β
I am free of all prejudice. I hate everyone equally.
β
β
W.C. Fields
β
I am no bird; and no net ensnares me: I am a free human being with an independent will.
β
β
Charlotte BrontΓ« (Jane Eyre)
β
The truth will set you free, but first it will piss you off.
β
β
Joe Klaas (The Twelve Steps to Happiness: A Practical Handbook for Understanding and Working the Twelve Step Programs for Alcoholism, Codependency, Eating Disorders, and Other Addictions)
β
Becoming fearless isn't the point. That's impossible. It's learning how to control your fear, and how to be free from it.
β
β
Veronica Roth (Divergent (Divergent, #1))
β
It's only after we've lost everything that we're free to do anything.
β
β
Chuck Palahniuk (Fight Club)
β
The only way to deal with an unfree world is to become so absolutely free that your very existence is an act of rebellion.
β
β
Albert Camus
β
Once you learn to read, you will be forever free.
β
β
Frederick Douglass
β
What I want is to be needed. What I need is to be indispensable to somebody. Who I need is somebody that will eat up all my free time, my ego, my attention. Somebody addicted to me. A mutual addiction.
β
β
Chuck Palahniuk (Choke)
β
None but ourselves can free our minds.
β
β
Bob Marley
β
Dance, when you're broken open. Dance, if you've torn the bandage off. Dance in the middle of the fighting. Dance in your blood. Dance when you're perfectly free.
β
β
Jalal ad-Din Muhammad ar-Rumi
β
People demand freedom of speech as a compensation for the freedom of thought which they seldom use.
β
β
SΓΈren Kierkegaard
β
When I discover who I am, Iβll be free.
β
β
Ralph Ellison (Invisible Man)
β
I wish I were a girl again, half-savage and hardy, and free.
β
β
Emily BrontΓ« (Wuthering Heights)
β
Expose yourself to your deepest fear; after that, fear has no power, and the fear of freedom shrinks and vanishes. You are free.
β
β
Jim Morrison
β
the free soul is rare, but you know it when you see it - basically because you feel good, very good, when you are near or with them.
β
β
Charles Bukowski (Tales of Ordinary Madness)
β
I am free and that is why I am lost.
β
β
Franz Kafka
β
She was free in her wildness. She was a wanderess, a drop of free water. She belonged to no man and to no city
β
β
Roman Payne (The Wanderess)
β
One word
Frees us of all the weight and pain of life:
That word is love.
β
β
Sophocles
β
Freeing yourself was one thing, claiming ownership of that freed self was another.
β
β
Toni Morrison (Beloved (Beloved Trilogy, #1))
β
The truth will set you free. But not until it is finished with you.
β
β
David Foster Wallace (Infinite Jest)
β
She is free in her wildness, she is a wanderess, a drop of free water. She knows nothing of borders and cares nothing for rules or customs. 'Time' for her isnβt something to fight against. Her life flows clean, with passion, like fresh water.
β
β
Roman Payne
β
If people refuse to look at you in a new light and they can only see you for what you were, only see you for the mistakes you've made, if they don't realize that you are not your mistakes, then they have to go.
β
β
Steve Maraboli (Life, the Truth, and Being Free)
β
The only lies for which we are truly punished are those we tell ourselves.
β
β
V.S. Naipaul (In a Free State)
β
Incredible change happens in your life when you decide to take control of what you do have power over instead of craving control over what you don't.
β
β
Steve Maraboli (Life, the Truth, and Being Free)
β
I want to be in a relationship where you telling me you love me is just a ceremonious validation of what you already show me.
β
β
Steve Maraboli (Life, the Truth, and Being Free)
β
A human being is a part of the whole called by us universe, a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feeling as something separated from the rest, a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty.
β
β
Albert Einstein
β
Now that she had nothing to lose, she was free.
β
β
Paulo Coelho (Eleven Minutes)
β
I am not free while any woman is unfree, even when her shackles are very different from my own.
β
β
Audre Lorde
β
Happiness is not the absence of problems, it's the ability to deal with them.
β
β
Steve Maraboli (Life, the Truth, and Being Free)
β
I feel free and strong. If I were not a reader of books I could not feel this way.
