Outlive Quotes

I don't think women outlive men, Doctor. It only seems longer. ~ Erma Bombeck

How fortunate that science hasn't cracked human immortality. It's a great blessing that we can outlive old wars. And old warriors. ~ Lois McMaster Bujold

The mind can make substance, and people planets of its own with beings brighter than have been, and give a breath to forms which can outlive all flesh. ~ Lord Byron

Things, things, they outlive us and go to scenes that we know nothing of. ~ Iris Murdoch

To outlive one's child is a terrible thing, but to do so because your child has taken his or her life is horrible. ~ Pierre Salinger

It was her grandfather who'd told her the tale of this particular violin, over and over, as if the telling could stave off loss, as if the weight and scope of human history were not found in books or in those mythic universities in Rome and Naples that no one in their village had ever seen but, rather, were encoded in objects like this one, a violin touched by hundreds of hands, loved, used, stroked, pressed, made to outlive its owners, storing their secrets and lies ~ Carolina De Robertis

(Resilience) acknowledges from the outset that things will go wrong. All of our solutions will eventually outlive their usefulness. We will make messes, and disruption we do not cause or predict will land on us. This is the drama of being alive. ~ Krista Tippett

Reclaiming ourselves usually means coming to recognize and accept that we have in us both sides of everything. We are capable of fear and courage, generosity and selfishness, vulnerability and strength. These things do not cancel each other out but offer us a full range of power and response to life. Life is as complex as we are. Sometimes our vulnerability is our strength, our fear develops our courage, and our woundedness is the road to our integrity. It is not an either/or world. It is a real world. In calling ourselves "heads" or "tails," we may never own and spend our human currency, the pure gold of which our coin is made.

But judgment may heal over time. One of the blessings of growing older is the discovery that many of the things I once believed to be my shortcomings have turned out in the long run to be my strengths, and other things of which I was unduly proud have revealed themselves in the end to be among my shortcomings. Things that I have hidden from others for years turn out to be the anchor and enrichment of my middle age. What a blessing it is to outlive your self-judgments and harvest your failures. ~ Rachel Naomi Remen

Let there be a heaven so that man may outlive his grasses. ~ Anne Sexton

I do not wish to grow old, to outlive my illusions. Only a short respite from cares and sorrow, a brief time of flowers, and music, and love, and laughter, and ecstatic tears. ~ Anne Reeve Aldrich

I've done you a disservice," he said at last. "It's only fair to let you know, but you won't have a normal life span."
I bit my lip. "Have you come to take my soul, then?"
"I told you that's not my jurisdiction. But you're not going to die soon. In fact, you won't die for a long time, far longer than I initially thought, I'm afraid. Nor will you age normally."
"Because I took your qi?"
He inclined his head. "I should have stopped you sooner."
I thought of the empty years that stretched ahead of me, years of solitude long after everyone I loved had died. Though I might have children or grandchildren. But perhaps they might comment on my strange youthfulness and shun me as unnatural. Whisper of sorcery, like those Javanese women who inserted gold needles in their faces and ate children. In the Chinese tradition, nothing was better than dying old and full of years, a treasure in the bosom of one's family. To outlive descendants and endure a long span of widowhood could hardly be construed as lucky. Tears filled my eyes, and for some reason this seemed to agitate Er Lang, for he turned away. In profile, he was even more handsome, if that was possible, though I was quite sure he was aware of it.
"It isn't necessarily a good thing, but you'll see all of the next century, and I think it will be an interesting one."
"That's what Tian Bai said," I said bitterly. "How long will I outlive him?"
"Long enough," he said. Then more gently, "You may ha ~ Yangsze Choo

I am not seeking anything but service to my creator. I do not need a house, I do not need a car, I do not need any of that, but to be present with each guest that sits across from me, and I am committed to a bigger thing than me, which is the vision of own, because own is going to outlive all of us. ~ Iyanla Vanzant

Death is an asshole. Regardless of illness or circumstance or gut feelings, you are never ready to accept never seeing someone again, to have nothing left but last conversations and memories. You are never ready to be left with how sick somebody looked, or the way they stood up and hugged you despite how dizzy and feverish they were. You are never ready to exist without a person you loved and still need. Death is a constant, but you are never ready…

