Not What He Wants Quotes

A successful poem says what a poet wants to say, and more, with particular finality. The remarks he makes about his poems are incidental when the poem is good, or embarrassing or absurd when it is bad and he is not permitted to say how the good poem is good, and may never know how the bad poem is bad. It is better to write about other people's poetry. ~ Randall Jarrell

If you've a notion of what man's heart is, wouldn't you say that maybe the whole effort of man on earth to build a civilization is simply man's frantic and frightened attempt to hide himself from himself? That there is a part of man that man wants to reject? That man wants to keep from knowing what he is? That he wants to protect himself from seeing that he is something awful? And that this 'awful' part of himself might not be as awful as he thinks, but he finds it too strange and he does not know what to do with it? We talk about what to do with the atom bomb ... But man's heart, his spirit is the deadliest thing in creation. Are not all cultures and civilizations just screens which men have used to divide themselves, to put between that part of themselves which they are afraid of and that part of themselves which they wish, in their deep timidity, to try to preserve? Are not all of man's efforts at order an attempt to still man's fear of himself? ~ Richard Wright

What a country wants to make it richer is never consumption, but production. Where there is the latter, we may be sure that there is no want of the former. To produce, implies that the producer de_sires to consume; why else should he give himself useless labor? He may not wish to consume what he himself produces, but his motive for producing and selling is the desire to buy. Therefore, if the producers generally produce and sell more and more, they certainly also buy more and more. ~ John Stuart Mill

Having a narcissistic parent is an early manifestation of a phenomenon termed by some as "co-narcissism." Alan Rappoport describes this as unconsciously adapting to and supporting the narcissistic patterns of another person. He argues that this pattern starts in childhood, with the child having to adjust and calibrate to the narcissistic parent.
Narcissistic parents are not tuned into their children, and the narcissistic parent largely views the child as an object with which to satisfy his or her needs. Narcissistic parents will be overly indulgent and intrusive about some things and detached and uninterested in others. Children in these situations often believe life is unpredictable and strive hard to please "unpleasable" and distracted parents. If you grow up like this, you learn that you are valued for what you did, but only if it was aligned with your parent's wants and needs. It can be a confusing way to grow up and also the perfect set-up for accepting narcissistic behavior as "normal" and then tolerating it from a partner or in other close relationships. ~ Ramani Durvasula

Excellent."
As soon as Bergman left earshot Vayl said, "I am going to buy you some pom-poms and a short pleated skirt-"
Hey, if Bergman needs a cheerleard, that's what he's getting."
Vayl tipped his head to one side and smiled wickedly. "I was just thinking perhaps I need a cheerleader as well."
Cassandra got up. "If that's where this conversation is headed, I'm leaving."
She wants some pom-poms too," I told Vayl.
I do not! ~ Jennifer Rardin

Not sure how you can get them to him without looking like a crazy stalker chick," Micah says.
"You think I'm a crazy stalker chick?"
"You're using an ancient war manual to try to win back your boyfriend. I think you're a girl who will do whatever it takes to get what she wants," he says. "Hey, at least you're committed. ~ Paula Stokes

And the son bursting into his father's house, killing him, and at the same time not killing him, this is not even a novel, not a poem, it is a sphinx posing riddles, which it, of course, will not solve itself. If he killed him, he killed him; how can it be that he killed him and yet did not kill him--who can understand that? Then it is announced to us that our tribune is the tribune of truth and sensible ideas, and so from this tribune of 'sensible ideas' an axiom resounds, accompanied by an oath, that to call the murder of a father parricide is simply a prejudice! But if parricide is a prejudice, and if every child ought to ask his father, 'Father, why should I love you?'--what will become of us, what will become of the foundations of society, where will the family end up? Parricide--don't you see, it's just the 'brimstone' of some Moscow merchant's wife? The most precious, the most sacred precepts concerning the purpose and future of the Russian courts are presented perversely and frivolously, only to achieve a certain end, to achieve the acquittal of that which cannot be acquitted. 'Oh, overwhelm him with mercy,' the defense attorney exclaims, and that is just what the criminal wants, and tomorrow everyone will see how overwhelmed he is! And is the defense attorney not being too modest in asking only for the defendant's acquittal? Why does he not ask that a fund be established in the parricide's name, in order to immortalize his deed for posterity and the younger generatio ~ Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Revenge loses sight of the end in the means, but it's end is not wholly bad - it wants the evil of the bad man to be to him what it is to everyone else. This is proved by the fact that the avenger wants the guilty party not merely to suffer, but to suffer at his hands, and to know it, and to know why. Hence the impulse to taunt the guilty man with his crime at the moment of taking vengeance: hence, too, such natural expressions as 'I wonder how he'd like it if the same thing were done to him' or 'I'll teach him'. For the same reason when we are going to abuse a man in words we say we are going to 'let him know what we think of him'. ~ C.S. Lewis

If one wants to go to Mumbai from Baroda, he will 'like' all the signs towards the south. And if he wants to go to Delhi, he will like all the signs towards the north. One can tell what path he is on from what he 'likes'. There are many paths, not just one. As many minds as there are, there are that many ways and they are all intellect-based opinions. Where one is guided by the intellectual opinions, there is nothing but aimless wandering there. Only the opinions of the Vitaraag Lords (the enlightened ones) is a "safe side"! ~ Dada Bhagwan

I do not at all believe in human freedom in the philosophical sense... Schopenhauer's saying, 'A man can do what he wants, but not will what he wants,' has been a very real inspiration to me since my youth; it has been a continual consolation in the face of life's hardships, my own and others', and an unfailing wellspring of tolerance. This realization mercifully mitigates the easily paralyzing sense of responsibility and prevents us from taking ourselves and other people too seriously; it is conducive to a view of life which, in part, gives humour its due. ~ Albert Einstein

Is there anyone who has ever written so much as a love letter in which he felt that he had said exactly what he intended? A writer falsifies himself both intentionally and unintentionally. Intentionally, because the accidental qualities of words constantly tempt and frighten him away from his true meaning. He gets an idea, begins trying to express it, and then, in the frightful mess of words that generally results, a pattern begins to form itself more or less accidentally. It is not by any means the pattern he wants, but it is at any rate not vulgar or disagreeable; it is good art. He takes it because good art is a more or less mysterious gift from heaven, and it seems a pity to waste it when it presents itself. ~ George Orwell

Onto a Vast Plain"

You are not surprised at the force of the storm -
you have seen it growing.
The trees flee. Their flight
sets the boulevards streaming. And you know:
he whom they flee is the one
you move toward. All your senses
sing him, as you stand at the window.

The weeks stood still in summer.
The trees' blood rose. Now you feel
it wants to sink back
into the source of everything. You thought
you could trust that power
when you plucked the fruit:
now it becomes a riddle again
and you again a stranger.

