Imperiously Define Quotes

When you judge a woman by her appearance, it doesn't define her, it defines you. Ladies, never allow yourself to be defined by someone's inability to appreciate your unique beauty. ~ Steve Maraboli

In all aspects of life ... we define our reality in terms of metaphors and then proceed to act on the basis of the metaphors. We draw inferences, set goals, make commitments, and execute plans, all on the basis of how we in part structure our experience, consciously and unconsciously, by means of metaphor. ~ George Lakoff

If I had to define a major depression in a single sentence, I would describe it as a genetic/neurochemical disorder requiring a strong environmental trigger whose characteristic manifestation is an inability to appreciate sunsets. ~ Robert M. Sapolsky

You can either read something many times in order to be assured that you got it all, or else you can define your purpose and use techniques which will assure that you have met it and gotten what you need. ~ E.F. Schumacher

How do I define success? Let me tell you, money's pretty nice. But having a lot of money does not automatically make you a successful person. What you want is money and meaning. You want your work to be meaningful, because meaning is what brings the real richness to your life. ~ Oprah Winfrey

There certainly is an affinity between a person and his work, but it is not easy to define what this affinity is, and on that question many judge quite wrongly. ~ Vincent Van Gogh

When you define your goals, you give your brain something new to look for and focus on. It's as if you're giving your mind a new set of eyes from which to see all the people, circumstances, conversations, resources, ideas, and creativity surrounding you. ~ Darren Hardy

Our choices define us: The stars may set us on a given path, but it is we who must decide whether we take it. ~ Romina Russell

How many times had I been caught in such a dilemma? Do I destroy the Trojans or the Greeks? Do I flirt with my sister's Hunters and risk getting slapped, or do I flirt with Britomartis and risk getting blow up? These are the kind of choices that define us. ~ Rick Riordan

I cannot define for you what God is. I can only say that my work has proved empirically that the pattern of God exists in every man and that this pattern has at its disposal the greatest of all his energies for transformation and transfiguration of his natural being. Not only the meaning of his life but his renewal and his institutions depend on his conscious relationship with this pattern of his collective unconscious. ~ Carl Jung

What kind of love was it that I felt when I was twenty? It is difficult to define - my physical passions were very weak then, perhaps because of a few years of great poverty and hard work. But my intellectual passions were strong, meaning that without asking anything in return, without wanting any pity, I wanted only to give, but not to receive. Foolish, wrong, exaggerated, proud, rash - for in love one must not only give, but also take; and, reversing it, one must not only take but also give. ~ Vincent Van Gogh

When my grandmother - may she attain the Kingdom of Heaven - was dying, my mother, as was then the custom, took me to her bedside and, as I kissed her right hand, my dear grandmother placed her dying left hand on my head and said in a whisper, yet very distinctly: "Eldest of my grandsons! Listen and always remember my strict injunction to you: In life never do as others do." Having said this, she gazed at the bridge of my nose and, evidently noticing my perplexity and my obscure understanding of what she had said, added somewhat angrily and imperiously: "Either do nothing - just go to school - or do something nobody else does Whereupon she immediately, without hesitation and with a perceptible impulse of disdain for all around her, and with commendable self-cognizance, gave up her soul directly into the hands of His Faithfulness, the Archangel Gabriel. ~ G.I. Gurdjieff

I knew the things happening in my life would eventually define my future, and I guess I hoped no matter what occurred those things wouldn't ultimately define me. ~ S.R. Grey

How do you define a boyfriend? If a boyfriend is the first person you think about when you wake up in the morning and the last face you see before you fall asleep, then I was in love with Jonah. But if a boyfriend had to involve physical chemistry and kissing and sex and stuff, then, no, he wasn't that. ~ Natalie Standiford

Your past doesn't define who you are. It just gives you the starting point for who you're going to be. ~ Agent Carolina

God is a person, and his universe reflects his personhood. The closer something is to the character of God, the more it reflects him and the less it can be measured. Things such as integrity, beauty, hope, and love are all in the same category as prayer. You can tell their presence and even describe them, but you can't define them, simply because they are too close to God's image. ~ Paul E. Miller

Pressed, I would define spirituality as the shadow of light humanity casts as it moves through the darkness of everything that can be explained. ~ John Updike

The peculiar striations that define someone's personality are too numerous to know, no matter how close the observer. A person we think we know can suddenly become someone else when previously hidden strands of his character are called to the fore by circumstance. ~ Elliot Perlman

It is increasingly clear to me that my art relates more and more to a sublimation of my closeness to the natural world, it's events, light itself, and the positive it is a personal expression based on observation and reaction, that I am not able to define except in terms of the work itself. ~ Ansel Adams

I like people that define their own values. I am much more interested in somebody who has their own definition of what they value, their own definition of what success is, their own definition of what love is. ~ Spike Jonze

How far should one accept the rules of the society in which one lives? To put it another way: at what point does conformity become corruption? Only by answering such questions does the conscience truly define itself. ~ Kenneth Tynan

The ability to see our lives as stories and share those stories with others is at the core of what it means to be human. We use stories to order and make sense of our lives, to define who we are, even to construct our realities: this happened, then this happened, then this. I was, I am, I will be. We recount our dreams, narrate our days and organize our memories into stories we tell others and ourselves. As natural-born storytellers, we respond to others' stories because they are deeply, intimately familiar. ~ John Capecci And Timothy Cage

