Thought Provoking Quotes

“A question that sometimes drives me hazy: am I or are the others crazy?”
― Albert Einstein

“Every villain is a hero in his own mind.”
― Tom Hiddleston

“Stars, too, were time travelers. How many of those ancient points of light were the last echoes of suns now dead? How many had been born but their light not yet come this far? If all the suns but ours collapsed tonight, how many lifetimes would it take us to realize we were alone? I had always known the sky was full of mysteries—but not until now had I realized how full of them the earth was.”
― Ransom Riggs, Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children

“I like to imagine that the world is one big machine. You know, machines never have any extra parts. They have the exact number and type of parts they need. So I figure if the entire world is a big machine, I have to be here for some reason. And that means you have to be here for some reason, too.”
― Brian Selznick, The Invention of Hugo Cabret

“We are a way for the cosmos to know itself.”
― Carl Sagan, Cosmos

“Books can be dangerous. The best ones should be labeled ‘This could change your life’.”
― Helen Exley

“According to Aristophanes in Plato's The Banquet, in the ancient world of legend there were three types of people.
In ancient times people weren't simply male or female, but one of three types : male/male, male/female or female/female. In other words, each person was made out of the components of two people. Everyone was happy with this arrangment and never really gave it much thought. But then God took a knife and cut everyone in half, right down the middle. So after that the world was divided just into male and female, the upshot being that people spend their time running around trying to locate their missing half.”
― Haruki Murakami, Kafka on the Shore

“Even the finest sword plunged into salt water will eventually rust.”
― Sun Tzu

“If love is blind, then maybe a blind person that loves has a greater understanding of it.”
― Criss Jami, Salomé: In Every Inch In Every Mile

“We do not remember days, we remember moments.”
― Cesare Pavese

“But I've strayed so far from normal now, I'll never find my way back. And the truth is, I no longer want to.”
― Alyson Noel, Saving Zoë

“The temptation of the age is to look good without being good.”
― Brennan Manning, The Ragamuffin Gospel: Good News for the Bedraggled, Beat-Up, and Burnt Out

“He lingered at the door, and said, 'The Lion wants courage, the Tin Man a heart, and the Scarecrow brains. Dorothy wants to go home. What do you want?'...
She couldn't say forgiveness, not to Liir. She started to say 'a soldier,' to make fun of his mooning affections over the guys in uniform. But realizing even as she said it that he would be hurt, she caught herself halfway, and in the end what came out of her mouth surprised them both.
She said, 'A soul-'
He blinked at her.”
― Gregory Maguire, Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West

“Normal people can become very annoying if put in annoying situations.”
― Jessica Park, Flat-Out Love

“Here was a new generation, shouting the old cries, learning the old creeds, through a revery of long days and nights; destined finally to go out into that dirty gray turmoil to follow love and pride; a new generation dedicated more than the last to the fear of poverty and the worship of success; grown up to find all Gods dead, all wars fought, all faiths in man shaken...”
― F. Scott Fitzgerald

“While we may judge things as good or bad, karma doesn't. It's a simple case of like gets like, the ultimate balancing act, nothing more, nothing less. And if you're deteremined to fix every situation you deem as bad, or difficult, or somehow unsavory, then you rob the person of their own chance to fix it, learn from it, or even grow from it. Some things, no matter how painful, happen for a reason. A reason you or I may not be able to grasp at first sight, not without knowing a person's entire life story—their cumulative past. And to just barge in and interfere, no matter how well-intentioned, would be akin to robbing them of their journey. Something that's better not done.”
― Alyson Noel, Shadowland

“So I have just one wish for you – the good luck to be somewhere where you are free to maintain the kind of integrity I have described, and where you do not feel forced by a need to maintain your position in the organization, or financial support, or so on, to lose your integrity. May you have that freedom.”
― Richard Feynman, Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman!: Adventures of a Curious Character

“Mostly I have felt myself becoming a servant of sadness. I am still looking for the beauty in that.”
― Maggie Nelson, Bluets

“You're stressing too much about what might be. Do something to take your mind off thinking about what might never happen.”
― Simone Elkeles, Leaving Paradise

“What work do I have to do then?" said Will, but went on at once, "No, on second thought, don't tell me. I shall decide what I do. If you say my work is fighting, or healing, or exploring, or whatever you might say, I'll always be thinking about it. And if I do end up doing that, I'll be resentful because it'll feel as if I didn't have a choice, and if I don't do it, I'll feel guilty because I should. Whatever I do, I will choose it, no one else.”
― Philip Pullman, The Amber Spyglass

“Challenge a person's beliefs, and you challenge his dignity, standing, and power. And when those beliefs are based on nothing but faith, they are chronically fragile. No one gets upset about the belief that rocks fall down as opposed to up, because all sane people can see it with their own eyes. Not so for the belief that babies are born with original sin or that God exists in three persons or that Ali is the second-most divinely inspired man after Muhammad. When people organize their lives around these beliefs, and then learn of other people who seem to be doing just fine without them--or worse, who credibly rebut them--they are in danger of looking like fools. Since one cannot defend a belief based on faith by persuading skeptics it is true, the faithful are apt to react to unbelief with rage, and may try to eliminate that affront to everything that makes their lives meaningful.”
― Steven Pinker, The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined

“Poor God, how often He is blamed for all the suffering in the
world. It’s like praising Satan for allowing all the good that happens.”
― E.A. Bucchianeri, Brushstrokes of a Gadfly,

“Some men think because they're afraid to do.”
― George R.R. Martin, A Feast for Crows

“At school, new ideas are thrust at you every day. Out in the world, you'll have to find your inner motivation to seek for new ideas on your own.”
― Bill Watterson

“Words are like people, I think. Put too many of them too close together and they cause trouble.”
― Carolee Dean, Take Me There

“If we were to one day encounter a form of life more powerful and intelligent than our own, and it regarded us as we regard fish, what would be our argument against being eaten?”
― Jonathan Safran Foer, Eating Animals

“Socrates: Have you noticed on our journey how often the citizens of this new land remind each other it is a free country?
Plato: I have, and think it odd they do this.
Socrates: How so, Plato?
Plato: It is like reminding a baker he is a baker, or a sculptor he is a
sculptor.
Socrates: You mean to say if someone is convinced of their trade, they have
no need to be reminded.
Plato: That is correct.
Socrates: I agree. If these citizens were convinced of their freedom, they would not need reminders.”
― E.A. Bucchianeri, Brushstrokes of a Gadfly,

“One thing you have to realize from now on is that it doesn't matter if this is a dream or not. Survival depends on what you do, not what you think.”
― Rebecca McKinsey, Anterria

“Information is a lot like water; it's hard to hold on to, and hard to keep from leaking away.”
― Ruth Ozeki, A Tale for the Time Being

“And what greater might do we possess as human beings than our capacity to question and to learn?”
― Ann Druyan