Quotes about making
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“I make writing as much a part of my life as I do eating or listening to music.”

Maya Angelou (1928–2014) American author and poet

Life, Music, Parting

“Nice people with common sense do not make interesting characters. They only make good former spouses.”

Isabel Allende (1942) Chilean writer

People, Sense

“It takes two people to make a friendship work”

Jodi Picoult (1966) Author

Source: Between the Lines

Friendship, People

“Nobleness was one word for making a fuss about the trivial inevitabilities of life, but there were others.”

Douglas Adams The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul

Source: The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul

Life

“Everywhere one seeks to produce meaning, to make the world signify, to render it visible. We are not, however, in danger of lacking meaning; quite the contrary, we are gorged with meaning and it is killing us.”

Jean Baudrillard (1929–2007) French sociologist and philosopher

World

“It was like when you make a move in chess and just as you take your finger off the piece, you see the mistake you've made, and there's this panic because you don't know yet the scale of disaster you've left yourself open to.”

Kazuo Ishiguro book Never Let Me Go

Source: Never Let Me Go (2005), Chapter 10

“Go now. Alone. Or I make good on my promise.
-A”

Sara Shepard (1973) Author

Source: Wicked

“Two people making love, she once said, are like one drowned person resuscitating the other.”

Anatole Broyard (1920–1990) American literary critic

Source: Kafka Was the Rage: A Greenwich Village Memoir

Love, People, Making love, Personality

“Oh dear, all those words again," thought Milo as he climbed into the wagon with Tock and the cabinet members. "How are you going to make it move? It doesn't have a--" "Be very quiet," advised the duke, "for it goes without saying.”

Norton Juster (1929) American children's writer, academic, and architect

“When you are in love, things make even more sense, he thought.”

Paulo Coelho book The Alchemist

Source: The Alchemist

Love, Sense

“We make families of our own, Travis whispered in my arms on the last night we spent together. It starts with you and me and then it spreads. And whatever happens, there’ll always be a part of me that’s part of you. No matter what.”

Steve Kluger book Almost Like Being in Love

Source: Almost Like Being in Love

Family, Parting, Night

“Animals make us Human.”

Temple Grandin (1947) USA-american doctor of animal science, author, and autism activist

Animals

“Hey, Fnick can I change the channel, the game's on." -Iggy

"Make yourself at home, FIGGY" -Fang”

James Patterson (1947) American author

Variant: So Fnick, can I change channel?" Iggy asked. "There's a game on."
"Make yourself at home, Figgy." Fang said.
Source: School's Out—Forever

Home, Game, Change

“There is no such thing as an empty space or an empty time. There is always something to see, something to hear. In fact, try as we may to make a silence, we cannot.”

John Cage book Silence: Lectures and Writings

Source: Silence: Lectures and Writings

Silence, Time

“What do we live for, if it is not to make life less difficult to each other?”

George Eliot book Middlemarch

Middlemarch (1871)
Context: What do we live for, if it is not to make life less difficult to each other? I cannot be indifferent to the troubles of a man who advised me in my trouble, and attended me in my illness.

Life, Relationship

“Without art, the crudeness of reality would make the world unbearable.”

George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950) Irish playwright

World, Art, Reality

“Liminal sucks. You can't grasp it with your hands and shape it. You can't make midnight come faster, or grow up sooner, or avoid the in-betweens. You can only hang in there, and get through them.”

Karen Marie Moning (1964) author

“Even if we no longer have much in common, we would have always had the past, which, in some ways, is just as important as the present or future. It is where we come from, what makes us who we are.”

Emily Giffin book Where We Belong

Source: Where We Belong

Way, Past, Future

“The baby!’ Nico grinned, which hurt his face muscles. He wasn’t used to making that expression. ‘Mellie and the kid are all right?”

Rick Riordan book The Blood of Olympus

Source: The Blood of Olympus

Hurt, Baby

“My father, Zeus, did not love me. The demigods at Camp Half-Blood did not love me. Python and the Beast and his comrades at Triumvirate Holdings did not love me. It was almost enough to make me question my self-worth.

No, no. That was crazy talk.”

Rick Riordan book The Hidden Oracle

Source: The Hidden Oracle

Love, Question

“She spoke of evenings in the country making popcorn on the porch. Once this would have gladdened my heart but because her heart was not glad when she said it I knew there was nothing in it but the idea of what one should do.”

Jack Kerouac book On the Road

Source: On the Road

Idea, Heart, Country

“Because if you're gonna make someone choose, then you shouldn't be surprised when they don't choose you.”

Alyson Nöel (1965) writer

“For me there is something primitively soothing about this music, and it went straight to my nervous system, making me feel ten feet tall.”

