Glass Half Empty Quotes

I'm a lawyer. Pessimists see a glass half-empty; optimists see a glass half-full. Lawyers see a glass containing possible carcinogenic materials without a warning label. Skepticism is coded in our DNA. ~ Naima Simone

Glass half empty, glass half full, glass too small? ~ David Mitchell

I don't see the future as bright, language-wise. I see it as a glass half empty - and evaporating quickly. ~ Dick Cavett

Abby must have been the one who found the safe house, because Townsend didn't like it.
"The building across the street is under construction," he snarled as soon as we'd carried our bags inside.
"The elevator has key card access, and I've hacked into the surveillance cameras from every system on the block," Abby argued. "We have a three-hundred-sixty-degree visual."
"Excellent." Townsend dropped his bag. "Now the circle can see us from every angle."
"Don't mind Agent Townsend, girls," Abby told us. "He's a glass-half-empty kind of spy."
"Also known as the good kind," he countered.
Abby huffed. ~ Ally Carter

Perception can be one-sided or variant: "Glass half empty or half full." There usually is more than one way of perceiving. Thoroughly check your inner dialogue. ~ T.F. Hodge

Glass half empty, glass half full. Well, either way you won't be going thirsty, count your blessings not your flaws ... ~ Lauren Aquilina

The optimist sees the glass half full. The pessimist sees the glass half empty. The chemist sees the glass completely full, half in liquid state and half in gaseous, both of which is probably poisonous. ~ Weike Wang

I've always been a glass-half-full as opposed to a glass-half-empty, and the day that changes is the day I should leave. ~ John Key

99% of the people in the world would say there's something that they'd like to change about their lives, because nothing's perfect, and nobody's perfect. I suppose I could look at the glass half-empty instead of as half-full. ~ Morris Chestnut

As a screenwriter and a half-Jew, I tend to look at the glass half-empty. ~ John Francis Daley

I've been told I'm a glass half-empty sort of person. ~ Maria Malonzo

Depending on whether you were a glass-half-full or glass-half-empty sort it was either very late at night or the wee hours of morning as I cast my line into the aquamarine waters of Cozumel and saw her head sticking up out of the low tide about twenty yards to my left. ~ Bobby Underwood

Is your glass half empty or half full?" asked the mole.

"I think I'm grateful to have a glass," said the boy. ~ Charlie Mackesy

Discouragers are the folks who regularly see the glass as half-empty, and they do not want anyone else to get one that's half full. ~ Cathy Burnham Martin

I pull her back to the mattress while she attempts to squirm away. "You're exhausting, you know that?" I roll her onto her back and she begins to nod, frantically.

"That's right, Warren. I'm exhausting. I'm mean. I always see the glass half empty, and if you think telling me you love me will make me nicer and less exhausting, you're wrong. You can't change me. Everyone wants to change me, but I am who I am, and if you think me telling you that I love you, too, will make me shit out unicorns and rainbows, you're wrong. I hate unicorns and rainbows. ~ Colleen Hoover

I hate how many people think "glass half-empty" when their glass is really four-fifths full. I'm grateful when I have one drop in the glass because I know exactly what to do with it. ~ Gary Vaynerchuk

I never see the glass half empty because I drink out the bottle ~ Ellen DeGeneres

I have that glass-half-empty syndrome, and it takes a great deal of effort to climb out of the hole of darkness that I choose to live in mentally. ~ Christian Slater

I'm a pessimistic person, I see the glass half empty even when it's full. ~ Nigahiga

Don't settle for a half empty glass, always go for a full one! ~ Stephen Richards

But you know, I'm the negative-Nancy, curmudgeon, glass-half-empty-with-a-leak-in-it guy - which is basically the fuel that fires me up anyway. Without that, we wouldn't have me. ~ Maynard James Keenan

Age-old question: Is the glass half empty or half full? Answer: Who cares? Does it really matter whether the glass is half full or half empty? The issue is whether it quenches your thirst. ~ Larry Winget

