c2p-cmd/Good-Quotes-Authors huggingface dataset:
If you know someone who’s depressed, please resolve never to ask them why. Depression isn’t a straightforward response to a bad situation; depression just is, like the weather.Try to understand the blackness, lethargy, hopelessness, and loneliness they’re going through. Be there for them when they come through the other side. It’s hard to be a friend to someone who’s depressed, but it is one of the kindest, noblest, and best things you will ever do.
— Stephen Fry
Be steady and well-ordered in your life so that you can be fierce and original in your work.
— Gustave Flaubert
Maybe this world is another planet’s hell.
— Aldous Huxley
He allowed himself to be swayed by his conviction that human beings are not born once and for all on the day their mothers give birth to them, but that life obliges them over and over again to give birth to themselves.
— Gabriel García Márquez, Love in the Time of Cholera
Your emotions are the slaves to your thoughts, and you are the slave to your emotions.
— Elizabeth Gilbert, Eat Pray Love: One Woman's Search for Everything Across Italy, India and Indonesia
It is not the length of life, but the depth.
— Ralph Waldo Emerson
I’ve known people that the world has thrown everything at to discourage them...to break their spirit. And yet something about them retains a dignity. They face life and don’t ask quarters.
— Horton Foote
Ordinary life is pretty complex stuff.
— Harvey Pekar
Sometimes I lie awake at night, and I ask, 'Where have I gone wrong'.Then a voice says to me, 'This is going to take more than one night.
— Charles M. Schulz
The Bhagavad Gita--that ancient Indian Yogic text--says that it is better to live your own destiny imperfectly than to live an imitation of somebody else's life with perfection.
— Elizabeth Gilbert, Eat, Pray, Love
I believe in being strong when everything seems to be going wrong. I believe that happy girls are the prettiest girls. I believe that tomorrow is another day, and I believe in miracles
— Audrey Hepburn
If a man will begin with certainties, he shall end in doubts; but if he will be content to begin with doubts, he shall end in certainties.
— Francis Bacon, The Advancement Of Learning
Death is so terribly final, while life is full of possibilities.
— George R.R. Martin, A Game of Thrones
I'll try anything once, twice if I like it, three times to make sure.
— Mae West
Nothing in life is to be feared, it is only to be understood. Now is the time to understand more, so that we may fear less.
— Marie Curie
Life seems sometimes like nothing more than a series of losses, from beginning to end. That's the given. How you respond to those losses, what you make of what's left, that's the part you have to make up as you go.
— Katharine Weber, The Music Lesson
What makes big boobs and perkiness so attractive to boys? I mean, really. Two round, mounds of fat and a fake smile. Yeah, winning attributes.
— Gena Showalter, Oh My Goth
Sometimes the right thing feels all wrong until it is over and done with.
— Alice Hoffman, Practical Magic
I sit beside the fire and think Of all that I have seenOf meadow flowers and butterfliesIn summers that have beenOf yellow leaves and gossamerIn autumns that there wereWith morning mist and silver sunAnd wind upon my hairI sit beside the fire and thinkOf how the world will beWhen winter comes without a spring That I shall ever seeFor still there are so many thingsThat I have never seenIn every wood in every springThere is a different greenI sit beside the fire and thinkOf people long agoAnd people that will see a worldThat I shall never knowBut all the while I sit and thinkOf times there were beforeI listen for returning feet And voices at the door
— J.R.R. Tolkien
There are times to stay put, and what you want will come to you, and there are times to go out into the world and find such a thing for yourself.
— Lemony Snicket, Horseradish
Live the Life of Your Dreams: Be brave enough to live the life of your dreams according to your vision and purpose instead of the expectations and opinions of others.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
Be grateful for what you already have while you pursue your goals. If you aren’t grateful for what you already have, what makes you think you would be happy with more.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
No amount of regretting can change the past, and no amount of worrying can change the future.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
Do what is right, not what is easy nor what is popular.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
Treat everyone with politeness and kindness, not because they are nice, but because you are.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
Don't let the expectations and opinions of other people affect your decisions. It's your life, not theirs. Do what matters most to you; do what makes you feel alive and happy. Don't let the expectations and ideas of others limit who you are. If you let others tell you who you are, you are living their reality — not yours. There is more to life than pleasing people. There is much more to life than following others' prescribed path. There is so much more to life than what you experience right now. You need to decide who you are for yourself. Become a whole being. Adventure.
— Roy T. Bennett
There is a saying in Tibetan, 'Tragedy should be utilized as a source of strength.'No matter what sort of difficulties, how painful experience is, if we lose our hope, that's our real disaster.
