Little Effort Quotes

Life gives us many challenges and between those challenges we have to learn to choose happiness. Happiness lies in little things of our lives like kindness, gratitude, learning new things, caring for all living beings on this planet. Life can become a beautiful journey with little effort. ~ Purvi Raniga

As millions use social media as a primary source of information, the risk of falling victim to being misinformed is high. Readers who quickly scan newsfeeds tend to only read (and share information about) a headline: focusing on "the hook." Whether due to complacency or lack of time, few explore the content. This allows bogus media outlets to descend on the unsuspecting (and unprepared) seekers of instant information, creating false stories with dazzling one-liners, secure in the knowledge that there will be little effort to pursue confirmation or research an entire story. ~ Carlos Wallace

What whites have rarely had to think about - because being the dominant group, we are so used to having our will done, with a little effort at least - is that maybe the point is not victory, however much we all wish to see justice attained and injustice routed. Maybe our redemption comes from the struggle itself. Maybe it is in the effort, the striving for equality and freedom that we become human. ~ Tim Wise

I started reading my manuscripts out loud, to hear what they sounded like. If the text flows with little effort, then I am satisfied, but if I keep stumbling and stuttering while I read, then I rewrite. ~ Gudjon Bergmann

I see disappointment as something small and aggregate rather than something unified or great. With a little effort, every failure can be turned into something good. ~ Eleanor Catton

Success in this world depends on knowing exactly how little effort each job is worth ... distribution of energy ... ~ Evelyn Waugh

To do the right thing requires little effort from within. For example, to convey my name and position in life correctly to someone I meet demands no effort or serious thought, but if I boast of what I am not the heart quibbles! It becomes heavier, doesn't it? That's how the heart speaks. ~ Daaji

Twofold misjudgement. - The misfortune suffered by clear-minded and easily understood writers is that they are taken for shallow and thus little effort is expended on reading them: and the good fortune that attends the obscure is that the reader toils at them and ascribes to them the pleasure he has in fact gained from his own zeal. ~ Friedrich Nietzsche

It is amazing how little effort most people make to improve control of their attention. If reading a book seems too difficult, instead of sharpening concentration we tend to set it aside and instead turn on the television, which not only requires minimal attention, but in fact tends to diffuse what little it commands with choppy editing, commercial interruptions, and generally inane content. ~ Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

Regrets were strange things. The women you lost, the friendships you failed to nurture when only a little effort would have made the difference; the fights you walked away from - good fights, fighting for justice, for wilderness, for peace, all because it would have been a little inconvenient at the time.

Yes, regrets were, indeed, strange things.
Regrets, seasoned with age were the things that denied you the peace of slumber - - that deep sleep that nourishes your soul, not the restive, disquieting sleep of the disappointed and the damned. ~ Wayne D. King

To this day, I remain awestruck by the fact that human beings are capable of this type of metamorphosis. We don't have to stay stuck displaying the same personality traits over the course of our lifetime but are free to transform into higher expressions of ourselves. Today I can honestly say that I know beyond the shadow of a doubt that human beings are capable of making radical and lasting change. After a decade of coaching individuals and leading groups, I have discovered that if I don't buy into people's perceptions of who they are and what they are capable of, I can bypass their public personas and see who they are in their highest expression. With a little effort, I can see their magnificence and their potential no matter what they look like or what condition their emotional, spiritual, or financial world is in. I can see through their acts, their personas, their fears and insecurities. I can see who they are apart from the baggage they carry around. The undeniable fact is that underneath all of our public personas, we already are that which we desire to be. Our only job is to see past our own limitations so that we can return to that which we already are. ~ Debbie Ford

The wind roared like thunder, and blew with such force that it was with difficulty that even strong men kept their feet, or clung with grim clasp to the iron stanchions. It was found necessary to clear the entire pier from the mass of onlookers, or else the fatalities of the night would have increased manifold. To add to the difficulties and dangers of the time, masses of sea-fog came drifting inland. White, wet clouds, which swept by in ghostly fashion, so dank and damp and cold that it needed but little effort of imagination to think that the spirits of those lost at sea were touching their living brethren with the clammy hands of death, and many a one shuddered as the wreaths of sea-mist swept by. ~ Bram Stoker