Summer was like your house: you know
where each thing stood.
Now you must go out into your heart
as onto a vast plain. Now
the immense loneliness begins.

The days go numb, the wind
sucks the world from your senses like withered leaves.

Through the empty branches the sky remains.
It is what you have.
Be earth now, and evensong.
Be the ground lying under that sky.
Be modest now, like a thing
ripened until it is real,
so that he who began it all
can feel you when he reaches for you. ~ Rainer Maria Rilke

Jesus Christ lived in the midst of his enemies. At the end all his disciples deserted him. On the Cross he was utterly alone, surrounded by evildoers and mockers. For this cause he had come, to bring peace to the enemies of God. So the Christian, too, belongs not in the seclusion of a cloistered life but in the thick of foes. There is his commission, his work. 'The kingdom is to be in the midst of your enemies. And he who will not suffer this does not want to be of the Kingdom of Christ; he wants to be among friends, to sit among roses and lilies, not with the bad people but the devout people. O you blasphemers and betrayers of Christ! If Christ had done what you are doing who would ever have been spared' (Luther). ~ Dietrich Bonhoeffer

And if you'd been healthy and happy, you wouldn't have come home?"
"When everything is lost a man seeks refuge, as if he were returning to his mother's womb."
"And after that?"
"After that he forgets. He's driven to it by his restlessness. He wants to be what he was not, or what he was. He runs away from his fortune and looks for another. ~ Mesa Selimovic

He may be stronger, but I'm not defenseless. He knows that, of coarse. That's why he's here. He wants me for what I can do after all. ~ Sophie Jordan

Trying to follow Jesus part-time or halfhearted is impossible. The relationship he wants with you requires your whole heart. And fans should know that his terms are not negotiable. So before you say, "I want to be a follower," be sure you understand what it's going to cost you. ~ Kyle Idleman

His silence had begun as something protective, but over the years it has transformed into something near oppressive, something that manages him rather than the other way around. Now he cannot find a way out of it, even when he wants to. He imagines he is floating in a small bubble of water, encased on all sides by walls and ceilings and floors of ice, all many feet thick. He knows there is a way out, but he is unequipped; he has no tools to begin his work, and his hands scrabble uselessly against the ice's slick. He had thought that by not saying who he was, he was making himself more palatable, less strange. But now, what he doesn't say makes him stranger, an object of pity and even suspicion. ~ Hanya Yanagihara

I'm not a policy and a strategy guy. I'm - you know, the military basically supports what the president wants, the decisions that he makes. ~ Michael Mullen

...asked by his wife whether he wants to have his bowling shoes laced over or laced under, Archie Bunker answers the question: "What's the difference?" Being a reader of sublime simplicity, his wife replies by patiently explaining the difference between lacing over and lacing under, whatever this may be, but provokes only ire. "What's the difference" did not ask for difference but means instead "I don't give a damn what the difference is. ~ Paul De Man

If a friend is the one who summons us to our best, then is not Jesus Christ our best friend, and should we not think of the Communion as one of His chief appeals to us to be our best? The Lord's Supper looks not back to our past with a critical eye, but to our future, with a hopeful one. The Master appeals from what we have been to what we may be. He bids us come, not because we are better than we have been, but because He wants us to be. To stay away because our hearts are cold is to refuse to go to the fire till we are warm. ~ Maltbie Davenport Babcock

You got a lot of ladies to get through. You're still young. First love's the sweetest, but it doesn't last."
"Not ever?" I ask.
Grandad looks at me with a seriousness he reserves for moments when he wants me to really pay attention. "When we fall that first time, we're not really in love with the girl. We're in love with being in love. We've got no idea what she's really about - or what she's capable of. We're in love with our idea of her and of who we become around her. We're idiots. ~ Holly Black

There is an emotional promiscuity we've noticed among many good young men and women. The young man understands something of the journey of the heart. He wants to talk, to "share the journey." The woman is grateful to be pursued, she opens up. They share the intimacies of their lives - their wounds, their walks with God. But he never commits. He enjoys her... then leaves. And she wonders, What did I do wrong? She failed to see his passivity. He really did not ever commit or offer assurances that he would. Like Willoughby to Marianne in Sense and Sensibility.

Be careful you do not offer too much of yourself to a man until you have good, solid evidence that he is a strong man willing to commit. Look at his track record with other women. Is there anything to be concerned about there? If so, bring it up. Also, does he have any close male friends - and what are they like as men? Can he hold down a job? Is he walking with God in a real and intimate way? Is he facing the wounds of his own life, and is he also demonstrating a desire to repent of Adam's passivity and/or violence? Is he headed somewhere with his life? A lot of questions, but your heart is a treasure, and we want you to offer it only to a man who is worthy and ready to handle it well. ~ Stasi Eldredge

What the Lord wants is that you shall go about the business to which He sets you, not asking for an easy post, nor grumbling at a hard one. ~ Catherine Booth

It is irrelevant to the entrepreneur, as the servant of the consumers, whether the wishes and wants of the consumers are wise or unwise, moral or immoral. He produces what the consumers want. In this sense he is amoral. He manufactures whiskey and guns just as he produces food and clothing. It is not his task to teach reason to the sovereign consumers. Should one entrepreneur, for ethical reasons of his own, refuse to manufacture whiskey, other entrepreneurs would do so as long as whiskey is wanted and bought. It is not because we have distilleries that people drink whiskey; it is because people like to drink whiskey that we have distilleries. One may deplore this. But it is not up to the entrepreneurs to improve mankind morally. And they are not to be blamed if those whose duty this is have failed to do so. ~ Ludwig Von Mises

When we talk about sin, we need to understand what sin is. Sin is not God says 'you can't do this' because He wants to take something away from you. He says: "If you do this, it will be death. If you do this, it will be life." And then He says: "Please, choose life, so that you can live. I've made you, I know how you work. I've made this whole Earth, I know how it works. Please, choose life. ~ Lacey Mosley

They just like to look strange and mysterious. When you get past all the boa feathers, every woman born in this world wants a strong man who knows her like a book, who's not only her lover but he who keepeth Israel. Stupid, isn't it?'
'She wants a father instead of a husband, then.'
'That's what it amounts to,' she said. 'The books are right on the score. ~ Harper Lee

What does man actually know about himself? Is he, indeed, ever able to perceive himself completely, as if laid out in a lighted display case? Does nature not conceal most things from him-even concerning his own body-in order to confine and lock him within a proud, deceptive consciousness, aloof from the coils of the bowels, the rapid flow of the blood stream, and the intricate quivering of the fibers! She threw away the key. And woe to that fatal curiosity which might one day have the power to peer out and down through a crack in the chamber of consciousness and then suspect that man is sustained in the indifference of his ignorance by that which is pitiless, greedy, insatiable, and murderous-as if hanging in dreams on the back of a tiger. Given this situation, where in the world could the drive for truth have come from? Insofar as the individual wants to maintain ~ Friedrich Nietzsche