— Dalai Lama XIV
I walk around the school hallways and look at the people. I look at the teachers and wonder why they're here. If they like their jobs. Or us. And I wonder how smart they were when they were fifteen. Not in a mean way. In a curious way. It's like looking at all the students and wondering who's had their heart broken that day, and how they are able to cope with having three quizzes and a book report due on top of that. Or wondering who did the heart breaking. And wondering why.
— Stephen Chbosky, The Perks of Being a Wallflower
If you can't change your fate, change your attitude.
— Amy Tan
The secret of life is honesty and fair dealing. If you can fake that, you've got it made.
— Groucho Marx
My only advice is to stay aware, listen carefully, and yell for help if you need it.
— Judy Blume
Life is to be lived, not controlled; and humanity is won by continuing to play in face of certain defeat.
— Ralph Ellison, Invisible Man
Respect other people's feelings. It might mean nothing to you, but it could mean everything to them.
— Roy T. Bennett
Life is too short to waste your time on people who don’t respect, appreciate, and value you.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
Do you not see how necessary a world of pains and troubles is to school an intelligence and make it a soul?
— John Keats, Letters of John Keats
Pain is a pesky part of being human, I've learned it feels like a stab wound to the heart, something I wish we could all do without, in our lives here. Pain is a sudden hurt that can't be escaped. But then I have also learned that because of pain, I can feel the beauty, tenderness, and freedom of healing. Pain feels like a fast stab wound to the heart. But then healing feels like the wind against your face when you are spreading your wings and flying through the air! We may not have wings growing out of our backs, but healing is the closest thing that will give us that wind against our faces.
— C. JoyBell C.
We are taught you must blame your father, your sisters, your brothers, the school, the teachers - but never blame yourself. It's never your fault. But it's always your fault, because if you wanted to change you're the one who has got to change.
— Katharine Hepburn, Me
What a strange thing!to be alivebeneath cherry blossoms.
— Kobayashi Issa, Poems
The real things haven't changed. It is still best to be honest and truthful
—  to make the most of what we have
Life has become immeasurably better since I have been forced to stop taking it seriously.
— Hunter S. Thompson
I am incapable of conceiving infinity, and yet I do not accept finity. I want this adventure that is the context of my life to go on without end.
— Simone de Beauvoir, La Vieillesse
It was only a sunny smile, and little it cost in the giving, but like morning light it scattered the night and made the day worth living.
— F. Scott Fitzgerald
Living is Easy with Eyes Closed.
— John Lennon
Anybody can look at a pretty girl and see a pretty girl. An artist can look at a pretty girl and see the old woman she will become. A better artist can look at an old woman and see the pretty girl that she used to be. But a great artist-a master-and that is what Auguste Rodin was-can look at an old woman, protray her exactly as she is...and force the viewer to see the pretty girl she used to be...and more than that, he can make anyone with the sensitivity of an armadillo, or even you, see that this lovely young girl is still alive, not old and ugly at all, but simply prisoned inside her ruined body. He can make you feel the quiet, endless tragedy that there was never a girl born who ever grew older than eighteen in her heart...no matter what the merciless hours have done to her. Look at her, Ben. Growing old doesn't matter to you and me; we were never meant to be admired-but it does to them.
— Robert A. Heinlein
Instead of worrying about what you cannot control, shift your energy to what you can create.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
It’s only after you’ve stepped outside your comfort zone that you begin to change, grow, and transform.
— Roy T. Bennett
The right thing and the easy thing are never the same.
— Kami Garcia, Beautiful Creatures
The difference between fiction and reality? Fiction has to make sense.
— Tom Clancy
After all, tomorrow is another day!
— Margaret Mitchell, Gone with the Wind
Don't be pushed around by the fears in your mind. Be led by the dreams in your heart.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
Death is Peaceful, Life is Harder
— Stephenie Meyer, Twilight
Don't be afraid to be confused. Try to remain permanently confused. Anything is possible. Stay open, forever, so open it hurts, and then open up some more, until the day you die, world without end, amen.
— George Saunders, The Braindead Megaphone
I felt once more how simple and frugal a thing is happiness: a glass of wine, a roast chestnut, a wretched little brazier, the sound of the sea. Nothing else.
— Nikos Kazantzakis, Zorba the Greek
The past is a place of reference, not a place of residence; the past is a place of learning, not a place of living.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
Life becomes easier and more beautiful when we can see the good in other people.
— Roy T. Bennett
I just need to know that someone out there listens and understands and doesn't try to sleep with someone even if they could have. I need to know these people exist.
— Stephen Chbosky, The Perks of Being a Wallflower
The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation. What is called resignation is confirmed desperation. From the desperate city you go into the desperate country, and have to console yourself with the bravery of minks and muskrats. A stereotyped but unconscious despair is concealed even under what are called the games and amusements of mankind. There is no play in them, for this comes after work. But it is a characteristic of wisdom not to do desperate things..