β
β
Walter Tevis
β
When we are children we seldom think of the future. This innocence leaves us free to enjoy ourselves as few adults can. The day we fret about the future is the day we leave our childhood behind.
β
β
Patrick Rothfuss (The Name of the Wind (The Kingkiller Chronicle, #1))
β
If you love something set it free, but don't be surprised if it comes back with herpes.
β
β
Chuck Palahniuk
β
Write what you know. That should leave you with a lot of free time.
β
β
Howard Nemerov
β
A man can be himself only so long as he is alone; and if he does not love solitude, he will not love freedom; for it is only when he is alone that he is really free.
β
β
Arthur Schopenhauer (Essays and Aphorisms)
β
We are not trapped or locked up in these bones. No, no. We are free to change. And love changes us. And if we can love one another, we can break open the sky.
β
β
Walter Mosley (Blue Light)
β
Sometimes life knocks you on your ass... get up, get up, get up!!! Happiness is not the absence of problems, it's the ability to deal with them.
β
β
Steve Maraboli (Life, the Truth, and Being Free)
β
Jane, be still; don't struggle so like a wild, frantic bird, that is rending its own plumage in its desperation."
"I am no bird; and no net ensnares me; I am a free human being, with an independent will; which I now exert to leave you.
β
β
Charlotte BrontΓ« (Jane Eyre)
β
It reminds me why I chose Dauntless in the first place: not because they are perfect, but because they are alive. Because they are free.
β
β
Veronica Roth (Insurgent (Divergent, #2))
β
Man is condemned to be free; because once thrown into the world, he is responsible for everything he does.
It is up to you to give [life] a meaning.
β
β
Jean-Paul Sartre
β
Only after disaster can we be resurrected. It's only after you've lost everything that you're free to do anything. Nothing is static, everything is evolving, everything is falling apart.
β
β
Chuck Palahniuk (Fight Club)
β
I am free, no matter what rules surround me. If I find them tolerable, I tolerate them; if I find them too obnoxious, I break them. I am free because I know that I alone am morally responsible for everything I do.
β
β
Robert A. Heinlein
β
We must be free not because we claim freedom, but because we practice it.
β
β
William Faulkner (Essays, Speeches & Public Letters)
β
People with no morals often considered themselves more free, but mostly they lacked the ability to feel or love.
β
β
Charles Bukowski (Women)
β
Everybody else is working to change, persuade, tempt and control them. The best readers come to fiction to be free of all that noise.
β
β
Philip Roth
β
All good things are wild and free.
β
β
Henry David Thoreau
β
How would your life be different ifβ¦You stopped making negative judgmental assumptions about people you encounter? Let today be the dayβ¦You look for the good in everyone you meet and respect their journey.
β
β
Steve Maraboli (Life, the Truth, and Being Free)
β
True freedom is impossible without a mind made free by discipline.
β
β
Mortimer J. Adler (How to Read a Book: The Classic Guide to Intelligent Reading)
β
Emancipate yourselves from mental slavery.
None but ourselves can free our minds.
β
β
Bob Marley
β
Here lies Dobby, a free elf.
β
β
J.K. Rowling (Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (Harry Potter, #7))
β
You only need one man to love you. But him to love you free like a wildfire, crazy like the moon, always like tomorrow, sudden like an inhale and overcoming like the tides. Only one man and all of this.
β
β
C. JoyBell C.
β
If you trust in yourself. . .and believe in your dreams. . .and follow your star. . . you'll still get beaten by people who spent their time working hard and learning things and weren't so lazy.
β
β
Terry Pratchett (The Wee Free Men (Discworld, #30; Tiffany Aching, #1))
β
At the end of the day, let there be no excuses, no explanations, no regrets.
β
β
Steve Maraboli (Life, the Truth, and Being Free)
β
Letting go gives us freedom, and freedom is the only condition for happiness. If, in our heart, we still cling to anything - anger, anxiety, or possessions - we cannot be free.
β
β
Thich Nhat Hanh (The Heart of the Buddha's Teaching: Transforming Suffering into Peace, Joy, and Liberation)
β
The truly free man is the one who can turn down an invitation to dinner without giving an excuse.
