Squandered Quotes

Nothing new can happen here, so all you do is think about the days of life when possibility hadn't been ripped from you forever, when anything could happen, and wonder why so much was squandered, so much wasted. ~ Kyle Minor

From all that I saw, and everywhere I wandered, I learned that time cannot be spent. It can only be squandered. ~ Roman Payne

I seldom try to probe the mystery of my sloth. I have squandered a gigantic fortune of work hours ... seems likely that I'll go on squandering till the very end. ~ Christopher Isherwood

A few generations ago, men went to work or war and rarely got to see life beyond their careers. A generation ago, our parents had to answer the question of what they would do with the last third of their lives. How would they spend their retirement? Would it be squandered on silly things or invested in significance? But now, the question of legacy isn't a matter of if you live long enough or when you retire; it's a matter of what you will do with what you have right now. You don't have to earn a living for thirty years to turn around and spend the next thirty giving it away. If significance is what matters to you, you can structure your life and work in a way that allows you to live your legacy now. In fact, your giving doesn't have to be a by-product of your success; it can be the very thing that drives it in the first place. ~ Jeff Goins

(G)aiety and kindness and tolerance and understanding were the gifts he bestowed upon the world. Wherever he went, he squandered these rare possessions in a most magnificent and bountiful manner, for he knew (what all wise people have realized since the beginning of time) that the only treasures which are truly ours are those we lay up in the hearts of our friends. ~ Hendrik Willem Van Loon

The rich flow of creativity, innovation, and almost musical complexity we are looking for in a fulfilled work life cannot be reached through trying or working harder. The medium for the soul, it seems, must be the message. The river down which we raft is made up of the same substance as the great sea of our destination. It is an ever-moving, firsthand creative engagement with life and with others that completes itself simply by being itself. This kind of approach must be seen as the "great art" of working in order to live, of remembering what is most important in the order of priorities and what place we occupy in a much greater story than the one our job description defines. Other "great arts," such as poetry, can remind and embolden us to this end. Whatever we choose to do, the stakes are very high. With a little more care, a little more courage, and, above all, a little more soul, our lives can be so easily discovered and celebrated in work, and not, as now, squandered and lost in its shadow. ~ David Whyte

Mr. Bush has squandered the hard-built paternity of 40 years. But so has the party, and so have its leaders. If they had pushed away for serious reasons, they could have separated the party's fortunes from the president's. This would have left a painfully broken party, but they wouldn't be left with a ruined brand,- as they all say, speaking the language of marketing. And they speak that language because they are marketers, not thinkers. Not serious about policy. Not serious about ideas. And not serious about leadership, only followership. ~ Peggy Noonan

In my errant life I roamed
to learn the secrets of women and men,
of gods and dreams.
I lived in wealth and poverty,
in fame and calamity.
I saw every country of our world,
I lived a thousand lives.
Many lives I spent, other lives I squandered,
for in my life I never traveled, all I did was wander. ~ Roman Payne

One of the most terrifying things I fear is not my potential, but how much regret I'll die with should I never use it. ~ Craig D. Lounsbrough

Many crores of rupees are squandered in this country by way offering gratitude to God and bribing Him to gain greater and greater wealth. ~ Periyar E.V. Ramasamy

A balanced-budget requirement implies is that government has the constitutional right to spend as much as it takes in; that government is permitted to waste however much revenue it can extract from wealth producers, and that the bums must merely bring into balance what was stolen (taxes) with what is squandered (spending). ~ Ilana Mercer

Freedom is not free. It is bought at a high price. It can be squandered cheaply. ~ Jerry Pournelle

There's just no accounting for happiness, or the way it turns up like a prodigal who comes back to the dust at your feet having squandered a fortune far away. ~ Jane Kenyon

Avarice is generally the last passion of those lives of which the first part has been squandered in pleasure, and the second devoted to ambition. He that sinks under the fatigue of getting wealth, lulls his age with the milder business of saving it ~ Samuel Johnson

We had 10 years after the Cold War to build a new world order and yet we squandered them. The United States cannot tolerate anyone acting independently. Every US president has to have a war. ~ Mikhail Gorbachev

My father is the most genial Midwestern guy imaginable, but for him, disaster lurks around every corner - financial ruin, squandered health, pyramid schemes, airbags failing to deploy - so he tends to use fear as a parenting tool to try to goad his daughters into being more prepared.When he retired, he reached new levels of preparedness, so his car contained bottled water, hand wipes, a roadside emergency kit with flares, books on tape, a coin dispenser, and two hand towels to use as makeshift bibs so he and my mother could drive and eat without making a mess. ~ Jancee Dunn