— Henry David Thoreau, Civil Disobedience and Other Essays
People make mistakes in life through believing too much, but they have a damned dull time if they believe too little.
— James Hilton, Lost Horizon
I live in my own little world. But its ok, they know me here.
— Lauren Myracle
If you care about something you have to protect it – If you’re lucky enough to find a way of life you love, you have to find the courage to live it.
— John Irving, A Prayer for Owen Meany
You live but once
—  you might as well be amusing.
Life isn't fair, it's just fairer than death, that's all.
— William Goldman, The Princess Bride
Now and then it's good to pause in our pursuit of happiness and just be happy.
— Guillaume Apollinaire
I am awfully greedy; I want everything from life. I want to be a woman and to be a man, to have many friends and to have loneliness, to work much and write good books, to travel and enjoy myself, to be selfish and to be unselfish… You see, it is difficult to get all which I want. And then when I do not succeed I get mad with anger.
— Simone de Beauvoir
When you consider things like the stars, our affairs don't seem to matter very much, do they?
— Virginia Woolf
Tiger got to hunt, bird got to fly;Man got to sit and wonder 'why, why, why?'Tiger got to sleep, bird got to land;Man got to tell himself he understand.
— Kurt Vonnegut Jr., Cat's Cradle
At the time, my life just seemed too complete, and maybe we have to break everything to make something better out of ourselves.
— Chuck Palahniuk, Fight Club
Sometimes life knocks you on your ass... get up, get up, get up!!! Happiness is not the absence of problems, it's the ability to deal with them.
— Steve Maraboli, Life, the Truth, and Being Free
why are trying so hard to fit in, when you're born to stand out
— Oliver James
Be mindful. Be grateful. Be positive. Be true. Be kind.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
No sympathy for the devil; keep that in mind. Buy the ticket, take the ride...and if it occasionally gets a little heavier than what you had in mind, well...maybe chalk it up to forced consciousness expansion: Tune in, freak out, get beaten.
— Hunter S. Thompson, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas
Even though you may want to move forward in your life, you may have one foot on the brakes. In order to be free, we must learn how to let go. Release the hurt. Release the fear. Refuse to entertain your old pain. The energy it takes to hang onto the past is holding you back from a new life. What is it you would let go of today?
— Mary Manin Morrissey
There’s no such thing as ruining your life. Life’s a pretty resilient thing, it turns out.
— Sophie Kinsella, The Undomestic Goddess
A star falls from the sky and into your hands. Then it seeps through your veins and swims inside your blood and becomes every part of you. And then you have to put it back into the sky. And it's the most painful thing you'll ever have to do and that you've ever done. But what's yours is yours. Whether it’s up in the sky or here in your hands. And one day, it'll fall from the sky and hit you in the head real hard and that time, you won't have to put it back in the sky again.
— C. JoyBell C.
Some people, they can't just move on, you know, mourn and cry and be done with it. Or at least seem to be. But for me... I don't know. I didn't want to fix it, to forget. It wasn't something that was broken. It's just...something that happened. And like that hole, I'm just finding ways, every day, of working around it. Respecting and remembering and getting on at the same time. 
— Sarah Dessen, The Truth About Forever
Don’t waste your time in anger, regrets, worries, and grudges. Life is too short to be unhappy.
— Roy T. Bennett
Success is not how high you have climbed, but how you make a positive difference to the world.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
Help others without any reason and give without the expectation of receiving anything in return.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
You are not rich until you have a rich heart.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
Stop comparing yourself to other people, just choose to be happy and live your own life.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
The more you feed your mind with positive thoughts, the more you can attract great things into your life.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
Great things happen to those who don't stop believing, trying, learning, and being grateful.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
No matter how long you train someone to be brave, you never know if they are or not until something real happens.
— Veronica Roth, Insurgent
Whoever saves one life, saves the world entire.
— Thomas Keneally, Schindler's List
We cannot change the cards we are dealt, just how we play the hand.
— Randy Pausch, The Last Lecture
Let me be, was all I wanted. Be what I am, no matter how I am.
— Henry Miller, Stand Still Like the Hummingbird
The thing about getting older is that you don't need everything to be possible any more, you just need things to be certain.
— Monica Ali, Brick Lane
Dear God," she prayed, "let me be something every minute of every hour of my life. Let me be gay; let me be sad. Let me be cold; let me be warm. Let me be hungry...have too much to eat. Let me be ragged or well dressed. Let me be sincere - be deceitful. Let me be truthful; let me be a liar. Let me be honorable and let me sin. Only let me be something every blessed minute. And when I sleep, let me dream all the time so that not one little piece of living is ever lost.
— Betty  Smith, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn
Sometimes you have to kind of die inside in order to rise from your own ashes and believe in yourself and love yourself to become a new person.
— Gerard Way
I can choose either to be a victim of the world or an adventurer in search of treasure. It's all a question of how I view my life.
