Favourite Quotes

Better to have a short life that is full of what you like doing, than a long life that is spent in a miserable way.

We can tell other people about having faith. What we had had faith in. What we found important enough to fight for. It’s not whether you were right or wrong, but how much faith you were willing to have: that decides the future.

Don’t be distracted by the what-ifs, should-haves, and if-onlys. The one path you choose yourself — that is the truth of your universe.

I refuse to leave behind any regrets… I don’t wanna look back and think, 'what might have been'!!!

You become who you are through your choices, through the love you give and the promises you keep.

Only fools let compliments get to their heads and criticism get to their heart.

For life is a journey. The places you go… The deeds you do… The tales whose hero you become… Every road is yours to take. So journey forth, friend, into this great world we live in… and find an adventure all your own.

To start the day with nothing, and to end it with something that didn’t exist yesterday is a wondrous and magical thing. It never gets old. Making shit. That’s where the fun is. And the wonder. And the glory.

Talent is a pursued interest. In other words, anything that you’re willing to practise, you can can do.

Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.

All boundaries are conventions, waiting to be transcended. One may transcend any convention, if only one can first conceive of doing so.

Sacrifice is a choice you make; loss is a choice made for you.

Words can have different interpretations. What one says isn’t the whole truth. It’s a human weakness. They test others to confirm their own existence. It’s a contradiction

This is our work, to discover what we can give. Isn’t this the purpose of education, to learn the nature of your own gifts and how to use them for good in the world?

Heeded my words not, did you? Pass on what you have learned. Strength, mastery. But weakness, folly, failure also. Yes, failure most of all. The greatest teacher, failure is. Luke, we are what they grow beyond. That is the true burden of all masters.

In many ways, the work of a critic is easy. We risk very little, yet enjoy a position over those who offer up their work and their selves to our judgement. We thrive on negative criticism, which is fun to write and to read. But the bitter truth we critics must face is that, in the grand scheme of things, the average piece of junk is probably more meaningful than our criticism designating it so. But there are times when a critic truly risks something, and that is in the discovery and defense of the new. The world is often unkind to new talent, new creations. The new needs friends.

Listen earnestly to anything [your children] want to tell you, no matter what. If you don’t listen eagerly to the little stuff when they are little, they won’t tell you the big stuff when they are big, because to them all of it has always been big stuff.

You will come to understand that you were taking care of them because it made YOU feel good, it made YOU happy to see them smiling and without a care in the world — and that was extremely selfish of you. While you were feeling satisfied with yourself, you were slowly eating away at their own dreams and ambitions. You were adding material things to their lives, but subtracting the most precious gifts of all: independence and growth.

I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.

The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral, begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy. Instead of diminishing evil, it multiplies it. Through violence you may murder the liar, but you cannot murder the lie, nor establish the truth. Through violence you murder the hater, but you do not murder hate. In fact, violence merely increases hate… Returning violence for violence multiplies violence, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.

Nothing discloses real character like the use of power. It is easy for the weak to be gentle. Most people can bear adversity. But if you wish to know what a man really is, give him power. This is the supreme test. It is the glory of Lincoln that, having almost absolute power, he never abused it, except on the side of mercy.

A leader, you see, is one of the things that distinguishes a mob from a people. He maintains the level of individuals. Too few individuals, and a people reverts to a mob.

If you email me directly, and if I buy off on the risk, then it’s OK. What’s not OK is they think that the weld is not good, they don’t tell me, they take it to the pad and blow it up. Now I have been clear. There’s plenty of forgiveness if you pass me the buck. There is no forgiveness if you don’t.

Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it.

We talked 'cause talking tells you things like what you really are thinking about / but sometimes you can’t find what you’re feeling 'til all the words run out.

Every surgeon carries within himself a small cemetery, where from time to time he goes to pray — a place of bitterness and regret, where he must look for an explanation for his failures.

Pride is not the opposite of shame, but its source. True humility is the only antidote to shame.

Your first and foremost job as a leader is to take charge of your own energy and then help to orchestrate the energy of those around you.

To conquer death you only have to die. You only have to die.

We don’t know what kind of people we truly are until the moment before our deaths. As death comes to embrace you, you will realise what you are. That is what death is, don’t you think?

I’ve seen things you people wouldn’t believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhäuser Gate. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain. Time to die.