Gurj > Gurj's Quotes

“But what other people thought was no longer of any help to me. Those thoughts only existed within certain structures, and I had definitively left those structures.”
― Rachel Cusk, Outline

“We live in a fantasy world, a world of illusion. The great task in life is to find reality" says Iris Murdoch.
But given the state of the world, is it wise?”
― Iris Murdoch

“And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom.”
― Elizabeth Appell

“As life goes on it becomes tiring to keep up the character you invented for yourself, and so you relapse into individuality and become more like yourself everyday.”
― Agatha Christie, Agatha Christie: An Autobiography

“He was gone, and I did not have time to tell him what I had just now realized: that I forgave him, and that she forgave us, and that we had to forgive to survive in the labyrinth. There were so many of us who would have to live with things done and things left undone that day. Things that did not go right, things that seemed okay at the time because we could not see the future. If only we could see the endless string of consequences that result from our smallest actions. But we can’t know better until knowing better is useless. And as I walked back to give Takumi’s note to the Colonel, I saw that I would never know. I would never know her well enough to know her thoughts in those last minutes, would never know if she left us on purpose. But the not-knowing would not keep me from caring, and I would always love Alaska Young, my crooked neighbor, with all my crooked heart.”
― John Green, Looking for Alaska

“Once, very long ago, Time fell in love with Fate. This, as you might imagine, proved problematic. Their romance disrupted the flow of time. It tangled the strings of fortune into knots.  The stars watched from the heavens nervously, worrying what might occur. What might happen to the days and nights were time to suffer a broken heart? What catastrophes might result if the same fate awaited Fate itself? The stars conspired and separated the two. For a while they breathed easier in the heavens. Time continued to flow as it always had, or perhaps imperceptibly slower. Fate weaved together the paths that were meant to intertwine, though perhaps a string was missed here and there. But eventually, Fate and Time found each other again.  In the heavens, the stars sighed, twinkling and fretting. They asked the Moon her advice. The Moon in turn called upon the parliament of owls to decide how best to proceed. The parliament of owls convened to discuss the matter amongst themselves night after night. They argued and debated while the world slept around them, and the world continued to turn, unaware that such important matters were under discussion while it slumbered.  The parliament of owls came to the logical conclusion that if the problem was in the combination, one of the elements should be removed. They chose to keep the one they felt more important. The parliament of owls told their decision to the stars and the stars agreed. The Moon did not, but on this night she was dark and could not offer her opinion.  So it was decided, and Fate was pulled apart. Ripped into pieces by beaks and claws. Fate’s screams echoed through the deepest corners and the highest heavens but no one dared to intervene save for a small brave mouse who snuck into the fray, creeping unnoticed through the blood and bone and feathers, and took Fate’s heart and kept it safe. When the furor died down there was nothing else left of Fate.  The owl who consumed Fate’s eyes gained great site, greater site then any that had been granted to a mortal creature before. The Parliament crowned him the Owl King. In the heavens the stars sparkled with relief but the moon was full of sorrow. And so time goes as it should and events that were once fated to happen are left instead to chance, and Chance never falls in love with anything for long. But the world is strange and endings are not truly endings no matter how the stars might wish it so.  Occasionally Fate can pull itself together again.  And Time is always waiting.”
― Erin Morgenstern, The Starless Sea

“I had absolutely no interest in being somebody else's muse.
I am not a muse.
I am the somebody.
End of fucking story.”
― Taylor Jenkins Reid, Daisy Jones & The Six

“I think you have to have faith in people before they earn it. Otherwise it's not faith, right?”
― Taylor Jenkins Reid, Daisy Jones & The Six

“I used to think soul mates were two of the same. I used to think I was supposed to look for somebody that was like me. I don't believe in soul mates anymore and I'm not looking for anything. But if I did believe in them, I'd believe your soul mate was somebody who had all the things you didn't, that needed all the things you had. Not somebody who's suffering from the same stuff you are.”
― Taylor Jenkins Reid , Daisy Jones & The Six

“You have to have one person in your life that you know would never do anything to steer you wrong. They may disagree with you. They could even break your heart, from time to time. But you have to have one person, at least, who you know will always tell you the truth.”
― Taylor Jenkins Reid, Daisy Jones & The Six

“I wish someone had told me that love isn’t torture. Because I thought love was this thing that was supposed to tear you in two and leave you heartbroken and make your heart race in the worst way. I thought love was bombs and tears and blood. I did not know that it was supposed to make you lighter, not heavier. I didn’t know it was supposed to take only the kind of work that makes you softer. I thought love was war. I didn’t know it was supposed to… I didn’t know it was supposed to be peace.”
― Taylor Jenkins Reid, Daisy Jones & The Six

“She had written something that felt like I could have written it, except I knew I couldn't have. I wouldn't have come up with something like that. Which is what we all want from art, isn’t it? When someone pins down something that feels like it lives inside us? Takes a piece of your heart out and shows it to you? It’s like they are introducing you to a part of yourself.”
― Taylor Jenkins Reid, Daisy Jones & The Six

“I feel like a constellation of wounds, held together with string and stubbornness.”
― Holly Black, The Queen of Nothing

“Maybe it isn't the worst thing to want to be loved, even if you're not. Even if it hurts. Maybe being human isn't always being weak.

Maybe it was the shame that was the problem.”
― Holly Black, The Queen of Nothing

“People think that intimacy is about sex. But intimacy is about truth. When you realize you can tell someone your truth, when you can show yourself to them, when you stand in front of them bare and their response is 'you're safe with me'- that's intimacy.”
― Taylor Jenkins Reid, The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo

“...above else I was afraid of dullness, peace. To achieve our inner peace, my father and I needed an outer unrest”
― Françoise Sagan, Bonjour Tristesse

“When someone shows you how little you mean to them and you keep coming back for more, before you know it you start to mean less to yourself. You are not made up of compartments! You are one whole person! What gets said to you gets said to all of you, ditto what gets done. Being treated like shit is not an amusing game or a transgressive intellectual experiment. It’s something you accept, condone, and learn to believe you deserve. This is so simple. But I tried so hard to make it complicated.”
― Lena Dunham, Not That Kind of Girl: A young woman tells you what she's "learned"

“You will find,” she says, “that there’s a certain grace to having your heart broken.”
― Lena Dunham, Not That Kind of Girl: A young woman tells you what she's "learned"

“You've learned a new rule and it's simple: don't put yourself in situations you'd like to run away from.”
― Lena Dunham, Not That Kind of Girl: A Young Woman Tells You What She's "Learned"

“Never mistake being nice for being weak.”
― Stephen Chbosky, Imaginary Friend

“Some people's fake is more honest than other people's real.”
― Stephen Chbosky, Imaginary Friend

“Ask the questions you want to ask. Seek out the people you want in your life. It might not be as hard as you think.”
― Stephanie Butland, Lost For Words

“If you go home with somebody, and they don't have books, don't fuck 'em!”
― John Waters

“Courage starts with showing up and letting ourselves be seen.”
― Brené Brown, Daring Greatly: How the Courage to Be Vulnerable Transforms the Way We Live, Love, Parent, and Lead