Quotes about time

A collection of quotes on the topic of time, timing, doing, use.

Best quotes about time

“Time is a drug. Too much of it kills you.”

Terry Pratchett book Small Gods

Source: Small Gods

“Sometimes you have to accept you can't win all the time.”

Lionel Messi (1987) Argentine association football player

“You have to die a few times before you can really
live.”

Charles Bukowski book The People Look Like Flowers at Last

Variant: You have to die a few times before you actually live.
Source: The People Look Like Flowers at Last

“For every book you buy, you should buy the time to read it.”

Karl Lagerfeld (1933–2019) German fashion designer

“You're only as young as the last time you changed your mind.”

Timothy Leary (1920–1996) American psychologist

As quoted in Office Yoga : Simple Stretches for Busy People (2000) by Darrin Zeer, p. 52

“Time is an illusion.”

Albert Einstein (1879–1955) German-born physicist and founder of the theory of relativity

“Do not wait; the time will never be "just right."”

Napoleon Hill book Think and Grow Rich

Start where you stand, and work with whatever tools you may have at your command, and better tools will be found as you go along.
Source: Think and Grow Rich (1938), p. 127

“In time we hate that which we often fear.”

William Shakespeare Antony and Cleopatra

Source: Antony and Cleopatra

“Tough times never last, but tough people do. ”

Robert H. Schuller (1926–2015) American television evangelist

“Sadness flies away on the wings of time.”

Jean De La Fontaine (1621–1695) French poet, fabulist and writer.

Johnny Depp quote: “People cry, not because they are weak. It is because they've been strong for too long.”

Vincent Van Gogh quote: “The only time I feel alive is when I'm painting.”

Tupac Shakur quote: “The only time I have problems is when I sleep.”

Terry Pratchett quote: “Time is a drug. Too much of it kills you.”

Karl Lagerfeld quote: “For every book you buy, you should buy the time to read it.”

Napoleon Hill quote: “Do not wait; the time will never be "just right."”

+ 9 quotes

Kobe Bryant quote: “I've known for a long time that they're a bunch of idiots.”

Ava Gardner quote: “The truth is, honey, I've enjoyed my life. I've had a hell of a good time.”

Johnny Depp quote: “I always felt like I was meant to have been born in another era, another time.”

William Shakespeare quote: “I like this place and could willingly waste my time in it.”

Gilles Villeneuve quote: “I will drive flat out all the time … I love racing.”

Carlos Ruiz Zafón quote: “To truly hate is an art one learns with time.”

Terry Pratchett quote: “There is always time for another last minute”

Virgil quote: “Who knows?
Better times may come to those in pain.”

Paulo Coelho quote: “Everything that happens once can never happen again. But everything that happens twice will surely happen a third time.”

Quotes about time

“…over time he would realize that the higher he was, the less danger he was in and the more he controlled the ever-ready mass.”

José Baroja book No fue un catorce de febrero y otros cuentos

“…the walls of his house were full of images of a happy past, which in his mind seemed like a constant outside of time.”

José Baroja book El curioso caso de la sombra que murió como un recuerdo y otros cuentos

Happiness, Past, Housing

“She kept saying “I love you,” every time they finished, every time he lost himself inside her, every time they reached that amazing ecstasy of two bodies that already know each other; But, deep down, she, little by little, had begun to doubt that “eternal love,” that verb so easy to conjugate.”

José Baroja book El curioso caso de la sombra que murió como un recuerdo y otros cuentos

Love

“No, they never expected or sensed the wishes of that omniscient narrator who, at times, wondered, accompanied by a glass of cabernet, about how his story should be constructed, how this story should develop.”

José Baroja book El curioso caso de la sombra que murió como un recuerdo y otros cuentos

Sense

“That apartment was everything those two lovers needed, locked up by their own will in a space and time, paradoxically, of absolute freedom.”

José Baroja book El curioso caso de la sombra que murió como un recuerdo y otros cuentos

Lovers, Freedom

“If I can't do it, I will work on it until I can. If I become able to do it, I will work on it until I can do it perfectly. If I become able to do it perfectly, I will work on it until I can do it perfectly any number of times.”

Yuzuru Hanyu (1994) Japanese figure skater (1994-)

Annotation: It's unclear, whether this quote is from Hanyu himself or based on a commercial script, but it's commonly attributed to him.
Original: (ja) できなかったら、できるまでやる。できるようになったら、完璧にできるまでやる。完璧にできるようになったら、何度でも、完璧にできるまでやる。
Source: Attributed, Lines from a TV commercial for 味の素アミノバイタル (AJINOMOTO amino VITAL), released on 1 October 2014, as quoted in フィギュアスケート14-15シーズン序盤号, published on 15 November 2014 by 日刊スポーツ新聞社 (Nikkan Sports News).

“I believe that academics do not flow naturally with this world, since, many times, the Academy, from those all-knowing egos, which are not lacking, turns the literary into a mere object lacking spirit.”

José Baroja (1983) Chilean author and editor

Source: Fuente: https://portal.ucm.cl/noticias/academico-la-ucm-presento-segunda-antologia-hijo-perra-otros-cuentos

World, Nature

“I think of the northern country, the United States, where they are specialists, very good at what they do, but sometimes, many times, they have no memory of the things that have happened, because they are so interested in raising money that the past is blurred and give meaning to ignorance on the basis of consumption.”