I am the middle sister. The one in between. Not oldest, not youngest, not boldest, not nicest. I am the shade of gray, the glass half empty or full, depending on your view. In my life, there has been little that I have done first or better than the one preceding or following me. Of all of us, though, I am the only one who has been broken. ~ Sarah Dessen

I'M NOT A PESSIMIST!
I just see the glass half empty even when it's completely full.
...WE'RE ALL GONNA DIE! ~ Clara DeLemos

I never quite understood the question that says, is the glass half empty or half full? What's the difference? Eventually it'll end up empty and in the trash. ~ Cyndi Goodgame

There are lots of things, including changing the kind of inner dialog, that can mitigate anxiety. And yes, there are people who have the glass half full and glass half empty, and I'm afraid the glass is going to break and I'll cut myself on the shards. ~ Scott Stossel

Charles had climbed on a bench and was calling out that he had something to say, creating a racket that quickly got the attention of the room. Everyone looked immensely surprised, including Tessa and Will. Sona frowned, clearly thinking Charles was very rude. She didn't know the half of it, Cordelia thought darkly.
"Let me be the first to raise a glass to the happy couple!" said Charles, doing just that. "To James Herondale and Cordelia Carstairs. I wish to add personally that James, my brother's parabatai, has always been like a younger brother to me."
"A younger brother he accused of vandalizing greenhouses across our fair nation," muttered Will.
"As for Cordelia Carstairs - how to describe her?" Charles went on.
"Especially when one has not bothered to get to know her at all," murmured James.
"She is both beautiful and fair," said Charles, leaving Cordelia to wonder what the difference was, "as well as being brave. I am sure she will make James as happy as my lovely Grace makes me." He smiled at Grace, who stood quietly near him, her face a mask. "That's right. I am formally announcing my intention to wed Grace Blackthorn. You will all be invited, of course."
Cordelia glanced over at Alastair; he was expressionless, but his hands, jammed into his pockets, were fists. James had narrowed his eyes.
Charles went on merrily. "And lastly, my thanks go out to the folk of the Enclave, who supported my actions as acting Consul through our recent t ~ Cassandra Clare

The night-sylphs, all of them, were armed with what looked like swords of glass. The pixies and the tiny ones were armed too, if not with knives and miniature swords , then with their own long claws. The pixies were creatures the size of dolls, but with strange attenuated bodies and long limbs, mostly clothed in colourful rags, and with dragonfly wings. Their joints were knobby, and their faces more animalistic. The smaller ones were also winged, but looked half-human and half-insect, with touches of bat and bird. ~ Mercedes Lackey

I see the glass half full and thank God for what I have. ~ Ana Monnar

Because she did not look behind, September did not see the smoky-glass casket close itself primly up again. She did not see it bend in half until it cracked, and Death hop up again, quite well, quite awake, and quite small once more. She certainly did not see Death stand on her tiptoes and blow a kiss after her, a kiss that rushed through all the frosted leaves of the autumnal forest, but could not quite catch a child running as fast as she could. As all mothers know, children travel faster than kisses. The speed of kisses is, in fact, what Doctor Fallow would call a cosmic constant. The speed of children has no limits. ~ Catherynne M Valente

Maybe someday I can find the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, but will lack the strength to lift it anymore. Then, I will think to empty the coin from the pot, but will lack the genius to carry out the said act. Later, I will be approached by someone who will ask me about the story of the pot of gold. I will attempt to explain the story to them in the best way that I can.
The person might then ask me, "How much of it was true?" and to them I shall respond with a question.
"How much do you have believed of it to be of truth and be not farce?"
They will ponder over what has been asked of them. They will solemnly look first to the ground, and then to the sky, seeking the divine answer to disarm, or perhaps the answer to their own question. After much time spent rehearsing the question and answer in their head, they will have finally reached the answer.
"Half - half of it I believe were true." They will say to me with complete confidence, and then that confidence will subside assertively into a question. Feeling flustered and unsure of themselves, with their face representing melting wax, they will again look to me for an answer.
"Half of it was true then," I will reply to them with my assertiveness.
Puzzled and dumbfounded, the person will ask me, "How was half of it true then?"
I will reply to this person in a sincere attempt to gain their confidence and instill wisdom in them.
"I cannot tell you what is right or wrong, only what ~ Phil Volatile