With little effort, he rolled his late lover off the edge of the cliff and watched, grimacing, when her dainty body bounced off a rocky outcropping. True, he planned on packing her back to France, or to another of his associates. And true, he didn't see her death as a great loss, but he wouldn't have wished her bashed on the rocks, even in death. However, this was the most expedient way to rid himself of an inconveniently dead mistress. ~ Chris Karlsen

Guns are neat little things, aren't they? They can kill extraordinary people with very little effort. ~ John Hinckley Jr.

Perhaps the central reason that Ahmadinejad's message, and the hundreds of thousands of voices echoing his call throughout the world, are so dangerous is because the Free World is making precious little effort to assert its own message. ~ Caroline Glick

Just as eagles soar through the vast expanse of the sky without meeting any obstructions, needing only minimal effort to maintain their flight, so advanced meditators concentrating on emptiness can meditate on emptiness for a long time with little effort. Their minds soar through space-like emptiness, undistracted by any other phenomenon. When we meditate on emptiness we should try to emulate these meditators. ~ Geshe Kelsang Gyatso

It's possible to search in vain for that point where your running feels "just right." As I considered the point of balance for myself, I was reminded of a quote from Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance by Robert Pirsig. He wrote: "Mountains should be climbed with as little effort as possible and without desire. The reality of your own nature should determine the speed. If you become restless, speed up. If you become winded, slow down. You climb the mountain in an equilibrium between restlessness and exhaustion. Then, when you're no longer thinking ahead, each footstep isn't just a means to an end but a unique event in itself. ~ John "The Penguin" Bingham

People put so much effort into starting a relationship and so little effort into ending one. ~ Marina Abramovic

Edward," I said, managing to speak more clearly with a little effort, "there's no point to forever without you. I wouldn't want one day without you. ~ Stephanie Meyers

Has your work become very easy? Do you find you can do it with little effort? Has it ceased to impose any strain or fatigue upon you? Do you no longer feel loss of vitality after a long spell of it? Can you now do it as easy as water rolls off a duck's back? If so, look out! Do some stock-taking. Examine your output ... Work done with little effort is likely to yield little result. Every job can be done excellently or indifferently. Excellence necessitates effort-hard, sustained, concentrated effort. ~ B.C. Forbes

If you've seen a photo of me from when I was a kid, I don't think anyone would have expected that going in front of the camera was something that I was going to do. I can't believe how little effort my parents put into making me seem like an appealing little girl. ~ Mindy Kaling

I could die today, if I wished, merely by making a little effort, if I could wish, if I could make an effort. But it is just as well to let myself die, quietly, without rushing things. Something must have changed. I will not weigh upon the balance any more, one way or the other. ~ Samuel Beckett

displayed and sold represented the very worst of what could go wrong when things weren't done his way. The salespeople, always interested in quick turnover, seemed to make little effort to understand what was special about a Mac, and had less incentive to do so after ~ Brent Schlender

Then I thought about the little effort I'd made that day, to get to this beach and eat breakfast. It was great effort, actually. And for some of us, that is what recovery from addiction takes. Little, great, conscious efforts. ~ Shannon Kopp

Perhaps I was mad, as I thought at moments; perhaps I was not like other men? But I was able to do the same things the others did; with a little effort and industry I could read Plato, was able to solve problems in trigonometry or follow a chemical analysis. These was only one thing I could not do: wrest the dark secret goal from myself and keep it before me as others did who knew exactly what they wanted to be- professors, lawyers, doctors, artists, however long this would take them and whatever difficulties and advantages this decision would bear in its wake. This I could not do. Perhaps I would become something similar but how was I to know? Perhaps I would have to continue my search for years on end and would not become anything, and would not reach a goal. Perhaps I would reach this goal but it would turn out to be an evil, dangerous, horrible one? ~ Hermann Hesse

