Importance Of Archives Quotes

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Sometimes the prize is not worth the costs. The means by which we achieve victory are as important as the victory itself.
Brandon Sanderson (The Way of Kings (The Stormlight Archive, #1))
The most important step a man can take. It's not the first one, is it? It's the next one. Always the next step, Dalinar.
Brandon Sanderson (Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive, #3))
To love the journey is to accept no such end. I have found, through painful experience, that the most important step a person can take is always the next one.
Brandon Sanderson (Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive, #3))
In the end, all men die. How you lived will be far more important to the Almighty than what you accomplished.
Brandon Sanderson (The Way of Kings (The Stormlight Archive, #1))
The most important word a man can say are, "I will do better.
Brandon Sanderson (Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive, #3))
What is it we value? Innovation. Originality. Novelty. But most importantly...timeliness. I fear you may be too late, my confused, unfortunate, friend.
Brandon Sanderson (The Way of Kings (The Stormlight Archive, #1))
The most important words a man can say are, “I will do better.” These are not the most important words any man can say. I am a man, and they are what I needed to say. The ancient code of the Knights Radiant says “journey before destination.” Some may call it a simple platitude, but it is far more. A journey will have pain and failure. It is not only the steps forward that we must accept. It is the stumbles. The trials. The knowledge that we will fail. That we will hurt those around us. But if we stop, if we accept the person we are when we fall, the journey ends. That failure becomes our destination. To love the journey is to accept no such end. I have found, through painful experience, that the most important step a person can take is always the next one. I’m certain some will feel threatened by this record. Some few may feel liberated. Most will simply feel that it should not exist. I needed to write it anyway.
Brandon Sanderson (Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive, #3))
The most important step a person can take is always the next one.
Brandon Sanderson (Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive, #3))
The most important words a man can say are, "I will do better.
Brandon Sanderson (Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive, #3))
I find nothing more frightening than a man trying to do what he has decided is important. Very little in the world has ever gone astray—at least on a grand scale—because a person decided to be frivolous
Brandon Sanderson (Words of Radiance (The Stormlight Archive, #2))
Journey before destination. There are several ways to achieve a goal. Failure is preferable to winning through unjust means. Protecting ten innocents is not worth killing one. In the end, all men die. How you lived will be far more important to the Almighty than what you accomplished.
Brandon Sanderson (The Way of Kings (The Stormlight Archive, #1))
But it was important to be rational at all times, not just when calm.
Brandon Sanderson (Words of Radiance (The Stormlight Archive, #2))
It is my solemn and important duty to bring happiness, light, and joy into your world when you’re being a dour idiot.
Brandon Sanderson (Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive, #3))
If the journey itself is indeed the most important piece, rather than the destination itself, then I traveled not to avoid duty—but to seek it.
Brandon Sanderson (Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive, #3))
The first step is to care, Tukks’s voice seemed to whisper. Some talk about being emotionless in battle. Well, I suppose it’s important to keep your head. But I hate that feeling of killing while calm and cold. I’ve seen that those who care fight harder, longer, and better than those who don’t. It’s the difference between mercenaries and real soldiers. It’s the difference between fighting to defend your homeland and fighting on foreign soil. It’s good to care when you fight, so long as you don’t let it consume you. Don’t try to stop yourself from feeling. You’ll hate who you become.
Brandon Sanderson (The Way of Kings (The Stormlight Archive, #1))
Then be wise about it. There are two kinds of important men, Shallan. There are those who, when the boulder of time rolls toward them, stand up in front of it and hold out their hands. All their lives, they've been told how great they are. They assume the word itself will bend to their whims as their nurse did when fetching them a fresh cup of milk. Those men end up squished. Other men stand to the side when the boulder of time passes, but are quick to say, 'See what I did! I made the boulder roll there. Don't make me do it again!' These men end up getting everyone else squished." "Is there not a third type of person?" "There is, but they are oh so rare. These know they can't stop the boulder. So they walk beside it, study it, and bide their time. Then they shove it-ever so slightly- to create a deviation in its path. These are the men who actually change the world. And they terrify me. For men never see as far as they think they do.
Brandon Sanderson (Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive, #3))
He used to tell me there were no bad dreams. Just dreams. That when we call them good or bad, we give importance to them. I know that doesn't make it better, Mac. I know it's easy to talk like that when you're awake. But the fact is, dreams catch us with our armor off.
V.E. Schwab (The Unbound (The Archived, #2))
For the men chatting together softly, the change was in being shown sunlight again. In being reminded that the darkness DID pass. But perhaps most important, the change was in not merely knowing that you weren't alone — but in FEELING it. Realizing that no matter how isolated you thought you were, no matter how often your brain told you terrible things, there WERE others who understood.
Brandon Sanderson (Rhythm of War (The Stormlight Archive, #4))
The most important step a man can take. It’s not the first one, is it? It’s the next one. Always the next step, Dalinar.
Brandon Sanderson (Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive, #3))
We will never cease our critique of those persons who distort the past, rewrite it, falsify it, who exaggerate the importance of one event and fail to mention some other; such a critique is proper (it cannot fail to be), but it doesn't count for much unless a more basic critique precedes it: a critique of human memory as such. For after all, what can memory actually do, the poor thing? It is only capable of retaining a paltry little scrap of the past, and no one knows why just this scrap and not some other one, since in each of us the choice occurs mysteriously, outside our will or our interests. We won't understand a thing about human life if we persist in avoiding the most obvious fact: that a reality no longer is what it was when it was; it cannot be reconstructed. Even the most voluminous archives cannot help.
Milan Kundera (Ignorance)
Absolutely nothing is as important as knowing who to trust.
Radovan Kavický
Remembering the fallen was important, but working to protect the living was more so.
Brandon Sanderson (Words of Radiance (The Stormlight Archive, #2))
The most important step a man can take. It’s not the first one, is it? It’s the next one. Always the next step, Dalinar. Trembling, bleeding, agonized, Dalinar forced air into his lungs and spoke a single ragged sentence. “You cannot have my pain.
Brandon Sanderson (Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive, #3))
Museums have no political power, but they do have the possibility of influencing the political process. This is a complete change from their role in the early days of collecting and hoarding the world to one of using the collections as an archive for a changing world. This role is not merely scientifically important, but it is also a cultural necessity.
Richard Fortey (Dry Store Room No. 1: The Secret Life of the Natural History Museum)
Sometimes,” Dalinar said, “the prize is not worth the costs. The means by which we achieve victory are as important as the victory itself.
