Choices And Mistakes Quotes

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Some mistakes... Just have greater consequences than others. But you don't have to let the result of one mistake be the thing that defines you. You, Clark, have the choice not to let that happen.
Jojo Moyes (Me Before You (Me Before You, #1))
They say that a person’s personality is the sum of their experiences. But that isn’t true, at least not entirely, because if our past was all that defined us, we’d never be able to put up with ourselves. We need to be allowed to convince ourselves that we’re more than the mistakes we made yesterday. That we are all of our next choices, too, all of our tomorrows.
Fredrik Backman (Anxious People)
There are no coincidences in life. What person that wandered in and out of your life was there for some purpose, even if they caused you harm. Sometimes, it doesn’t make sense the short periods of time we get with people, or the outcomes from their choices. However, if you turn it over to God he promises that you will see the big picture in the hereafter. Nothing is too small to be a mistake.
Shannon L. Alder
It's a funny thing about life, once you begin to take note of the things you are grateful for, you begin to lose sight of the things that you lack.
Germany Kent
Don’t make the same mistakes that everyone else makes. Make wonderful mistakes. Make the kind of mistakes that make people so shocked that they have no other choice but to be a little impressed.
Jenny Lawson (Furiously Happy: A Funny Book About Horrible Things)
We need to be allowed to convince ourselves that we're more than the mistakes we made yesterday. That we are all of our next choices, too, all of our tomorrows.
Fredrik Backman (Anxious People)
I marvel at how even the wrong choices can keep us on the right path. How the worst mistake can wind up being the best thing that ever happened to us.
Katie Klein (Cross My Heart (Cross My Heart, #1))
No mistake about it. Ice is cold; roses are red; I'm in love. And this love is about to carry me off somewhere. The current's too overpowering; I don't have any choice. It may very well be a special place, some place I've never seen before. Danger may be lurking there, something that may end up wounding me deeply, fatally. I might end up losing everything. But there's no turning back. I can only go with the flow. Even if it means I'll be burned up, gone forever.
Haruki Murakami (Sputnik Sweetheart)
Well—I have to say I personally have never drawn such a sharp line between ‘good’ and ‘bad’ as you. For me: that line is often false. The two are never disconnected. One can’t exist without the other. As long as I am acting out of love, I feel I am doing best I know how. But you—wrapped up in judgment, always regretting the past, cursing yourself, blaming yourself, asking ‘what if,’ ‘what if.’ ‘Life is cruel.’ ‘I wish I had died instead of.’ Well—think about this. What if all your actions and choices, good or bad, make no difference to God? What if the pattern is pre-set? No no—hang on—this is a question worth struggling with. What if our badness and mistakes are the very thing that set our fate and bring us round to good? What if, for some of us, we can’t get there any other way?
Donna Tartt (The Goldfinch)
Scars are but evidence of life," Coquette said. "Evidence of choices to be learned from...evidence of wounds...wounds inflicted of mistakes...wounds we choose to allow the healing of. We likewise choose to see them, that we may not make the same mistakes again.
Marcia Lynn McClure (The Whispered Kiss)
The basis of shame is not some personal mistake of ours, but the ignominy, the humiliation we feel that we must be what we are without any choice in the matter, and that this humiliation is seen by everyone.
Milan Kundera (Immortality)
If one makes a mistake, then an apology is usually sufficient to get things back on an even keel. However-and this is a big ‘however’- most people do not ever know why their apology did not seem to have any effect. It is simply that they did not make a mistake; they made a choice…and never understood the difference between the two.
Andy Andrews (The Noticer: Sometimes, All a Person Needs Is a Little Perspective)
Cheating isn’t a mistake; it’s a choice.
Vi Keeland (Stuck-Up Suit)
He felt as though he were failing in practically every area of his life. Lately, happiness seemed as distant and unattainable to him as space travel. He hadn't always felt this way. There had been a long period of time during which he remembered being very happy. But things change. People change. Change was one of the inevitable laws of nature, exacting its toll on people's lives. Mistakes are made, regrets form, and all that was left were repercussions that made something as simple as rising from the bed seem almost laborious.
Nicholas Sparks (The Choice)
It is better to stay single and wait for the one that makes sense then to marry someone that makes absolutely no sense. The moment you settle is when the one person that makes all the sense in the world shows up and Satan sits back and enjoys your spiritual meltdown.
Shannon L. Alder
You can never make the same mistake twice because the second time you make it, it's not a mistake, it's a choice.
Steven Denn
It doesn't matter if we don't mean to do the things we do. It doesn't mean if it was an accident or a mistake. It doesn't even matter if we think this is all up to fate. Because regardless of our destiny, we still have to answer for our actions. We make choices, big and small, every day of our lives, and those choices have consequences.
Taylor Jenkins Reid (Maybe in Another Life)
It only takes one mistake and nothing else you ever do will matter. No matter how hard you work or how smart you become, you'll always be known for that one poor choice.
Chuck Palahniuk (Snuff)
You don’t have to say everything to be a light. Sometimes a fire built on a hill will bring interested people to your campfire.