But while it's scary and awful and exhausting and terrible, it's also comforting to have accepted that death will always be there and will always rip out your heart. It doesn't get easy, and it will find surprising new ways of debilitating you. But what does get simpler is your awareness of it – the reminder that you have gotten through it before, and you will get through it again, and it will never, ever be as bad as it is in the moment you are battling through. It will never hurt the way it did when you found out, and the ache will never be as painful as when you realize those were your last words to them. It won't be as painful forever…

So, no, we can't control death. But we can control how we breathe, how we act, the type of work we do. We can control what we say yes or no to, control who we choose to surround ourselves with, control the way we make the people we love feel. We can decide to be kind, to try our best, and to be honest. Those are the things that outlive us. When we're faced with the harshnes ~ Anne T. Donahue

To some extent, I have only lived to have something to outlive. By confiding these futile remembrances to paper, I am conscious of accomplishing the most important act of my life. I was predestined to Memory. ~ Oscar Milosz

It is a terrible thing for an old woman to outlive her dogs. ~ Tennessee Williams

By following this simple path, you become extraordinary, unfathomable, a being of profound cosmic subtlety. You outlive time and space by realizing the subtle truth of the universe. ~ Laozi

Guard your honor. Let your reputation fall where it will. And outlive the bastards. ~ Lois McMaster Bujold

If two percent of all the films made in Hollywood are really artistically worthy - and I think it's a lot more than two percent - that's a pretty big percentage of things that will outlive their own generation. ~ Murray Horwitz

And if there is water there let it be from a river. And if there is peace let it be from silence and forgetting. From the slow settle of dust on a house worn down, on a history lost, on a woman buried quietly into geography. And if there is memory let it be disjointed and nonsensical, let it disturb understanding and logic, let it rise like birds or hands into the blood blue bone of the sky, whispering its nothing beyond telling. ( ... ) Let someone lose the captions to all of the photographs; let them pile into new logics and forms that outlive us.
- "Siberia: Still Life of a Moving Image" (6. Representation) ~ Lidia Yuknavitch

He made a blushing cital of himself,
And chid his truant youth with such a grace
As if he mastered there a double sprite
Of teaching and of learning instantly.
There did he pause: but let me tell the world:
If he outlive the envy of this day,
England did never owe so sweet a hope,
So much misconstrued in his wantonness. ~ William Shakespeare

If being a spokesman for a generation is a fleeting occupation, being a symbol of an era is downright dangerous for anyone who has the bad luck to outlive it. ~ Jay McInerney

Given good yarn, good workmanship, and good care, a knitted shawl and outlive its knitter, providing warmth and pleasure to several generations of family and friends. ~ Martha Waterman

The United Nations research states that men with the longest life expectancy are from Japan, followed by Switzerland. I am rather surprised at this result as since time immemorial we have been doing the Karva Chauth fast to make sure our men have long lives, and the results should have definitely shown by now. I scan the list, confident that in this chart of life expectancy, the Indian man must definitely be in the top 5. Nope! There are 146 countries above us where the men have longer lifespans, and the biggest blow is that even with four wives who don't fast for them, the Arab men outlive our good old Indian dudes. ~ Twinkle Khanna

I would resurrect that person in words, and once the pages had been printed and the story had been bound between covers, they would have something to hold on to for the rest of their lives. Not only that, but something that would outlive them, that would outlive us all.
One should never underestimate the power of books. ~ Paul Auster

Children have the resilience to outlive their sufferings, if given a chance. ~ Ishmael Beah

I've discovered the secret of revenge. Outlive the f
ers! I'll dance on their graves. ~ Michael Robotham

Is it not strange that desire should so many years outlive performance? ~ William Shakespeare

I've got death inside me. It's just a question of whether or not I can outlive it. ~ Don DeLillo