Do not attempt to accomplish greater results by a greater effort of your little understanding, but by a greater understanding of your little effort. The greater your understanding of the power within yourself, the less effort you need to make in order to achieve. ~ Walter Russell

Only if the humans could make a little effort from the bottom of their heart to discard their affinity with religious dogmas, and embrace their inner divinity, the world would become a true peaceful paradise with zero conflicts on the basis of religious orientation. ~ Abhijit Naskar

Reading is a very strange thing. We get talked to about it and talk explicitly about it in first grade and second grade and third grade, and then it all devolves into interpretation. But if you think about what's going on when you read, you're processing information at an incredible rate.
One measure of how good the writing is is how little effort it requires for the reader to track what's going on. For example, I am not an absolute believer in standard punctuation at all times, but one thing that's often a big shock to my students is that punctuation isn't merely a matter of pacing or how you would read something out loud. These marks are, in fact, cues to the reader for how very quickly to organize the various phrases and clauses of the sentence so the sentence as a whole makes sense. ~ David Foster Wallace

It is not expensive to be beautiful. It takes only a little effort to be presentable and beautiful. But it takes some effort. And unfortunately people think of beauty as luxury, beauty as frivolity, ... or extravagance. Beauty is a discipline, beauty is art, is harmony, in the ideological sense and in the theological sense, beauty is God and love made real. And the ultimate reach in this world is beauty. ~ Imelda Marcos

Improving the human condition takes little effort; destroying it takes maximum force. ~ T.F. Hodge

You know, of course, that as prophesied by Moroni, there are those whose research relating to Joseph Smith is not for the purpose of gaining added light and knowledge but to undermine his character, magnify his flaws, and if possible destroy his influence. Their work product can sometimes be jarring, and so can issues raised at times by honest historians and researchers with no "axe to grind." But I would offer you this advice in your own study: Be patient, don't be superficial, and don't ignore the Spirit.

In counseling patience, I simply mean that while some answers come quickly or with little effort, others are simply not available for the moment because information or evidence is lacking. Don't suppose, however, that a lack of evidence about something today means that evidence doesn't exist or that it will not be forthcoming in the future. The absence of evidence is not proof. . . .

When I say don't be superficial, I mean don't form conclusions based on unexamined assertions or incomplete research, and don't be influenced by insincere seekers. I would offer you the advice of our Assistant Church Historian, Rick Turley, an intellectually gifted researcher and author whose recent works include the definitive history of the Mountain Meadows Massacre. He says simply, "Don't study Church history too little." While some honestly pursue truth and real understanding, others are intent on finding or creating doubts. Their interpretations may come from project ~ D. Todd Christofferson

As a visual person, I love a creative resume. Putting in a little effort on the design side will show that you care about making things look good. ~ Sophia Amoruso

I'd learned very quickly that I could create a fair amount of chaos with very little effort. Some defense lawyers call it "making the State come off their mountain to fight on my molehill." I just called it fun. ~ Scott Pratt

It would take little effort for her to hurt him right now. She could hurt him badly.
But Griffin King could hurt her, as well, and he hadn't. Instead of using force or violence against her, he used patience and understanding. She had no defense against that.
When he let her go, she was shaking. Tears filled her eyes as she turned to her mother who stood staring at her in horror.
"My sweet little girl," her mother whispered. "I didn't know. I would never ... " Her words faded into a choked sob. Finley crossed the short distance between them on quivering legs and wrapped her arms around the shorter woman. She didn't care if Griffin or his nasty aunt saw her tears. If anything was worth crying over, the discovery that her father had made her a monster had to be one. ~ Kady Cross

As your employer, if I see that you have to work hard to get your results, yet your coworkers achieve their results with little effort, don't be surprised if I'm not all that impressed with your hard work. ~ Larry Winget

With a little effort, anything can be shown to connect with anything else: existence is infinitely cross-referenced. And everything has more than one definition. ~ Martha Cooley

Keep your friends close, enemies closer. Takes little effort to drive a sharp knife through their hearts when they outlive their uselessness! ~ Akuku Mach Pep