Shannon L. Alder
Making mistakes is part of learning to choose well. No way around it. Choices are thrust upon us, and we don't always get things right. Even postponing or avoiding a decision can become a choice that carries heavy consequences. Mistakes can be painful-sometimes they cause irrevocable harm-but welcome to Earth. Poor choices are part of growing up, and part of life. You will make bad choices, and you will be affected by the poor choices of others. We must rise above such things.
Brandon Mull (Keys to the Demon Prison (Fablehaven, #5))
What is a woman's place in this modern world? Jasnah Kholin's words read. I rebel against this question, though so many of my peers ask it. The inherent bias in the inquiry seems invisible to so many of them. They consider themselves progressive because they are willing to challenge many of the assumptions of the past. They ignore the greater assumption--that a 'place' for women must be defined and set forth to begin with. Half of the population must somehow be reduced to the role arrived at by a single conversation. No matter how broad that role is, it will be--by-nature--a reduction from the infinite variety that is womanhood. I say that there is no role for women--there is, instead, a role for each woman, and she must make it for herself. For some, it will be the role of scholar; for others, it will be the role of wife. For others, it will be both. For yet others, it will be neither. Do not mistake me in assuming I value one woman's role above another. My point is not to stratify our society--we have done that far to well already--my point is to diversify our discourse. A woman's strength should not be in her role, whatever she chooses it to be, but in the power to choose that role. It is amazing to me that I even have to make this point, as I see it as the very foundation of our conversation.
Brandon Sanderson (Words of Radiance (The Stormlight Archive, #2))
One should learn the lessons of history. The mistakes of the past need only be made once. Unless there are no other choices. ~ Bayaz
Joe Abercrombie (Before They Are Hanged (The First Law, #2))
you never make the same mistake twice. the second time you make it, it is no longer a mistake. it is a choice
Lauren Conrad
It seemed cruelly unfair to me, even then, how fast your life can change before you have an opportunity to rethink your choices. We should get second chances on the big stuff. We should come equipped with erasers attached to the tops of our heads. Like pencils. We should be able to flip over and scribble away mistakes, at least once or twice during the duration of our existence, especially in matters of life and death.
Tiffanie DeBartolo (God-Shaped Hole)
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.
Dan Millman (Way of the Peaceful Warrior: A Book That Changes Lives)
I took all the blame. I admitted mistakes I hadn't made, intentions I'd never had. Whenever she turned cold and hard, I begged her to be good to me again, to forgive me and love me. Sometimes I had the feeling that she hurt herself when she turned cold and rigid. As if what she was yearning for was the warmth of my apologies, protestations, and entreaties. Sometimes I thought she just bullied me. But either way, I had no choice.
Bernhard Schlink (The Reader)
I know I should just leave. Just go. Because there's a point where a mistake turns into a big mistake, and I should probably come to my senses before I get there.
David Levithan (Naomi and Ely's No Kiss List)
The world demands I make good choices on no information, and then blames my maidenhood for my mistakes, as if my maidenhood were responsible for my ignorance. Ignorance is not stupidity, but it might as well be. And I do not like feeling stupid.
Lois McMaster Bujold (The Curse of Chalion (World of the Five Gods, #1))
Mistakes are something that happen by accident. You didn't walk out the door one morning and fall into some guy's bed. You thought about it, for a while. You made that choice.
Jodi Picoult (The Tenth Circle)
Screwing up is hardly a major mistake. Sometimes your wrong choices bring you to the right places.
Shannon L. Alder
You got one choice at the beginning but if you didn't choose right, things got narrow real quick.
Ron Rash (Serena)
It was possible, he understood, for a person's life to become just a long series of mistakes, and that the end, when it came, was just one more mistake in a chain of bad choices. The thing was, most of these mistakes were actually borrowed from other people. You took their bad ideas, and for whatever reason, made them your own.
Justin Cronin (The Passage (The Passage, #1))
The mistakes you make now count. Not for everything, and not forever. But they do matter, and they shape you.If you take nothing else from what I've been through, at least remember this: make your choices well. Because you'll always be accountable for them. That's what being an adult is all about.
Sarah Dessen (The Moon and More)
I must be in love with this woman, Sumire realized with a start. No mistake about it. Ice is cold; roses are red; I'm in love. And this love is about to carry me off somewhere. This current's too overpowering; I don't have any choice. It may very well be a special place, some place I've never seen before. Danger may be lurking there, something that may end up wounding me deeply, fatally. I might end up losing everything. But there's no turning back. I can only go with the flow. Even if it means I'll be burned up, gone forever.
Haruki Murakami (Sputnik Sweetheart)
I'm pro-choice because I've never been a fourteen-year-old incest victim pregnant by her father, or a woman who's going to die if her pregnancy continues, or even a teenager who made a mistake or a rape victim. I want women to have choices, but I also believe that it's a life, especially once it's big enough to live outside the womb.
Laurell K. Hamilton (Danse Macabre (Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter, #14))
You can make heaven out of hell, or hell out of heaven. The choice is yours.
