Quotes about doing
page 17

“Women, as some witty Frenchman once put it, inspire us with the desire to do masterpieces and always prevent us from carrying them out.”

Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) Irish writer and poet

Source: The Picture of Dorian Gray and Other Writings

Women

“Nothing is lost that we do not first see as lost. Visions born of fear give birth to our failing.
Visions born of hope give birth to our success.
What is possible lives within us, and it only remains for us to discover it.”

Terry Brooks (1944) American writer

Fear, Hope, Birth, Success

“Do not, as some ungracious pastors do,
Show me the steep and thorny way to heaven;
Whilst, like a puff'd and reckless libertine,
Himself the primrose path of dalliance treads
And recks not his own read.”

William Shakespeare Hamlet

Source: Hamlet

Way, Reading

“The finest actor is he who play the comedy of life perfectly, as i aspire to do. To walk well, talk well, weep well, laugh well and die well, it is all pure acting, because in every man there is the dumb dreadful immortal spirit who is real- who cannot act, who-is and who steadily maintains an infinite though speechless protest against the body's lies”

Marie Corelli (1855–1924) British writer

Source: The Sorrows of Satan or The Strange Experience of One Geoffrey Tempest, Millionaire

Life

“You can't just sit there and put everyone's lives ahead of yours and think that counts as love. You just can't. You have to do things.”

Stephen Chbosky (1970) American writer

Love, Thinking

“If you're bored with life, if you don't get up every morning with a burning desire to do things, you don't have enough goals.”

Lou Holtz (1937) American college football coach, professional football coach, television sports announcer

Life

“It is part of a good man to do great and noble deeds, though he risk everything.”

Plutarch (46–127) ancient Greek historian and philosopher

For Men, Parting

“Act as if what you do makes a difference. It does.”

William James (1842–1910) American philosopher, psychologist, and pragmatist

Motivational, Success, Wise, Deep

“I worried so much about how I looked and whether I was doing things right, I felt half the time I was impersonating a girl instead of really being one.”

Sue Monk Kidd book The Secret Life of Bees

Source: The Secret Life of Bees

Girl, Time

“Life is a great surprise. I do not see why death should not be an even greater one.”

Vladimir Nabokov (1899–1977) Russian-American novelist, lepidopterist, professor

Life, Death

“We don’t do what we do for the glory or the fame or the credit; we do it for the quiet satisfaction of making the world a better place, saving the lives of innocents, and being better than you are.”

Derek Landy (1974) Irish children's writer

Source: Dark Days

World

“If you care about being thought credible and intelligent, do not use complex language where simpler language will do.”

Daniel Kahneman book Thinking, Fast and Slow

Source: Thinking, Fast and Slow

Intelligence

“If the first woman God ever made was strong enough to turn the world upside down all alone, the women together ought to be able to turn back and get it right side up again! and now they is asking to do it, the men better let them.”

Sojourner Truth (1797–1883) African-American abolitionist and women's rights activist

Ain't I a Woman? Speech (1851)

Women, Men, God, World

“What dark secrets do you keep hidden from the world? Where would you go if no one could find you? What would you do if no one could see you?”

P. C. Cast book Hunted

Source: Hunted

Secret, World

“We are all carrying so many things in our life and inside ourselves. Often it feels there is no place to put them down. Where do you place the questions you carry”

Sabrina Ward Harrison (1975) Canadian writer

Source: Spilling Open: The Art of Becoming Yourself

Life, Feeling, Question

“If I do not believe as you believe, it proves that you do not believe as I believe, and that is all that it proves.”

Thomas Paine (1737–1809) English and American political activist

“But sometimes you gotta do stuff you don’t want to do.”

P. C. Cast book Burned

Source: Burned

“Since Stark had come back from the Otherworld, he'd been too weak and out of it to do much more than eat, sleep, and play computer games with Seoras, which was actually a super weird sight, it was like high school meets Braveheart meets Call of Duty.”

P. C. Cast book Awakened

Source: Awakened

School, Game, Sleep

“If there are no stupid questions, then what kind of questions do stupid people ask? Do they get smart just in time to ask questions?”

Scott Adams (1957) cartoonist, writer

People, Stupidity, Question, Time

“The purpose of life is not to do what we want but what needs to be done.”