José Baroja (1983) Chilean author and editor

Source: https://www.peruinforma.com/entrevista-cultural-al-escritor-chileno-jose-baroja/

Money, Thinking, Memory, Past

“People cry, not because they are weak. It is because they've been strong for too long.”

Johnny Depp (1963) American actor, film producer, and musician

People, Strong, Cry

“Help me find a way to pass the time Everybody tellin' me life's short, but I wanna die Help me find a way to make you mine Everybody tellin' me not to, but I'm gonna try Now I'm gettin' high again, tonight”

Lil Peep (1996–2017) American rapper

Song The Brightside, Album: Come Over When You're Sober, Pt. 1

Life, Way, Help

“Runnin' away from you takes time and pain And I don't even want to So, I'm gettin' high all week without you Poppin' pills, thinkin' about you”

Lil Peep (1996–2017) American rapper

Song U Said, Album: Come Over When You're Sober, Pt. 1

Pain

“Education, therefore, has to be organized in such a way that people from all walks of life can participate in educational activities at levels and times of their preference.”

Sukavich Rangsitpol (1935) Thai politician

Education for All People and Education for Life

Life, People, Education, Way

“Looking back on each element, the absence of the audience this time meant that it was difficult to make that connection [with the crowd], but there are a lot of movements in the choreography that try to speak to the audience, so I think that’s also a key appeal for this program.”

Yuzuru Hanyu (1994) Japanese figure skater (1994-)

Translation source: Yuzuru Hanyu – World Championships 2021 Post-SP Interview https://axelwithwings.com/2021/03/26/eng-translation-yuzuru-hanyu-world-championships-2021-post-sp-interview-210326/ by Axel with Wings, published 26 March 2021. (Retrieved 31 March 2021) Annotation: Hanyu had to perform his short program Let me entertain you by Robbie Williams in front of empty rinks due to the COVID-19 pandemic and was asked, what he wanted to express with that piece of music in particular. Other quotes, 2021 Original: (ja) 振り付け1つ1つに、今回はお客さんがいないのでなかなかコネクトすることは難しいですけれども、1つ1つにお客さんとつながるような振りが多くあるので、それもまたこのプログラムの魅力かなと思います。 Source: Part 1 of the interview after the men's short program at Worlds 2021, as quoted in an article https://www.sponichi.co.jp/sports/news/2021/03/25/kiji/20210326s00079000182000c.html by Nippon Sports (Sponichi), published 26 March 2021. (Retrieved 31 March 2021)

Thinking

“When I'm 80 years old and sitting on my rocking chair, I'll be reading Harry Potter. And my family will ask me: «After all this time?» and I'll say: «Always».”

Alan Rickman (1946–2016) English film, television and stage actor

Family, Reading

“I been by myself for a long time I just wish that I could know if I was on your mind Runnin' out of time I just wish that I could know if you were by my side On the day I die, would you even cry?”

Lil Peep (1996–2017) American rapper

Song About U

Cry

“Since we all came from a women, got our name from a women, and our game from a women. I wonder why we take from women, why we rape our women, do we hate our women? I think its time we killed for our women, be real to our women, try to heal our women, cus if we dont we'll have a race of babies that will hate the ladies, who make the babies. And since a man can't make one he has no right to tell a women when and where to create one”

Tupac Shakur (1971–1996) rapper and actor

Women, Hate, Game, Thinking

“I try to find challenges after every competition and overcome them the next time.”

Yuzuru Hanyu (1994) Japanese figure skater (1994-)

Featured quote from Hanyu in his athlete profile https://www.olympicchannel.com/de/athletes/detail/yuzuru-hanyu/ on the Olympic Channel, as of September 2020. Other quotes

“There was a time when I was not sure, if I was a victim of the disaster or a skater, but I feel maybe I am neither of them. I haven't reached a definite answer, but as a skater, I feel so much support from so many people.”

Yuzuru Hanyu (1994) Japanese figure skater (1994-)

Annotation: This quote originates from the same source as the one above.
Page: 46.
Blue Flame II
Original: (ja) 自分は被災者なのかスケーターなのか、ということにすごく迷っていた時期もあったんですけど、どっちでもないのかなという気がしました。明確な答えはまだ出てないですけど、スケーターとして本当にいろんな方に支えられてるなと感じています。

People, Feeling, Support

“The Tenczyn castle dates from the 14th century and it was built as a defensive edifice by Andrzej Toporczyk who after some time took the name of Tenczyński - after the name of the place. For many years the castle was a source of power of the family who played an important part in the politics of old Poland.”

Marek Żukow-Karczewski (1961) Polish historian, journalist and opinion journalist

Tenczyn - a "Bastille"-type castle of the Tenczyński family, "Aura" 2, 1990-02, p. 19-21. http://yadda.icm.edu.pl/yadda/element/bwmeta1.element.agro-7ab5a4ef-bee9-490b-8838-4917699dfedc?q=d88195b-abee-4385-bd61-43f313e62483$6&qt=IN_PAGE

Family, Parting

“Where There is a will
there is a will
to search and discover
a better day

Where a positive heart
is all you need
to rise beyond
and succeed

Where young minds grow
and respect each other
based on their deeds
and not their color

when times are dim
say as I say
"Where there's a will
there's a way!”