— Paulo Coelho, Eleven Minutes
Death is not the opposite of life, but a part of it.
— Haruki Murakami, Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman: 24 Stories
And I learned what is obvious to a child. That life is simply a collection of little lives, each lived one day at a time. That each day should be spent finding beauty in flowers and poetry and talking to animals. That a day spent with dreaming and sunsets and refreshing breezes cannot be bettered. But most of all, I learned that life is about sitting on benches next to ancient creeks with my hand on her knee and sometimes, on good days, for falling in love.
— Nicholas Sparks
To acquire the habit of reading is to construct for yourself a refuge from almost all the miseries of life.
— W. Somerset Maugham, Books and You
Face your life, its pain, its pleasure, leave no path untaken.
— Neil Gaiman, The Graveyard Book
Follow your heart, listen to your inner voice, stop caring about what others think.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
When you're lost in those woods, it sometimes takes you a while to realize that you are lost. For the longest time, you can convince yourself that you've just wandered off the path, that you'll find your way back to the trailhead any moment now. Then night falls again and again, and you still have no idea where you are, and it's time to admit that you have bewildered yourself so far off the path that you don't even know from which direction the sun rises anymore.
— Elizabeth Gilbert
There is no good and evil, there is only power and those too weak to seek it.
— J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone
I think I've discovered the secret of life -- you just hang around until you get used to it.
— Charles M. Schulz
How would your life be different if…You stopped making negative judgmental assumptions about people you encounter? Let today be the day…You look for the good in everyone you meet and respect their journey.
— Steve Maraboli, Life, the Truth, and Being Free
There is not a particle of life which does not bear poetry within it
— Gustave Flaubert
Unexpected intrusions of beauty. This is what life is.
— Saul Bellow, Herzog
The trouble with being in the rat race is that even if you win, you're still a rat.
— Lily Tomlin
Almost nobody dances sober, unless they happen to be insane.
— H.P. Lovecraft
Life is pleasant. Death is peaceful. It's the transition that's troublesome.
— Isaac Asimov
How people treat you is their karma
—  how you react is yours.
Do not let the memories of your past limit the potential of your future. There are no limits to what you can achieve on your journey through life, except in your mind.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
Do not set aside your happiness. Do not wait to be happy in the future. The best time to be happy is always now.
— Roy T. Bennett
Surround Yourself with People Who Believe in Your Dreams:Surround yourself with people who believe in your dreams, encourage your ideas, support your ambitions, and bring out the best in you.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
Always remember people who have helped you along the way, and don’t forget to lift someone up.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
It’s your life
—  you don’t need someone’s permission to live the life you want. Be brave to live from your heart.
Accept yourself, love yourself, and keep moving forward. If you want to fly, you have to give up what weighs you down.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
A pain stabbed my heart, as it did every time I saw a girl I loved who was going the opposite direction in this too-big world.
— Jack Kerouac, On the Road
In the name of God, stop a moment, cease your work, look around you.
— Leo Tolstoy
Don't be afraid of enemies who attack you. Be afraid of the friends who flatter you.
— Dale Carnegie, How to Win Friends and Influence People
That's what literature is. It's the people who went before us, tapping out messages from the past, from beyond the grave, trying to tell us about life and death! Listen to them!
— Connie Willis, Passage
There is some kind of a sweet innocence in being human- in not having to be just happy or just sad- in the nature of being able to be both broken and whole, at the same time.
— C. JoyBell C.
If you can keep your head when all about you Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,But make allowance for their doubting too;If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,Or being lied about, don't deal in lies,Or being hated, don't give way to hating,And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wiseIf you can dream - and not make dreams your master;If you can think - and not make thoughts your aim;If you can meet with Triumph and DisasterAnd treat those two impostors just the same;If you can bear to hear the truth you've spokenTwisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out toolsIf you can make one heap of all your winnings And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,And lose, and start again at your beginningsAnd never breathe a word about your loss;If you can force your heart and nerve and sinewTo serve your turn long after they are gone,And so hold on when there is nothing in youExcept the will which says to them: 'Hold on!'If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,Or walk with Kings - nor lose the common touch,If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,If all men count with you, but none too much;If you can fill the unforgiving minuteWith sixty seconds' worth of distance run,Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,And - which is more - you'll be a Man, my son!
— Rudyard Kipling, If: A Father's Advice to His Son
Make improvements, not excuses. Seek respect, not attention.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma - which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of other's opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.
— Steve Jobs
The biggest adventure you can ever take is to live the life of your dreams.
— Oprah Winfrey
The only person who can pull me down is myself, and I'm not going to let myself pull me down anymore.
— C. JoyBell C.
