Quotes by Jonathan Carroll - Page 2

People who truly love us can be divided into two categories: those who understand us, and those who forgive us our worst sins. Rarely do you find someone capable of both.
Jonathan Carroll / Writer
Forgiveness
Love
True Love
Capable
Categories
Divided
People
Two
Love People Find
Forgive
Rarely
Sins
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Lying is too much trouble. You have to make sure to taste each word before letting it off your tongue. I hate that. It's hard enough making people understand without lying.
Jonathan Carroll / Writer
Hate
Lying
People
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The angel said, "I like black-and-white films more than color because they're more artificial. You have to work harder to overcome your disbelief. It's sort of like prayer.
Jonathan Carroll / Writer
Angel
Black And White
Prayer
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Dogs are minor angels, and I don't mean that facetiously. They love unconditionally , forgive immediately, are the truest of friends, willing to do anything that makes us happy
Jonathan Carroll / Writer
Angel
Dog
Mean
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Fear pounds on the door to our heart demanding to be let in. Joy is modest and often comes into our lives like a shy person entering a room; it can take a while to even notice it's there.
Jonathan Carroll / Writer
Fear
Doors
Heart
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Real love is always chaotic. You lose control; you lose perspective. You lose the ability to protect yourself. The greater the love, the greater the chaos. It’s a given and that’s the secret.
Jonathan Carroll / Writer
Love Is
Perspective
Real
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At a Boston signing, someone from the audience asked why I was so obsessed with furniture in my books. The question rattled around in my head. I had no idea that I was obsessed with furniture.
Jonathan Carroll / Writer
Book
Boston
Furniture
Ideas
No Idea
Signing
Rattled
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In Poland, my audience is all women between 18 and 30. At U.S. conventions, you have the fantasy and science fiction crowd. At Harvard you have an entirely different audience. It's so schizophrenic.
Jonathan Carroll / Writer
Conventions
Crowds
Different
Fantasy
Fiction
Harvard
Poland
Schizophrenic
All Women
Entirely
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The problem with waiting for someone, whether that wait is an hour or a lifetime, is everyone's 'clock' is different. So what you might consider forever is only a little while to them, or vice versa.
Jonathan Carroll / Writer
Different
Forever
Waiting
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I have never heard anyone say This is it. I know right now is the high point of my life. It will never get any better. Only in retrospect do we recognize the best times and of course then it is too late.
Jonathan Carroll / Writer
Heard
Late
Retrospect
Too Late
Life Best Better
High Point
Recognize
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Dogs are here to remind us life really is a simple thing. You eat, sleep, take walks, and pee when you must. That's about all there is. They are quick to forgive trespasses and assume strangers will be kind.
Jonathan Carroll / Writer
Dog
Simple
Sleep
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One of the saddest realities is that we never know when our lives are at their peak. Only after it is over and we have some kind of perspective do we realize how good we had it a day, a month, five years ago.
Jonathan Carroll / Writer
Our Lives
Perspective
Reality
Saddest
Years
Years Ago
Month
Peak
Realities
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Time talks behind our back. To our face it's friendly and logical, never hesitating to give more of itself. But when we're not looking, it steals our lives and says bad things about us to the parts of us it's stolen
Jonathan Carroll / Writer
Faces
Friendly
Giving
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When I was in college, I was the editor of the literary magazine and insisted neither the editors nor the writers be specifically identified-only our student numbers appeared on the title page. I love that idea and still do.
Jonathan Carroll / Writer
College
Editors
Ideas
Numbers
Appeared
Editor
Writers
Literary
Insisted
Magazine
Neither
Page
Specifically
Title
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The Viennese wash everything. Where else in the world does the government hire public servants to wash public telephone booths and the glass over traffic lights? Every time I see someone doing these things, I smile like a child.
Jonathan Carroll / Writer
Smile
Children
Glasses
Light
Public Servants
Traffic
Booths
Every Time
Glass
Hire
Lights
Servants
Telephone
Wash
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How easily we ignore or forget the small kindnesses and considerations in life which are really the only everyday magic we witness on a regular basis. Just think- to make happiness out of nothing more than a few kind words or a generous gesture.
Jonathan Carroll / Writer
Kindness
Magic
Thinking
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It took me less than half a lifetime to realize that regret is one of the few guaranteed certainties. Sooner or later everything is touched by it, despite our naive and senseless hope that just this time we will be spared its cold hand on our heart.
Jonathan Carroll / Writer
Cold
Despite
Hands
Heart
Lifetime
Naive
Regret
Sooner Or Later
Touched
Sooner
Certainties
Guaranteed
Senseless
Spared
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Most men, no matter how well or badly dressed, carry overstuffed, beat up wallets that should have been replaced years ago. Why is that? Every time I see a guy take out a wallet anywhere, it looks like a piece of old melted chocolate cake-with strings.
Jonathan Carroll / Writer
Men
Cake
Chocolate
Replaced
Should Have
Strings
Years Ago
Anywhere
Badly
Beat
Carry
Dressed
Every Time
Melted
Piece
Wallet
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The keys that unlock the heart are made of funny materials: a disarming phrase that comes out of the blue, nowhere, a certain sexy walk that sends you reeling, the way someone hums when she is alone. My father said it was the way my mother danced with him.
