Mya > Mya's Quotes

“Nobody tells this to people who are beginners, I wish someone told me. All of us who do creative work, we get into it because we have good taste. But there is this gap. For the first couple years you make stuff, it’s just not that good. It’s trying to be good, it has potential, but it’s not. But your taste, the thing that got you into the game, is still killer. And your taste is why your work disappoints you. A lot of people never get past this phase, they quit. Most people I know who do interesting, creative work went through years of this. We know our work doesn’t have this special thing that we want it to have. We all go through this. And if you are just starting out or you are still in this phase, you gotta know its normal and the most important thing you can do is do a lot of work. Put yourself on a deadline so that every week you will finish one story. It is only by going through a volume of work that you will close that gap, and your work will be as good as your ambitions. And I took longer to figure out how to do this than anyone I’ve ever met. It’s gonna take awhile. It’s normal to take awhile. You’ve just gotta fight your way through.”
― Ira Glass

“Jane's stories are too sensible. Then Diana puts too much murders into hers. She says most of the time she doesn't know what to do with the people so she kills them off to get rid of them."

-Anne Shirley”
― L.M. Montgomery, Anne of Green Gables

“Don't be very frightened, Marilla. I was walking the ridge-pole and I fell off. I suspect I have sprained my ankle. But, Marilla, I might have broken my neck. Let us look on the bright side of things.”
― L.M. Montgomery, Anne of Green Gables

“I am well in body although considerably rumpled up in spirit, thank you, ma'am,' said Anne gravely. Then aside to Marilla in an audible whisper, 'There wasn't anything startling in that, was there, Marilla?”
― L.M. Montgomery, Anne of Green Gables

“You get to Alcatraz by being the worst of the worst. Unless you're me. I came here because my mother said I had to.”
― Gennifer Choldenko, Al Capone Does My Shirts

“Every character should want something, even if it is only a glass of water.”
― Kurt Vonnegut, BAGOMBO SNUFF BOX.

“And so it goes...”
― Kurt Vonnegut, Slaughterhouse-Five

“To be is to do - Socrates

To do is to be - Sartre

Do Be Do Be Do - Sinatra”
― Kurt Vonnegut

“It sounds like a fairy-tale, but not only that; this story of what man by his science and practical inventions has achieved on this earth, where he first appeared as a weakly member of the animal kingdom, and on which each individual of his species must ever again appear as a helpless infant... is a direct fulfilment of all, or of most, of the dearest wishes in his fairy-tales. All these possessions he has acquired through culture. Long ago he formed an ideal conception of omnipotence and omniscience which he embodied in his gods. Whatever seemed unattainable to his desires - or forbidden to him - he attributed to these gods. One may say, therefore, that these gods were the ideals of his culture. Now he has himself approached very near to realizing this ideal, he has nearly become a god himself. But only, it is true, in the way that ideals are usually realized in the general experience of humanity. Not completely; in some respects not at all, in others only by halves. Man has become a god by means of artificial limbs, so to speak, quite magnificent when equipped with all his accessory organs; but they do not grow on him and they still give him trouble at times... Future ages will produce further great advances in this realm of culture, probably inconceivable now, and will increase man's likeness to a god still more.”
― Sigmund Freud, Civilization and Its Discontents

“If you tell the truth, you don't have to remember anything.”
― Mark Twain

“Friendship ... is born at the moment when one man says to another "What! You too? I thought that no one but myself . . .”
― C.S. Lewis, The Four Loves

“You can't wait for inspiration. You have to go after it with a club.”
― Jack London

“Cut out all these exclamation points. An exclamation point is like laughing at your own joke.”
― F. Scott Fitzgerald

“I am so clever that sometimes I don't understand a single word of what I am saying.”
― Oscar Wilde, The Happy Prince and Other Stories

“Do you ever think if people heard our conversations they'd lock us up?"
All the time.”
― Wendy Mass, Jeremy Fink and the Meaning of Life

“You should eat a waffle! You can't be sad if you eat a waffle!”
― Lauren Myracle, ttfn

“This is my depressed stance. When you're depressed, it makes a lot of difference how you stand. The worst thing you can do is straighten up and hold your head high because then you'll start to feel better. If you're going to get any joy out of being depressed, you've got to stand like this.”
― Charles M. Schulz

“Never miss a good chance to shut up.”
― Will Rogers

“Writers fish for the right words like fishermen fish for, um, whatever those aquatic creatures with fins and gills are called. 
”
― Jarod Kintz, This is the best book I've ever written, and it still sucks

“The person, be it gentleman or lady, who has not pleasure in a good novel, must be intolerably stupid.”
― Jane Austen, Northanger Abbey

“I'm not afraid of death; I just don't want to be there when it happens.”
― Woody Allen

“I love mankind ... it's people I can't stand!!”
― Charles M. Schulz

“Creativity is knowing how to hide your sources”
― C.E.M. Joad

“Saying 'I notice you're a nerd' is like saying, 'Hey, I notice that you'd rather be intelligent than be stupid, that you'd rather be thoughtful than be vapid, that you believe that there are things that matter more than the arrest record of Lindsay Lohan. Why is that?' In fact, it seems to me that most contemporary insults are pretty lame. Even 'lame' is kind of lame. Saying 'You're lame' is like saying 'You walk with a limp.' Yeah, whatever, so does 50 Cent, and he's done all right for himself.”
― John Green

“Reader, suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of Congress. But I repeat myself.”
― Mark Twain

“Jesus!" Luke exclaimed.
"Actually, it's just me," said Simon. "Although I've been told the resemblance is startling.”
― Cassandra Clare

“You know the world is going crazy when the best rapper is a white guy, the best golfer is a black guy, the tallest guy in the NBA is Chinese, the Swiss hold the America's Cup, France is accusing the U.S. of arrogance, Germany doesn't want to go to war, and the three most powerful men in America are named "Bush", "Dick", and "Colin." Need I say more?”
― Chris Rock

“Ask not what you can do for your country. Ask what’s for lunch.”
― Orson Welles

“Don't Panic.”
― Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy

“People who count their chickens before they are hatched act very wisely because chickens run about so absurdly that it's impossible to count them accurately.”
― Oscar Wilde