The smell of peaches and cheese eddied about the car, filling his nose with pleasure. All rarities, for which he had squandered two weeks' salary-borrowed in advance from Mr. Sloat. And, in addition, under the car seat where it could not roll and break, a bottle of Chablis wine knocked back and forth: the greatest rarity of all. He had been keeping it in a safety deposit box at the Bank of America, hanging onto it and not selling it no matter how much they offered, in case at some long, late, last moment a girl appeared. That had not happened, not until now. ~ Philip K. Dick

When the last autumn of Dickens's life was over, he continued to work through his final winter and into spring. This is how all of us writers give away the days and years and decades of our lives in exchange for stacks of paper with scratches and squiggles on them. And when Death calls, how many of us would trade all those pages, all that squandered lifetime-worth of painfully achieved scratches and squiggles, for just one more day, one more fully lived and experienced day? And what price would we writers pay for that one extra day spent with those we ignored while we were locked away scratching and squiggling in our arrogant years of solipsistic isolation?
Would we trade all those pages for a single hour? Or all of our books for one real minute? ~ Dan Simmons

She was one of the freest people in the world. A middle-class white woman in America, she was the benefactor of a lifetime of advantage and opportunity. She was more free than a woman in Tehran or Bangladesh. She had the means to feed herself and her family, she could dress and speak as she pleased. She could work and travel without any reasonable fear of attack. She was so free, that she indebted and enslaved herself to clothes, cars, fashion, and Facebook. Youth may be wasted on the young, but freedom is squandered on the privileged. ~ M.K. Williams

Here at home, when Americans were standing in long lines to give blood after the attack on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, we squandered an obvious opportunity to make service a noble cause again, and rekindle an American spirit of community. ~ Joe Biden

He considered respect for one's given word as a wealth that should not be squandered. ~ Gabriel Garcia Marquez

The biggest problem the banks had was that they had lent roughly 30 billion euros to the Greek government - where it was stolen or squandered. In Greece the banks didn't sink the country. The country sank the banks. ~ Michael Lewis

On the mainland of America, the Wampanoags of Massasoit and King Philip had vanished, along with the Chesapeakes, the Chickahominys, and the Potomacs of the great Powhatan confederacy. (Only Pocahontas was remembered.) Scattered or reduced to remnants were the Pequots, Montauks, Nanticokes. Machapungas, Catawbas, Cheraws, Miamis, Hurons, Eries, Mohawks, Senecas, and Mohegans. (Only Uncas was remembered.) Their musical names remained forever fixed on the American land, but their bones were forgotten in a thousand burned villages or lost in forests fast disappearing before the axes of twenty million invaders. Already the once sweet-watered streams, most of which bore Indian names, were clouded with silt and the wastes of man; the very earth was being ravaged and squandered. To the Indians it seemed that these Europeans hated everything in nature - the living forests and their birds and beasts, the grassy glades, the water, the soil, and the air itself. ~ Dee Brown

To grow the plants and animals that made up my meal, no pesticides found their way into any farmworker's bloodstream, no nitrogen runoff or growth hormones seeped into the watershed, no soils were poisoned, no antibiotics were squandered, no subsidy checks were written. If the high price of my all-organic meal is weighed against the comparatively low price it exacted from the larger world, as it should be, it begins to look, at least in karmic terms, like a real bargain. ~ Michael Pollan

All those wasted and squandered years when I did nothing but go around looking inside myself until I ended up alone even though I was surrounded by people. But I paid attention only to what was happenstance about them - not their true selves. ~ Sigrid Undset

The present is too often squandered grieving the past or fearing the future, which makes the present nothing more than a cheap facsimile of what was or what will be instead of what it could be. ~ Craig D. Lounsbrough

A good thing that is squandered upon bad folk is never remembered by them for good. ~ Sebastian Evans

Britain has squandered its windfall of natural resources from North Sea oil and gas. Instead of prudently investing the 'unearned income' from nature, to build a safe, clean and green energy supply for the nation, we face unnecessary shortages. But there is still a chance to put the proceeds from liquidating our fossil fuel assets to better and more appropriate use. Instead of oil companies profiteering from climate change and oil depletion, a windfall tax could establish an Oil Legacy Fund to pay for Britain's urgent transition to a sustainable, decentralised energy system ~ Andrew Simms