I still like boiled potatoes with the skins on," he said, "and I do not want a man standing in back of my chair, laughing up his sleeve at me while I am taking the potatoes' jackets off." Of pleasure and material things he was wary. "I have never known what to do with money after my expenses were paid. I can't squander it on myself without hurting myself," he said, "and nobody wants to do that. ~ David Halberstam

The search for a "suitable" church makes the man a critic where God wants him to be a pupil. What he wants from the layman in church is an attitude which may, indeed, be critical in the sense of rejecting what is false or unhelpful but which is wholly uncritical in the sense that it does not appraise- does not waste time in thinking about what it rejects, but lays itself open in uncommenting, humble receptivity to any nourishment that is going. ~ C.S. Lewis

I'm not an idiot, Kenji. I have reasons for the things I say."
"Yeah, and maybe I'm just saying that you have no idea what you're saying."
"Whatever."
"Don't whatever me - "
"Whatever," I say again.
"Oh my God," Kenji says to no one in particular. "I think this girl wants to get her ass kicked."
"You couldn't kick my ass if I had ten of them."
Kenji laughs out loud. "Is that a challenge?"
"It's a warning," I say to him.
"Ohhhhhh, so you're threatening me now? Little crybaby knows how to make threats now?"
"Shut up, Kenji."
"Shut up, Kenji," he repeats in a whiny voice, mocking me. ~ Tahereh Mafi

Do you think I'm a whore?" Harry pulled over to the side of the road and turned to me. "I think you're brilliant. I think you're tough. And I think the word whore is something ignorant people throw around when they have nothing else.

… "Isn't it awfully convenient," Harry added, "that when men make the rules, the one thing that's looked down on the most is the one thing that would bear them the greatest threat? Imagine if every single woman on the planet wanted something in exchange when she gave up her body. You'd all be ruling the place. An armed populace. Only men like me would stand a chance against you. And that's the last thing those assholes want, a world run by people like you and me."

I laughed, my eyes still puffy and tired from crying. "So am I a whore or not?" "Who knows?" he said. "We're all whores, really, in some way or another. At least in Hollywood." … "But I like you this way. I like you impure and scrappy and formidable. I like the Evelyn Hugo who sees the world for what it is and then goes out there and wrestles what she wants out of it. So, you know, put whatever label you want on it, just don't change. That would be the real tragedy. ~ Taylor Jenkins Reid

I used to feel spiritually inferior because I had not experienced the more spectacular manifestations of the Spirit and could not point to any bona fide "miracles" in my life. Increasingly, though, I have come to see that what I value may differ greatly from what God values. Jesus, often reluctant to perform miracles, considered it progress when he departed earth and entrusted the mission to his flawed disciples. Like a proud parent, God seems to take more delight as a spectator of the bumbling achievements of stripling children than in any self-display of omnipotence.
From God's perspective, if I may speculate, the great advance in human history may be what happened at Pentecost, which restored the direct correspondence of spirit to Spirit that had been lost in Eden. I want God to act in direct, impressive, irrefutable ways. God wants to "share power" with the likes of me, accomplishing his work through people, not despite them. ~ Philip Yancey

We twist and turn, we plead and beg, we offer our tormentor what he wants so that the hurting will stop. And when there is no torturer to placate, no hooded man with hot irons and tongs, just a burn you can't escape, we bargain with God, or ourselves, depending on the size of our egos. I made mock of the dying at Mabberton and now their ghosts watched me burn. Take the pain, I said, and I will be a good man. Or if not that, a better man. We all become weasels with enough hurt on us. But I thing a small part of it was more than that. A small part was that terrible two-edged sword called experience, cutting away at the cruel child I was, carving out whatever man might be yet to come. I promised a better one. Though I have been known to lie. ~ Mark Lawrence

A recent book by University of Chicago professor of philosophy and law Brian Leiter outlines what I believe will become the theoretical consensus that does away with religious liberty in spirit if not in letter. "There is no principled reason," he writes, "for legal or constitutional regimes to single out religion for protection." . . . Evoking the principle of fairness, Leiter argues that everybody's conscience should be accorded the same legal protections. Thus he proposes to replace religious liberty with a plenary "liberty of conscience."

Leiter's argument is libertarian. He wants to get the government out of the business of deciding whose conscience is worth protecting. This mentality seems to expand freedom, but that's an illusion. In practice it will lead to diminished freedom, as is always the case with any thoroughgoing libertarianism. ~ R. R. Reno

And the strange thing was he had never loved her more than in that moment, because at that moment she had become himself.

But thats not love, he thought, thats not what she wants, not what any of them want, they do not want you to find yourself in them, they want instead that you should lose yourself in them. And yet, he thought, they are always trying to find themselves in you. [...]

And it seemed to him then that every human was always looking for himself, in bars, in railway trains, in offices, in mirrors, in love, especially in love, for the self of him that is there, someplace, in every other human. Love was not to give oneself, but find oneself, describe oneself. And that the whole conception had been written wrong. Because the only part of any man that he can ever touch or understand is that part of himself he recognises in him. And that he is always looking for the way in which he can expose his sealed bee cell and reach the other airtight cells with which he is connected in the waxy comb.

And the only way he had ever found, the only code, the only language by which he could speak and be heard by other men, could communicate himself, was with a bugle. If you had a bugle here, he told himself, you could speak to her and be understood, you could play Fatigue Call for her, with its tiredness, its heavy belly going out to sweep somebody else's streets when it would rather stay home and sleep, she would understand it then.

But yo ~ James Jones

I wanted so much to live. I wanted so much to stay and not to leave. In a moment no answer would matter to me, but just the same, I wanted to know what I guess any dying person wants to know.
"Answer this, Ellimist: Did I . . . did I make a difference? My life, and my . . . my death . . . was I worth it? Did my life really matter?"
"Yes," he said. "You were brave. You were strong. You were good. You mattered."
"Yeah. Okay, then. Okay, then. ~ K.A. Applegate

The nutritionist said I should eat root vegetables.
Said if I could get down thirteen turnips a day
I would be grounded, rooted.
Said my head would not keep flying away
to where the darkness lives.

The psychic told me my heart carries too much weight.
Said for twenty dollars she'd tell me what to do.
I handed her the twenty. She said, "Stop worrying, darling.
You will find a good man soon."

