Small Differences Quotes

Practice builds habits. Our habits are our character. When it comes to virtue, practice makes a very great difference - or rather, all the difference. ~ Eric Greitens

The ethics of plagiarism have turned into the narcissism of small differences: because journalism cannot own up to its heavily derivative nature, it must enforce originality on the level of the sentence. ~ Malcolm Gladwell

It was as if the small differences mattered more than the really big ones - like you had to recognize something before you could hate it properly. No ~ Karen Traviss

The arts teach students that small differences can have large effects. The arts traffic in subtleties. ~ Elliot W. Eisner

There is, to be sure, sometimes only a small difference between being alert to possible danger and allowing oneself to become terrified to the point of paralysis by seeming or imagined portents. ~ Sherwin B. Nuland

No relationship is perfect, ever. There are always some ways you have to bend, to compromise, to give something up in order to gain something greater ... The love we have for each other is bigger than these small differences. And that's the key. It's like a big pie chart, and the love in a relationship has to be the biggest piece. Love can make up for a lot. ~ Sarah Dessen

Negotiating small differences is part of being a grownup; no one can tell you in advance where to put your foot down. ~ Susan Neiman

Everyone's goals are the same with very small differences. I mean, the goal of a socialist and the goal of a libertarian are exactly the same. The goals are happiness and security and freedom, and you balance those. ~ Penn Jillette

The less there is to look at, the more important it is that we look at it closely and carefully. This is critical to abstract art. Small differences make all the difference. ~ Kirk Varnedoe

The moments that we have with friends and family, the chances that we have to make a big difference in the world or even to make a small difference to the ones we love, all those wonderful chances that life gives us, life also takes away. It can happen fast and a whole lot sooner than you think. ~ Larry Page

I think it's this congenital problem with journalism that we oversell the difference we make. We make small differences. ~ Katherine Boo

Intolerance of groups is often, strangely enough, exhibited more strongly against small differences than against fundamental ones. ~ Sigmund Freud

The change from atoms to bits is irrevocable and unstoppable. Why now? Because the change is also exponential - small differences of yesterday can have suddenly shocking consequences tomorrow. ~ Nicholas Negroponte

Star Trek was an attempt to say that humanity will reach maturity and wisdom on the day that it begins not just to tolerate, but take a special delight in differences in ideas and differences in life forms. [ ... ] If we cannot learn to actually enjoy those small differences, to take a positive delight in those small differences between our own kind, here on this planet, then we do not deserve to go out into space and meet the diversity that is almost certainly out there. ~ Gene Roddenberry

Be wary, though, of the way news media use the word "significant," because to statisticians it doesn't mean "noteworthy." In statistics, the word "significant" means that the results passed mathematical tests such as t-tests, chi-square tests, regression, and principal components analysis (there are hundreds). Statistical significance tests quantify how easily pure chance can explain the results. With a very large number of observations, even small differences that are trivial in magnitude can be beyond what our models of change and randomness can explain. These tests don't know what's noteworthy and what's not - that's a human judgment. ~ Daniel J. Levitin

The love we have for each other is bigger than these small differences. And that's the key. It's like a big pie chart, and the love in a relationship has to be the biggest piece. Love can make up for a lot, Remy. ~ Sarah Dessen

So, if someone like Richard Dawkins indignantly protests that his passion about these sorts of things -- the passion that drives the "God Delusion" -- should not be taken as a religious passion, I am happy to accept that. I do nevertheless think that often Dawkins and company show the sociological characteristics of the religious. This comes across particularly in what Freud calls the narcissism of small differences, the hatred of those who are close to them but not quite close enough. Just as evangelicals can differ bitterly over the true meaning of the host, so the New Atheists loathe people like me who (like them) have no religious belief but who think that science as such does not refute religion.
[Is Darwinism a Religion? - Michael Ruse] ~ Michael Ruse

I've found that small wins, small projects, small differences often make huge differences. ~ Rosabeth Moss Kanter

4. Differentiation - making the smallest possible sensory distinctions between movements - builds brain maps. Newborns, Feldenkrais observed, often make very large, poorly differentiated movements based on primitive reflexes, using many muscles at once, such as reflexively extending their entire arms. They also cannot discriminate among their fingers. As they mature, they learn to make smaller, more precise individual movements. But the movements do not become precise until the child can use awareness to discern very small differences among them. Differentiation, Feldenkrais would ~ Norman Doidge

