Adam Gutschenritter > Adam's Quotes

“Sure, we'd faced some things as children that a lot of kids don't. Sure, Justin had qualified for his Junior de Sade Badge in his teaching methods for dealing with pain. We still hadn't learned, though, that growing up is all about getting hurt. And then getting over it. You hurt. You recover. You move on. Odds are pretty good you're just going to get hurt again. But each time, you learn something.

Each time, you come out of it a little stronger, and at some point you realize that there are more flavors of pain than coffee. There's the little empty pain of leaving something behind - gradutaing, taking the next step forward, walking out of something familiar and safe into the unknown. There's the big, whirling pain of life upending all of your plans and expecations. There's the sharp little pains of failure, and the more obscure aches of successes that didn't give you what you thought they would. There are the vicious, stabbing pains of hopes being torn up. The sweet little pains of finding others, giving them your love, and taking joy in their life they grow and learn. There's the steady pain of empathy that you shrug off so you can stand beside a wounded friend and help them bear their burdens.

And if you're very, very lucky, there are a very few blazing hot little pains you feel when you realized that you are standing in a moment of utter perfection, an instant of triumph, or happiness, or mirth which at the same time cannot possibly last - and yet will remain with you for life.

Everyone is down on pain, because they forget something important about it: Pain is for the living. Only the dead don't feel it.

Pain is a part of life. Sometimes it's a big part, and sometimes it isn't, but either way, it's a part of the big puzzle, the deep music, the great game. Pain does two things: It teaches you, tells you that you're alive. Then it passes away and leaves you changed. It leaves you wiser, sometimes. Sometimes it leaves you stronger. Either way, pain leaves its mark, and everything important that will ever happen to you in life is going to involve it in one degree or another.”
― Jim Butcher

“What is the point of having free will if one cannot occasionally spit in the eye of destiny?”
― Jim Butcher, White Night

“I not only use all the brains that I have, but all I can borrow.”
― Woodrow Wilson

“Paranoid? Probably. But just because you're paranoid doesn't mean there isn't an invisible demon about to eat your face.”
― Jim Butcher, Storm Front

“I had to smile at the man. I mean, you have to smile at idiots and children.”
― Jim Butcher, Fool Moon

“Laugh whenever you can. Keeps you from killing yourself when things are bad. That and vodka.”
― Jim Butcher, Changes

“Evil isn’t the real threat to the world. Stupid is just as destructive as Evil, maybe more so, and it’s a hell of a lot more common. What we really need is a crusade against Stupid. That might actually make a difference.”
― Jim Butcher, Vignette

“I don't care about whose DNA has recombined with whose. When everything goes to hell, the people who stand by you without flinching--they are your family.”
― Jim Butcher, Proven Guilty

“I died. I died and someone made a clerical error and I am in Heaven.”
― jim butcher, Summer Knight

“There is a primal reassurance in being touched, in knowing that someone else, someone close to you, wants to be touching you. There is a bone-deep security that goes with the brush of a human hand, a silent, reflex-level affirmation that someone is near, that someone cares.”
― Jim Butcher, White Night

“There's more magic in a baby's first giggle than in any firestorm a wizard can conjure up, and don't let anyone tell you any different.”
― Jim Butcher, Fool Moon

“Sleep is God. Go worship.”
― Jim Butcher, Death Masks

“The human mind is not a terribly logical or consistent place.”
― Jim Butcher, Turn Coat

“Anger is just anger. It isn't good. It isn't bad. It just is. What you do with it is what matters. It's like anything else. You can use it to build or to destroy. You just have to make the choice."

Constructive anger," the demon said, her voice dripping sarcasm.

Also known as passion," I said quietly. "Passion has overthrown tyrants and freed prisoners and slaves. Passion has brought justice where there was savagery. Passion has created freedom where there was nothing but fear. Passion has helped souls rise from the ashes of their horrible lives and build something better, stronger, more beautiful.”
― Jim Butcher, White Night

“It's all right to be afraid. You just don't let it stop you from doing your job.”
― Jim Butcher, Fool Moon

“Life would be unbearably dull if we had answers to all our questions.”
― Jim Butcher, Death Masks

“There are things you can't walk away from. Not if you want to live with yourself afterward.”
― Jim Butcher, Death Masks

“The man once wrote: Do not meddle in the affairs of wizards, for they are subtle and quick to anger. Tolkien had that one mostly right.

I stepped forward, let the door bang closed, and snarled, "Fuck subtle.”
― Jim Butcher, Changes

“Time after time, history demonstrates that when people don't want to believe something, they have enormous skills of ignoring it altogether.”
― Jim Butcher, Dead Beat

“But there were some things I believed in. Some things I had faith in. And faith isn't about perfect attendance to services, or how much money you put on the little plate. It isn't about going skyclad to the Holy Rites, or meditating each day upon the divine.
Faith is about what you do. It's about aspiring to be better and nobler and kinder than you are. It's about making sacrifices for the good of others - even when there's not going to be anyone telling you what a hero you are.”
― Jim Butcher, Changes

“Knowledge is the ultimate weapon. It always has been.”
― Jim Butcher, White Night

“Laughter is good for you. Nine out of ten stand-up comedians recommend laughter in the face of intense stupidity.”
― Jim Butcher, Proven Guilty

“I've never lost a duel to the death. Not one.”
― Jim Butcher, Captain's Fury

“Ignorance is more than bliss, it's freaking orgasmic ecstacy!”
― Jim Butcher, Blood Rites

“If you can't stop the bad thoughts from coming to visit, at least you can make fun of them while they're hanging around.”
― Jim Butcher, Turn Coat

“All things pass in time. We are far less significant than we imagine ourselves to be. All that we are, all that we have wrought, is but a shadow, no matter how durable it may seem. One day, when the last man has breathed his last breath, the sun will shine, the mountains will stand, the rain will fall, the streams will whisper—and they will not miss him.”
― Jim Butcher

“They say you can know a man by his enemies, Dresden." He smiled, and laughter lurked beneath his next words, never quite surfacing. "You defy beings that should cow you into silence. You resist forces that are inevitable for no more reason than that you believe they should be resisted. You bow your head to neither demons nor angels, and you put yourself in harm's way to defend those who cannot defend themselves." He nodded slowly. "I think I like you.”
― Jim Butcher, Changes

“Hope is a force of nature. Don't let anyone tell you different.”
― Jim Butcher, Changes

“Even in winter, the cold isn't always bitter, and not every day is cruel.”
― Jim Butcher, Changes

“Pain is a byproduct of life. That’s the truth. Life sometimes sucks. That’s true for everyone. But if you don’t face the pain and the suck, you don’t ever get the other things either. Laughter. Joy. Love. Pain passes, but those things are worth fighting for. Worth dying for.”
― Jim Butcher, Vignette