The first psycho therapist told me to spend
three hours each day sitting in a dark closet
with my eyes closed and ears plugged.
I tried it once but couldn't stop thinking
about how gay it was to be sitting in the closet.

The yogi told me to stretch everything but the truth.
Said to focus on the out breath. Said everyone finds happiness
when they care more about what they give
than what they get.

The pharmacist said, "Lexapro, Lamicatl, Lithium, Xanax."

The doctor said an anti-psychotic might help me
forget what the trauma said.

The trauma said, "Don't write these poems.
Nobody wants to hear you cry
about the grief inside your bones."

But my bones said, "Tyler Clementi jumped
from the George Washington Bridge
into the Hudson River convinced
he was entirely alone."

My bones said, "Write the poems. ~ Andrea Gibson

When I reached him, I anchored my hands on my hips and glared. "Do not get into anymore fights on my behalf." I didn't want him suspended-or worse. "Now give me your keys."
He gently flicked the end of my nose. "Haven't you heard? I do what I want, when I want, and there's nothing anyone can do to stop me."
I could knee him between the legs and simply steal his keys, proving otherwise, but all I said was, "Believe me, I've witnessed that firsthand," and held out my hands. "Now be a good boy and do what I want you to do."
He lifted the sunglasses and I saw a bright gleam in those violet eyes. "And what is it, exactly, that Little Ali wants?"
Little Ali. Ugh. "I said give me your keys." No reason to play nice. He certainly wasn't. "And if you call me Little Ali again, I'll smash your trachea the way I hear you like to to others."
Suddenly suspicious, he snapped out a quick "Why?"
"Because I hate it."
"Not the name. The keys."
"Hello. Because I want to stab you with them, why else?"
"Why?"He insisted.
Fine. "Because I need to practice my driving, and I promised my grandparents I would."
"You're telling me..." The glasses slid back into place as he cupped the back of my neck and dragged me closer to him, peering down at me sternly. "That you Don't know how to drive?"
"Of course I know how to drive. Now, if you ask me if I know how to drive well, the answer will be different."
He choked out a laugh, but backed away a ~ Gena Showalter

Twin Peaks aired in Russia and Mikhail Gorbachev was a big fan of the show. . .One day Aaron [Spelling] gets a call from Carl Lindner who wants to know who killed Laura Palmer. Aaron was not that involved with the show on a day-to-day basis, so he calls me up and he said, "Who killed Laura Palmer?" I said, "No clue." He said, "It's really important."

I called David [Lynch] and he says, "I can't tell you." I don't want to press David, so I call Aaron back to say, "David won't tell me, who wants to know?" and he says "President Bush." What happened was Gorbachev called Bush, who called Carl, who called Aaron, who called me. So I called David back and I said, "This isn't going to go anywhere, it'll be a secret. You have to tell me who Laura's killer is." That's when I realized David had no idea who killed Laura Palmer. ~ Brad Dukes

I have never believed that man's freedom consisted in doing what he wants, but rather in never doing what he does not want to do. ~ Jean-Jacques Rousseau

The person who is motivated by necessity is interested in what's known and what's secure. The person who is motivated by possibility is equally interested in what's not known. He wants to know what can evolve, what opportunities might develop. ~ Tony Robbins

I found out Si was taking naps every day on Kay's couch! I went to Phil and told him it was a problem.
"Look, I know he's your brother and he's my uncle, but he's not the kind of worker we need to have," I told Phil, while trying to make a good first impression.
I was trying to instill a new work ethic and culture in Duck Commander, and I couldn't have Si sleeping on the job!
"Don't touch Si," Phil told me. "You leave him alone. He's making reeds and that's the hardest thing we do. Si is the only guy who wants to do it, and he's good at it. Si is fine."
Amazingly enough, in the ten years I've been running Duck Commander, we've never once run out of reeds. Six years ago, Si suffered a heart attack. He smoked cigarettes for almost forty years and then quit after his heart attack, so we were all so proud of him. Even before his heart attack, I wasn't sure about putting Si on our DVDs because I thought he would just come across too crazy. He cracked us up in the duck blind and we all loved him, but I told Jep and the other camera guys to film around him. Honestly, I didn't think anyone would understand what he was saying. When we finally tried to put him on the DVDs, he clammed up in front of the camera and looked like a frog in a cartoon just sitting there. He wouldn't perform. Finally, we put a hidden camera under a shirt on Si's desk. We were near the end of editing a DVD and showed a shooting scene to Si. He always takes credit for shooting more ducks than ~ Willie Robertson

Five people and a bank holiday weekend. What could possibly go wrong?

Marc, he has the perfect life so why does he want to go and ruin it?

Paul, the guy who has blackouts if he drinks too much.

Chloe, the bulimic loner who just wants to be at peace.

Lindsey, the forty-four-year-old who still lives at home with her controlling mum.

And Rich, all he thinks about is money and notches on the bed post.

Five people working for the same company, but not really knowing each other. They all start the long weekend, but how many will finish it and arrive back at work on the right side of the law and still alive? ~ Ross Lennon

If God wants something from me, he would tell me. He wouldn't leave someone else to do this, as if an infinite being were short on time. And he would certainly not leave fallible, sinful humans to deliver an endless plethora of confused and contradictory messages. God would deliver the message himself, directly, to each and every one of us, and with such clarity as the most brilliant being in the universe could accomplish. We would all hear him out and shout "Eureka!" So obvious and well-demonstrated would his message be. It would be spoken to each of us in exactly those terms we would understand. And we would all agree on what that message was. ~ Richard Carrier

God listens and He responds. Sometimes His reply could be "I'm with you. Do not be afraid." Sadly, many times we withdrew long before receiving the blessing He has for us, what He wants to show us; or we get disappointed because we don't recognize His answer for not being what we expected. ~ Yilda B. Rivera

Sentry: King, may I speak?
Creon: Your very voice distresses me.
Sentry: Are you sure that it is my voice, and not your conscience?
Creon: By God, he wants to analyze me now!
Sentry: It is not what I say, but what has been done, that hurts you.
Creon: You talk too much. ~ Sophocles

Do you know how long I've been telling myself you hated me? Or how hard it's been to keep believing it? You'd do things, these amazing, insane things, like stealing me back from Blind Michael or breaking me out of jail, and I'd say, 'Oh, he just wants to pay his debts,' or, 'Oh, who knows what a cat is thinking?'" My voice broke a little on the last word. Dammit.

Tybalt's eyes widened, hope kindling in their depths. "What are you saying?"

"I'm saying - oak and ash, Tybalt, I'm saying I'm in love with you, I've been in love with you for a while, and the only way I was dealing with it was by not dealing with it, ever." I shook my head. "I knew I'd never have you, so I told myself I didn't want you, and if you don't really want me, if you want some idea of me, or just want to chase and not catch, I'll understand, but this has been a hard week, Tybalt, this has been such a hard week. I've been waiting for you to come here, because I need you to tell me. Okay? Just tell me what you want."