Brandon Sanderson (The Way of Kings (The Stormlight Archive, #1))
Sometimes the proof is never committed to the archive—it is not considered important enough to record, or if it is, not important enough to preserve.
Carmen Maria Machado (In the Dream House)
Leniency and mercy. Men set free despite crimes, because they were good fathers, or well liked in the community, or in the favor of someone important. “Some of those who are set free change their lives and go on to produce for society. Others recidivate and create great tragedies. The thing is, Szeth son Neturo, we humans are terrible at spotting which will be which. The purpose of the law is so we do not have to choose. So our native sentimentality will not harm us.
Brandon Sanderson (Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive #3))
Have you ever considered, bridgeman, that bad art does more for the world than good art? Artists spend more of their lives making bad practice pieces than they do masterworks, particularly at the start. And even when an artist becomes a master, some pieces don’t work out. Still others are somehow just wrong until the last stroke. “You learn more from bad art than you do from good art, as your mistakes are more important than your successes. Plus, good art usually evokes the same emotions in people—most good art is the same kind of good. But bad pieces can each be bad in their own unique way. So I’m glad we have bad art, and I’m sure the Almighty agrees.
Brandon Sanderson (Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive, #3))
The means by which we achieve victory are as important as the victory itself.
Brandon Sanderson (The Way of Kings (The Stormlight Archive, #1))
Someday when we get around to writing a genealogy of our failures, inadequacies, and disappointments, an important place in such a study will be the books we never read, for whatever reason. Aside from the music we never listened to, the movies we never watched, or the old archives and maps we never explored, the books we never read will be one of the indicators of our anachronisms and our flawed humanity.
Boris Gunjević (God in Pain: Inversions of Apocalypse)
All memory is individual, unreproducible - it dies with each person. What is called collective memory is not a remembering but a stipulation: that is important, and this is the story about how it happened, with the pictures that lock the story in our minds. Ideologies create substantiating archives of images, representative images, which encapsulate common ideas of significance and trigger predictable thoughts, feelings.
Susan Sontag (Regarding the Pain of Others)
Brother. 'You must find the most important words a man can say
Brandon Sanderson (The Way of Kings (The Stormlight Archive, #1))
The most important step a man can take. It's not the first one, is it? It's the next one. Always the next step.
Brandon Sanderson (Oathbringer (Stormlight Archive #3, Part 1 of 6))
Middle ground only comes in war after lots of people have died—and only after the important people are worried they might actually lose.
Brandon Sanderson (Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive #3))
The most important step a man can take. It's not the first one, is it? It's the next one. Always the next step, Dalinar. Trembling, bleeding, agonized, Dalinar forced air into his lungs and spoke a single ragged sentence. "You cannot have my pain.
Brandon Sanderson (Oathbringer (Stormlight Archive #3, Part 1 of 6))
When thinking about anthropodermic books, we can't simply fault the doctors of the past for engaging in behavior that was tacitly or explicitly sanctioned by the laws and mores of their time and place in history; nor can we expect them to retroactively adhere to the deeply important beliefs we now have about informed consent. What we can do, and have a moral obligation to do, is examine the institutions in which these injustices were able to proceed, learn from their mistakes, and critically view the pernicious ways these mindsets might persist in our current society and fight to eradicate them.
Megan Rosenbloom (Dark Archives: A Librarian's Investigation into the Science and History of Books Bound in Human Skin)
But perhaps most important, the change was in not merely knowing that you weren’t alone—but in feeling it. Realizing that no matter how isolated you thought you were, no matter how often your brain told you terrible things, there were others who understood. It wouldn’t fix everything. But it was a start.
Brandon Sanderson (Rhythm of War (The Stormlight Archive, #4))
Shallan grinned. “Have you ever considered, bridgeman, that bad art does more for the world than good art? Artists spend more of their lives making bad practice pieces than they do masterworks, particularly at the start. And even when an artist becomes a master, some pieces don’t work out. Still others are somehow just wrong until the last stroke. “You learn more from bad art than you do from good art, as your mistakes are more important than your successes. Plus, good art usually evokes the same emotions in people—most good art is the same kind of good. But bad pieces can each be bad in their own unique way. So I’m glad we have bad art, and I’m sure the Almighty agrees.
Brandon Sanderson (Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive, #3))
Life before death,” Teft said, wagging a finger at Kaladin. “The Radiant seeks to defend life, always. He never kills unnecessarily, and never risks his own life for frivolous reasons. Living is harder than dying. The Radiant’s duty is to live. “Strength before weakness. All men are weak at some time in their lives. The Radiant protects those who are weak, and uses his strength for others. Strength does not make one capable of rule; it makes one capable of service.” Teft picked up spheres, putting them in his pouch. He held the last one for a second, then tucked it away too. “Journey before destination. There are always several ways to achieve a goal. Failure is preferable to winning through unjust means. Protecting ten innocents is not worth killing one. In the end, all men die. How you lived will be far more important to the Almighty than what you accomplished.
Brandon Sanderson (The Way of Kings (The Stormlight Archive, #1))
There is a secret you must learn, child,” Jasnah said. “A secret that is even more important than those relating to Shadesmar and spren. Power is an illusion of perception.
Brandon Sanderson (Words of Radiance (The Stormlight Archive, #2))
I have found, through painful experience, that the most important step a person can take is always the next one.
Brandon Sanderson (Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive, #3))
The space itself - its piles of papers representing decades of tangled history - reminded me of all that I didn't know and couldn't know. This itself is part of the wisdom of archives. By creating a finite space, where some things are included, some omitted, an archive challenges you to examine its dusty spaces, but more importantly, to search for what has been entirely left out.
Avi Steinberg (Running the Books: The Adventures of an Accidental Prison Librarian)
My Kind of Girl A letter of inspiration from a loving Mother Understands who she is Stands for what she believes in She cannot be broken No one can belittle her When trials come her way She remains unfazed My Kind of Girl Walks with confidence She exudes excellence An epitome of elegance She does due diligence Being mindful of her intelligence And knowing her importance My Kind of Girl Builds her own future A certified trailblazer Who utilizes the power within her To be of good influence Always on top of her game Yes, she keeps soaring like an eagle My Kind of Girl Takes charge for her own life Secures her name in historical archives For she is no ordinary woman An extraordinary being She dares to dream In the world, she makes a difference That is my kind of girl
Gift Gugu Mona (From My Mother's Classroom: A Badge of Honour for a Remarkable Woman)
I find nothing more frightening than a man trying to do what he has decided is important. Very little in the world has ever gone astray - at least on a grand scale - because a person decided to be frivolous.