Tupac Shakur book The Rose That Grew from Concrete

Source: The Rose That Grew from Concrete

Color, Way, Search, Heart

“I am an optimist... I choose to be. There is a lot of darkness in our world, there is a lot of pain and you can choose to see that or you can choose to see the joy. If you try to respond positively to the world, you will spend your time better.”

Tom Hiddleston (1981) English actor, producer and musical performer

Pain, World, Joy

“Never stop. Never stop fighting. Never stop dreaming. And don’t be afraid of wearing your heart on your sleeve - in declaring the films that you love, the films that you want to make, the life that you’ve had, and the lives you can help reflect in cinema. For myself, for a long time… maybe I felt inauthentic or something, I felt like my voice wasn’t worth hearing, and I think everyone’s voice is worth hearing. So if you’ve got something to say, say it from the rooftops.”

Tom Hiddleston (1981) English actor, producer and musical performer

Love, Life, Making love, Dreams

“What about sunrise, what about rain?
What about all the things that you said we were to gain?
What about flowering fields, is there a time?
What about all the dreams that you said was yours and mine?”

Michael Jackson (1958–2009) American singer, songwriter and dancer

HIStory: Past, Present & Future, Book I (1995)

Dreams, Flowers

“I like roses best. But they bloom in all four seasons. I wonder if people who like roses best have to die four times over again.”

Osamu Dazai book The Setting Sun

Source: The Setting Sun

People, Season

“One time, Niall sat on the floor for hours trying to find a way of putting his M&M's in alphabetical order.”

Louis Tomlinson (1991) English pop singer

https://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/5834782.Louis_Tomlinson

Way

“The Barbican - an element of medieval fortifications; a circular defensive structure with loop-holes, in front of the town walls. In Europe this kind of building has been preserved only at Carcassonne (southern France), Zgorzelec (Görlitz), and of course in Cracow. (…) It was at that time, that one of the largest European buildings of this kind came to to exist in Cracow, being nowadays the best preserved example of the medieval barbican.”

Marek Żukow-Karczewski (1961) Polish historian, journalist and opinion journalist

The Barbican (Barbakan), "Kraków" Magazyn Kulturalny, Special Edition, 1991, p. 58-59. http://pbn.nauka.gov.pl/sedno-webapp/works/509488

“If you have ever seen the play Peter Pan you will remember how the pirate chief was always making his dying speech because he was afraid that possibly when the time came for him to die he might not have time to get it off his chest. It is much the same with me, and so, although I am not at this moment dying, I shall be doing so one of these days and I want to send you a parting word of goodbye.

Remember, it is the last you will ever hear from me, so think it over.

I have had a most happy life and I want each one of you to have as happy a life too.

I believe that God put us in this jolly world to be happy and enjoy life. Happiness doesn't come from being rich, nor merely from being successful in your career, nor by self-indulgence. One step towards happiness is to make yourself healthy and strong while you are a boy, so that you can be useful and so can enjoy life when you are a man.

Nature study will show you how full of beautiful and wonderful things God has made the world for you to enjoy. Be contented with what you have got and make the best of it. Look on the bright side of things instead of the gloomy one.

But the real way to get happiness is by giving out happiness to other people. Try and leave this world a little better than you found it and when your turn come to die, you can die happy in feeling that at any rate you have not wasted your time but have done your best. "Be Prepared" in this way, to live happy and to die happy - stick to your Scout promise always - even after you have ceased to be a boy - and God help you do it.”

Robert Baden-Powell (1857–1941) lieutenant-general in the British Army, writer, founder and Chief Scout of the Scout Movement

Life, God, Happiness, People

“The Krzyżtopór castle which was built in the 17th century belongs to the most splendid Polish buildings of the defensive and palatial character. The castle was famous for its design which accounted for the principles of the division of time (4 towers, 12 large halls, 52 rooms and 365 windows).”

Marek Żukow-Karczewski (1961) Polish historian, journalist and opinion journalist

Krzyżtopór - lordly fortress belonging to the Ossoliński family at Ujazd, "Aura" 7, 1989-07, p. 20-22. http://yadda.icm.edu.pl/yadda/element/bwmeta1.element.agro-10431a86-d55f-41c2-a32b-a56f6d26570e?q=fb98c219-0d8f-4b9e-88ea-9c0f94821cd5$5&qt=IN_PAGE

“Serial killers do, on a small scale, what governments do on a large one. They are a product of the times and these are bloodthirsty times. Even psychopaths have emotions if you dig deep enough. Then again, maybe they don't.”

Richard Ramirez (1960–2013) American serial killer

Interview with Mike Watkiss. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uA6MkH9BHMg

“Only the weak will fall and give up, the strong falls 100 times and wakes up 200 times”

Cornelius Keagon (1996) Liberian humanitarian aid worker

Strong

“there is a place in the heart that
will never be filled

a space

and even during the
best moments
and
the greatest times
times

we will know it

we will know it
more than
ever

there is a place in the heart that
will never be filled
and

we will wait
and
wait

in that space.”

