c2p-cmd/Good-Quotes-Authors huggingface dataset:
It's hard to imagine a more biblical definition of devil worship than an exaltation of the self, an exaltation of the ego, and a tearing down of that countercultural sign of the cross," Moore argued. This pride – doing things our way instead of following God's plan
— Russell D. Moore
Observing people taking in the work I had watched Robert create was an emotional experience. It had left our private world. It was what I had always wanted for him, but I felt a slight pang of possessiveness sharing it with others. Overriding that feeling was the joy of seeing Robert's face, suffused with confirmation, as he glimpsed the future he had so resolutely sought and had worked so hard to achieve.
— Patti Smith, Just Kids
A distinction to which they had been born gave no pride.
— Jane Austen, Northanger Abbey
It seemed to her everyone had too much self-protective pride to truly strip off down to their souls in front of their long-term partners. It was easier to pretend there was nothing more to know, to fall into an easygoing companionship. It was almost embarrassing to be truly intimate with your spouse; because how could you watch someone floss one minute, and the next minute share your deepest passion or tritest of fears? It was almost easier to talk about that sort of thing before you’d shared a bathroom and a bank account and argued over the packing of the dishwasher.
— Liane Moriarty, The Husband's Secret
Love the pride of the conquered nations, and leave them to honour their father and their mother.
— Karen Blixen, Out of Africa
You could bounce rocks off her pride.
— Terry Pratchett
That is how war corrupts us. It plays on our pride in our own free will.
— John Fowles, The Magus
Shun too great a desire for knowledge, for in it there is much fretting and delusion. Intellectuals like to appear learned and to be called wise. Yet there are many things the knowledge of which does little or no good to the soul, and he who concerns himself about other things than those which lead to salvation is very unwise.
— Thomas à Kempis, The Imitation of Christ
Putting your pride first makes the results come in second, at best.
— Ziad K. Abdelnour, Economic Warfare: Secrets of Wealth Creation in the Age of Welfare Politics
Do you have still the dye with which to turn your tunic red?’‘The madder? Yes, I do.’‘Enough of it for a century?’‘Enough for the entire cohort, if you want it.’He twitched a smile then; I was coming to know it, and to revel in the sight of it. I was his then, part of the XIIth, and he knew it.‘Not the entire cohort yet, Demalion. The century will do. Henceforth we are the Bloody First. And I fancy we might have a mule’s tail on our standard. See to it on our return.
— M.C. Scott, Rome: The Eagle of the Twelfth
His fists clenched at his sides. 'Damn it! Where's your pride?' 'Pride? It's in my heart, of course.' 'You're letting me demean you!' She smiled. 'You can't do that. I can only demean myself.
— Susan Elizabeth Phillips, Kiss an Angel
Neither man nor angel can discern hypocrisy, the only evil that walks invisible except to God alone.
— John Milton, Paradise Lost
I love you, Maddie, and I am devoted to making your life full of happiness and accomplishments, nurturing your creativity, encouraging your independence and making sure you always know what a gift you are to this world.” He kisses her forehead and she smiles up at him happily before admiring her pretty new necklace.
— Kristen Proby, Safe with Me
I love you, Josie, and I am devoted to making your life full of happiness and accomplishments, ensuring that you thrive to your fullest potential and that while you reach for the sky, you remain grounded by the love of our family and our home.
— Kristen Proby, Safe with Me
Don't allow life to pass you by because you are afraid of [looking] stupid.
— Richie Norton, The Power of Starting Something Stupid: How to Crush Fear, Make Dreams Happen, and Live without Regret
Pride is nothing more than us highlighting us.
— Kevin Thoman
Well, I must endure the presence of two or three caterpillars if I wish to become acquainted with the butterflies. It seems that they are very beautiful.And if not the butterflies– and the caterpillars– who will call upon me? You will be far away. . . as for the large animals– I am not at all afraid of any of them. I have my claws.”And, navely, she showed her four thorns. Then she added:“Don’t linger like this. You have decided to go away. Now go!”For she did not want him to see her crying. She was such a proud flower. . .
— Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, The Little Prince
Ambrosio was yet to learn, that to an heart unacquainted with her, Vice is ever most dangerous when lurking behind the Mask of Virtue.
— Matthew      Lewis, The Monk
A gunslinger knows pride, that invisible bone that keeps the neck stiff.
— Stephen King, The Gunslinger
one primary enemy of the Gospel—legalism—comes in two forms. Some people avoid the gospel and try to save themselves by keeping the rules, doing what they’re told, maintaining the standards, and so on (you could call this “front-door legalism”). Other people avoid the gospel and try to save themselves by breaking the rules, doing whatever they want, developing their own autonomous standards, and so on (you could call this “back-door legalism”).
— Tullian Tchividjian
It was amazing the things you could bring yourself to do when you felt insecure, when you were out to protect your heart. You could deny it what it wants most, just for the sake of saving your pride or dodging another bullet.
— Rachael Wade, Declaration
The truth is I love you but you reject my love. You would rather be right than loved.
— E'yen A. Gardner, Love Letters
We have invented a moral sense which is rotting now that we can't give it employment, and when a moral sense begins to rot, it is worse than when you had none. I suppose that all endeavors which are directed to a purely worldly end, as my precious civilization was, contain within themselves the germs of their own corruption.
