Popular quotes about Words! Wisdom and inspiration are here! | page 53
And for adults, the world of fantasy books returns to us the great words of power which, in order to be tamed, we have excised from our adult vocabularies. These words are the pornography of innocence, words which adults no longer use with other adults, and so we laugh at them and consign them to the nursery, fear masking as cynicism. These are the words that were forged in the earth, air, fire, and water of human existence, and the words are: Love. Hate. Good. Evil. Courage. Honor. Truth.
Jane YolenI love words very much. I've always loved to talk, and I've always love words โ the words that rest in your mouth, what words mean and how you taste them and so on. And for me the spoken word can be used almost as a gesture.
Martha GrahamIโm not too keen on talking. I always have the feeling that the words are getting away from me, escaping and scattering. Itโs not to do with vocabulary or meanings, because I know quite a lot of words, but when I come out with them they get confused and scattered. Thatโs why I avoid stories and speeches and just stick to answering the questions Iโm asked. All the extra words, the overflow, I keep to myself, the words that I silently multiply to get close to the truth.
Delphine de ViganNo matter how low down you are; no matter what your disposition has been; you may be low in your thoughts, words, and actions; you may be selfish; your heart may be overflowing with corruption and wickedness; yet Jesus will have compassion upon you. He will speak comforting words to you; not treat you coldly or spurn you, as perhaps those of earth would, but will speak tender words, and words of love and affection and kindness. Just come at once. He is a faithful friend - a friend that sticketh closer than a brother.
Dwight L. MoodyHe should have known better because, early in his learnings under his brother Mahmoud, he had discovered that long human words (the longer the better) were easy, unmistakable, and rarely changed their meanings, but short words were slippery, unpredictable changing their meanings without any pattern. Or so he seemed to grok. Short human words were never like a short Martian word - such as grok which forever meant exactly the same thing. Short human words were like trying to lift water with a knife. And this had been a very short word.
Robert A. HeinleinWords are pale shadows of forgotten names. As names have power, words have power. Words can light fires in the minds of men. Words can wring tears from the hardest hearts.
Patrick RothfussWords, words, words! They shut one off from the universe. Three quarters of the time one's never in contact with things, only with the beastly words that stand for them.
Aldous HuxleyYou've been quiet these past days," Trevanion said. "Are you going to tell me what the...exchange of words was about?" "Who said there was an exchange of words?" Finnikin asked with irritation. "When a woman says 'I hope you fall under your horse' and 'catch your death, then see if I grieve you,'" Perri said, "then there's been an exchange of words." Finnikin glared at him. "In my humble opinion.
Melina MarchettaA book is a physical object in a world of physical objects. It is a set of dead symbols. And then the right reader comes along, and the wordsโor rather the poetry behind the words, for the words themselves are mere symbolsโspring to life, and we have a resurrection of the word.
Jorge Luis BorgesEncourage others each and every day-nothing's more important than our words. Did you know that, on average, each of us speaks about twenty-five thousand words daily? My last book didn't have that many words. A lot of language is flowing out of our mouths every day and having an impact on those around us. But how much of that flow is fulfilling God's intended purpose for our speech? How much of it reflects pride, rather than a gospel-motivated humility?
C. J. MahaneyA recently reprinted memoir by Frederick Douglass has footnotes explaining what words like 'arraigned,' 'curried' and 'exculpate' meant, and explaining who Job was. In other words, this man who was born a slave and never went to school educated himself to the point where his words now have to be explained to today's expensively under-educated generation.
Thomas SowellI get so much inspiration from my travels, but I also started an exercise where I write down so many words every week. Then I begin crossing them off. We create a grid of words and also images, but words for me are more ample because you can interpret them your own way.
Francisco CostaI often recall these words when I am writing, and I think to myself, โItโs true. There arenโt any new words. Our job is to give new meanings and special overtones to absolutely ordinary words.โ I find the thought reassuring. It means that vast, unknown stretches still lie before us, fertile territories just waiting for us to cultivate them.
Haruki MurakamiGood words will not give my people good health and stop them from dying. Good words will not get my people a home where they can live in peace and take care of themselves. I am tired of talk that comes to nothing. It makes my heart sick when I remember all the good words and broken promises.
Chief JosephI was carrying a beautiful alcoholic conflagration around with me. The thing fed on its own heat and flamed the fiercer. There was no time, in all my waking time, that I didn't want a drink. I began to anticipate the completion of my daily thousand words by taking a drink when only five hundred words were written. It was not long until I prefaced the beginning of the thousand words with a drink.
Jack Londonsentences were used by man before words and still come with the readiness of instinct to his lips. They, and not words, are the foundations of all language. ... Your cat has no words, but it has considerable feeling for the architecture of the sentence in relation to the problem of expressing climax.
Rebecca WestWords and music equally important. But the way to get what I'm looking for is different in each case. I have something specific I'm hoping for with the words and the music, and the way to get the words the way I like them is to take a long time, and the way to get the music I like it is to not let me or anyone else get in the way of it.
Todd SniderI put a lot of stock in the written word, and the power of it. That's what I love about acting and reading scripts. Words are really powerful. I don't believe that axiom at all - words can absolutely hurt you. Words can wound. They can do a lot of damage. I think they can do way more damage than sticks and stones. I'll take sticks and stones.
Mary-Louise ParkerWell, I would hardly say I do write as yet. But I write because I like words. I suppose if I liked stone I might carve. I like words. I like reading. I notice particular words. That sets me off.
A. S. ByattPeople don't talk like this, theytalklikethis. Syllables, words, sentences run together like a watercolour left in the rain. To understand what anyone is saying to us we must separate these noises into words and the words into sentences so that we might in our turn issue a stream of mixed sounds in response.