Charles Bukowski (1920–1994) American writer

Waiting, Heart

“Think Thousand times before taking a decision But - After taking decison never turn back even if you get Thousand difficulties!!”

Adolf Hitler (1889–1945) Führer and Reich Chancellor of Germany, Leader of the Nazi Party

Thinking, Decision

“Michael Jackson: There's a time for this, and this you should not do. You should not go out and say, 'Oh he's Jacko'. I'm not a "Jacko."”

Michael Jackson (1958–2009) American singer, songwriter and dancer

I'm "Jackson".
Televised Interview with Barbara Walters(1998)

“Struck intensely tonight by the thought that we live in a great age. We can make music, food, pictures, art, & love with unbelievable unprecedented freedom. It's all there, there for the taking & the making, all the time.”

Tom Hiddleston (1981) English actor, producer and musical performer

Love, Age, Food, Art

“The task of the teacher has come to an end and it is the right time for the student to outshine the master.”

Mwanandeke Kindembo (1996) Congolese author

Teachers

“I would rather be ashes than dust! I would rather that my spark should burn out in a brilliant blaze than it should be stifled by dry-rot. I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom of me in magnificent glow, than a sleepy and permanent planet. The proper function of man is to live, not to exist. I shall not waste my days in trying to prolong them. I shall use my time.”

Jack London (1876–1916) American author, journalist, and social activist

The Bulletin, San Francisco, California, December 2, 1916, part 2, p. 1.
Also included in Jack London’s Tales of Adventure, ed. Irving Shepard, Introduction, p. vii (1956)

Wise

“The only time I feel alive is when I'm painting.”

Vincent Van Gogh (1853–1890) Dutch post-Impressionist painter (1853-1890)

Feeling, Painting

“What I do when I write is that I'll do a raggedy, rough version just to hear the chorus, just to see how much I like the chorus. If it works for me that way when it's raggedy, then I'll know it will just work… Listen to that, that's at home. Janet, Randy, Me… Janet and I are going "Whoo, Whoo… Whoo, Whoo…" I do that same process with every song. It's the melody, it's the melody that's most important, If the melody can sell me, then I'll go to the next step. The idea is to transcribe from what's in your mentality onto tape. If you take a song like "Billie Jean," Where the bass line is the prominent, dominant piece, the protagonist of the song, the main driving riff that you hear, getting the character of the riff to be just the way you want it to be, that takes a lot of time. Listen, you're hearing four basses on there, doing four different personalities, and that's what gives it character, but it takes a lot of work.”

Michael Jackson (1958–2009) American singer, songwriter and dancer

On listening to an early version of Billie Jean on an iPhone
Ebony interview (2007)

Way, Home, Idea, Personality

“Teachers also say that teaching for learning how-to-learn-learn will consume a lot of time. It will be difficult to cover all the content specified by the curriculum if learning uses up too much time on hands-on activities. The less-is-more alternative has not been considered as a possible solution at all in educational reforms where only expanding will bring about progress and development is more. Now is an appropriate time for educators to come down to the heart of educational matters or the learning methods to achieve the less-is-more alternative in all educational reforms.”

Sukavich Rangsitpol (1935) Thai politician

Teacher

Education, Learning, Teachers, Heart

“The proper function of man is to live, not to exist. I shall not waste my days in trying to prolong them. I shall use my time.”

Jack London (1876–1916) American author, journalist, and social activist

Variant: "I shall not waste my days in trying to prolong them. I shall use my time." also mentioned as Jack London quote in Ian Fleming book You Only Live Twice (1964), Ch. 21 : Orbit
Source: San Francisco Bulletin in 1916. Also included as an introduction to a compilation of Jack London short stories in 1956.

For Men

“You gotta make a change. Its time for us as a people to start making some changes, lets change the way we eat, lets change the way we live, and lets change the way we treat each other. You see the old way wasn't working so its on us, to do what we gotta do to survive.”

Tupac Shakur (1971–1996) rapper and actor

People, Way, Change

“When peace comes, we will perhaps in time be able to forgive the Arabs for killing our sons, but it will be harder for us to forgive them for having forced us to kill their sons.”

Golda Meir (1898–1978) former prime minister of Israel

Press conference in London (1969), as quoted in A Land of Our Own : An Oral Autobiography (1973) edited by Marie Syrkin, p. 242
Variant: When peace comes, we will perhaps in time be able to forgive the Arabs for killing our sons, but it will be harder for us to forgive them for having forced us to kill their sons.

Peace, Forgiveness

“I can’t win. Love is Russian roulette for me. No one loves the real me inside. they're all in love with my fame, my stardom.
I fall in love far too quickly and end up getting hurt all the time. I've got scars all over. But I can't help myself because basically I'm a softie I have this hard, macho shell — which I project on stage but there's a much softer side. too, which melts like butter.”

Freddie Mercury (1946–1991) British singer, songwriter and record producer

"Rock On Freddie" (1985).

Love, Help, Hurt

“We are just waves in time and space, changing continuously, and the illusion of individuality is produced through the concatenation of the rapidly succeeding phases of existence. What we define as likeness is merely the result of the symmetrical arrangement of molecules which compose our body.”