— T.H. White, The Ill-Made Knight
If I love a dose of (good) theology or philosophy, I probably also love discipline, improvement, wisdom, and challenges. If I hate it, I am probably too comfortable and proud to try to question myself.
— Criss Jami, Killosophy
We still go where we want, even if we got to crawl for the right.' - Tom Joad (Jr.)
— John Steinbeck, The Grapes of Wrath
Where is the pain when your pride is wounded? And why do we say that: wounded? There is no gash, no blood, not even a scratch. Which part of us hurts? The brain cells? The neurons? What, for goodness' sake, what?
— A.P., Sabine
People will do the basest things on account of their so-called honor.
— T.H. White, The Ill-Made Knight
Their song reminds me of a child’s neighborhood rallying cry—ee-ock-ee—with a heartfelt warble at the end. But it is their call that is especially endearing. The towhee has the brass and grace to call, simply and clearly, "tweet". I know of no other bird that stoops to literal tweeting.
— Annie Dillard, Pilgrim at Tinker Creek
It is always a pride to die as an American.
— M.F. Moonzajer
She regretted nothing she had shared with her lover, nor was she ashamed of the fires that had changed her life; just the opposite, she felt that they had tempered her, made her strong, given her pride in making decisions and paying the consequences for them.
— Isabel Allende, Daughter of Fortune
Sometimes I almost pity them. I think I have a freedom they cannot understand. No insult, no blame can touch me. Because I have set myself beyond the pale. I am nothing, I am hardly human any more. I am the French Lieutenant’s Whore.
— John Fowles, The French Lieutenant's Woman
Hubris calls for nemesis, and in one form or another it's going to get it, not as a punishment from outside but as the completion of a pattern already started.
— Mary Midgley, The Myths We Live by
One of the most difficult defilements of the spirit to deal with is the critical spirit. A critical spirit has its root in pride. Because of the 'plank' of pride in our own eye we are not capable of dealing with the 'speck' of need in someone else. We are often like the Pharisee who, completely unconscious of his own need prayed "God, I thank you that I am not like other men" (Luke 18:11). We are quick to see - and to speak of - the faults of others, but slow to see our own needs. How sweetly we relish the opportunity to speak critically of someone else - even when we are unsure of the facts. We forge that "a man who stirs up dissension among brothers" by criticizing one to another is one of the "six thing which the Lord hates" (Proverbs 6:16-19)
— Jerry Bridges, The Pursuit of Holiness
Poems should be like pins which prick the skin of boredom and leave a glow equal in its pride to the gate of the sadist who stuck the pin and walked away
— Norman Mailer, Deaths For The Ladies
Sometimes it also helps to have a bit less pride.
— Alex Flinn, Beastly
Pip, dear old chap, life is made of ever so many partings welded together, as I may say, and one man’s a blacksmith, and one’s a whitesmith, and one’s a goldsmith, and one’s a coppersmith. Diwisions among such must come, and must be met as they come. If there’s been any fault at all to-day, it’s mine. You and me is not two figures to be together in London; nor yet anywheres else but what is private, and beknown, and understood among friends. It ain’t that I am proud, but that I want to be right, as you shall never see me no more in these clothes. I’m wrong in these clothes. I’m wrong out of the forge, the kitchen, or off th’ meshes. You won’t find half so much fault in me if you think me in forge dress, with my hammer in my hand, or even my pipe. You won’t find half so much fault in me if, supposing as you should ever wish to see me, you come and put your head in at the forge window and see Joe the blacksmith, there, at the old anvil, in the old burnt apron, sticking to the old work. I’m awful dull, but I hope I’ve beat out something nigh the rights of this at last. And so God bless you, dear old Pip, old chap, God bless you!
— Charles Dickens, Great Expectations
...how much did pride count in the ebullition of passions in his breast?
— Edith Wharton, Ethan Frome
In an earlier age, it might have been possible to believe that goodness would prevail over pride, but not anymore. The proud could be proud with impunity, because there was nobody to contradict him in his pride and because narcissism was no longer considered a vice. That was what the whole cult of celebrity was about, she thought; and we fêted these people and fed their vanity.
— Alexander McCall Smith, Friends, Lovers, Chocolate
i was delighted I had offended her upholstered sensibilities.
— Pat Conroy, The Prince of Tides
Ego and pride is a two headed twist.
— T.F. Hodge, From Within I Rise: Spiritual Triumph Over Death and Conscious Encounters with "The Divine Presence"
Sometimes, you have to love beyond yourself! And that's how you learn to love! That's why you had to drink the bitter glass of your love.
— Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra
But in some great souls, who consider themselves as citizens of the world, and forcing the imaginary barriers that separate people from people...
— Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Discourse on the Origin of Inequality
Pride would never be her ally.
— Zane Grey, The Call of the Canyon
The poet who sees himself as a hero or a prophet, or a priest of the socio-political forces to which he is loyal, which he believes are the historical necessities of his times, too easily becomes a puppet. He has no external measure with which to assess reality. Whether he submits to the forces or rejects them, he becomes a parody of himself, and then without knowing it submits his gifts to the demons of his era. He loses his place in the continuity of time. He becomes dependent on social affirmation and the drug of exalted feelings common to all revolutionaries. He destroys, even as he thinks he creates.
