Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
Though I respect hugely the effort and the care and the beauty of games, I want to be working with people who want to create the 'War & Peace' of games, the 'Citizen Kane' of games, and not just be warming up George Romero.
Visitors who come from the Soviet Union and tell you how marvelous it is to be able to look at public buildings without advertisements stuck all over them are just telling you that they can't decipher the cyrillic alphabet.
To cement a new friendship, especially between foreigners or persons of a different social world, a spark with which both were secretly charged must fly from person to person, and cut across the accidents of place and time.
Among the most remarkable features characterizing Zen we find these: spirituality, directness of expression, disregard of form or conventionalism, and frequently an almost wanton delight in going astray from respectability.
I was already writing 'The Lost Symbol' when I started to realize 'The Da Vinci Code' would be big. The thing that happened to me and must happen to any writer who's had success is that I temporarily became very self-aware.
It's better to make a mistake with the full force of your being than to timidly avoid mistakes with a trembling spirit. Responsibility means recognizing both pleasure and price, action and consequence, then making a choice.
Our emotional mind will harness the rational mind to its purposes, for our feelings and reactions-- rationalizations-- justifying them in terms of the present moment, without realizing the influence of our emotional memory.
Human beings are natural mimickers. The more you're conscious of the other side's posture, mannerisms, and word choices - and the more you subtly reflect those back - the more accurate you'll be at taking their perspective.
No matter how much kids beg to be treated like adults, nobody likes to let go of their childhood. You wish for it and dream of it and the second you have it, you wonder what you've done. You wonder what it is you've become.
The other are the strategic, so-called strategic stocks that the United States and the other Western industrial countries have, which could put in as much as four million barrels a day of oil into the market pretty quickly.
We could make this work, you know." "I will knee you in the groin." "I could give you a night you will never forget." "Because you will be writhing in agony all night and I will laugh unmercifully. It will be unforgettable.
I find myself having these conversations where I go...You know, the guy, in that place. The guy in the place with the thing, you know. And it becomes this game of charades. And then finally, we realize that I mean the Pope.
The question is, why are politicians so eager to be president? What is it about the job that makes it worth revealing, on national television, that you have the ethical standards of a slime-coated piece of industrial waste?
Washington's address is virtually unknown today and has not been seen in most American history textbooks in nearly four decades. Perhaps it is because of all the religious warnings Washington made in his 'Farewell Address.'
It's a Gen X thing to be okay with going unnoticed or unrated or untouched. To be free from strangers' expectations, or anger. People got angry at me when I stopped making music because it seemed I was devaluing everything.
If you have never been tortured, or locked up and verbally threatened, you may find it hard to believe that anyone would confess to something he had not done. Intuition holds that the innocent do not make false confessions.
Affairs of state tend to drive most presidents toward the center on both foreign and domestic policy, no matter where on the political spectrum they begin, and especially so in the areas of intelligence and law enforcement.
Here," she said. "This is for you." "I didn't really get you anything," I sputtered. "I mean, I didn't know that you were going to be here, and--" "Don't worry. It's your embarrassment at not having the thought that counts.
That's the attraction of the conference circuit: it's a way of converting work into play, combining professionalism with tourism, and all at someone else's expense. Write a paper and see the world! I'm Jane Austen - fly me!
There is a human longing to go back to other times. We all know how when we were children we asked our parents, "What was it like when you were a kid?" I think it probably has something to do with our survival as a species.
Eat your vegetables. Brush your teeth. Sweat once in a while. Get plenty of rest. Don't smoke. Laugh more. There are certain tenets to health that are pretty commonsensical and that we all know we should practice routinely.
The American family is not simply changing; it is getting weaker. . . . Family decline drives some of our most urgent social problems. . . . The heart of the family problem lies in the steady breakup of the two-parent home.
I argued strongly to the American publisher that 'Reality Hunger' should come out first. They thought that 'The Thing About Life' would have more appeal because it's on a broader topic; it's about mortality rather than art.
The first thing I do when I walk into a hotel is find the gym, and if they don't have a gym, I start looking for a handhold where I can do my pull-ups. Sometimes if a shower curtain rod is sturdy enough, I'll do them there.
Claim today as a demarcation; a new beginning where you can regain your trust in love, where you start looking for love, giving more love, and being responsible for the places where there hasn't been more love in your life.
When the Taliban took over in 1996, the news of their crimes hit the Toronto papers. As a feminist and as an anti-war activist, I heard about what was happening to women, and I wanted to do something to support those folks.