Brandon Sanderson (Words of Radiance (The Stormlight Archive #2))
You must find the most important words a man can say...Those words came to me from one who claimed to have seen the future.....The past is the future and as each man has lived, so must you. "So, I can but repeat what has been done before?" "In some things, yes. You will love, you will hurt, you will dream, and you will die. Each man's past is your future." "Then what is the point," I asked, "if all has been seen and done?" "The question, she replied, is not whether you will love, hurt, dream, and die. It is what you will love; why you will hurt; when you will dream; and how you will die.This is your choice. You cannot pick the destination, only the path.
Brandon Sanderson (Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive, #3))
The most important words a man can say are, "I will do better." These are not the most important words any man can say. I am a man, and they are what I needed to say. The ancient code of the Knights Radiant says "Journey before Destination." Some may call it a simple a platitude, but it is far more. A journey will have pain and failure. It is not only the steps forward that we must accept. It is the stumbles. The trials. The knowledge that we will fail. That we will hurt those around us. But if we stop, if we accept the person we are when we fall, the journey ends. That failure becomes our destination. To love the journey is to accept no such end. I have found, through painful experience, that the most important step a person can take is always the next one.
Brandon Sanderson
You learn more from bad art than you do from good art, as your mistakes are more important than your successes. Plus, good art usually evokes the same emotions in people—most good art is the same kind of good. But bad pieces can each be bad in their own unique way.
Brandon Sanderson (Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive, #3))
Words are important,” Gavilar said. “Much more than you give them credit for being.” “Perhaps,” Dalinar said. “But if they were all-powerful, you wouldn’t need my sword, would you?” “Perhaps. I can’t help feeling words would be enough, if only I knew the right ones to say.
Brandon Sanderson (Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive, #3))
Why am I holding on to this stuff? Some of this junk is losing its punch. Pictures. Pieces of paper with writing on them—I can no longer connect with the thoughts or feelings that birthed them, that drove me in that panicky desperate moment to scribble in a barely legible scrawl as if on a cave wall. All say the same thing in some form or another: “I am here. This is me in this moment.” Do I have some fantasy that this stuff will be important after I die? Do I think that scholars will be thrilled that I left such a disorganized treasure trove of creative evidence of me? Will the archives be fought over by college libraries? What will probably happen is my brother will come out with my mother and look in the boxes. My mother will hold up a VHS or a cassette and say to my brother, “Do I have a machine that plays these?” My brother will shake his head no and they will throw it all away.
Marc Maron (Attempting Normal)
When the Archives file out of the room, Galen turns to Emma. She’s ready for him. She holds up her shushing finger. “Don’t even,” she says. “I was going to tell you, but I just didn’t have a chance.” “Tell me now,” he says. “Since it seems I’m the last to know.” He isn’t the last to know, of course. But he’d really hoped she would come to him with it. Before now. Before it became an issue for other people. She raises a hesitant brow. “Please,” he grates out. She sighs in a gust. “I still don’t think it’s important at the moment, but when Rayna took off for the Arena, I hoped on one of the jet skis and tried to follow. But,” she amends, “I did not intend to get in the water. I swear I didn’t. It’s just that Goliath wanted to play, and he tipped over the”-she must sense all his patience oozing out-“anyway, so I come across this Syrena, Jasa, and she’s been caught in a net and two men are pulling her aboard. So me and Goliath helped her.” “Where are the fishermen now?” “Um. Unless Rachel did something drastic, they’re probably at home telling their kids crazy stories about mermaids.” Galen feels a sense of control slipping, but of what he’s not sure. For centuries, the Syrena have remained unnoticed by humans. Now within the span of a week, they’ve allowed themselves to be captured twice. He hopes this does not become a pattern. Toraf must have mistaken his long pause for brooding. “Don’t be too hard on her, Galen,” he says. “I told you, Emma helped her and then went straight home.” “Stay out of this,” Galen says pleasantly. “I knew you told him.” Emma crosses her arms at Toraf. “You really are a snitch.” “You had enough to worry about. And so did I.” Toraf shrugs, unperturbed. “It’s over now.” Nalia pinches the bridge of her nose. “This is where I ground you for life,” she tells Emma. “All three hundred years of it.
Anna Banks (Of Triton (The Syrena Legacy, #2))
After this examination there are still gaps of doubt and apparent contradiction. And it is natural that it be so, because the Eternal Return is an experience. There lies its importance: in the fact of being. The Eternal Return is not the reincarnation as it has been spread in our days. Original Buddhism, on the other hand, could be pointing to something similar. Buddha was a shastriya, that is, a prince of the warrior caste, not a brahman, or priest, and his Doctrine was also for heroes and warriors. Then, it has been transformed by the monks. Buddha, like Nietzsche, talks about a reincarnation without mentioning the soul. What is it that reincarnates, then? As in Nietzsche it could be that 'atom-seed', or 'all those conditions that determine its existence and that they come back to give themselves', in the turn of the Energy, or of the Light that finds the old image. The Buddhist would want to be liberated, to leave the Circle; that's why it kills desire, that makes return. The Will to Power, as we have seen, returns to its 'archive', wishes to possess again its 'non-existence'. The difference: Nietzsche wants to return eternally, incorporates the Will and considers Nirvana a dream of decadents, of warriors who have become priests, monks. However, we do not know what Buddha really thought, because he did not talk about these things, nor did he explain Nirvana. Maybe, he just wanted to get out of this Circle to enter to fight in another wider Circle, that is more immense.
Miguel Serrano
[...] fundamental PIM problems are surprisingly resistant to technology change. [...] Despite apparent technology improvements, we still forget to deal with vital actionable items. find it hard to judge the value of new information, keep large amounts of infomation of questionable value, and fail to retrieve important information that we have made stringent efforts to organize.