— Michael D. O'Brien, Island of the World
Cecelia, as with every look and gesture she let us know, was entirely at ease only in the company of her equals – a company that included, besides herself, only her sister. And of course Cecelia held some secret doubts about herself; you can’t dislike nearly everybody and be quite certain that you have exempted yourself.
— Wendell Berry, Jayber Crow
Don’t be proud-you don’t have anything
— Zarina Bibi
My friend opened a small box which Lestrade had produced. Inside lay a beautiful silver cigarette case monogrammed with Holmes's initials, underneath which ran the words, "With the Respects of Scotland Yard, November 1888."Sherlock Holmes sat with his lips parted, but no sound emerged."Thank you," he managed at length.
— Lyndsay Faye, Dust and Shadow: An Account of the Ripper Killings by Dr. John H. Watson
Do not turn your face from others with pride, nor walk arrogantly on earth. Verily the Almighty does not like those who are arrogant and boastful.
— Anonymous, The Qur'an / القرآن الكريم
I'm not even going to tell you what I think about what just happened in there. But I know it sucked and I have no idea why you aren't crying right now, but I know your heart hurts, and maybe even your pride. So fuck school. We’re going for ice cream.
— Colleen Hoover, Hopeless
Nobody wants to give up a weekend-long excuse to dress up and attempt to outshine one another.
— Elizabeth Eulberg, Prom and Prejudice
Take these things to heart, my son, I warn you.All men make mistakes, it is only human.But once the wrong is done, a mancan turn his back on folly, misfortune too,if he tries to make amends, however low he's fallen,and stops his bullnecked ways. Stubbornnessbrands you for stupidity - pride is a crime.
— Sophocles, Antigone
It is of immense importance to learn to laugh at ourselves.
— Katherine Mansfield
The nobility of England would have snored through the Sermon on the Mount. But you'll labor like scholars over a bulldog's pedigree.
— Robert Bolt, A Man for All Seasons
He is not truly patient who will only suffer as far as seems right to him and from whom he pleases. The truly patient man considers not by whom he is tried, one above him, or by an equal, or by an inferior, whether by a good and holy man or by a perverse and unworthy, but from every creature. He gratefully accepts all from the hand of God and counts it gain.
— Thomas à Kempis, The Imitation of Christ
Do you want it bad enough to get over being hurt?
— Richard Castle
Don’t let your pride write a check your heart can’t pay for.
— R.E. Bradshaw, Before It Stains
The drums of Africa still beat in my heart. They will not let me rest while there is a single Negro boy or girl without a chance to prove his worth.
— Mary McLeod Bethune
When our embarrassment level is exceeded by our desperation level, we are a good candidate for God's grace.
— Peter Lord
There is no greater enemy than pride.
— Sanskrit
Instead of being proud that you led someone to God, be more concerned with the person you pushed away from Him.
— Donna Lynn Hope
Tom Sawyer the Pirate looked around upon the envying juveniles about him and confessed in his heart that this was the proudest moment of his life.
— Mark Twain, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer
National pride is the culmination of a lifetime public relations campaign of psychological mind-control techniques.
— Bryant McGill, Voice of Reason
Pride has traditionally been regarded as the foremost of the Seven Deadly Sins, but it has rather obviously been overtaken by Greed.
— James Carlos Blake
Don't force to become the top, but loosen up to be the top....(as in don't try hard when people are before you but be glad... instead of working up your energy for the highest honor)
— Florie Jo Alicer
Maybe Grodzenski was showing me, with his quiet pride, the reason he hummed a little while he worked.
— Nicole Krauss, The History of Love
There's blood pounding through the Duke's head.Knighthood is glory, he's thinking, not just grace in the saddle and at swordplay, but courage enough to give your life to defend what you hold dear. A noble reward, for noble men. A badge of honour.He'd never ennoble a merchant. Even Chaucer, whom he admires, but knows to be a fool on a battlefield. Not Chaucer's fault, that; just his merchant blood.Knighthood's not for the likes of these people; for Madame Perrers' brood. He thought she knew her place. But she's overreached herself; she's as grasping as the rest of them, after all. Do these people think they can buy or steal everything?
— Vanora Bennett, The People's Queen
The dark war consciousness and pride have seized upon the weak, with great cynicisms and glib, soulless intellects, that grind away like robotic gears at what they despise and can never understand.
— Bryant McGill, Voice of Reason
I am proud. It will get me into trouble someday, but today it makes me brave
— Veronica Roth, Divergent
Self-centered indulgence, pride and a lack of shame over sin are now emblems of the American lifestyle.
— Billy Graham
Have some pride, will ya? Begging someone to like you is so pathetic.
— Stacey Kade, The Ghost and the Goth
Nothing disciplines the inordinate desires of the flesh like service, and nothing transforms the desires of the flesh like serving in hiddenness. The flesh whines against service but screams against hidden service. It strains and pulls for honour and recognition. It will devise subtle, religiously acceptable means to call attention to the service rendered. If we stoutly refuse to give in to this lust of the flesh, we crucify it. Every time we crucify the flesh, we crucify our pride and arrogance.
— Richard J. Foster, Celebration of Discipline: The Path to Spiritual Growth
After all we'd been through, we still couldn't take our heads from out of our asses or our hands from around each other's throats.
— Max Brooks, World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War
I am done with the monster of "We," the word of serfdom, of plunder, of misery, falsehood and shame.And now I see the face of god, and I raise this god over the earth, this god whom men have sought since men came into being, this god who will grant them joy and peace and pride.This god, this one word:"I.