β
β
Jules Renard (The Journal of Jules Renard)
β
You must learn to let go. Release the stress. You were never in control anyway.
β
β
Steve Maraboli (Life, the Truth, and Being Free)
β
He who has overcome his fears will truly be free.
β
β
Aristotle
β
Our task must be to free ourselves... by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature and it's beauty.
β
β
Albert Einstein
β
And this I believe: that the free, exploring mind of the individual human is the most valuable thing in the world. And this I would fight for: the freedom of the mind to take any direction it wishes, undirected. And this I must fight against: any idea, religion, or government which limits or destroys the individual. This is what I am and what I am about.
β
β
John Steinbeck (East of Eden)
β
For to be free is not merely to cast off one's chains, but to live in a way that respects and enhances the freedom of others.
β
β
Nelson Mandela
β
Who are you?
Are you in touch with all of your darkest fantasies?
Have you created a life for yourself where you can experience them?
I have. I am fucking crazy.
But I am free.
β
β
Lana Del Rey
β
If you really love something, you never try to keep it the way it is forever. You have to let it be free to change.
β
β
Cassandra Clare (City of Ashes (The Mortal Instruments, #2))
β
I didnβt want any flowers, I only wanted
to lie with my hands turned up and be utterly empty.
How free it is, you have no idea how free.
β
β
Sylvia Plath (Ariel)
β
It is always the false that makes you suffer, the false desires and fears, the false values and ideas, the false relationships between people. Abandon the false and you are free of pain; truth makes happy, truth liberates.
β
β
Nisargadatta Maharaj
β
What is freedom of expression? Without the freedom to offend, it ceases to exist.
β
β
Salman Rushdie
β
Take someone who doesn't keep score,
who's not looking to be richer, or afraid of losing,
who has not the slightest interest even
in his own personality: he's free.
β
β
Jalal ad-Din Muhammad ar-Rumi
β
It is important that we forgive ourselves for making mistakes. We need to learn from our errors and move on.
β
β
Steve Maraboli (Life, the Truth, and Being Free)
β
Time is priceless, but itβs Free. You can't own it, you can use it. You can spend it. But you can't keep it. Once you've lost it you can never get it back.
β
β
Audrey Niffenegger (The Time Traveler's Wife)
β
A rat in a maze is free to go anywhere, as long as it stays inside the maze.
β
β
Margaret Atwood (The Handmaidβs Tale (The Handmaid's Tale, #1))
β
Dare to Be
When a new day begins, dare to smile gratefully.
When there is darkness, dare to be the first to shine a light.
When there is injustice, dare to be the first to condemn it.
When something seems difficult, dare to do it anyway.
When life seems to beat you down, dare to fight back.
When there seems to be no hope, dare to find some.
When youβre feeling tired, dare to keep going.
When times are tough, dare to be tougher.
When love hurts you, dare to love again.
When someone is hurting, dare to help them heal.
When another is lost, dare to help them find the way.
When a friend falls, dare to be the first to extend a hand.
When you cross paths with another, dare to make them smile.
When you feel great, dare to help someone else feel great too.
When the day has ended, dare to feel as youβve done your best.
Dare to be the best you can β
At all times, Dare to be!
β
β
Steve Maraboli (Life, the Truth, and Being Free)
β
Man is always prey to his truths. Once he has admitted them, he cannot free himself from them.
β
β
Albert Camus (The Myth of Sisyphus and Other Essays)
β
Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free.
β
β
Emma Lazarus
β
Even though you may want to move forward in your life, you may have one foot on the brakes. In order to be free, we must learn how to let go. Release the hurt. Release the fear. Refuse to entertain your old pain. The energy it takes to hang onto the past is holding you back from a new life. What is it you would let go of today?
β
β
Mary Manin Morrissey
β
Make a pact with yourself today to not be defined by your past. Sometimes the greatest thing to come out of all your hard work isn't what you get for it, but what you become for it. Shake things up today! Be You...Be Free...Share.
β
β
Steve Maraboli (Life, the Truth, and Being Free)
β
What did it feel like, I wondered, to love someone that much? So much that you couldn't even control yourself when they came close, as if you might just break free of whatever was holding you and throw yourself at them with enough force to easily overwhelm you both.