Christopher Paolini book Brisingr

Variant: The purpose of life is not to do what we want but what needs to be done. This is what fate demands of us.
Source: Brisingr

Life

“To teach how to live without certainty, and yet without being paralyzed by hesitation, is perhaps the chief thing that philosophy, in our age, can still do for those who study it.”

Bertrand Russell book A History of Western Philosophy

Source: A History of Western Philosophy

Age, Study

“Wait until next time," he warned. "I'll do things that'll make you lose control within seconds.”

Richelle Mead book Last Sacrifice

Variant: Next time I will do things to you that will make you lose controll in seconds"
-Dimitri.
Source: Last Sacrifice

Time, Waiting

“When people kill themselves, they think they're ending the pain, but all they're doing is passing it on to those they leave behind.”

Jeannette Walls (1960) American writer and journalist

Pain, People, Thinking

“What you're supposed to do when you don't like a thing is change it. If you can't change it, change the way you think about it. Don't complain.”

Maya Angelou book Wouldn't Take Nothing for My Journey Now

Source: Wouldn't Take Nothing for My Journey Now

Way, Thinking, Change

“Reality offers us such wealth that we must cut some of it out on the spot, simplify. The question is, do we always cut out what we should? ”

Henri Cartier-Bresson (1908–2004) French photographer

Question, Reality, Wealth

“Never apologize for showing feeling, my friend. Remember that when you do so, you apologize for truth.”

Benjamin Disraeli (1804–1881) British Conservative politician, writer, aristocrat and Prime Minister

Part 1, Chapter 13; sometimes paraphrased: "Never apologize for showing feeling. When you do so, you apologize for the truth."
Books, Coningsby (1844), Contarini Fleming (1832)

Truth, Feeling

“To explain all nature is too difficult a task for any one man or even for any one age. 'Tis much better to do a little with certainty, & leave the rest for others that come after you, than to explain all things by conjecture without making sure of any thing.”

Isaac Newton (1643–1727) British physicist and mathematician and founder of modern classical physics

Statement from unpublished notes for the Preface to Opticks (1704) quoted in Never at Rest: A Biography of Isaac Newton (1983) by Richard S. Westfall, p. 643

Age, Nature

“Never give up on what you really want to do. The person with big dreams is more powerful than one with all the facts.”

H. Jackson Brown, Jr. (1940) American writer

Source: Life's Little Instruction Book: 511 Suggestions, Observations, and Reminders on How to Live a Happy and Rewarding Life

Funny, Powerful, Dreams, Personality

“He who can copy can do.”

Leonardo Da Vinci (1452–1519) Italian Renaissance polymath

“The last ever dolphin message was misinterpreted as a surprisingly sophisticated attempt to do a double-backwards-somersault through a hoop whilst whistling the 'Star Spangled Banner', but in fact the message was this:”

Douglas Adams The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy pentalogy

Source: The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

Star

“Men of lofty genius when they are doing the least work are most active.”

Leonardo Da Vinci (1452–1519) Italian Renaissance polymath

Men

“It's only those who do nothing that make no mistakes, I suppose.”

Joseph Conrad book An Outcast of the Islands

Source: An Outcast of the Islands (1896), Pt. 3, Ch. 2; possibly an adaptation of a Polish proverb, "Ten się nie myli, kto nic nie robi" — "One is not wrong, who does nothing."

“Always dream and shoot higher than you know you can do. Don't bother just to be better than your contemporaries or predecessors. Try to be better than yourself.”

William Faulkner (1897–1962) American writer

Paris Review interview (1958)
Context: Always dream and shoot higher than you know you can do. Don't bother just to be better than your contemporaries or predecessors. Try to be better than yourself. An artist is a creature driven by demons. He don’t know why they choose him and he’s usually too busy to wonder why. He is completely amoral in that he will rob, borrow, beg, or steal from anybody and everybody to get the work done.

Dreams

“Things do not grow better; they remain as they are. It is we who grow better, by the changes we make in ourselves.”

Swami Vivekananda (1863–1902) Indian Hindu monk and phylosopher

Change

“Don't limit yourself. Many people limit themselves to what they think they can do. You can go as far as your mind lets you. What you believe remember you can achieve.”

Mary Kay Ash (1918–2001) Entrepreneur

For women, People, Thinking

“When you judge others, you do not define them, you define yourself”

Earl Nightingale (1921–1989) American motivational speaker

“…she was struck by the simple truth that sometimes the most ordinary things could be made extraordinary, simply by doing them with the right people.”