Love. Passion. Belief. Duty. The lines blur sometomes. There are ove fifteen recognised mjor religions on this planet. One religion believes something different from another, and yet so often it's just the same thing with a different name, or a different form of worship, or a different headdress. But they will fight to protect what they believe in, no matter the cost. You've been here a while Jack. How many wars, how many lives squandered on religion. Then we get to science. Science versus creationism for instance. Two opposing stances on the same subject, neither of which has evidence to back it up ~ Gary Russell

American airstrikes ... create risks, especially if our intelligence there is rusty. The crucial step, and the one we should apply diplomatic pressure to try to achieve, is for Maliki to step back and share power with Sunnis while accepting decentralization of government. If Maliki does all that, it may still be possible to save Iraq. Without that, airstrikes would be a further waste in a land in which we've already squandered far, far too much. ~ Nicholas D. Kristof

Life is entrusted to man as a treasure which must not be squandered, as a talent which must be used well. ~ Pope John Paul II

Not one thought entered my head that did not seem disloyal. I was ashamed, seeing their pride close up, as if for the first time, at how little I had accomplished, how much I had failed to do at St. Paul's. Somewhere in the last two years I had forgotten my mission. What had I done, I kept thinking, that was worthy of their faith? How had I helped my race? How had I prepared myself for a meaningful future? ... They were right: only a handful of us got this break. I wanted to shout at them that I had squandered it. Now that it's all over, hey, I'm not your girl! I couldn't do it. ~ Lorene Cary

It is not pleasant to recall something they must view with regret. They are, therefore, unwilling to direct their thoughts backward to illspent
hours, and those whose vices become obvious if they review the past, even the vices which were disguised under some allurement of momentary pleasure, do not have the courage to revert to those hours. No one willingly turns his thought back to the past, unless all his acts have been submitted to the censorship of his
conscience, which is never deceived; he who has ambitiously coveted, proudly scorned, recklessly conquered, treacherously betrayed, greedily seized, or lavishly squandered, must needs fear his own memory. ~ Seneca.

Everything in his life had led to this moment
every decision both good and bad, every heart-ache, every struggle, every victory and every defeat. And then he hesitated and that moment was over, squandered, and gone forever. ~ Testy McTesterson

Instead of going back and looking at the question, people tinker with the solution, trying to make it fit."-Claude Legrande ... "The consequences of failing to do that [in our personal lives] are the same as those facing businesses - even more dire, perhaps, because what's being squandered isn't just the potential for profits. It's the potential for happiness. We miss opportunities to innovate and to make positive changes in our lives when we aren't willing to question ourselves. ~ Amanda Lang

Your next world is your next world, and not to be squandered offhand. ~ Thomas Hardy

Beauty is your gift from God and it should be used and not squandered. Study this face as if it were a map of the ocean, your own trade route to the Indies. For it will bring you its own fortune. But always believe what the glass tells you. Because while others will try to flatter you, it has no reason to lie. ~ Sarah Dunant

What right did my father have to the details of my life? He squandered his chance to be the protective father. You can't come rushing to the rescue six months later. I wasn't a person to be saved only when it was a convenient time to swoop in. ~ Tayari Jones

I am just a poor boy, though my story's seldom told, and I have squandered my resistance, for a pocket full of mumbles, such are promises. All lies in jest, still a man hears what he wants to hear and disregards the rest ... la-la-la-la-la-la-la-lala-la-la-la-la ... ~ Paul Simon

As a turning point, the Bay of Pigs deserves comparison with 9/11 - a moment that created an opening to pose first-order questions, but elicited instead an ill-conceived, reflexive response. As would Johnson, Carter, and George W. Bush, Kennedy in 1961 squandered an opportunity to rethink and reorient U.S. policy, with fateful implications. ~ Andrew J. Bacevich

Inherited wealth may be easily squandered, but inherited poverty is a legacy almost impossible to loose. ~ Eric Haney

You can blame Al Gore and you can blame Ralph Nader and you can blame George Bush, but I blame Bill [Clinton]. I just do. I just think he squandered his presidency the night that woman delivered that pizza to him, and if he hadn't, we wouldn't be where we are and there would be a lot of people who are alive today who aren't. ~ Nora Ephron

Chigurh shot him through the forehead and then stood watching. Watching the capillaries break up in his eyes. The light receding. Watching his own image degrade in that squandered world. ~ Cormac McCarthy