At Linkabit, we put little effort and energy into patenting things. ~ Irwin M. Jacobs

Perception was easily accomplished, required little effort, and it never had to stand the test of reality. ~ Terry Goodkind

Aye, Captain!" With little effort, he swept me up and hoisted me over his shoulder, knocking the air out of me. "Shore leave!" he shouted as he trotted down the gangplank.
"Kashmir!"
"Ah!" he said as I pounded him on the back. "That was my kidney!"
"Put me down," I said breathlessly, "or I'll take out the other one!"
"You should know, amira," he said, emphasizing the Persian accent he often kept hidden. "We don't negotiate with terrorists! ~ Heidi Heilig

I was not much interested in school, and both at secondary school and at university, I only just scraped through, with as little effort as I judged possible without failing. ~ Nikolaas Tinbergen

I know it's none of my business, but I really wouldn't let her put you off. So you don't understand sex and love and women. Just means you were born with a cock. And this girl? Naomi? She seems like she's worth putting a little effort into it. You know?"
"Yeah," Holden said. Then: "Can we never talk about that again?"
"Sure. ~ James S.A. Corey

Goals achieved with little effort are seldom worthwhile or lasting. ~ John Wooden

Simm watched the hanging with disgust. Why would the young man pretend to be a spy when he had no skills and no natural ability? As far as he could tell there had been no secret inks, no codes, and little effort to keep his movements secret. Maybe the world was better off without such fools; fledglings who fell out of the sky only to die on the ground. ~ Dory Codington

Computer scientists have so far worked on developing powerful programming languages that make it possible to solve the technical problems of computation. Little effort has gone toward devising the languages of interaction. ~ Donald A. Norman

The secret which that confession discloses should be told with little effort, for it has indirectly escaped me already. The poor weak words, which have failed to describe Miss Fairlie, have succeeded in betraying the sensations she awakened in me. It is so with us all. Our words are giants when they do us an injury, and dwarfs when they do us a service.
I loved her. ~ Wilkie Collins

Never under-estimate your effort, no matter how little. Every effort, little or great is a step closer towards the actualisation of your dreams. ~ Chinonye J. Chidolue

The hard discipline, with the exception of one great good point, is fraught with evil. The good point is that men can do one or two things well with very little effort, having practiced them every day through generations. ~ Swami Vivekananda

I was not a good scholar, and during my last year at school I made little effort. This was not due to laziness ... , but to a state of youthful day-dreaming and indifference ... that was only ... pierced when creative desire enveloped me like ether. ~ Hermann Hesse

Goals should be difficult to achieve because those achieved with little effort are seldom appreciated, give little personal satisfaction, and are often not very worthwhile. There is a price to be paid for achieving anything of significance. ~ John Wooden

In retrospect, I'm embarrassed by how little effort on his part it took for me to come back or stay. I was so desperate for him to love me, to want me, to fight for me that I was literally grateful for any mere scrap of effort. I'd made so many excuses for his inability to treat me well that even the smallest gesture was amplified in my head. After years of this, I finally got my head out of my ass and realized that aside from feeling insecure and fragile about the state of my relationship all the time, we also wanted entirely different things out of life! ~ Greg Behrendt

My fear is that as we rightly celebrate, and in some quarters rediscover, all that Christ has saved us from, we are giving little thought and making little effort concerning all that Christ has saved us to. ~ Kevin DeYoung

It's really rather easy to write eighth-century Chinese poetry," said Angus Lordie. "In English, of course. It requires little effort, I find. ~ Alexander McCall Smith

Good books are as friends, willing to give to us if we are willing to make a little effort. ~ Gordon B. Hinckley

With a little effort, she could get up by herself. ~ Paolo Giordano

Little effort is needed to create a rumor, but a much greater effort must be made to deny it. ~ Eraldo Banovac

I understood very clearly that something was required of me, but could not guess what I was expected to do. Some persons, knowing that they were later going to ask a favour, would have made themselves more agreeable when a favour was being asked of them. That was not Widmerpool's way. I almost admired him for making so little effort to conceal his lack of interest in my own affairs, while waiting his time to demand something of myself. ~ Anthony Powell