Jonathan Carroll / Writer
Father
Mother
Sexy
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Death doesn't make you sad- it makes you empty. That's what's so bad about it. All of your charms and beliefs and funny habits fall fast through a big black hole, and suddenly you know they're gone because just as suddenly, there's nothing left at all inside.
Jonathan Carroll / Writer
Black
Fall
Gone
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Women are always complaining about men's fascination with breasts. But what if men were absolutely indifferent to breasts? What would women do then with these things that serve one function once or twice in a lifetime, and the rest of the time are just in the way?
Jonathan Carroll / Writer
Men
Breasts
Complaining
Fascination
Function
Indifferent
Lifetime
What If
Time Men Women
Twice
Women Are
Time Women Men
Serve
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If you are very lucky, you're allowed to be in certain places during just the right season of your life: by the sea for the summer when you're seven or eight and full of the absolute need to swim until dark and exhaustion close their hands together, cupping you in between.
Jonathan Carroll / Writer
Dark
Eight
Summer
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If it was as logical as that, I wouldn't continue to feel as bad as I do. I know what you're saying, and you're absolutely right in a way. But logic and rationality only go so far. Then you know what happens? Ha! Then your heart adds its two cents and everything reasonable goes right-out-the-window.
Jonathan Carroll / Writer
Add
Heart
Two
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When you love someone deeply, you know secrets they haven't told you yet. Or secrets they aren't even aware of themselves. ... She was also the person I wanted to share the trivia of my life with, because that too is part of the magic of concern: Whatever you live is important to them and they will help you through it.
Jonathan Carroll / Writer
Magic
Secret
When You Love Someone
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If you are a success in life, there are places you must go and pay to be humiliated. It is an unwritten law that human beings must be tormented throughout their lives in one way or another. If you are fortunate enough to have risen to a social level where no one does it to you for free, then you must pay for the service.
Jonathan Carroll / Writer
Doe
Law
Levels
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Buying a pair of shoes is one of the most optimistic acts I know, next to falling in love. I like nothing better than to see an old man wearing a brand new pair of brogues or cap-toed oxfords, preferably jaunty orange-brown, unscuffed, heels unworn. We want to be here tomorrow, but buying new shoes, like falling in love, says I plan on being here tomorrow.
Jonathan Carroll / Writer
Optimistic
Men
Falling In Love
Oxford
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Part of life is a quest to find that one essential person who will understand our story. But we choose wrongly so often. Over the ensuing years that person we thought understood us best ends up regarding us with pity, indifference, or active dislike. Those who truly care can be divided into two categories: those who understand us, and those who forgive our worst sins. Rarely do we find someone capable of both.
Jonathan Carroll / Writer
Forgiving
Two
Years
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A short story is a sprint, a novel is a marathon. Sprinters have seconds to get from here to there and then they are finished. Marathoners have to carefully pace themselves so that they don't run out of energy (or in the case of the novelist-- ideas) because they have so far to run. To mix the metaphor, writing a short story is like having a short intense affair, whereas writing a novel is like a long rich marriage.
Jonathan Carroll / Writer
Running
Ideas
Writing
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The future is fastidious and punctual. It keeps perfect time and arrives everywhere on the dot. In contrast, its slacker brother the past has no use for clocks or appointments. It comes and goes as it pleases in our memory, camping out wherever the hell it damn well wants to in there. Untrustworthy, prone to exaggeration, biased- you wouldn't lend it ten cents, but it *sure* can be charming and seductive when it feels like it.
Jonathan Carroll / Writer
Brother
Memories
Past
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Reading a book, for me at least, is like traveling in someone else's world. If it's a good book, then you feel comfortable and yet anxious to see what's going to happen to you there, what'll be around the next corner. But if it's a lousy book, then it's like going through Secaucus, New Jersey -- it smells and you wish you weren't there, but since you've started the trip, you roll up the windows and breathe through your mouth until you're done.
Jonathan Carroll / Writer
Book
Reading
Smell
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There are people we meet in life who miss being important to us by inches, days, or heartbeats. Another place or time or a different emotional frame of mind and we would willingly fall into their arms; gladly take up their challenge or invitation. But as it is, we encounter them when we are discontent or content and they are not. Whatever they are, we are not and vice versa. Two trains going in different directions that pass for a few powerful moments at full speed, blasting noise and wind but then they are gone. Whatever serious chemistry might have been possible if, isn’t.
Jonathan Carroll / Writer
Emotional
Fall
Powerful
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At the end of their relationship she asked if they could still remain friends. His face stayed expressionless until he said "No. Because we put friends in boxes. You see them once in a while, or even a lot, but still they have their box in your life, their specific place. Their *category.* That's one of the great things about being someone's love-- you have no box in their life because you're part of all their boxes. You're their friend, their lover, their confidante-- all those things. I don't want to be put in one of your boxes and I don't want to shrink you to fit into one of mine.
Jonathan Carroll / Writer
Faces
Love You
Want
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Jonathan Carroll Quotes - Page 2

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