"I've learned one thing, and that's to quit worrying about stupid things. You have four years to be irresponsible here, relax. Work is for people with jobs. You'll never remember class time, but you'll remember the time you wasted hanging out with your friends. So stay out late. Go out with your friends on a Tuesday when you have a paper due on Wednesday. Spend money you don't have. Drink 'til sunrise. The work never ends, but college does..."
— Tom Petty

"All that we are is the result of what we have thought. If a man speaks or acts with an evil thought, pain follows him. If a man speaks or acts with a pure thought, happiness follows him, like a shadow that never leaves him."
— Siddhārtha Gautama

"If you can't change your fate, change your attitude."
— Amy Tan

"I am like a falling star who has finally found her place next to another in a lovely constellation, where we will sparkle in the heavens forever."
— Amy Tan

"Isn't hate merely the result of wounded love?
-Lena"
— Amy Tan (The Joy Luck Club)

"A pious man explained to his followers: 'It is evil to take lives and noble to save them. Each day I pledge to save a hundred lives. I drop my net in the lake and scoop out a hundred fishes. I place the fishes on the bank, where they flop and twirl. "Don't be scared," I tell those fishes. "I am saving you from drowning." Soon enough, the fishes grow calm and lie still. Yet, sad to say, I am always too late. The fishes expire. And because it is evil to waste anything, I take those dead fishes to market and I sell them for a good price. With the money I receive, I buy more nets so I can save more fishes."
— Amy Tan (Saving Fish from Drowning: A Novel)

"5246
"But I will win and give her my spirit, because this is the way a mother loves her daughter.
-Ying Ying" "
— Amy Tan (The Joy Luck Club)

"Boy, those French! They have a different word for everything."
— Steve Martin

"Stupid f***ing white man."
— Jim Jarmusch

"Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away."
— Maya Angelou

"A WOMAN SHOULD HAVE ....
enough money within her control to move out
and rent a place of her own even if she never wants
to or needs to...
A WOMAN SHOULD HAVE ....
something perfect to wear if the employer or date of her
dreams wants to see her in an hour...
A WOMAN SHOULD HAVE ...
a youth she's content to leave behind....
A WOMAN SHOULD HAVE ....
a past juicy enough that she's looking forward to
retelling it in her old age....
A WOMAN SHOULD HAVE .....
a set of screwdrivers, a cordless drill, and a black
lace bra...
A WOMAN SHOULD HAVE ....
one friend who always makes her laugh... and one who
lets her cry...
A WOMAN SHOULD HAVE ....
a good piece of furniture not previously owned by anyone
else in her family...
A WOMAN SHOULD HAVE ....
eight matching plates, wine glasses with stems, and a
recipe for a meal that will make her guests feel honored...
A WOMAN SHOULD HAVE ....
a feeling of control over her destiny...
EVERY WOMAN SHOULD KNOW...
how to fall in love without losing herself..
EVERY WOMAN SHOULD KNOW...
HOW TO QUIT A JOB,
BREAK UP WITH A LOVER,
AND CONFRONT A FRIEND WITHOUT RUINING THE FRIENDSHIP...
EVERY WOMAN SHOULD KNOW...
when to try harder... and WHEN TO WALK AWAY...
EVERY WOMAN SHOULD KNOW...
that she can't change the length of her calves,
the width of her hips, or the nature of her parents..
EVERY WOMAN SHOULD KNOW...
that her childhood may not have been perfect...but it's over...
EVERY WOMAN SHOULD KNOW...
what she would and wouldn't do for love or more...
EVERY WOMAN SHOULD KNOW...
how to live alone... even if she doesn't like it...
EVERY WOMAN SHOULD KNOW...
whom she can trust,
whom she can't,
and why she shouldn't
take it personally...
EVERY WOMAN SHOULD KNOW...
where to go...
be it to her best friend's kitchen table...
or a charming inn in the woods...
when her soul needs soothing...
EVERY WOMAN SHOULD KNOW...
what she can and can't accomplish in a day...
a month...and a year..."
— Pamela Redmond Satran

"A day without laughter is a day wasted."
— Charlie Chaplin

" Pretty women wonder where my secret lies.
I'm not cute or built to suit a fashion model's size
But when I start to tell them,
They think I'm telling lies.
I say,
It's in the reach of my arms
The span of my hips,
The stride of my step,
The curl of my lips.
I'm a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That's me."
— Maya Angelou

"Be the change that you wish to see in the world."
— Mahatma Gandhi

"Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed, citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has."
— Margaret Mead

"The earth is our mother. Whatever befalls the earth befalls the sons and daughters of the earth. This we know. All things are connected like the blood which unites one family. All things are connected.