Y
That perfect letter. The wishbone, fork in the road, empty wineglass. The question we ask over and over. Why? Me with my arms outstretched, feet in first position. The chromosome half of us don't have. Second to last in the alphabet: almost there. Coupled with an L, let's make an adverb. A modest X, legs closed. Y or N? Yes, of course. Upside-down peace sign. Little bird tracks in the sand.
Y, a Greet letter, joined the Latin alphabet after the Romans conquered Greece in the first century
a double agent: consonant and vowel. No one used adverbs before then, and no one was happy. ~ Marjorie Celona

Pale and pinched-up faces hovered about the windows where was tempting food; hungry eyes wandered over the profusion guarded by one thin sheet of brittle glass
an iron wall to them; half-naked shivering figures stopped to gaze at Chinese shawls and golden stuffs of India. ~ Charles Dickens

She was a very pretty woman. She had dark red hair and her eyes -- her eyes are just like mine, Harry thought, edging a little closer to the glass. Bright green -- exactly the same shape, but then he noticed that she was crying; smiling, but crying at the same time. The tall, thin, black-haired man standing next to her put his arm around her. He wore glasses, and his hair was very untidy. It stuck up at the back, just like Harry's did.

Harry was so close to the mirror now that his nose was nearly touching that of his reflection.

"Mum?" he whispered. "Dad?"

They just looked at him, smiling. And slowly, Harry looked into the faces of the other people in the mirror and saw other pairs of green eyes like his, other noses like his, even a little old man who looked as though he had Harry's knobbly knees -- Harry was looking at his family, for the first time in his life.

The Potters smiled and waved at Harry and he stared hungrily back at them, his hands pressed flat against the glass as though he was hoping to fall right through it and reach them. He had a powerful kind of ache inside of him, half joy, half terrible sadness. ~ J.K. Rowling

The world of men is a brutal place. And yet women visit our offices, approach us in the streets, and send us petitions with tens of thousands more signatures every year to ask for more freedom. They feel their safety comes at the expense of their freedom. And, gentlemen, the trouble with freedom is it isn't just an empty phrase that serves well in a speech. The desire to be free is an instinct deeply ingrained in every living thing. Trap any wild animal, and it will bite off its own paw to be free again. Capture a man, and breaking free will become his sole mission. Te only way to dissuade a creature from striving for its freedom is to break it ... I, for my part, am not prepared to break half the population of Britain. I am, in fact, unprepared to see single woman harmed because of her desire for some liberty. ~ Evie Dunmore

No way," Eve replied. "If you're going, go big."
"Remind me to play poker with you later," Michael said. "I love a girl who'll go all in."
She hip-bumped him. "That's what you want to do with me later? Dude. Respect the dress, at least."
Michael trailed his pale fingers down her back, following the line of her spine, all the way to the red rose. Eve shivered, and her eyes went half-closed. Whatever Michael whispered in her ear, Claire thought it was probably way too personal to hear. ~ Rachel Caine

The difference between a fairly interesting writer and a fascinating writer is that the fascinating writer has a better nose for what genuinely excites him, he is hotter on the trail, he has a better instinct for what is truly alive in him. The worse writer may seem to be more sensible in many ways, but he is less sensible in this vital matter: he cannot distinguish what is full of life from what is only half full or empty of it. And so his writing is less alive, and as a writer he is less alive, and in writing, as in everything else, nothing matters but life. ~ Ted Hughes

Colored like a sunset tide is a gaze sharply slicing through the reflective glass. A furrowed brow is set much too seriously, as if trying to unfold the pieces of the face that stared back at it. One eyebrow is raised skeptically, always calculating and analyzing its surroundings. I tilt my head trying to see the deeper meaning in my features, trying to imagine the connection between my looks and my character as I stare in the mirror for the required five minutes.

