Think And It Will Happen Quotes

Your thoughts are your wand. Trust what you think and it will happen. ~ Debasish Mridha

I don't think that the despiritualised, dehumanised culture in which we live, the McDonalds and Disney culture, does our internal lives, our mythological lives, any favours at all. In other words, to be an Outsider in this culture now is to be looking inside at a plastic world, and I think it's easier to critique that world if I don't belong to it ... In Hollywood where I live now, there's a lot of having lunches, a lot of going to parties ... and I will have no part of that. I'm certainly not very good at it, I don't like it and I feel a little weird about it. I don't want to be part of the problem, I want to be a part of the solution, and the only way I can help solve the problem of the plasticity of our world is by writing, by painting and by making my work, so I stay where I can do that, which is at my desk, in my studio. I will venture out when I need to sell a book or exhibit my paintings, but the rest of the time my job is to be here and imagine. ~ Clive Barker

Every night, millions of Americans spend their free hours watching television rather than engaging in any form of social interaction. What are they watching? In recent years we have seen reality television become the most popular form of television programming. To discover the nature of our current "reality," we might consider examples such as Survivor, the series that helped spawn the reality TV revolution. Every week tens of millions of viewers watched as a group of ordinary people stranded in some isolated place struggled to meet various challenges and endure harsh conditions. Ah, one might think, here we will see people working cooperatively, like our ancient ancestors, working cooperatively in order to "win"! But the "reality" was very different. The conditions of the game were arranged so that, yes, they had to work cooperatively, but the alliances by nature were only temporary and conditional, as the contestants plotted and schemed against one another to win the game and walk off with the Grand Prize: a million dollars! The objective was to banish contestants one by one from the deserted island through a group vote, eliminating every other contestant until only a lone individual remained - the "sole survivor." The end game was the ultimate American fantasy in our Age of Individualism: to be left completely alone, sitting on a mountain of cash!

　　While Survivor was an overt example of our individualistic orientation, it certainly was not unique in its glorifi ~ Dalai Lama XIV

A wonderful, warm, positive individual who exhibits the values that are prerequisite to a significant faculty post in higher education, I think that it is an absolutely extraordinary and bold career move that Darwin has made in leaving the Orchestra and embarking on the trajectory of a solo performer/educator. And what a marvelous thing it is for Detroit to be able to welcome home a successful native son - one in whom the community can take pride, and one who will serve as an inspiration to a younger generation of aspiring performers eager to make their mark in the world. ~ David Cerone

It is very difficult to develop a proper sense of self-esteem in a dysfunctional family. Having very little self-worth, looking at one's own character defects becomes so overwhelming there is no room for inward focus. People so afflicted think: "I need to keep you from knowing me. I have already rejected me, but if you knew how flawed I am, you would also reject me…and since this is all I have, I could not stand any more rejection. I am not worthy of someone understanding me so you will not get the chance...so I must judge, reject, attack, and/or find fault with you. I don't accept me so how can I accept you? ~ David Walton Earle

I think there's a part of the brain, probably somewhere in the back, that won't give up believing in magic. It was the part that made cavemen believe that drawing elks on stone would make for a good hunt the next day. And it's still chugging along, making you think you have lucky socks, or that your kids' birthdays will win the lottery. ~ Adam Rex

Bookseller: Can I help at all?
customer: Yes, where's your fiction section?
bookseller: It starts over on the far wall. Are you looking for anything in particular?
customer: Yes, any books by Stefan Browning.
bookseller: I'm not familiar with him, what kind of books has he written?
customer: I don't know if he's written any. You see, my name's Stefan Browning, and I always like to go into
bookshops to see if anyone with my name has written a book.
bookseller: ... right.
customer: Because then I can buy it, you see, and carry it around with me and tell everyone that I've had a novel published.Then everyone will think I'm really cool, don't you think? ~ Jen Campbell

His slender hands curled into fists. "You don't want to change? Do you have any idea what I've been through for you? Why do you think I keep coming back to that horrid, dirty, decaying world of yours? Because you changed me! It makes me sick to think of how I have shifted away from what I should be!"
I leaned back, terrified of the pure fury in his face.
He took a deep breath, closing his eyes and releasing all the tension from his facial muscles, returning them back to the mask of perfection. "But this is irrelevant. When I get back to where I am supposed to be, my connection to eternity will be restored and flawless. I will be restored. And you will be connected, too, and we have forever to - "
"Whoa, whoa, stop right there, psycho. I'm not coming with you."
He got that infuriating smile, that one that all faeries have that says they know more than you ever will and you can't even begin to function on the same plane as them but isn't it cute that you think you have any right to consider yourself a rational creature. It was a condescending head pat in smile form.
"Evelyn," he said, his golden voice trying to pull me in closer. "I love you. ~ Kiersten White

