Quotes about making
page 13

“Men should think twice before making widowhood women's only path to power.”

Gloria Steinem (1934) American feminist and journalist

“In mystical traditions, it is one's own readiness that makes experiences exoteric or esoteric.
The secret isn't that you're not being told.
The secret is that you're not able to hear.”

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

Secret

“Painting is stronger than me, it makes me do it's bidding.”

Pablo Picasso (1881–1973) Spanish painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist, and stage designer

Painting

“The point is, you have family and friends who love you. You have a world out there just waiting for you to conquer it. You have a life that will be anything you make it. That's the point.”

Malorie Blackman book Boys Don't Cry

Source: Boys Don't Cry

Love, Life, World, Family

“If they can make penicillin out of moldy bread, then they can sure make something out of you.”

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

Variant: Go to College,
Stay in school,
If they can make penicillin out of mouldy bread,
they can sure make something out of you.

Graduation

“A window within the soul to see
Light and Magick I send with thee
Be strong, be brave, make the right choice
Though Darkness shouts with a terrible voice
Know that I am watching from above
And that always, always, the answer is love!”

P. C. Cast book Awakened

Source: Awakened

Love, Soul, Light, Strong

“I make myself rich by making my wants few.”

Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862) 1817-1862 American poet, essayist, naturalist, and abolitionist

“Making others happy, through kindness of speech and sincerity of right advice, is a sign of true greatness. To hurt another soul by sarcastic words, looks, or suggestions, is despicable.”

Paramahansa Yogananda (1893–1952) Yogi, a guru of Kriya Yoga and founder of Self-Realization Fellowship

Source: Where There is Light: Insight and Inspiration for Meeting Life's Challenges

Happiness, Soul, Hurt, Sincerity

“To create, I destroyed myself; I made myself external to such a degree within myself that within myself I do not exist except in an external fashion. I am the living setting in which several actors make entrances, putting on several different plays.”

Fernando Pessoa book The Book of Disquiet

Source: The Book of Disquiet

Fashion

“I want to love you simply, in words not spoken: tinder to the flame which transforms it to ash
I want to love you simply, in signs not expressed: clouds to the rain which make them evanescent (Aku Ingin-I Want)”

Sapardi Djoko Damono (1940) Indonesian poet

Love

“Seeing things a human shouldn't have to see makes us human.”

Terry Pratchett book Thief of Time

Source: Thief of Time

“Everything is vague to a degree you do not realize till you have tried to make it precise.”

Bertrand Russell (1872–1970) logician, one of the first analytic philosophers and political activist

“The Heart is the Capital of the Mind—
The Mind is a single State—
The Heart and the Mind together make
A single Continent—

One—is the Population—
Numerous enough—
This ecstatic Nation
Seek—it is Yourself.”

Emily Dickinson (1830–1886) American poet

Heart

“Bran was the only person I knew who could use words like "blackguard" and make them sound like swear words-but then he could have said "bunny rabbit" in that tone of voice and weaken my spine with the same shiver of fear.”

Patricia Briggs book Moon Called

Source: Moon Called

Fear, Personality

“It is in our idleness, in our dreams, that the submerged truth sometimes makes its way to the surface.”

Virginia Woolf (1882–1941) English writer

Variant: Yet it is in our idleness, in our dreams, that the submerged truth sometimes comes to the top.

Truth, Dreams, Way

“Being open to correction means making ourselves vulnerable, and many people are not willing to do that.”

Myles Munroe (1954–2014) Bahamian Evangelical Christian minister

Source: Waiting and Dating

People

“Evil isn’t the real threat to the world. Stupid is just as destructive as Evil, maybe more so, and it’s a hell of a lot more common. What we really need is a crusade against Stupid. That might actually make a difference.”

Jim Butcher book Vignette

Stupidity, World, Hell, Evil

“It is much easier to make good men wise, than to make bad men good.”