Bill BrysonI love you," she whispered. Richard pulled her tight against him. His fingers traced a trail down the bumps of her spine. "I feel so frustrated that there aren't any better words than "I love you,"" he said. "It doesn't seem enough for the way I feel about you. I'm sorry there aren't any better words to tell you." "They are words enough for me." "Then, I love you, Kahlan. A thousand times, a million times, I love you. Forever.
Terry GoodkindSome people study a text very deeply. The people are my text. I study their words and what their words sound like, over and over again. When I was a kid, my grandfather said that "if you say a word often enough, it becomes you." Thinking of that later in life gave me this idea that I could try to become America by learning the words of people from many aspects of the country. It doesn't matter how educated they are. By living in the world and living their experiences, they bring extraordinary truths. I try to do those truths justice.
Anna Deavere SmithAll people in the world - who are not hermits or mutes - speak words. They speak different languages, but they speak words. They say, "How are you" or "I'm not feeling well" all over the world. These common words - these common elements that we have between us - the writer has to take some verbs and nouns and pronouns and adjectives and adverbs and arrange them in a way that sound fresh.
Maya AngelouWords create pictures, and pictures in your mind create words. And then the words come back out your mouth....And when that spiritual force comes out it is going to give substance to the image that's on the inside of you. Aw, that's that visualization stuff! Aw, that's that New Age! No, New Age is trying to do this; and they'd get somewhat results out of it because this is spiritual law, brother.
Kenneth CopelandI am tied down with single words. But you wander off; you slip away; you rise up higher, with words and words in phrases.
Virginia WoolfIf you want to change your life, begin by changing your words. Start speaking the words of your dreams, of who you want to become, not the words of fear or failure.
Robert KiyosakiYour words must match what you do. In so many words, you need to show sincerity with your words.
John GarrettIt is probably impossible to think without words, but if we permit ourselves to think with the wrong words, we shall soon be entertaining erroneous thoughts; for words, which are given us for the expression of thought, have a habit of going beyond their proper bounds and determining the content of thought.
Aiden Wilson TozerHow fascinating to a child are words: the shapes, sounds, textures and mysterious meanings of words; the way words link together into elastic patterns called "sentences." And these sentences into paragraphs, and beyond.
Joyce Carol OatesWords have power," Isaac answered. Words begin and end wars. They create and destroy families. They break hearts. They heal them. If you have the right words, there's nothin on earth you can't do." - Crave the Moon
Lori HandelandSeptember knew a number of curse words, most of which she heard the girls at school saying in the bathrooms, in hushed voices, as if the words could make things happen just by being spoken, as if they were fairy words, and had to be handled just so.
Catherynne M. ValenteObviously people's feelings are going to get hurt when you use certain words, but you can't outlaw words. They're really the history of our culture. They tell you what's going on. When you make words politically incorrect you're taking all the poetry out of the language. I'm pro anybody living their lives the way they want to live, sexually and otherwise; and I'm anti any kind of language repression.
David DuchovnyWords are to be taken seriously. I try to take seriously acts of language. Words set things in motion. I've seen them doing it. Words set up atmospheres, electrical fields, charges.
Toni Cade BambaraA natural hierarchy is simply an order of increasing wholeness, such as: particles to atoms to cells to organisms, or letters to words to sentences to paragraphs. The whole of one level becomes part of the whole of the next. In other words, natural hierarchies are composed of holons.
Ken WilberIt is because as we are, our hearts are closed, and we cannot place the holy words in our hearts. So we place them on top of our hearts. And there they stay until, one day, the heart breaks and the words fall in.
Parker J. PalmerMemory offers up its gifts only when jogged by something in the present. It isn't a storehouse of fixed images and words, but a dynamic associative network in the brain that is never quiet and is subject to revision each time we retrieve an old picture or old words.
Siri HustvedtI don't want to sound creepy, but I remember when I couldn't really talk. I was looking at the television and my mother just moved one of the curtains, so the sun started to hit the television, and I couldn't see the television anymore. I started crying. I wasn't able to find the words to say, "I can't see this anymore, please do something about it." I remember crying and not knowing exactly how to express myself; not because it was painful, or that I was too upset, but because there were no words. As human beings, sometimes we just cry when we don't know how to say something.
Mauro RemiddiIn Spanish it is very difficult to make things flow, because words are over-long. But in English, you have light words.
Jorge Luis BorgesTrying to write is very much like trying to put a Chinese puzzle together. We have a pattern in mind which we wish to work out in words; but the words will not fit the spaces, or, if they do, they will not match the design.
Helen KellerAs if he was beating me to the punch, his words living forever, while I was left speechless, no rebuttal, no words left to say.
Sarah DessenIt is the way of my people to use light words at such times and say less than they mean. We fear to say too much. It robs us of the right words when a jest is out of place.
J. R. R. TolkienI never start with what lots of people think of as a subject or a theme. They're school words, not art words. So, writing essays busts my arse because the art is in addressing the subject. I find it really difficult and monstrously time-consuming. In an essay I need to employ my imagination but it's indentured in a way it's not when I'm free to make everything up.
Tim WintonFor me personally, I don't pray using words - it is just with my intent. Why do I need to pray with "words," to something external, when I know what I want?
Miguel Angel RuizShe [my mother] said that if I listened to her, later I would know what she knew: where true words came from, always from up high, above everything else. And if I didn't listen to her, she said my ear would bend too easily to other people, all saying words that had no lasting meaning, because they came from the bottom of their hearts, where their own desires lived, a place where I could not belong.
Amy Tan