A man of good will with a little effort and belief in his own powers can enjoy a deep, tranquil, rich life - provided he go his own way ... To live one's own life is still the best way of life, always was and always will be. ~ Henry Miller

With just a little effort, life can be more or less exceptionally tolerable. ~ Gene Simmons

Oft times, anger was all I had, my sole defining characteristic. It clung to me like an insecure girlfriend, and I put as little effort into sloughing it off. ~ Bobby Adair

clinical literature is virtually unanimous that full MPD [Multiple Personality Disorder] cannot be created iatrogenically. There is no evidence that such a case has been demonstrated; clinicians of widely different orientations have studied the available information and arrived at similar conclusions (e.g., Braun, 1984; Gruenewald, 1984; Kernberg, in press; Kluft, 1982; Putnam, 1989). Nonetheless, most of these observers have noted that many of the phenomena of MPD can be created quite readily, and that phenomena with striking superficial resemblance to MPD can be generated with relatively little effort. In fact, I noted in passing (Kluft, 1986a) that I had replicated the interventions of Harriman (1942,1943), Leavitt (1947), and Kampman (1976), and found the resultant phenomena clearly distinguishable from clinical MPD.
(from Kluft, R. P. (1989). Dissociation: Vol. 2, No. 2, p. 083-091: Iatrongenic creation of new alter personalities) ~ Richard P. Kluft

finding the time to practice takes a little effort and thought. For many of us, already feeling maxed out in terms of time constraints, being told that we need to set aside more time five days a week to do something else is in itself stressful. As you make your wellness and wholeness a priority, you will find it becomes easier to protect your practice by creating a special place and time in which to work on yourself. ~ Beryl Bender Birch

At night I locked my bedroom door, because [my father] could not sleep and would insist on talking to me, endlessly, without making sense. But there was a small window over the door which could not be locked. One night I woke up to see him slithering through the tiny aperture and jumping nimbly to the floor. But he paid no attention to me. He aimlessly picked up various pieces of heavy mahogany furniture and let them drop with seemingly little effort. In his insanity he had become superhumanly agile and powerful. Staying with him was a nightmare. ~ Jung Chang

If you ever feel to express proper gratitude for the good things of this life, be sure that you express your gratitude for the right thing. Very likely you will not have a great deal of gratitude, and you must not waste any of it but what you do have will be of the most excellent quality. For it will accumulate, and the accumulation will all go to quality. And the things for which you are to be grateful are the bitternesses you have known.

If you have had it in mind ever to give way to bursts of gratitude for this air that comes from off the salt sea, for that line of pearls and violets that you see just above the horizon, for the health of your body, for the sleep that comes to you at the close of the day, for any of those things, then get rid of the idea at once. Those things are quite well, but they are not really given to you. They are merely placed where any one can reach them with little effort. The kind fates don't care whether you get them or not. Their responsibility ends when they leave them there.

But the bitternesses they give to each person separately. They give you yours, Mary MacLane, for your very own. Don't say they never think of you. ~ Mary MacLane

Mountains should be climbed with as little effort as possible and without desire. The reality of your own nature should determine the speed. If you become restless, speed up. If you become winded, slow down. You climb the mountain in an equilibrium between restlessness and exhaustion. ~ Robert M. Pirsig

Wow. You're going to be a little more difficult to date than I
anticipated."
I loosely crossed my arms and leaned against the door frame. "Yep. It's gonna require a little effort on your part. Like physically leaving your room and crossing that horrible hallway that protects you from the cold and snow, and actually come talk to me in person."
"Alright, alright. You win. Personal contact it is. So how about you meet me for lunch tomorrow?"
"Sure." I reached over and gently tugged him towards me. "See how easy that was?" His body pressed up against me and his lips brushed mine once more. My insides did a happy dance.
"I want you to remember this arrangement when I stop by unexpectedly and you have green goop smeared all over your face and you're too embarrassed to open the door. ~ Devon Ashley