Nikola Tesla (1856–1943) Serbian American inventor

Change

“Don't use the same mouth to lie and pray to God at the same time.”

Mwanandeke Kindembo (1996) Congolese author

God, Lie

“It's impossible to fear and love God at the same time. Simply, because you can't enter into heaven and hell at the same time!”

Mwanandeke Kindembo (1996) Congolese author

Love, God, Fear, Hell

“The only time I have problems is when I sleep.”

Tupac Shakur (1971–1996) rapper and actor

Problem, Sleep

“The good times of today are the sad thoughts of tomorrow.”

Bob Marley (1945–1981) Jamaican singer, songwriter, musician

Variant: The good times of today are the sad thoughts of tomorrow.

Sadness, Sad, Heartbreaking

“I can't change the fact that my paintings don't sell. But the time will come when people will recognize that they are worth more than the value of the paints used in the picture.”

Vincent Van Gogh (1853–1890) Dutch post-Impressionist painter (1853-1890)

People, Change, Painting

“This time the struggle is for our freedom, this time the struggle is for our independence! Joy bangla!”

Sheikh Mujibur Rahman (1920–1975) Bengali revolutionary, founder ("father") of Bangladesh

Quote, This time the struggle is for our freedom (1971)

Freedom

“Following the enormous conjecture in the press over the last two weeks, I wish to confirm that I have been tested HIV positive and have AIDS. I felt it correct to keep this information private to date to protect the privacy of those around me. However, the time has come now for my friends and fans around the world to know the truth and I hope that everyone will join with my doctors and all those worldwide in the fight against this terrible disease. My privacy has always been very special to me and I am famous for my lack of interviews. Please understand this policy will continue.”

Freddie Mercury (1946–1991) British singer, songwriter and record producer

Statement to the press (23 November 1991), the day before his death, as quoted at The Biography Channel http://www.thebiographychannel.co.uk/biography_story/338:294/1/Freddie_Mercury.htm.

Truth, World, Disease, Hope

“Time is still the best critic, and patience the best teacher.”

Frédéric Chopin (1810–1849) Polish composer

As quoted in Chopin : Pianist and Teacher as Seen by His Pupils.
Source: Chopin : Pianist and Teacher as Seen by His Pupils (1986) by Jean-Jacques Eigeldinger, Roy Howat, Naomi Shohet, and Krysia Osostowicz, p. 23

Teachers, Patience

“If I had a flower for every time I thought of you, I could walk through my garden forever.”

Alfred, Lord Tennyson (1809–1892) British poet laureate

Flowers, Missing You, Relationship, Cute

“I didn’t grow up in a man’s man world. I grew up with my mum and my sister. But I definitely think in the last two years, I’ve become a lot more content with who I am. I think there’s so much masculinity in being vulnerable and allowing yourself to be feminine, and I’m very comfortable with that. Growing up you don’t even know what those things mean. You have this idea of what being masculine is and as you grow up and experience more of the world, you become more comfortable with who you are. Today it’s easier to embrace masculinity in so many different things. I definitely find – through music, writing, talking with friends and being open – that some of the times when I feel most confident is when I’m allowing myself to be vulnerable. It’s something that I definitely try and do.”

Harry Styles (1994) English singer, songwriter, and actor

In conversation with Timothée Chalamet for i-D Magazine (2 November 2018) https://i-d.vice.com/en_uk/article/evwwma/harry-styles-interviews-timothee-chalamet-photos

World, Music, Feeling, Confidence

“I always say that the times in my life when I've been happiest are the times when I've seen, like, a sunset.”

Chris Evans (actor) (1981) American actor

Life

“Every single pleasure I can imagine or have experienced is more delightful, more of a pleasure, if you take it in small sips, if you take your time. Reading is not an exception.”

Amos Oz (1939–2018) Israeli writer, novelist, journalist and intellectual

Pleasure, Imagination, Reading

“Because in the end, you won’t remember the time you spent working in the office or mowing your lawn. Climb that goddamn mountain.”

Jack Kerouac (1922–1969) American writer

Sometimes credited to Jack Kerouac, from his book The Dharma Bums. It is not a quote by Kerouac. It first appeared as a very brief description of The Dharma Bums in Esquire's list of "The 80 Best Books Every Man Should Read" in 2010: http://www.esquire.com/entertainment/books/g96/80-books/?slide=71. It was later copied by Kilburn Hall in his list of 30 "Books and Authors Every Man Should Read" which he first posted online in 2012: https://kilburnhall.wordpress.com/2012/03/17/the-books-and-authors-every-man-should-read/
Misattributed

Mountain

“As we tell stories about the lives of others, we learn how to imagine what another creature might feel in response to various events. At the same time, we identify with the other creature and learn something about ourselves.”

Martha C. Nussbaum (1947) American philosopher

Feeling, Imagination, Learning

“Where are you? Here
What time is it? Now
What are you? This moment.”

Dan Millman (1946) American self help writer

Source: Way of the Peaceful Warrior: A Book That Changes Lives

“Led Zeppelin is the greatest. Robert Plant is one of the most original vocalists of our time. As a rock band they deserve the kind of success they're getting.”