Whatever befalls the earth befalls the sons and daughters of the earth. We did not weave the web of life, we are merely strands in it. Whatever we do to the web we do to ourselves."
— Chief Seattle

"You got to get up to get down!"
— James Brown..i think

"Only Irish coffee provides in a single glass all four essential food groups: alcohol, caffeine, sugar and fat."
— Alex Levine

"How come when you mix water and flour together you get glue...and then you add eggs and sugar and you get cake? Where does the glue go?"
— Rita Rudner

"The wages of sin are death, but by the time taxes are taken out, it's just sort of a tired feeling.
"
— Paula Poundstone

"Do not be too moral. You may cheat yourself out of much life so. Aim above morality. Be not simply good, be good for something."
— Henry David Thoreau

"Too much of a good thing can be wonderful! "
— Mae West

"I feel thin, sort of stretched, like butter, scraped over too much bread.~~
Bilbo Baggins on the occasion of his 111st Birthday"
— J.R.R. Tolkien (The Fellowship of the Ring)

"The very least you can do in your life is figure out what you hope for. And the most you can do is live inside that hope. Not admire it from a distance, but live right in it, under its roof."
— Barbara Kingsolver (Animal Dreams)

"Everything you're sure is right can be wrong in another place. "
— Barbara Kingsolver (The Poisonwood Bible)

"There were two things about Mama. One is she always expected the best out of me. And the other is that then no matter what I did, whatever I came home with, she acted like it was the moon I had just hung up in the sky and plugged in all the stars. Like I was that good."
— Barbara Kingsolver (The Bean Trees)

"If we can't, as artists, improve on real life, we should put down our pencils and go bake bread."
— Barbara Kingsolver

"A mother's body remembers her babies..."
— Barbara Kingsolver

"Households that have lost the soul of cooking from their routines may not know what they are missing: the song of a stir-fry sizzle, the small talk of clinking measuring spoons, the yeasty scent of rising dough, the painting of flavors onto a pizza before it slides into the oven."
— Barbara Kingsolver (Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life)

"It's what you do that makes your soul."
— Barbara Kingsolver

"Sometimes the strength of motherhood is greater than natural laws."
— Barbara Kingsolver

"Love weighs nothing."
— Barbara Kingsolver

"Cooking is 80 percent confidence, a skill best acquired starting from when the apron strings wrap around you twice."
— Barbara Kingsolver (Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life)

"If you want sweet dreams, you've got to live a sweet life."
— Barbara Kingsolver

"Value is not made of money, but a tender balance of expectation and longing."
— Barbara Kingsolver (Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life)

"What I want is so simple I almost can't say it: elementary kindness."
— Barbara Kingsolver (Animal Dreams)

"Those of us who give body and soul to projects that never seem to end- child rearing, housecleaning, gardening- know the value of the occasional closed door. We need our moments of declared truce."
— Barbara Kingsolver

"People think a soul mate is your perfect fit, and that's what everyone wants. But a true soul mate is a mirror, the person who shows you everything that is holding you back, the person who brings you to your own attention so you can change your life.

A true soul mate is probably the most important person you'll ever meet, because they tear down your walls and smack you awake. But to live with a soul mate forever? Nah. Too painful. Soul mates, they come into your life just to reveal another layer of yourself to you, and then leave.

A soul mates purpose is to shake you up, tear apart your ego a little bit, show you your obstacles and addictions, break your heart open so new light can get in, make you so desperate and out of control that you have to transform your life, then introduce you to your spiritual master..."
— Elizabeth Gilbert (Eat, Pray, Love: One Woman's Search for Everything Across Italy, India and Indonesia)

"Never forget that once upon a time, in an unguarded moment, you recognized yourself as a friend."
— Elizabeth Gilbert

"Dear me, how I love a library."
— Elizabeth Gilbert

"...we must take care of our families where-ever we find them."
— Elizabeth Gilbert

"I thought about one of my favorite Sufi poems, which says that God long ago drew a circle in the sand exactly around the spot where you are standing right now. I was never not coming here. This was never not going to happen."
— Elizabeth Gilbert

"What you seek is seeking you."
— Mawlana Jalal-al-Din Rumi

"How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment before starting to improve the world."
— Anne Frank

"Human greatness does not lie in wealth or power, but in character and goodness. People are just people, and all people have faults and shortcomings, but all of us are born with a basic goodness."
— Anne Frank

"Because paper has more patience than people. "
— Anne Frank

"He who controls the past controls the future. He who controls the present controls the past."
— George Orwell (1984)

"The creatures outside looked from pig to man, and from man to pig, and from pig to man again; but already it was impossible to say which was which."
— George Orwell (Animal Farm)

"At 50, everyone has the face he deserves."
— George Orwell

"Life is an opportunity, benefit from it.
Life is beauty, admire it.
Life is a dream, realize it.
Life is a challenge, meet it.
Life is a duty, complete it.
Life is a game, play it.
Life is a promise, fulfill it.
Life is sorrow, overcome it.
Life is a song, sing it.
Life is a struggle, accept it.
Life is a tragedy, confront it.
Life is an adventure, dare it.
Life is luck, make it.
Life is too precious, do not destroy it.
Life is life, fight for it."
— Mother Teresa