"Oh, October. Toby. My Toby." He pulled one hand from mine, reaching up to tuck my hair behind my ear. His fingers were shaking. That was what I focused on, more than anything else. His fingers were shaking. "Do you think I'm cruel enough to do that to you?"

I sniffled. "No," I admitted.

"Thank Oberon," he said, and pulled me close, and kissed me. ~ Seanan McGuire

Let's say you're playing chess against someone who's got more pieces on the board and decades more experience than we do. How do you win?"

"You don't," Rose said. "Unless you cheat."

"We already tried cheating," I said. "Getting him in trouble, risking his job. He's apparently planning a response tonight."

"Change the game, then," Rose said.

"Again, we tried that. There's no winning. Not really. So what I'm proposing is pretty simple."

"Do tell," Rose said. "Also, you do know that we're being followed?"

"We're surrounded," I said. "But she wants to deal badly enough that she'll hear us out before she murders us. Nevermind that. Our analogy here. I'm proposing the pigeon strategy. Knock over all of the pieces, shit on the board, and then strut around like we're the victors. ~ Wildbow

The truth is not that the problem is the newsroom does not understand capitalism. The problem is that the front office does not understand journalism. The problem is not that the average reporter does not understand what it is that's necessary to make the payroll, to make the good edifice, to make the thing that he wants. It is that in fact those who control too many of the edifices have actually come to believe that Wall Street has wisdom, and that that wisdom should instruct our business. ~ Hodding Carter III

It keeps people calm. That's the important thing. Holden thinks he's a hero, power to the people, information wants to be free blah blah blah, but he's a fucking moron." "He's on his own ship." Avasarala crossed her arms. "What's your point?" "He's on his own ship and we're not." "So we're all fucking morons," Avasarala said. "Fine. ~ James S.A. Corey

You think that's what Mouse wants? You in jail? He's not the pile of ashes we're going to put in the ground. His soul is free in the woods. ~ Debra Anastasia

It was at this time that backgammon was invented and began to be popular. It is a kind of paradigm of how wealth is acquired, which in this world is not the reward of intelligence or ability, just as luck is not a product of skill ... If luck favours the player, he gets what he wants; if it doesn't, a skilled and prudent man cannot win that which fortune only bestows on whom it likes. It is thus that the good things of this world are apportioned by chance. ~ Mas'udi

How do we listen to his voice? With the ear of our heart. With love. Love has ears, as love has eyes. Just be there, and love him, and let him love you." (35). Easier said than done. "What will happen then? What will we hear? Let God take care of that. Seek only him, do not use him as a means to seek any other end. He is not your Santa, he is your Savior. I cannot tell you what he will give you, except for one thing: he will give you himself. He will give you more of himself the more you want him, that is, the more you love him. He wants to pour infinite riches into your soul; prayer is a way of opening up your soul so more of God can enter. ~ Peter Kreeft

To Roland's relief, Jean de Joinville came to his aid. "Sire, this good knight wants only to preserve your life. Let us all ride together against the Egyptians."
"If I ride against them alone, God will protect me," said Louis.
A new figure pushed into the circle. He wore the white surcoat and red cross of a Templar over his mail. With a leap of his heart, Roland recognized Guido Bruchesi.
Guido looked at him but did not acknowledge him. He went directly to the King.
He spoke quietly but firmly. "Sire, what you have just said is presumption."
"I do not see how that could be, brother Templar." But Louis took his foot out of the stirrup as Roland watched with growing hope. You can always catch Louis's attention with a religious argument, Roland thought, even on the battlefield.
"Sire," said Guido, "Satan tempted our Seigneur Jesus, telling Him that if He cast Himself down from the mountaintop, angels would lift him up." Guido cast a sidelong look at Amalric. "You, Sire, are being tempted to ride alone against the whole Egyptian army, expecting God's protection. You are demanding a miracle. That is presumption."
Louis was silent for a moment. "Perhaps you are right."
Roland let out a long breath. ~ Robert Shea

But it's not enough! So long as the most powerful of the Epics consider themselves immune, nothing will change. So long as you leave them alone, you're essentially proving what they've always said! That if an Epic is strong enough, he can take what he wants, do what he wants. You're saying they deserve to rule. ~ Brandon Sanderson

Gluttony is a great fault; but we do not necessarily dislike a glutton. We only dislike the glutton when he becomes a gourmet-that is, we only dislike him when he not only wants the best for himself, but knows what is best for other people. ~ Gilbert K. Chesterton

I'm a man who knows what he wants. And when I find something I want, I go after it until it belongs to me."
"Again, Braxton, I'm a person, not an object you can own."
"You're right, but that doesn't mean you can't belong to me … And you have to know that if you belong to me, I'd belong to you as well. ~ Aurora Rose Reynolds

As a rule, man is a fool. When it's hot, he wants it cool; When its cool, he wants it hot. Always wanting, what is not. ~ Benjamin Disraeli

But come on - tell me the proposal story, anyway."

She raised an eyebrow. "Really?"

"Really. Just keep in mind that I'm a guy, which means I'm genetically predisposed to think that whatever mushy romantic tale you're about to tell me is highly cheesy."

Rylann laughed. "I'll keep it simple, then." She rested her drink on the table. "Well, you already heard how Kyle picked me up at the courthouse after my trial. He said he wanted to surprise me with a vacation because I'd been working so hard, but that we needed to drive to Champaign first to meet with his former mentor, the head of the U of I Department of Computer Sciences, to discuss some project Kyle was working on for a client." She held up a sparkly hand, nearly blinding Cade and probably half of the other Starbucks patrons. "In hindsight, yes, that sounds a little fishy, but what do I know about all this network security stuff? He had his laptop out, there was some talk about malicious payloads and Trojan horse attacks - it all sounded legitimate enough at the time."

"Remind me, while I'm acting U.S. attorney, not to assign you to any cybercrime cases."