Freddie Mercury (1946–1991) British singer, songwriter and record producer

As quoted in "Queen's Freddie Mercury Shopping For An Image In London" by Scott Cohen in Circus Magazine (April 1975).

Success

“Why are our songs so dark but our shows a celebration? Because our songs are to help you get through those dark times and our shows are a celebration of you making it through another day. Our shows are celebrating the fact that you’re not alone. So let’s celebrate.”

Tyler Joseph (1988) American singer-songwriter and record producer

Help

“Every struggle in your life has shaped you into the person you are today. Be thankful for the hard times, they can only make you stronger.”

Keanu Reeves (1964) Canadian actor, director, producer and musician

Life, Making love, Personality

“As a realist, you must give me the watch and not the time.”

Mwanandeke Kindembo (1996) Congolese author

“Fool me one time, shame on you. Fool me twice, can't put the blame on you. Fool me three times, fuck the peace sign. Load the chopper, let it rain on you.”

J. Cole (1985) American Song Writer, Rapper and former Pro Basketball Player, From Fayetteville, North Carolina

Source: Song No Role Modelz

Peace, Fools

“I can't judge any of you. I have no malice against you and no ribbons for you. But I think that it is high time that you all start looking at yourselves, and judging the lie that you live in.”

Charles Manson (1934–2017) American criminal and musician

Lie, Thinking

“Inventors don't have time for married life.”

Nikola Tesla (1856–1943) Serbian American inventor

Life

“I want to spend my time with people who don't look to be respected. But such good people won't want to spend their time with me.”

Osamu Dazai book The Setting Sun

Source: The Setting Sun

People

“Worrying is carrying tomorrow's load with today's strength- carrying two days at once. It is moving into tomorrow ahead of time. Worrying doesn't empty tomorrow of its sorrow, it empties today of its strength.”

Corrie ten Boom (1892–1983) Dutch resistance hero and writer

“Each time we don't say what we wanna say, we're dying.”

Yoko Ono (1933) Japanese artist, author, and peace activist

“It seems like every time you come up something happens to bring you back down.”

Tupac Shakur (1971–1996) rapper and actor

“I was trying to figure out what I’m doing, and that was the first time I was constantly being kicked down for doing that. When I didn’t know, I just wanted to say, ‘This is what I want, this is where I am in my professional life, things changed in my personal life, things changed in my heart — everything.’ And people just thought, ‘Alright, this is what we think.’ And yeah, I made some decisions that weren’t great as well, and so did he and that’s why we went through all that to only make us better. And he has heard [the song] and he has seen the video, and it’s something that I feel like girls need hear, and it’s something I’m willing to share with people.”

Selena Gomez (1992) American singer and actress

Life, People, Feeling, Girl

“Nationalism is so beautiful for nationalists. At the same time, you are really opposed to the unification of the world.”

Mwanandeke Kindembo (1996) Congolese author

World, Beauty

“Success is based on time. Therefore, you will be considered successful depending on the era and generation you live in.”

Mwanandeke Kindembo (1996) Congolese author

Success, Dependency

“Nothing in life is to be feared, it is only to be understood. Now is the time to understand more, so that we may fear less.”

Marie Curie (1867–1934) French-Polish physicist and chemist

As quoted in Our Precarious Habitat (1973) by Melvin A. Benarde, p. v

Life, Fear, Understanding, Motivational

“While the Zionists try to make the rest of the World believe that the national consciousness of the Jew finds its satisfaction in the creation of a Palestinian state, the Jews again slyly dupe the dumb Goyim. It doesn't even enter their heads to build up a Jewish state in Palestine for the purpose of living there; all they want is a central organisation for their international world swindler, endowed with its own sovereign rights and removed from the intervention of other states: a haven for convicted scoundrels and a university for budding crooks.
It is a sign of their rising confidence and sense of security that at a time when one section is still playing the German, French-man, or Englishman, the other with open effrontery comes out as the Jewish race.”

Adolf Hitler book Mein Kampf

1920s, Zweites Buch (1928)
Source: Mein Kampf
Context: Jewry is a Folk with a racial core that is not wholly unitary. Nevertheless, as a Folk, it has special intrinsic characteristics which separate it from all other Folks living on the globe. Jewry is not a religious community, but the religious bond between Jews; rather is in reality the momentary governmental system of the Jewish Folk. The Jew has never had a territorially bounded State of his own in the manner of Aryan States. Nevertheless, his religious community is a real State, since it guarantees the preservation, the increase and the future of the Jewish Folk. But this is solely the task of the State. That the Jewish State is subject to no territorial limitation, as is the case with Aryan States, is connected with the character of the Jewish Folk, which is lacking in the productive forces for the construction and preservation of its own territorial State.

World, Confidence, Sense, Universe

“There's a time for departure even when there's no certain place to go.”

Tennessee Williams (1911–1983) American playwright

Departure, Sad, Heartbreaking, Depressing

“Perhaps, somewhere, some day, at a less miserable time, we may see each other again.”

Vladimir Nabokov book Lolita

Source: Lolita

Sad

“I have no advice for anybody; except to, you know, be awake enough to see where you are at any given time, and how that is beautiful, and has poetry inside. Even places you hate.”