Life must not be squandered. A person got from life what he put ino it. ~ LaVyrle Spencer

I spent a lot of money on booze, birds, and fast cars. The rest I just squandered. ~ George Best

Health can be squandered, but not stored up. ~ Mason Cooley

Never to be squandered ... the miracle of another human being. ~ Craig Lucas

What young people didn't know, she thought, lying down beside this man, his hand on her shoulder, her arm; oh, what young people did not know. They did not know that lumpy, aged, and wrinkled bodies were as needy as their own young, firm ones, that love was not to be tossed away carelessly ... No, if love was available, one chose it, or didn't chose it. And if her platter had been full with the goodness of Henry and she had found it burdensome, had flicked it off crumbs at a time, it was because she had not know what one should know: that day after day was unconsciously squandered ... But here they were, and Olive pictured two slices of Swiss cheese pressed together, such holes they brought to this union
what pieces life took out of you. ~ Elizabeth Strout

In the end, he was nobody to Adam, he was nobody to Ronan. Adam spit his words back at him and Ronan squandered however many second chances he gave him. Gansey was just a guy with a lot of stuff and a hole inside him that chewed away more of his heart every year. ~ Maggie Stiefvater

After years of watching their patrimony squandered in this way, a large percentage of the [Niger] Delta's population feels abandoned by both national and local politicians, and has settled on illegal bunkering as the most direct way to ensure that they benefit from their own oil wealth. The trouble is that what started as activism has become an industry. In the words of one activist, 'It is becoming increasingly difficult to separate greed from grievance. ~ John Ghazvinian

Merciful Father ... I have squandered my days with plans of many things.
This was not among them. But at this moment, I beg only, to live the next few minutes well.
For all we ought to have thought and have not thought ... All we ought to have said and have not said. All we ought to have done and have not done. I pray thee, God for forgiveness. ~ Ahmed Ibn Fadlan

The play of the toughest and most lucid mind are at the same time both lavished and squandered. ~ Albert Camus

It's yad that propels us, like a motor, onward. Yad is like envy, but it's not simply that. It's like spite, rage, anger, but more elegant, more complicated. It's like pity for someone, regret for something you did or did not do, for a chance you missed, for an opportunity you squandered. ~ Miroslav Penkov

One day, if you make the most of it, can be more satisfactory than a lifetime squandered. ~ Colleen Houck

I wonder what life would have been like if I would have taken all that time I spent wondering what life would have been like, and instead used that time to make it what I wanted it to be like. ~ Craig D. Lounsbrough

The girl's life had been squandered in the streets, and among the most noisome of the stews and dens of London, but there was something of the woman's original nature left in her still; and when she heard a light step approaching the door opposite to that by which she had entered, and thought of the wide contrast which the small room would in another moment contain, she felt burdened with the sense of her own deep shame: and shrunk as though she could scarcely bear the presence of her with whom she had sought this interview. ~ Charles Dickens

Money is never to be squandered or spent ostentatiously. Some of the greatest people in history have lived lives of the greatest simplicity. Remember it's the you inside that counts. ~ Rose Kennedy

Never in the history of American warfare has this nation witnessed such an exhibition of cowardice, indecisiveness, incompetence, and laziness in the army's senior officer ranks. Battle after battle was lost, untrained troops were sacrificed in fights they could never win, territories won were quickly squandered, and the chain of command was ignored to near-treasonous levels. ~ Dennis Byrne

I have squandered away my father's political legacy ... My personal life is in a mess ... Can I turn the tables? - Rhea Malviya ~ Tuhin A. Sinha

This "manna from heaven" was being squandered because of the laziness and stupidity of the savages who refused to work as harvesters of latex and obliged the planters to go to the tribes and take them by force. Which meant a great loss of time and money for the enterprises. "Well, ~ Mario Vargas-Llosa

If I were running a campaign, I'd urge taking the mountain of money reportedly squandered on pizza, coffee and bagels and spending it more wisely - on a talented young comedy writer. ~ Dick Cavett

Happiness

There's just no accounting for happiness,
or the way it turns up like a prodigal
who comes back to the dust at your feet
having squandered a fortune far away.

And how can you not forgive?
You make a feast in honor of what
was lost, and take from its place the finest
garment, which you saved for an occasion
you could not imagine, and you weep night and day
to know that you were not abandoned,
that happiness saved its most extreme form
for you alone.