From the dark brown hair fastened tightly in a bun, a curl as bright as woven gold comes loose. A flash of unruly hair prominent through the typical browns is like my temper; always there, but not always visible. I begin to grow frustrated with the girl in the mirror, and she cocks her hip as if mocking me. In a moment, her lips curve in a half smile, not quite detectable in sight but rather in feeling, like the sensation of something good just around the corner. A chin was set high in a stubborn fashion, symbolizing either persistence or complete adamancy. Shoulders are held stiff like ancient mountains, proud but slightly arrogant.

The image watches with the misty eyes of a daydreamer, glazed over with a sort of trance as if in the middle of a reverie, or a vision. Every once and a while, her true fears surface in those eyes, terror that her life would amount to nothing, that her work would have no impact. Words written are meant to be read, and sometimes I worry that my thoughts and ideas wi ~ K.D. Enos

There are the dirtstreaked glass panes of the bay windows, there are the heavy, moth-eaten drapes, and there, half hidden by the curtains, pointed face peeking out with that familiar worried look, is Elsie. ~ Anonymous

She hadn't gotten his expression quite right in her imagination, because the stunned, vacant expression on Shane's face when she started down the stairs was even better than fantasy. His mouth actually dropped open. Next to him, Michael turned around, and although she hadn't counted on it, there was a warm fuzzy to making a hot golden-angel vampire blink and give her a quick, involuntary once-over.
Claire stopped on the steps above them and did a tentative hip-shimmy. "Okay?" she asked. Shane's mouth shut with a snap, and Michael actually cleared his throat.
"Fine," Michael said.
"Fine?" That was Eve, coming down the stairs behind Claire. She moved around the roadblock and punched Michael in the arm. "She looks amazing. I'm not half g*y and I think she's hot."
Shane wasn't saying anything. Claire felt warm and a little dizzy, the way he was looking at her. She resisted the urge to check to see if her skirt was straight -- she'd done it a dozen times already --and forced herself to meet his gaze and smile.
"You sure this is smart?" Shane asked, which was not what she'd expected, not at all. "You look fantastic."
"Thanks -- "
He interrupted her. "Fantastic in this town pops you to the top of the take-out menu."
She held up her left hand and pointed to her wrist. The gold bracelet was clearly visible. "I'll be okay," she said. "The vamps won't bother me."
"Not even talking about the vamps. You're going to be drawing every guy there wh ~ Rachel Caine

The empty quarter, the empty half, the empty outside of a full beaker ... why are these the things he looks for? ~ L.E. Modesitt Jr.

By this point Viviane Lavender had loved Jack Griffith for twelve years, which was far more than half of her life. If she thought of her love as a commodity and were to, say, eat it, it would fill 4,745 cherry pies. If she were to preserve it, she would need 23,725 glass jars and labels and a basement spanning the length of Pinnacle Lane.
If she were to drink it, she'd drown. ~ Leslye Walton

Men strolled through life with a wallet in their pants, and women were saddled with children, the map, the bag, the half-empty water bottles. Resentment ~ Janice Y.K. Lee

In spite of all my aches and pains, and I've got plenty. Inside I go on feeling just a chit like Gina. Perhaps everyone does. The glass shows them how old they are and they just don't believe it. It seems only a few months ago that we were at Florence. Do you remember Fräulein Schweich and her boots?"