Jeff Buckley (1966–1997) American singer, guitarist and songwriter

Hate, Beauty

“I went deep inside myself. I had time to explore my beliefs and because of that I'm stronger.
Bob Marley (March 1981)”

Bob Marley (1945–1981) Jamaican singer, songwriter, musician

“You cannot hope to build a better world without improving the individuals. To that end each of us must work for his own improvement, and at the same time share a general responsibility for all humanity, our particular duty being to aid those to whom we think we can be most useful.”

Marie Curie (1867–1934) French-Polish physicist and chemist

Pierre Curie (1923), as translated by Charlotte Kellogg and Vernon Lyman Kellogg, p. 168

World, Hope, Thinking

“If time travel is possible, where are the tourists from the future?”

Stephen Hawking book A Brief History of Time

Source: A Brief History of Time

Travel, Future

“That was a great time, the summer of '71 - I can't remember it, but I'll never forget it!”

Lemmy Kilmister (1945–2015) British singer-songwriter

Summer, Forgetting

“Death must be so beautiful. To lie in the soft brown earth, with the grasses waving above one’s head, and listen to silence. To have no yesterday, and no tomorrow. To forget time, to forgive life, to be at peace.”

Sylvia Plath book The Bell Jar

Source: The Bell Jar

Life, Death, Lie, Peace

“Maybe it meant something. Maybe not, in the long run, but no explanation, no mix of words or music or memories can touch that sense of knowing that you were there and alive in that corner of time and the world. Whatever it meant.”

Hunter S. Thompson book Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas

Source: Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas

World, Music, Sense, Memory

“Friendship is a priceless gift that cannot be bought nor sold, but its value is far greater than a mountain made of gold; for gold is cold & lifeless - it can neither see nor hear, in time of trouble its powerless to cheer — it has no ears to listen, no heart to understand, it cannot bring you comfort or reach out a helping hand. So when you ask God for a gift, be thankful if sends not diamonds, pearls or riches but the love of real true friends.”

Muhammad Ali (1942–2016) African American boxer, philanthropist and activist

Response to Harold Bell, question about his view on friendship in an Interview (video) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=InSFYdFaS3E.

Love, God, Friendship, Mountain

“I no longer have patience for certain things, not because I’ve become arrogant, but simply because I reached a point in my life where I do not want to waste more time with what displeases me or hurts me. I have no patience for cynicism, excessive criticism and demands of any nature. I lost the will to please those who do not like me, to love those who do not love me and to smile at those who do not want to smile at me. I no longer spend a single minute on those who lie or want to manipulate. I decided not to coexist anymore with pretense, hypocrisy, dishonesty and cheap praise. I do not tolerate selective erudition nor academic arrogance. I do not adjust either to popular gossiping. I hate conflict and comparisons. I believe in a world of opposites and that’s why I avoid people with rigid and inflexible personalities. In friendship I dislike the lack of loyalty and betrayal. I do not get along with those who do not know how to give a compliment or a word of encouragement. Exaggerations bore me and I have difficulty accepting those who do not like animals. And on top of everything I have no patience for anyone who does not deserve my patience.”

Meryl Streep (1949) American actress

Misattributed to Meryl Streep (and widely disseminated on the Internet as of August/September 2014), this quote is allegedly a translation of a text by the author José Micard Teixeira, the original of which begins (in Portuguese): "Já não tenho paciência para algumas coisas, não porque me tenha tornado arrogante..."
Misattributed

Love, Life, Hate, Friendship

“I just don't feel the need to swallow all the time, I only do it because I have to, because, like, saliva's gross or something, but I don't see it that way. It's just spit, what's the big deal? I really don't care.”

Alyson Hannigan (1974) American actress

When asked why she doesn't swallow her saliva very often after being asked if she was sick and she said she wasn't.

Way, Feeling

“Life is suffering, and suffering can make you resentful, murderous, and then genocidal, if you take it far enough. So you need an antidote to suffering. And maybe you think that you can build walls of luxury around yourself, and that that will protect you from the suffering. Good luck with that. That isn't going to work. Maybe you think that you could build a delusion and live inside that. Well, that's going to fall apart. What is there, then, that's going to help you fight against suffering? That's easy: It's the Truth. The Truth is the antidote to suffering. The reason for that is because the Truth puts reality behind you, so that you can face the reality that's coming straight at you without becoming weak and degenerating and becoming resentful and wishing for the destruction of Being, because that's the final Hell. The final Hell is your soul wishing for the destruction of everything, because it's too painful, and you're too bitter. And that happens to people all the time.”

Jordan Peterson (1962) Canadian clinical psychologist, cultural critic, and professor of psychology

Other

Life, Pain, People, Truth

“Just as I was starting on my journey the idea came to me for a new symphony, this time with a program, but a program which will remain an enigma to all— let them guess it who can. It will be called "A Programmatic Symphony" (No. 6). During my trip, while composing in my mind, I frequently shed tears. When I got home I settled down to sketch it, and the work went so furiously that I had the first movement completely ready in less than four days and the remaining movements are already clearly outlined in my head. Half the third movement is already done. There will be much innovation of form in this symphony— and incidentally, the finale will not be a noisy allegro but, on the contrary, a long drawn-out adagio. You can't imagine what bliss I feel, being convinced that my time is not yet passed and I can still work. Perhaps, of course, I'm mistaken, but I don't think so.”

Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky (1840–1893) Russian composer

Letter to a nephew (late February 1893)

Feeling, Home, Imagination, Idea

“I still feel like I'm 15 sometimes and then other times, I'm wanting to feel comfortable in my body and my skin.”

Selena Gomez (1992) American singer and actress

Feeling

“Every time you smile, I smile
And every time you shine, I'll shine for you.”

Taylor Swift (1989) American singer-songwriter

Jump Then Fall, Fearless: Platinum Edition (2009).
Song lyrics

Smile

“When I first heard it, I thought that's extremely challenging, the vocal — it was almost hysterical, and it was so up there, the register, but it was absolutely fascinating. And I know at the time a lot of my friends couldn't bear it, they thought it was just "too much"”

John Lydon (1956) English singer, songwriter, and musician

but that's exactly what drew me in.
On Kate Bush's first hit, "Wuthering Heights"
The Kate Bush Story (2014)

“Time is a vindictive bandit to steal the beauty of our former selves.”

Raphael (1483–1520) Italian painter and architect

Quote from: 1001 quotations to inspire you before you die; Quintessence Editions Ltd., 2016, ISBN 978-1-84403-895-4

Beauty

“For every album I’ve ever made, I’ve written many times more music than has actually been released, and the way I choose which music appears is almost totally random, but one thing I have never done is to make music for the sake of commercialism”

Vangelis (1943) Greek composer of electronic, progressive, ambient, jazz, pop rock, and orchestral music

1984
Context: On albums and commercialism: "For every album I’ve ever made, I’ve written many times more music than has actually been released, and the way I choose which music appears is almost totally random, but one thing I have never done is to make music for the sake of commercialism... I don’t think it’s possible to guarantee commercial success for an album anyway, because nobody really knows what is commercial and what isn’t. Even if I went out of my way to make an album that was more accessible to the public, that would not guarantee its commercial success".

Music, Way, Appearance

“Because we don't know when we will die, we get to think of life as an inexhaustible well. Yet everything happens only a certain number of times, and a very small number really.”

Paul Bowles book The Sheltering Sky

The Sheltering Sky (1949)
Context: Because we don't know when we will die, we get to think of life as an inexhaustible well. Yet everything happens only a certain number of times, and a very small number really. How many more times will you remember a certain afternoon of your childhood, some afternoon that is so deeply a part of your being that you can't even conceive of your life without it? Perhaps four or five times more, perhaps not even that. How many more times will you watch the full moon rise? Perhaps twenty. And yet it all seems limitless.

Life, Thinking

“He had utter disdain for the Nazis and had no time for their racial purity agenda.”

Erich von Manstein (1887–1973) German general

Nuremberg Trial transcripts

“If you hate, then you have been defeated.
Do not allow anyone to diminish you.
Do not fall down to their level that you allow them to lower yourself enough to hate them.
It is exhausting to hate so much…not to mention toxic.
It has caused a prodigious amount of problems that negatively affect you, however it has never solved anything yet.
Do not squander a second of your time to even allow that person to occupy even a tiny part of your mind at all.
Often we hate that which we fear the most.
Let it flow out of you.
Then see how much lighter you feel in your mind, body and soul.”

Stephie Pahlavi Zan

Hate, Fear, Feeling, Soul

“Money beats soul every goddamn time.”

Jim Morrison (1943–1971) lead singer of The Doors

Money, Soul

“Tell the truth. If you tell the truth all the time you don't have to worry three months down the line about what you said three months earlier. Truth is always the truth. You won't have to complicate your life by trying to cover up.”

Ben Carson (1951) 17th and current United States Secretary of Housing and Urban Development; American neurosurgeon

Source: Think Big: Unleashing Your Potential for Excellence

Life, Truth

“We patronize them for their incompleteness, for their tragic fate of having taken form so far below ourselves. And therein we err, and greatly err. For the animal shall not be measured by man. In a world older and more complete than ours they move finished and complete, gifted with extensions of the senses we have lost or never attained, living by voices we shall never hear. They are not brethren, they are not underlings; they are other nations, caught with ourselves in the net of life and time, fellow prisoners of the splendor and travail of the earth.”

Henry Beston (1888–1968) American writer

Source: The Outermost House, 1928, p. 25: Ch 2
Source: The Outermost House: A Year of Life On The Great Beach of Cape Cod
Context: We need another and a wiser and perhaps a more mystical concept of animals. Remote from universal nature, and living by complicated artifice, man in civilization surveys the creature through the glass of his knowledge and sees thereby a feather magnified and the whole image in distortion. We patronize them for their incompleteness, for their tragic fate of having taken form so far below ourselves. And therein we err, and greatly err. For the animal shall not be measured by man. In a world older and more complete than ours they moved finished and complete, gifted with extensions of the senses we have lost or never attained, living by voices we shall never hear. They are not brethren, they are not underlings; they are other nations, caught with ourselves in the net of life and time, fellow prisoners of the splendour and travail of the earth.

Life, Fate, World, Sense