β
β
Sarah Dessen (This Lullaby)
β
People like to say love is unconditional, but it's not, and even if it was unconditional, it's still never free. There's always an expectation attached. They always want something in return. Like they want you to be happy or whatever and that makes you automatically responsible for their happiness because they won't be happy unless you are ... I just don't want that responsibility.
β
β
Katja Millay (The Sea of Tranquility)
β
There are only two kinds of people in the end: those who say to God, "Thy will be done," and those to whom God says, in the end, "Thy will be done." All that are in Hell, choose it. Without that self-choice there could be no Hell. No soul that seriously and constantly desires joy will ever miss it. Those who seek find. Those who knock it is opened.
β
β
C.S. Lewis (The Great Divorce)
β
Yes, we praise women over 40 for a multitude of reasons. Unfortunately, it's not reciprocal. For every stunning, smart, well-coiffed, hot woman over 40, there is a bald, paunchy relic in yellow pants making a fool of himself with some 22-year old waitress. Ladies, I apologize. For all those men who say, "Why buy the cow when you can get the milk for free?", here's an update for you. Nowadays 80% of women are against marriage. Why? Because women realize it's not worth buying an entire pig just to get a little sausage!
β
β
Andy Rooney
β
Love is the ultimate outlaw. It just won't adhere to any rules. The most any of us can do is to sign on as its accomplice. Instead of vowing to honor and obey, maybe we should swear to aid and abet. That would mean that security is out of the question. The words "make" and "stay" become inappropriate. My love for you has no strings attached. I love you for free.
β
β
Tom Robbins (Still Life with Woodpecker)
β
When someone seeks," said Siddhartha, "then it easily happens that his eyes see only the thing that he seeks, and he is able to find nothing, to take in nothing because he always thinks only about the thing he is seeking, because he has one goal, because he is obsessed with his goal. Seeking means: having a goal. But finding means: being free, being open, having no goal.
β
β
Hermann Hesse (Siddhartha)
β
Just because I liked something at one point in time doesnβt mean Iβll always like it, or that I have to go on liking it at all points in time as an unthinking act of loyalty to who I am as a person, based solely on who I was as a person. To be loyal to myself is to allow myself to grow and change, and challenge who I am and what I think. The only thing I am for sure is unsure, and this means Iβm growing, and not stagnant or shrinking.
β
β
Jarod Kintz (At even one penny, this book would be overpriced. In fact, free is too expensive, because you'd still waste time by reading it.)
β
If you don't get what you want, you suffer; if you get what you don't want, you suffer; even when you get exactly what you want, you still suffer because you can't hold on to it forever. Your mind is your predicament. It wants to be free of change. Free of pain, free of the obligations of life and death. But change is law and no amount of pretending will alter that reality.
β
β
Socrates
β
You call yourself a free spirit, a "wild thing," and you're terrified somebody's gonna stick you in a cage. Well baby, you're already in that cage. You built it yourself. And it's not bounded in the west by Tulip, Texas, or in the east by Somali-land. It's wherever you go. Because no matter where you run, you just end up running into yourself.
β
β
Truman Capote (Breakfast at Tiffanyβs and Three Stories)
β
Our lives are not as limited as we think they are; the world is a wonderfully weird place; consensual reality is significantly flawed; no institution can be trusted, but love does work; all things are possible; and we all could be happy and fulfilled if we only had the guts to be truly free and the wisdom to shrink our egos and quit taking ourselves so damn seriously.
β
β
Tom Robbins
β
Why do you want to shut out of your life any uneasiness, any misery, any depression, since after all you don't know what work these conditions are doing inside you? Why do you want to persecute yourself with the question of where all this is coming from and where it is going? Since you know, after all, that you are in the midst of transitions and you wished for nothing so much as to change. If there is anything unhealthy in your reactions, just bear in mind that sickness is the means by which an organism frees itself from what is alien; so one must simply help it to be sick, to have its whole sickness and to break out with it, since that is the way it gets better.
β
β
Rainer Maria Rilke (Letters to a Young Poet)
β
Tess, Tess, Tessa.