The two elderly women laughed together at events that had happened nearly half a century ago. ~ Agatha Christie

If you leave a door half open, soon you'll hear the whispers spoken.
If you play outside alone, soon you won't be going home.
If your window's left unlatched, you'll hear him tapping at the glass.
If you're lonely, sad, and blue, the Whisper Man will come for you. ~ Alex North

The raw-foodist Dr. Norman Walker had two series of six colon cleanses done every year in the second half of his life - he lived to be at least 109 (some say older). I've found that one colonic every four to six months has been effective for me - although I am sure that more would do me good. I always recommend starting with a series of four to six sessions even if you think you do not need it. The primary goal of colon hydrotherapy is to empty the bowels completely in order for the lymph system to drain. The secondary goal is to remove encrusted mucus (which feeds unwanted parasites and poisons the system) from the inner intestinal lining. The third goal is to allow the liver to flush and release. ~ David Wolfe

I know a lot of people that had one cancer that are not alive today. I've had three. So my glass is much more than half full. ~ Hamilton Jordan

Good gracious, Jerry, you'll probably have to marry the girl.'
Joanna was half serious, half laughing.
It was at that moment that I made a very important discovery.
'Damn it all,' I said. 'I don't mind if I do. In fact - I should like it.'
A very funny expression came over Joanna's face. She got up and said dryly, as she went toward the door, 'Yes, I've known that for some time ... '
She left me standing, glass in hand, aghast at my new discovery. ~ Agatha Christie

Dad's in D.C. all week," he said as we climbed out, "so I get to use the garage. Parking's a bitch around here."
I didn't know whether to roll my eyes or sympathize.
"Is your mom home?" I really didn't know how I felt about seeing Karina Romanova in her own home. Well,no.
Truth: I was worried how she would feel about seeing me in it.
"Will she mind my being here?"
"Why would she?" Alex gave me an odd look as he pushed open a small door onto a wide brick patio. "But no, she's at the studio until midnight. It's just you,me,and the lacrosse team."
I could see myself with amazing clarity in the huge glass wall that was the entire back of the house. I was small, dark, and frozen. "You're kidding, right?"
Next to mine, Alex's reflection looked twice as big and ust as still. "You're kidding. Right?"
I nodded. Clearly not emphatically enough.
"Christ,Ella. Who do you think I am?"
I sighed. Honestly, I didn't know. "I think you're probably a terrific guy, Alex. But let's be truthful here.We don't really know each other."
"Oh,come one.We've gone to school together for two and a half years. I've been to Marino's..." He stopped. Sighed. "Okay.Fine.So let's change it. Now." And he unlocked the door to his house. ~ Melissa Jensen

Hot Brandy Flip. (Use large bar-glass, heated.) Take 1 tea-spoonful of sugar. 1 wine-glass of brandy. Yolk of one egg. Dissolve the sugar in a little hot water, add the brandy and egg, shake up thoroughly, pour into a medium bar-glass, and fill it one-half full of boiling water. Grate a little nutmeg on top, and serve. ~ Ross Bolton

Suddenly the door crashed into the room in a cacophony of shattered, splintered wood, revealing Emil standing in the frame, his small beady eyes fixed on Peter. A satisfied smile split his fat face, his lips peeled away from a mouthful of neglected, black teeth. In his right hand was a half empty bottle of vodka, in his left hand was Elena. ~ Sean J. Quirk

I kept my head down and my mouth full. I didn't want Frankie's sharp eyes or tongue focused on me any more than necessary. It was a lot easier with Daniel taking up half of the food and most of the air.
"What about it, Ella?" he asked when everything was gone except the parsley garnish. "When do we get the pleasure of your vocal stylings?"
"I don't sing."
"You mean you won't sng," Sadie corrected. I tried to be charitable about her treason; she goes pretty brainless around Daniel. "Ella sings really well."
"I'm sure she does." Daniel tipped his beer glass in my direction. "In fact, I bet she could totally murder 'Don't Stop Believin'." A song that is actually one of my guilty pleasures. I think he probably knew that. I think he probably had himself a lovely chuckle over it.Then he whispered, "Coward."
In another story, the plucky little heroine would have slapped both hands onto the table, making it wobble a little on its predicatbly uneven fourth leg. She would then have taken both hands, ripped the long scarf from around her neck and, chin high and scar spotlit, stalked to the dais, leaped up, and slayed the audience with her kick-ass version of "Respect." Or maybe "Single Ladies," for the sheer Yay factor.
In this version,I gave Daniel what I hoped was a slayer look and busied myself refolding my napkin.
He was,not surprisingly, unfazed. "Can I ask you a question?"
I sighed. "Will my answer to that one make any difference?"
"Non ~ Melissa Jensen