No, happiness is the uncle you never
knew about, who flies a single-engine plane
onto the grassy landing strip, hitchhikes
into town, and inquires at every door
until he finds you asleep midafternoon
as you so often are during the unmerciful
hours of your despair.

It comes to the monk in his cell.
It comes to the woman sweeping the street
with a birch broom, to the child
whose mother has passed out from drink.
It comes to the lover, to the dog chewing
a sock, to the pusher, to the basket maker,
and to the clerk stacking cans of carrots
in the night.
It even comes to the boulder
in the perpetual shade of pine barrens,
to rain falling on the open sea,
to the wineglass, weary of holding wine. ~ Jane Kenyon

By starving myself into society's beauty ideal, I had compromised my success, my independence, and my quality of life. Being overweight was really no different. It was just the "f - you" response to the same pressure. I was still responding to the pressure to comply to the fashion industry's standards of beauty, just in the negative sense. I was still answering to their demands when really I shouldn't have been listening to them at all. The images of stick-thin prepubescent girls never should have had power over me. I should've had my sights set on successful businesswomen and successful female artists, authors, and politicians to emulate. Instead I stupidly and pointlessly just wanted to be considered pretty. I squandered my brain and my talent to squeeze into a size 2 dress while my male counterparts went to work on making money, making policy, making a difference. ~ Portia De Rossi

My grandson is mad at me. He's mad at me because I squandered his college fund on Spanx. It's a lot, but there's a lot going on here. ~ Joan Rivers

The fancy term for what America has squandered in the past year and a half or so is legitimacy. ~ Todd Gitlin

Trust and integrity are precious resources, easily squandered, hard to regain. They can thrive only on a foundation of respect for veracity. ~ Sissela Bok

I've been troubled with weak moments lately, 'tis true. I've been drinky once this month already, and I did not go to church a-Sunday, and I dropped a curse or two yesterday; so I don't want to go too far for my safety. Your next world is your next world, and not to be squandered offhand." "I ~ Thomas Hardy

The way God squandered Himself had always hurt her; and annoyed her too. The sky full of wings and only the shepherds awake. That golden voice speaking and only a few fishermen there to hear; and perhaps some of the words He spoke carried away on the wind or lost in the sound of the waves lapping against the side of the boat. A thousand blossoms shimmering over the orchard, each a world of wonder all to itself, and then the whole thing blown away on a southwest gale as though the delicate little worlds were of no value at all. Well, of all the spendthrifts, she would think and then pull herself up. It was not for her to criticize the ways of Almighty God; if He liked to go to all that trouble over the snowflakes, millions and millions of them, their intricate patterns too small to be seen by human eyes, and melting as soon as made, that was His affair and not hers. All she could do about it was to catch in her window, and save from entire waste, as much of the squandered beauty as she could. ~ Elizabeth Goudge

Five years later, I take a deep, shuddery breath to stop myself crying. It's not just that I can't hold Aoife again, it's everything: It's grief for the regions we deadlanded, the ice caps we melted, the Gulf Stream we redirected, the rivers we drained, the coasts we flooded, the lakes we choked with crap, the seas we killed, the species we drove to extinction, the pollinators we wiped out, the oil we squandered, the drugs we rendered impotent, the comforting liars we voted into office - all so we didn't have to change our cozy lifestyles. ~ David Mitchell

Few things are so liberally bestowed, or squandered with so little effect, as good advice. ~ Samuel Johnson

He was able to prove that the South had surrendered ninety-seven million acres to erosion (an area larger than the two Carolinas and Georgia); it had squandered the chances of millions of people by tolerating poverty and illiteracy; and it had ignored human potential by refusing to provide technological training, or even basic services, to its people. The overwhelming power of Odum's data undercut (what Odum himself called) Gone with the Wind nostalgia - the collective self-image elite southerners had cultivated. ~ Nancy Isenberg

What is history but the story of how politicians have squandered the blood and treasure of the human race? ~ Thomas Sowell

Fear is a lethal killer of dreams, the greatest cancer that has beset passion, and a ruthless thief of lives stolen and buried in the decay of lives squandered. Yet the greatest tragedy of all is that the fear that destroys us is rarely the monster it pretends to be, nor does it possess anything close to the power that we grant it. Therefore, it is only a killer, a cancer and a thief because we empower it to be so. ~ Craig D. Lounsbrough

