Quotes about thinking
page 42

“He wanted to think of words that would make some difference but there were none in any language he knew that were sufficient to the moment or that would change a single thing.”

Kent Haruf book Eventide

Source: Eventide

Change

“But crazy people never think they're crazy. You're sane just by the virtue of the question.”

Jacquelyn Frank (1968) writer

Source: Seduce Me in Dreams

People, Question

“Perhaps most people in the world aren’t trying to be free, Kafka. They just think they are. It’s all an illusion. If they really were set free, most people would be in a real pickle. You’d better remember that. People actually prefer not being free?”

Haruki Murakami book Kafka on the Shore

Source: Kafka on the Shore

People, World

“It’s a huge thing, this Shift, just as big as I imagined. My brain doesn’t want to think anymore; all of a sudden it wants to do.”

Ned Vizzini book It's Kind of a Funny Story

Source: It's Kind of a Funny Story

Imagination

“Later on in life, you expect a bit of rest, don't you? You think you deserve it. I did, anyway. But then you begin to understand that the reward of merit is not life's business.”

Julian Barnes book The Sense of an Ending

Source: The Sense of an Ending

Life, Understanding, Business

“You'd think getting chopped into a million pieces and cast into the darkest part of the Underworld would give him a subtle clue that nobody wanted him around.”

Rick Riordan book The Sea of Monsters

Source: The Sea of Monsters

Parting

“If you haven't been in a war and are wondering how long it takes to get used to losing everything you think you need or love, I can tell you the answer is no time at all.”

Meg Rosoff book How I Live Now

Source: How I Live Now

Love, War, Time

“Now I know that if you wait until you think you are ready, you'll wait your whole life”

John Flanagan (1873–1938) Irish-American hammer thrower

Source: Erak's Ransom

Life, Waiting

“I can never drive my car over a bridge without thinking of suicide.
I can never look at a lake or an ocean without thinking of suicide.”

Charles Bukowski (1920–1994) American writer

Source: The Captain is Out to Lunch and the Sailors Have Taken Over the Ship

Cars, Suicide

“I used to think the world was broken down by tribes,' I said. 'By Black and White. By Indian and White. But I know this isn't true. The world is only broken into two tribes: the people who are assholes and the people who are not.”

Sherman Alexie book The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian

Source: The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian

People, World

“Watching a coast as it slips by the ship is like thinking about an enigma. There it is before you, smiling, frowning, inviting, grand, mean, insipid, or savage, and always mute with an air of whispering, "Come and find out".”

Joseph Conrad book Heart of Darkness

Source: Heart of Darkness

Smile

“I think infatuation is like a garden. If tended and cared for, it grows into love. If neglected or abused it dies. The only way to have eternal love is to never let your heart forget what it's like to live without it.
-Vane”

Sherrilyn Kenyon (1965) Novelist

Source: Night Play

Love, Way, Heart, Forgetting

“Being a teenager isn't all that different from being part of someone else's story. There's always someone who thinks they know better than you do”

Jodi Picoult (1966) Author

Source: Between the Lines

Parting

“He loved constantly, instantly, spontaneously, without thought or words. That's what he taught me. Love is not something you think about, it is a state in which you dwell. That was his gift.”

Christopher Moore book Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal

Source: Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal

Love

“Work is a blessing when it helps us to think about what were doing; but it become a curse when its sole use is to stop us thinking about the meaning of our life.”

Paulo Coelho book Like the Flowing River

Source: Like the Flowing River

Life, Help

“Do you think there's a difference? Between belonging with and belonging to?”

Jenny Han book To All the Boys I've Loved Before

Source: To All the Boys I've Loved Before

“It be better, I think, to climb out in search of something, instead of hating, what you're leaving.”

Lois Lowry Son

Source: Son

Hate, Search

“I think that when you live in a world with limits… when you've met everyone and seem everything you're going to see - you lose the hope that something extraordinary will happen in your life”

Jodi Picoult (1966) Author

Source: Between the Lines

Life, World, Hope

“Endeavoring to purchase something we think beautiful may in fact be the most unimaginative way of dealing with the longing it excites in us, just as trying to sleep with someone may be the bluntest response to a feeling of love.”