Ofer Bergman (The Science of Managing Our Digital Stuff (Mit Press))
The Atonist nobility knew it was impossible to organize and control a worldwide empire from Britain. The British Isles were geographically too far West for effective management. In order to be closer to the “markets,” the Atonist corporate executives coveted Rome. Additionally, by way of their armed Templar branch and incessant murderous “Crusades,” they succeeded making inroads further east. Their double-headed eagle of control reigned over Eastern and Western hemispheres. The seats of Druidic learning once existed in the majority of lands, and so the Atonist or Christian system spread out in similar fashion. Its agents were sent from Britain and Rome to many a region and for many a dark purpose. To this very day, the nobility of Europe and the east are controlled from London and Rome. Nothing has changed when it comes to the dominion of Aton. As Alan Butler and Stephen Dafoe have proven, the Culdean monks, of whom we write, had been hired for generations as tutors to elite families throughout Europe. In their book The Knights Templar Revealed, the authors highlight the role played by Culdean adepts tutoring the super-wealthy and influential Catholic dynasties of Burgundy, Champagne and Lorraine, France. Research into the Templars and their affiliated “Salt Line” dynasties reveals that the seven great Crusades were not instigated and participated in for the reasons mentioned in most official history books. As we show here, the Templars were the military wing of British and European Atonists. It was their job to conquer lands, slaughter rivals and rebuild the so-called “Temple of Solomon” or, more correctly, Akhenaton’s New World Order. After its creation, the story of Jesus was transplanted from Britain, where it was invented, to Galilee and Judea. This was done so Christianity would not appear to be conspicuously Druidic in complexion. To conceive Christianity in Britain was one thing; to birth it there was another. The Atonists knew their warped religion was based on ancient Amenism and Druidism. They knew their Jesus, Iesus or Yeshua, was based on Druidic Iesa or Iusa, and that a good many educated people throughout the world knew it also. Their difficulty concerned how to come up with a believable king of light sufficiently appealing to the world’s many pagan nations. Their employees, such as St. Paul (Josephus Piso), were allowed to plunder the archive of the pagans. They were instructed to draw from the canon of stellar gnosis and ancient solar theologies of Egypt, Chaldea and Ireland. The archetypal elements would, like ingredients, simply be tossed about and rearranged and, most importantly, the territory of the new godman would be resituated to suit the meta plan.
Michael Tsarion (The Irish Origins of Civilization, Volume One: The Servants of Truth: Druidic Traditions & Influence Explored)
Brother?” Gavilar said. Dalinar turned back and regarded Gavilar, who was bathed by the bleeding light of a fire reaching its end. “Words are important,” Gavilar said. “Much more than you give them credit for being.” “Perhaps,” Dalinar said. “But if they were all-powerful, you wouldn’t need my sword, would you?” “Perhaps. I can’t help feeling words would be enough, if only I knew the right ones to say.
Brandon Sanderson (Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive, #3))
The night I was found there was a big fire here. Mrs. Love told me so, when I was nine. She thought she should, because of the smell of smoke on my clothes when she found me. Later I came over to have a look. And I’ve been coming ever since. Later I looked it up in the archives of the local paper. Anyway—” His voice had the unmistakable lightness of someone telling something extremely important. A story so cherished it had to be dressed in casualness to disguise its significance in case the listener turned out to be unsympathetic.
Diane Setterfield (The Thirteenth Tale)
Bill, this is serious, and despite my stable condition, I am a man and I have something of the gravest importance to ask you. PLEASE could you do this for me? SOMEwhere in the "archives" there must be a picture of Joan, your wife, my mother. Please, Bill. Father, I'm almost 33 and I don't know what my own mother looked like. Would it should it can it possibly be too much trouble to let a precariously living son see the IMAGE of his mother? Honestly, this has rankled me for years on end. This letter has certainly asked a lot. I love you, Bill. Bill Jr.
William S. Burroughs Jr.
The ancient code of the Knights Radiant says “journey before destination.” Some may call it a simple platitude, but it is far more. A journey will have pain and failure. It is not only the steps forward that we must accept. It is the stumbles. The trials. The knowledge that we will fail. That we will hurt those around us. But if we stop, if we accept the person we are when we fall, the journey ends. That failure becomes our destination. To love the journey is to accept no such end. I have found, through painful experience, that the most important step a person can take is always the next one.
Brandon Sanderson (Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive, #3))
Clearly, just imprinting a document in clay is not enough to guarantee efficient, accurate and convenient data processing. That requires methods of organisation like catalogues, methods of reproduction like photocopy machines, methods of rapid and accurate retrieval like computer algorithms, and pedantic (but hopefully cheerful) librarians who know how to use these tools. Inventing such methods proved to be far more difficult than inventing writing. Many writing systems developed independently in cultures distant in time and place from each other. Every decade archaeologists discover another few forgotten scripts. Some of them might prove to be even older than the Sumerian scratches in clay. But most of them remain curiosities because those who invented them failed to invent efficient ways of cataloguing and retrieving data. What set apart Sumer, as well as pharaonic Egypt, ancient China and the Inca Empire, is that these cultures developed good techniques of archiving, cataloguing and retrieving written records. They obviously had no computers or photocopying machines, but they did have catalogues, and far more importantly, they did create special schools in which professional scribes, clerks, librarians and accountants were rigorously trained in the secrets of data-processing.
Yuval Noah Harari (Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind)
The ancient code of the Knights Radiant says “journey before destination.” Some may call it a simple platitude, but it is far more. A journey will have pain and failure. It is not only the steps forward that we must accept. It is the stumbles. The trials. The knowledge that we will fail. That we will hurt those around us. But if we stop, if we accept the person we are when we fall, the journey ends. That failure becomes our destination. To love the journey is to accept no such end. I have found, through painful experience, that the most important step a person can take is always the next one. I’m certain some will feel threatened by this record. Some few may feel liberated. Most will simply feel that it should not exist. I needed to write it anyway.
Brandon Sanderson (Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive, #3))
We tend to believe that the most important thing about an email is its content, but that’s not exactly right. The most important aspect of an email, from a time management perspective, is how urgently it needs a reply. Because we forget when the sender needs a reply, we waste time rereading the message. The solution to this mania is simple: only touch each email twice. The first time we open an email, before closing it, answer this question: When does this email require a response? Tagging each email as either “Today” or “This Week” attaches the most important information to each new message, preparing it for the second (and last) time we open it. Of course, for super-urgent, email-me-right-now-type messages, go ahead and respond. Messages that don’t need a response at all should be deleted or archived immediately.
Nir Eyal (Indistractable: How to Control Your Attention and Choose Your Life)
In addition to social and ethical reforms, Christianity was responsible for important economic and technological innovations. The Catholic Church established medieval Europe’s most sophisticated administrative system, and pioneered the use of archives, catalogues, timetables and other techniques of data processing. The Vatican was the closest thing twelfth-century Europe had to Silicon Valley. The Church established Europe’s first economic corporations – the monasteries – which for 1,000 years spearheaded the European economy and introduced advanced agricultural and administrative methods. Monasteries were the first institutions to use clocks, and for centuries they and the cathedral schools were the most important learning centres of Europe, helping to found many of Europe’s first universities, such as Bologna, Oxford and Salamanca.
