Quotes about start
page 37

Bryan Adams photo

“Oh this heart's on fire.
Right from the start it's been burnin' for you.
Oh this heart's on fire.
One thing honey - this heart's true.”

Bryan Adams (1959) Canadian singer-songwriter

Hearts on Fire, Written by Bryan Adams and Jim Vallance
Song lyrics, Into the Fire (1987)

Kent Hovind photo

“I took one of my kids to the dentist one time when he was about six or seven years old. The dentist said, "Mr. Hovind, this kid has a cavity." I said, "Yes sir, I know about that. Are you talking about the big one in his head or the one in his tooth?" He said, "Well, just the one in his tooth. That's the one we are going to fix today." I said, "Okay, let's fix it Doc." Then I said, "Now son, you've got to sit still. The dentist has to give you a shot." He says, "A SHOT! A SHOT!" I said, "Yes, he's going to give you a shot. Calm down; I've had one before." I showed him where I had mine. I said, "It's no problem. When he gives you the shot, your mouth will go numb so he can drill out the bad part and fill the hole with silver." He says, "Daddy, he's going to give me a SHOT!" I said, "Yes son, he's going to give you a shot. Now, listen carefully. SIT STILL! If you wiggle, I'm going to have to take you outside and spank you, so, don't -- wiggle!" He did his best. He tried to sit still, but when the doctor pulled out that giant needle about twelve feet long, and poured in about eighteen gallons of Novocain, and said, "Okay kid, open up," he freaked. [….. ] We tried to hold him still, but we couldn't hold him still enough for that kind of operation. [….. ] Finally, after a few minutes the doctor gave up and said, "I can't work on this kid. I'm sorry, I just can't do it." I said, "Doc, let me take him outside and talk to him for a few minutes." We went out to the parking lot, got in the old Chevy van and sat in the back seat. I said, "Son, listen carefully. You know that I love you." He said, "I know daddy." I said, "Now son, I told you to sit still. You did not sit still. What happens when you disobey daddy?" He said, "Sniff, sniff… I get a spanking?" I said, "Correct, bend over." Boy, did I give him a spanking, and it was a doozy. A few minutes later, smoke was rising off his hind end, tears were coming out of his eyes, and pearls were coming out of his nostrils -- the whole thing. I said, "Okay son, listen carefully. We are going to go back into the dentist office, and you are going to sit in that chair. If you wiggle one time, I'm not going to yell at you and I'm not going to scream at you. I'm going to calmly take you back out here to the van, and I'm going to give you two spankings just like the one you just received. Then, we are going to go back into the dentist office, and you are going to sit in the chair. If you wiggle, we are going to come back out to the van, and you are going to get three spankings just like the one you just got. Son, we are going to go back and forth all day long until I get tired, and I have played tennis for years. I have a wonderful forehand smash. I don't believe I'll get tired for a long time, son." I believe that he knew that, and I knew that. We went back into the dentist office. That kid sat in the chair. The dentist said, "Open your mouth." He opened his mouth. The dentist said, "Open it wider." He held it open real wide, and I said, "Son, sit still." He looked over at me, then he looked at that dentist with that giant needle. He started to shake; then he looked at me again. As he gripped the chair, he did not move a muscle. I don't think the kid even breathed for twenty minutes. The doctor gave him the shot; drilled it out; filled the tooth full of silver; and we were on our way out the door in fifteen or twenty minutes. It wasn't long at all. The doctor then said, "Mr. Hovind, come here." I said, "Yes sir?" He said, "Look, I don't know what you said to that kid while you were outside, but I would like for you to work for me."”

Kent Hovind (1953) American young Earth creationist

I said, "No sir, you don't want me to work for you, the Child Welfare would have me in jail in a flash."
Unmasking the False Religion of Evolution (1996)

Thom Yorke photo
Tim Shieff photo
Gwendolyn Brooks photo

“When I start writing a poem, I don't think about models or about what anybody else in the world has done.”

