When in doubt, just tell 'em it was Carlin or Vonnegut.

To keep me sane everyday:

"Do not wait for life. Do not long for it. Be aware, always and at every moment, that the miracle is in the here and now" - Proust

And as a woman:

"Keep your head, heels, and standards high."

Not sure where it's from, but I always thought any respectable woman would nod in agreement.

 

“Listen to the mustn'ts, child. Listen to the don'ts. Listen to the shouldn'ts, the impossibles, the won'ts. Listen to the never haves, then listen close to me... Anything can happen, child. Anything can be.”

Shel Silverstein

I've learned there are troubles of more than one kind.
Some come from ahead.
Some come from behind.
But I've bought a large bat.
I'm all ready you see.
Now my troubles are going to have troubles with me.

Dr. Seuss.

“Fantasy is escapist, and that is its glory. If a soldier is imprisioned by the enemy, don't we consider it his duty to escape?. . .If we value the freedom of mind and soul, if we're partisans of liberty, then it's our plain duty to escape, and to take as many people with us as we can!”

J.R.R. Tolkien

 

I know I've posted theses here before but these are my two favorites.

"Hope is the first step on the road to dissapointment"
"I do not regret the things that I've done, but those I did not do"

 

Seems appropriate to start with the Vonnegut ones first

"Here I am, cleaning shit off of practically everything"

"If you can do a half-assed job of anything, you're a one-eyed man in the kingdom of the blind."

"A purpose of human life, no matter who is controlling it, is to love whoever is around to be loved."

A couple from The Bard

"Give every man thy ear, but few thy voice"

"My parts, my title, and my perfect soul shall manifest me rightly"

Probably one of my favorites by H. L. Mencken

"A man who can laugh, if only at himself, is never really miserable."

I don't know the person who said this, but it's pretty much been my life's motto

"No amount of planning will ever take the place of dumb luck.

One from Konrad Adenauer

"We all live under the same sky, but we don't all have the same horizon"

A couple from Warren Ellis

"It's a strange world out there. Let's keep it that way."

"You’re probably wondering what the point of all this ugly rambling bullshit is. It’s this: The future is inherently a good thing. And we move into it one winter at a time. Things get better one winter at a time. So if you’re going to celebrate something then have a drink on this: The world is generally and on balance, a better place to live this year than it was last year. For instance: I didn’t have this gun last year…"

Some from one of my favorite movies - The Ninth Configuration

"In order for life to have appeared spontaneously on earth, there first had to be hundreds of millions of protein molecules of the ninth configuration. But given the size of the planet Earth, do you know how long it would have taken for just one of these protein molecules to appear entirely by chance? Roughly ten to the two hundred and forty-third power billions of years. And I find that far, far more fantastic than simply believing in God."

"Infinite goodness is creating a being you know, in advance, is going to complain."

I'm sure I've got plenty more, but those are ones that stick out at the moment.

 

From an HM1 I knew when I was in the Navy:

"There never seems to be enough time to do it right, but there always seems to be enough time to do it again."

From George Carlin:

"Think of how stupid the average person is, and realize half of them are stupider than that."

 

"Tomorrow's just an excuse away" - Smashing Pumpkins

 

I feel like I should have more, so I may revisit this, but here are three good ones.

 

Handed down barstardisation of an old Buddhist proverb:

"To reach enlightenment - chop wood, carry water. When you reach enlightenment - chop wood, carry water."

 

I finally found the Bruce Lee quote that I was looking for which is more of an annecdote told about him:

 

For some reason I really like this quote, it gives me hope. - 'Stealth, stealthy stealth stealth stealth. Listen. This is the elusive rainbow unicorn of dating advice for chumps like you. You don't need to be a genuinely nice guy to get laid. You don't need to be an asshole to get laid. There's a unicorn out there for everyone and each woman has her own personal taste. Unless you're a lying, deceitful shit-covered unicorn. Everyone hates shit-covered unicorns.' - Politiik

Also this large picture sums it up quite nicely.

 

My rough translation, from La peste by Albert Camus

 

I like the Doug Stanhope version better.

This is the one that probably sticks out the most for me. Bhagavad Gita, chapter 2:

And chapter 11, famously (mis)quoted by Oppenheimer after the detonation of the first nuclear bomb.

 

My favoriate quote:

It encapsulates Stoicism as well as Marcus Aurelius or Seneca ever could. I think I'd like to have this on my tombstone, because that is how I picture peaceful death.

One of my favorite passages of poetry:

And a few other quotes that I really like:

"All of man's troubles come from not knowing how to sit still, alone in a room."
—Blaise Pascal

"That which does not hurt the city cannot hurt the citizen."
—Marcus Aurelius

"If you insist instead on adventuring for real, achieving things of real and large consequence against great real obstacles, then learn to see the glorious nobility of those who try well yet fail."
—Robin Hanson

 

I have a "reading companion" with me whenever I read. So no matter what I'm reading,(historical, biography, fiction, evolutionary psychology etc.), if I see something I like or want to remember, I write it down immediately. Comes in handy for threads like this.


"Fixing on something is the hand of death, flexibility is the hand of life."---Miyamoto Musashi

"...have apparent confidence in all, real confidence in none, until from actual experience it is found that that individual is worthy of it--from this rule I have never departed..."---Andrew Jackson

"Black care rarely sits behind a rider whose pace is fast enough."---Theodore Roosevelt

"Madness is the exception in individuals but the rule in groups."---Friedrich Nietzsche

I'll put up some more later if I have the time

 

"Be careful with quotes on the internet as they may not be authentic" - Abraham Lincoln

 

"Pain or damage don't end the world. Or despair. Or fucking beatings. The world ends when you're dead. Until then, you got more punishment in store. Stand it like a man...and give some back." -Deadwood

“When we are green, still half-created, we believe that our dreams are rights, that the world is disposed to act in our best interests, and that falling and dying are for quitters. We live on the innocent and monstrous assurance that we alone, of all the people ever born, have a special arrangement whereby we will be allowed to stay green forever.” -This Boy's Life

"We have the illusion that parents, that friends, that all of our support network is going to help us out in the end, that we can define ourselves through other people, by conforming to a group, by being like other people, by doing what other people tell us to do. But that is actually the illusion. That is actually the con game that goes on. The truth is, you are essentially alone in life. You were born alone and you are going to die alone. And although you have these networks of support and they are real and you do have parents, on the other hand, it is really up to you to define who you are and what you want in life." -Tucker Max (Yeah, yeah, fuck you)

"Go then - there are other worlds than these." -The Gunslinger

"Not all who wander are lost." -J.R.R. Tolkien

 

I realize that I'm black, but I like to be viewed as a person, and this is everybody's wish.


I've missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I've lost almost 300 games. 26 times, I've been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I've failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed.


I'm not out there sweating for three hours every day just to find out what it feels like to sweat.


There is no "I" in team but there is in win.


All by Michael Jordan. My High school wrestling coach was a really big fan apparently because he said the last two a lot. And he had the one about failure in his office. The first one is a quote I have always really liked ever since I read it. Growing up in Oklahoma I often felt like I was in a little bit of an "Us vs. Them" situation quite often. The football field and the wrestling mat both made race go away. In sports there are your brothers, and there are your enemies and as long as you are good, and help put points on the board nothing else mattered.

 

"Find something worth dying for, and live for it".

Can't find who wrote it, but I swear I first read it on this very board. I like it so much I'm having it tattoo'd on my forearm in the New Year.