Yuval Noah Harari (Homo Deus: A History of Tomorrow)
I couldn’t think of anything funny.” He hesitated. “Though that hasn’t ever stopped you.” Shallan grinned. “Have you ever considered, bridgeman, that bad art does more for the world than good art? Artists spend more of their lives making bad practice pieces than they do masterworks, particularly at the start. And even when an artist becomes a master, some pieces don’t work out. Still others are somehow just wrong until the last stroke. “You learn more from bad art than you do from good art, as your mistakes are more important than your successes. Plus, good art usually evokes the same emotions in people—most good art is the same kind of good. But bad pieces can each be bad in their own unique way. So I’m glad we have bad art, and I’m sure the Almighty agrees.” “All this,” Adolin said, amused, “to justify your sense of humor, Shallan?” “My sense of humor? No, I’m merely trying to justify the creation of Captain Kaladin.
Brandon Sanderson (Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive, #3))
The history of slavery provides the spine of this novel. Some texts that offered “deep background” were Boubacar Barry’s Senegambia and the Atlantic Slave Trade, which excavates eighteenth-century slave trading history in Wolof-speaking areas of West Africa, and Walter Rucker’s Gold Coast Diasporas: Identity, Culture, and Power, about Asante peoples of West Africa, those who would come to be called “Coromantee.” Sylviane Diouf’s Servants of Allah: African Muslims Enslaved in the Americas is a must-read for anyone interested in Muslim history on the American side of the Atlantic. And Marcus Rediker’s The Slave Ship: A Human History gives background information about the brutal transatlantic slave trade. In addition, the digitized Georgia Archives provided information about eighteenth-century slave and Native American codes, as well as Land Lottery records. Henry Louis Gates’s edited The Classic Slave Narratives, which include Jacobs’s as well as Frederick Douglass’s autobiographies, continue to be so important to me. Ailey’s family lives
Honorée Fanonne Jeffers (The Love Songs of W.E.B. Du Bois)
Ever since the end of World War II, when antibiotics arrived like jingle-clad, ultramodern cleaning products, we’ve been swept up in antigerm warfare. But in a recent article published in Archives of General Psychiatry, the Emory University neuroscientist Charles Raison and his colleagues say there’s mounting evidence that our ultraclean, polished-chrome, Lysoled modern world holds the key to today’s higher rates of depression, especially among young people. Loss of our ancient bond with microorganisms in gut, skin, food, and soil plays an important role, because without them we’re not privy to the good bacteria our immune system once counted on to fend off inflammation. “Since ancient times,” Raison says, “benign microorganisms, sometimes referred to as ‘old friends,’ have taught the immune system how to tolerate other harmless microorganisms, and in the process reduce inflammatory responses that have been linked to most modern illnesses, from cancer to depression.” He raises the question of “whether we should encourage measured reexposure to benign environmental microorganisms
Diane Ackerman (The Human Age: The World Shaped By Us)
Christianity and other traditional religions are still important players in the world. Yet their role is now largely reactive. In the past, they were a creative force. Christianity, for example, spread the hitherto heretical notion that all humans are equal before God, thereby changing human political structures, social hierarchies and even gender relations. In his Sermon on the Mount Jesus went further, insisting that the meek and oppressed are God’s favourite people, thus turning the pyramid of power on its head, and providing ammunition for generations of revolutionaries. In addition to social and ethical reforms, Christianity was responsible for important economic and technological innovations. The Catholic Church established medieval Europe’s most sophisticated administrative system, and pioneered the use of archives, catalogues, timetables and other techniques of data processing. The Vatican was the closest thing twelfth-century Europe had to Silicon Valley. The Church established Europe’s first economic corporations – the monasteries – which for 1,000 years spearheaded the European economy and introduced advanced agricultural and administrative methods.
Yuval Noah Harari (Homo Deus: A Brief History of Tomorrow)
Chapter 1, “Esoteric Antiquarianism,” situates Egyptian Oedipus in its most important literary contexts: Renaissance Egyptology, including philosophical and archeological traditions, and early modern scholarship on paganism and mythology. It argues that Kircher’s hieroglyphic studies are better understood as an antiquarian rather than philosophical enterprise, and it shows how much he shared with other seventeenth-century scholars who used symbolism and allegory to explain ancient imagery. The next two chapters chronicle the evolution of Kircher’s hieroglyphic studies, including his pioneering publications on Coptic. Chapter 2, “How to Get Ahead in the Republic of Letters,” treats the period from 1632 until 1637 and tells the story of young Kircher’s decisive encounter with the arch-antiquary Peiresc, which revolved around the study of Arabic and Coptic manuscripts. Chapter 3, “Oedipus in Rome,” continues the narrative until 1655, emphasizing the networks and institutions, especially in Rome, that were essential to Kircher’s enterprise. Using correspondence and archival documents, this pair of chapters reconstructs the social world in which Kircher’s studies were conceived, executed, and consumed, showing how he forged his career by establishing a reputation as an Oriental philologist. The next four chapters examine Egyptian Oedipus and Pamphilian Obelisk through a series of thematic case studies. Chapter 4, “Ancient Theology and the Antiquarian,” shows in detail how Kircher turned Renaissance occult philosophy, especially the doctrine of the prisca theologia, into a historical framework for explaining antiquities. Chapter 5, “The Discovery of Oriental Antiquity,” looks at his use of Oriental sources, focusing on Arabic texts related to Egypt and Hebrew kabbalistic literature. It provides an in-depth look at the modus operandi behind Kircher’s imposing edifice of erudition, which combined bogus and genuine learning. Chapter 6, “Erudition and Censorship,” draws on archival evidence to document how the pressures of ecclesiastical censorship shaped Kircher’s hieroglyphic studies. Readers curious about how Kircher actually produced his astonishing translations of hieroglyphic inscriptions will find a detailed discussion in chapter 7, “Symbolic Wisdom in an Age of Criticism,” which also examines his desperate effort to defend their reliability. This chapter brings into sharp focus the central irony of Kircher’s project: his unyielding antiquarian passion to explain hieroglyphic inscriptions and discover new historical sources led him to disregard the critical standards that defined erudite scholarship at its best. The book’s final chapter, “Oedipus at Large,” examines the reception of Kircher’s hieroglyphic studies through the eighteenth century in relation to changing ideas about the history of civilization.