She looked at the produce stalls, a row of jewels in a case, the colors more subtle in the winter, a Pantone display consisting only of greens, without the raspberries and plums of summer, the pumpkins of autumn. But if anything, the lack of variation allowed her mind to slow and settle, to see the small differences between the almost-greens and creamy whites of a cabbage and a cauliflower, to wake up the senses that had grown lazy and satisfied with the abundance of the previous eight months. Winter was a chromatic palate-cleanser, and she had always greeted it with the pleasure of a tart lemon sorbet, served in a chilled silver bowl between courses. ~ Erica Bauermeister

Together on the path of love, we can try to make a small difference in someone's life. What else is there to do? ~ Chan Khong

Three-and-a-half-month-old infants already seem to exhibit the other-race effect. In a study at the University of Kentucky, white babies were very good at distinguishing faces with 100 percent Caucasian features from faces that had been graphically morphed to include features that were 70 percent white and 30 percent Asian. They couldn't do the reverse: They could not tell 100 percent Asian faces from those that were morphed to include 30 percent white features. In other words, they could detect small differences between white and not-quite-white faces, but not the same kinds of differences between Asian and not-quite-Asian faces.
Lawrence A. Hirschfeld of the University of Michigan did some of the pioneering work on how early in life children begin to understand race. He showed children of ages three, four, and seven, a picture of "Johnny:" a chubby black boy in a police uniform, complete with whistle and toy gun. He then showed them pictures of adults who shared two of Johnny's three main traits of race, body build, and uniform. Prof. Hirschfeld prepared all combinations - policemen who were fat but were white, thin black policemen, etc. - and asked the children which was Johnny's daddy or which was Johnny all grown up. Even the three-year-olds were significantly more likely to choose the black man rather than the fat man or the policeman. They knew that weight and occupation can change but race is permanent.
In 1996, after 15 years of studying children and race, ~ Jared Taylor

Courage has you say in a defiant spirit you can take everything from me, you could cut me deep, you could render me in shame but you will never ever stop me from loving those who mock me, from loving those that hate me, from loving those who don't forgive me, from loving the cynics, from loving the darkness so much that I myself through my small acts of consistent unyielding love may bring on the light. ~ Cory Booker

Tranquillity hides in small spaces, and when found needs to be treasured, because you know it's a phantom that will slip away again. ~ Diane Ackerman

The gold in 'them there hills' is not always buried deep. Much of it is within easy reach. Some of it is right on the surface to be picked up by any searcher with a keen eye for detail and an eagerness to explore. As in any treasure hunt, the involvement grows as the hunt proceeds and each success whether small or great adds the fuel of excitement to the exploration. ( Prolog, 1978 ) ~ Arnold Ephraim Ross

I'm in touch with Stick players all over the world, so I have a unique perspective on what they need from a website. Stick Enterprises is a small family-run business, but they have a depth of experience and committment that's pretty rare these days. I try to make sure that all the bases are covered for them, because I think what they do is really valuable to the music world. ~ Greg Howard

Religion raises the stakes of human conflict much higher than tribalism, racism, or politics ever can, as it is the only form of in-group/out-group thinking that casts the differences between people in terms of eternal rewards and punishments. ~ Sam Harris

The buildings appear to be glued together, mostly small houses and apartment blocks that looked nervous. There is murky snow spread out like carpet. There is concrete, empty hat-stand trees, and gray air. ~ Markus Zusak

In an interview, President Obama said he recently deejayed a small dance party at the White House. Obama has a lot in common with deejays. He takes requests and then completely ignores them. ~ Jimmy Fallon

His expression was strained. "I'm trying like hell to be the good guy here. I need you to go inside and lock the door behind you to keep out of trouble."

"I thought Wildstone was safe."

"It is. The trouble isn't going to come from the unknown. It's going to come from me. Go, Quinn. Now. And lock your door."