I never will forget this. I went and threw myself across my daughter's bed, and I cried and I cried and I cried and I cried, because I felt like that I had been so faithful and that there was no financial breakthrough for us. You ever have one of those days where you are tired of hearing everybody else's testimony? But, I made a decision that day, and I think we all have to come to this point in many different areas of our life. And, as I lay across that bed and cried, when I finally got done crying I said this out loud, it was like my declaration, "God, I am going to tithe and give offerings until the day I die whether I ever see anything from it or not!" And, you know what, from that day forward we began to prosper and increase. And, I believe with all of my heart that was a test for me. ~ Joyce Meyer

What with your phone and the Xbox and the taxi TV and that music player you wear on your arm and the headphones that look like donuts on your ears, doesn't it make life so much smaller? If absolutely everything important is only happening on such a small screen, isn't that a shame? Especially when the world is so overwhelmingly large and surprising? Are you missing too much? You can't imagine it now, but you'll look like me one day, even though you'll feel just the same as you do now. You'll catch a glimpse of yourself in the mirror and think how quickly it's all gone, and I wonder if all the time you used watching those families whose lives are filmed for the television, and making those cartoons of yourselves with panting dog tongues, and chasing after that terrible Pokémon fellow…well, will it feel like time well spent? ~ Lauren Graham

It is necessary - and toward this point our development will move, little by little - that nothing alien happen to us, but only what has long been our own. ~ Rainer Maria Rilke

Pulling back, he gave her a little space and grinned as she found her balance again.
"Do you think that will ever get old?" Harper asked with an embarrassed blush.
"Christ, I hope not. Just remember how you feel right now because you might be really mad at me in about one minute."
"Uh-oh. I don't think I like the sound of that." Harper raised an eyebrow at him.
He took her hand and led her toward the studio before pulling her in front of him, her back to his chest. It was the safest position to avoid a kick in the nuts and the best position to block a fast escape.
He felt Harper's quick intake of breath as she turned to face him with a hand over her mouth.
"What did you do?" she said through her fingers.
"Happy birthday, sweetheart." He pushed her through the door as everyone inside shouted, "Surprise! ~ Scarlett Cole

Extraordinary change can happen in your life, but it will take extraordinary people, extraordinary courage and extraordinary faith to believe that this won't be a repeat of your past. ~ Shannon L. Alder

Well, I can't help going to see Sibyl play, even if it is only for an act. I get hungry for her presence; and when I think of the wonderful soul that is hidden away in that little ivory body, I am filled with awe."
"You can dine with me to-night, Dorian, can't you?"
He shook his head. "To night she is Imogen," he answered, "and tomorrow night she will be Juliet."
"When is she Sibyl Vane?"
"Never."
"I congratulate you. ~ Oscar Wilde

While I don't believe in love at first sight, because I think it takes more work than that, I do believe that one soul can speak to another and find an inexplicably deep connection over a short period of time, unimaginably short, and know that it will never forget that soul, that moment, or the light it emits forever. ~ Katherine Reay

A Pleasant Theology One reason why many people find Creative Evolution so attractive is that it gives one much of the emotional comfort of believing in God and none of the less pleasant consequences. When you are feeling fit and the sun is shining and you do not want to believe that the whole universe is a mere mechanical dance of atoms, it is nice to be able to think of this great mysterious Force rolling on through the centuries and carrying you on its crest. If, on the other hand, you want to do something rather shabby, the Life-Force, being only a blind force, with no morals and no mind, will never interfere with you like that troublesome God we learned about when we were children. The Life-Force is a sort of tame God. You can switch it on when you want, but it will not bother you. All the thrills of religion and none of the cost. Is the Life-Force the greatest achievement of wishful thinking the world has yet seen? - from Mere Christianity ~ C.S. Lewis

I know what you are thinking. You can't now fathom ever forgetting to think about me. You're afraid that if you move forward, it will take you further away from me. This is a common misconception shared by many people and it delays their healing... It keeps you stuck in you grief and it's only because you are still clinging to me. You think if you stop grieving that you will lose me. Maybe you even feel if you let go of me that you are abandoning me; maybe you feel that you will hurt my feelings because if it were the other way around you would not ever want me to forget about you. You are afraid that if you love again that you will grow away from me.
I am Here! I am here, waiting to run to you when the time comes. It's unconditional. It's forever. ~ Kate McGahan