Daniel Stolzenberg (Egyptian Oedipus: Athanasius Kircher and the Secrets of Antiquity)
I should say that it was only for me that Marxism seemed over. Surely, I would tell G. at least once a week, it had to count for something that every single self-described Marxist state had turned into an economically backward dictatorship. Irrelevant, he would reply. The real Marxists weren’t the Leninists and Stalinists and Maoists—or the Trotskyists either, those bloodthirsty romantics—but libertarian anarchist-socialists, people like Anton Pannekoek, Herman Gorter, Karl Korsch, scholarly believers in true workers’ control who had labored in obscurity for most of the twentieth century, enjoyed a late-afternoon moment in the sun after 1968 when they were discovered by the New Left, and had now once again fallen back into the shadows of history, existing mostly as tiny stars in the vast night sky of the Internet, archived on blogs with names like Diary of a Council Communist and Break Their Haughty Power. They were all men. The group itself was mostly men. This was, as Marxists used to say, no accident. There was something about Marxist theory that just did not appeal to women. G. and I spent a lot of time discussing the possible reasons for this. Was it that women don’t allow themselves to engage in abstract speculation, as he thought? That Marxism is incompatible with feminism, as I sometimes suspected? Or perhaps the problem was not Marxism but Marxists: in its heyday men had kept a lock on it as they did on everything they considered important; now, in its decline, Marxism had become one of those obsessive lonely-guy hobbies, like collecting stamps or 78s. Maybe, like collecting, it was related, through subterranean psychological pathways, to sexual perversions, most of which seemed to be male as well. You never hear about a female foot fetishist, or a woman like the high-school history teacher of a friend of mine who kept dated bottles of his own urine on a closet shelf. Perhaps women’s need for speculation is satisfied by the intense curiosity they bring to daily life, the way their collecting masquerades as fashion and domesticity—instead of old records, shoes and ceramic mixing bowls—and their perversity can be satisfied simply by enacting the highly artificial role of Woman, by becoming, as it were, fetishizers of their own feet.
Katha Pollitt (Learning to Drive (Movie Tie-in Edition): And Other Life Stories)
Which was more important? Stability or the ability to watch over the others? Blood of my fathers, he thought. I wasn’t made for this politicking and scheming. I was made to wield a sword and ride down enemies .
Brandon Sanderson (The Way of Kings (The Stormlight Archive, #1))
For this reason- the sentimental mementos of personal relationships collectively stockpiled and interlinked within the vast archives of the site- Facebook has become an important place for remembrance, a nostalgic campfire that draws together old friends in my memory. It is also a virtual medium through which my now-distant friends and I keep track of the ongoing stories of each others’ lives, enabling us to “groom” one another in a variety of ways- sending Gifts, playing Scrabulous, or taking the time to write a humorous or thoughtful Wall Post. The glow of this campfire may make invisible the surrounding forest and the wolves that lurk within, waiting for their chance to steal our source of sustenance for their own gain.
Jennifer Anne Ryan (The Virtual Campfire: An Ethnography of Online Social Networking)
Delete it. The message isn’t important or it requires no response. The simplest action is to get rid of it. If you think it might be important, then you will put the message into an archive folder. Defer it. If a message requires a task that takes 5 or more minutes to complete, then defer it and schedule a date and time when you will do it. One of the main reasons people get bogged down is that they try to take action on emails that require you to complete a lengthy task. For emails like this, it makes sense to estimate the time required, write down the specific action into your calendar, respond back to the recipient with a date when they should expect it and then filter the email into your “Follow-Up” folder. You can use the items on your calendar to schedule the rest of your week. Another option for deferring an item is to use the Boomerang extension, which creates reminders for specific tasks. Delegate it. You may not be the best person to handle the task. If you have a team or subordinates, then delegate the task to the appropriate person. After that, create a reminder in your calendar to follow up and make sure it has been handled. Do it. If it takes less than 5 minutes to respond to an email or complete the required task, then take care of it immediately.
S.J. Scott (10-Minute Digital Declutter: The Simple Habit to Eliminate Technology Overload)
Spend the first 15 minutes of your working day prioritizing what to do. • Spend one hour a week for organizing and filing papers. • Spend 15 minutes a day throwing away papers and clearing away your desk • Spend the last 15 minutes of your working day to go through your tasks for tomorrow. What’s important? What’s urgent? • Use your e-mail inbox as a to-do list. Tasks solved get archived and tasks unsolved stay in the inbox. • If there are any e-mails and tasks that you can do in less than 5 minutes, always do them right away! ALWAYS! • Don’t accept any new tasks until you are in control. • Do the job right the first time, so that it doesn’t come back to haunt you and cost you more time later. Do
Marc Reklau (30 Days - Change your habits, Change your life: A couple of simple steps every day to create the life you want)
fireplace poker—to one of the servants. The messenger stood up in a smooth motion. His refinement seemed a shield that rebuffed Father’s temper. Shallan envied him. “It appears I will get nowhere with this conversation,” the messenger said loudly. He looked at Father, but his tone seemed to imply that his words were for them all. “I came prepared for that inevitability. The highprince has given me authority, and I would very much like to know the truth of what happened in this household. Any lighteyes of birth who can provide witness will be welcomed.” “They need the testimony of a lighteyes,” Jushu said softly to his siblings. “Father is important enough that they can’t just remove him.” “There was one,” the messenger said loudly, “who was willing to speak to us of the truth. He has since made himself unavailable. Do any of you have his courage? Will you come with me and testify to the highprince of the crimes committed on these lands?” He looked toward
Brandon Sanderson (Words of Radiance (The Stormlight Archive, #2))
And is … mercy such a bad thing, aboshi?” “Not bad; merely chaotic. If you look through the records in this hall, you will find the same story told again and again. Leniency and mercy. Men set free despite crimes, because they were good fathers, or well-liked in the community, or in the favor of someone important. Some of those who are set free change their lives and go on to produce for society. Others recidivate and create great tragedies. The thing is, Szeth-son-Neturo, we humans are terrible at spotting which will be which. The purpose of the law is so we do not have to choose. So our native sentimentality will not harm us.
Brandon Sanderson (Oathbringer (Stormlight Archive #3, Part 1 of 6))
Artists spend more of their lives making bad practice pieces than they do masterworks, particularly at the start. And even when an artist becomes a master, some pieces don’t work out. Still others are somehow just wrong until the last stroke. “You learn more from bad art than you do from good art, as your mistakes are more important than your successes. Plus, good art usually evokes the same emotions in people—most good art is the same kind of good. But bad pieces can each be bad in their own unique way.
