yourself, which means: fight for your happiness.

 A creative person is motivated by the desire to achieve, not by the desire to beat others.

 Freedom (n.): To ask nothing. To expect nothing. To depend on nothing.

Quotes by Ayn Rand

Became the World All Around

There must be more to life than having everything.

Once a little boy sent me a charming card with a little drawing on it. I loved it. I answer all my children’s letters — sometimes very hastily — but this one I lingered over. I sent him a card and I drew a picture of a Wild Thing on it. I wrote, “Dear Jim: I loved your card.” Then I got a letter back from his mother and she said, “Jim loved your card so much he ate it.” That to me was one of the highest compliments I’ve ever received. He didn’t care that it was an original Maurice Sendak drawing or anything. He saw it, he loved it, he ate it.

I believe there is no part of our lives, our adult as well as child life, when we're not fantasizing, but we prefer to relegate fantasy to children, as though it were some tomfoolery only fit for the immature minds of the young. Children do live in fantasy and reality; they move back and forth very easily in a way we no longer remember how to do.

And the walls became the world all around.

Quotes by Maurice Sendak

If Only

Life is the only real counselor; wisdom unfiltered through personal experience does not become a part of the moral tissue.

The air of ideas is the only air worth breathing.

Some things are best mended by a break.

There are two ways of spreading light; to be the candle or the mirror that reflects it.

Beware of monotony; it's the mother of all the deadly sins.

If only we'd stop trying to be happy we could have a pretty good time.

Quotes by Edith Wharton

You are the Lens

Bless your uneasiness as a sign that there is still life within you.

Freedom from fear could be said to sum up the whole philosophy of human rights.

Is life so wretched? Isn't it rather your hands which are too small, your vision which is muddled? You are the one who must grow up.

Life only demands from you the strength you possess. Only one feat is possible - not to have run away.

Never, for the sake of peace and quiet, deny your own experience or convictions.

Time always seems long to the child who is waiting - for Christmas, for next summer, for becoming a grownup: long also when he surrenders his whole soul to each moment of a happy day.

You are ... the lens in the beam. You can only receive, give, and possess the light as the lens does.

Quotes by Dag Hammarskjold

More Myself

Art does the same things dreams do. We have a hunger for dreams and art fulfills that hunger. So much of real life is a disappointment. That's why we have art.

Getting the first draft finished is like pushing a peanut with your nose across a very dirty floor.

I had forgotten that time wasn't fixed like concrete but in fact was fluid as sand, or water. I had forgotten that even misery can end.

I never change, I simply become more myself.

Revenge is living well, without you.

Reading is the sole means by which we slip, involuntarily, often helplessly, into another's skin, another's voice, another's soul.

Quotes by Joyce Carol Oates

Nothing Impossible

A day spent without the sight or sound of beauty, the contemplation of mystery, or the search of truth or perfection is a poverty-stricken day; and a succession of such days is fatal to human life.

Adding highway lanes to deal with traffic congestion is like loosening your belt to cure obesity.

Restore human legs as a means of travel. Pedestrians rely on food for fuel and need no special parking facilities.

The artist has a special task and duty; the task of reminding men of their humanity and the promise of their creativity.

Nothing is unthinkable, nothing impossible to the balanced person, provided it comes out of the needs of life and is dedicated to life's further development.

Quotes by Lewis Mumford

What We Give

You are the storyteller of your own life and you can create your own legend or not.

A man does what he can; a woman does what a man cannot.

I need to remember to overcome.

Real soup is to the body what peace is to the soul.

We only have what we give.  

Quotes by Isabel Allende

The Triumph Over It

(Over the next several months I am focusing on individual authors rather than themes.)

As I have said, the first thing is to be honest with yourself. You can never have an impact on society if you have not changed yourself.... Great peacemakers are all people of integrity, of honesty, but humility.

A good head and good heart are always a formidable combination. But when you add to that a literate tongue or pen, then you have something very special.

As we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same.

I learned that courage was not the absence of fear, but the triumph over it.