Great. I looked at the two identical bottles of rug detergent on the back porch. One was new and returnable. One was six months old and half empty. But which was which? I couldn't tell! They were opaque. I knew that word because I was in the Gifted Program, but it didn't help me in that split second ... I would never be placed in the Common Sense Program. ~ Tina Fey

[Speaking to a group of female students] Have you any notion how many books are written [by men] about women in the course of one year? (...) Are you aware that you are, perhaps, the most discussed animal in the universe? (...)
Professors, schoolmasters, sociologists, clergymen, novelists, essayists, journalists, men who had no qualification save that they were not women (...) were very angry (...) as they wrote (...) about the mental, moral, and physical inferiority of women. (...) Why were they angry? (...)
Possibly when the professor [imagined by V. Woolf as a prototype of patriarchal writer] insisted a little too emphatically upon the inferiority of women, he was concerned not with their inferiority, but with his own superiority. (...) Hence the enormous importance to a patriarch (...) of feeling that great number of people, half the human race indeed [=women], are by nature inferior to himself.
Women have served all these centuries as looking-glasses possessing the magic and delicious power of reflecting the figure of man at twice its natural size. (…) That serves to explain in part the necessity that women so often are to men. And it serves to explain how restless they are under her criticism. For if she begins to tell the truth, the figure in the looking-glass shrinks; his fitness for life is diminished (…)

A Room of One´s Own, chapter 2 ~ Virginia Woolf

To empty the heart does not mean to not love. On the contrary, true love, as God intented it, is purest when it is not based on a false attachment. The process of first emptying the heart can be found in the beginning half of the shahada (declaration of faith). ~ Yasmin Mogahed

How many more cars, clothes, toys and trinkets do we really need before we wake up and realize that half the world goes to bed every night with empty stomachs and naked bodies? ~ K.P. Yohannan

Traveling on, the shaft of his light reached now a great, dully shining oblong, and he stopped, surprised. Then, through the glass sides, he saw bright shapes of fish wheel in schools down the opaque water, startled by the illumination. Coming at last, and so suddenly, on life like his own, Mr. Lecky moved closer. The fixed flood of his light enveloped these small fish dimly, glowed back on him. They came sliding, drifting, mouths in motion, gills rippling, up the light, against the glass. Their senseless round eyes stared at Mr. Lecky. Idling with great grace, the extravagant products of selective breeding - fringetails, Korean, calico - passed, swayed about, came languidly back. Moving faster, stub-finned, crop-tailed danios from the Malabar coast appeared, hovered, taking the light on their fat flanks, now spotted, now iridescent pearl or opal.

Seeing so many of them, so eager and attentive, Mr. Lecky felt an unexpected compunction. He was their only proprietor; and soon, trapped unnaturally here in the big tank, they would starve to death. His light went back to a counter he had just passed, showing him again the half-noticed packages - food for birds and pet animals, food, too, for fish. Returning to the tank, his light found many of the fish still waiting, the rest rushing back. He went and took a package, tore the top off, and poured the contents onto the rectangle of open water. It would perhaps postpone the time when, having eaten each other, the sick rema ~ James Gould Cozzens

On bended knee is no way to be free
lifting up an empty cup I ask silently
that all my destinations will accept the one that's me
so I can breath
Circles they grow and they swallow people whole
half their lives they say goodnight to wive's they'll never know
got a mind full of questions and a teacher in my soul
so it goes ... ~ Eddie Vedder

Let's not travel to tick things off lists, or collect half-hearted semi-treasures to be placed in dusty drawers in empty rooms. Rather, we'll travel to find grounds and rooftops and tiny hidden parks, where we'll sit and dismiss the passing time, spun in the city's web, 'til we've surrendered, content to be spent and consumed. I need to feel a place while I'm in it. ~ Victoria Erickson