Shannon L. Alder
I'm not a slave to your destiny. I walk my own road. I make my own mistakes. And maybe this is one of them. But I'll fucking own it. because it's my choice. My life. My fate.
Jay Kristoff (Darkdawn (The Nevernight Chronicle, #3))
God has a way of picking a “nobody” and turning their world upside down, in order to create a “somebody” that will remove the obstacles they encountered out of the pathway for others.
Shannon L. Alder
It is a mistake to consider any belief more liberated than another. It is the possibility of change which is important. Every new form of liberation is destined to eventually become another form of enslavement for most of its adherents. There is no freedom from duality on this plane of existence, but one may at least aspire to choice of duality.
Peter J. Carroll (Liber Null and Psychonaut: An Introduction to Chaos Magic)
But things change. People change. Change was one of the inevitable laws of nature, exacting its toll on people’s lives. Mistakes are made, regrets form, and all that was left were repercussions that made something as simple as rising from the bed seem almost laborious.
Nicholas Sparks (The Choice)
Anyone can possess, anyone can profess, but it is an altogether different thing to confess.
Shannon L. Alder
Don't be afraid to make mistakes. But if you do, make new ones. Life is too short to make the wrong choice twice.
Joyce Rachelle
Grow with discipline. Balance intuition with rigor. Innovate around the core. Don't embrace the status quo. Find new ways to see. Never expect a silver bullet. Get your hands dirty. Listen with empathy and overcommunicate with transparency. Tell your story, refusing to let others define you. Use authentic experiences to inspire. Stick to your values, they are your foundation. Hold people accountable, but give them the tools to succeed. Make the tough choices; it's how you execute that counts. Be decisive in times of crisis. Be nimble. Find truth in trials and lessons in mistakes. Be responsible for what you see, hear, and do. Believe.
Howard Schultz (Onward: How Starbucks Fought for Its Life without Losing Its Soul)
In this new, turbulent reality, the one person I recognize is him. My memories of him - memories of us - have done something to me. I've changed somewhere deep inside. I feel different. Heavier, like my feet have been more firmly planted, liberated by certainty, free to grow roots here in my own self, free to trust unequivocally in the strength and steadiness of my own heart. It's an empowering discovery, to find that I can trust myself - even when I'm not myself - to make the right choices. To know for certain now that there was at least one mistake I never made. Aaron Warner Anderson is the only emotional through line in my life that ever made sense. He's the only constant. The only steady, reliable heartbeat I've ever had. Aaron, Aaron, Aaron, Aaron. I had no idea how much we'd lost, no idea how much of him I'd longed for. I had no idea how desperately we'd been fighting. How many years we'd fought for moments - minutes - to be together. It fills me with a painful kind of joy. - Ella
Tahereh Mafi (Defy Me (Shatter Me, #5))
It has always been simple, but making it hard was always your way of avoiding pain. If you want to change your life, you have to change what you are doing. It wasn't his fault, her fault, their fault or the circumstances. It was your inability to choose. So, life chose for you. Somewhere in that crazy mind of yours time stopped. You thought someone would rescue you, but they didn't. You have to rescue yourself. This is not a fire you can put out; you have to walk through it, in order to reach life. Getting burned is apart of growth, didn't you know?
Shannon L. Alder
You will make mistakes. You will make decisions, and sometimes you will regret those choices. Sometimes there won't be a right choice, just the best of several bad options. I don't need to tell you that you can do this-you know you can.
Sarah J. Maas (Queen of Shadows (Throne of Glass, #4))
so here i sit. a sum of the parts. about a third way down this wonderful path, so to speak. and i've been thinking lately about a friendship that fell apart with time, with distance, and with the misunderstanding of youth. i'm trying not to confuse sadness with regret. not the easiest thing at times. i dont regret that certain things happened. i understand that perhaps i had a choice in the matter, or perhaps i believe in fate. probably not, but so far actions as small as the quickest glance to events as monumental as death have pushed me slowly along to right here, right now. there was no other way to get here. the meandering and erratic path was actually the straightest of lines. take away a handful of angry words, things once thought of as mistakes or regrets, and i'm suddenly a different person with a different history, a different future. that, i would regret. so here i sit. thinking about a person i once called my best friends. a man who might be full of sadness and regret, who might not give a damn, or who might, just might, remember the future and realize that's where its at.
Chris Wright
Mistakes wreck your life. But they make what you have. It's kind of all one. You know what Hester told me when we were working the sheep one time? She said it's no good to complain about your flock, because it's the put-together of all your past choices.
Barbara Kingsolver (Flight Behavior)
So many roads. So many detours. So many choices. So many mistakes.
