Alasdair > Alasdair's Quotes

“Every lover is, in his heart, a madman, and, in his head, a minstrel.”
― Neil Gaiman, Stardust

“Only once in your life, I truly believe, you find someone who can completely turn your world around. You tell them things that you’ve never shared with another soul and they absorb everything you say and actually want to hear more. You share hopes for the future, dreams that will never come true, goals that were never achieved and the many disappointments life has thrown at you. When something wonderful happens, you can’t wait to tell them about it, knowing they will share in your excitement. They are not embarrassed to cry with you when you are hurting or laugh with you when you make a fool of yourself. Never do they hurt your feelings or make you feel like you are not good enough, but rather they build you up and show you the things about yourself that make you special and even beautiful. There is never any pressure, jealousy or competition but only a quiet calmness when they are around. You can be yourself and not worry about what they will think of you because they love you for who you are. The things that seem insignificant to most people such as a note, song or walk become invaluable treasures kept safe in your heart to cherish forever. Memories of your childhood come back and are so clear and vivid it’s like being young again. Colours seem brighter and more brilliant. Laughter seems part of daily life where before it was infrequent or didn’t exist at all. A phone call or two during the day helps to get you through a long day’s work and always brings a smile to your face. In their presence, there’s no need for continuous conversation, but you find you’re quite content in just having them nearby. Things that never interested you before become fascinating because you know they are important to this person who is so special to you. You think of this person on every occasion and in everything you do. Simple things bring them to mind like a pale blue sky, gentle wind or even a storm cloud on the horizon. You open your heart knowing that there’s a chance it may be broken one day and in opening your heart, you experience a love and joy that you never dreamed possible. You find that being vulnerable is the only way to allow your heart to feel true pleasure that’s so real it scares you. You find strength in knowing you have a true friend and possibly a soul mate who will remain loyal to the end. Life seems completely different, exciting and worthwhile. Your only hope and security is in knowing that they are a part of your life.”
― Bob Marley

“I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where. I love you simply, without problems or pride: I love you in this way because I do not know any other way of loving but this, in which there is no I or you, so intimate that your hand upon my chest is my hand, so intimate that when I fall asleep your eyes close.”
― Pablo Neruda, 100 Love Sonnets

“This life is what you make it. No matter what, you're going to mess up sometimes, it's a universal truth. But the good part is you get to decide how you're going to mess it up. Girls will be your friends - they'll act like it anyway. But just remember, some come, some go. The ones that stay with you through everything - they're your true best friends. Don't let go of them. Also remember, sisters make the best friends in the world. As for lovers, well, they'll come and go too. And baby, I hate to say it, most of them - actually pretty much all of them are going to break your heart, but you can't give up because if you give up, you'll never find your soulmate. You'll never find that half who makes you whole and that goes for everything. Just because you fail once, doesn't mean you're gonna fail at everything. Keep trying, hold on, and always, always, always believe in yourself, because if you don't, then who will, sweetie? So keep your head high, keep your chin up, and most importantly, keep smiling, because life's a beautiful thing and there's so much to smile about.”
― Marilyn Monroe

“Arrow! Black arrow! I have saved you to the last. You have never failed me and I have always recovered you. I had you from my father and he from of old. If ever you came from the forges of the true king under the Mountain, go now and speed well!”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Hobbit, or There and Back Again

“Have you ever been in love? Horrible isn't it? It makes you so vulnerable. It opens your chest and it opens up your heart and it means that someone can get inside you and mess you up.”
― Neil Gaiman, The Sandman, Vol. 9: The Kindly Ones

“You may not be her first, her last, or her only. She loved before she may love again. But if she loves you now, what else matters? She's not perfect—you aren't either, and the two of you may never be perfect together but if she can make you laugh, cause you to think twice, and admit to being human and making mistakes, hold onto her and give her the most you can. She may not be thinking about you every second of the day, but she will give you a part of her that she knows you can break—her heart. So don't hurt her, don't change her, don't analyze and don't expect more than she can give. Smile when she makes you happy, let her know when she makes you mad, and miss her when she's not there.”
― Bob Marley

“You don't love someone because they're perfect, you love them in spite of the fact that they're not.”
― Jodi Picoult, My Sister's Keeper