Alain de Botton book The Architecture of Happiness

Source: The Architecture of Happiness

Love, Beauty, Way, Feeling

“Personally, I think they killed the bear because they were afraid of it. That s what people do, kill the things they re afraid of.”

Michael Thomas Ford (1968) American writer

Source: Suicide Notes

People, Personality

“I smile, now, thinking: we all like to think we are important enough to need psychiatrists”

Sylvia Plath (1932–1963) American poet, novelist and short story writer

Source: The Unabridged Journals of Sylvia Plath

Smile

“Dare to think!”

Immanuel Kant (1724–1804) German philosopher

Source: What is Enlightenment?

“I don't like people who like me because I'm a Negro; neither do I like people who find in the same accident grounds for contempt. I love America more than any other country in the world, and, exactly for this reason, I insist on the right to criticize her perpetually. I think all theories are suspect, that the finest principles may have to be modified, or may even be pulverized by the demands of life, and that one must find, therefore, one's own moral center and move through the world hoping that this center will guide one aright.”

James Baldwin (1924–1987) (1924-1987) writer from the United States

Autobiographical Notes (1952)
Context: I don't like people who like me because I'm a Negro; neither do I like people who find in the same accident grounds for contempt. I love America more than any other country in the world, and, exactly for this reason, I insist on the right to criticize her perpetually. I think all theories are suspect, that the finest principles may have to be modified, or may even be pulverized by the demands of life, and that one must find, therefore, one's own moral center and move through the world hoping that this center will guide one aright. I consider that I have many responsibilities, but none greater than this: to last, as Hemingway says, and get my work done.
I want to be an honest man and a good writer.

Love, Life, People, World

“When Vishous pushed open the door to the exam room, he got a gander at the kind of seating arrangement that made him think fondly of castration.”

Jessica Bird (1969) U.S. novelist

Source: Lover Unleashed

“I don't know if mama was right, that we each have a destiny, or if if was Lt Dan, that we are all just floating around, accidental, like on a breeze, but I think… I think… maybe… it's both happening at the same time.”

Winston Groom Forrest Gump

Source: Forrest Gump

Time

“The individual's duty is to do what he wants to do, to think whatever he likes, to be accountable to no one but himself, to challenge every idea and every person.”

Jean Paul Sartre book The Age of Reason

Source: The Age of Reason

Idea, Personality

“But you love her.”
Will stared at him. “Of course I do,” he
said finally. “I had come to think I would
never love anyone, but I love her.”

Cassandra Clare book Clockwork Prince

Source: Clockwork Prince

Love

“I have met with women whom I really think would like to be married to a Poem and to be given away by a Novel.”

John Keats (1795–1821) English Romantic poet

Women

“Toohey: "Mr. Roark, we're alone here. Why don't you tell me what you think of me? In any words you wish. No one will hear us."
Roark: "But I don't think of you.”

Ayn Rand book The Fountainhead

Source: The Fountainhead

“If you want to identify me, ask me not where I live, or what I like to eat, or how I comb my hair, but ask me what I am living for, in detail, ask me what I think is keeping me from living fully for the thing I want to live for.”

Thomas Merton (1915–1968) Priest and author

“You’re better than this, Adrian. Whatever the reason, you’re better than it. Don’t trick yourself into thinking you’re weaker than you are”

Richelle Mead book Silver Shadows

Source: Silver Shadows

“… have you ever found God in church? I never did. I just found a bunch of folks hoping for him to show. Any God I ever felt in church I brought in with me. And I think all the other folks did too. They come to church to share God, not find God.”

Alice Walker book The Color Purple

Source: The Color Purple

God, Hope

“I don't think we have a future. I know we do. I want to marry you and have kids and be a stay-at-home writer dad while you take Boston journalism by storm. I want to wake up beside you every day for the rest of my life.”

Shannon Stacey (1972) american writer

Source: Exclusively Yours

Life, Home, Future

“…and you smile back and try not to think about the fact that you have nothing, absolutely nothing, to say to each other.”