Sarah Jessica Parker
I want a dyke for president. I want a person with AIDS for president and I want a fag for vice president and I want someone with no health insurance and I want someone who grew up in a place where the earth is so saturated with toxic waste that they didn’t have a choice about getting leukemia. I want a president that had an abortion at sixteen and I want a candidate who isn’t the lesser of two evils and I want a president who lost their last lover to AIDS, who still sees that in their eyes every time they lay down to rest, who held their lover in their arms and knew they were dying. I want a president with no air-conditioning, a president who has stood in line at the clinic, at the DMV, at the welfare office, and has been unemployed and laid off and sexually harassed and gaybashed and deported. I want someone who has spent the night in the tombs and had a cross burned on their lawn and survived rape. I want someone who has been in love and been hurt, who respects sex, who has made mistakes and learned from them. I want a Black woman for president. I want someone with bad teeth and an attitude, someone who has eaten that nasty hospital food, someone who crossdresses and has done drugs and been in therapy. I want someone who has committed civil disobedience. And I want to know why this isn’t possible. I want to know why we started learning somewhere down the line that a president is always a clown. Always a john and never a hooker. Always a boss and never a worker. Always a liar, always a thief, and never caught.
Zoe Leonard
We can spend our days bemoaning our losses, or we can grow from them. Ultimately the choice is ours. We can be victims of circumstance or masters of our own fate, but make no mistake, we cannot be both. The Walk - Epilogue Page 288
Richard Paul Evans (The Walk (The Walk, #1))
You’re saying the gods don’t have free will.” “The power to make mistakes,” Penny said. “Only we have that. Mortals.
Lev Grossman (The Magician King (The Magicians, #2))
Blaze your own trail in life. Make your own choices and make your own mistakes. It's the only way you'll find your own happiness, not someone else's.
M. Leighton (Everything for Us (The Bad Boys, #3))
When you blame others, what you are really saying is what is inside of you can’t be fixed, so you have no control of your own happiness. Therefore, you have made the conscience choice to give focus and fuel to a bad situation that will take you nowhere and give you nothing, but ignorance and pain.
Shannon L. Alder
I tell you not to be timid. I tell you to make the choices, make the mistakes, big, terrible, reckless mistakes, really screw it all up. I tell you it is the only way.
Jandy Nelson (I'll Give You the Sun)
It's not fair to spend so much time working towards something, only to have someone else's lapse in judgment, poor choice, one mistake, destroy it all.
Kristin Walker (A Match Made in High School)
There are no completely good or bad people. Everybody makes mistakes, or bad choices. It's how we live with them that make us the people we are.
Karen White (The Time Between)
We are bound by our choices, but we are more than our mistakes
Kate Beckett
People screw up. People screw up a lot. We allow our own selfishness to overpower us at times. It happens. But you can’t allow that to tear you down. You can’t keep dwelling on your past choices, and your past actions, or else you’ll never learn from them.
Nicole Sobon (Deprogrammed (The Emile Reed Chronicles, #2))
Along the way, I’ve tried not to make the same mistake twice, to learn, to adapt, and to pray for the wisdom to make better choices in the future.
Hillary Rodham Clinton (Hard Choices)
Stay away from any minute of joy that can bring you a lifetime of sorrow.
Dennis E. Adonis
Before you take that first curious, coerced, spiteful, or vengeful step forward, remember this: it’s a thousand times easier to slip into a muddy pit than it is to climb out of one.
Richelle E. Goodrich (Making Wishes: Quotes, Thoughts, & a Little Poetry for Every Day of the Year)
Life’s the sum total of all our small mistakes, little tragedies, bad choices. Addition on top of addition. They pile up and pile up until the cost of keeping up appearances is too high and the weight is just too much. Then: collapse.
Lauren Oliver (Rooms)
So, your saying choices and destiny shape the course of our lives? "I think so, yes. It's just easier to blame fate for all of the mistakes.
Gena Showalter (The Darkest Craving (Lords of The Underworld, #10))
Why are we asked to make the most important decisions of our lives when we are so young, and so prone to mistakes?
Samuel Park (This Burns My Heart)
Some mistakes...just have greater consequences than others. But you don't have to let that night be the thing that defines you. You have the choice not to let that happen.
Jojo Moyes (Me Before You (Me Before You, #1))
With all these forks in the roads of our path, why do so many choose to take the knife?
Anthony Liccione
Today I choose life. Every morning when I wake up I can choose joy, happiness, negativity, pain... To feel the freedom that comes from being able to continue to make mistakes and choices - today I choose to feel life, not to deny my humanity but embrace it.
Kevyn Aucoin
I'm not defending him; I have no idea why he's made the choices he has. But...I can't help but feel sorry for him. Because one day he's going to open his eyes and realize that he's made the biggest mistake of his life.
Emma Chase (Twisted (Tangled, #2))
Misperceiving that there is one correct choice is a common mistake. Coming to understand that there are usually a few good choices--and then there's the one you pick, commit to, and make great--is the best way to make flexible, optimal, good decisions in life.
Katie Couric
Never mistake the uncomfortable feeling of insecurity and the fear of the unknown with the Holy Ghost’s promptings. Sometimes those feelings are simply Satan keeping you stuck where you are because he knows you will have a half-life there. He knows that you will spend half of your life disconnected, discontented and convincing your mind of what its heart will never accept. He knows when you have settled, gave up and didn’t try. Inaction is his greatest weapon, while regret is his second.