I believe that Gaston Cleric narrowly missed being a great poet, and I have sometimes thought that his outbursts of imaginative talk were fatal to his poetic gift. He squandered too much in the heat of personal communication. How often have I seen him draw his dark brows together, fix his eyes upon some object on the wall or a figure in the carpet, and then flash into the lamplight the very image that was in his brain. ~ Willa Cather

...9/11 was immediately understood not only as a tragedy for the United States and the city of New York but also as a global outrage, which took the lives of so many citizens from across the world. The headline emphasized the manner in which questions of identity were geographically and emotionally connected - the local (New York, Pennsylvania and Washington), the national (United States), and the global. Shortly afterwards, however, the event became reinscribed in overwhelmingly national terms - 'Attack on America'. Tragically, as former Vice President Al Gore has said, the United States has squandered that global goodwill and solidarity by its largely unilateral engagement in Iraq and other activities which have been judged by others to be inimical to international law, such as extraordinary rendition, detention camps, and the doctrine of pre-emption. We are certainly not all Americans now. ~ Klaus Dodds

He had squandered the two most precious treasures ever known: the gift of life and the gift of love. ~ Jackson Radcliffe

The Righteous Salaf were as fearful of their good deeds being squandered, or not being accepted, as the present generation is certain that their neglect would be forgiven. ~ Hasan Of Basra

The U.S. government decided it would become the world sheriff. No one forced it to take on the role. Yet ever since it strapped on its six-guns, the actions of its senior deputies have trivialized the process by rewarding recalcitrance. The Victims of Trafficking and Violence Protection Act was an extraordinary opportunity to promote actions that could save the lives and health of many women and girls. That opportunity has been largely squandered. ~ Victor Malarek

There, at the top of the table, alone amongst all these women, stooped over his ample plateful, with his napkin tied around his neck like a child, an old man sat eating, drips of gravy drbibbling gravy from him lips. His eyes were bloodshot and he had a little pigtail tied up with a black ribbon. This was the Marquis' father-in-law ... he had led a ... Read more tumultuous life of debauchery and duelling, of wagers made and women abducted, had squandered his fortune and terrified his whole family ... Emma's eyes kept coming back to this old man with the sagging lips, as though to something wonderfully majestic. He had lived at court and slept in the bed of a queen! ~ Gustave Flaubert

California is now a valuable touchstone to the country, a warning of what not to do. Rarely has a single generation inherited so much natural wealth and bounty from the investment and hard work of those more noble now resting in our cemeteries-and squandered that gift within a generation. ~ Victor Davis Hanson

What is dishonorably got, is dishonorably squandered. ~ Marcus Tullius Cicero

Two years were all we had, love," she whispered, "and we squandered them. ~ Meredith Ann Pierce

To avoid the cost incurred in pursuing great things we opt for ease and blithely abandon great things. The sheer recklessness of such a pathetically apathetic trade-off will eventually cost us a life squandered, which in the end is the greatest cost of all. ~ Craig D. Lounsbrough

As the days and weeks and seasons wore on he found himself repeating this nothing, not wanting to. Gradually he came to understand that this particular nothing was all that he could really say now. He chanted it to himself in cell blocks and dingy apartments, recited it like a litany, ripped himself to rags against the sharp and ugly poetry of it. It echoed down the grimy hallways and squandered moments of his life, the answer to every question, the lyric of all songs. ~ Scott Hawkins

What had happened wasn't supposed to have happened and yet, they still rendered the predictable media spin of potential squandered, the gift of education sacrificed to the allure of thug life, etc. Not only simplistic, but also offensively so. ~ Jeff Hobbs

The promise of grace is not to be squandered; it needs to be protected from the godless. There are those who are not worthy of the sanctuary. The proclamation of grace has its limits. Grace may not be proclaimed to anyone who does not recognize or distinguish or desire it. Not only does that pollute the sanctuary itself, not only must those who sin still be guilty against the Most Holy, but in addition, the misuse of the Holy must turn against the community itself. The world upon whom grace is thrust as a bargain will grow tired of it, and it will not only trample upon the Holy, but also will tear apart those who force it on them. For its own sake, for the sake of the sinner, and for the sake of the community, the Holy is to be protected from cheap surrender. The Gospel is protected by the preaching of repentance which calls sin sin and declares the sinner guilty. The key to loose is protected by the key to bind. The preaching of grace can only be protected by the preaching of repentance. ~ Dietrich Bonhoeffer