Gwendolyn Brooks (1917–2000) American writer

"An Interview with Gwendolyn Brooks", Contemporary Literature 11:1 (Winter 1970)

Gordon R. Dickson photo
Allen C. Guelzo photo
George W. Bush photo
Ippen photo

“Once our false thinking has completely ceased
There is neither start nor conclusion, beginning nor end
In the oneness of Buddha and sentient beings
Say Namu-amida-butsu.”

Ippen (1239–1289) Japanese Buddhist monk, founder of the Jishu school.

"Hymn of Amida's Vow" (Chapter 1, p. 4).
No Abode: The Record of Ippen (1997)

Nate Diaz photo

“I'll wake up and I'll train the next day. It's been like that since I started. I think I train harder, harder than the hardest workers in the off-season.”

Nate Diaz (1985) American mixed martial artist

As quoted in "Nate Diaz discusses win over Conor McGregor" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hg6NkqFPOyY (5 March 2016), UFC on FOX, FOX

Lionel Richie photo

“What is happening here?
Something is going on
That's not quite clear.
Somebody turn on the light,
We're gonna have a party.
It's starting tonight.

Oh, what a feeling!
When we're dancing on the ceiling.”

Lionel Richie (1949) American singer-songwriter, musician, record producer and actor

Dancing on the Ceiling, co-written with Mike Frenchik and Carlos Rios.
Song lyrics, Dancing on the Ceiling (1986)

John Steinbeck photo
Pink (singer) photo

“This used to be a funhouse,
But now it's full of evil clowns.
It's time to start the countdown.
I'm gonna burn it down down down;
I'm gonna burn it down.”

Pink (singer) (1979) American singer-songwriter

Funhouse, written by Pink, Tony Kanal and Jimmy Harry
Song lyrics, Funhouse (2008)

Babe Ruth photo
Angela Merkel photo
Peter Greenaway photo

“And so, what we've done all of these years is very simple, is use the little tool, which is ask three whys in a row. Because the first why you always have a good answer for. The second why, it starts getting difficult. By the third why, you don't really know why you're doing what you're doing.”

Ricardo Semler (1959) Brazilian businessman

TED: "How to run a company with (almost) no rules" https://www.ted.com/talks/ricardo_semler_how_to_run_a_company_with_almost_no_rules/ (October 2014)

Kathleen Hanna photo
Mickey Spillane photo

“I was thinking too damn much to be careful. When I stabbed my key in the lock and turned it there was a momentary catch in the tumblers before it went all the way around and I swore out loud as I rammed the door with my shoulder and hit the floor. Something swished through the air over my head and I caught an arm and pulled a squirming, fighting bundle of muscle down on top of me.
If I could have reached my rod I would have blown his guts out. His breath was in my face and I brought my knee up, but he jerked out of the way bringing his hand down again and my shoulder went numb after a split second of blinding pain. He tried again with one hand going for my throat, but I got one foot loose and kicked out and up and felt my toe smash onto his groin. The cramp of the pain doubled him over on top of me, his breath sucking in like a leaky tire.
Then I got cocky. I thought I had him. I went to get up and he moved. Just once. That thing in his hand smashed against the side of my head and I started to crumple up piece by piece until there wasn't anything left except the sense to see and hear enough to know that he had crawled out of the room and was falling down the stairs outside. Then I thought about the lock on my door and how I had a guy fix it so that I could tell if it had been jimmied open so I wouldn't step into any blind alleys without a gun in my hand, but because of a dame who lay naked and smiling on a bed I wouldn't share, I had forgotten all about it.”

The Big Kill (1951)

Dave Barry photo
Nathan Lane photo

“A complex system that works is invariably found to have evolved from a simple system that worked. The inverse proposition also appears to be true: A complex system designed from scratch never works and cannot be made to work. You have to start over, beginning with a working simple system.”