David Nicholls book One Day

Source: One Day

Smile

“We do not live to think, but, on the contrary, we think in order that we may succeed in surviving.”

José Ortega Y Gasset (1883–1955) Spanish liberal philosopher and essayist

“I often think how unadventurous my life must seem from the outside, though I do like my job.”

Mary Hoffman book City of Flowers

Source: City of Flowers

Life

“I think you don't grow up until you stop worrying about other people's purposes or lack of them and find the purposes you believe in for yourself.”

Orson Scott Card book Xenocide

Source: Xenocide

People

“I see time away hasn’t made you any more charming. (Fang)
Oh, I can be charming. I just choose not to. People start to think you like them, then when you stab them in the back, they take it so personally. Really pisses me off. (Thorn)”

Sherrilyn Kenyon (1965) Novelist

Source: Bad Moon Rising

People, Time, Personality

“no army has ever marched into battle thinking that the Creator had sided with their enemy.”

Terry Goodkind book Wizard's First Rule

Source: Wizard's First Rule

“Most people think it takes a long time to change. It doesn’t. Change is immediate! Instantaneous! It may take a long time to decide to change…but change happens in a heartbeat!”

Andy Andrews (1959) author and corporate speaker

Source: The Noticer: Sometimes, All a Person Needs Is a Little Perspective

People, Change, Time

“I've often thought that there isn't any "I" at all; that we are simply the means of expression of something else; that when we think we are ourselves, we are simply the victims of a delusion.”

Aleister Crowley book Diary of a Drug Fiend

Source: Diary of a Drug Fiend

“She was the kind of person who took care of things by herself. She’d never ask anybody for advice or help. It wasn’t a matter of pride, I think. She just did what seemed natural to her.”

Haruki Murakami book Norwegian Wood

Source: Norwegian Wood

Nature, Help, Personality

“Men think that self-sacrifice is the most charming of all the cardinal virtues for women, and in order to keep it in healthy working order, they make opportunities for its illustration as often as possible. I would fain teach women that self-development is a higher duty than self-sacrifice.”

Elizabeth Cady Stanton book The Woman's Bible

The Woman's Bible (1898)
Source: The Woman's Bible: A Classic Feminist Perspective

Women, Men

“The Clave thinks the wards will stand forever because they’ve stood for a thousand years. But so did Rome, till the barbarians came. Everything falls someday”

Cassandra Clare (1973) American author

“This was an evil beyond thinking. The killing of a man was not so evil as the killing of a boat. For a boat does not have sons, and a boat cannot protect itself, and a wounded boat does not heal.”

John Steinbeck book The Pearl

Source: The Pearl

Evil

“If you think you can, you can. If you think you can't, you're right.”

Mary Kay Ash (1918–2001) Entrepreneur

Variant: If you think you can, you can. And if you think you can not, you are right.

“Nothing is ever finished and done with in this world. You may think a seed was finished and done with when it falls like a dead thing into the earth; but when it puts forth leaves and flowers next spring you see your mistake.”

Elizabeth Goudge book The Little White Horse

Source: The Little White Horse

World, Spring, Flowers, Dead

“He plants his feet stubbornly, adopting what he must think is an heroic post. He's just begging for a pigeon to fly by and relieve itself.”

Libba Bray A Great and Terrible Beauty

Source: A Great and Terrible Beauty

Flying

“So remember it, lad. If your head thinks up mischief, your backside's going to pay for it. Brian Fraser to young Jamie”

Diana Gabaldon book Outlander

Source: Outlander

“For in the end, he was trying to tell us what afflicted the people in 'Brave New World' was not that they were laughing instead of thinking, but that they did not know what they were laughing about and why they had stopped thinking.”

Neil Postman (1931–2003) American writer and academic

Source: Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business

People, World, Affliction

“I always think of books as being like people. Even the dull ones are worthy of decent respect, but you don't have to seek them out and spend time with them.”

Orson Scott Card Treasure Box

Source: Treasure Box

People, Books, Time

“But somethings in life are more important than being happy. Like being free to think for yourself.”