"Anyhow. . . we get to Champaign, which as it so happens, is where Kyle and I first met ten years ago. And the limo turns onto the street where I used to live while in law school, and Kyle asks the driver to pull over because he wants to see the place for old time's sake. So we get out of the limo, and he's making thi ~ Julie James

I often think that the ideal of our perfection that we set up, and often go through torture to achieve, may not be God's idea of how He wants us to be at all. That may be something quite different that we never would have thought of, and what seems like a failure to us may really be something bringing us closer to His will for us. ~ Caryll Houselander

Harry Burns: You realize of course that we could never be friends.
Sally Albright: Why not?
Harry Burns: What I'm saying is - and this is not a come-on in any way, shape or form - is that men and women can't be friends because the sex part always gets in the way.
Sally Albright: That's not true. I have a number of men friends and there is no sex involved.
Harry Burns: No you don't.
Sally Albright: Yes I do.
Harry Burns: No you don't.
Sally Albright: Yes I do.
Harry Burns: You only think you do.
Sally Albright: You say I'm having sex with these men without my knowledge?
Harry Burns: No, what I'm saying is they all WANT to have sex with you.
Sally Albright: They do not.
Harry Burns: Do too.
Sally Albright: They do not.
Harry Burns: Do too.
Sally Albright: How do you know?
Harry Burns: Because no man can be friends with a woman that he finds attractive. He always wants to have sex with her.
Sally Albright: So, you're saying that a man can be friends with a woman he finds unattractive?
Harry Burns: No. You pretty much want to nail 'em too.
Sally Albright: What if THEY don't want to have sex with YOU?
Harry Burns: Doesn't matter because the sex thing is already out there so the friendship is ultimately doomed and that is the end of the story.
Sally Albright: Well, I guess we're not going to be friends then.
Harry Burns: I guess not.
Sally Albrig ~ Nora Ephron

You know that your toddler needed love and approval but he often seemed not to care whether he got it or not and never seemed to know how to earn it. Your pre-school child is positively asking you to tell him what does and does not earn approval, so he is ready to learn any social refinement of being human which you will teach him ... He knows now that he wants your love and he has learned how to ask for it. ~ Penelope Leach

Has anyone by fussing before the mirror ever gotten taller by so much as an inch? If fussing can't even do that, why fuss at all? Walk into the fields and look at the wildflowers. They don't fuss with their appearance - but have you ever seen color and design quite like it? The ten best-dressed men and women in the country look shabby alongside them. If God gives such attention to the wildflowers, most of them never even seen, don't you think he'll attend to you, take pride in you, do his best for you? 29-32 What I'm trying to do here is get you to relax, not be so preoccupied with getting so you can respond to God's giving. People who don't know God and the way he works fuss over these things, but you know both God and how he works. Steep yourself in God-reality, God-initiative, God-provisions. You'll find all your everyday human concerns will be met. Don't be afraid of missing out. You're my dearest friends! The Father wants to give you the very kingdom itself. ~ Eugene H. Peterson

A man must first of all understand certain things. He has thousands of false ideas and false conceptions, chiefly about himself, and he must get rid of some of them before beginning to acquire anything new. Otherwise the new will be built on a wrong foundation and the result will be worse than before. To speak the truth is the most difficult thing in the world; one must study a great deal and for a long time in order to speak the truth. The wish alone is not enough. To speak the truth one must know what the truth is and what a lie is, and first of all in oneself. And this nobody wants to know. ~ G.I. Gurdjieff

Anders turns and looks at him. He wants to hear Coyle's cousin repeat what he's just said, but he knows better than to ask. The others will think he's being a jerk, ragging the kid for his grammar. But that isn't it, not at all - it's that Anders is strangely roused, elated, by those final two words, their pure unexpectedness and their music. He takes the field in a trance, repeating them to himself. ~ Tobias Wolff

From all that urges and admonishes, the romantic turns away. He wants to dream, enjoy, immerse himself, instead of clearing his way by striving and wrestling. That which has been and rises out of what is past occupies him far more than what is to become and also more than what wants to become; for the word of the future would always be command. Experiences with their many echoes and their billows stand higher in his estimation than life with its tasks; for tasks always establish a bond with harsh reality. And from this he is in flight. He does not want to struggles against fate, but rather to receive it with an ardent and devout soul; he does not want to wrestle for the blessing, but to experience it, abandoning himself, devoid of will, to what spells salvation and bliss. ~ Leo Baeck

What a writer wants to do is not what he does. ~ Jorge Luis Borges

God wants to save us in a people. He does not want to save us in isolation. And so today's church more than ever is accentuating the idea of being a people. The church therefore experiences conflicts, because it does not want a mass; it wants a people. A mass is a heap of persons, the drowsier the better, the more compliant the better. The church rejects communism's slander that it is the opium of the people. It has no intention of being the people's opium. Those that create drowsy masses are others. The church wants to rouse men and women to the true meaning of being a people. What is a people? A people is a community of persons where all cooperate for the common good. ~ Oscar A. Romero

Be careful, Alexandra, you're beginning to sound like the type of young lady who wants all those things typical young females want," Ella said with warning in her voice, her nose wrinkled, "marriage, children, a house in Surrey." "What's wrong with wanting marriage and children?" Vivi asked. "I want those things. Not Surrey," she said with a raised finger, "but the rest." "True, but with you, it's different. You're pining after The One." Ella said the last with an exaggerated swoon, which Vivi ignored. "Well, maybe Blackmoor is Alex's One." Ella turned an incredulous look on Alex. "Really?" They both turned questioning looks on Alex, who thought for a moment before speaking. Was Gavin The One? Could she imagine spending the rest of her life with him? Certainly, his mere presence set her heart racing. When he flashed one of his private, conspiratorial grins, she wanted to stop whatever she was doing and just bask in the glow of his attention. ~ Sarah MacLean

It fells incredible, but it's not what I'm desperate for. I am desperate for him. I know what I have to do to get what I want, and I've made my peace with it. He wants me to beg... I'll beg. He wants me to plead... I will. Because right now he knows he's got me wrapped around his little finger... and it's right where I want to be. I'm sick. I'm deluded. I'm lost. I'm his. ~ Callie Hart

I think any supernatural hero today, whether he's a vampire, werewolf, a resuscitated mummy, whatever he is, is going to have to deal with the fact that scientists are going to want to catch him and study him. His big enemy is not going to be Dr. Van Helsing today, it's going to be the doctor who wants to put him in a lab and get his blood for what it can do to cure disease or grant immortality. ~ Anne Rice

We use a most unfortunate idiom when we say, of a lustful man prowling the streets, that he "wants a woman". Strictly speaking, a woman is just what he does not want. He wants a pleasure for which a woman happens to be the necessary piece of apparatus. How much he cares about the woman as such may be gauged by his attitude for her five minutes after fruition. ~ C.S. Lewis

I have sometimes said to a client: "If you are so in touch with your feelings from your abusive childhood, then you should know what abuse feels like. You should be able to remember how miserable it was to be cut down to nothing, to be put in fear, to be told that the abuse is your own fault. You should be less likely to abuse a woman, not more so, from having been through it." Once I make this point, he generally stops mentioning his terrible childhood; he only wants to draw attention to it if it's an excuse to stay the same, not if it's a reason to change. ~ Lundy Bancroft