I am lucky, Master Gill," Mat said. "You just have a good meal waiting when I come back." As he stood, he picked up the dice cup and spun the dice out beside the stones board for luck. The calico cat leaped down, hissing at him with her back arched. The five spotted dice came to rest, each showing a single pip. The Dark One's Eyes.
"That's the best toss or the worst," Gill said. "It depends on the game you are playing, doesn't it. Lad, I think you mean to play a dangerous game. Why don't you take that cup out into the common room and lose a few coppers? You look to me like a fellow who might like a little gamble. I will see the letter gets to the Palace safely."
"Coline wants you to clean the drains," Mat told him, and turned to Thom while the innkeeper was still blinking and muttering to himself. "It doesn't seem to make any odds whether I get an arrow in me trying to deliver that letter or a knife in my back waiting. It's six up, and a half dozen down. Just you have that meal waiting, Thom." He tossed a gold mark on the table in front of Gill. "Have my things put in a room, innkeeper. If it takes more coin, you will have it. Be careful of the big roll; it frightens Thom something awful. ~ Robert Jordan

I decided to choose:
No more sadness because of how someone else will feel.
No more hiding my feelings.
No more avoiding the truth of how I felt.
No more unresolved situations.
No more letting people rob me of my happiness and joy and letting life pass me by.
No more misery and selling myself short.
No more letting people take and steal my inner peace.
No more giving a shit about what other people think of me - they are going to form their opinion anyway - and the question is, who cares? Not me. That's the least of my worries.
No more giving everyone the best of me. It is time for me to fall in love with myself and give myself ALL of me! ~ Charlena E. Jackson

Herman Melville came to see me at the Consulate, looking much as he used to do (a little paler, and perhaps a little sadder), in a rough outside coat, and with his characteristic gravity and reserve of manner.... [W]e soon found ourselves on pretty much our former terms of sociability and confidence. Melville has not been well, of late; ... and no doubt has suffered from too constant literary occupation, pursued without much success, latterly; and his writings, for a long while past, have indicated a morbid state of mind.... Melville, as he always does, began to reason of Providence and futurity, and of everything that lies beyond human ken, and informed me that he had "pretty much made up his mind to be annihilated"; but still he does not seem to rest in that anticipation; and, I think, will never rest until he gets hold of a definite belief. It is strange how he persists -- and has persisted ever since I knew him, and probably long before -- in wondering to-and-fro over these deserts, as dismal and monotonous as the sand hills amid which we were sitting. He can neither believe, nor be comfortable in his unbelief; and he is too honest and courageous not to try to do one or the other. If he were a religious man, he would be one of the most truly religious and reverential; he has a very high and noble nature, and better worth immortality than most of us.

[after what would be their last meeting] ~ Nathaniel Hawthorne

since the Depression, we bankers have had the leisure and . . . solitude, you might say, to think about the future. The Civil War left us with a federal government. The Great War made us a creditor nation. As bankers, we must anticipate what changes this war will thrust upon us."
[…] The old man leaned forward and took a long breath. "I see the rise of this country to a height no country has occupied, ever," he said quietly. "Not the Romans. Not the Carolingians. Not Genghis Khan or the Tatars or Napoleon's France. Hah! You're all looking at me like I've one foot in the funny farm. How is that possible? you ask. Because our dominance won't arise from subjugating peoples. We'll emerge from this war victorious and unscathed, and become bankers to the world. We'll export our dreams, our language, our culture, our way of life. And it will prove irresistible. ~ Jennifer Egan

That will be your married look, I, as a Christian, will soon give up the notion of consorting with a mere sprite or salamander. But what had you to ask, thing, - out with it?" "There, you are less than civil now; and I like rudeness a great deal better than flattery. I had rather be a thing than an angel. This is what I have to ask, - Why did you take such pains to make me believe you wished to marry Miss Ingram?" "Is that all? Thank God it is no worse!" And now he unknit his black brows; looked down, smiling at me, and stroked my hair, as if well pleased at seeing a danger averted. "I think I may confess," he continued, "even although I should make you a little indignant, Jane - and I have seen what a fire-spirit you can be when you are indignant. You glowed in the cool moonlight last night, when you mutinied against fate, and claimed your rank as my equal. Janet, by-the-bye, it was you who made me the offer. ~ Charlotte Bronte

And if out of this turning-within, out of this immersion in your own world, poems come, then you will not think of asking anyone whether they are good or not. Nor will you try to interest magazines in these works: for you will see them as your dear natural possession, a piece of your life, a voice from it. A work of art is good if it has arisen out of necessity. That is the only way one can judge it. ~ Rainer Maria Rilke

The top two for me are Spotlight and The Revenant [movies]. Everything says The Revenant, but Spotlight is special. I think this movie would have been a lot more jumpy and fast-faced if anyone else had done it. This movie is very unassuming in how powerful it is. It very calmly, and very cooly, eats you up inside. I think if there's anything that will upset the Revenant run, it's gonna be Spotlight. ~ Bun B.