Jon Krakauer (1954) American outdoors writer and journalist

Life, Happiness

“My idea of Christmas, whether old-fashioned or modern, is very simple: loving others. Come to think of it, why do we have to wait for Christmas to do that?”

Bob Hope (1903–2003) American comedian, actor, singer and dancer

Love, Idea, Fashion, Waiting

“If you think you are enlightened; go home for Thanksgiving.”

Ram Dass (1931–2019) American contemporary spiritual teacher and the author of the 1971 book Be Here Now

Home

“I think we have established in so many ways that I am hot enough for the both of us”

Cassandra Clare book City of Heavenly Fire

Source: City of Heavenly Fire

Way

“Who wants us?" Bianca demanded. "Because if you think you'll get a ransom, you're wrong. We don't have any family. Nico and I—" Her voice broke a little. "We've got no one but each other.”

Rick Riordan book The Titan's Curse

Source: The Titan's Curse

Family

“Sometimes a man doesn’t know what to do about things and sometimes it’s best to lie very still and try not to think at all about anything.”

Charles Bukowski (1920–1994) American writer

Source: Burning in Water, Drowning in Flame

Lie

“Fool! You may hate me… But I… I haven't stopped thinking of you for a single day.”

Rumiko Takahashi (1957) manga artist

Source: InuYasha: Stolen Spirit

Hate, Fools

“Maybe all the schemes of the devil were nothing compared to what man could think up.”

Joe Hill (1879–1915) Swedish-American labor activist, songwriter, and member of the Industrial Workers of the World

Source: Horns

“Really? And what curse befalls the Adams of the world?"
Ann opens her mouth and, presumably thinking of nothing to say, closes it again.
It is Felicity who answers, eyes steely. "They are weak to temptation. And we are their temptresses.”

Libba Bray book Rebel Angels

Source: Rebel Angels

World

“How Do you spell relax?" I whispered, holding his head with my hands.
I think the answer is f-u-c-k-m-e." He answered.”

Yasmine Galenorn (1961) American writer

Source: Dragon Wytch

“I don't think the money people in Hollywood have ever thought I was normal, but I am dedicated to my work and that's what counts.”

Angelina Jolie (1975) American actress, film director, and screenwriter

Money, People

“Pippa's laugh is bitter, tinged with tears. 'Ha! Why do girls think being beautiful will solve every problem? Being beautiful just creates problems. It's a misery. I wish I were someone else.”

Libba Bray A Great and Terrible Beauty

Source: A Great and Terrible Beauty

Beauty, Girl, Problem, Tear

“Zeus will destroy you!' she promised. 'Hades will have your soul!'
'' I yelled
I wasn't sure where the Latin came from. I think it meant 'Eat my pants!”

Rick Riordan book The Lightning Thief

Source: The Lightning Thief

Soul

“Stop thinking all the time that you're in the way, that you're bothering the person next to you. If people don't like it, they can complain. And if they don't have courage to complain, that's their problem.”

Paulo Coelho (1947) Brazilian lyricist and novelist

Source: Veronika Decides to Die

People, Way, Courage, Problem

“Even if I thought he as perfect for her." She turned to face him. "What were we thinking?"

"We weren't," he said. "We were in love.”

Nicholas Sparks book The Best of Me

Source: The Best of Me

Love, Perfection

“Do you think it would be quite so easy to kill them now that your weapon has been destroyed?' he sneered. 'No,' she said, frowning at him, 'Obviously not.”

Derek Landy (1974) Irish children's writer

Source: Death Bringer

“It is foolish to think that we will enter heaven without entering into ourselves.”

Teresa of Ávila (1515–1582) Roman Catholic saint

“It's funny, but you never really think much about breathing. Until it's all you ever think about.”

Tim Winton book Breath

Source: Breath

“Hunches [are] just messages from the subconscious, which [is] thinking furiously all the time and processing information we have not consciously noted.”

