“When you're different, sometimes you don't see the millions of people who accept you for what you are. All you notice is the person who doesn't.”
“There's always going to be bad stuff out there. But here's the amazing thing -- light trumps darkness, every time. You stick a candle into the dark, but you can't stick the dark into the light.”
“In the space between yes and no, there's a lifetime. It's the difference between the path you walk and the one you leave behind; it's the gap between who you thought you could be and who you really are; its the legroom for the lies you'll tell yourself in the future.”
“words are like nets - we hope they'll cover what we mean, but we know they can't possibly hold that much joy, or grief, or wonder.”
“After all, how many of us had tried to forget something traumatic...only to find it printed on the back of our eyelids, tattooed on our tongues?”
“There are all sorts of experiences we can't really put a name to...The birth of a child, for one. Or the death of a parent. Falling in love. Words are like nets--we hope they'll cover what we mean, but we know they can't possibly hold that much joy, grief, or wonder. Finding God is like that, too. If it's happened to you, you know what it feels like. But try to describe it to someone else--and language only takes you so far.”
“I knew what it was like to lose someone you loved. You didn't get past something like that, you got through it.”
“Did you ever wonder if the person in the picture is the same one you see when you look in the mirror?" - "That's the eternal question, isn't it? Are we born who we are, or do we make ourselves that way?”
“That’s what religion does. It points a finger. It causes wars. It breaks apart countries. It’s a petri dish for stereotypes to grow in. Religion’s not about being holy...Just holier-than-thous.”
“I imagine the touch of someone who loves you so much, he cannot bear to watch you sleep; and so you wake up with his hand on your heart.”
“You’ll tell yourself anything you have to, to pretend that you’re still the one in control.”
“And I remembered something else that makes us human: faith, the only weapon in our arsenal to battle doubt.”
“You didn't get past something like that, you go through it -- and for that reason alone, I understood more about her than she ever would have guessed.”
“It was so damn hard to find love in this world, to locate someone who could make you feel that there was a reason you'd been put on this earth. A child, I imagined, was the purest form of that. A child was the love you didn't have to look for, didn't have to prove anything to, didn't have to worry about losing. Which is why, when it happened, it hurt so badly.”
“I don't belong to a religion. Religion's the reason the world's falling apart..." That's what religion does. It points a finger. It causes wars. It breaks apart countries. It's a petri dish for stereotypes to grow in. Religion's not about being holy," Shay said. "Just holier-than-thou.”
“Like the teens I worked with, I understood the need for miracles--they kept reality from paralyzing you”
“You know how I see it? There's always going to be bad stuff out there. But here's the amazing thing--light trumps darkness, every time. You stick a candle into the dark, but you can't stick the dark into the light...I guess from my point of view, we can choose to be in the dark, or we can light a candle. And for me, Christ is that candle.”
“The hardest thing in the world is believing someone can change. It's always easier to go along with the way things are than to admit that you might have been wrong in the first place.”
“I want to live," he said, "So I have to die.”
“We pretend that we know our children, because it's easier than admitting the truth--from the minute that cord is cut, they are strangers. It's far easier to tell yourself your daughter is still a little girl than to see her in a bikini and realize she has the curves of a young woman; it's safer to say you're a good parent who has all the right conversations about drugs and sex than to acknowledge there are a thousand things she would never tell you.”
“You live and let live, eventually that becomes enough.”
“I know what it's like when the things you believe make you feel like you're on the outside looking in.”
“Words are like nets - we hope they'll cover what we mean, but we know they can't possibly hold that much joy, or grief, or wonder. Like falling in love or finding god, if it ha...ppens to you, you know what it feels like. But try to describe it to someone else - and language only takes you so far.”
“The joke's on them. One little hypodermic wont' be enough. Split a piece of wood, and they'll find me. Lift up a stone, and they'll find me. Look in the mirror, and they'll find me...If you really want to know what makes someone a killer, ask yourself what would make you do it.”
“This is what it always comes down to, I realized. There are the ones who believe, and the ones who don't, and caught in the space between them are guns.”
“Do you know how, when you are on the verge of a breakdown, the world pounds in your ears; a rush of blood, of consequence? Do you now how it feels when the truth cuts your tongue to ribbons, and still you have to speak it?”
“A place like this wears down everything, and tolerance is no exception. In here, coexistence passes for forgiveness. You do not learn to like something you abhor; you come to live with it...You live and let live, and eventually that becomes enough.”
“The questions that we have to ask and to answer about that procession during this moment of transition are so important that they may well change the lives of men and women forever. For we have to ask ourselves, here and now, do we wish to join that procession, or don't we? On what terms shall we join that procession? Above all, where is it leading us, the procession of educated men?...Let us never cease from thinking--what is this "civilisation" in which we find ourselves? What are these ceremonies and why should we take part in them? What are these professions and why should we make money out of them? Where in short is it leading us, the procession of the sons of educated men?”
“Captain Reed eyed him thoughtfully. "I built my whole life around the stories they about me. You know what I learned?"
Archer shook his head.
"What you do makes you who you are....”
“When you look in the mirror, what do you want to see: yet another reminder of your hopeless attempt to be the girl of his dreams, or you? The answer should always be you.”
“If to raise malicious smiles at the infirmities or misfortunes of those who have never injured us be the province of wit or humour, Heaven grant me a double portion of dullness.”
“The weapon he held in his sweaty grip was one of a small consignment of prototypes received at the last port of call. The experts said it was the most powerful hand weapon in the known universe. He choked. That would soon be put to the test!”
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