Nicholas Sparks book The Lucky One

Elizabeth Green, Chapter 15, Beth, p. 274
Variant: Sometimes the most ordinary things could be made extraordinary, simply by doin them with the right people.(Elizabeth Green)
Source: 2000s, The Lucky One (2008)

People, Truth

“I do note with interest that old women in my books become young women on the covers… this is discrimination against the chronologically gifted.”

Terry Pratchett (1948–2015) English author

Women, Books

“Do not be a magician - be magic!”

Leonard Cohen book Beautiful Losers

Source: Beautiful Losers

“Empathy is not simply a matter of trying to imagine what others are going through, but having the will to muster enough courage to do something about it. In a way, empathy is predicated upon hope.”

Cornel West (1953) African-American philosopher and political/civil rights activist

Hope, Way, Imagination, Courage

“But let me tell you this: sometimes at night, when I look up at the stars, an see the whole sky jus laid out there, don't you think I ain't rememberin it all. I still got dreams like anybody else, an ever so often, I am thinkin about how things might of been. An then, all of a sudden, I'm forty, fifty, sixty years ole, you know?
Well, so what? I may be a idiot, but most of the time, anyway, I tried to do the right thing-- an dreams is jus dreams, ain't they? So whatever else has happened, I am figgerin this: I can always look back an say, at least I ain't led no hum-drum life.
You know what I mean?”

Winston Groom Forrest Gump

Source: Forrest Gump

Life, Dreams, Star, Thinking

“I do not ask the wounded person how he feels, I myself become the wounded person.”

Walt Whitman Song of Myself

Source: Song of Myself

Feeling, Personality

“Do what you do for the sheer joy of it,
Do what you choose, not what someone else chooses for you.”

Neale Donald Walsch (1943) American writer

Joy

“Technology and comfort - having those, people speak of culture, but do not have it.”

Thomas Mann book Doctor Faustus

Source: Doctor Faustus

People

“When you know better… You do better.”

Oprah Winfrey (1954) American businesswoman, talk show host, actress, producer, and philanthropist

Funny, Heart Touching, Graduation

“If you can develop this ability to see what you look at, to understand its meaning, to readjust your knowledge to this new information, you can continue to learn and to grow as long as you live and you’ll have a wonderful time doing it.”

Eleanor Roosevelt (1884–1962) American politician, diplomat, and activist, and First Lady of the United States

Source: You Learn by Living: Eleven Keys for a More Fulfilling Life

Understanding, Knowledge, Learning, Time

“When people do not respect us we are sharply offended; yet deep down in his private heart no man much respects himself.”

Mark Twain (1835–1910) American author and humorist

People, Heart

“Do you know, darling? When you became involved with others you quite possibly stepped down a level or two, but If you become involved with me, you will be throwing yourself into the abyss.”

Franz Kafka book Letters to Milena

Source: Letters to Milena

“William: "I'm sure we can all pull together, sir."
Vetinari: "Oh, I do hope not. Pulling together is the aim of despotism and tyranny. Free men pull in all kinds of directions.”

Terry Pratchett book The Truth

Source: The Truth

Men, Hope

“Punctuality is for people with nothing better to do”

Jim Butcher book Small Favor

Source: Small Favor

People

“Once conform, once do what other people do because they do it, and a lethargy steals over all the finer nerves and faculties of the soul.”

Virginia Woolf (1882–1941) English writer

People, Soul

“Suffer love! A good ephitet! I do suffer love indeed, for I love thee against my will.”

William Shakespeare book Much Ado About Nothing

Source: Much Ado About Nothing

Love, Suffering

“I cannot say this too strongly: Do not compare yourselves to others. Be true to who you are, and continue to learn with all your might.”

Daisaku Ikeda (1928) Japanese writer

Source: Discussions on Youth

Learning

“The seasons do not push one another; neither do clouds race the wind across the sky. All things happen in their own good time.”

Dan Millman (1946) American self help writer

Time, Season

“His sudden mad love for Sibyl Vane was a psychological phenomenon of no small interest. There was no doubt that curiosity had much to do with it, curiosity and the desire for new experiences; yet it was not a simple but rather a very complex passion.”