Henry Fielding book The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling

Source: The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling

Men

“My little girls can break my heart. They can make me cry just looking at them eating their string beans.”

Barack Obama (1961) 44th President of the United States of America

Girl, Heart, Cry

“Julian spoke with the clear, unequivocal lucidity of madmen who have escaped the hypocrisy of having to abide by a reality that makes no sense.”

Carlos Ruiz Zafón book The Shadow of the Wind

Source: The Shadow of the Wind

Reality, Sense

“Somethings in life are out of your control. you can make it a party or a tragedy. Or, you could refuse to take the next step. You could refuse to take what you wanted most because you're afraid some day you might lose it.”

Nora Roberts Vision in White

Source: Vision in White

Life

“99% of failures come from people who make excuses.”

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

People, Failure

“In school they told me "Practice makes perfect." And then they told me "Nobody's perfect," so then I stopped practicing.”

Steven Wright (1955) American actor and author

When the Leaves Blow Away (2006), I Still Have a Pony (2007)

School, Perfection

“Art is making something out of nothing and selling it.”

Frank Zappa (1940–1993) American musician, songwriter, composer, and record and film producer

Zen Masters : The Wisdom of Frank Zappa (2003)

Art

“Reading makes me feel I've accomplished something, learned something, become a better person…. Reading is bliss.”

Nora Ephron (1941–2012) Film director, author screenwriter

Feeling, Learning, Reading, Personality

“If it had grown up, it would have made a dreadfully ugly child; but it makes rather a handsome pig, I think.”

Lewis Carroll book Alice's Adventures in Wonderland

Source: Alice in Wonderland

Thinking

“Don't talk to me about rules, dear. Wherever I stay I make the goddamn rules.”

Maria Callas (1923–1977) American-born Greek operatic soprano

On her controversial personality and performance, quoted in Wild Women Talk Back : Audacious Advice for the Bedroom, Boardroom, and Beyond (2004) by Autumn Stephens, p. 142

“Two types of people laugh at the law: those that break it and those that make it.”

Terry Pratchett book Night Watch

Source: Night Watch

People, Law

“Speak when you are angry and you will make the best speech you will ever regret.”

Ambrose Bierce (1842–1914) American editorialist, journalist, short story writer, fabulist, and satirist

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

Hélène Cixous (1937) French philosopher and writer

Books, Courage, Hurt

“Benvolio: What sadness lengthens Romeo's hours?
Romeo: Not having that, which, having, makes them short.”

William Shakespeare book Romeo and Juliet

Source: Romeo and Juliet

Sadness

“As long as the world is turning and spinning, we're gonna be dizzy and we're gonna make mistakes.”

Mel Brooks (1926) American director, writer, actor, and producer

The 2,000 Year Old Man (and sequels)

World

“OH, THERE HAS TO BE SOMETHING IN THE STOCKING THAT MAKES A NOISE, said Death. OTHERWISE, WHAT IS 4:30 A. M. FOR?”

Terry Pratchett book Hogfather

Source: Hogfather

Death

“You don't make a photograph just with a camera. You bring to the act of photography all the pictures you have seen, the books you have read, the music you have heard, the people you have loved.”

Ansel Adams (1902–1984) American photographer and environmentalist

Love, People, Books, Music

“Throw up whatever's making you sick, Darren," he said, "then get your behind back in here.”

Darren Shan book Cirque du Freak

Source: A Living Nightmare

“Men don't think and differently from women - they just make more noise about being able to.”

Tamora Pierce The Woman Who Rides Like a Man

Source: The Woman Who Rides Like a Man

Women, Men, Thinking

“If you make friends with yourself, you'll never be alone.”

Maxwell Maltz (1889–1975) Plastic surgeon, self-help author

Variant: If you make friends with yourself you will never be alone.

“The chicken is only an egg’s way for making another egg.”