An idea is like a virus. Resilient. Highly contagious. The smallest seed of an idea can grow. It can grow to define ... or destroy you. ~ Ziad K. Abdelnour

There is tragedy all around us, we pick up pieces, we find our feet and before long another turn of events stare us in the eyes; like we're some kind of magician- the fight seems endless, so I look to the world for inspiration. I observe and I watch how others face adversity, some hide from it, some master each lesson and some create a life with it ... Our lessons don't define us, our integrity to keep rising after every fall is. ~ Nikki Rowe

Consider these differences: Self help depends on my efforts to get where I need to go, sanctification asks God to do what only He can, and then equips me to do what I can in response. Self help focuses on my definition on healthy, helpful, good and wise. Sanctification allows scripture to define the virtues I ought to pursue and display. Self help believes my life is my own, sanctification says that my life is God's and He determines my purpose and path. Self help asserts that knowing my worth and value gives my life meaning, but sanctification moves me to find my worth in what Jesus paid for me. Self help pursues good things, sanctification chases God things. Self help strives to make my life easier, sanctification is submitting to a life that may be harder, but better. Self help has me at the center, sanctification has God at the center. Self help's end game is my happiness, sanctification's goal is my holiness. ~ Whitney Capps

People need a monster they can believe in.
A true and horrible enemy. A demon to define themselves against. Otherwise, it's just us versus us. ~ Chuck Palahniuk

I'm a very loyal person and I allowed myself to be defined as somebody who was doing Gordon's bidding. I should have fought back harder to define myself at an earlier stage. ~ Ed Balls

As children, we think our mother has always been a mother, but it is just one of the roles you may have the opportunity to play. They don't define you as a human being. ~ Amy Bloom

Don't allow the faults you've made in the past define the person you are today. ~ Mya Waechtler

Philosopher has given a rational, objectively demonstrable, scientific answer to the question of why man needs a code of values. So long as that question remained unanswered, no rational, scientific, objective code of ethics could be discovered or defined. The greatest of all philosophers, Aristotle, did not regard ethics as an exact science; he based his ethical system on observations of what the noble and wise men of his time chose to do, leaving unanswered the questions of: why they chose to do it and why he evaluated them as noble and wise. Most philosophers took the existence of ethics for granted, as the given, as a historical fact, and were not concerned with discovering its metaphysical cause or objective validation. Many of them attempted to break the traditional monopoly of mysticism in the field of ethics and, allegedly, to define a rational, scientific, nonreligious morality. But their attempts consisted of trying to justify them on social grounds, ~ Ayn Rand

In terms of the ego, most religions teach in some way that all of us must die before we die, and then we will not be afraid of dying. Suffering of some sort seems to be the only thing strong enough to destabilize our arrogance and our ignorance. I would define suffering very simply as whenever you are not in control. ~ Richard Rohr

If you do not define success for yourself, you may unknowingly adopt someone else's definition along the way. ~ Chris Matakas

People like to define you through what they've seen you do ... There are aspects of my personality, I guess, that come through on-screen, but I don't sit around thinking, I've been a bumbling suitor all my life. ~ Ben Stiller

I define sustainable history as a durable progressive trajectory in which the quality of life on this planet or other planets is premised on the guarantee of human dignity for all at all times and under all circumstances. ~ Nayef Al-Rodhan

We number our days and divide our seasons. We endlessly define what it is to be in love. When in truth, spring blurs into summer and always has, long before that line was ever drawn. ~ Lang Leav

If I had to define 'sexy' now, as Disney as it sounds, I would have to say it's about complete and utter confidence. ~ Solange Knowles

Last night Grey and I were caught together and now he insists we marry."
Eve's eyes were huge blue saucers. "Define 'caught.'"
Rose stroked Heathcliff's silky ears. "Naked and in bed-that sort of caught."
Her friend looked positively scandalized-and gleeful. "No! Who caught you?"
"His brother Archer and a servant." She purposefully did not mention anything about Bronte's situation. As much as she trusted Eve, she could not be certain that none of the grooms wouldn't overhear. And since most of the household probably knew about her and Grey by dawn, it didn't seem so important to keep her own council in that regard.
"I have no doubt that your maid is getting every sordid detail-and possibly embellishment-belowstairs as we speak."
Eve frowned. "Do you think Ryeton's servants would be so cruel as to discuss you openly?"
She rolled her eyes. "They would never in a million years do anything to intentionally hurt me or Grey, but there's bound to be talk. It's that affection for both of us that makes their lips loose. I swear one of the footmen grinned at me this morning as I took breakfast."
Her friend chuckled sweetly, laughing even harder as one of the pups came up on its hind legs to lick her chin. "At least you will have dedicated servants, if not indiscreet ones."
Rose had to smile-it was that or burst into sobs. "At least. ~ Kathryn Smith

70 years ago a colonialist, who killed your forefathers, drank their blood and burned your books, drew some lines on a map and you [still] define yourselves by those lines. Think about that. ~ Hamza Tzortzis

An author cannot of course remain wholly unaffected by his experience, but the ways in which a story-germ uses the soil of experience are extremely complex, and attempts to define the process are at best guesses from evidence that is inadequate and ambiguous. ~ J.R.R. Tolkien

Life is a series of decisions that define us. ~ Sarah J. Schmitt

Every man must define his identity against his mother. If he does not, he just falls back into her and is swallowed up. ~ Camille Paglia

I'm so glad He has been teaching me to define His goodness based on who He is, not on my own limited understanding of Him. ~ Perry Noble