Was there ever a more beautiful sound than your name? To speak it aloud makes my heart ring like a bell. Strange to imagine that, isnβt it β a heart ringing β but when you touch me that is what it is like: as if my heart is ringing in my chest and the sound shivers down my veins and splinters my bones with joy.
Why have I written these words in this book? Because of you. You taught me to love this book where I had scorned it. When I read it for the second time, with an open mind and heart, I felt the most complete despair and envy of Sydney Carton. Yes, Sydney, for even if he had no hope that the woman he loved would love him, at least he could tell her of his love. At least he could do something to prove his passion, even if that thing was to die.
I would have chosen death for a chance to tell you the truth, Tessa, if I could have been assured that death would be my own. And that is why I envied Sydney, for he was free.
And now at last I am free, and I can finally tell you, without fear of danger to you, all that I feel in my heart.
You are not the last dream of my soul.
You are the first dream, the only dream I ever was unable to stop myself from dreaming. You are the first dream of my soul, and from that dream I hope will come all other dreams, a lifetimeβs worth.
With hope at least,
Will Herondale
β
β
Cassandra Clare (Clockwork Prince (The Infernal Devices, #2))
β
The heaviest of burdens crushes us, we sink beneath it, it pins us to the ground. But in love poetry of every age, the woman longs to be weighed down by the man's body.The heaviest of burdens is therefore simultaneously an image of life's most intense fulfillment. The heavier the burden, the closer our lives come to the earth, the more real and truthful they become. Conversely, the absolute absence of burden causes man to be lighter than air, to soar into heights, take leave of the earth and his earthly being, and become only half real, his movements as free as they are insignificant. What then shall we choose? Weight or lightness?
β
β
Milan Kundera (The Unbearable Lightness of Being)
β
For now she need not think of anybody. She could be herself, by herself. And that was what now she often felt the need of - to think; well not even to think. To be silent; to be alone. All the being and the doing, expansive, glittering, vocal, evaporated; and one shrunk, with a sense of solemnity, to being oneself, a wedge-shaped core of darkness, something invisible to others... and this self having shed its attachments was free for the strangest adventures.
β
β
Virginia Woolf (To the Lighthouse)
β
Stop fighting me!" he said, trying to pull on the arm he held.
He was in a precarious position himself, straddling the rail as he tried to lean over far enough to get me and actually hold onto me.
βLet go of me!β I yelled back.
But he was too strong and managed to haul most of me over the rail, enough so that I wasnβt in total danger of falling again.
See, hereβs the thing. In that moment before I let go, I really had been contemplating my death. Iβd come to terms with it and accepted it. I also, however, had known Dimitri might do something exactly like this. He was just that fast and that good. That was why I was holding my stake in the hand that was dangling free.
I looked him in the eye. "I will always love you."
Then I plunged the stake into his chest.
It wasnβt as precise a blow as I would have liked, not with the skilled way he was dodging. I struggled to get the stake in deep enough to his heart, unsure if I could do it from this angle. Then, his struggles stopped. His eyes stared at me, stunned, and his lips parted, almost into a smile, albeit a grisly and pained one.
"Thatβs what I was supposed to say. . .β he gasped out.
Those were his last words.
β
β
Richelle Mead (Blood Promise (Vampire Academy, #4))
β
Because children have abounding vitality, because they are in spirit fierce and free, therefore they want things repeated and unchanged. They always say, "Do it again"; and the grown-up person does it again until he is nearly dead. For grown-up people are not strong enough to exult in monotony. But perhaps God is strong enough to exult in monotony. It is possible that God says every morning, "Do it again" to the sun; and every evening, "Do it again" to the moon. It may not be automatic necessity that makes all daisies alike; it may be that God makes every daisy separately, but has never got tired of making them. It may be that He has the eternal appetite of infancy; for we have sinned and grown old, and our Father is younger than we.
β
β
G.K. Chesterton (Orthodoxy)
β
The Peace of Wild Things
When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my childrenβs lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.