— Ayn Rand, Anthem
The moment men begin to care more for education than for religion they begin to care more for ambition than for education. It is no longer a world in which the souls of all are equal before heaven, but a world in which the mind of each is bent on achieving unequal advantage over the other. There begins to be a mere vanity in being educated whether it be self-educated or merely state-educated. Education ought to be a searchlight given to a man to explore everything, but very specially the things most distant from himself. Education tends to be a spotlight; which is centered entirely on himself. Some improvement may be made by turning equally vivid and perhaps vulgar spotlights upon a large number of other people as well. But the only final cure is to turn off the limelight and let him realize the stars.
— G.K. Chesterton
I am leaving now; but know, Katerina Ivanovna, that you indeed love only him. And the more he insults you, the more you love him. That is your strain. You precisely love him as he is, you love him insulting you. If he reformed, you would drop him at once and stop loving him altogether. But you need him in order to continually contemplate your high deed of faithfulness, and to reproach him for his unfaithfulness. And it all comes from your pride. Oh, there is much humility and humiliation in it, but all of it comes from pride.
— Fyodor Dostoyevsky, The Brothers Karamazov
Their eyes were dark and hard and glowing, with no fear in them, no kindness and no guilt.
— Ayn Rand, Anthem
The warrior who goes off to battle should not boast as the one who returns from it.
— Richard Paul Evans, Lost December
We alone, of the thousands who walk this earth, we alone in this hour are doing a work which has no purpose save that we wish to do it.
— Ayn Rand, Anthem
For our face and body were beautiful. Our face was not like the faces of our brothers, for we felt not pity when looking upon it. Our body was not like the bodies of our brothers, for our limbs were straigth and thin and hard and strong. And we thought that we could trust this being who looked upon us from the stream, and that we had nothing to fear with this being.
— Ayn Rand, Anthem
The queen who mended her stockings in prison must have looked every inch a queen and even more a queen than at sumptuous banquets and levees.
— Fyodor Dostoyevsky
He who despises himself, nevertheless esteems himself as a self-despiser. (Nietz
— W.H. Auden, The Dyer's Hand
The power of the sky can be made to do men's bidding. There are no limits to its secrets and its might, and it can be made to grant us anything if we but choose to ask.
— Ayn Rand, Anthem
Have you ever read a wonderful quote that you want to post on your twitter/facebook/blog/whatever but you feel like it may come off as “not Christian enough” or just a little theologically lacking?
— Nick Rynerson
Pride costs nothing, yet it is especially precious when it can be “purchased” at someone else’s expense.
— Andrew Levkoff, A Mixture of Madness
Author says the ineffectual U.S. Navy of two centuries ago lost two thirds as many men to duelist bullets as to sea hazards.
— Joseph Wheelan, Jefferson's War: America's First War on Terror 1801-1805
When you fight with God, your warring against your pride.
— Anthony Liccione
Never give in--never, never, never, never, in nothing great or small, large or petty, never give in except to convictions of honor and good sense. Never yield to force; never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy.
— Winston  Churchill
Do not believe that you alone can be right.The man who thinks that,The man who maintains that only he has the powerTo reason correctly, the gift to speak, the soul—A man like that, when you know him, turns out empty.
— Sophocles, Antigone
It is my eyes which see, and the sight of my eyes grants beauty to the earth. It is my ears which hear, and the hearing of my ears gives its song to the world. It is my mind which thinks, and the judgement of my mind is the only searchlight that can find the truth. It is my will which chooses, and the choice of my will is the only edict I must respect.
— Ayn Rand, Anthem
I clearly saw the skeleton underneathall this show of personalitywhat is left of a manand all his pride but bones?
— Jack Kerouac, Scattered Poems
Thus, Marlowe posed the silent question: could aspiring Icarus be happy with a toilsome life on land managing a plough with plodding oxen having once tasted the weightless bliss of flight?
— E.A. Bucchianeri, Faust: My Soul Be Damned for the World: Volume I
Deception sneaks in through the window of pride.
— Evinda Lepins
I am neither foe nor friend to my brothers, but such as each of them shall deserve of me. And to earn my love, my brothers must do more than to have been born. I do not grant my love without reason, nor to any chance passer-by who may wish to claim it. I honor men with my love. But honor is a thing to be earned.I shall choose friends among men, but neither slaves nor masters. And I shall choose only such as please me, and them I shall love and respect, but neither command not obey.
— Ayn Rand, Anthem
There are few couples as unhappy as those who are too proud to admit their unhappiness.
— P.D. James, Unnatural Causes
Love hath no pride.
— Karen Marie Moning, Kiss of the Highlander
Because he had been- and in many ways still was- such a brilliant man, he no doubt understood the nature of his memory problem. It wasn't pride that prevented him from asking for help but a deep aversion to causing more trouble than necessary for those of us who lived in the normal world.
— Yōko Ogawa, The Housekeeper and the Professor
Reason is God's crowning gift to man, and you are rightTo warn me against losing mine. I cannot say—I hope that I shall never want to say!— that youHave reasoned badly. Yet there are other menWho can reason, too; and their opinions might be helpful.You are not in a position to know everythingThat people say or do, or what they feel:Your temper terrifies them—everyoneWill tell you only what you like to hear.