“When someone loves you, the way they talk about you is different. You feel safe and comfortable.”
― Jess C. Scott, The Intern

“A servant wants to be rewarded for what he does. A lover wants only to be in love's presence, that ocean whose depth will never be known.”
― Jalâl ad-Dîn Rûmî, The Book of Love: Poems of Ecstasy and Longing

“You’ve so distracted me, your absence fans my love. Don’t ask how. Then you come near. “Do not…” I say, and “Do not…,” you answer. Don’t ask why this delights me.”
― Rumi, The Book of Love: Poems of Ecstasy and Longing

“Life is choosing whom and what you love. Everything else follows.”
― Todd Johnson, The Sweet By and By

“Most books on witchcraft will tell you that witches work naked. This is because most books on witchcraft were written by men.”
― Neil Gaiman

“We must kill the false woman who is preventing the live one from breathing.”
― Hélène Cixous

“The only book that is worth writing is the one we don’t have the courage or strength to write. The book that hurts us (we who are writing), that makes us tremble, redden, bleed”
― Hélène Cixous

“There is no greater love than the love the wolf feels for the lamb-it-doesn’t-eat.”
― Hélène Cixous, Stigmata: Escaping Texts

“We should write as we dream; we should even try and write, we should all do it for ourselves, it’s very healthy, because it’s the only place where we never lie. At night we don’t lie. Now if we think that our whole lives are built on lying-they are strange buildings-we should try and write as our dreams teach us; shamelessly, fearlessly, and by facing what is inside very human being-sheer violence, disgust, terror, shit, invention, poetry. In our dreams we are criminals; we kill, and we kill with a lot of enjoyment. But we are also the happiest people on earth; we make love as we never make love in life.”
― Helene Cixous

“And I was afraid. She frightens me because she can knock me down with a word. Because she does not know that writing is walking on a dizzying silence setting one word after the other on emptiness. Writing is miraculous and terrifying like the flight of a bird who has no wings but flings itself out and only gets wings by flying.”
― Hélène Cixous, The Book of Promethea

“This is what’s happening: together we are descending the stairs of the heart, which lead to the sources. (It is a secret staircase. I knew it existed. Which is why I avoided it. Because it leads to the other-life, deep, underground, the fluvial, the painful.)

We are in the process of descending into the depths of the heart. To where bodies communicate with each other.”
― Hélène Cixous, The Book of Promethea

“Every man has his secret sorrows which the world knows not; and often times we call a man cold when he is only sad.”
― Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

“She was a girl who knew how to be happy even when she was sad. And that’s important—you know ”
― Marilyn Monroe

“She wasn't bitter. She was sad, though. But it was a hopeful kind of sad. The kind of sad that just takes time. ”
― Stephen Chbosky, The Perks of Being a Wallflower

“Un-winged and naked, sorrow surrenders its crown to a throne called grace.”
― Aberjhani, The River of Winged Dreams

“There can be no rebirth without a dark night of the soul, a total annihilation of all that you believed in and thought that you were.”
― Pir Vilayat Inayat Khan, Thinking Like the Universe: The Sufi Path of Awakening

“Two roads diverged in a wood, and I -
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.”
― Robert Frost

“Lions are born knowing they are predators. Antelopes understand they are the prey.
Humans are one of the few creatures on Earth given the choice.”
― Patrick H.T. Doyle

“The human body is the best work of art.”
― Jess C. Scott

“Sonnet XVII

I do not love you as if you were salt-rose, or topaz,
or the arrow of carnations the fire shoots off.
I love you as certain dark things are to be loved,
in secret, between the shadow and the soul.

I love you as the plant that never blooms
but carries in itself the light of hidden flowers;
thanks to your love a certain solid fragrance,
risen from the earth, lives darkly in my body.

I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where.
I love you straightforwardly, without complexities or pride;
so I love you because I know no other way than this:

where I does not exist, nor you,
so close that your hand on my chest is my hand,
so close that your eyes close as I fall asleep. ”
― Pablo Neruda

“Dance, when you're broken open. Dance, if you've torn the bandage off. Dance in the middle of the fighting. Dance in your blood. Dance when you're perfectly free.”
― Rumi

“Stop acting so small. You are the universe in ecstatic motion.”
― Rumi