She stared up at him, mesmerized by the thought of him being trouble, images going through her head of him proving it to her, all of them involving little to no clothing and a bed. ~ Jill Shalvis

Every experience is a gift and happens for a reason. No matter how big or small, we are reminded that we are the captains of our ship. ~ Alexz Johnson

It was comforting for only a moment. Then Joshua realized that the dude still had a seriously huge knife in his hand.
The part of him that was crying like a kicked puppy took off running. Unfortunately it took the rest of him with it.
"No! Nononono!" He cried even as he bolted. This was what scared him about being a werewolf. He wasn't in control of his body anymore. Because of his last name and small size, he'd always been a target of bullies. He'd learned early that they could hurt him but they couldn't control him if he didn't let them. And then he learned martial arts and they couldn't even hurt him anymore. In the last twenty-four hours, it had been as if he was strapped into a rollercoaster: all he could do was go for the ride and scream a lot. ~ Wen Spencer

Cosmetic surgery is terrifying. It never looks good. Those women look weird. They look in the mirror and think they look great, but they don't see what we see. I think it's hideous. They scare small children. ~ Jerry Hall

You are all there, the people in the city. I can't believe I was ever among you. When you are away from a city it becomes a fantasy. Any town, New York, Chicago, with its people, becomes improbable with distance. Just as I am improbable here, in Illinois, in a small town by a quiet lake. All of us improbable to one another because we are not present to one another. And it is so good to hear the sounds, and know that Mexico City is still there and the people moving and living. ~ Ray Bradbury

The main of life is composed of small incidents and petty occurrences; of wishes for objects not remote, and grief for disappointments of no fatal consequence ... ~ Samuel Johnson

I and other humans no difference. ~ Ikkyu

Following

Someone is always falling in love with you:
men and women, infants and children,
octogenarians and adolescents.
A tenant of heaven-haven on the pearly doorstep
hopes you will wave your hand in passing.
Where you stood just now a white bird
has flown into a ponderosa pine
and a black bee hovers in a bush of yellow flowers.

People would like to discuss you, but hold back.
Mystery is a fragile substance, too easy to tear.
Several persons, however, have noticed that you are followed
not by the usual shadow but by a shaft of sunlight.
Even on a day of fog or light rain.
Even after sunset.

When you are not present, you still walk quietly
through our minds, and we tell ourselves little stories
or small poems about you, like this one.
When a bird sings, we listen carefully
hoping your name will be mentioned. ~ Virginia Adair

'It is very small for its age,' said Gnathaena. ~ Athenaeus

I looked at the back of Jessica's silky bent head and thought of those old stories where one twin is hurt and the other, miles away, feels the pain. I wondered if there had been a moment, during that giggly girls' night at Auntie Vera's, when she had made some small, unnoticed sound; if all the answers we wanted were locked away behind the strange dark gateways of her mind. ~ Tana French

Dr Rahmat thrust his hand between her legs, tried to kiss her and suggested that there was time for a quick one.'

'Meaning sexual intercourse?' Sir Hector was clearly not about to take the view that my client was offering his patient a small sherry. ~ John Mortimer

Unable to swim, he had maneuvered to fall off an old-timers' party yacht in the Hudson River. His departure was not remarked by the revelers. They motored on toward the Atlantic and he bobbed around in the wash. He couldn't swim. But he did. He learned how. Before he knew it, he was making time and nearing the dock where a small Italian liner sat dead still, white, three stories high. Nobody was around when he pulled up on a stray rope on the wharf and walked erect to the street, where cars were flashing. Day after tomorrow was his seventieth birthday. What a past, he said. I've survived. Further, I'm horny and vindictive. Does the fire never stop? ~ Barry Hannah

Immortality gets very, very boring. You'd be surprised at how interesting the small mundanities of life can seem after a few millennia. ~ N.K. Jemisin

Edith, in her veal-coloured room in the Hotel du Lac, sat with her hands in her lap, wondering what she was doing there. And then remembered, and trembled. And thought with shame of her small injustices, of her unworthy thoughts towards those excellent women who had befriended her, and to whom she had revealed nothing. I have been too harsh on women, she thought, because I understand them better than I understand men. I know their watchfulness, their patience, their need to advertise themselves as successful. Their need never to admit to a failure. I know all that because I am one of them. I am harsh because I remember Mother and her unkindness, and because I am continually on the alert for more. But women are not all like Mother, and it is really stupid of me to imagine that they are. Edith, Father would have said, think a little. You have made a false equation. ~ Anita Brookner

