Mastering Time Quotes

I must govern the clock, not be governed by it. ~ Golda Meir

Other words, of mastering time without being mastered by death. ~ Ransom Riggs

Until we can manage time, we can manage nothing else. ~ Peter F. Drucker

The first step towards mastering time is always to make time meaningless ~ Robert Aickman

Bones are patient. Bones never tire nor do they run away. When you come upon a man who has been dead many years, his bones will still be lying there, in place, content, patiently waiting, but his flesh will have gotten up and left him. Water is like flesh. Water will not stand still. It is always off to somewhere else; restless, talkative, and curious. Even water in a covered jar will disappear in time. Flesh is water. Stones are like bones. Satisfied. Patient. Dependable. Tell me, then, Alobar, in order to achieve immortality, should you emulate water or stone? Should you trust your flesh or your bones? ~ Tom Robbins

By the second day, the song lyrics had faded, but in their place came darker irritations. Gradually, I started to become aware of a young man sitting just behind me and to the left. I had noticed him when he first entered the mediation hall, and had felt a flash of annoyance at the time: something about him, especially his beard, had struck me as too calculatedly dishevelled, as if he were trying to make a statement. Now his audible breathing was starting to irritate me, too. It seemed studied, unnatural, somehow theatrical. My irritation slowly intensified - a reaction that struck me as entirely reasonable and proportionate at the time. It was all beginning to feel like a personal attack. How much contempt must the bearded meditator have for me, I seethed silently, deliberately to decide to ruin the serenity of my meditation by behaving so obnoxiously? Experienced retreat-goers, it turns out, have a term for this phenomenon. The call it 'vipassana vendetta'. In the stillness tiny irritations become magnified into full-blown hate campaigns; the mind is so conditioned to attaching to storylines that it seizes upon whatever's available. Being on retreat had temporarily separated me from all the real causes of distress in my life, and so, apparently, I was inventing new ones. As I shuffled to my narrow bed that evening, I was still smarting about the loud-breathing man. I did let go of the vendetta eventually - but only because I'd fallen into an exhausted and dreamless sleep ~ Oliver Burkeman

There must have been moments even that afternoon when Daisy tumbled short of his dreams
not through her own fault, but because of the colossal vitality of his illusion. It had gone beyond her, beyond everything. He had thrown himself into it with a creative passion, adding to it all the time, decking it out with every bright feather that drifted his way. No amount of fire or freshness can challenge what a man will store up in his ghostly heart. ~ F Scott Fitzgerald

When people form their opinion about God from what they hear from contemporary legalistic religion, it's no wonder they conclude that God is a cranky, old, bookkeeping, judgmental, demanding deity who is more interested in people's behavior than anything else. It would be easy to see how a god like that would be angry much of the time.
Sadly, people who hold that view of God impose it on the Bible and interpret the Bible to present a God like that. Nothing could be further from the truth. I'm not saying that our God is a milquetoast, a mild-mannered god who can be managed. He's no kitten, that for sure. ~ Steve McVey

Love unspoken is the most tremendous force in the world. One is amazed at the way in which people waste their time making speeches, agitating, praying, even. They might save their breath. The great lovers of the world, in silence, rule the world. ~ Mary Webb

I was a goth girl in high school. Perhaps the powdered white face and the black lipstick were not the most attractive. I felt fabulous at the time but looking back, uh, probably not the best idea. ~ Christina Hendricks

Sad is one of those words that has given up its life for our country, it's been a martyr for the American dream, it's been neutralized, co-opted by our culture to suggest a tinge of discomfort that lasts the time it takes for this and then for that to happen, the time it takes to change a channel. But sadness is real because once it meant something real. It meant dignified, grave; it meant trustworthy; it meant exceptionally bad, deplorable, shameful; it meant massive, weighty, forming a compact body; it meant falling heavily; and it meant of a color: dark. It meant dark in color, to darken. It meant me. I felt sad. ~ Claudia Rankine

I reach and have reached the timeless moment, the pure suspension within time, only through love. ~ May Sarton