At the time when everyone in Syracuse desired the death of Dionysius, an elderly woman prayed over and over that he would be unharmed and outlive her. And after the tyrant learned about this, he asked her why she did so. Then the woman said: 'When I was a girl, we had an oppressive tyrant, and I wished for another ruler. And after the tyrant was killed, a harsher one succeeded the latter shortly afterwards, and I thought that it would be a great blessing if the successor's rule would also be terminated. We then had a still harsher ruler, yourself. And so if you were removed, a worse tyrant will replace you'. ~ Thomas Aquinas

God,' he thought, 'never let me outlive my wits. ~ Patrick O'Brian

To live a life of purpose is to focus on certain things that will outlive you. ~ Ivan Fernandez

No mother should outlive her children, and no captain should outlive his ship. ~ George R R Martin

It's not natural to outlive your child. This has always been my greatest fear. ~ Debbie Reynolds

After all, let a man take what pains he may to hush it down, a human soul is an awful ghostly, unquiet possession, for a bad man to have. Who knows the metes and bounds of it? Who knows all it's awful perhapses, -those shudderings and temblings, which it can no more live down than it can outlive its own eternity! What a fool is he who locks his door to keep out spirits, who has in his own bosom a spirit he dares not meet alone, -whose voice, smothered far down, and piled over with mountains of earthiness, is yet like the forewarning trumpet of doom! ~ Harriet Beecher Stowe

Words outlive people, institutions, civilizations. Words spur images, associations, memories, inspirations and synapse pulsations. Words send off physical resonations of thought into the nethersphere. Words hurt, soothe, inspire, demean, demand, incite, pacify, teach, romance, pervert, unite, divide. Words be powerful. ~ Inga Muscio

People worry that if they buy an annuity and then die before the policy starts to pay off, their heirs will lose out. I tell them, "What you should be more worried about is if you outlive your money, you will have to move in with your kids. Ask your kids which of these outcomes they are more worried about." ~ Richard Thaler

Customs will often outlive the remembrance of their origin. ~ Thomas Paine

Read for yourselves, read for the sake of your inspiration, for the sweet turmoil in your lovely head. But also read against yourselves, read for questioning and impotence, for despair and erudition, read the dry sardonic remarks of cynical philosophers like Cioran or even Carl Schmitt, read newspapers, read those who despise, dismiss or simply ignore poetry and try to understand why they do it. Read your enemies, read those who reinforce your sense of what's evolving in poetry, and also read those whose darkness or malice or madness or greatness you can't understand because only in this way will you grow, outlive yourself, and become what you are. ~ Adam Zagajewski

Let me die the moment my love dies.
Let me not outlive my own capacity to love.
Let me die still loving, and so, never die. ~ Mary Zimmerman

When I die," he continued, "you're next in line."
"Do you actually believe I'll outlive you?" West asked. "With my vices?"
"I have just as many."
"Yes, but I'm far more enthusiastic about mine. ~ Lisa Kleypas

At night I sometimes see the figure of a man, on an empty road in a deserted landscape, walking behind a hearse. I am that man. It's you the hearse is taking away. I don't want to be there for your cremation; I don't want to be given an urn with your ashes in it. I hear the voice of Kathleen Ferrier singing, 'Die Welt ist leer, Ich will nicht leben mehr'* and I wake up. I check your breathing, my hand brushed over you. Neither of us wants to outlive the other. We've often said to ourselves that if, by some miracle, we were to have a second life, we'd like to spend it together.
*The world is empty. I don't want to go on living. ~ Andre Gorz

With Marvel and DC, you're working with their pre-established fictional universes and characters. At those places, you're working with characters who will outlive you and maybe your children and your childern's children. Batman will outlive me, Spider-Man will outlive me, the Avengers will outlive me, and so it goes. ~ Grant Morrison

They say that art should stand the test of time. Life lasts a limited amount of time. Mountains and trees and earth will outlive human beings, but we don't know if they will be here always. Art does outlast the life span of its maker. Art should communicate to an increasing circle of strangers-people who do not know the artist, but come to know the work, and through the work, come to know something about the humanity of the artist that rings with their own humanity. ~ Anna Deavere Smith