I think US/UK genre has become more open to "diverse" writers and writing; there's a genuine interest in reading work from countries outside the US/UK and hearing voices that have been historically shut out, but at the same time, people are quite lazy. That sounds harsh, but I include myself in it - your tastes are shaped by what you've read and watched before, and it takes a little effort to understand stories that use a different voice, that follow different storytelling conventions, that are trying to subvert the dominant paradigm. There's a quite large group of people who are "yay diversity" in theory, but I think the number of people who have then said to themselves, "OK, if I'm committed to this, I need to start reading outside my comfort zone and making an effort" is maybe a little smaller. ~ Zen Cho

To add to the difficulties and dangers of the time, masses of sea-fog came drifting inland. White, wet clouds, which swept by in ghostly fashion, so dank and damp and cold that it needed but little effort of imagination to think that the spirits of those lost at sea were touching their living brethren with the clammy hands of death, and many a one shuddered at the wreaths of sea-mist swept by. ~ Bram Stoker

No one has yet realized the wealth of sympathy, the kindness, and generosity hidden in the soul of a child. The effort of every true education should be to unlock that treasure. ~ Emma Goldman

It's not time," "Take it easy," "Wait and see," "It's someone else's turn" - none of these stalls are appropriate for a leader in search of change. There's a small price for being too early, but a huge penalty for being too late. The longer you wait to launch an innovation, the less your effort is worth. ~ Seth Godin

Necessity, they say, is the mother of invention, but fear too, is not barren of ingenious suggestions."
"Nice little saloon, isn't it" I said, as if noticing it for the first time.
"At noon I gave no orders for change of course, and the mates whiskers grew much concerned and seemed to be offering themselves to my unduly notice. ~ Joseph Conrad

I remember seeing the movie 'To Sir With Love' when I was a little girl. ~ Chaka Khan

What is the purpose of reason, Richard Parker? Is it no more than to shine at practicalities - the getting of food, clothing and shelter? Why can't reason give greater answers? Why can we throw a question further than we can pull in an answer? Why such a vast net of there's so little fish to catch? ~ Yann Martel

I feel like a little boy who is constantly offered new toys. ~ Placido Domingo

I don't think anyone's a failure as long as they're still innocent. Just a little. They may lose everything good in them but as long as they believe just a little in something very small, they're still innocent. To fail is to lose every bit of innocence. ~ Charlotte Bingham

I mean my point as an artist is I'm on my own little weird journey across the sky here and whether or not anybody's listening, or listening to the degree I would like them to, at the end of the day has to be an inconsequential thing because I can't chase this culture. ~ Billy Corgan

By the time she'd finished with him, with a little encouraging pat and a request that he rest quiet like a good lad, there was no point in denying it: Holly Evernight would be the death of him. ~ Kristen Callihan

God, I was just six years older than you are now. That's terrifying." She raised her shoulder, nudging my head. "Please don't make me a grandmother in six years, okay?"
I scoffed. "Trust me, after the Boy Issues I've had, I'm becoming a nun."
"Well, that's good to know."
We stayed there, dangling our feet over the creek, talking, until the sun was high overhead. By the time we made our way back to the compound, I was feeling a little better. Sure, my life was still intensely screwed up, but at least I had some answers. ~ Rachel Hawkins

Man, that kind of little honeybee just buzzes from flower to flower."
"Maybe, but honey is sweet, you know? ~ Colleen Coover

What do I think was modernism's subject, then? What was it about? No doubt you can guess my starting point. It was about steam - in both the Malevich and the de Chirico a train still rushes across the landscape. It was about change and power and contingency, in other words, but also control, compression, and captivity - an absurd or oppressive orderliness is haunting the bright new fields and the sunlit squares with their eternally flapping flags. Modernism presents us with a world becoming a realm of appearances - fragments, patchwork quilts of color, dream-tableaux made out of disconnected phantasms. But all of this is still happening in modernism, and still resisted as it is described. The two paintings remain shot through, it seems to me, with the effort to answer back to the flattening and derealizing-the will to put the fragments back into some sort of order. Modernism is agonized, but its agony is not separable from weird levity or whimsy. Pleasure and horror go together in it. Malevich may be desperate, or euphoric. He may be pouring scorn on the idea of collective man, or spelling the idea out with utter childish optimism. We shall never know his real opinions. His picture entertains both.