The curious beauty of African music is that it uplifts even as it tells a sad tale. You may be poor, you may have only a ramshackle house, you may have lost your job, but that song gives you hope.    

~Quotes by Nelson Mandela

Cultivate our Garden

If you wish to achieve worthwhile things in your personal and career life, you must become a worthwhile person in your own self-development. ~ Brian Tracy

Let him who would move the world first move himself. ~Socrates

All our knowledge has its origin in our perceptions. ~ Leonardo da Vinci

BE OPEN TO new thoughts, to new people, to new principles, to new ideas, to new experiences. "NEW" MAKES US GROW. ~Rossana Condoleo

There is nothing noble in being superior to your fellow man; true nobility is being superior to your former self. ~Ernest Hemingway

Let us cultivate our garden. ~Voltaire
 
 Quotes about self improvement, life

Touching Eternity

The past is a ghost, the future a dream and all we ever have is now.  ~ Bill Cosby

Forever is composed of nows.  ~ Emily Dickinson

Drink your tea slowly and reverently, as if it is the axis on which the world earth revolves - slowly, evenly, without rushing toward the future.  ~ Thich Nhat Hanh

The only limit to our realization of tomorrow will be our doubts of today. Let us move forward with strong and active faith.  ~ Franklin D. Roosevelt

For the Present is the point at which time touches eternity.  ~ C. S. Lewis

Quotes about the present, life

Seeking a Thread

All the knowledge I possess everyone else can acquire, but my heart is all my own.   ~ Goethe
 
To romanticize the world is to make us aware of the magic, mystery and wonder of the world; it is to educate the senses to see the ordinary as extraordinary, the familiar as strange, the mundane as sacred, the finite as infinite.  ~Novalis

I set about seeking a thread, a theme, a style, in the realm of legend. Something that might allow me to give free rein to my juvenile sense of romanticism and the beautiful image.   ~ Leni Riefenstahl
 
I'm a romantic -- a sentimental person thinks things will last -- a romantic person hopes against hope that they won't.  ~ F. Scott Fitzgerald

To say the word Romanticism is to say modern art -- that is, intimacy, spirituality, color, aspiration towards the infinite, expressed by every means available to the arts.  ~ Charles Baudelaire 


Quotes about romanticism, life

Magic Exists

Dwell on the beauty of life. Watch the stars, and see yourself running with them.   ~ Marcus Aurelius
 
The nitrogen in our DNA, the calcium in our teeth, the iron in our blood, the carbon in our apple pies were made in the interiors of collapsing stars. We are made of starstuff.   ~ Carl Sagan
 
Trust your heart if the seas catch fire, live by love though the stars walk backward.    ~ e e cummings
 
Though my soul may set in darkness, it will rise in perfect light; I have loved the stars too fondly to be fearful of the night.   ~Sarah Williams

Magic exists. Who can doubt it, when there are rainbows and wildflowers, the music of the wind and the silence of the stars? Anyone who has loved has been touched by magic. It is such a simple and such an extraordinary part of the lives we live.   ~ Nora Roberts

Quotes about stars, life

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An Unaswered Question

A good question is never answered. It is not a bolt to be tightened into place, but a seed to be planted and to bear more seeds toward the hope of greening the landscape of idea.   ~ Henry David Thoreau

Life is an unanswered question, but let's still believe in the dignity and importance of that question.   ~ Tennessee Williams

I kept six honest serving men. They taught me all I knew. Their names are What and Why and When and How and Where and Who.    ~ Rudyard Kipling

If you crave some daily quotes and questions about life, you might like 365 Quote Quest.