β
β
Wendell Berry (The Selected Poems of Wendell Berry)
β
You think because he doesn't love you that you are worthless. You think that because he doesn't want you anymore that he is right -- that his judgement and opinion of you are correct. If he throws you out, then you are garbage. You think he belongs to you because you want to belong to him. Don't. It's a bad word, 'belong.' Especially when you put it with somebody you love. Love shouldn't be like that. Did you ever see the way the clouds love a mountain? They circle all around it; sometimes you can't even see the mountain for the clouds. But you know what? You go up top and what do you see? His head. The clouds never cover the head. His head pokes through, beacuse the clouds let him; they don't wrap him up. They let him keep his head up high, free, with nothing to hide him or bind him. You can't own a human being. You can't lose what you don't own. Suppose you did own him. Could you really love somebody who was absolutely nobody without you? You really want somebody like that? Somebody who falls apart when you walk out the door? You don't, do you? And neither does he. You're turning over your whole life to him. Your whole life, girl. And if it means so little to you that you can just give it away, hand it to him, then why should it mean any more to him? He can't value you more than you value yourself.
β
β
Toni Morrison
β
If Peeta and I were both to die, or they thought we were....My fingers fumble with the pouch on my belt, freeing it. Peeta sees it and his hand clamps on my wrist. "No, I won't let you." "Trust me," I whisper. He holds my gaze for a long moment then lets go. I loosen the top of the pouch and pour a few spoonfuls of berries into his palm. Then I fill my own. "On the count of three?" Peeta leans down and kisses me once, very gently. "The count of three," he says. We stand, our backs pressed together, our empty hands locked tight. "Hold them out. I want everyone to see," he says. I spread out my fingers, and the dark berries glisten in the sun. I give Peeta's hand one last squeeze as a signal, as a good-bye, and we begin counting. "One." Maybe I'm wrong. "Two." Maybe they don't care if we both die. "Three!" It's too late to change my mind. I lift my hand to my mouth taking one last look at the world. The berries have just passed my lips when the trumpets begin to blare. The frantic voice of Claudius Templesmith shouts above them. "Stop! Stop! Ladies and gentlemen, I am pleased to present the victors of the 74th Hunger Games, Katniss Everdeen and Peeta Mellark! I give you - the tributes of District 12!
β
β
Suzanne Collins (The Hunger Games (The Hunger Games, #1))
β
It's a very Greek idea, and a very profound one. Beauty is terror. Whatever we call beautiful, we quiver before it. And what could be more terrifying and beautiful, to souls like the Greeks or our own, than to lose control completely? To throw off the chains of being for an instant, to shatter the accident of our mortal selves? Euripides speaks of the Maenads: head thrown I back, throat to the stars, "more like deer than human being." To be absolutely free! One is quite capable, of course, of working out these destructive passions in more vulgar and less efficient ways. But how glorious to release them in a single burst! To sing, to scream, to dance barefoot in the woods in the dead of night, with no more awareness of mortality than an animal! These are powerful mysteries. The bellowing of bulls. Springs of honey bubbling from the ground. If we are strong enough in our souls we can rip away the veil and look that naked, terrible beauty right in the face; let God consume us, devour us, unstring our bones. Then spit us out reborn.
β
β
Donna Tartt (The Secret History)
β
You never called me back," he said. "I called you so many times and you never called me back."
Magnus looked at Alec as if he'd lost his mind. "Your city is under attack," he said. "The wards have been broken, and the streets are full of demons. And you want to know why I haven't called you?"
Alec set his jaw in a stubborn line. "I want to know why you haven't called me back."
Magnus threw his hands up in the air in a gesture of utter exasperation. Alec noted with interest that when he did it, a few sparks escaped from his fingertips, like fireflies escaping from a jar. "You're an idiot."
"Is that why you haven't called me? Because I'm an idiot?"
"No." Magnus strode toward him. "I didn't call you because I'm tired of you only wanting me around when you need something. I'm tired of watching you be in love with someone else - someone, incidentally, who will never love you back. Not the way I do."
"You love me?"
"You stupid Nephilim," Magnus said patiently. "Why else am I here? Why else would I have spent the past few weeks patching up all your moronic friends every time they got hurt? And getting you out of every ridiculous situation you found yourself in? Not to mention helping you win a battle against Valentine. And all completely free of charge!