[When I die], I will decidedly not be regretting missed opportunities for a good time. My regrets will be more along the lines of a sad list of people hurt, people let down, assets wasted and advantages squandered. ~ Anthony Bourdain

Time is a resource, much like money or autonomy, which can be invaluable or can be squandered. ~ Chris Gabrieli

I might have said you'll pay for the wild & reckless hour,
pay in the currency of sweat and shiver,
the future squandered, the course
of years reconfigured, relinquishment so
complete it's more utter than any falling in love. Falling

instead in flames, burning tiles spiraling to litter
the courtyards of countless places that will
never be yours, the fingerprints,
tossed gloves & glittering costumes, flared
cornices & parapets, shattering panes, smoked out

or streaked with embers, the tinder of spools, such
a savage conflagration, stupid edge-game,
the way junkies tempt death,
over & over again, toy with it. I might have
told you that. Everything you ever meant to be, pfft,

out the window in sulphured matchlight, slow tinder
& strike, possession purely ardent as worship
& the scream working its way out
of your bones, demolition of wall & strut
within until you're stark animal need. That is

love, isn't it? Everything you meant to be falls
away so you dwell within a perfect
singularity, a kind of saint. ~ Lynda Hull

What made him most anxious, he told me, was not the big questions - the mercilessness of fate, the possibility of heaven. He was too exhausted, he said, to wrestle with those. But he'd become impatient with the way people wasted their lives, squandered their chances like paychecks. ~ Wally Lamb

Beginning today, I will create a new future by creating a new me. No longer will I dwell in a pit of despair, moaning over squandered time and lost opportunity. I can do nothing about the past. My future is immediate. I will grasp it in both hands and carry it with running feet. When I am faced with the choice of doing nothing or doing something, I will always choose to act! I seize this moment. I choose now. ~ Andy Andrews

Only silly Dorothys arrive in a magical land and want to go home. You don't want to be a silly stinking Dorothy, do you? They're reviled throughout every wondrous land. Did you know the name Dorothy translates as "squandered opportunity"? ~ Bill Willingham

Damn! I thought, furious that even after expending my only rocket, I couldn't get the machine pistol; I was right back where I started, except one rocket lighter. I had squandered my gift! I felt like the guy who found a lamp that would grant one wish, and he says, "Jeez, I wish I knew what to wish for." I ~ Dafydd Ab Hugh

What young people did not know. They did not know that lumpy, aged, and wrinkled bodies were as needy as their own young, firm ones, that love was not to be tossed away carelessly, as if it were a tart on a platter with others that got passed around again. No, if love was available, one chose it, or didn't choose it. And if her platter had been full with the goodness of Henry and she had found it burdensome, had flicked it off crumbs at a time, it was because she had not known what one should know: that day after day was unconsciously squandered. ~ Elizabeth Strout

The product of this inner life is a living product. It will be needed when the youth returns home weary and dust-laden, when the soldier is wounded, when the wealth is squandered away and pride is humbled, when man's heart cries for truth in the immensity of facts and harmony in the contradiction of tendencies. Its value is not in its multiplication of materials, but in its spiritual fulfilment. ~ Rabindranath Tagore

The world supports a multi-million dollar industry of intelligence and ability research, but it devotes virtually nothing to determine why this intelligence is squandered by engaging in amazing, breathtaking acts of stupidity. ~ Robert Sternberg

Old friend, I am writing to you again
The infamous tale of squandered love

To have my denial broken by myself
To have accepted past for my behove

To have grown into a man of honor
To have embraced the code of chivalry

To have been reborn as a bird of myth
To have caught lies in nightly reverie

Lost myself in this chronic transition
I regret the love wasted, in-between

Who knew life can just be happy or full
If only the great men ere had foreseen

As humbled as I have become due this
I'm failing to see the point of these rhymes

So old friend, do tell me what is better
Death, endured once or a zillion times? ~ Zubair Ahsan

We're all broken, all walk with a limp. Here is the truth about you and me: even when in a far-off country, wasted life, stripped bare, smeared, squandered, nothing but scar tissue and shameful, self-inflicted wounds, the love of the Father finds the son and daughter. ~ Charles Martin

I'm from a middle class family but my father squandered all the money, so I didn't really run around with rich people. I was very judgmental towards a lot of them. ~ Benjamin Clementine

Nature had squandered an unreasonable quantity of male beauty on this undeserving creature. ~ Lisa Kleypas