Brandon Sanderson (Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive, #3))
The most important words a man can say are, “I will do better.” These are not the most important words any man can say. I am a man, and they are what I needed to say. The ancient code of the Knights Radiant says “journey before destination.” Some may call it a simple platitude, but it is far more. A journey will have pain and failure. It is not only the steps forward that we must accept. It is the stumbles. The trials. The knowledge that we will fail. That we will hurt those around us. But if we stop, if we accept the person we are when we fall, the journey ends. That failure becomes our destination. To love the journey is to accept no such end. I have found, through painful experience, that the most important step a person can take is always the next one.
Brandon Sanderson (Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive, #3))
In the form in which it issued from the Jewish academies of Babylonia and Palestine, it is a great national work, a scientific document of first importance, the archives of ten centuries, in which are preserved the thoughts and opinions, the views and verdicts, the errors, transgressions, hopes, disappointments, customs, ideals, convictions, and sorrows of Israel--a work produced by the zeal and patience of thirty generations, laboring with a self-denial unparalleled in the history of literature.
Michael Levi Rodkinson (THE BABYLONIAN TALMUD, ALL 20 VOLUMES (ILLUSTRATED))
It is important to stop here and note that it is an energetic impossibility for a soul to go backward in its evolution.
Linda Howe (How to Read the Akashic Records: Accessing the Archive of the Soul and Its Journey)
Where is he?” “Doing things he finds very important. I would fault him for it, as I find nothing more frightening than a man trying to do what he has decided is important. Very little in the world has ever gone astray—at least on a grand scale—because a person decided to be frivolous.
Brandon Sanderson (Words of Radiance (The Stormlight Archive, #2))
There are two kinds of important men, Shallan. There are those who, when the boulder of time rolls toward them, stand up in front of it and hold out their hands. All their lives, they’ve been told how great they are. They assume the world itself will bend to their whims as their nurse did when fetching them a fresh cup of milk. “Those men end up squished. “Other men stand to the side when the boulder of time passes, but are quick to say, ‘See what I did! I made the boulder roll there. Don’t make me do it again!’ “These men end up getting everyone else squished.” “Is there not a third type of person?” “There is, but they are oh so rare. These know they can’t stop the boulder. So they walk beside it, study it, and bide their time. Then they shove it—ever so slightly—to create a deviation in its path. “These are the men … well, these are the men who actually change the world. And they terrify me. For men never see as far as they think they do.
Brandon Sanderson (Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive, #3))
Words are important," Gavilar said. "Much more than you give them credit for being." "Perhaps," Dalinar said. "But if the were all-powerful, you wouldn't need my sword, would you?" "Perhaps. I can't help feeling words would be enough, if only I knew the right ones to say.
Brandon Sanderson (Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive, #3))
Shallan wasn’t certain what she thought of the idea of a “true soldier” being the type who didn’t care about politics. Shouldn’t the why of what a man was doing be important to him? Soldiers didn’t talk that way. There was some ideal she couldn’t quite grasp, a kind of cult of obedience—of caring only about the battlefield and the challenge it presented.
Brandon Sanderson (Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive, #3))
Shallan won’t listen to me any longer,” Jasnah said. “She rebels against every little thing I tell her. These last few months on her own have changed the child.” “She never obeyed well, Jasnah. That is who she is.” “In the past, at least she pretended to care about my teaching.” “But you have said, more humans should question their places in life. Did you not say that they too often accept presumed truth as fact?” She tapped the table. “You’re right, of course. Wouldn’t I rather have her straining against her boundaries, as opposed to happily living within them? Whether she obeys me or not is of little import. But I do worry about her ability to command her situation, rather than letting her impulses command her.” “How do you change this, if it is?” An excellent question. Jasnah searched through the papers on her small table. She’d been collecting reports from her informants in the warcamps—the ones who had survived—about Shallan. She’d truly done well in Jasnah’s absence. Perhaps what the child needed was not more structure, but more challenges.
Brandon Sanderson (Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive, #3))
You learn more from bad art than you do from good art, as your mistakes are more important than your successes. Plus, good art usually evokes the same emotions in people—most good art is the same kind of good. But bad pieces can each be bad in their own unique way. So I’m glad we have bad art, and I’m sure the Almighty agrees.
Brandon Sanderson (Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive, #3))
Have you ever considered, bridgeman, that bad art does more for the world than good art? Artists spend more of their lives making bad practice pieces than they do masterworks, particularly at the start. And even when an artist becomes a master, some pieces don’t work out. Still others are somehow just wrong until the last stroke. “You learn more from bad art than you do from good art, as your mistakes are more important than your successes. Plus, good art usually evokes the same emotions in people—most good art is the same kind of good. But bad pieces can each be bad in their own unique way.
Brandon Sanderson (Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive, #3))
But as I tucked the picture back in between some pages toward the end of the book, I realized something important, which is this: that everything that happened after I took the picture was also inside it, even though no one could see it, except me when I looked at it, and maybe also you, in the future, when you look at it, even if you didn't even see the original moment with your own eyes.
Valeria Luiselli (Lost Children Archive)
Well, they could name it what they wanted, but Nu Ralik knew that the boundaries of nature were far more important than the boundaries of nations. Ishikk was a Purelaker. First and foremost. By tide and sun he was.
Brandon Sanderson (The Way of Kings (The Stormlight Archive, #1))
unceremoniously as “John F. Kennedy: The Photographic Archive of Cecil W. Stoughton.” I knew—even sight unseen—that this was no ordinary scrapbook collection of scratchy Polaroids and faded albums. No, this might be the treasure trove of one of Camelot’s court photographers, a man who had visually documented some of the most important events in the presidency of John F. Kennedy, including a secret party in New York City attended by the president and the most glamorous movie star of the time: Marilyn Monroe.
James L. Swanson (Second Best Thing: Marilyn, JFK, and a Night to Remember)
became a blurry swirl of shapes and colors narrowing into a luminous spot of white light at the end of a black anoxic tunnel and dissolving into a rapid series of bright sharp images that I recognized at once from my childhood: long forgotten memories of important moments flashing by faster than anything I’d ever experienced, twenty to thirty frames a second, each one of them original, like perfect photographic slides from the archives of my young life, every scene compressed into a complete story with sights and sounds and smells and feelings from the time. Each image was euphoric, rapturous. The smiling face of my beautiful young mother / a gentle touch from her hand on my face / absorbing her love / playing in the sand at the seashore with my father / waves washing up on the beach / feeling the strength and security of his presence / soothing, kind-hearted praise from a teacher at school / faces and voices of adoring aunts and uncles / steam trains coming in at the local railroad station / hearing myself say “choo-choo” / the excitement of shared discovery with my brother on Christmas morning / running free through a familiar forest with a happy dog / hitting a baseball hard and hearing encouraging cries from my parents behind me in the bleachers / shooting baskets in a backyard court with a buddy from high school / a tender kiss from the soft warm lips of a lovely teenage girl / the encouraging thrust of her stomach and thighs against mine.