My main objective was to interrogate people. I never killed anyone with my own hands. If I hadn't been there, someone else would have taken my place. But it was me: I had a pen, I made notes, I tried to write impartial reports to submit to my superiors, but they wanted confessions that led to more arrests. I sacrificed everything for the Revolution, and back then I believed in what I was doing. I was proud at the time. But as I look back now, it makes me shudder. The fact that I killed more than twelve thousand people makes me feel ashamed. ~ Anonymous

A people may prefer a free government, but if, from indolence, or carelessness, or cowardice, or want of public spirit, they are unequal to the exertions necessary for preserving it. They are more or less unfit for liberty; and although it may be for their good to have had it even for a short time, they are unlikely long to enjoy it ~ John Stuart Mill

Only those elements time cannot wear: The Angels, the Empyrean, and the First Matter are the elements time cannot wear, for they will last to all time. Man, however, in his mortal state, is not eternal. The Gate of Hell, therefore, was created before man. The theological point is worth attention. The doctrine of Original Sin is, of course, one familiar to many creeds. Here, however, it would seem that the preparation for damnation predates Original Sin. True, in one interpretation. Hell was created for the punishment of the Rebellious Angels and not for man. Had man not sinned, he would never have known Hell. But on the other hand, Dante's God was one who knew all, and knew therefore that man would indeed sin. The theological problem is an extremely delicate one. ~ Dante Alighieri

Anything that's not positive, I don't have the energy to focus on it. Anything that's not going in the right direction, I don't have the time or the energy. ~ DMX

Time and tide waits for no man, to capture time, treasure every moment in your life and let the time that slowly slips away memorable and worthy to be kept as sweet memories ~ M.O. Kenyan

We need, then, to protect a time and a place for timeless time, and to remind ourselves continually that this is not self-indulgent but rather crucial to intellectual work. If we don't find timeless time, there is evidence that not only our work but also our brains will suffer. ~ Maggie Berg

We simply do not allow space in our hearts, minds, or souls for darkness.
Instead, we choose faith. Faith in ourselves and the power of hard work. Faith in our God whose overwhelming love sustains us every single day. That's what we choose.
We choose love. Our love for our children. Our commitment to leaving them a better world. Our love for our country which has given us so many blessings and advantages. Our love for our fellow citizens: parents working hard to support their kids, men and women in uniform who risk everything to keep us safe, young people from the toughest background who never stop believing in their dreams, some people like so many of you. That's what we choose.
And we choose excellence. We choose to tune out all the noise and strive for excellence in everything we do. No cutting corners, no taking shortcuts, no whining. We give 120% every single time. Because excellence is the most powerful answer you can give to the doubters and the haters. It's also the most powerful thing you can do for yourself. Because the process of striving, and struggling, and pushing yourself to new heights, that's how you develop your God-given talent. That's how you make yourself stronger, and smarter, and more able to make a difference for others. ~ Michelle Obama

Time is persistent, and we need to make the best of it. ~ Charlena E. Jackson

I remember the first time I read Freud, I was 25 or 30, and I was expecting it to be about the Oedipus complex. But what I actually discovered confirmed my own common experience, that you also had little boys who loved their fathers and little girls who loved their mothers. ~ Arnaud Desplechin

What would it be like really and absolutely to believe? ( ... ) To know, really and absolutely know, that there's a Divine Being not set in time or space who reads your thoughts better than you ever did, and probably before you even have them? To believe that God sends you to war, God bends the path of bullets, decides which of his children will die, or have their legs blown off, or make a few hundred million on Wall Street, depending on today's Grand Design? (ch. 14) ~ John Le Carre

Those who row the boat don't have time to rock it while those who rock it don't have time to row it. ~ Orrin Woodward

You don't measure love in time. You measure love in transformation. Sometimes the longest connections yield very little growth, while the briefest of encounters change everything. The heart doesn't wear a watch - it's timeless. It doesn't care how long you know someone. It doesn't care if you had a 40 year anniversary if there is no juice in the connection. What the heart cares about is resonance. Resonance that opens it, resonance that enlivens it, resonance that calls it home. And when it finds it, the transformation begins… ~ Jeff Brown

Every time I'm in Canada I feel more Swedish, and every time I'm in Sweden I feel more Canadian. I belong in both places and I love them both equally. It's funny because the Swedes claim me as their Swedish pride and the Canadians call me their Canadian girl. I'll take it all. ~ Malin Akerman