As soon as Jesus sits on his throne he's gonna rule the world with a rod of iron. That means he's gonna make the ACLU do what he wants them to. That means you're not gonna have to ask if you can pray in public school. We will live by the law of God and no other law. ~ John Hagee

If we see a child who is two or three, perhaps four years old, we find a free human. Why is this human free? Because this human does whatever he or she wants to do. The human is completely wild. Just like a flower, a tree, or an animal that has not been domesticated – wild! And if we observe humans who are two years old, we find that most of the time these humans have a big smile on their face and they're having fun. They are exploring the world. They are not afraid to play. They are afraid when they are hurt, when they are hungry, when some of their needs are not met, but they don't worry about the past, don't care about the future, and only live in the present moment. Very young children are not afraid to express what they feel. ~ Miguel Ruiz

"Some people develop a love of something and that love is a lifelong love. Like, say, a scientist. He is on a quest for knowledge. He loves theories. He loves testing his theories. He loves this quest for knowledge. And maybe he is only a teacher or a professor but he still loves this knowledge, he loves what he does and he wants to share it with people. Sure, there are some days when he doesn't want to get out of bed in the morning and go to the job but when he stands back and, and... puts it all into perspective... he realizes it's not that bad at all. He likes what he does. On the other hand, you take a man who works in a factory. It's unrealistic to think this man likes putting the same bolt in the same part or whatever for eight to twelve hours a day. He does it for a paycheck so he can support his family or his booze habit or whatever. But every day, when he goes to work, he has to put himself into something like a coma because he hates what he does so much. Do you follow me? ~ Andersen Prunty

Don't let what he wants eclipse what you need. He is very dreamy," she says. "But he is not the sun. You are. ~ Shonda Rhimes

If you wish to understand a philosopher, do not ask what he says, but find out what he wants ~ Friedrich Nietzsche

The moment the earthquake hits, Ted has a premonition: a burning sensation on his feet. Not the pins and needles from sitting cross-legged for too long, but like the restlessness of the soles after standing on the subway for an hour. Like the blood wants to burst from his skin. No blinding vision, no sudden trance - it's not until weeks later that he realizes what the feeling was. But in the future, he won't tell the story this way. ~ Viet Dinh

I see a man."
Rose bit back a sigh. Of course she did. She seemed to see a man in every cup. And here she'd actually hoped that Sadie Moon might be as unusually talented as her appearance suggested.
"He hides himself. A mask. He keeps to the shadows."
Rose's heart rolled over her chest. "What else?"
"You want him," Sadie said, turning the cup in her palms. "You do not understand what you feel for him, or why he pushes you away."
"No." Rose was breathless. "I don't."
Those fey eyes locked with hers. "Because he loves you enough to give you up. He is all about duty and honor, but he is ruled by fear."
She was on the very edge of her seat now. "Yes. He's afraid of coming out of the shadows."
Sadie shook her head, the feathers on her hat bobbing. "That's only part of it. He's afraid for you."
"For me?" Rose's teeth clicked together. "Why?"
The fortune teller shrugged. "For that answer, you will have to go to him. You have many men in your cup, Lady Rose."
Disappointed, Rose sagged a little. "For all the good it does me."
A bright grin flashed beneath that amazing hat. "The man who wants you but will not take you. Another who would take everything you offer and give what he can of himself-but it will not be enough. Another who wants nothing from you at all."
Grey. Kellan? And probably Archer. ~ Kathryn Smith

I'm not possessive over you, Maddie," he says into my ear. "I'm protective, and there's a difference. I'd never try to control you or tell you what you can and can't do, but I know every guy in this frat house wants to be me right now-especially Kyle. And you know why? It's because you're so fucking beautiful." My breath catches in my throat. "They'll all want you, but I have you, and there's not a chance I'm gonna risk one of them taking you from me, all right? So yes, Angel, yes, you are fucking mine! ~ Emma Hart

"What for?" I said. "What for, Tante Lou? He treated me the same way he treated her. He wants me to feel guilty, just as he wants her to feel guilty. Well, I'm not feeling guilty, Tante Lou. I didn't put him there. I do everything I know how to do to keep people like him from going there. He's not going to make me feel guilty." ~ Ernest Gaines

So are demons forces that are totally external to us who seek to defy God? Are they just the shadow side of our own souls? Are they social constructions from a premodern era? Bottom line: Who cares? I don't think demons are something human reason can put its finger on. Or that human faith can resolve. I just know that demons, whether they be addictions or actual evil spirits, are not what Jesus wants for us, since basically every time he encounters them he tells them to piss off. ~ Nadia Bolz-Weber

MRI testing again shows what may be the underlying brain mechanism. The amygdalae are two small lobes in the brain associated with fear, arousal, and emotions. When they are active, it is thought to be a sign of vigilance, meaning that the brain is wary and wants more information. A study at Massachusetts General Hospital found that when subjects looked at photographs of faces - half were white, half were black - MRI scans found high amygdala activity. This was considered to be a normal reaction to unfamiliar faces. When the subjects looked at the photographs a second time the faces were more familiar; only the other-race faces continued to provoke high amygdala activity. This was true for both blacks and whites, suggesting that encounters with people of different races keep the brain at a higher level of watchfulness.
Amygdalae notice race even when a person does not. William A. Cunningham of Ohio State University showed white subjects pictures of faces for only 30 milliseconds - not long enough for the subjects to be conscious of them - but black faces triggered greater amygdala activity than white faces. When he showed faces for a half a second - long enough for people to notice race - he found that black faces prompted greater activity in the pre-frontal areas, a part of the brain associated with detecting internal conflicts and controlling conscious behavior. This suggested the subjects were trying to suppress certain feelings about blacks.
Steven Neuberg of Ar ~ Jared Taylor

There's not a single fear, thought, feeling or need that's too big or too small for Jesus. He wants you to tell Him what's on your heart. ~ Jeremy Camp

You tried to change didn't you?
closed your mouth more
tried to be softer
prettier
less volatile, less awake
but even when sleeping you could feel
him travelling away from you in his dreams
so what did you want to do, love
split his head open?
you can't make homes out of human beings
someone should have already told you that
and if he wants to leave
then let him leave
you are terrifying
and strange and beautiful
something not everyone knows how to love. ~ Warsan Shire

I've been wondering ... I mean, I thought you might be able to tell me something. Buddy met my eyes and I saw, for the first time, how he had changed. Instead of the old, sure smile that flashed on easily and frequently as a photographer's bulb, his face was grave, even tentative
the face of a man who often does not get what he wants. ~ Sylvia Plath

The story of the Good Samaritan (Luke 1o) can he interpreted mystically in such a way that the question of the knowledge of God becomes its focus. The priest and the Levite, who walk past the man who fell among robbers and was seriously hurt, are pious God-fearing persons. They "know" God and the law of God. They have God the same way that the one who knows has that which is known. They know what God wants them to be and do. They also know where God is to he found, in the scriptures and the cult of the temple. For them, God is mediated through the existing institutions. They have their God - one who is not to he found on the road between Jerusalem and Jericho.