Whoever speaks in primordial images speaks with a thousand voices; he enthrals and overpowers ... he transmutes our personal destiny into the destiny of mankind, and evokes in us all those beneficent forces that ever and anon have enabled humanity to find refuge from every peril and to outlive the longest night. ~ C. G. Jung

Faustina is a great work of the Creator. She has nothing of what you call brains; she doesn't need them for her destiny ... It is to be glorious for a few years: not to outlive some dull husband and live on his money till she is eighty, going to lectures and comparing the attractions of winter tours that offer the romance of the Caribbean. ~ Robertson Davies

There's something stubborn about families, unhappy ones in particular: they outlive themselves, and then they live on. ~ Daphne Merkin

Not marble, nor the gilded monuments / Of princes, shall outlive this powerful rhyme; / But you shall shine more bright in these contents / Than unswept stone, besmear'd with sluttish time. ~ John Green

And the thought consoled me, as it does now: everything you believe you have imagined is real. You have only to outlive it. ~ Joyce Carol Oates

For if there is any single thing that everyone hopes for most dearly, it must be this: that the youngest outlive the oldest. ~ Barbara Kingsolver

[D]eath serves as a sobering reminder of our limited time on this Earth, thereby compelling us to endeavour to leave behind not insipid, uninspiring lives, but rather true manifestations of our ideas in their tangible forms, whose permanence can far outlive our own. ~ Agnes Chew

It's a stark thought that when we die most of us will leave behind uneaten biscuits, unused coffee, half toilet rolls, half cartons of milk in the fridge to go sour; that everyday functional things will outlive us and prove that we weren't ready to go; that we weren't smart or knowing or heroic; that we were just animals whose animal bodies stopped working without any sort of schedule or any consent from us. ~ Steven Hall

I continued up the stairs, this time on wings, suspecting for the first time that Louisa's book might outlive us all. ~ Patricia O'Brien

It's kind of hard to outlive your past ~ Richelle Mead

We contended that whatever diminishes the sense of superiority in men makes them more manly, brotherly, and pleasant to have about; we felt sure that the bluff, the swagger, the bravado of young men would not outlive the mastery of the outdoor arts in which his sister is now successfully engaged ... indeed, we felt that if she continued to improve after the fashion of the last decade her physical achievements will be such that it will become the pride of many a ruddy youth to be known as that girl's brother. ~ Frances E. Willard

Because the memory of those who lie below, passes away so soon. At first they tend them, morning, noon, and night; they soon begin to come less frequently; from once a day, to once a week; from once a week to once a month; then, at long and uncertain intervals; then, not at all. Such tokens seldom flourish long. I have known the briefest summer flowers outlive them. ~ Charles Dickens

To die for one's great ideas is glorious - and easy. The horror is to outlive them. That is our worst capability. ~ Pearl Mary Teresa Craigie

I've achieved what every artist wants, which is that some of their work will outlive them. ~ George Michael

She'll outlive the last cockroach ~ Sue Monk Kidd

If there are ghosts on this earth, they are formed by the things you cannot utter, and they'll outlive the black in your teeth, burn hotter than any hole in your stomach. Untold stories take on lives of their own. They silently eat dinner with you. Still as shoe trees, they stand over you, watching you sleep. They'll make you pace all-night ~ Adam Johnson

If you can find a host for me that has a friendly parrot, I will be very very glad ... DON'T buy a parrot figuring that it will be a fun surprise for me. To acquire a parrot is a major decision: it is likely to outlive you. If you don't know how to treat the parrot, it could be emotionally scarred and spend many decades feeling frightened and unhappy. If you buy a captured wild parrot, you will promote a cruel and devastating practice, and the parrot will be emotionally scarred before you get it. Meeting that sad animal is not an agreeable surprise. ~ Richard Stallman

Louie, declared dead more than sixty years earlier, would outlive them all. ~ Laura Hillenbrand

With my art, it's the one thing that I know will outlive me and outlive my feelings. It will outlive my depressive seasons. ~ Frank Ocean

If you hate your parents, the man or the establishment, don't show them up by getting wasted and wrapping your car around a tree. If you really want to rebel against your parents, out-learn them, outlive them, and know more than they do. ~ Henry Rollins