John Laurence (The Cat From Hue: A Vietnam War Story)
Pekwa Nicholas Mohlala BA GA MOHLALA IN SCHOONOORD HISTORY SOURCES AND RESEARCHERS Our sources for our ongoing research on the history of Ba Ga Mohlala in Schoonoord The main sources that we use in our ongoing researches on the history of Ba Ga Mohlala in Schoonoord are government official records, archival records, and oral evidence. There are few archival records on the history on the history of Ba Ga Mohlala in general, Banareng, and Batlokwa Ba Lethebe. There are also very few published documents (especially books and others forms of researched publications) on Ba Ga Mohlala in general, Banareng, and Batlokwa Ba Lethebe, and this is one of the principal motivations for the need to record the history of Ba Ga Mohlala in general, Banareng, and Batlokwa Ba Lethebe. Therefore, the bulk of secondary are the available general works of South African History, and most of such works deal scantily with the history of Ba Ga Mohlala, Banareng, and Batlokwa Ba Lethebe, that is because those general works mainly deal with South African tribes in general rather  than Ba Ga Mohlala, Banareng, and Batlokwa Ba Lethebe in particular. As such those sources are used to contextualize the history of Ba Ga Mohlala, Banareng, and Batlokwa Ba Lethebe, and are mostly used to develop theorical framework. Oral evidence forms an important part of our researches. That is because most of the history of clans, and tribes in South Africa, such as Ba Ga Mohlala, Banareng, and Batlokwa Ba Lethebe was not written and it is expected that very few written records do exist on their history. As a result, the few written records which are available are used in conjunction with oral evidence. Most importantly, the other sources which have been mentioned thus far are used to corroborate oral information, and vice versa. Thus, the combination of all these sources result in a more balanced and objective study of the history of Ba Ga Mohlala, Banareng, and Batlokwa Ba Lethebe. Because oral information is one of the core sources of our studies in the history of Ba Ga Mohlala, Banareng, and Batlokwa Ba Lethebe, best practices in oral research are thoroughly  followed in order to achieve the best possible outcome possible. Like any other forms of collecting evidence, and as well as other sources of information, oral evidence has its own problem areas and some benefits, and there are also processes of dealing with those problem areas. There are three main problem areas of oral history. Firstly, the limitations of the interviewee which include, unreliability of memory, deliberate falsification, unfairness through vindictiveness, excessive discretion, superficiality and gossip, oversimplification, distortion of interviewee's role, lack of perspective, distortion due to to personal feelings, self-consciousness, influence of hindsight, and repetition of published evidence. Secondly, the interviewer has limitations which include, unrepresantative sampling, biased questioning, difference and bias towards the intreviews, and interviews as a replacement for reading documents. The third and last problem areas of oral is about the limitations inherent in the nature of intetviewing itself which include, misinterpretation of what the interviewee have said, inability of oral history to verified by others, interview transcripts missing the essence of the interview, impossibility of true communication, and dependence on survivors and those who agree to be interviewed.
Pekwa Nicholas Mohlala
For I have never been dedicated to a more important purpose, and the very pillars of the sky will shake with the results of our war here. I ask again. Support me. Do not stand aside and let disaster consume more lives. I’ve never begged you for something before, old friend. I do so now.
Brandon Sanderson (The Way of Kings (The Stormlight Archive, #1))
Urithiru was said to be the center of the Silver Kingdoms, a city that held ten thrones, one for each king. It was the most majestic, most amazing, most important city in all the world.
Brandon Sanderson (The Way of Kings (The Stormlight Archive, #1))
I often find myself wondering of those other paths, those other worlds of possibility. Surely I exist in other realms, surely we all do. What are the other versions of ourselves like? What have they accomplished that we never could? And the most important question of all, am I doing what I can to be the best version of myself? -Azzeal, Keeper of the Windwalker Archive
Michael James Ploof (The Windwalker Trilogy (The Windwalker Archive, #1-3))
This is an embarrassing hole. History is the most important of the literary subarts.
Brandon Sanderson (The Way of Kings (The Stormlight Archive, #1))
the boundaries of nature were far more important than the boundaries of nations.
Brandon Sanderson (The Way of Kings (The Stormlight Archive, #1))
Then be wise about it. There are two kinds of important men, Shallan. There are those who, when the boulder of time rolls toward them, stand up in front of it and hold out their hands. All their lives, they've been told how great they are. They assume the word itself will bend to their whims as their nurse did when fetching them a fresh cup of milk. Those men end up squished. Other men stand to the side when the boulder of time passes, but are quick to say, 'See what I did! I made the boulder roll there. Don't make me do it again!' These men end up getting everyone else squished." "Is there not a third type of person?" "There is, but they are oh so rare. These know they can't stop the boulder. So they walk beside it, study it, and bide their time. Then they shove it-ever so slightly-to create a deviation in its path. These are the men who actually change the world. And they terrify me. For men never see as far as they think they do.
Brandon Sanderson (Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive, #3))
Protecting ten innocents is not worth killing one. In the end, all men die. How you lived will be far more important
Brandon Sanderson (The Way of Kings (The Stormlight Archive, #1))
You learn more from bad art than you do from good art, as your mistakes are more important than your successes.
Brandon Sanderson (Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive, #3))
A journey will have pain and failure. It is not only the steps forward that we must accept. It is the stumbles. The trials. The knowledge that we will fail. That we will hurt those around us. But if we stop, if we accept the person we are when we fall, the journey ends. That failure becomes our destination. To love the journey is to accept no such end. I have found, through painful experience, that the most important step a person can take is always the next one.
Brandon Sanderson (Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive, #3))
Then find the middle ground.” “Middle ground only comes in war after lots of people have died—and only after the important people are worried they might actually lose.
Brandon Sanderson (Oathbringer (The Stormlight Archive, #3))
Like all cultures, internet culture is referential, baffling to outsiders, relying more on shared history than explicit instruction. Like all cultures, it's not truly a single culture: it has some parts that are widely shared and others that occupy tiny niches. Like all cultures, importantly, it's in flux, however neatly we archive our favourite parts and attempt to pass them down to our offspring.
Gretchen McCulloch