John Gall (1925–2014) American physician

Source: General systemantics, an essay on how systems work, and especially how they fail..., 1975, p. 71. This statement is known as Gall's law

Aron Ra photo
Neil Gaiman photo
Margaret Thatcher photo
Donald J. Trump photo
W. H. Auden photo
Tzvetan Todorov photo

“American society has always exercised a stronger pressure on individual behavior than Western European societies; but in time of war this pressure is notched a few degrees, and starts to become quite alarming.”

Tzvetan Todorov (1939–2017) Bulgarian historian, philosopher, structuralist literary critic, sociologist and essayist

The New World Disorder: Reflections of a European (2005)

Plutarch photo
Franz Marc photo
Yanis Varoufakis photo

“(The Eurozone) resembles a fine riverboat that was launched on a still ocean in 2000. And then the first storm that hit it, in 2008, started creating serious structural problems for it. We started leaking water. And of course, the people in the third class, as in the Titanic, start feeling the drowning effects first.”

Yanis Varoufakis (1961) Greek-Australian political economist and author, Greek finance minister

Source: Channel 4 News, " Yanis Varoufakis interview: 'Greece can start breathing again, growing' https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yPfv3zv1OnE." 26 Jan. 2015: On comparing the eurozone to the Titanic; Quoted in: Jonathan Chew. " These 7 Yanis Varoufakis Quotes Show Why We’ll Miss Him http://time.com/3946586/greece-varoufakis-quotes/," Fortune, 6 July 2015.

Donald J. Trump photo
Roza Otunbayeva photo
Anna Sui photo
Richard Feynman photo

“This conference was worse than a Rorschach test: There's a meaningless inkblot, and the others ask you what you think you see, but when you tell them, they start arguing with you!”

Richard Feynman (1918–1988) American theoretical physicist

Part 5: "The World of One Physicist", "Is Electricity Fire?", p. 283
Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman! (1985)

Noam Elkies photo
MF Doom photo

“How Doom hold heat, and preach non-violence? Shhh, he 'bout to start the speech, c'mon, silence!”

MF Doom (1971) hip hop artist from America

As Madvillain, "Raid", Madvillainy (2004)
Sourced Lines

Stanley Baldwin photo
Babe Ruth photo

“A ballplayer should quit when it starts to feel as if all the baselines run uphill.”

Babe Ruth (1895–1948) American baseball player

As quoted in Encyclopedia of Baseball (1951) by Hy Turkin and S. C. Thompson; reproduced in "Good Field, Good Hit Sums Up New Baseball Data Book" http://archives.chicagotribune.com/1951/05/27/page/44/article/good-field-good-hit-sums-up-new-baseball-data-book by Robert Cromie, in The Chicago Tribune (May 27, 1951), p. A4

Ai Weiwei photo
John Lancaster Spalding photo
Jack McDevitt photo

“It had been his experience that the worst cynics all started out as idealists.”

Jack McDevitt (1935) American novelist, Short story writer

Source: Academy Series - Priscilla "Hutch" Hutchins, Odyssey (2006), Chapter 18 (p. 166)

Philip Larkin photo

“to start at a new place is always to feel incompetent & unwanted.”

Philip Larkin (1922–1985) English poet, novelist, jazz critic and librarian

Letter to Winifred Arnott, 7 October 1953

Kent Hovind photo
John Fante photo
Lawrence H. Summers photo

“Where countries have been able to carry through on their reform commitments -- as in Korea, Thailand and the Philippines -- results are starting to come in the form of lower interest rates, new investment and increased growth.”

Lawrence H. Summers (1954) Former US Secretary of the Treasury

David Ignatius (April 12, 1999) "Clinton's Capitulation on China", The Washington Post, p. A23.
1990s

Jason Mewes photo
Clifford D. Simak photo
V. Vale photo

“I started my publishing with one simple goal: to fight the control process. But I think that we’re actually controlled most by our aesthetic.”