Dean Koontz book Intensity

Source: Intensity

Time

“What we don't let out traps us. We think, "No one else feels this way, I must be crazy." So we don't say anything. And we become enveloped by a deep loneliness, not knowing where our feelings come from or what to do with them. "Why do I feel this way? Last week, I was on top of the world and now my feelings don't make sense." Voicing it, getting it out and letting it other people hear it, helps to dissipate it. The fears and self-criticisms begin to leak. And we begin to heal.”

Sabrina Ward Harrison (1975) Canadian writer

Quoted by Katherine Martin in Women of Courage: Inspiring Stories from the Women Who Lived Them, p. 268 (1999)

People, World, Fear, Way

“For what's the use of talking with a man who has a disease and thinks about the stars?”

Bertolt Brecht (1898–1956) German poet, playwright, theatre director

Disease, Star

“Oh yeah, Scooby, it does. You and I have gone round many a day. I’m the reason you keep thinking you’ve had alien abductions. (Caleb)”

Sherrilyn Kenyon (1965) Novelist

Source: Infinity

“Really, when I think it over, literature has only one excuse for existing; it saves the person who makes it from the disgustingness of life.”

Joris-Karl Huysmans book Là-Bas

Source: Là-Bas

Life, Literature, Personality

“You know, Aunt Tasha makes jokes about how youʹd actually be a better queen than the others, except sometimes… I donʹt think sheʹs joking.”

Richelle Mead book Last Sacrifice

Source: Last Sacrifice

“Baby," she says in a harsh whisper, "in this world, lots of people will try to grind you down. They need you to be small so they can be big. You let them think whatever they want, but you make sure you get yours. You get yours.”

Holly Black book Red Glove

Source: Red Glove

People, World, Baby

“Although many of us may think of ourselves as thinking creatures that feel, biologically we are feeling creatures that think”

Jill Bolte Taylor (1959) American neuroscientist

Source: My Stroke of Insight: A Brain Scientist's Personal Journey

Feeling

“…we can not love or think except in fragments of time each of which goes along its own trajectory and immediately disappears.”

Italo Calvino (1923–1985) Italian journalist and writer of short stories and novels

Source: If on a Winter's Night a Traveler

Love, Time

“I often think we should have tattooed on the back of whatever hand we use to shoot or write, 'I might be wrong.”

Louise Penny book A Fatal Grace

Source: A Fatal Grace

Tattoo

“A guy who is crazily, madly in love with you. A guy who sees how incredible and amazing you are, even though you’re not the cheerleader or even close to the prettiest girl in the school. A guy who thinks you’re beautiful, just the way you are.”

Candace Bushnell book The Carrie Diaries

Source: The Carrie Diaries

Love, School, Beauty, Way

“Please don't die," she whispered. "I don't think I can bury
you. I already buried everyone else."

"How can I die," Alexander said, his voice breaking, "when you
have poured your immortal blood into me?”

Paullina Simons book The Bronze Horseman

Source: The Bronze Horseman

“Nobody had forgotten anything here. In Berlin, you had to wrestle with the past, you had to build on the ruins, inside them. It wasn't like America where we scraped the earth clean, thinking we could start again every time.”

Janet Fitch book White Oleander

Source: White Oleander

Time, Past

“Lord Peter Wimsey: I always have a quotation for everything - it saves original thinking.”

Dorothy L. Sayers book Have His Carcase

Variant: Lord Peter Wimsey: A facility for quotation covers the absence of original thought.
Source: Have His Carcase (1932)

“And that's when I know it's over. As soon as you start thinking about the beginning, it's the end.”

Junot Díaz book This Is How You Lose Her

Source: This Is How You Lose Her

“They say I'm old-fashioned, and live in the past, but sometimes I think progress progresses too fast!”

Dr. Seuss (1904–1991) American children's writer and illustrator, co-founder of Beginner Books

Fashion, Past

“I think to myself that when you're in love, sometimes you have to swallow your pride, and sometimes you have to fight to keep your pride. It's a balance. But when the relationship is right, you find that balance.”

Emily Giffin Something Borrowed

Variant: When you’re in love, sometimes you have to swallow your pride, and sometimes you have to keep your pride. It’s a balance. But when the relationship is right, you find the balance.
Source: Something Borrowed

Love, Fight