20th-century Author Quotes

I truly believe that our major social ills would disappear if we just spent our lives perfecting the art of connecting with each other.

Sean Stephenson

Conventional wisdom is no wisdom at all. Conventional wisdom is taking somebody else's word for the way things are It's the followers of this world who rely on assumption. Not the leaders.

Richard Marcinko

Being alone in our present society raises an important question about identity and well-being.

Every thought, action, decision, or feeling creates an eddy in the interlocking, inter-balancing energy fields of life. In this interconnected universe, every improvement we make in our private world improves the world at large for everyone.

David R. Hawkins

The fact that, in the United States, there are people serving ten-year prison terms for growing marijuana plants in their backyards while Wall Street racketeers, who have defrauded millions of people and destroyed the global economy, walk free is a kind of bizarre hypocrisy that boggles my mind.

Mark Haskell Smith

It takes strength to be proud of yourself and to accept yourself when you know that you have something out of the ordinary about you.

Abigail Tarttelin

Most days it feels as if the world is whirling around me and I am standing still. In slow motion, I watch the colors blur; people and faces all become a massive wash.

Sarah Kay (poet)

I was already at an age when putting off anything was a bad idea.

What I'm trying to get at is, as bad as everything seems, I think, at its heart, life is good. It doesn't throw anything at us that it knows we can't handle—and, even if it takes its time, it turns everything right side up again.

Alexandra Bracken

Marriages are more likely to fail when one partner not only does not mirror the other's expressions of happiness, but instead shows expressions of contempt.

The brain is the man; its health is essential for normal living; its disorders are surely the most profound of human miseries; and its destruction annihilates a person humanly, however intact his body.

H. Chandler Elliott

The war came to me in my dreams and showed me its sole purpose: to go on, only to go on.

It's stupid. There are maps to show you how to get to the place where you want to be but no maps that show you how to get to the time when you want to be.

We can't continue to be like this. Who am I? Your fiancée or your concubine?

Sacrifice is at the heart of repentance. Without deeds, your apology is worthless.

Bryan Davis (author)

When we strike a balance between the challenge of an activity and our skill at performing it, when the rhythm of the work itself feels in sync with our pulse, when we know that what we're doing matters, we can get totally absorbed in our task. That is happiness.

Ask him why there are hypocrites in the world.' 'Because it is hard to bear the happiness of others.' 'When are we happy?' 'When we desire nothing and realize that possession is only momentary, and so are forever playing.' 'What is regret?' 'To realize that one has spent one's life worrying about the future.' 'What is sorrow?' 'To long for the past.' 'What is the highest pleasure?' 'To hear a good story.

Vikram Chandra (novelist)

An English philosopher said that whatever is cosmic is also comic. Do the best you can and don't take it so seriously.

Tetsugen Bernard Glassman

Never underestimate the power of the human mind to believe what it wants to
believe, no matter the conflicting evidence.

Persistence is the twin sister of excellence. One is a matter of quality; the other, a matter of time.

Maybe da Vinci didn't serve lamb in his painting of the Last Supper, but there was room for interpretation. Jesus himself was the lamb led to the slaughter.

To stand up for someone was to stitch your fate into the lining of theirs.

I've come to think that's what heaven is- a place in the memory of others where our best selves live on.

Christina Baker Kline

You hardly know me. Why do you want me to come with you?' 'Who knows? Perhaps you remind me just a bit of -' 'Someone you used to know?' Alec interjected skeptically. 'Someone I used to be.

Lynn Flewelling

I want you to back yourself into a corner. Give yourself no choice but to succeed. Let the consequences of failure become so dire and so unthinkable that you'll have no choice but to do whatever it takes to succeed.