— Sophocles, The Oedipus Cycle: Oedipus Rex/Oedipus at Colonus/Antigone
I don't know why people are so shy about expressing openly in front of the world their longing for each other, the most powerful and tender natural attraction, but they pretend to be proud or indifferent and they don't consider, especially if they're young, that the sands of our life have been measured by God unto the last grain and that every carelessly wasted second of love sinks irreversibly into eternity.
— Angel Wagenstein, Isaac's Torah
It is the favourite stratagem of our passions to sham a retreat, and to turn sharp round upon us at the moment we have made up our minds that the day is our own.
— George Eliot, Adam Bede
The wretch, concentred all in self,Living, shall forfeit fair renown,And, doubly dying, shall go downTo the vile dust, from whence he sprung,Unwept, unhonored, and unsung.
— Walter Scott, The Lay of the Last Minstrel 1805
For the word "We" must never be spoken, save by one's choice and as a second thought. This word must never be placed first within man's soul, else it becomes a monster, the root of all the evils on earth, the root of man's torture by men, and of an unspeakable lie.The word "We" is as lime poured over men, which sets and hardens to stone, and crushes all beneath it, and that which is white and that which is black are lost equally in the grey of it. It is the word by which the depraved steal the virtue of the good, by which the weak steal the might of the strong, by which the fools steal the wisdom of the sages.
— Ayn Rand, Anthem
There had been an attempt to humiliate him. It had not succeeded. He had paid, but pain, like pleasure, has no duration. Pride was an entity more persistent.
— Jack Vance, The Palace of Love
Stirred up pride is poison to the soul.
— Evinda Lepins
Our pride keeps us from breaking our pride. Our pride tells us we don't have pride issues.
— Heather Bixler, Breaking Pride
A dead man’s vanity: his ashes full of life that cannot be deceased before a living being’s pride.
— Munia Khan
Envy, is Pride's greatest Fear.
— Anthony Liccione
The Three Kinds of Pride are: (1) thinking I am better than the other(s)
—  (2) thinking I am worse than the other(s)
Materialism, attachment to things of the world, includes pride. Many religious people suffer from pride: taking pleasure or even delight in being good, or religious.
— Idries Shah, Sufi Thought and Action
What I love about being queer is... Everything. I like that it makes me different, and I like that it makes people uncomfortable sometimes. I like that it makes people ask me lots of questions about things they probably would not normally ask people about their relationships or lifestyles. And most of all I love being queer because i get to have a girlfriend.
— Tegan Quin
You can't take credit for your talents, but it matters that you use them. You can't really be blamed for your weaknesses, but it matters that you correct them. So pride and shame don't make a lot of sense, in the final analysis, but they weren't much fun anyway.
— Sam Harris
English does not distinguish between arrogant-up (irreverence toward the temporarily powerful) and arrogant-down (directed at the small guy).
— Nassim Nicholas Taleb, The Bed of Procrustes: Philosophical and Practical Aphorisms
She, however, attentively watched my looks, and her artist's pride was gratified, no doubt, to read my heartfelt admiration in my eyes.
— Anne Brontë, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall
Love can either be your greatest companion or your worst enemy, depending on your pride to accept or deny things.
— Anthony Liccione
...it was no longer a matter of whether I would steal or lie or murder; it was a simple, urgent matter of public pride, a matter of how much I had in common with other people.
— Richard Wright, Black Boy
I remind you that I have no faith. If I sought God, I find myself.
— Henry de Montherlant, Les jeunes filles
I have more concern for my nephew's welfare than for Lannister pride.
— George R.R. Martin, A Game of Thrones
At the end of the day, if pride is your greatest strength, turn it into vanity.
— Lionel Suggs
All this dread order break- for whom? for thee?Vile worm!- oh madness! pride! impiety!
— Alexander Pope
We fundamentalists are a pack of mood-loving showoffs. I'm sure the Minor Prophets would have found subject for correction.
— Elisabeth Elliot, Shadow of the Almighty: The Life and Testament of Jim Elliot
Cherubs fan our foolish fires, filling hearts with mad desires. They prick our pride and haughtiness with quick, angelic naughtiness.
— John Biccard
You need to decide what works for you. But ultimately, hold out for adoration and respect
— Catherine Sanderson, Petite Anglaise
We are all going, I thought, and it applies to turtles and turtlenecks, Alaska the girl and Alaska the place, because nothing can last, not even the earth itself. The Buddha said that suffering was caused by desire, we'd learned, and that the cessation of desire meant the cessation of suffering. When you stopped wishing things wouldn't fall apart, you'd stop suffering when they did.
— John Green, Looking for Alaska
A friend is someone who gives you total freedom to be yourself-and especially to feel, or not feel. Whatever you happen to be feeling at any moment is fine with them. That's what real love amounts to - letting a person be what he really is.
— Jim Morrison
Because one believes in oneself, one doesn't try to convince others. Because one is content with oneself, one doesn't need others' approval. Because one accepts oneself, the whole world accepts him or her.
— Lao Tzu
For after all, the best thing one can do when it is raining is let it rain.
— Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
The best way is not to fight it, just go. Don't be trying all the time to fix things. What you run from only stays with you longer. When you fight something, you only make it stronger.
— Chuck Palahniuk, Invisible Monsters
Whatever gets you through the night
— John Lennon
Maturity, one discovers, has everything to do with the acceptance of ‘not knowing.