Most women outlive their spouses. Divorce remains at record rates. It's important for a woman to be able to control her finances. ~ Maria Bartiromo

I hope you outlive me so I never have to know what life is like without you. ~ C.J. English

He is afraid the shame will outlive him. ~ Franz Kafka

So your junk food has a shelf life of twenty-two years and will probably outlive your fat, sorry ass. ~ Rory Freedman

Finally, a prominent nation is taking on the homosexual agenda and rejecting it outright. A number of African nations have done the same, but third-world countries are not newsworthy to mainstream media. The irony is stunning that a Communist nation would understand that preserving the value of men and women marrying and producing children makes for demographic survival, while many American Christian leaders cower in the shadows, in fear of activist homosexuals and their leftist supporters. I say 'cheers' to the Russians on this one. That nation will probably outlive America. ~ Sylvia Thompson

A writer never forgets the first time he accepted a few coins or a word of praise in exchange for a story. He will never forget the sweet poison of vanity in his blood and the belief that, if he succeeds in not letting anyone discover his lack of talent, the dream of literature will provide him with a roof over his head, a hot meal at the end of the day, and what he covets the most: his name printed on a miserable piece of paper that surely will outlive him. A writer is condemned to remember that moment, because from then on he is doomed and his soul has a price. ~ Carlos Ruiz Zafon

I don't really care whether I live that long or not, It's just that when I die, I dont want to leave any enemies, and I figure the only way to do that is to outlive them all. ~ Harold Robbins

So may'st thou live, till like ripe fruit thou drop Into thy mother's lap, or be with ease Gathered, not harshly plucked, for death mature: This is old age; but then thou must outlive Thy youth, thy strength, thy beauty, which will change To withered weak and grey. ~ John Milton

Rosario is safe. You were supposed to outlive me. Elisa is ten times the ruler you were. I've stolen your wife. I'm not sorry.
I miss you. ~ Rae Carson

I kept looking to do songs that were written years ago and would live or outlive all of us, and the one thing they had in common was Sinatra. ~ Michael Bolton

Well, I have lost you; and I lost you fairly;
In my own way, and with my full consent.
Say what you will, kings in a tumbrel rarely
Went to their deaths more proud than this one went.
Some nights of apprehension and hot weeping
I will confess; but that's permitted me;
Day dried my eyes; I was not one for keeping
Rubbed in a cage a wing that would be free.
If I had loved you less or played you slyly
I might have held you for a summer more,
But at the cost of words I value highly,
And no such summer as the one before.
Should I outlive this anguish, and men do,
I shall have only good to say of you. ~ Edna St. Vincent Millay

During that war we had a word for extreme man-made disorder which was fubar, an acronym for 'fucked up beyond all recognition.' Well - the whole planet is now fubar with postwar miracles, but, back in the early 1960s, I was one of the first persons to be totally wrecked by one - an acrylic wall-paint whose colors, according to advertisements of the day, would ' ... outlive the smile on the "Mona Lisa".'
The name of the paint was Sateen Dura-Luxe. Mona Lisa is still smiling. ~ Kurt Vonnegut

Have, myself, full confidence that if all do their duty, if nothing is neglected, and if the best arrangements are made, as they are being made, we shall prove ourselves once again able to defend our Island home, to ride out the storm of war, and to outlive the menace of tyranny, if necessary for years, if necessary alone. Winston Churchill, House of Commons, 4 June 1940 ~ Andrew Roberts

Did you think they did it alone?
Built whole armies,
and conquered thrones?

Constructed promised lands
that would outlive the sun
resurrected prosperity from ash and bone?

A crest is not just a manmade thing
it is also created by generations of women
who wield swords through guile and letters.