I was one of the first veejays to take the camera out on location, and that's what was unique about MTV at that time. ~ Pauly Shore

I was as surprised as a flower that sees for the first time a bee coming towards it ~ Yann Martel

The religious right is one of the most politically militant voting blocs in the country and the agenda is clear (a gun in every uterus). Time we stopped subsidizing the anti-abortion movement in the form of tax-exemptions. ~ Quentin R. Bufogle

At this rate, he'd be able to spend quality time with her for a whole day without flipping his gourd when he was ninety. Something to look forward to. ~ Kelly Moran

When things are good, it is because we remember a time when they were not. When there was pain. But now the pain is gone, so things are 'good'. When we hurt, it is because we recall a time when we did not. When there was no pain. But now we suffer, so things are 'bad'. The tiger sipped from the cup, peering at the boy over the rim. Stars swirled in its eyes. "Good. Bad. The cup holds both. ~ Brooke Burgess

All our moments are last moments. We abide in the forever leaving of our own coming? We can put our hands together, palm to palm, settling here on the last leaf of our brief flight, and bow to the wonder of it. ~ Jens Jensen

Time and again in this century, the political map of the world was transformed. And ineach instance a new world order came about through the advent of a new tyrant or the outbreak of a bloody global war, or its end. ~ George H. W. Bush

When you care about perfection, you care about an expectation. But there is also caring for where I am right now, for what's happening right now. When I spend time with students, they tell me that they've read something in a book or heard something from a teacher that they don't think they're living up to. And I tell them, Take care of yourself right now. Befriend what's happening, not just who you're supposed to be or what the world should be like. This is where you are now. So how do you care for yourself this minute? ~ Bernie Glassman

During this week, Ragan has experience a bit of insecurity with me, the result of my being quieter than usual, which he interprets as being a withdrawal from him. "No," I countered, "it is a withdrawal into myself." I do not think the same need exists in him. Quiet can be the two of us reading silently. But he prefers that I be nearby. I need regular time without anybody else around in order to feel restored. ~ Phyllis Theroux

Local fog in Venice has a name: nebbia. It obliterates all reflections ... and everything that has a shape: buildings, people, colonnades, bridges, statues. Boat services are canceled, airplanes neither arrive, nor take off for weeks, stores are closed and mail ceases to litter one's threshold. The effect is as though some raw hand had turned all those enfilades inside out and wrapped the lining around the city... the fog is thick, blinding, and immobile... this is a time for reading, for burning electricity all day long, for going easy on self-deprecating thoughts of coffee, for listening to the BBC World Service, for going to bed early. In short, a time for self-oblivion, induced by a city that has ceased to be seen. Unwittingly, you take your cue from it, especially if, like it, you've got company. Having failed to be born here, you at least can take some pride in sharing its invisibility... ~ Joseph Brodsky

Entrepreneurs always pitch their idea as 'the X of Y', so this is going to be 'the Microsoft of food.' And yet disruptive innovations usually don't have that character. Most of the time, if something seems like a good idea, it probably isn't. ~ Eric Ries

I prepared to explore it as I had done the others; but no sooner had I entered the lodge than my fire failed me, leaving me in total darkness.

Handing it out to the doctor to be relighted, I began feeling my way about the interior of the lodge. I had almost made the circuit when my hand came in contact with a human foot; at the same time a voice unmistakably Indian, and which evidently came from the owner of the foot, convinced me that I was not alone.

I would have gladly placed myself on the outside of the lodge and there matured plus for interviewing its occupant; but, unfortunately, to reach the entrance of the lodge, I must either pass over or around the owner of the before-mentioned foot and voice.

Could I have been convinced that among its other possessions there was neither tomahawk nor scalping-knife, pistol nor war club, or any similar article of the noble red man's toilet, I would have risked an attempt to escape through the low narrow opening of the lodge; but who ever saw an Indian without one or all of these interesting trinkets?

Had I made the attempt, I should have expected to encounter either the keen edge of the scalping-knife or the blow of the tomahawk and to have engaged in a questionable struggle for life. This would not do.

I crouched in silence for a few moments, hoping the doctor would return with the lighted fire. I need not say that each succeeding moment spent in the darkness of that lodge se ~ George Armstrong Custer