What is wrong with this knowledge of God? The problem is not the knowledge of the Torah or the knowledge of the temple. (It is absurd to read an anti-Judaistic meaning into a story of the Jew Jesus, since it could just as well have come from Hillel or another Jewish teacher.) What is false is a knowledge of God that does not allow for any unknowing or any negative theology. Because both actors know that God is "this," they do not see "that." Hence the Good Samaritan is the anti-fundamentalist story par excellence.

"And so I ask God to rid me of God," Meister Eckhart says. The God who is known and familiar is too small for him. ~ Dorothee Solle

The pope is encouraging immigrants to come here. He's encouraging us to let them come here. He's encouraging us to stop any efforts whatsoever to prevent them from coming here. Why, if capitalism's so bad? 'Cause if he gets what he wants and everybody else along with him, we're not gonna be capitalists very much long. Here's what the pope said about Trump. ~ Rush Limbaugh

At that moment, she remembered something. Something Sazed had said. You must love him enough to trust his wishes, he had told her. It isn't love unless you learn to respect him - not what you assume is best, but what he actually wants ... . ~ Brandon Sanderson

I'm frustrated with him, but I'm also frustrated with myself. That I can't find the words to explain it to him. I'm totally sure he's not doing it on purpose, but Seth is a guy, and he can't ever know what it feels like to walk down a hallway and know that you're getting judged for the size of your ass or how big your boobs are. He'll never understand what it's like to second guess everything you wear and how you sit and walk and stand in case it doesn't attract the right kind of attention, or worse, attracts the wrong kind. He'll never get how scary and crazy-making it is to feel like you belong to some big Boy Monster that decides it can grab you and touch you and rank you whenever and however it wants. ~ Jennifer Mathieu

One's 'life' is 'fractured'; he does not even know what he is living for. What is the essence of the human life? It is that one can attain whatever life form one wants, or he can attain ultimate liberation (moksha) if he wants moksha. ~ Dada Bhagwan

God famously doesn't afflict Job because of anything Job has done, but because he wants to prove a point to Satan. Twenty years later, I am sympathetic with my first assessment; to me, in spite of the soft radiant beauty of many of its passages, the Bible still has a mechanical quality, a refusal to brook complexity that feels brutal and violent. There has been a change, however. When I look at Revelation now, it still seems frightening and impenetrable, and it still suggests an inexorable, ridiculous order that is unknowable by us, in which our earthly concerns matter very little. However, it not longer reads to me like a chronicle of arbitrarily inflicted cruelty. It reads like a terrible abstract of how we violate ourselves and others and thus bring down endless suffering on earth. When I read And they blasphemed the God of heaven because of their pain and their sores, and did not repent of their deeds, I think of myself and others I've known or know who blaspheme life itself by failing to have the courage to be honest and kind - and how then we rage around and lash out because we hurt. When I read the word fornication, I don't read it as a description of sex outside legal marriage: I read it as sex done in a state of psychic disintegration, with no awareness of one's self or one's partner, let alone any sense of honor or even real playfulness. I still don't know what to make of much of it, but I'm inclined to read it as a writer's primitive attempt to give form to his mor ~ Mary Gaitskill

He wants to apologize but does not know for what. His life has been devoted to apologetics. It is his profession. He is concerned with both justification and remorse. He has always acted rightly, but nothing has ever come of it. ~ Joy Williams

Man knows, and in the course of years he comes to know it increasingly well, feeling it ever more acutely, that memory is weak and fleeting, and if he doesn't write down what he has learned and experienced, that which he carries within him will perish when he does. This is when it seems everyone wants to write a book. Singers and football players, politicians and millionaires. And if they themselves do not know how, or else lack the time, they commission someone else to do it for them ... engendering this reality is the impression of writing as a simple pursuit, though those who subscribe to that view might do well to ponder Thomas Mann's observation that, 'a writer is a man for whom writing is more difficult than it is for others ~ Ryszard Kapuscinski

A. T. Stewart started life with a dollar and fifty cents. This merchant prince began by calling at the doors of houses in order to sell needles, thread and buttons. He soon found the people did not want them, and his small stock was thrown back on his hands. Then he said wisely, "I'll not buy any more of these goods, but I'll go and ask people what they do want." Thereafter he studied the needs and desires of people, found out just what they most wanted, endeavored to meet those wants, and became the greatest business man of his time. ~ Grenville Kleiser

Concept of what he wants: money will not give him a code of values, if he's evaded the knowledge of what to value, and it will not provide him with a purpose, if he's evaded the choice of what to seek. ~ Ayn Rand

Oh, he'll help us whether he wants to or not. I told the truth. I would not kill him. The death-curse of a god is an evil thing.
But I can hurt him. And I will.
And besides ...
Have you never wondered, little bird, what it must be like to see the world through the eyes of a god? ~ Neil Gaiman

Why do men like a woman to give up control? What is it about the lack of control that men like so much?" "It's not that they like a lack of control. But a man wants a woman who gives herself to him. He wants a woman to melt into his arms, to get aroused from a kiss on the back of her neck, ~ Lauren Blakely

Where do I belong?"
"With me," my mother and Galen say in unison. They exchange hard glares. Galen locks his jaw.
"I'm her mother," she tells Galen, her voice sharp. "Her place is with me."
"I want her for my mate," Galen says. The admission warms up the space between us with an impossible heat and I want to melt into him. His words, his declaration, cannot be unspoken. And how he's declared it to everyone who matters. It's out there in the open, hanging in the air. He wants me for his mate. Me. Him. Forever. And I'm not sure how I feel about that. How I should feel about that.
I've known for some time that he wanted that eventually, but how soon? Before we graduate? Before I go to college? What does it mean to mate with him? He's a Triton prince. His place is with the Syrena, in the ocean. And let's not forget that my place with them is dead-no Half-Breeds allowed. We have so much to talk about before this can even happen, but I feel saying so might make him feel rejected, or embarrass him in front of his older brother, the great Triton king. Or like I'm having second thoughts, and I'm not. Not exactly.
I peer up at him, wanting to see his eyes, to see the promise in them that I heard in his voice.
But he won't look at me. He's not looking at Mom, either. He keeps his iron glare on Grom, unyielding and demanding. But Grom doesn't wither under the weight of it. In fact, he deflects it with an indifferent expression. They are definitely engaging i ~ Anna Banks