V. Vale (1942) American writer

Mark McCloud in conversation with V. Vale http://sfaq.us/2015/03/mark-mccloud-in-conversation-with-v-vale/ in SFAQ (12 March 2015)

Willie Nelson photo
Brad Paisley photo
B. W. Powe photo
Koenraad Elst photo
Jim Rogers photo
Douglas Coupland photo

“A divorced man talked about his experiences with women:Everybody is looking for a winner. They're impressed by position and status even if they're not being treated well. They evaluate a man by such things as his dress and his home.If you start saying you want freedom and space, they can't handle it. You can just tell that they wouldn't be there if you didn't have money. … It's really easy to get laid. Just go to a nice place dressed nice—everyone's looking for a well-off guy.Society preaches that you must be this or you must be that. Success has nothing to do with human qualities. I found that it was empty. I couldn't feel a damn thing emotionally. I was numb. Everything was in order, but nothing—no tears, no real happiness, no real sadness either. When you can't find anything to be sad about, that's really sad! I'm getting so I don't want to do anything. I'm emotionally upset by humanity. Not that I'm an angel, but it's discouraging to see that there's only one place you can go. Everyday I almost feel like vomiting.I've always had people crash on me, but I've never been able to crash on them. It scares the hell out of me. There's no one who cares enough. The only reason I'm here is to keep the whole damn thing up. I wonder why I can't sink. It's scary.</blockquote”

Herb Goldberg (1937–2019) American psychologist

The Liberation Crunch: Getting the Worst of Both Worlds, pp. 146&ndash;147
The New Male (1979)

Henry Ford photo
Fritjof Capra photo
Roger Manganelli photo
Billy Childish photo

“Bowie and McCartney arrived, and the biscuits and caviare started and I left immediately. I don’t like shouting across rooms, with people in shiny suits who look like used-car salesmen.”

Billy Childish (1959) British musician

Tim Teeman, "The importance of being Childish", http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,22876-2475809.html The Times, 2006-12-02
On a party in the mid-1990s.

Hans Freudenthal photo
Lawrence Lessig photo
Jack McDevitt photo
Nina Shatskaya photo
Arshile Gorky photo
Ismail ibn Musa Menk photo

“You can search the world for happiness but you won't find it until you start being content with what the Almighty has already given you.”

Ismail ibn Musa Menk (1975) Muslim cleric and Grand Mufti of Zimbabwe.

31 May 2016 https://twitter.com/muftimenk/status/737814141872820224
Twitter

David Bowie photo

“The tragic youth was going down on me
(…)
I've been right and I've been wrong
Now I'm back where I started from
Never looked over reality's shoulder”

David Bowie (1947–2016) British musician, actor, record producer and arranger

"Reality"
Song lyrics, Reality (2003)

William L. Shirer photo
George Hendrik Breitner photo

“.. but also for the person who is visiting Paris later in his life for the very first time, something unusual will happen.... then there appears for the man of age a light - a light in which he sees the dreamy images of his life transforming into more tangible and more solid forms. Because that city has created our modern culture, and the movements of life in most countries are just a reflex of those which are starting in France's capital.”

George Hendrik Breitner (1857–1923) Dutch painter and photographer

translation from the original Dutch, Fons Heijnsbroek
version in original Dutch (citaat van Breitner's brief, in het Nederlands:) Maar ook voor hem die Parijs op latere leeftijd voor het eerst betreedt, gebeurt er iets ongewoons in zijn leven.. ..er gaat voor de mensch van leeftijd een licht op, een licht waarin hij de droomgestalten van zijn leven tot meer tastbare vastere vormen ziet verwezenlijkt. Want die stad heeft onze moderne cultuur geschapen en de bewegingen van het leven in de meeste landen een reflex van die, welke in Frankrijks hoofdstad een aanvang nemen.
Quote of Breitner, after 1884 (when he visited Paris); as cited by Frans Erens, in Vervlogen jaren; De Arbeiderspers, Zwolle 1958, p. 98
undated quotes

Emmitt Smith photo

“He's got great balance and great vision, and Emmitt has earned his starting spot.”