Keep GoingYour hardest times often lead to the greatest moments of your life. Keep going. Tough situations build strong people in the end.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
I believe that words are strong, that they can overwhelm what we fear when fear seems more awful than life is good.
— Andrew Solomon, The Noonday Demon: An Atlas of Depression
Life is about accepting the challenges along the way, choosing to keep moving forward, and savoring the journey.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
Every man's life ends the same way. It is only the details of how he lived and how he died that distinguish one man from another.
— Ernest Hemingway
Always find opportunities to make someone smile, and to offer random acts of kindness in everyday life.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
Learn to light a candle in the darkest moments of someone’s life. Be the light that helps others see
—  it is what gives life its deepest significance.
Be brave to stand for what you believe in even if you stand alone.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
Ester asked why people are sad."That’s simple," says the old man. "They are the prisoners of their personal history. Everyone believes that the main aim in life is to follow a plan. They never ask if that plan is theirs or if it was created by another person. They accumulate experiences, memories, things, other people's ideas, and it is more than they can possibly cope with. And that is why they forget their dreams.
— Paulo Coelho, The Zahir
I think prime numbers are like life. They are very logical but you could never work out the rules, even if you spent all your time thinking about them
— Mark Haddon, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time
When the going gets tough, put one foot in front of the other and just keep going. Don’t give up.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
You cannot control the behavior of others, but you can always choose how you respond to it.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
Sometimes you have to lose all you have to find out who you truly are.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
Maturity is when you stop complaining and making excuses, and start making changes.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
Do Not Lie to Yourself We have to be honest about what we want and take risks rather than lie to ourselves and make excuses to stay in our comfort zone.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
Focus on your strengths, not your weaknesses.Focus on your character, not your reputation.Focus on your blessings, not your misfortunes.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
Do I dare Disturb the universe? In a minute there is time For decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse.
— T.S. Eliot
If you want to make God laugh, tell him about your plans.
— Woody Allen
Why do they always teach us that it's easy and evil to do what we want and that we need discipline to restrain ourselves? It's the hardest thing in the world--to do what we want. And it takes the greatest kind of courage. I mean, what we really want.
— Ayn Rand
Not one of your pertinent ancestors was squashed, devoured, drowned, starved, stranded, stuck fast, untimely wounded, or otherwise deflected from its life's quest of delivering a tiny charge of genetic material to the right partner at the right moment in order to perpetuate the only possible sequence of hereditary combinations that could result -- eventually, astoundingly, and all too briefly -- in you.
— Bill Bryson, A Short History of Nearly Everything
One lives in the hope of becoming a memory.
— Antonio Porchia
I live my life in widening circles that reach out across the world.
— Rainer Maria Rilke, Rilke's Book of Hours: Love Poems to God
Do not despise your own place and hour. Every place is under the stars, every place is the center of the world.
— John Burroughs, Studies in Nature and Literature
Accept what life offers you and try to drink from every cup. All wines should be tasted; some should only be sipped, but with others, drink the whole bottle.
— Paulo Coelho, Brida
I think that we are like stars. Something happens to burst us open; but when we burst open and think we are dying; we’re actually turning into a supernova. And then when we look at ourselves again, we see that we’re suddenly more beautiful than we ever were before!
— C. JoyBell C.
What good is the warmth of summer, without the cold of winter to give it sweetness.
— John Steinbeck, Travels with Charley: In Search of America
What, if some day or night a demon were to steal after you into your loneliest loneliness and say to you: 'This life as you now live it and have lived it, you will have to live once more and innumerable times more' ... Would you not throw yourself down and gnash your teeth and curse the demon who spoke thus? Or have you once experienced a tremendous moment when you would have answered him: 'You are a god and never have I heard anything more divine.
— Friedrich Nietzsche, The Gay Science
Sometimes the hardest part isn't letting go but rather learning to start over.
— Nicole Sobon, Program 13
Do not fear failure but rather fear not trying.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
Life is not a problem to be solved, but a reality to be experienced.
— Søren Kierkegaard
Life is worth living as long as there's a laugh in it.
— L.M. Montgomery, Anne of Green Gables
Pursue what catches your heart, not what catches your eyes.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
One ChoiceOne Choice, decided your friends.One Choice, defines your beliefs.One Choice, determines your loyalties - Forever.ONCE CHOICE CAN TRANSFORM YOU
— Veronica Roth, Divergent
Lots of things can be fixed. Things can be fixed. But many times, relationships between people cannot be fixed, because they should not be fixed. You're aboard a ship setting sail, and the other person has joined the inland circus, or is boarding a different ship, and you just can't be with each other anymore. Because you shouldn't be.
— C. JoyBell C.
Believe something and the Universe is on its way to being changed. Because you've changed, by believing. Once you've changed, other things start to follow. Isn't that the way it works?
— Diane Duane, So You Want to Be a Wizard
Pull up a chair. Take a taste. Come join us. Life is so endlessly delicious.