The intensity of a national culture should be represented by ... the general education level and ... the exceptional merit of a small elite of pioneers. ~ George Sarton

I do not like to call myself a Liberal, because there is so much that is wrong with liberalism. I also do not like to call my a Conservative for exactly the same reason. The fact that the theater of conservativism today seems to be such a haven for such an abundance of small minded, non-thinking, irrationalists is however making it very difficult for me to not adopt a harder stance. ~ Derek R. Audette

Summer Between Terms"

The day's so calm and muggy I sweat tears,
the summer's cloudcap and the summer's heat...
surely good writers write all possible wrong--
are we so conscience-dark and cataract-blind,
we only blame in others what they blame in us?
(The sentence writes we, when charity wants I...)
It takes such painful mellowing to use error...
I have stood too long on a chair or ladder,
branch-lightening forking through my thought and veins--
I cannot hang my heavy picture straight.
I can't see myself...in the cattery,
the tomcats doze till the litters are eatable,
then find their kittens and chew off their breakable heads.
They told us by harshness to win the stars.

Planes, trains, lorries simmer through the garden,
the reviewer sent by God to humble me
ransacking my bags of dust for silver spoons--
he and I go on typing to go on living.
There are ways to live on words in England--
reading for trainfare, my host ruined on wine,
my ear gone bad from clinging to the ropes.
I'd take a lower place, eat my toad hourly;
even big frauds wince at fraudulence,
and squirm from small incisions in the self--
they live on timetable with no time to tell.
I'm sorry, I run with the hares now, not the hounds.
I waste hours writing in and writing out a line,
as if listening to conscience were telling the truth ~ Robert Lowell

If I as Pekwa Nicholas Mohlala take my family, my brothers and sisters, myself, and our children, combined, we have all the resources, knowledge, skills, and capacity to run a successful, profitable, and sustainable small business.

If I take my extended family both maternal and partenal, my aunts and uncles and my cousins, myself, and our children, combined, we have all the resources, knowledge, skills, and capacity to run a successful, profitable, and sustainable medium business.

If I take Ba Ga Mohlala family in general, including aunts, uncles, and grandchildren, combined, we have all the resources, knowledge, skills, and capacity to run a successful, profitable, and sustainable Big Business business.

If I take Banareng clan including aunts, uncles, and grandchildren, combined, we have all the resources, knowledge, skills, and capacity to run a successful, profitable, and sustainable multinational business.

YET, we are not able to do that because of lack of unity, and the lack of unity is caused by selfishness and lack of trust.

At the moment what we have is majority of successful independent individuals running their individual successful, profitable and sustainable small businesses and successful individuals pursuing their own fulfilling careers.

If ever we want to succeed as families and one united clan, we need to start by addressing the issue of trust, and selfishness. Other than that, anything th ~ Pekwa Nicholas Mohlala

When I was small, my parents came back from Tijuana, and my dad bought me a very small acoustic guitar. I loved it. I started making up my own songs right away. ~ Diane Warren

My line of vision was such that the creature filled the moon like a fossil. It had gone there, I thought, to live and die, for there, of all places, was its small definition made whole and eternal ~ N. Scott Momaday

There is a still small voice telling us what is right, and if we listen to that still small voice we shall grow and increase in strength and power, in testimony and in ability not only to live the gospel but to inspire others to do so. ~ Heber J. Grant

It was understood, it was mere good manners, to proclaim that you were in his debt and that he had the right to call upon you at any time to redeem your debt by some small service. Now ~ Mario Puzo

It's the so-called small habits that matter the most. How you talk to yourself. The books you choose to read. Who you share your energy with. Who you allow to have access to you. These are the habits that ultimately shape your life. ~ Clyde Lee Dennis

After praying, and before eating anything, it is a good custom for everyone to feed one another a small portion of the food. This will help to cultivate mutual love and affection among the family members. ~ Mata Amritanandamayi

There are two great mythological themes that weave throughout human history: the heroic and shamanic journeys. In the former, the hero journeys out of the ordinary world into a realm of primal forces, finding and facing monsters and allies in a quest for healing.

In the latter, the protagonist enters another order of reality, a landscape of mystery and power to be pulled apart and put back together in a new and more powerful way.