β
β
Cassandra Clare (City of Glass (The Mortal Instruments, #3))
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Now I will tell you the answer to my question. It is this. The Party seeks power entirely for its own sake. We are not interested in the good of others; we are interested solely in power, pure power. What pure power means you will understand presently. We are different from the oligarchies of the past in that we know what we are doing. All the others, even those who resembled ourselves, were cowards and hypocrites. The German Nazis and the Russian Communists came very close to us in their methods, but they never had the courage to recognize their own motives. They pretended, perhaps they even believed, that they had seized power unwillingly and for a limited time, and that just around the corner there lay a paradise where human beings would be free and equal. We are not like that. We know that no one ever seizes power with the intention of relinquishing it. Power is not a means; it is an end. One does not establish a dictatorship in order to safeguard a revolution; one makes the revolution in order to establish the dictatorship. The object of persecution is persecution. The object of torture is torture. The object of power is power. Now you begin to understand me.
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George Orwell (1984)
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Loneliness is a strange sort of thing.
It creeps on you, quiet and still, sits by your side in the dark, strokes by your hair as you sleep. It wraps itself around your bones, squeezing so tight you almost can't breathe. It leaves lies in your heart, lies next to you at night, leaches the light out of every corner. It's a constant companion, clasping your hand only to yank you down when you're struggling to stand up.
You wake up in the morning and wonder who you are. You fail to fall asleep at night and tremble in your skin. You doubt you doubt you doubt.
do I
don't I
should I
why won't I
And even when you're ready to let go. When you're ready to break free. When you're ready to be brand-new. Loneliness is an old friend stand beside you in the mirror, looking you in the eye, challenging you to live your life without it. You can't find the words to fight yourself, to fight the words screaming that you're not enough never enough never ever enough.
Loneliness is a bitter, wretched companion.
Sometimes it just won't let go.
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Tahereh Mafi (Unravel Me (Shatter Me, #2))
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I walked past Malison, up Lower Main to Main and across the road. I didnβt need to look to know he was behind me. I entered Royal Wood, went a short way along a path and waited. It was cool and dim beneath the trees. When Malison entered the Wood, I continued eastward.Β
I wanted to place his body in hallowed ground. He was born a Mearan. The least I could do was send him to Loric. The distance between us closed until he was on my heels. He chose to come, I told myself, as if that lessened the crime I planned. He chose what I have to offer.
We were almost to the cemetery before he asked where we were going. I answered with another question. βDo you like living in the High Lordβs kitchens?β
He, of course, replied, βNo.β
βWell, weβre going to a better place.β
When we reached the edge of the Wood, I pushed aside a branch to see the Temple of Loric and Calecβs cottage. No smoke was coming from the chimney, and I assumed the old man was yet abed. His pony was grazing in the field of graves. The sun hid behind a bank of clouds.
Malison moved beside me. βItβs a graveyard.β
βAre you afraid of ghosts?β I asked.
βMy fatherβs a ghost,β he whispered.
I asked if he wanted to learn how to throw a knife. He said, βYes,β as I knew he would.Β He untucked his shirt, withdrew the knife he had stolen and gave it to me. It was a thick-bladed, single-edged knife, better suited for dicing celery than slitting a young throat. But it would serve my purpose. That I also knew. Iβd spent all night projecting how the morning would unfold and, except for indulging in the tea, it had happened as I had imagined.Β
Damut kissed her son farewell. Malison followed me of his own free will. Without fear, he placed the instrument of his death into my hand. We were at the appointed place, at the appointed time. The stolen knife was warm from the heat of his body. I had only to use it. Yet I hesitated, and again prayed for Sythene to show me a different path.
βArenβt you going to show me?β Malison prompted, as if to echo my prayer.
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K. Ritz (Sheever's Journal, Diary of a Poison Master)
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Get Off The Scale!
You are beautiful. Your beauty, just like your capacity for life, happiness, and success, is immeasurable. Day after day, countless people across the globe get on a scale in search of validation of beauty and social acceptance.
Get off the scale! I have yet to see a scale that can tell you how enchanting your eyes are. I have yet to see a scale that can show you how wonderful your hair looks when the sun shines its glorious rays on it. I have yet to see a scale that can thank you for your compassion, sense of humor, and contagious smile. Get off the scale because I have yet to see one that can admire you for your perseverance when challenged in life.