When we think "prophetic" we need not always think grandly about public tasks. The prophetic task needs to be done wherever there are men and women who will yield to the managed prose future offered them by the king. So, we may ask, if we are to do that alternative constructive task of imagination, if we are to reach more than the most surface group prepared to be "religious," where do we begin? What I propose is this: The royal consciousness leads people to numbness, especially to numbness about death. It is the task of prophetic ministry and imagination to bring people to engage their experiences of suffering to death. ~ Walter Brueggemann

Human rights did not begin with the French Revolution ... [they] really stem from a mixture of Judaism and Christianity ... [we English] had 1688, our quiet revolution, where Parliament exerted its will over the King ... it was not the sort of Revolution that France's was ... 'Liberty, equality, fraternity' - they forgot obligations and duties I think. And then of course the fraternity went missing for a long time. ~ Margaret Thatcher

I don't have all of the answers to the world. I don't know everything about life and marriage and happiness. But I do know what love is. And I do know that when love is real, and when love is in its strongest form, it is the most powerful thing on this earth. It kills, saves lives, heals wounds, and most of all, brings hope. That is what you have done for me, Lily. You have brought me hope. When I look into your eyes, I know that no matter what may happen to me, as long as I can see those eyes staring back at me, then I'll be fine. Somehow I'll make it through. Somehow I'll find a way to survive for you. And that's what I want to feel for the rest of my time here on Earth, however short or long that may be. I want to wake up every morning and see your shining face staring back at me. But I also want to protect you. I want to protect you from anything that may hurt you. I want to be there when you cry to dry your tears. When you feel lonely, I want to give you a kiss. When you are scared, to embrace you. And when you are happy, to share a laugh with you. I don't know what's in store for us, but I do know that true love outlasts everything. It outlasts doubt, hate, war, misfortune, and most of all death. I vow to you to always be beside you. Not only in this life, but the next. Because that's when love becomes real. That's when love becomes unchained from anything in this life. I know that when I die, the first thing that I will see will be your eyes. That is how I will know th ~ Mordred

Don't waste all today worrying about the possible mistakes you may have made yesterday. You don't know what will happen tomorrow or how long we have here, so enjoy what you have today since you have it. May you be thankful for today and live it to the fullest as it truly is a gift ~ Angie Karan

If man
if each one of us
abdicates his responsibilities with regard to values; if each one of us limits himself to leading a trivial existence in a technological civilization, with greater adaptation and increasing success as his sole objectives; if we do not even consider the possibility of making a stand against these determinants, then everything will happen as I have described it, and the determinates will be transformed into inevitabilities. ~ Jacques Ellul

Curiously enough, it seems that at times the spiritual side prevails, and then the materialistic side - in wave-like motions following each other. ...At one time the full flood of materialistic ideas prevails, and everything in this life - prosperity, the education which procures more pleasures, more food - will become glorious at first and then that will degrade and degenerate. Along with the prosperity will rise to white heat all the inborn jealousies and hatreds of the human race. Competition and merciless cruelty will be the watchword of the day. To quote a very commonplace and not very elegant English proverb, "Everyone for himself, and the devil take the hindmost", becomes the motto of the day. Then people think that the whole scheme of life is a failure. And the world would be destroyed had not spirituality come to the rescue and lent a helping hand to the sinking world. Then the world gets new hope and finds a new basis for a new building, and another wave of spirituality comes, which in time again declines. As a rule, spirituality brings a class of men who lay exclusive claim to the special powers of the world. The immediate effect of this is a reaction towards materialism, which opens the door to scores of exclusive claims, until the time comes when not only all the spiritual powers of the race, but all its material powers and privileges are centered in the hands of a very few; and these few, standing on the necks of the masses of the people, want to rule them. Then ~ Swami Vivekananda

Now there is one thing I can tell you: you will enjoy certain pleasures you would not fathom now. When you still had your mother you often thought of the days when you would have her no longer. Now you will often think of days past when you had her. When you are used to this horrible thing that they will forever be cast into the past, then you will gently feel her revive, returning to take her place, her entire place, beside you. At the present time, this is not yet possible. Let yourself be inert, wait till the incomprehensible power ... that has broken you restores you a little, I say a little, for henceforth you will always keep something broken about you. Tell yourself this, too, for it is a kind of pleasure to know that you will never love less, that you will never be consoled, that you will constantly remember more and more. ~ Marcel Proust