Show me your kings,
and I will show you the queens that willed them,
that bred them, and taught them to do better. ~ Nikita Gill

After a pause, Andrew says that these buildings will always be here, that they will outlive us all. And I believe him. "But just imagine," my mammal brain says, "if you took this one we're standing in down in such a way that it toppled into that guy. ~ Hugh Howey

Words often outlive the people who create them. ~ Amy Neftzger

The London games mark the 24th anniversary of my winning two golds and setting the world record in the heptathlon. Someone is going to want it; records are made to be broken - it's only a matter of time. I hope mine will outlive me. ~ Jackie Joyner-Kersee

They live too long who happiness outlive. ~ John Dryden

Pleasure need not be less keen because there will be centuries of springs to come, their blossom unseen by human eyes, the walls will crumble, the trees die and rot, the gardens revert to weeds and grass, because all beauty will outlive the human intelligence which records, enjoys and celebrates it. ~ P.D. James

If humans escape the solar system and outlive the Sun, our descendants may someday live on one of these planets. Atoms from Times Square, cycled through the heart of the Sun, will form our new bodies. One day, either we will all be dead, or we will all be New Yorkers. ~ Randall Munroe

We are not different nor alike
But each strange in his leather body
sealed in skin and reaching out clumsy hands
and loving is an act
that cannot outlive
the open hand
the open eye
the door in the chest standing open. ~ Marge Piercy

Your suicide makes the lives of those who outlive you more intense. Should they be threatened by boredom, or tshould the absurdity of their lives leap out at them from the curve of some cruel mirror, let them remember you, and the pain of existence will seem preferable to the disquietude of no longer being. ~ Edouard Leve

My goal is for Gunnar to outlive me. That's the way it should be. My dream is for him to be a dad himself one day, so he can find out all the anxiety that kids bring to their dads. ~ Boomer Esiason

There is something within our biological structure that screams out and says it is morally wrong for the old to outlive the young. This is one of the times when God doesn't seem to make sense. This is the worst that life gets. ~ Rick Atkinson

Without him, we are nothing, but the paradox is that we, the figments of another mind, will outlive the mind that made us, for once we are thrown into the world, we continue to exist forever, and our stories go on being told, even after we are dead. ~ Paul Auster

You start to feel panic, because you realise that human beings are possessed by the idea that they must fill the world with objects and ideas that will outlive them, and you suddenly glimpse the fires that burn below human despair. ~ Greg Baxter

It is well known that women outlive men; could it merely be superior vanity that keeps them going? ~ Truman Capote

The rose does not bloom without thorns. True, but would that the thorns did not outlive the rose. ~ Charles Francis Richter

It's a terrible thing to outlive your child, a tragedy I wish upon no one. ~ Nicholas Sparks

You outlive your wife, then your colleagues and friends, then your accountant and the building doorman. ou no longer attend the opera, because the human bladder can only endure so much. Social engagements require strategy and hearing aid calibrations. pg 269 ~ Dominic Smith

You seem to forget that the sun must set. You knew perfectly well that I would not be with you long enough. Still, you weep and cry and ask God 'Why' as if it were some kind of surprise. Why? Because love changes everything. Love's the surprise. ~ Kate McGahan

Trees have a curious relationship to the subject of the present moment. There are many created things in the universe that outlive us, that outlive the sun, even, but I can't think about them. I live with trees. ~ Annie Dillard

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

Quentin did not answer, staring at the window; then he could not tell if it was the actual window or the window's pale rectangle upon his eyelids, though after a moment it began to emerge. It began to take shape in its same curious, light, gravity-defying attitude
the once-folded sheet out of the wistaria Mississippi summer, the cigar smell, the random blowing of the fireflies. "The South," Shreve said. "The South. Jesus. No wonder you folks all outlive yourselves by years and years and years." It was becoming quite distinct. He would be able to decipher the words soon, in a moment; even almost now, now, now.
"I am older at twenty than a lot of people who have died," Quentin said. ~ William Faulkner

If what you create does not outlive you, then you have failed. ~ Uday Kotak

He no longer wished to be dead. At the same time, it cannot be said that he was glad to be alive. But at least he did not resent it. He was alive, and the stubbornness of this fact had little by little begun to fascinate him - as if he had managed to outlive himself, as if he were somehow living a posthumous life. ~ Paul Auster

Printed books usually outlive bookstores and the publishers who bought them out. They sit around, demanding nothing, for decades. That's one of their nicest qualities
their brute persistence. ~ Nicholson Baker