— Ruth Reichl
Simplicity is the keynote of all true elegance.
— Coco Chanel
To shine your brightest light is to be who you truly are.
— Roy T. Bennett
Be thankful for everything that happens in your life
—  it’s all an experience.
But how could you live and have no story to tell?
— Fyodor Dostoyevsky, White Nights
Time doesn’t heal emotional pain, you need to learn how to let go.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
Stop giving other people the power to control your happiness, your mind, and your life. If you don't take control of yourself and your own life, someone else is bound to try.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
Kindness is not a business. True kindness expects nothing in return and should never act with conditions.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
Once you realize you deserve a bright future, letting go of your dark past is the best choice you will ever make.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
This must be Thursday,' said Arthur to himself, sinking low over his beer. 'I never could get the hang of Thursdays.
— Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
There is nothing more rare, nor more beautiful, than a woman being unapologetically herself; comfortable in her perfect imperfection. To me, that is the true essence of beauty.
— Steve Maraboli, Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience
Man is condemned to be free; because once thrown into the world, he is responsible for everything he does. It is up to you to give [life] a meaning.
— Jean-Paul Sartre
That what I need to survive is not Gale's fire, kindled with rage and hatred. I have plenty of fire myself. What I need is the dandelion in the spring. The bright yellow that means rebirth instead of destruction. The promise that life can go on, no matter how bad our losses. That it can be good again. And only Peeta can give me that.
— Suzanne Collins, Mockingjay
She burned too bright for this world.
— Emily Brontë, Wuthering Heights
I'd like to repeat the advice that I gave you before, in that I think you really should make a radical change in your lifestyle and begin to boldly do things which you may previously never have thought of doing, or been too hesitant to attempt. So many people live within unhappy circumstances and yet will not take the initiative to change their situation because they are conditioned to a life of security, conformity, and conservatism, all of which may appear to give one peace of mind, but in reality nothing is more damaging to the adventurous spirit within a man than a secure future. The very basic core of a man's living spirit is his passion for adventure. The joy of life comes from our encounters with new experiences, and hence there is no greater joy than to have an endlessly changing horizon, for each day to have a new and different sun. If you want to get more out of life, Ron, you must lose your inclination for monotonous security and adopt a helter-skelter style of life that will at first appear to you to be crazy. But once you become accustomed to such a life you will see its full meaning and its incredible beauty. And so, Ron, in short, get out of Salton City and hit the Road. I guarantee you will be very glad you did. But I fear that you will ignore my advice. You think that I am stubborn, but you are even more stubborn than me. You had a wonderful chance on your drive back to see one of the greatest sights on earth, the Grand Canyon, something every American should see at least once in his life. But for some reason incomprehensible to me you wanted nothing but to bolt for home as quickly as possible, right back to the same situation which you see day after day after day. I fear you will follow this same inclination in the future and thus fail to discover all the wonderful things that God has placed around us to discover. Don't settle down and sit in one place. Move around, be nomadic, make each day a new horizon. You are still going to live a long time, Ron, and it would be a shame if you did not take the opportunity to revolutionize your life and move into an entirely new realm of experience.You are wrong if you think Joy emanates only or principally from human relationships. God has placed it all around us. It is in everything and anything we might experience. We just have to have the courage to turn against our habitual lifestyle and engage in unconventional living.My point is that you do not need me or anyone else around to bring this new kind of light in your life. It is simply waiting out there for you to grasp it, and all you have to do is reach for it. The only person you are fighting is yourself and your stubbornness to engage in new circumstances.
— Jon Krakauer, Into the Wild
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, The Alchemist
Believe in yourself. You are braver than you think, more talented than you know, and capable of more than you imagine.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
Start each day with a positive thought and a grateful heart.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
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, Family Happiness
I am fated to journey hand in hand with my strange heroes and to survey the surging immensity of life, to survey it through the laughter that all can see and through the tears unseen and unknown by anyone.
— Nikolai Gogol
Let the improvement of yourself keep you so busy that you have no time to criticize others.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
If you believe very strongly in something, stand up and fight for it.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
A man with outward courage dares to die
—  a man with inner courage dares to live.
Develop an interest in life as you see it; the people, things, literature, music - the world is so rich, simply throbbing with rich treasures, beautiful souls and interesting people. Forget yourself.
— Henry Miller
It's not the men in your life that matters, it's the life in your men.
— Mae West
I believe there is another world waiting for us. A better world. And I'll be waiting for you there.
— David Mitchell, Cloud Atlas
Many people die at twenty five and aren't buried until they are seventy five.
— Benjamin Franklin
Scar tissue is stronger than regular tissue. Realize the strength, move on.