Shannon L. Alder
The witches, who lowered their eyes for no man . . . Until she could get away, perhaps she might learn a thing or two about what it was like to have fangs and claws. And how to use them. “Blue,” she whispered. “My blood runs blue.” “Good choice, witchling,” Manon said, and the word was a challenge and an order. She turned away, but glanced over her shoulder. “Welcome to the Blackbeaks.” Witchling. Elide stared after her. She had likely just made the biggest mistake of her life, but . . . it was strange. Strange, that feeling of belonging.
Sarah J. Maas (Queen of Shadows (Throne of Glass, #4))
You both have grown up feeling as if you weren't properly loved by those who should have loved you the most. People make mistakes. They make wrong choices at the worst moments. Never at any time were you not loved Know this. Cherish this. Love one another and be courageous enough to live your life and love more. Don't let fear trap you.
Katie McGarry (Nowhere But Here (Thunder Road, #1))
Saying something is “meant to be” is a cop out. It’s a way for people to deal when they screw up or when life hands them a bowl of shit stew. The things that are meant to be are the things we can’t control, the things we don’t cause, the things that happen regardless of who or what we are. Like sunsets and snow-fall and natural disasters. I’ve never believed hardship or suffering was meant to be. I’ve never believed relationships were meant to be. We choose. In large part, we choose. We create, we make mistakes, we burn bridges, we build new ones.
Amy Harmon (The Song of David (The Law of Moses, #2))
You don't have to apologize for loving someone or wanting a life that no longer fits your blueprint. The beginning phase of reclaiming your life always starts with apologizing to yourself, then apologizing to others for wasting their time because of your fear based decisions. The truth is when we eliminate fear we often find the real path we were meant to be on.
Shannon L. Alder
The difference between a good administrator and a bad one is about five heartbeats. Good administrators make immediate choices. […] They usually can be made to work. A bad administrator, on the other hand, hesitates, diddles around, asks for committees, for research and reports. Eventually, he acts in ways which create serious problems. […] “A bad administrator is more concerned with reports than with decisions. He wants the hard record which he can display as an excuse for his errors. […] Oh, they depend on verbal orders. They never lie about what they’ve done if their verbal orders cause problems, and they surround themselves with people able to act wisely on the basis of verbal orders. Often, the most important piece of information is that something has gone wrong. Bad administrators hide their mistakes until it’s too late to make corrections.
Frank Herbert (God Emperor of Dune (Dune Chronicles #4))
Too many people spend their life in fear of making a mistake. However, here is the truth: Fear is the mistake. If you block out all the doubts and listen only to what you feel in your heart, then follow that course, you waste less time in indecision and spend more time being authentic. Life is too short to settle for parttime happiness.
Shannon L. Alder
We lose ourselves,” she repeated, forming each word with care, “but we find our way back.” Wasn’t that the story of her life? Wasn’t that the story of Bethie’s? You make the wrong choices, you make mistakes, you disappear for a decade, you marry the wrong man. You get hurt. You lose sight of who you are, or of who you want to be, and then you remember, and if you’re lucky you have sisters or friends who remind you when you forget your best intentions. You come back to yourself, again and again. You try, and fail, and try again, and fail again.
Jennifer Weiner (Mrs. Everything)
No man likes to acknowledge that he has made a mistake in the choice of his profession, and every man, worthy of the name, will row long against wind and tide before he allows himself to cry out, 'I am baffled!' and submits to be floated passively back to land.
Charlotte Brontë (The Professor)
doesn’t matter if we don’t mean to do the things we do. It doesn’t matter if it was an accident or a mistake. It doesn’t even matter if we think this is all up to fate. Because regardless of our destiny, we still have to answer for our actions. We make choices, big and small, every day of our lives, and those choices have consequences. We have to face those consequences head-on, for better or worse. We don’t get to erase them just by saying we didn’t mean to. Fate or not, our lives are still the results of our choices. I’m starting to think that when we don’t own them, we don’t own ourselves.
Taylor Jenkins Reid (Maybe in Another Life)
Just a moment. Just 1 second, just 1 more minute, just give me another hour or maybe the weekend to think it over it’s not so much it’s not so hard it’s all we ever ask for it’s a simple request. But the moments the seconds the minutes the hours the days and years become one big mistake, one extraordinary opportunity slipped right through our fingers because we couldn’t decide, we couldn’t understand, we needed more time, we didn’t know what to do. We don’t even know what we’ve done. We have no idea how we even got here when all we ever wanted was to wake up in the morning and go to sleep at night and maybe stop for ice cream on the way home and that one decision, that one choice, that one accidental opportunity unraveled everything we’ve ever known and ever believed in and what do we do? What do we do from here?
Tahereh Mafi (Unravel Me (Shatter Me, #2))
There had been a long period of time during which he remembered being very happy. But things change. People change. Change was one of the most inevitable laws of nature, exacting its toll on people's lives. Mistakes are made, regrets form, and all that was left were repercussions that made something as simple as rising from the bed seem almost laborious.