Emmitt Smith (1969) American football player and sports broadcaster

Galen Hall — reported in United Press International (October 11, 1987) "Emmitt Smith is a Gator on the loose", Houston Chronicle, p. 5.
About

Aron Ra photo
Amir Khusrow photo
Anthony Burgess photo
Julius Malema photo
Helen Garner photo
Pierre Teilhard De Chardin photo
Leopoldo Galtieri photo
Taryn Terrell photo
Hillary Clinton photo
Draft:Udit Narayan photo
S. H. Raza photo
Gloria Steinem photo
Kancha Ilaiah photo

“Hinduism is a religion of violence. All. Now, because of this, the consciousness of worshipping the killer or worshipping violence did not give any space for human rights. So my question is the human rights discourse must start with an anti-warrior position.”

Kancha Ilaiah (1952) Indian scholar, activist and writer

"The State of Dalit Mobilization : An Interview with Kancha Ilaiah" in Ghadar Vol. 1, No. 3 (26 November 1997) http://www.proxsa.org/resources/ghadar/v1n2/ilaiah.html.

Elaine Paige photo
Paulo Freire photo
Salvador Dalí photo
Douglas Coupland photo
Margaret Thatcher photo
Margaret Cho photo
Javad Alizadeh photo

“The world starts with a Big Bang and finishes with a human-made atomic Big Bang!”

Javad Alizadeh (1953) cartoonist, journalist and humorist

Quoted in Humor & Caricature (May 1995), p. 3

Abraham Joshua Heschel photo
Jozef Israëls photo

“.. on my travels, for example, abroad,.. I see things that attract me, in the works of others, - which impress me. That's what you reflect upon at times. And when you come home you think: Me too have to make something like that... Then you start, and when it's finished it looks like the work of that person or another... But your own originality doesn't get lost, - your sentiment remains!.. And this happens not only to me, - this happens to others also... Unintentionally you continue to build on motives of others..”

Jozef Israëls (1824–1911) Dutch painter

translation from the original Dutch: Fons Heijnsbroek
version in Dutch (citaat van Jozef Israëls, in het Nederlands): ..op mijn reizen bijvoorbeeld, in het buitenland,. ..ik zie dingen die me aantrekken, in werken van anderen, - die me imponeeren. Daar denk-je dan eens over na. En als je dan thuiskomt denk-je: zoo iets moet ik toch óók eens maken.. .Dan begin-je eraan, en als 't klaar is lijkt het op het werk van dien of dien.. Maar je eigen originaliteit gaat tòch niet verloren, - je sentiment blijft!. ..En zo gaat het niet alleen met mij, - zoo gaat het ook met anderen.. .Je bouwt onwillekeurig voort op motieven van ànderen..
Quoted by N.H. Wolf, in 'Bij onze Nederlandsche kunstenaars. IV. - Jozef Israëls, Grootmeester der Nederlandsche Schilders', in Wereldkroniek, 8 Feb. 1902
Quotes of Jozef Israels, after 1900

Calvin Coolidge photo

“In dealing with our military problems there is one principle that is exceedingly important. Our institutions are founded not on military power but on civil authority. We are irrevocably committed to the theory of a government by the people. We have our constitutions and our laws, our executives, our legislatures, and our courts, but ultimately we are governed by public opinion. Our forefathers had seen so much of militarism, and suffered so much from it, that they desired to banish it forever. They believed and declared in at least one of their State constitutions that the military power should be subordinate to and governed by the civil authority. It is for this reason that any organization of men in the military service bent on inflaming the public mind for the purpose of forcing Government action through the pressure of public opinion is an exceedingly dangerous undertaking and precedent. This is so whatever form it might take, whether it be for the purpose of influencing the Executive, the legislature, or the heads of departments. It is for the civil authority to determine what appropriations shall be granted, what appointments shall be made, and what rules shall be adopted for the conduct of its armed forces. Whenever the military power starts dictating to the civil authority, by whatsoever means adopted, the liberties of the country are beginning to end. National defense should at all times be supported, but any form of militarism should be resisted.”

Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933) American politician, 30th president of the United States (in office from 1923 to 1929)

1920s, Toleration and Liberalism (1925)