— Henry Rollins
Listen with curiosity. Speak with honesty. Act with integrity. The greatest problem with communication is we don’t listen to understand. We listen to reply. When we listen with curiosity, we don’t listen with the intent to reply. We listen for what’s behind the words.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
Every luxury must be paid for, and everything is a luxury, starting with being in this world.
— Cesare Pavese, Il mestiere di vivere: Diario 1935-1950
Life has no remote....get up and change it yourself!
— Mark A. Cooper, Operation Einstein
The strongest people find the courage and caring to help others, even if they are going through their own storm.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
Perfectionism is the enemy of happiness. Embrace being perfectly imperfect. Learn from your mistakes and forgive yourself, you’ll be happier. We make mistakes because we are imperfect. Learn from your mistakes, forgive yourself, and keep moving forward.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
To have what you have never had, you have to do what you have never done.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
Never complain, never explain. Resist the temptation to defend yourself or make excuses.
— Brian Tracy
There are two tragedies in life. One is to lose your heart's desire. The other is to gain it.
— George Bernard Shaw, Man and Superman
People are like stained-glass windows. They sparkle and shine when the sun is out, but when the darkness sets in, their true beauty is revealed only if there is a light from within.
— Elisabeth Kübler-Ross
The aim of life is to live, and to live means to be aware, joyously, drunkenly, serenely, divinely aware.
— Henry Miller
The world is a tragedy to those who feel, but a comedy to those who think.
— Horace Walpole
As soon as you trust yourself, you will know how to live.
— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Faust: First Part
It all goes away. Eventually, everything goes away.
— Elizabeth Gilbert, Eat, Pray, Love
It's better to burn out than to fade away.
— Neil Young
No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it's not the same river and he's not the same man.
— Heraclitus
Life is so beautiful that death has fallen in love with it, a jealous, possessive love that grabs at what it can. But life leaps over oblivion lightly, losing only a thing or two of no importance, and gloom is but the passing shadow of a cloud...
— Yann Martel, Life of Pi
Happiness depends on your mindset and attitude.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
At the end of the day, let there be no excuses, no explanations, no regrets.
— Steve Maraboli, Life, the Truth, and Being Free
Be Brave and Take Risks: You need to have faith in yourself. Be brave and take risks. You don't have to have it all figured out to move forward.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
I'm sorry for my inability to let unimportant things go, for my inability to hold on to the important things.
— Jonathan Safran Foer
Some of us get dipped in flat, some in satin, some in gloss...." He turned to me. "But every once in a while, you find someone who's iridescent, and when you do, nothing will ever compare.
— Wendelin Van Draanen, Flipped
One always has a better book in one's mind than one can manage to get onto paper.
— Michael Cunningham
Life is too short, or too long, for me to allow myself the luxury of living it so badly.
— Paulo Coelho
Roads Go Ever OnRoads go ever ever on,Over rock and under tree,By caves where never sun has shone,By streams that never find the sea;Over snow by winter sown,And through the merry flowers of June,Over grass and over stone,And under mountains in the moon.Roads go ever ever on,Under cloud and under star.Yet feet that wandering have goneTurn at last to home afar.Eyes that fire and sword have seen,And horror in the halls of stoneLook at last on meadows green,And trees and hills they long have known.The Road goes ever on and onDown from the door where it began.Now far ahead the Road has gone,And I must follow, if I can,Pursuing it with eager feet,Until it joins some larger way,Where many paths and errands meet.The Road goes ever on and onDown from the door where it began.Now far ahead the Road has gone,And I must follow, if I can,Pursuing it with weary feet,Until it joins some larger way,Where many paths and errands meet.And whither then? I cannot say.The Road goes ever on and onOut from the door where it began.Now far ahead the Road has gone.Let others follow, if they can!Let them a journey new begin.But I at last with weary feetWill turn towards the lighted inn,My evening-rest and sleep to meet.
— J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings
What would come, would come...and you would have to meet it, when it did.
— J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
The meaning of life is that it stops.
— Franz Kafka
You're on Earth. There's no cure for that.
— Samuel Beckett
Those who are willing to be vulnerable move among mysteries.
— Theodore Roethke, Straw for the Fire: From the Notebooks of Theodore Roethke
Oh, Life, I am yours. Whatever it is you want of me, I am ready to give.
— William Steig, Dominic
Courage is feeling fear, not getting rid of fear, and taking action in the face of fear.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
You are in charge of your own happiness
—  you don't need to wait for other people's permission to be happy.
Every one of us is losing something precious to us. Lost opportunities, lost possibilities, feelings we can never get back again. That’s part of what it means to be alive.
— Haruki Murakami, Kafka on the Shore
In everybody’s life there’s a point of no return. And in a very few cases, a point where you can’t go forward anymore. And when we reach that point, all we can do is quietly accept the fact. That’s how we survive.