Nicholas Sparks (The Choice)
It’s funny – you don’t think of doctors getting ill.’ It’s true, and I think it’s part of something bigger: patients don’t actually think of doctors as being human. It’s why they’re so quick to complain if we make a mistake or if we get cross. It’s why they’ll bite our heads off when we finally call them into our over-running clinic room at 7 p.m., not thinking that we also have homes we’d rather be at. But it’s the flip side of not wanting your doctor to be fallible, capable of getting your diagnosis wrong. They don’t want to think of medicine as a subject that anyone on the planet can learn, a career choice their mouth-breathing cousin could have made.
Adam Kay (This is Going to Hurt: Secret Diaries of a Junior Doctor)
There was rarely an obvious branching point in a person's life. People changed slowly, over time. You didn't take one step, then find yourself in a completely new location. You first took a little step off the path to avoid some rocks. For a while, you walked alongside the path, but then you wandered out a little way to step on softer soil. Then you stopped paying attention as you drifted farther and farther away. Finally, you found yourself in the wrong city, wondering why the signs on the roadway hadn't led you better.
Brandon Sanderson (The Emperor's Soul (The Cosmere))
You are my everything,” Julie said. “You are challenging, and difficult, and guarded. I love those things about you. You are fascinating, and complex, and brilliant, and funny. I love those things about you, too. I am in love with your selflessness and your ability to sacrifice too much. I am in love with the parts of you that fear and that hurt and that push people away. I am love in with your vulnerability and your strength. I am in love with your capacity to love harder and with more loyalty than I ever imagined anyone could. I am in love with the choices you’ve made, even the mistakes, because they brought us to where we are right now. More than those things, I am very simply in love with you and everything that you are. Your past, your present, and your future.” She touched her fingers to him, tracing his lips and then moving across his jaw and over his cheek. “I think about you all the time, and I can’t get you out of my head. I am listening to my heart, finally, without doubting anything. And I will never stop.” And then she kissed him. Long and hard and endlessly, only eventually slowing. “Now open your eyes and look at me. I feel everything that you feel, Matt. I always have, and I know that now. And it is time to stop hurting.
Jessica Park (Flat-Out Matt (Flat-Out Love, #1.5))
People make the mistake of thinking that experiencing an emotion means you have to do something about it. In fact, you don’t have to do anything with your emotions at all. You can simply acknowledge them as they arrive – oh, look, that old bitch Envy is back again – then go about your business. It’s the clinging to emotion that causes suffering … A wiser choice is to let it go and breathe.
J.T. Geissinger (Perfect Strangers)
It's easy to mistake being innocent for being simpleminded or naive. We all want to seem sophisticated; we all want to seem street-smart. To be innocent is to be "out of it." Yet there is a deep truth in innocence. A baby looks in his mother's eyes, and all he sees is love. As innocence fades away, more complicated things take its place. We think we need to outwit others and scheme to get what we want. We begin to spend a lot of energy protecting ourselves. Then life turns into a struggle. People have no choice but to be street-smart. How else can they survive? When you get right down to it, survival means seeing things the way they really are and responding. It means being open. And that's what innocence is. It's simple and trusting like a child, not judgmental and committed to one narrow point of view. If you are locked into a pattern of thinking and responding, your creativity gets blocked. You miss the freshness and magic of the moment. Learn to be innocent again, and that freshness never fades.
Michael Jackson (Dancing the Dream: Poems and Reflections)
This is new for me. I'm learning how to have a realtionship with someone other than Ashton. I made a horrible mistake. It was like a relapse. But you," I reached up and tucked the tear dampened hair that had worked its way loose behind her ear. "You touch a place inside of me that Ashton never did. I feel things with you I never felt for her. I loved her for a very long time. I can't help the fact I still want to be there if she needs me. Next time there is a choice to make it will be you I choose first. I can promise you that.
Abbi Glines (The Vincent Brothers (The Vincent Boys, #2))
Nowadays, if a man living in a civilized country (ha!) hears cannon blasts in his sleep, he will, of course, mistake them for thunderclaps, gun salutes on the feast day of the local patron saint, or furniture being moved by the slime-buckets living upstairs, and go right on sleeping soundly. But the ringing of the telephone, the triumphal march of the cell phone, or the doorbell, no: Those are all sounds of summons in response to which the civilzed man (ha-ha!) has no choice but to surface from the depths of slumber and answer.
Andrea Camilleri (August Heat)
For we are opposed around the world by a monolithic and ruthless conspiracy that relies primarily on covert means for expanding its sphere of influence -- on infiltration instead of invasion, on subversion instead of elections, on intimidation instead of free choice, on guerrillas by night instead of armies by day. It is a system which has conscripted vast human and material resources into the building of a tightly knit, highly efficient machine that combines military, diplomatic, intelligence, economic, scientific and political operations. Its preparations are concealed, not published. Its mistakes are buried, not headlined. Its dissenters are silenced, not praised. No expenditure is questioned, no rumor is printed, no secret is revealed. It conducts the Cold War, in short, with a war-time discipline no democracy would ever hope or wish to match.