Eric Clapton (1945) English musician, singer, songwriter, and guitarist

Music, Feeling

“Grover didn't say anything for awhile. Then, when I thought he was going to give me some deep philosophical comment to make me feel better, he said, "Can I have your apple?”

Rick Riordan book The Lightning Thief

Source: The Lightning Thief

Feeling

“Whatever happens to you belongs to you. Make it yours. Feed it to yourself even if it feels impossible to swallow. Let it nurture you, because it will.”

Cheryl Strayed book Tiny Beautiful Things: Advice on Love and Life from Dear Sugar

Source: Tiny Beautiful Things: Advice on Love and Life from Dear Sugar

Feeling, Hurtful

“If a story is not about the hearer, he will not listen. And here I make a rule—a great and interesting story is about everyone or it will not last.”

John Steinbeck (1902–1968) American writer

“Criticism of others is thus an oblique form of self-commendation. We think we make the picture hang straight on our wall by telling our neighbors that all his pictures are crooked.”

Fulton J. Sheen (1895–1979) Catholic bishop and television presenter

Source: Seven Words of Jesus and Mary: Lessons from Cana and Calvary

Thinking

“Déjà vu is more than just that fleeting moment of surprise, instantly forgotten because we never bother with things that make no sense. It show that time doesn't pass. It's a leap into something we have already experienced and that is being repeated.”

Paulo Coelho book Aleph

Source: Aleph

Sense, Time

“I think that others can drive a creature to naughtiness, always accusing and blaming them. After a while it must make the creature unhappy and drive him… to be naughty, because nobody expects them to be good…”

Brian Jacques book Outcast of Redwall

Source: Outcast of Redwall

Thinking

“Good books make you ask questions. Bad readers want everything answered.”

Scott Westerfeld (1963) American science fiction writer

Books, Question

“Hephaestus glowered up at us. “I didn’t make you, did I?”

Uh,” Annabeth said, “no, sir.”

Good,” the god grumbled. “Shoddy workmanship.”

Rick Riordan book The Battle of the Labyrinth

Source: The Battle of the Labyrinth

God

“Nobody likes being alone that much. I don't go out of my way to make friends, that's all. It just leads to disappointment.”

Haruki Murakami book Norwegian Wood

Source: Norwegian Wood

Disappointment, Way, For Friend

“Things change when someone special comes into your life. Both sides have to give up things. The one thing you don't give up in a good relationship is you--whatever makes you most you. - Jim Olsten (Jane's Grandpa)”

Elizabeth Chandler (1954) writer

Source: I Do

Life, Change

“I know why we laugh. We laugh because it hurts, and it's the only thing to make it stop hurting.”

Robert A. Heinlein book Stranger in a Strange Land

Variant: I've found out why people laugh. They laugh because it hurts so much... because it's the only thing that'll make it stop hurting.
Source: Stranger in a Strange Land

Hurt

“Heathcliff, make the world stop right here. Make everything stop and stand still and never move again. Make the moors never change and you and I never change.”

Emily Brontë book Wuthering Heights

Source: Wuthering Heights

World, Change

“Be you wise and never sad,
You will get your lovely lad.
Never serious be, nor true,
And your wish will come to you--
And if that makes you happy, kid,
You'll be the first it ever did.”

Dorothy Parker (1893–1967) American poet, short story writer, critic and satirist

Love, Happiness, Sadness

“The marriage partner is not really the problem. No other person can ultimately make you happy. You must learn how to be happy within yourself.”

Joel Osteen (1963) American televangelist and author

Source: Your Best Life Now: 7 Steps to Living at Your Full Potential

Marriage, Happiness, Problem, Learning

“The fact is that when you make the other suffer, he will try to find relief by making you suffer more. The result is an escalation of suffering on both sides.”

Thich Nhat Hanh (1926) Religious leader and peace activist

Source: Anger: Wisdom for Cooling the Flames

Suffering

“Because it’s no longer enough to be a decent person. It’s no longer enough to shake our heads and make concerned grimaces at the news. True enlightened activism is the only thing that can save humanity from itself.”

Joss Whedon (1964) American director, writer, and producer for television and film

Personality

“Philosophy ought to question the basic assumptions of the age. Thinking through, critically and carefully, what most of us take for granted is, I believe, the chief task of philosophy, and the task that makes philosophy a worthwhile activity.”

Peter Singer book Animal Liberation

Source: Animal Liberation

Age, Question, Thinking

“Guilty feelings about clothes are totally unnecessary. A lot of people earn their living by making clothes, so you should never feel bad.”

Karl Lagerfeld (1933–2019) German fashion designer

People, Feeling, Clothes

“I think maybe part of what got him into trouble was that he did too much thinking. Sometimes he tried too hard to make sense of the world, to figure out why people were bad to each other so often.”

