Laura > Laura's Quotes

“Of course it was painful, and there were times when, emotionally, I just wanted to chuck it all. But pain seems to be a precondition for this kind of sport. If pain weren't involved, who in the world would ever go to the trouble of taking part in sports like the triathlon or the marathon, which demand such an investment of time and energy? It's precisely because of the pain, precisely because we want to overcome that pain, that we can get the feeling, through this process, of really being alive--or at least a partial sense of it. Your quality of experience is based not on standards such as time or ranking, but on finally awakening to an awareness of the fluidity within action itself.”
― Haruki Murakami, What I Talk About When I Talk About Running

“The greatest happiness you can have is knowing that you do not necessarily require happiness.”
― William Saroyan, My Heart's in the Highlands

“I should like to see any power of the world destroy this race, this small tribe of unimportant people, whose history is ended, whose wars have all been fought and lost, whose structures have crumbled, whose literature is unread, whose music is unheard, whose prayers are no longer uttered. Go ahead, destroy this race. Let us say that it is again 1915. There is war in the world. Destroy Armenia. See if you can do it. Send them from their homes into the desert. Let them have neither bread nor water. Burn their houses and their churches. See if they will not live again. See if they will not laugh again. See if the race will not live again when two of them meet in a beer parlor, twenty years after, and laugh, and speak in their tongue. Go ahead, see if you can do anything about it. See if you can stop them from mocking the big ideas of the world, you sons of bitches, a couple of Armenians talking in the world, go ahead and try to destroy them.”
― WILLIAM SAROYAN

“We didn't say anything because there was such an awful lot to say, and no language to say it in.”
― William Saroyan

“You may tend to get cancer from the thing that makes you want to smoke so much, not from the smoking itself.”
― William Saroyan, Not Dying

“No enemy is so annoying as one who was a friend, or still is a friend,and there are many more of these than one would suspect.”
― William Saroyan

“Most of my girlfriends are sent by the Devil and seem genuinely bemused when I do not succumb to their powers.”
― Robert Black

“The devil?” Jason heaved the tick over his shoulder like a collier with his sack. “Satan. The adversary. The enemy of the plan of God. The undoer. The destroyer. Yes. He definitely was.” Jason smiled. “But he meant well.”
― Orson Scott Card, The Worthing Saga

“The greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing the world he was evil.”
― Edmund Carver

“I cannot believe in a God who wants to be praised all the time.”
― Friedrich Nietzsche

“Who is more humble? The scientist who looks at the universe with an open mind and accepts whatever the universe has to teach us, or somebody who says everything in this book must be considered the literal truth and never mind the fallibility of all the human beings involved?”
― Carl Sagan

“The Bible has noble poetry in it... and some good morals and a wealth of obscenity, and upwards of a thousand lies.”
― Mark Twain

“The world is so exquisite with so much love and moral depth, that there is no reason to deceive ourselves with pretty stories for which there's little good evidence. Far better it seems to me, in our vulnerability, is to look death in the eye and to be grateful every day for the brief but magnificent opportunity that life provides.”
― Carl Sagan

“To one who has faith, no explanation is necessary. To one without faith, no explanation is possible.”
― St. Thomas Aquinas

“I do not consider it an insult, but rather a compliment to be called an agnostic. I do not pretend to know where many ignorant men are sure — that is all that agnosticism means.”
― Clarence Darrow

“Even now, there are still days so beautiful, I almost believe in God.”
― Ann Hood, Comfort: A Journey Through Grief

“Sunshine, if I ever disappear, please tell people that I ran after the Devil, trying to get my soul back.”
― April Genevieve Tucholke, Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea

“We should be agnostic about those things for which there is no evidence. We should not hold beliefs merely because they gratify our desires for afterlife, immortality, heaven, hell, etc.”
― Julian S. Huxley

“One day, in retrospect, the years of struggle will strike you as the most beautiful.”
― Sigmund Freud

“You know," said Arthur, "it's at times like this, when I'm trapped in a Vogon airlock with a man from Betelgeuse, and about to die of asphyxiation in deep space that I really wish I'd listened to what my mother told me when I was young."
"Why, what did she tell you?"
"I don't know, I didn't listen.”
― Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy

“There is no sunrise so beautiful that it is worth waking me up to see it.”
― Mindy Kaling, Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me?

“It’s precisely because of the pain, the we can get the feeling, through this process, of really being alive—or at least a partial sense of it.”
― Haruki Murakami, What I Talk About When I Talk About Running