John F. Kennedy
Don’t compare your actual self to a hypothetical self. Don’t drown in a sea of “what if” s. Don’t clutter your mind by imagining other versions of you, in parallel universes, where you made different decisions. The internet age encourages choice and comparison, but don’t do this to yourself. “Comparison is the thief of joy,” said Theodore Roosevelt. You are you. The past is the past. The only way to make a better life is from inside the present. To focus on regret does nothing but turn that very present into another thing you will wish you did differently. Accept your own reality. Be human enough to make mistakes. Be human enough not to dread the future. Be human enough to be, well, enough. Accepting where you are in life makes it so much easier to be happy for other people without feeling terrible about yourself.
Matt Haig (Notes on a Nervous Planet)
There are many reasons to steer clear of  Christianity. No question. I fully understand why people make that choice. Christianity has survived some unspeakable abominations: the Crusades, clergy sex-scandals, papal corruption, televangelist scams, and clown ministry. But it will survive us, too. It will survive our mistakes and pride and exclusion of others. I believe that the power of  Christianity — the thing that made the very first disciples drop their nets and walk away from everything they knew, the thing that caused Mary Magdalene to return to the tomb and then announce the resurrection of Christ, the thing that the early Christians martyred themselves for, and the thing that keeps me in the Jesus business (or, what my Episcopal priest friend Paul calls “working for the company”) — is something that cannot be killed. The power of unbounded mercy, of what we call The Gospel, cannot be destroyed by corruption and toothy TV preachers. Because in the end, there is still Jesus.
Nadia Bolz-Weber (Accidental Saints: Finding God in All the Wrong People)
Children fail to realize that a mother doesn’t have to provide their “wants”. Her bags are heavy because they are filled by everyone’s “wants”. There isn’t one “want” in the bags a mother is carrying that belongs to her. She looks past her self-fulfillment. She feels as though her wants and needs are not important; therefore, they are never on the list. Children cannot see past their selfish ways. By law, a parent is supposed to provide shelter, food, clothing, make sure their children attend schools and have their annual health checkups. A mother isn’t required to put her children in extracurricular activities; that is a choice. Friends come and go; a marriage may last or fail, but once you’re a mother there is no such thing as divorcing your children. Being a mother is the hardest job ever; it is “till death do you part”. As a mother, you try your best to make sure your children do not make the same mistakes that you did.
Charlena E. Jackson (A Woman's Love Is Never Good Enough)
The very word "secrecy" is repugnant in a free and open society; and we are as a people inherently and historically opposed to secret societies, to secret oaths and to secret proceedings...Our way of life is under attack. Those who make themselves our enemy are advancing around the globe...no war ever posed a greater threat to our security. If you are awaiting a finding of "clear and present danger," then I can only say that the danger has never been more clear and its presence has never been more imminent...For we are opposed around the world by a monolithic and ruthless conspiracy that relies primarily on covert means for expanding its sphere of influence–on infiltration instead of invasion, on subversion instead of elections, on intimidation instead of free choice, on guerrillas by night instead of armies by day. It is a system which has conscripted vast human and material resources into the building of a tightly knit, highly efficient machine that combines military, diplomatic, intelligence, economic, scientific and political operations. Its preparations are concealed, not published. Its mistakes are buried, not headlined. Its dissenters are silenced, not praised. No expenditure is questioned, no rumor is printed, no secret is revealed.
John F. Kennedy
Mantra to Overcome Depression Vitamin D. Sunlight. Go outside. Get a good night of sleep. Not too good. Not shades drawn forever good. Not like you used to. Open the windows. Buy more houseplants. Breathe. Meditate. One day, you will no longer be afraid of being alone with your thoughts. Exercise. Actually exercise instead of just Googling it. Eat well. Cook for yourself. Organize your closet, the garage. Drink plenty of water and repeat after me: I am not a problem to be solved. Repeat after me: I am worthy I am worthy I am neither the mistake nor the punishment. Forget to take vitamins. Let the houseplant die. Eat spoonfuls of peanut butter. Shave your head. Forget this poem. It doesn't matter. There is no wrong way to remember the grace of your own body; no choice that can unmake itself. There is only now, here look: you are already forgiven.
Sierra DeMulder (Today Means Amen)
Sometimes, we expect life to work a certain way and when it doesn’t we blame others or see it as a sign, rather than face the pain of the choices we should or shouldn’t have made. Real healing won’t begin until we stop saying, “God prevented this or that.” Often in our attempt to protect ourselves from pain, we leave things to fate and don’t take chances. Or, we don’t work hard enough to keep the blessings we are given. Maybe, we didn't recognize a blessing, until it was too late. Often, it is the lies we tell ourselves that keeps us stuck in a delusion of not being responsible for our lives. We leave it all up to God. The truth is we are not leaves blowing toward our destiny without any control. To believe this is to take away our freedom of choice and that of others. The final stage of grief is acceptance. This can’t be reached through always believing God willed the outcomes in our lives, despite our inaction or actions. To think so is to take the easy escape from our accountability. Sometimes, God has nothing to do with it. Sometimes, we just screwed up and guarded our heart from accepting it, by putting our outcome on God as the reason it turned out the way it did. Faith is a beautiful thing, but without work we can give into a mysticism of destiny that really doesn't teach us lessons or consequences for our actions. Life then becomes a distorted delusion of no accountability with God always to blame for battles we walked away from, won or loss.