— Mark Z. Danielewski, House of Leaves
Be calm. God awaits you at the door.
— Gabriel García Márquez, Love in the Time of Cholera
Accepting all the good and bad about someone. It's a great thing to aspire to. The hard part is actually doing it.
— Sarah Dessen, What Happened to Goodbye
IT happened. There is no avoiding it, no forgetting. No running away, or flying, or burying, or hiding.
— Laurie Halse Anderson, Speak
The end of a melody is not its goal: but nonetheless, had the melody not reached its end it would not have reached its goal either. A parable.
— Friedrich Nietzsche
Nothing brings down walls as surely as acceptance.
— Deepak Chopra, The Third Jesus: The Christ We Cannot Ignore
You have to give up! you have to give up!You have to realize that someday you will die,Until you know that, you are useless!
— Chuck Palahniuk, Fight Club
[D]etachment means letting go and nonattachment means simply letting be. (95)
— Stephen Levine, A Year to Live: How to Live This Year as If It Were Your Last
What's been important in my understanding of myself and others is the fact that each one of us is so much more than any one thing. A sick child is much more than his or her sickness. A person with a disability is much, much more than a handicap. A pediatrician is more than a medical doctor. You're MUCH more than your job description or your age or your income or your output.
— Fred Rogers, The World According to Mister Rogers: Important Things to Remember
Know that everything is in perfect order whether you understand it or not.
— Valery Satterwhite
Reason lost the battle, and all I could do was surrender and accept I was in love.
— Paulo Coelho, The Witch Of Portobello
The minute you settle for less than you deserve, you get even less than you settled for. 
— Maureen Dowd
Falling in love was simple; one had only to yield. Digesting another person, however, and sustaining love, was bloody work, and not a soft job.
— Hanif Kureishi, Midnight all Day
Don't look for peace. Don't look for any other state than the one you are in now; otherwise, you will set up inner conflict and unconscious resistance. Forgive yourself for not being at peace. The moment you completely accept your non-peace, your non-peace becomes transmuted into peace. Anything you accept fully will get you there, will take you into peace. This is the miracle of surrender
— Eckhart Tolle, The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
But at some point you have to make peace with what you were given and if God wanted me to be a shy girl with think, dark hair, He would have made me that way, but He didn't. Useful, then, might be to accept how I was made and embody myself fully therein.
— Elizabeth Gilbert, Eat, Pray, Love
No, the secret is that there's no reward and we have to endure our characters and our natures as best we can, because no amount of experience or insight is going to rectify our deficiencies, our self-regard, or our cupidity. We have to learn that our desires do not find any real echo in the world. We have to accept that the people we love do not love us, or not in the way we hope. We have to accept betrayal and disloyalty, and, hardest of all, that someone is finer than we are in character or intelligence.
— Sándor Márai, Embers
it's best to accept life as it really is and not as I imagined it to be
— Paulo Coelho, Veronika Decides to Die
To come to know that nothing is good, nothing is bad, is a turning point; it is a conversion. You start looking in; the outside reality loses meaning. The social reality is a fiction, a beautiful drama; you can participate in it, but then you don’t take it seriously. It is just a role to be played; play it as beautifully, as efficiently, as possible. But don’t take it seriously, it has nothing of the ultimate in it.
— Osho
The best thing about coming out is, it's totally liberating. You feel like you've made this incredible discovery about yourself and you want to share it and be open and honest and not spend all your time wondering how is this person going to react, or should I be careful around this person, or what will the neighbors say? And it's more. It's about getting past the question of what's wrong with me, to knowing there's nothing wrong, that you were born this way. You're a normal person and a beautiful person and you should be proud of who you are. You deserve to live with dignity and show people your pride.
— Julie Anne Peters, Keeping You a Secret
For a very long time everybody refuses and then almost without a pause almost everybody accepts.
— Gertrude Stein
It wasn’t that everything was going my way, but I began to believe that the way it was going was perfect. I accepted that where I was in life, was exactly where I was supposed to be.
— The Hippie, Snowflake Obsidian: Memoir of a Cutter
Many of us crucify ourselves between two thieves - regret for the past and fear of the future.
— Fulton Oursler
The image I'd had of myself as a child was someone I'd never be, and it was only recently that I realized it was okay to be who I was. - Cat
— Jeaniene Frost, This Side of the Grave
You're insane!""I won't argue that point.
— Ray Bradbury, The Martian Chronicles
You're yourself," Tana said, grinning. "More purely yourself than anyone I know. And if you can't see who that is anymore, then see yourself the way I see you.
— Holly Black, The Coldest Girl in Coldtown
The MistakeWith the mistake your life goes in reverse.Now you can see exactly what you didWrong yesterday and wrong the day beforeAnd each mistake leads back to something worseAnd every nuance of your hypocrisyTowards yourself, and every excuseStands solidly on the perspective linesAnd there is perfect visibility.What an enlightenment. The colonnadeRolls past on either side. You needn't move.The statues of your errors brush your sleeve.You watch the tale turn back — and you're dismayed.And this dismay at this, this big mistakeIs made worse by the sight of all those whoKnew all along where these mistakes would lead — Those frozen friends who watched the crisis 
— James Fenton, Out of Danger
Toleration is the greatest gift of the mind
—  it requires the same effort of the brain that it takes to balance oneself on a bicycle.