Modernism was certainly about the pathos of dream and desire in twentieth- century circumstances, but, again, the desires were unstoppable, ineradicable. The upright man will not let go of the future. The infinite still exists at the top of the tower. Even in the Picasso ~ T.J. Clark

Novel-writing is a bit like deception. You lie as little as you possibly can. That's the way I do it, anyway. ~ Joseph O'Neill

Maybe mountaineering shouldn't be considered heroic at all, since the whole effort is 'useless' and in no way to be compared with sitting down at the wrong lunch counter in the early-sixties South, or going into battle. Nevertheless, situations arise in the useless enterprise of mountaineering that present people with choices, that make emotional and physical demands that few can meet. ~ Robert Roper

Though we might have precious little
It's still precious

I like that song about this wonderful world
It's got a sunny point of view
And sometimes I feel it's true
At least for a few of us
I like that world, it makes a wonderful song
But there's a darker point of view
But sadly just as true
For so many among us

Though we might have precious little
It's still precious

In the sweetest child there's a vicious streak
In the strongest man there's a child so weak
In the whole wide world there's no magic place
So you might as well rise put on your bravest face

I like that show where they solve all the murders
An heroic point of view
It's got justice and vengeance too
At least so the story goes
I like that story, makes a satisfying case
But there's a messy point of view
That's sadly just as true
For so many among us

In softest voice there's an acid tongue
In the oldest eyes there's a soul so young
In the shakiest will there's a core of steel
On the smoothest ride there's a squeaky wheel

Though we might have precious little
It's still precious ~ Rush

There was a little man, and he had a little soul; And he said, Little Soul, let us try, try, try! ~ Charles Lamb

As she began rattling off a number of multi-syllabic Latin-derived medical terms, he had to rearrange himself in his leathers. Something about her getting all professional made him want to get all up in her. Probably had to do with the bonding thing - he wanted to mark this spectacular person as his, so the whole world knew they needed to back the fuck off. Jane was the only female who had ever gotten his attention and held it. And yeah, if he had to wax psychological on the situation, it was probably because her single-minded passion for her job, shit, her relentless commitment to excellence, made him feel a little like he was always chasing her just to keep up. On so many levels he was a typical predator: The chase was more electric than the capture and consumption. And with Jane, there was always something to pursue. "Hello? V?" When their eyes met, he frowned. "Sorry. Distracted. ~ J.R. Ward

To understand something properly, we need to know it a little more; but to know someone purely, we need to understand our inner feelings truly and for sure. ~ Anuj

Youth is a beautiful dream, on whose brightness books shed a blinding dust. Will ever the day come when the wise link the joy of knowledge to youth's dream? Will ever the day come when Nature becomes the teacher of man, humanity his book and life his school? Youth's joyous purpose cannot be fulfilled until that day comes. Too slow is our march toward spiritual elevation, because we make so little use of youth's ardor. ~ Khalil Gibran

Women have very little idea of how much men hate them. ~ Germaine Greer

In those days the Pimas always had plenty.

The Papagos who lived in the desert south of us did not have a river like the Gila to water their fields, and their food was never plentiful.

During the summer months, some of them would come to our village, with cactus syrup put up in little ollas, and salt, and we would give them beans and corn in exchange.

The only salt we had came from the Papagos. At a certain time of the year they would go down to the ocean and get the salt from the shore where the tide left the water to dry. It was a kind of ceremony with them.