Shannon L. Alder
The Rules For Being Human 1. You will receive a body. You may like it or hate it, but it will be yours for the entire period of this time around. 2. You will learn lessons. You are enrolled in a full-time informal school called Life. Each day in this school you will have the opportunity to learn lessons. You may like the lessons or think them irrelevant and stupid. 3. There are no mistakes, only lessons. Growth is a process of trial and error: Experimentation. The “failed” experiments are as much a part of the process as the experiment that ultimately “works.” 4. A lesson is repeated until learned. A lesson will be presented to you in various forms until you have learned it. When you have learned it, you can then go on to the next lesson. 5. Learning lessons does not end. There is no part of life that does not contain its lessons. If you are alive, there are lessons to be learned. 6. “There” is no better than “here.” When your “there” has become a “here,” you will simply obtain another “there” that will again look better than “here.” 7. Others are merely mirrors of you. You cannot love or hate something about another person unless it reflects something you love or hate about yourself. 8. What you make of your life is up to you. You have all the tools and resources you need. What you do with them is up to you. The choice is yours. 9. Your answers lie inside you. The answers to Life’s questions lie inside you. All you need to do is look, listen and trust. 10. You will forget all this. Chérie Carter-Scott
Jack Canfield (Chicken Soup for the Soul: Stories to Open the Heart and Rekindle the Spirit)
for the existentialists, what generated anxiety was not the godlessness of the world, per se, but rather the freedom to choose between God and godlessness. Though freedom is something we actively seek, the freedom to choose generates anxiety. “When I behold my possibilities,” Kierkegaard wrote, “I experience that dread which is the dizziness of freedom, and my choice is made in fear and trembling.” Many people try to flee anxiety by fleeing choice. This helps explain the perverse-seeming appeal of authoritarian societies—the certainties of a rigid, choiceless society can be very reassuring—and why times of upheaval so often produce extremist leaders and movements: Hitler in Weimar Germany, Father Coughlin in Depression-era America, or Jean-Marie Le Pen in France and Vladimir Putin in Russia today. But running from anxiety, Kierkegaard believed, was a mistake because anxiety was a “school” that taught people to come to terms with the human condition.
Scott Stossel (My Age of Anxiety: Fear, Hope, Dread, and the Search for Peace of Mind)
Be your best self and do not imitate anyone else. Find your strengths. They are your talents. They will make you smile and cause you to real joy on the inside. Don’t listen to those who ridicule the choices you make or the dreams you share. Let no one despise your youth. As Og Mandino explained in The Greatest Salesman in the World, “Experience is overrated, usually by old men who nod wisely and speak stupidly.” Create your own experiences. And know that you are creating memories for a lifetime. Life is not about finding yourself; it is about creating yourself. You have to take chances to make your dreams reality. Face your fears head-on and move rapidly. Don’t be afraid of making mistakes. Make lots of them! Your odds for success will increase with the number of decisions you make. Have patience with your dreams and the expectations you have for others. Be impatient with yourself daily. Live as if this is your last day. Say “I love you” to all those who matter. Know that everyone matters. You must play full-out right now. Sit up, hold your head high. Breathe deeply. Lift your chest up. Stand up straight and with confidence. Dust yourself off. Stop being a party pooper in your own life. Smile. A bigger noticeable smile. Start acting happy. Yes, you act first. I promise the feeling of happiness will soon follow.
Robert Smith
There is a story they tell, about a girl dared by her peers to venture to a local graveyard after dark. This was her folly: when they told her that standing on someone’s grave at night would cause the inhabitant to reach up and pull her under, she scoffed. Scoffing is the first mistake a woman can make. I will show you, she said. Pride is the second mistake. They gave her a knife to stick into the frosty earth, as a way of proving her presence and her theory. She went to that graveyard. Some storytellers say that she picked the grave at random. I believe she selected a very old one, her choice tinged by self-doubt and the latent belief that if she were wrong, the intact muscle and flesh of a newly dead corpse would be more dangerous than one centuries gone. She knelt on the grave and plunged the blade deep. As she stood to run she found she couldn’t escape. Something was clutching at her clothes. She cried out and fell down. When morning came, her friends arrived at the cemetery. They found her dead on the grave, the blade pinning the sturdy wool of her skirt to the ground. Dead of fright or exposure, would it matter when the parents arrived? She was not wrong, but it didn’t matter any more. Afterwards, everyone believed that she had wished to die, even though she had died proving that she could live. As it turns out, being right was the third, and worst, mistake.
Carmen Maria Machado (Her Body and Other Parties: Stories)