I realize he doesn't think I'll do it. No one probably does.
And that's exactly why I will. ~ M. Leighton

Why is the human need to be in control relevant to a discussion of random patterns? Because if events are random, we are not in control, and if we are in control of events, they are not random, there is therefore a fundamental clash between our need to feel we are in control and our ability to recognize randomness. That clash is one of the principal reasons we misinterpret random events. In fact, inducing people to mistake luck for skills, or pointless actions for control, is one of the easiest enterprises a research psychologist can engage in ask people to control flashing lights by pressing a dummy button, and they will believe they are succeeding even though the lights are flashing at random. Show people a circle of lights that flash at random and tell them that by concentrating they can cause the flashing to move in clockwise direction, and they will astonish themselves with their ability to make it happen. ~ Leonard Mlodinow

I think China will do nothing to obstruct it, and they probably will go along with it. ~ Henry A. Kissinger

True Shandeism, think what you will against it, opens the heart and lungs, and like all those affections which partake of its nature, it forces the blood and other vital fluids of the body to run freely thro' its channels, and makes the wheel of life run long and chearfully round. ~ Laurence Sterne

Accidental nuclear war between two superpowers may or may not happen in my lifetime, but if it does, it will obviously change everything. The climate change we're currently worrying about pales in comparison with nuclear winter, where a global dust cloud blocks sunlight for years, much like when an asteroid or supervolcano caused a mass extinction in the past. The 2008 economic turmoil was of course nothing compared to the resulting global crop failures, infrastructure collapse and mass starvation, with survivors succumbing to hungry armed gangs systematically pillaging from house to house. Do I expect to see this in my lifetime? I'd give it about 30%, putting it roughly on par with my getting cancer. Yet we devote way less attention and resources to reducing the risk of nuclear disaster than we do for cancer. And whereas humanity as a whole survives even if 30% get cancer, it's less obvious to what extent our civilization would survive a nuclear Armageddon. There are concrete and straightforward steps that can be taken to slash this risk, as spelled out in numerous reports by scientific organizations, but these never become major election issues and tend to get largely ignored. ~ Max Tegmark

If what God says is the truest thing about us, then it makes sense to follow him and accept our As-Is condition as the starting point. Thomas Merton said, 'The reason we never enter into the deepest reality of our relationship with God is that we so seldom acknowledge our utter nothingness before him.' If we confess the truth about ourselves, there's every reason to fear God will say, 'Yeah, that's right; and anotherthing...' and we're fairly sure there will be another thing. We are like people afraid to tell the doctor where we really hurt because we fear we may be sicker than we think.

We are sicker than we think. We're dying and, crazily, running from the healer because we're ashamed, because we hate ourselves for all we are and all we're not. ~ Brennan Manning

Jim Thunder, at seventy-five the youngest of the speakers, is a round brown man of serious demeanor who spoke only in Potawatomi. He began solemnly, but as he warmed to his subject his voice lifted like a breeze in the birch trees and his hands began to tell the story. He became more and more animated, rising to his feet, holding us rapt and silent although almost no one understood a single word. He paused as if reaching the climax of his story and looked out at the audience with a twinkle of expectation. One of the grandmothers behind him covered her mouth in a giggle and his stern face suddenly broke into a smile as big and sweet as a cracked watermelon. He bent over laughing and the grandmas dabbed away tears of laughter, holding their sides, while the rest of us looked on in wonderment. When the laughter subsided, he spoke at last in English: "What will happen to a joke if no one will hear it any more? How lonely those words will be, when their is power gone. Where will they go? Off to join the stories that can never be told again. ~ Robin Wall Kimmerer

Why do you think there aren't rules to how sex will work? You didn't want to talk to me about what you wanted. You pushed me into the room so I wouldn't turn on the light because you knew damn well I would push back on that, didn't you?"
She stayed where she was. "Yes. I don't want you to see me. I don't look like one of those girls in a magazine."
He groaned, the sound coming from deep in his chest. "Those girls in the magazines are airbrushed and way too thin. The camera adds pounds so those girls are so skinny I wouldn't be able to fuck them for fear I would break them. I want a woman, Avery, not some tiny freaking thing whose waistline only proves she doesn't eat. I want a woman who can take me. I want a woman I can hold on to. So bend over because I want to see your ass. I want to look at it because I've been dreaming about it for days. It's hot and round and so fucking juicy I can't stand it. Get me hot, Avery. Show me your ass. ~ Lexi Blake

When I think of talking, it is of course with a woman. For talking at its best being an inspiration, it wants a corresponding divine quality of receptiveness, and where will you find this but in a woman? ~ Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.