They always felt that we gave them more than they could give us, although to get the salt they had walked hundreds of miles to the ocean and back. And so they would stay with us for a few days and help us harvest our wheat. ~ George Webb

I don't see white police officers slamming the heads of little white boys into police cars. ~ Maxine Waters

We're all gifted with the opportunity to succeed. But you get further if you extend the hand of friendship. ~ Jimmy Little

He went to the cupboard where he had stored Eddie's remaining possessions. There was, as he had remembered, a pair of jeans, and he took these out and unfolded them. They were distressed, but no more so than new jeans were these days, and they appeared to fit. William examined himself in the mirror; the jeans took off ten years, he thought, possibly more, and they were perfect with the blazer. This was the very essence of casual smart, he thought - that vague concept that allowed you to wear anything as long as you looked as if you had at least made some effort. He could hold up his head in any company in an outfit like this. ~ Alexander McCall Smith

With type as with philosophy, music and food, it is better to have a little of the best than to be swamped with the derivative, the careless, the routine. ~ Robert Bringhurst

That puke was the most wonderful thing I'd ever seen. It was green and a little red. Technicolor, really, the color puke is supposed to be. It definitely wasn't black, and it didn't smell like toasty poop. This was a good sign. ~ Carrie Harris

As far as people communicating with each other well I think that listening is important. You know really trying to read between the lines of what some body is saying and trying to read their mind a little bit where there at because most people don't really say what they're feeling. Which is the bones of great literature. ~ Joy Behar

Mack stared at him, aghast. "So I'm just supposed to stand there and do nothing?"
"That's not what I said, son. I said you can't use your fists. Besides, for every Scripture you could recite on defending the fatherless, I could respond with a verse on pursuing peace."
"Peace," Mack scoffed. "While he's beating defenseless children?"
"I'm just saying, when you attack Sloop it appears you are the problem, not him."
"So just what do you suggest I do?"
Vaughan's expression gentled. "Recognize that the problem is much deeper and bigger than you or even Sloop. And give God a little credit. He doesn't need your fists to bring Sloop down. He needs your cooperation. So intercede with prayer and petition, trust in the Lord, and keep your eyes open and your hands behind your back. ~ Deeanne Gist

The elements of trial and error, similar to earth and sky, and fire and water, delineates the constituent modules of our lives. Living robustly includes more failures than successes. We achieve adeptness to living by exhibiting a willingness to make good faith mistakes and learn from each misadventure. Every effort that fails to achieve our expected result is understandably frustrating. The fact is that without ideas and dreams and devoid of occasional crash landings, a person can never hope to achieve any worthy acts to temper resounding personal disappointment. Meaningful success is ultimately defined when a person dies, when an entire life's work devoted to performing passionate and compassionate enterprises can be judge as a whole unit. ~ Kilroy J. Oldster

And, er, these stories about you..."

"Oh, all true. Most of them. A bit of exaggeration, but mostly true."

"The one about the Citadel in Muntab and the Pash and the fish bone?"

"Oh, yes."

"But how did you get in where half a dozen armed and trained men couldn't even - ?"

"I am a little man and I carry a broom," said Lu-Tze simply. "Everyone has some mess that needs clearing up. What harm is a man with a broom?"

"What? And that was it?"

"Well, the rest was a matter of cookery, really. The Pash was not a good man, but he was a glutton for his fish pie."

"No martial arts?" said Lobsang.

"Oh, always a last resort. History needs shepherds, not butchers."

"Do you know okidoki?"

"Just a lot of bunny-hops."

"Shittake?"

"If I wanted to thrust my hand into hot sand I would go to the seaside."

"Upsidazi?"

"A waste of good bricks."

"No kando?"

"You made that one up. ~ Terry Pratchett

Megan noisily sucked in air for a scream that froze in her lungs. The cat stood in front of the open fire escape window, tail twitching, eyes focused intently on her face. Cursing inwardly at the stupidity of leaving the window open even a little bit, she made a mental note to never do it again ... if she lived.
The sheer size of the body under that sleek black coat was breathtaking, not to mention the power evident in those muscles. Megan whimpered as she caught sight of the sharp claws just visible on its feet. "Holy crap, someone up there has a really sick sense of humor. When I said I should get a cat, this is not what I meant!" she whispered. The cat snorted and her heart lodged in her throat. ~ Cait Miller

Our children were allowed to help when they were little, urged to help when they grew a little older, and sometimes ordered to help when they were teenagers. ~ Boyd K. Packer