Richard Dawkins (1941) English ethologist, evolutionary biologist and author

Way

“A line comes back to Marie-Laure from Jules Verne: Science, my lad, is made up of mistakes, but they are mistakes which it is useful to make, because they lead little by little to the truth.”

Anthony Doerr book All the Light We Cannot See

Source: All the Light We Cannot See

Truth, Science

“After all, a woman who doesn't love cats is never going to be make a man happy.”

Orhan Pamuk book The Museum of Innocence

Source: The Museum of Innocence

Love, Happiness, Cats

“We can forgive a man for making a useful thing as long as he does not admire it”

Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) Irish writer and poet

Forgiveness

“Some people say great God come from the sky take away everything and make everybody feel high, but if you know what life is worth, you will look for yours on earth.”

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

Get Up, Stand Up (cowritten with Peter Tosh), from the album Burnin (1973)
Song lyrics

Life, God, People, Feeling

“Writing is a lonely job. Having someone who believes in you makes a lot if difference. They don't have to makes speeches. Just believing is usually enough.”

Stephen King (1947) American author

Source: On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft

“True masters are those who've chosen to make a life rather than a living.”

Neale Donald Walsch (1943) American writer

Source: Conversations with God: An Uncommon Dialogue, Book 1

Life

“Let go of your worries and focus
only on the task at hand. The future will be what it will, and fretting about it will only make your fears more likely to come true.
I know,"--Glaedr”

Christopher Paolini book Inheritance

Source: Inheritance

Fear, Future

“I have one life and one chance to make it count for something… I'm free to choose what that something is, and the something I've chosen is my faith. Now, my faith goes beyond theology and religion and requires considerable work and effort. My faith demands -- this is not optional -- my faith demands that I do whatever I can, wherever I am, whenever I can, for as long as I can with whatever I have to try to make a difference.”

Jimmy Carter (1924) American politician, 39th president of the United States (in office from 1977 to 1981)

Life, Faith, Religion, Effort

“Jace shook his blond head in exasperation.
"You had to make a crazy jail friend, didn't you? You couldn't just count ceiling tiles or tame a pet mouse like normal prisoners do?”

Cassandra Clare book City of Glass

Source: City of Glass

“You speak from your heart, young Firepaw. This will make you a stronger warrior one day." said Lionheart
Tigerclaw growled. "Or it might make him give in to kittypet weakness right at the moment of attack”

Erin Hunter

Source: Into the Wild

Heart

“Nothing shapes your life more than the commitments you choose to make.”

Rick Warren (1954) Christian religious leader

Source: The Purpose Driven Life: What on Earth Am I Here for?

Life

“what cannot be saved when fate takes, patience her injury a mockery makes”

William Shakespeare Othello

Source: Othello

Fate, Patience

“Self-respect. It would make me lovable. And it's the secret to good sex.”

Susan Sontag (1933–2004) American writer and filmmaker, professor, and activist

Source: As Consciousness is Harnessed to Flesh: Journals and Notebooks, 1964-1980

Secret, Sex

“Stay away from people who belittle your ambition, small people do that, but great people make you like to be great!”

Mark Twain (1835–1910) American author and humorist

Variant: Keep away from people who try to belittle your ambitions. Small people always do that, but the really great make you feel that you, too, can become great.

People

“Many people could say things in a cutting way, Nanny knew. But Granny Weatherwax couldin a cutting way. She could make something sound stupid just by hearing it.”

Terry Pratchett (1948–2015) English author

People, Stupidity, Way

“Madness is tonic and invigorating. It makes the sane more sane. The only ones who are unable to profit by it are the insane.”