Oscar Wilde book The Picture of Dorian Gray

Source: The Picture of Dorian Gray

Love, Passion, Madness

“You mustn’t wish for another life. You mustn’t want to be somebody else. What you must do is this:
“Rejoice evermore.
Pray without ceasing.
In everything give thanks.”
I am not all the way capable of so much, but those are the right instructions.”

Wendell Berry (1934) author

Source: Hannah Coulter

Life, Way

“D’you know what happens when you hurt people?’ Ammu said. ‘When you hurt people, they begin to love you less. That’s what careless words do. They make people love you a little less.”

Arundhati Roy book The God of Small Things

Source: The God of Small Things

Love, People, Hurt

“Gaea?” Leo shook his head. “Isn’t that Mother Nature? She’s supposed to have, like, flowers in her hair and birds singing around her and dear and rabbits doing her laundry.”
“Leo, that’s Snow White,” Piper said.”

Rick Riordan book The Lost Hero

Source: The Lost Hero

Flowers, Nature, Bird, Singing

“He pulls me around and kisses me. "You're Mac," he says. "And I'm Jericho. And nothing else matters. Never will. You exist in a place that is beyond all rules for me. Do you understand that?"
I do.
Jericho Barrons just told me he loves me.”

Karen Marie Moning (1964) author

Source: Shadowfever

Love, Understanding, Kiss

“You'll never achieve real success unless you like what you're doing.”

Dale Carnegie (1888–1955) American writer and lecturer

Success

“Falling hard for somebody makes you do things you never thought you'd do before. Like pulling off an A in History or finally facing the truth about yourself”

Steve Kluger book Almost Like Being in Love

Source: Almost Like Being in Love

Truth, History

“It's spring fever. That is what the name of it is. And when you've got it, you want—oh, you don't quite know what it is you do want, but it just fairly makes your heart ache, you want it so!”

Mark Twain (1835–1910) American author and humorist

Spring, Heart

“It's vital to remember who you really are. It's very important. It isn't a good idea to rely on other people or things to do it for you, you see. They always get it wrong.”

Terry Pratchett book Sourcery

Source: Sourcery

People, Idea

“Things may happen and often do to people as brainy and footsy as you”

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

Source: Oh, The Places You'll Go!

People

“I come from the South and I know what war is, for I have seen its terrible wreckage and ruin. It is easy for me as President to declare war. I do not have to fight, and neither do the gentlemen on the Hill who now clamor for it. It is some poor farmer's boy, or the son of some poor widow - who will have to do the fighting and dying.”

Woodrow Wilson (1856–1924) American politician, 28th president of the United States (in office from 1913 to 1921)

War, Boy, Fight

“I just want to say to the kids out there watching: You can do anything you want in life. Unless Jay Leno wants to do it too.”

Conan O'Brien (1963) American television show host and comedian

Life

“We need to talk. All of us. About what we're going to do now."
"I was going to watch Project Runway. It's on next.”

Cassandra Clare book City of Ashes

Clary and Jace, pg. 137
Source: The Mortal Instruments, City of Ashes (2008)

“Yeah, all right, but everyone knows they torture people," mumbled Sam.
"Do they?" said Vimes. "Then why doesn't anyone do anything about it?"
"'cos they torture people.”

Terry Pratchett book Night Watch

Source: Night Watch

People

“We taste and feel and see the truth. We do not reason ourselves into it.”

W.B. Yeats (1865–1939) Irish poet and playwright

Truth, Feeling

“I’m very conscious of the fact that you can’t do it alone. It’s teamwork. When you do it alone you run the risk that when you are no longer there nobody else will do it.”

Wangari Maathai (1940–2011) Kenyan environmental and political activist

Source: The Green Belt Movement: Sharing the Approach and the Experience

“When our actions do not, our fears do make us traitors”

William Shakespeare (1564–1616) English playwright and poet

Fear

“I do love nothing in the world so well as you- is not that strange?”

William Shakespeare book Much Ado About Nothing

Source: Much Ado About Nothing

Love, World

“Strength is paradoxical. I am not strong because I can force others to do what I wish as a result of my play with them, but because I can allow them to do what they wish in the course of my play with them.”

James P. Carse American academic

Source: Finite and Infinite Games: A Vision of Life as Play and Possibility

Strong

“DO I DETECT A NOTE OF UNSEASONAL GRUMPINESS? said Death. NO SUGAR PIGGYWIGGY FOR YOU, ALBERT.”