Jon Krakauer book Into the Wild

Source: Into the Wild

People, World, Thinking, Sense

“Our chief want in life, is somebody who shall make us do what we can.”

Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882) American philosopher, essayist, and poet

Considerations by the Way
1860s, The Conduct of Life (1860)

Life

“I wonder sometimes if I'm the only one spending my life making the same mistake over and over again or if that's simply human. Do we all tend toward a single besetting sin?”

Karen Joy Fowler book We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves

Source: We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves

Life

“I wondered if it was possible to take someone's pain away with a kiss. Because that was what i wanted to do, take all of his sadness and pour it out of him, comfort him, make the boy i knew come back.”

Jenny Han (1980) American writer

Source: The Summer I Turned Pretty

Pain, Sadness, Boy, Kiss

“Death alone gives meaning to life, and you will never fully live until you know you must die. And make your peace with that knowledge.”

Alice Borchardt (1939–2007) American fiction writer

Source: The Raven Warrior

Life, Death, Peace, Knowledge

“Does it make you brave to stick your hand in a bear's mouth? Would you do it again just because you didn't die?”

Robert Jordan The Dragon Reborn

Source: The Dragon Reborn

“What is it about men that make women so lonely?”

Elliot Perlman (1964) Australian writer

Women, Men

“Well, I like to eat, sleep, drink, and be in love.
I like to work, read, learn, and understand life.
I like a pipe for a Christmas present,
or records — Bessie, bop, or Bach.
I guess being colored doesn’t make me not like
the same things other folks like who are other races.”

Langston Hughes (1902–1967) American writer and social activist

"Theme from English B"
Montage of a Dream Deferred (1951)

Love, Life, Color, Drink

“Sometimes the only way to fix a mistake- is to make it twice.”

Julianna Baggott (1969) Author

Source: Girl Talk

Way

“A man when he is making up to anybody can be cordial and gallant and full of little attentions and altogether charming. But when a man is really in love he can't help looking like a sheep.”

Agatha Christie book The Mystery of the Blue Train

Miss Viner
Source: The Mystery of the Blue Train (1928)
Context: I was wrong about that young man of yours. A man when he is making up to anybody can be cordial and gallant and full of little attentions and altogether charming. But when a man is really in love he can't help looking like a sheep. Now, whenever that young man looked at you he looked like a sheep. I take back all I said this morning. It is genuine.

Love, Help

“Hardly anyone still reads nowadays. People make use of the writer only in order to work off their own excess energy on him in a perverse manner, in the form of agreement or disagreement.”

Robert Musil book The Man Without Qualities

Source: The Man Without Qualities

People, Reading

“If you come back to me, I'll never leave you", I whispered into the furry ear. "I'll make you all the pies you could ever eat.”

Ilona Andrews American husband-and-wife novelist duo

Source: Magic Bleeds

“No book worth its salt is meant to put you to sleep, it's meant to make you jump out of your bed in your underwear and run and beat the author's brains out.”

Bohumil Hrabal book Dancing Lessons for the Advanced in Age

Source: Dancing Lessons for the Advanced in Age

Books, Sleep

“Stories can conquer fear, you know. They can make the heart bigger.”

Ben Okri (1959) Nigerian writer

Fear, Heart

“Maybe-- maybe love makes you suspicious and doubting. Is it true that when you love a woman you are never sure-- never sure of her because you aren't sure of yourself?”

John Steinbeck book East of Eden

Source: East of Eden (1952)
Context: Maybe that's the reason," Adam said slowly, feeling his way. "Maybe if I had loved him I would have been jealous of him. You were. Maybe-maybe love makes you suspicious and doubting. Is it true that when you love a woman you are never sure-never sure of her because you aren't sure of yourself? I can see it pretty clearly. I can see how you loved him and what it did to you. I did not love him. Maybe he loved me. He tested me and hurt me and punished me and finally he sent me out like a sacrifice, maybe to make up for something. But he did not love you, and so he had faith in you. Maybe — why, maybe it's a kind of reverse.

Love

“But grief makes a monster out of us sometimes… and sometimes you say and do things to the people you love that you can't forgive yourself for.”

Melina Marchetta book On the Jellicoe Road

Source: On the Jellicoe Road

Love, People, Forgiveness

“None of you appreciate me. Why is it so hard to believe that I could make a real contribution in these dark rimes?”

Richelle Mead Shadow Kiss

Source: Shadow Kiss

“You know, sometimes you've got to trust the people you love. You've got to trust that if they're good people, they'll make good decisions.”

Janette Rallison (1966) American writer

Source: How to Take the Ex Out of Ex-Boyfriend

Love, People, Decision

“Everyone's life is a mess. We all make mistakes… and not just little slip-ups. Major mistakes that hurt us and other people.”