Henry Miller (1891–1980) American novelist

Madness

“You may go over the world and you will find that every form of religion which has breathed upon this earth has degraded woman… I have been traveling over the old world during the last few years and have found new food for thought. What power is it that makes the Hindoo woman burn herself upon the funeral pyre of her husband? Her religion. What holds the Turkish woman in the harem? Her religion. By what power do the Mormons perpetuate their system of polygamy? By their religion/ Man, of himself, could not do this; but when he declares, 'Thus saith the Lord,' of course he can do it. So long as ministers stand up and tell us Christ is the head of the church, so is man the head of woman, how are we to break the chains which have held women down through the ages? You Christian women look at the Hindoo, the Turkish, the Mormon women, and wonder how they can be held in such bondage…

Now I ask you if our religion teaches the dignity of woman? It teaches us the abominable idea of the sixth century--Augustine's idea--that motherhood is a curse; that woman is the author of sin, and is most corrupt. Can we ever cultivate any proper sense of self-respect as long as women take such sentiments from the mouths of the priesthood?”

Elizabeth Cady Stanton (1815–1902) Suffragist and Women's Rights activist

Women, Age, World, Religion

“What you do, the way you think, makes you beautiful.”

Scott Westerfeld book Uglies

Variant: Yes. What you do, the way you think, makes you beautiful.
Source: Uglies

Beauty, Way, Thinking, Beauty

“This will be our reply to violence:
to make music more intensely,
more beautifully,
more devotedly than ever before.”

Leonard Bernstein (1918–1990) American composer, conductor, author, music lecturer, and pianist

Music, Peaceful

“There are terrible people who, instead of solving a problem, bungle it and make it more difficult for all who come after. Whoever can't hit the nail on the head should, please, not hit at all.”

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

People, Problem

“And we all know love is a glass which makes even a monster appear fascinating.”

Alberto Moravia book The Woman of Rome

Source: The Woman of Rome

Love, Appearance

“Silent solitude makes true speech possible and personal. If I am not in touch with my own belovedness, then I cannot touch the sacredness of others. If I am estranged from myself, I am likewise a stranger to others.”

Brennan Manning (1934–2013) writer, American Roman Catholic priest and United States Marine

Source: Abba's Child: The Cry of the Heart for Intimate Belonging

Solitude, Personality

“Make no judgments where you have no compassion.”

Anne McCaffrey (1926–2011) American-Irish novelist

“Pray don't talk to me about the weather, Mr. Worthing. Whenever people talk to me about the weather, I always feel quite certain that they mean something else. And that makes me quite nervous.”

Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) Irish writer and poet

People, Feeling, Weather

“Mort was already aware that love made you feel hot and cold and cruel and weak, but he hadn't realized that it could make you stupid.”

Terry Pratchett book Mort

Source: Mort

Love, Stupidity, Feeling

“When you recover or discover something that nourishes your soul and brings joy, care enough about yourself to make room for it in your life.”

Jean Shinoda Bolen (1936) American psychiatrist

Life, Soul, Joy, Deep

“Make as much racket as you like people. Noise is life and an excess of noise is a sign that life is good. There will be time for us all to be quiet when we are safely dead.”

Salman Rushdie book The Enchantress of Florence

Source: The Enchantress of Florence

Life, People, Time, Dead

“I’ll follow thee and make a heaven of hell,
To die upon the hand I love so well.”

William Shakespeare A Midsummer Night's Dream

Source: A Midsummer Night's Dream

Love, Hell

“For I do not exist: there exist but the thousands of mirrors that reflect me. With every acquaintance I make, the population of phantoms resembling me increases. Somewhere they live, somewhere they multiply. I alone do not exist.”

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

“Security is a false God. Begin to make sacrifices to it and you are lost.”

Paul Bowles (1910–1999) American composer, writer, translator

God, Falseness

“Most people have no imagination. If they could imagine the sufferings of others, they would not make them suffer so.”

Anna Funder book All That I Am

Source: All That I Am

People, Imagination, Suffering

“Surround yourself with people who make you happy. People who make you laugh, who help you when you’re in need. People who genuinely care. They are the ones worth keeping in your life. Everyone else is just passing through”

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

Attributed to Karl Marx, a composer with the same name.
Misattributed

Life, Happiness, People, Help

“Anything with the power to make you laugh over thirty years later isn’t a waste of time. I think something like that is very close to immortality.”