Terry Pratchett book Hogfather

Source: Hogfather

Death

“When angels visit us, we do not hear the rustle of wings, nor feel the feathery touch of the breast of a dove; but we know their presence by the love they create in our hearts.”

Mary Baker Eddy (1821–1910) religious leader

Source: Poems by Mary Baker Eddy

Love, Angels, Feeling, Heart

“People with dark souls have nothing but dark dreams. People with really dark souls do nothing but dream.”

Haruki Murakami book Hear the Wind Sing

Source: Hear the Wind Sing

People, Dreams, Soul

“We can do no great things; only small things with great love.(mother Teresa)”

Robert Fulghum book All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten

Source: All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten

Life, Graduation, Wedding, Love

“Good writers have two things in common: they prefer to be understood rather than admired; and they do not write for knowing and over-acute readers.”

Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) German philosopher, poet, composer, cultural critic, and classical philologist

“If you do the work you get rewarded. There are no shortcuts in life.”

Michael Jordan (1963) American retired professional basketball player and businessman

Life

“There is no royal road to science, and only those who do not dread the fatiguing climb of its steep paths have a chance of gaining its luminous summits.”

Karl Marx (1818–1883) German philosopher, economist, sociologist, journalist and revolutionary socialist

Source: Capital, Vol 1: A Critical Analysis of Capitalist Production

Science, Chance

“I’m sorry, Eve. I love you. I’m not letting you do this.”
She screamed and battered harder. “You love me? You asshole! Let me go!”

Rachel Caine (1962) American writer

Source: The Dead Girls' Dance

Love

“The main thing to do is pay attention. Pay close attention to everything, notice what no one else notices. Then you'll know what no one else knows, and that's always useful.”

Jeanne DuPrau The City of Ember

Source: The City of Ember

“To know and not to do is really not to know.”

Stephen R. Covey (1932–2012) American educator, author, businessman and motivational speaker

For Wife, Depressing, Anniversary, Graduation

“Do not indoctrinate your children. Teach them how to think for themselves, how to evaluate evidence, and how to disagree with you.”

Richard Dawkins book The God Delusion

Source: The God Delusion

Children, Thinking

“It's a terrible thing, I think, in life to wait until you're ready. I have this feeling now that actually no one is ever ready to do anything. There is almost no such thing as ready. There is only now. And you may as well do it now. Generally speaking, now is as good a time as any.”

Hugh Laurie (1959) British actor, comedian, writer, musician and director

Context: (Answering "What made you step up to making your own record?") I felt like I may not get opportunities to do this ever again, so it’s about time—it’s a terrible thing, I think, in life to wait until you’re ready. I have this feeling now that actually no one is ever ready to do anything. There’s almost no such thing as ready. There’s only now. And you may as well do it now. I mean, I say that confidently as if I’m about to go bungee jumping or something—I’m not. I’m not a crazed risk taker. But I do think that, generally speaking, now is as good a time as any.

Life, Feeling, Thinking, Time

“"How do you find America?"
"Turn left at Greenland.”

Ringo Starr (1940) British musician, former member of the Beatles

“Where are our Men of abilities? Why do they not come forth to save their Country?”

George Washington (1732–1799) first President of the United States

Men, Country

“Silverstream: You idiot!!! What are you doing in my territory???
Graystripe:… Drowning?
Silverstream: Can't you do that in your own territory?
Graystripe: Ah, but who would rescue me there?”

Erin Hunter

“Always do sober what you said you'd do drunk. That will teach you to keep your mouth shut!”

Ernest Hemingway (1899–1961) American author and journalist

From a set of "rules for life" sent to publisher Charles Scribner IV; quoted in Scribner's memoir In the Company of Writers (New York: Scribner, 1991), p. 64 https://books.google.com/books?id=yYdHGtlgIsYC&pg=PA64&dq=hemingway+%22rules+for+life%22&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwj-zvyfgNDMAhUJ_mMKHU6zDrYQ6AEIIzAB#v=onepage&q=%20%22rules%20for%20life%22&f=false

“Neither seek nor avoid; take what comes. It is liberty to be affected by nothing. Do not merely endure; be unattached.”

Swami Vivekananda (1863–1902) Indian Hindu monk and phylosopher

Pearls of Wisdom

“It is awfully hard work doing nothing. However, I don't mind hard work where there is no definite object of any kind. -Algernon”

Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) Irish writer and poet

Source: The Importance of Being Earnest and Other Plays