You learned to accept, or you ended up in a small room writing letters home with Crayolas.
— Stephen King, Pet Sematary
How wonderful! How wonderful! All things are perfect, exactly as they are.
— Gautama Buddha
It is easier to make our wishes conform to our means than to make our means conform to our wishes.
— Robert E. Lee
Then she lay on her back and gazed at the cloudless sky. Mr. Beebe, whose opinion of her rose daily, whispered to his niece that that was the proper way to behave if any little thing went wrong.
— E.M. Forster, A Room with a View
Acceptance doesn’t mean that life gets better
—  it just means that my way of living life on life’s terms improves.
Life has its rhythm ad we have ours. They’re designed to coexist in harmony, so that when we do what is ours to do and otherwise let life be, we garner acceptance and serenity. (285)
— Victoria Moran, Younger by the Day: 365 Ways to Rejuvenate Your Body and Revitalize Your Spirit
No matter what happens, you will always be Pack. Because you have that loyalty and restraint. Not human, not whatever, but Kate. Unique and different, but not separate.
— Ilona Andrews, Magic Rises
It's a persons ego that leads them away. So I should say, let your mind be open to those things that affects your ego. Learn how to accept your mistakes and learn how to understand mistakes of others.
— Jayson Engay
That's how you should be. Accept your burden and carry it, with joy.
— John Ajvide Lindqvist
A tree gives glory to God by being a tree. For in being what God means it to be it is obeying [God]. It “consents,” so to speak, to [God's] creative love. It is expressing an idea which is in God and which is not distinct from the essence of God, and therefore a tree imitates God by being a tree
— Thomas Merton, New Seeds of Contemplation
A child said What is the grass? fetching it to me with full hands
— How could I answer the child? I do not know what it is any morethan he.
I just want to be loved, is that so wrong?!
— Harvey Fierstein, Torch Song Trilogy
I know what it's like to battle everyday of my life, just for acceptance, just to survive.
— Christine Feehan, Water Bound
I will not compare myself with others, nor them with me. I will appreciate myself and others for what I and they contribute.
— Gail Blanke, Throw Out Fifty Things: Clear the Clutter, Find Your Life
It's Miranda who speaks up. "You're gay," she says, with complete seriousness. "And I love you.
— David Levithan, Two Boys Kissing
Regret swallows broken men whole. Acceptance builds them anew.
— Sarah Noffke, Stunned
There will always be people who will accept you for what you are!
— Sakura Tsukuba, Land of the Blindfolded, Vol. 9
Observe the rhythm of passers-by on the street, at work, everywhere. Summon loving acceptance and let their tempos move you emotionally and corporeally. Try to assimilate new ideas by trying out the rhythms of those you encounter.
— Alexandra Katehakis, Mirror of Intimacy: Daily Reflections on Emotional and Erotic Intelligence
Dad they think she has Down Syndrome." He smiled genuinely as his eyes welled up with tears. "That's okay. We love her.
— Kelle Hampton, Bloom: Finding Beauty in the Unexpected--A Memoir
Life's too short to care about what other people think. Besides, they should accept us for who we are
— Jeannette Walls, The Glass Castle
Nobody's going to win all the time. On the highway of life you can't always be in the fast lane.
— Haruki Murakami, What I Talk About When I Talk About Running
Was insanity really easier to accept than unconsciousness?
— Jeff Lindsay, Darkly Dreaming Dexter
We all belong here equally...Just by being born onto the earth we are accepted and the earth supports us. We don't have to be especially good. We don't have to accomplish anything. We don't even have to be healthy.
— Polly Horvath, My One Hundred Adventures
Now that she had actually seen and accepted reality, and reality brought such a healing calm.
— Gloria Naylor
He plants himself right there in front of Craig’s mother and says, “You need to love him. I don’t care who you thought he was, or who you want him to be, you need to love him exactly as he is because your son is a remarkable human being. You have to understand that.”And Craig’s mother whispers back, “I know. I know.
— David Levithan, Two Boys Kissing
Be whoever you want to be. Party all night if you want. Just come home to me.
— Dawn Atkins, Friendly Persuasion
If you accept others as equals, you embrace them unconditionally, now and forever. But if you let them know that you tolerate them, you suggest in the same breath that they are actually an inconvenience, like a nagging pain or an unpleasant odour you are willing to disregard.
— Arthur Japin, In Lucia's Eyes
What to AcceptThe fact of mountains. The actualityOf any stone — by kicking, if necessary. The need to ignore stupid people, While restraining one's natural impulseTo murder them. The change from your dollar, Be it no more than a penny, For without a pretense of universal penuryThere can be no honor between rich and poor.Love, unconditionally, or until proven false.The inevitability of cancer and/orHeart disease. The dialogue as written, Once you've taken the role. Failure, Gracefully. Any hospitalityYou're willing to return. The airEach city offers you to breathe.The latest hit. Assistance.All accidents. The end.
— Thomas M. Disch, Yes, Let's: New and Selected Poems
Literature is as old as speech. It grew out of human need for it and it has not changed except to become more needed. The skalds, the bards, the writers are not separate and exclusive. From the beginning, their functions, their duties, and their responsibilities have been decreed by our species... the writer is delegated to declare and to celebrate man's proven capacity for greatness of heart and spirit - for gallantry in defeat, for courage, compassion and love. In the endless war against weakness and despair, these are the bright rally flags of hope and of emulation. I hold that a writer who does not passionately believe in the perfectibility of man has no dedication nor any membership in literature.