Stephen King book Hearts in Atlantis

Source: Hearts in Atlantis

Thinking, Time

“You cannot qualify war in harsher terms than I will. War is cruelty, and you cannot refine it; and those who brought war into our country deserve all the curses and maledictions a people can pour out. I know I had no hand in making this war, and I know I will make more sacrifices to-day than any of you to secure peace.”

William T. Sherman (1820–1891) American General, businessman, educator, and author.

1860s, 1864, Letter to the City of Atlanta (September 1864)
Source: Memoirs of General W.T. Sherman
Context: You cannot qualify war in harsher terms than I will. War is cruelty, and you cannot refine it; and those who brought war into our country deserve all the curses and maledictions a people can pour out. I know I had no hand in making this war, and I know I will make more sacrifices today than any of you to secure peace. But you cannot have peace and a division of our country. If the United States submits to a division now, it will not stop
Context: You cannot qualify war in harsher terms than I will. War is cruelty, and you cannot refine it; and those who brought war into our country deserve all the curses and maledictions a people can pour out. I know I had no hand in making this war, and I know I will make more sacrifices today than any of you to secure peace. But you cannot have peace and a division of our country. If the United States submits to a division now, it will not stop, but will go on until we reap the fate of Mexico, which is eternal war. The United States does and must assert its authority, wherever it once had power; for, if it relaxes one bit to pressure, it is gone, and I believe that such is the national feeling.

War, People, Peace, Country

“They muddy the water, to make it seem deep.”

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

Water, Deep

“Whoever uses the spirit that is
in him creatively is an artist. To
make living itself an art, that is
the goal.”

Henry Miller (1891–1980) American novelist

Source: Big Sur and the Oranges of Hieronymus Bosch (1957), p. 400

Art

“His retreat into himself is not a final renunciation of the world, but a search for quietude, where alone it is possible for him to make his contribution to the life of the community.”

C.G. Jung (1875–1961) Swiss psychiatrist and psychotherapist who founded analytical psychology

Life, World, Search, Communication

“Legends are best left as legends and attempts to make them real are rarely successful”

Michael Moorcock book Elric of Melniboné

Source: Elric of Melniboné

Success

“As the Arabs say, "The nature of rain is the same, but it makes thorns grow in the marshes and flowers in the gardens.”

Anthony de Mello (1931–1987) Indian writer

Source: Awareness: Conversations with the Masters

Flowers, Nature

“And it was awfully strange, he thought, how she still had the power, as she came tinkling, rustling, still had the power as she came across the room, to make the moon, which he detested, rise at Bourton on the terrace in the summer sky.”

Virginia Woolf book Mrs Dalloway

Source: Mrs Dalloway

Summer

“Measure what is measurable, and make measurable what is not so.”

Galileo Galilei (1564–1642) Italian mathematician, physicist, philosopher and astronomer

The quote is widely misattributed to Galilei, but is actually from two French scholars, Antoine-Augustin Cournot and Thomas-Henri Martin. See "Der messende Luchs: Zwei verbreitete Fehler in der Galilei-Literatur" by Andreas Kleinert in "NTM Zeitschrift für Geschichte der Wissenschaften, Technik und Medizin" May 2009, Volume 17, Issue 2, pp 199–206.
Attributed

“It may be that until now there has been no more potent means for beautifying man himself than piety: it can turn man into so much art, surface, play of colors, graciousness that his sight no longer makes one suffer.”

Friedrich Nietzsche book Beyond Good and Evil

Source: Beyond Good and Evil

Art, Color, Suffering

“There is no coming to consciousness without pain. People will do anything, no matter how absurd, in order to avoid facing their own Soul. One does not become enlightened by imagining figures of light, but by making the darkness conscious.”

C.G. Jung (1875–1961) Swiss psychiatrist and psychotherapist who founded analytical psychology

Pain, People, Soul, Imagination