These great stories remind us that the soul is not accessible merely through the rational mind. The thinking intellect is a small part of the larger self. The soul makes its appearance known in dream and deep imagery, in feeling states (dark or light) that transcend the usual boundaries of the self, and in the sacred time and space accessed in ritual and ceremony.

The entrance to this vibrant territory lies in another way of seeing, a creative and active quality of perception that engages our full capacity, across the threshold where mind, body, and emotions merge within a path of heart. ~ Sparrow Hart

When the kirtan is harmonious with so many people, it's a tumultuous beautiful sound. We can't hear just one voice during the chorus; or rather we do hear one voice. But that one voice is actually the sound of everyone's voice in harmony. That's our offering to God. And why is it so pleasing to the Lord? Because we are all cooperating for a higher purpose. We are all united for the pleasure of the center, for the pleasure of Krishna, in spite of all our differences. ~ Radhanath Swami

Small towns may revile you, but they have to keep you-they can't turn you away. ~ John Irving

There's something always instinctively visually right about nature. There's no difference, to my eye, between looking at a great painting and looking at nature. Because painting, when it's great, has the same immutable rightness, unquestioned rightness, about it. ~ Larry Poons

It seems that, after nineteen centuries of extraordinary glorification, the small Host for which so many cathedrals have sprung up, the small Host that has rested in millions of breasts and that has found a tabernacle and worshippers even in the desert - it seems that the triumphant Host of Lourdes and the Eucharistic Congresses of Chicago and Carthage remains as unknown, as secret as when it appeared for the first time in a room in Jerusalem. Light is in the world as in the days of St. John the Baptist, and the world does not know it ~ Francois Mauriac

The whole law of human existence consists in nothing other than a man's always being able to bow before the immeasurably great. If people are deprived of the immeasurably great, they will not live and will die in despair. The immeasurable and infinite is as necessary for man as the small planet he inhabits ... ~ Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Tell the students to give up their small ambitions and come eastward to preach the gospel of Christ. ~ Francis Xavier

A girl as small as a violet, a girl who moves like a flower petal – is pulling me toward her with more force than her mass. ~ Kim In Yook

I believe in the possible. I believe, small though we are, insignificant though we may be, we can reach a full understanding of the universe. You were right when you said you felt small, looking up at all that up there. We are very, very small, but we are profoundly capable of very, very big things. ~ Stephen Hawking

Every small good deed counts. ~ Lailah Gifty Akita

What at first had seemed to be no more than a small bump in the road was turned into a full-scale misfortune ~ Paul Auster

Many minutes pass. I learn much from him, and he from me. It's exhilarating, to be suddenly awash in ideas whose implications would take me days to consider fully. But we're also gathering strategic information: I infer the extent of his unspoken knowledge, compare it with my own, and simulate his corresponding inferences. For there is always the awareness that this must come to an end; the formulation of our exchanges renders ideological differences luminously clear. Reynolds hasn't witnessed the beauty that I have; he's stood before lovely insights, oblivious to them. The sole gestalt that inspires him is the one I ignored: that of the planetary society, of the biosphere. I am a lover of beauty, he of humanity. Each feels that the other has ignored great opportunities. He ~ Ted Chiang

America has been very open to immigrants in terms of laws, getting loans - it has been helping immigrants more than it's been helping African Americans in starting a small business. That's key, whether you're starting a restaurant or a laundromat. ~ Marcus Samuelsson

Help us show children around the world that we can make a difference together. ~ Bradley Whitford

The difference between friendship and love is how much you can hurt each other. ~ Ashleigh Brilliant

The past doesn't change no matter how much time you spend thinking about it. Good and bad all add up to the whole. Take away one piece, no matter how small, and the whole changes. Whether it's optimism, pessimism or fatalism, I don't spend my time wishing for the past to be different so present would be different, too. I control my future with what I choose now. ~ Megan Hart

The line at the end that says, 'Nobody, not even the rain, has such small hands' makes perfect sense to me. It means they can go anywhere inside of you, because like the rain, like water, they find places that nothing solid could pass through. It explains the way that Sky gets into me, into places that I never knew were there. How he touches a part of me no one has ever touched. We both have secret places in us. ~ Ava Dellaira