James Alan Gardner Trapped

Source: Trapped

Life, People, Hurt

“Having to read footnotes resembles having to go downstairs to answer the door while in the midst of making love.”

Noel Coward (1899–1973) English playwright, composer, director, actor and singer

Love, Making love, Reading

“Make every day your masterpiece.”

John Wooden (1910–2010) American basketball coach

Interview on Charlie Rose https://archive.org/details/WHUT_20100614_130000_Charlie_Rose (2000) <br class="br">Source: Wooden: A Lifetime of Observations and Reflections On and Off the Court

“If a man makes me keep my distance, the comfort is, he keeps his at the same time.”

Jonathan Swift (1667–1745) Anglo-Irish satirist, essayist, and poet

Time

“Things just happen in the right way, at the right time. At least when you let them, when you work with circumstances instead of saying, 'This isn't supposed to be happening this way,' and trying harder to make it happen some other way.”

Benjamin Hoff book The Tao of Pooh

Source: The Tao of Pooh

Way, Time

“What difference does it make if the Gospel is mostly a lie? It's an engrossing story and the words of its hero are excellent words to live by, even today.”

Tom Robbins (1932) American writer

Lie

“It strikes Werner just then as wondrously futile to build splendid buildings, to make music, to sing songs, to print huge books full of colorful birds in the face of the seismic, engulfing indifference of the world - what pretensions humans have!”

Anthony Doerr book All the Light We Cannot See

Source: All the Light We Cannot See

Books, World, Music, Color

“I turned to speak to God
About the world's despair
But to make bad matters worse
I found God wasn't there.
God turned to speak to me
(Don't anybody laugh)
God found I wasn't there
At least not over half.”

Robert Frost (1874–1963) American poet

Ten Mills : Not All There
1920s, Further Range (1926)

God, World, Despair

“Connect. Embrace. Liberate. Love somebody. Just one person. And then spread that to two. And as many as you can. You'll see the difference it makes.”

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

Love, Personality

“You gain power by pretending to be weak. By contrast, you make people feel strong. You save people by letting them save you.”

Chuck Palahniuk book Choke

Source: Choke

People, Feeling, Strong

“[W]hen a group of people make something sacred, the members of the cult lose the ability to think clearly about it. Morality binds and blinds.”

Jonathan Haidt (1963) American psychologist

Source: The Righteous Mind: Why Good People are Divided by Politics and Religion

People, Thinking

“I have a terrible wanderthirst; the very sight of a map makes me want to put on my hat and take an umbrella and start. I
shall see before I die the palms and temples of the South.”

Jean Webster book Daddy-Long-Legs

Source: Daddy-Long-Legs

“What's up?" I asked.

You tell me," he said. "You were the one about ready to start making out with Adrian."

It was an experiment," I said. "It was part of my therapy."

What the hell kind of therapy are you in?”

Richelle Mead Shadow Kiss

Source: Shadow Kiss

Hell, Parting

“Metaphors. This was the cost of making out with an artist.”

Richelle Mead book The Indigo Spell

Source: The Indigo Spell

“Beauty is often spoken of as though it only stirs lust or admiration, but the most beautiful people are so in a way that makes them look like destiny or fate or meaning, the heroes of a remarkable story.”

Rebecca Solnit (1961) Author and essayist from United States

Source: A Field Guide to Getting Lost

Fate, People, Beauty, Way

“How do you fight someone smarter than yourself?' Rand Whispered. 'The answer is simple. You make her think that you are sitting down across the table from her, ready to play her game. Then you punch her in the face as hard as you can.”

Brandon Sanderson The Wheel of Time

Source: The Gathering Storm

Game, Thinking, Fight

“Happily ever after?"
"If justice doesn't triumph and love doesn't make the circle in entertainment fiction, what's the point? Real life sucks too often.”

Nora Roberts (1950) American romance writer

Source: Angels Fall

Love, Life, Justice

“Do you take pride in your hurt? Does it make you seem large and tragic?… Well, think about it. Maybe you're playing a part on a great stage with only yourself as audience.”

John Steinbeck book East of Eden

Source: East of Eden

Thinking, Parting, Hurt

“Every day when I wake I tell myself that it will be my last. If you are not trying to hold on to time, you are not so afraid of losing it… And then, if you make it to bedtime, you feel the joy of cheating death out of one more day.”

Suzanne Collins book Gregor the Overlander

Variant: You see, I tired of constant fear, so I made a decision. Every day when I wake I tell myself that it will be my last. If you are not trying to hold on to time, you are not so afraid of losing it.
Source: Gregor the Overlander

Death, Feeling, Time, Joy