A Supernatural Serenity

It's faith in something and enthusiasm for something that makes a life worth living.  ~ Oliver Wendell Holmes

Courage is going from failure to failure without losing enthusiasm.  ~ Winston Churchill

We act as though comfort and luxury were the chief requirements in life, when all we need to make us really happy is something to be enthusiastic about.  ~ Charles Kingsley 

I still get wildly enthusiastic about little things... I play with leaves. I skip down the street and run against the wind.  ~ Leo Buscaglia

Enthusiasm spells the difference between mediocrity and accomplishment.  ~ Norman Vincent Peale

Enthusiasm is a supernatural serenity.  ~ Henry David Thoreau

Quotes about enthusiasm, life

The Most Important Thing

A quiet secluded life in the country, with the possibility of being useful to people to whom it is easy to do good, and who are not accustomed to have it done to them; then work which one hopes may be of some use; then rest, nature, books, music, love for one's neighbor — such is my idea of happiness.   ~ Leo Tolstoy
 
Every person needs to take one day away. A day in which one consciously separates the past from the future. Jobs, family, employers, and friends can exist one day without any one of us, and if our egos permit us to confess, they could exist eternally in our absence. Each person deserves a day away in which no problems are confronted, no solutions searched for. Each of us needs to withdraw from the cares which will not withdraw from us.   ~ Maya Angelou
 
I cannot rest, I must draw, however poor the result, and when I have a bad time come over me it is a stronger desire than ever. ~ Beatrix Potter
 
Love turns work into rest.   ~ Teresa of Avila
 
Sometimes the most important thing in a whole day is the rest we take between two deep breaths.   ~ Etty Hillesum
 
Rest and be thankful.   ~ William Wordsworth

Quotes about rest, life

Not Everyone Sees It

Beauty is whatever gives joy.  ~Edna St. Vincent Millay

It is not beauty that endears; it’s love that makes us see beauty.  ~Leo Tolstoy

Beauty? To me it is a word without sense because I do not know where its meaning comes from nor where it leads to.   ~Pablo Picasso

Love of beauty is taste. The creation of beauty is art.   ~Ralph Waldo Emerson

Beauty is how you feel inside, and it reflects in your eyes. It is not something physical.   ~Sophia Loren

Everything has its beauty, but not everyone sees it.  ~Confucius

Quotes about beauty, life

To the Sunny Side of the Street

I myself have 12 hats, and each one represents a different personality. Why just be yourself?   ~Margaret Atwood
 
As a singer I tried on all these hats, these voices, these clothes, and eventually out came me.    ~ Carly Simon

At the age of four with paper hats and wooden swords we're all Generals. Only some of us never grow out of it.   ~ Peter Ustinov
 
I think tomorrow is a say-something-hat day.  ~Vida Boheme
 
Grab your coat and get your hat. Leave your worry on your doorstep. Just direct your feet to the sunny side of the street.   ~ Dorothy Fields 

Quotes about hats, life

The Noblest Pleasure

Seek first to understand, and then to be understood.  ~ Stephen Covey

I have striven not to laugh at human actions, not to weep at them, nor to hate them, but to understand them.  ~ Benedict de Spinoza

It is better to understand a little than to misunderstand a lot.  ~ Anatole France

The noblest pleasure is the joy of understanding.  ~ Leonardo da Vinci

Any fool can criticize, condemn, and complain but it takes character and self control to be understanding and forgiving.  ~ Dale Carnegie

Quotes about understanding, life

Derives its Powers

You have power over your mind - not outside events. Realize this, and you will find strength.  ~ Marcus Aurelius  

To handle yourself, use your head; to handle others, use your heart.  ~ Eleanor Roosevelt

He who controls others may be powerful, but he who has mastered himself is mightier still.  ~ Lao Tzu

Ultimately, the only power to which man should aspire is that which he exercises over himself.  ~ Elie Wiesel

If passion drives you, let reason hold the reins.  ~ Benjamin Franklin

The cyclone derives its powers from a calm center.  So does a person.  ~ Norman Vincent Peale

Quotes about self control, life

Now Isn't That Pleasant

We are the ones for whom we have been waiting.  ~ Hopi Elders

My friend...care for your psyche...know thyself, for once we know ourselves, we may learn how to care for ourselves.  ~ Socrates

When we can no longer change a situation, we are challenged to change ourselves.  ~ Viktor Frankl  

Find out who you are and do it on purpose.  ~  Dolly Parton

You are you.  Now isn't that pleasant.  ~  Dr. Seuss

Quotes about self, life