— Haruki Murakami, Kafka on the Shore
How much I missed, simply because I was afraid of missing it.
— Paulo Coelho, Brida
Who says life is fair, where is that written?
— William Goldman, The Princess Bride
You spend your whole life stuck in the labyrinth, thinking about how you'll escape one day, and how awesome it will be, and imagining that future keeps you going, but you never do it. You just use the future to escape the present.
— John Green, Looking for Alaska
We all make mistakes, have struggles, and even regret things in our past. But you are not your mistakes, you are not your struggles, and you are here NOW with the power to shape your day and your future.
— Steve Maraboli, Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience
I wonder why I don't go to bed and go to sleep. But then it would be tomorrow, so I decide that no matter how tired, no matter how incoherent I am, I can skip on hour more of sleep and live.
— Sylvia Plath, The Unabridged Journals of Sylvia Plath
One of the few good things about modern times: If you die horribly on television, you will not have died in vain. You will have entertained us.
— Kurt Vonnegut Jr.
When a woman becomes her own best friend life is easier.
— Diane Von Furstenberg
My body is my journal, and my tattoos are my story.
— Johnny Depp
Throughout life people will make you mad, disrespect you and treat you bad. Let God deal with the things they do, cause hate in your heart will consume you too.
— Will Smith
Strong people have a strong sense of self-worth and self-awareness
—  they don’t need the approval of others.
You've a good heart. Sometimes that's enough to see you safe wherever you go. But mostly, it's not.
— Neil Gaiman, Neverwhere
Our true friends are those who are with us when the good things happen. They cheer us on and are pleased by our triumphs. False friends only appear at difficult times, with their sad, supportive faces, when, in fact, our suffering is serving to console them for their miserable lives.
— Paulo Coelho, The Zahir
Paradoxically though it may seem, it is none the less true that life imitates art far more than art imitates life.
— Oscar Wilde
When you arise in the morning think of what a privilege it is to be alive, to think, to enjoy, to love ...
— Marcus Aurelius, Meditations
Believe in your infinite potential. Your only limitations are those you set upon yourself.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
The whole of life is just like watching a film. Only it's as though you always get in ten minutes after the big picture has started, and no-one will tell you the plot, so you have to work it out all yourself from the clues.
— Terry Pratchett, Moving Pictures
People are unhappy when they get something too easily. You have to sweat--that's the only moral they know.
— Dany Laferrière, I Am a Japanese Writer
It's never too late to change your life for the better. You don't have to take huge steps to change your life. Making even the smallest changes to your daily routine can make a big difference to your life.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
The outer world is a reflection of the inner world. Other people’s perception of you is a reflection of them
—  your response to them is an awareness of you.
The biggest wall you have to climb is the one you build in your mind: Never let your mind talk you out of your dreams, trick you into giving up. Never let your mind become the greatest obstacle to success. To get your mind on the right track, the rest will follow.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
Patience Is Not the Ability to Wait: Patience is not the ability to wait. Patience is to be calm no matter what happens, constantly take action to turn it to positive growth opportunities, and have faith to believe that it will all work out in the end while you are waiting.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
You Are the Master of Your AttitudeYou cannot control what happens to you, but you can control the way you think about all the events. You always have a choice. You can choose to face them with a positive mental attitude.
— Roy T. Bennett, The Light in the Heart
The two most important days in your life are the day you are born and the day you find out why.
— Mark Twain
People have to forgive. We don't have to like them, we don't have to be friends with them, we don't have to send them hearts in text messages, but we have to forgive them, to overlook, to forget. Because if we don't we are tying rocks to our feet, too much for our wings to carry!
— C. JoyBell C.
Learning to let go should be learned before learning to get. Life should be touched, not strangled. You’ve got to relax, let it happen at times, and at others move forward with it.
— Ray Bradbury
I learned this, at least, by my experiment; that if one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life which he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours..
— Henry David Thoreau
I walked over to the hill where we used to go and sled. There were a lot of little kids there. I watched them flying. Doing jumps and having races. And I thought that all those little kids are going to grow up someday. And all of those little kids are going to do the things that we do. And they will all kiss someone someday. But for now, sledding is enough. I think it would be great if sledding were always enough, but it isn't.
— Stephen Chbosky, The Perks of Being a Wallflower
I can see how it might be possible for a man to look down upon the earth and be an atheist, but I cannot conceive how a man could look up into the heavens and say there is no God.
— Abraham Lincoln
My one regret in life is that I am not someone else.
— Woody Allen
Make a pact with yourself today to not be defined by your past. Sometimes the greatest thing to come out of all your hard work isn't what you get for it, but what you become for it. Shake things up today! Be You...Be Free...Share.
— Steve Maraboli, Life, the Truth, and Being Free
Do not take life too seriously. You will never get out of it alive.
— Elbert Hubbard