— John Steinbeck
Water flows because it's willing.
— Marty Rubin
If something bad happened just do this 3 things.First inhale second exhale and third accept that it happened.
— Kenneth de Guzman
Every human is not born with the extraordinary capacity to accept himself unconditionally, the kind of acceptance that helps him to survive when the whole world stands in opposition.~ Aarush Kashyap
— Kirtida Gautam, #iAm16iCan
He loved her in spite of her unlovableness. Armande had many trying, thought not necessarily rare, traits, all of which he accepted as absurd clues in a clever puzzle.
— Vladimir Nabokov
What I will no longer accept is the mediocre life of a modest little gentleman.
— Joan Miró
And the view was suddenly clear to me. The world opened out to its grim beyonds and I realized that, at forty, one must learn the rigors of acceptance. Capitalize it: Acceptance. I needed to accept what was put before me--be it a watery grave in Ireland's only natural fjord, or a return to the city and its grayer intensities, or a wordless exile in some steaming Cambodian swamp hole, or poems or no poems, or children or not, lovers or not, illness or otherwise, success or its absence. I would accept all that was put in my way, from here on through until I breathed my last.
— Kevin Barry
And you require no answers", Foamfollower was laughing in his gladness, "You are sufficient to every question".
— Stephen R. Donaldson, The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, the Unbeliever
Its not easy taking your own advice, accepting what you don't like hearing, & seeing the grey amongst the black & white.
— April Mae Monterrosa
Love it the way it is.
— Thaddeus Golas
As soon as Mr. Prosser realized that he was substantially the loser after all, it was as if a weight lifted itself off his shoulders: this was more like the world as he knew it.
— Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
Never do anything you'll regret. Never regret anything you do.
— Lea Mishell
You will think you take generous views of her; but you will never begin to know through what a strange sea of feeling she passed before she accepted you. As she stood there in front of you the other day, she plunged into it. She said 'Why not?' to something which, a few hours earlier, had been inconceivable. She turned about on a thousand gathered prejudices and traditions as on a pivot, and looked where she had never looked hitherto.
— Henry James, The American
I can’t apologize for who I am any more. Even better, I have no desire to.
— Scott Stabile
I won’t stop until I can look at myself in the mirror in love with the person I see.
— Scott Stabile
Love is not blind.Love sees everything and says yes to it all.
— Scott Stabile
God loves all of us.
— Lailah Gifty Akita
In acceptance, I am grounded. In vulnerability, I am strong. In love, I am whole.
— Scott Stabile
Don’t try to avoid criticism. If you do nothing, you will be nothing. If you do only the parts you really love, you will also be nothing. It takes what it takes. It takes all of it. Own it, accept it, embrace it and do it. Want all of what you want!
— Akiroq Brost
Love me for what I amNot what I try to be.Love me for what I am.I amA person who likes to lie too much.I try too muchTo impress other people...Often my inferiors.
— William Finn, The Marvin Songs : Three One-Act Musicals
He accepts life in all its facets, in all its climates and colors. He alone does not choose he accepts life unconditionally. He does not shun love; being a man he does not run away from women. As one who has known and experienced God, he alone does not turn his face from war. He is full of love and compassion, and yet he has the courage to accept and fight a war. His heart is utterly non violent, yet he plunges into the fire and fury of violence when it becomes unavoidable. He accepts the nectar, and yet he is not afraid of poison.
— Osho, Krishna: The Man and his Philosophy
You don't have to understand me I am not a word in a dictionary just accept me the way I am.
— Maria Nieves
Acceptance for me is loving what “is” and not in looking back at the past. I do not need to know what the future holds either- if the present is good, can the future be anything less than good?
— Latika Teotia
And I never felt more alive, until I spread my wings and flew away. Flew away with the ravens. It was then that I knew, knew that I was one of them, even though I was red. Red with blood and anger and hate. They accepted me, as The Red Raven.
— The Red Raven
Rejection makes you uglier, acceptance makes you, all the more, good-looking!
— Kamini Arichandran
To truly accept a thing one must have no inner tension about it.
— Will Advise
To be loved and to love, takes courage. To be fully seen is incredibly rare and breathtaking. We lower our masks and see a celestial inner being. It is our full self -- the supernova as well as the black holes. Our fears and doubts. Our anger and joy...This is love.
— Carolyn Riker, Blue Clouds: A Collection of Soul’s Creative Intelligence
Any meaning of life derives from amiably accepting our anonymous role in the singular order of the universe. Such gracious reception of life’s turbulences stems from willingly capitulating to whatever fomented experiences life brings us without harboring a disconsolate degree of remorse or regret.
— Kilroy J. Oldster, Dead Toad Scrolls
Every person just has a unique combination of common problems. If we accept this, we can work together to fix ourselves.
— Avina Celeste
With thousands of years of history frozen in time, it's no wonder that many southerners like me romanticize the north as a place where we can freeze our former selves, thaw, and then bloom anew. Here it’s just you, the land, and your thoughts, and you can't leave until you've wrestled with yourself and emerged a survivor. But then again, the light is much more intense up here and everything looks different because of it. The sun hasn’t set in a couple of months, and you can see things much more clearly when it is light all of the time.
— Shannon  Mullen, See What Flowers