Beth Given > Beth's Quotes

“People always think that happiness is a faraway thing … something complicated and hard to get. Yet, what little things can make it up.”
― Betty Smith, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn

“Experience is what you get when you didn't get what you wanted. And experience is often the most valuable thing you have to offer.”
― Randy Pausch, The Last Lecture

“Life is made up of moments, small pieces of glittering mica in a long stretch of gray cement. It would be wonderful if they came to us unsummoned, but particularly in lives as busy as the ones most of us lead now, that won’t happen. We have to teach ourselves how to make room for them, to love them, and to live, really live.”
― Anna Quindlen, A Short Guide to a Happy Life

“Mike was right: the pattern of life isn't a straight line; it crosses and recrosses, drawing in and tying together other lives, as I do when I gather in the ends of my thread to make a knot.”
― Benedict Freedman

“When they [visitors to his studio:] learn about the six-week daily-strip deadline and the 12-week Sunday-page deadline, a visitor almost never fails to remark: "Gee, you could work real hard, couldn't you, and get several months ahead and then take the time off?"

Being, as I said, a slow learner, it took me until last year to realize what an odd statement that really is. You don't work all of your life to do something so you don't have to do it.”
― Charles M. Schulz, My Life with Charlie Brown

“I am not concerned with simply surviving. I am very concerned about improving. I start each day by examining yesterday's work and looking for areas where I can improve. I am always trying to draw the characters better, and trying to design each panel somewhat in the manner a painter would treat his canvas.”
― Charles M. Schulz, My Life with Charlie Brown

“You have been my friend. That in itself is a tremendous thing. I wove my webs for you because I liked you. After all, what's a life, anyway? We're born, we live a little while, we die. A spider's life can't help being something of a mess, with all this trapping and eating flies. By helping you, perhaps I was trying to lift up my life a trifle. Heaven knows anyone's life can stand a little of that.”
― E. B. White, Charlotte’s Web

“No man is an island,' said John Donne. I feel we are all islands -- in a common sea.”
― Anne Morrow Lindbergh, Gift from the Sea

“I find there is a quality to being alone that is incredibly precious. Life rushes back into the void, richer, more vivid, fuller than before.”
― Anne Morrow Lindbergh, Gift from the Sea

“When you love someone you do not love them, all the time, in the exact same way, from moment to moment. It is an impossibility. It is a lie to pretend to. And yet this is exactly what most of us demand. We have so little faith in the ebb and flow of life, of love, of relationships.”
― Anne Morrow Lindbergh, Gift from the Sea

“One cannot collect all the beautiful shells on the beach. One can only collect a few. One moon shell is more impressive than three. There is only one moon in the sky.”
― Anne Morrow Lindbergh, Gift from the Sea

“We believe in ordinary acts of bravery, in the courage that drives one person to stand up for another.”
― Veronica Roth, Divergent

“I have a theory that selflessness and bravery aren't all that different.”
― Veronica Roth, Divergent

“If optimism is the highest form of courage -- as I am beginning to believe it is -- then these students are all heroes.”
― Paula Huntley, The Hemingway Book Club of Kosovo

“Tonight I write this journal entry on my laptop. Other nights I have handwritten entries in notebooks. Sometimes I jot down notes as I ride home in the cab or wait for an appointment. I want all of this -- everything and everyone -- to stay with me.”
― Paula Huntley, The Hemingway Book Club of Kosovo

“Books are the plane, and the train, and the road. They are the destination, and the journey. They are home.”
― Anna Quindlen, How Reading Changed My Life

“How is it that, a full two centuries after Jane Austen finished her manuscript, we come to the world of Pride and Prejudice and find ourselves transcending customs, strictures, time, mores, to arrive at a place that educates, amuses, and enthralls us? It is a miracle. We read in bed because reading is halfway between life and dreaming, our own consciousness in someone else's mind.”
― Anna Quindlen, How Reading Changed My Life

“There's zero correlation between being the best talker and having the best ideas.”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“The secret to life is to put yourself in the right lighting. For some, it's a Broadway spotlight; for others, a lamplit desk. Use your natural powers -- of persistence, concentration, and insight -- to do work you love and work that matters. Solve problems. make art, think deeply.”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“Spend your free time the way you like, not the way you think you're supposed to.”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“The belief that unhappiness is selfless and happiness is selfish is misguided. It's more selfless to act happy. It takes energy, generosity, and discipline to be unfailingly lighthearted, yet everyone takes the happy person for granted. No one is careful of his feelings or tries to keep his spirits high. He seems self-sufficient; he becomes a cushion for others. And because happiness seems unforced, that person usually gets no credit.”
― Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project

“Never start a sentence with the words 'No offense.”
― Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project

“One of the best ways to make yourself happy is to make other people happy. One of the best ways to make other people happy is to be happy yourself.”
― Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project

“What you do every day matters more than what you do once in a while.”
― Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project

“Studies show that aggressively expressing anger doesn't relieve anger but amplifies it. On the other hand, not expressing anger often allows it to disappear without leaving ugly traces.”
― Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project

“Enthusiasm is more important to mastery than innate ability, it turns out, because the single most important element in developing an expertise is your willingness to practice.”
― Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project

“I think adversity magnifies behavior. Tend to be a control freak? You'll become more controlling. Eat for comfort? You'll eat more. And on the positive, if you tend to focus on solutions and celebrate small successes, that's what you'll do in adversity.”
― Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project

“Life, with its rules, its obligations, and its freedoms, is like a sonnet: You're given the form, but you have to write the sonnet yourself. - Mrs. Whatsit”
― Madeleine L'Engle, A Wrinkle in Time

“Books to the ceiling,
Books to the sky,
My pile of books is a mile high.
How I love them! How I need them!
I'll have a long beard by the time I read them.”
― Arnold Lobel

“Think of prayer as a fundamental exercise we use to build core spiritual strength. Like exercise for our bodies, it has to be consistent—every single day—to build strength.”
― Virginia H. Pearce, Through His Eyes: Rethinking What You Believe About Yourself