A 70-year-old who takes good care of herself can have the biology of a 40-year-old. Conversely, a hard-living 30-year-old who has been inattentive to his health and well-being may have the biology of a man many years older.
Believe it or not, Marshal, I believe in talk therapy, basic interpersonal skills. I have this radical idea that if you treat a patient with respect and listen to what he's trying to tell you, you just might reach him. (87)
Clarabelle laughed like she'd just heard the funniest thing ever. "Of course you HOPE you won't die, Valkyrie! Who would HOPE to die? That's just SILLY! But you probably WILL die, that's what I'm saying. Don't you think so?
Ecstasy is what everyone craves - not love or sex, but a hot-blooded, soaring intensity, in which being alive is a joy and a thrill. That enravishment doesn't give meaning to life, and yet without it life seems meaningless.
When Katrina hit, my family lost everything - their homes, jobs, friends - and then it was a ripple effect, as so many others attached to them were affected. I had to come up with $12,000 per month to take care of everyone.
Remind yourself of all the things you love about life, stay in touch with your loved ones and friends, and do what your own heart tells you to. Your tomorrow will always bring you good things if you live each day with love.
Not everyone supported gaming, but we had a general meeting and a vote on whether to pursue a casino or not and the tribe voted yes, and as a tribal representative to the state legislature, I had to represent that decision.
I don't think it's healthy to have 68-year-old men, 70-year-old men thinking regularly about a traumatic experience that happened to them and thinking that they cannot talk about it with anybody, and no one wants to listen.
The Edmund Pettus Bridge - which in 2013 was declared a National Historic Landmark - isn't symbolic of the Civil War in a meaningful way. It is, however, the modern-day battlefield where the voting rights movement was born.
If the material consumption of a fraction of humanity is already harming the planet, is there an alternative path that enables all of humanity to live more lightly upon the Earth while experiencing a higher quality of life?
The predominance of mind is no more than a stage in the evolution of consciousness. We need to go on to the next stage now as a matter of urgency; otherwise, we will be destroyed by the mind, which has grown into a monster.
Wisdom comes with the ability to be still. Just look and just listen. No more is needed. Being still, looking, and listening activates the non-conceptual intelligence within you. Let stillness direct your words and actions.
Tofu and futons. The adepts of Orientalism seem to spend most of their lives reclining. They can't quite summon the energy to crawl up onto a chair. Even their Yogic exercises are carried out in a prone or sitting position.
Prayer makes a godly man, and puts within him "the mind of Christ," the mind of humility, of self-surrender, of service, of pity, and of prayer. If we really pray, we will become more like God, or else we will quit praying.
A man can pray better because of the prayers of the past; a man can live holier because of the prayers of the past; the man of many and acceptable prayers has done the truest and greatest service to the incoming generation.
The life of faith is lived one day at a time, and it has to be lived - not always looked forward to as though the "real" living were around the next corner. It is today for which we are responsible. God still owns tomorrow.
School is just like having a job. You have to show up, you have to do your work, and you have to be around tons of idiots or mean people. Now that I think about it, it's worse than having a job. At least there you get paid.
Privacy is so sacred, and any time a victim is returned, a survivor is found and rescued, privacy is one of the greatest gifts we can give them because if they decide to share, that's up to them, and they will come forward.
Evolution, dismissed as a sloppy programmer, has seen fit to create us as a wild amalgam of everything that came before us: except for the realm of insects, the whole history of life on earth is inscribed within our bodies.
Physical attraction was about aesthetics, not sexual performance, not mental stimulation. Without a mental connection, a remarkable sexual performance yielded no lifelong guarantees. It was only lust. And lust was not love.
The best advice that anyone can give you for choosing a specific career is never to accept someone else's advice. Indeed, one of the biggest reasons for choosing the career you have chosen should be that no one told you to.
Your prosperity and happiness will ultimately be determined by the enrichment you create for others in this world. If whatever you are doing does not enrich your life, or that of others, then it's time to do something else.
According to the book Celebrate Today, June 18th is National Splurge Day. Besides being the birthday of Paul McCartney and Isabella Rossellini, it's also mine. Go ahead; celebrate my birthday and don't worry about the cost!
All the old bogeys of 'dignified subject-matter,' of 'balanced compositions,' of 'correct drawing' were laid to rest. The artist was responsible to no one but his own sensibilities for what he painted and how he painted it.