Itβs true, the scale can only give you a numerical reflection of your relationship with gravity. Thatβs it. It cannot measure beauty, talent, purpose, life force, possibility, strength, or love. Donβt give the scale more power than it has earned. Take note of the number, then get off the scale and live your life. You are beautiful!
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Steve Maraboli (Life, the Truth, and Being Free)
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I was suffering the easily foreseeable consequences. Addiction is the hallmark of every infatuation-based love story. It all begins when the object of your adoration bestows upon you a heady, hallucinogenic dose of something you never dared to admit you wanted-an emotional speedball, perhaps, of thunderous love and roiling excitement. Soon you start craving that intense attention, with a hungry obsession of any junkie. When the drug is witheld, you promptly turn sick, crazy, and depleted (not to mention resentful of the dealer who encouraged this addiction in the first place but now refuses to pony up the good stuff anymore-- despite the fact that you know he has it hidden somewhere, goddamn it, because he used to give it to you for free). Next stage finds you skinny and shaking in a corner, certain only that you would sell your soul or rob your neighbors just to have 'that thing' even one more time. Meanwhile, the object of your adoration has now become repulsed by you. He looks at you like you're someone he's never met before, much less someone he once loved with high passion. The irony is,you can hardly blame him. I mean, check yourself out. You're a pathetic mess,unrecognizable even to your own eyes. So that's it. You have now reached infatuation's final destination-- the complete and merciless devaluation of self." - pg 20-21
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Elizabeth Gilbert
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I'm sorry, but I don't want to be an emperor. That's not my business. I don't want to rule or conquer anyone. I should like to help everyone if possible; Jew, Gentile, black man, white. We all want to help one another. Human beings are like that. We want to live by each other's happiness, not by each other's misery. We don't want to hate and despise one another. In this world there is room for everyone, and the good earth is rich and can provide for everyone. The way of life can be free and beautiful, but we have lost the way. Greed has poisoned men's souls, has barricaded the world with hate, has goose-stepped us into misery and bloodshed. We have developed speed, but we have shut ourselves in. Machinery that gives abundance has left us in want. Our knowledge has made us cynical; our cleverness, hard and unkind. We think too much and feel too little. More than machinery, we need humanity. More than cleverness, we need kindness and gentleness. Without these qualities, life will be violent and all will be lost. The airplane and the radio have brought us closer together. The very nature of these inventions cries out for the goodness in men; cries out for universal brotherhood; for the unity of us all. Even now my voice is reaching millions throughout the world, millions of despairing men, women, and little children, victims of a system that makes men torture and imprison innocent people. To those who can hear me, I say, do not despair. The misery that is now upon us is but the passing of greed, the bitterness of men who fear the way of human progress. The hate of men will pass, and dictators die, and the power they took from the people will return to the people. And so long as men die, liberty will never perish. Soldiers! Don't give yourselves to brutes, men who despise you, enslave you; who regiment your lives, tell you what to do, what to think and what to feel! Who drill you, diet you, treat you like cattle, use you as cannon fodder. Don't give yourselves to these unnatural men - machine men with machine minds and machine hearts! You are not machines, you are not cattle, you are men! You have the love of humanity in your hearts! You don't hate! Only the unloved hate; the unloved and the unnatural. Soldiers! Don't fight for slavery! Fight for liberty! In the seventeenth chapter of St. Luke, it is written that the kingdom of God is within man, not one man nor a group of men, but in all men! In you! You, the people, have the power, the power to create machines, the power to create happiness! You, the people, have the power to make this life free and beautiful, to make this life a wonderful adventure. Then in the name of democracy, let us use that power. Let us all unite. Let us fight for a new world, a decent world that will give men a chance to work, that will give youth a future and old age a security. By the promise of these things, brutes have risen to power. But they lie! They do not fulfill that promise. They never will! Dictators free themselves but they enslave the people. Now let us fight to fulfill that promise. Let us fight to free the world! To do away with national barriers! To do away with greed, with hate and intolerance! Let us fight for a world of reason, a world where science and progress will lead to all men's happiness. Soldiers, in the name of democracy, let us all unite!
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Charlie Chaplin