Quotes from Get Out of Your Own Way: Overcoming Self-Defeating Behavior

“Emotions are built on layers. Beneath hatred is usually anger; beneath anger is frustration; beneath frustration is hurt; beneath hurt is fear. If you keep expressing your feelings, you will generally move through them in that order. What begins with “I hate you” culminates in “I’m scared. I don’t want to lose you, and I don’t know what to do about it.”
― Mark Goulston, quote from Get Out of Your Own Way: Overcoming Self-Defeating Behavior

“You know the old saying, “If you can’t stand the heat, get out of the kitchen.” Well, if you always get out as soon as the kitchen gets hot, your life will end up half-baked.”
― Mark Goulston, quote from Get Out of Your Own Way: Overcoming Self-Defeating Behavior

“man should never be ashamed to own he has been in the wrong, which is but saying, in other words, that he is wiser today than he was yesterday.” —ALEXANDER POPE”
― Mark Goulston, quote from Get Out of Your Own Way: Overcoming Self-Defeating Behavior

“You cannot shake hands with a clenched fist.” —INDIRA GANDHI”
― Mark Goulston, quote from Get Out of Your Own Way: Overcoming Self-Defeating Behavior

“Both partners describe one of their own character flaws. Humility resolves self-righteousness.”
― Mark Goulston, quote from Get Out of Your Own Way: Overcoming Self-Defeating Behavior

“Both partners share a quality of the other person that they admire. Admiration resolves disappointment. Both partners express appreciation for something that the other one did. Gratitude resolves resentment. Both partners apologize, without excuses, for something they did to hurt the other person. Remorse resolves hurt.”
― Mark Goulston, quote from Get Out of Your Own Way: Overcoming Self-Defeating Behavior

“All the beautiful sentiments in the world weigh less than a simple lonely action.”
― Mark Goulston, quote from Get Out of Your Own Way: Overcoming Self-Defeating Behavior

“But the goal is not to replace what cannot be replaced, or duplicate what cannot be duplicated, but simply to create opportunities for new memories. One”
― Mark Goulston, quote from Get Out of Your Own Way: Overcoming Self-Defeating Behavior

“That is what learning is. You suddenly understand something you’ve understood all your life, but in a new way.” —DORIS LESSING Ordinary”
― Mark Goulston, quote from Get Out of Your Own Way: Overcoming Self-Defeating Behavior

“Those who are comfortable taking chances know that the best way to grow is to reach beyond their grasp. Their sense of direction comes from the heart. They don’t shy away from surprise; they might even seek it out. And they seldom die with regrets. In the end we regret not what we have done but what we have not done.”
― Mark Goulston, quote from Get Out of Your Own Way: Overcoming Self-Defeating Behavior

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Popular quotes

“The world’s a stage, and all the men and women merely.”
― Blake Crouch, quote from Wayward

“For ages anthropologists lumped all African peoples into one ‘race,’ but the genetic truth is that the larger world’s diversity is more or less a subset of African diversity.”
― Sam Kean, quote from The Violinist's Thumb: And Other Lost Tales of Love, War, and Genius, as Written by Our Genetic Code

“A well-known scientist (some say it was Bertrand Russell) once gave a public lecture on astronomy. He described how the earth orbits around the sun and how the sun, in turn, orbits around the center of a vast collection of stars called our galaxy. At teh end of the lecture, a little old lady at the back of the room got up and said: "What you have told us is rubbish. The world is really a flat plate supported on the back of a giant tortoise." The scientist gave a superior smile before replying, "What is the tortoise standing on?" "You're very clever, young man, very clever, " said the old lady. "But it turtles all the way down!”
― Stephen Hawking, quote from A Brief History of Time: From the Big Bang to Black Holes

“The teams followed her from the third-floor railing to the nearby Electronic Learning Center. All the video games and flight simulators were dark. The arcade was eerily quiet. Kyle noticed something new in what had always been his favorite room in the library: One whole wall was covered, floor to ceiling, with a panoramic (but blank) video screen. As Kyle squinted at the wide swath of shiny white, he noticed a series of evenly spaced glowing green LEDs at eye level on the wall.”
― Chris Grabenstein, quote from Mr. Lemoncello's Library Olympics

“Asa-zisa „psihologie pentru mase” bate intr-una moneda pe „asumarea responsabilitatii”, dar nu sunt decat vorbe goale: este extraordinar de greu, ba chiar terifiant, sa accepti ideea ca tu si numai tu esti acela care iti construiesti viata, felul in care o traiesti. Ca urmare, problema in psihoterapie consta intotdeauna in a sti cum sa treci de la o apreciere in plan intelectual, care se dovedeste ineficace, a unui adevar despre tine insuti la un mod saul altul de a-l simti in plan emotional. Abia din clipa in care terapia mobilizeaza emotii profunde, incepe sa devina o forta redutabila in favoarea schimbarii.”
― Irvin D. Yalom, quote from Love's Executioner: & Other Tales of Psychotherapy

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BookQuoters is a community of passionate readers who enjoy sharing the most meaningful, memorable and interesting quotes from great books. As the world communicates more and more via texts, memes and sound bytes, short but profound quotes from books have become more relevant and important. For some of us a quote becomes a mantra, a goal or a philosophy by which we live. For all of us, quotes are a great way to remember a book and to carry with us the author’s best ideas.

We thoughtfully gather quotes from our favorite books, both classic and current, and choose the ones that are most thought-provoking. Each quote represents a book that is interesting, well written and has potential to enhance the reader’s life. We also accept submissions from our visitors and will select the quotes we feel are most appealing to the BookQuoters community.

Founded in 2023, BookQuoters has quickly become a large and vibrant community of people who share an affinity for books. Books are seen by some as a throwback to a previous world; conversely, gleaning the main ideas of a book via a quote or a quick summary is typical of the Information Age but is a habit disdained by some diehard readers. We feel that we have the best of both worlds at BookQuoters; we read books cover-to-cover but offer you some of the highlights. We hope you’ll join us.