It's not always enough to be brave, I realized years later. You have to be brave and contribute something positive, too. Brave on its own is just a party trick.
I realized that were I to paint flowers small, no one would look at them because I was unknown. So I thought I'll make them big, like the huge buildings going up. People will be startled; they'll have to look at them - and they did.
I realized that, while I would never be my mother nor have her life, the lesson she had left me was that it was possible to love and care for a man and still have at your core a strength so great that you never even needed to put it on display.
I hadn’t realized that music could unlock things in you, could transport you to somewhere even the composer hadn’t predicted. It left an imprint in the air around you, as if you carried its remnants with you when you went.
I can pinpoint that as the single happiest moment of my life, because I realized then that Mom would always have my back. It made me feel giant. I raced back down the concrete ramp, faster than I ever had before, so fast I should have fallen, but I didn't fall, because Mom was in the world.
Truth is not something outside to be discovered, it is something inside to be realized.
I realized that, instead of moving people closer to a salvation decision, an answer can push them further away. Rather than engaging their minds or urging them to consider an alternative perspective, an answer can give them ammunition for future attacks against the gospel.
One night I realized that when you give people understanding and encouragement a funny little meek childish look abashes their eyes, no matter what they've been doing they weren't sure it was right - lambies all over the world.
I realized that searching was my symbol, the emblem of those who go out at night with nothing in mind, the motives of a destroyer of compasses.
I realized that to become a saint one must suffer a great deal, always seek what is best, and forget oneself.
I made a list of the happiest periods of my life & I realized that none of them involve money.
I got done writing Ports of Call and suddenly realized I have far too much material for the book.
If I'm writing strictly for others, how does that show what I'm experiencing or thinking? I just got to a point where I realized I could be as personal as I wanted to be and people could relate to those situations if they so choose.
He realized at last that the arguments of pessimism were powerless to comfort him
I finally realized that being grateful to my body was key to giving more love to myself.
As I did more of that, I realized, "Well, maybe I should do more magic. "
I had a student once come up to me and we were talking about this incident, and, of course, I never had the right thing to say. But later on, I realized I should have said: Don't write about trying to change the world, just write about a changed world or a world that's not changing. Let that do the work.
It was difficult to get into my friends' rock bands when I was a teenager. They somehow didn't see the need for an accordion player. That's when I realized that I had to find my own path in life.
I've stopped war reporting. I realized that I'd answered all of my questions about war and about myself.
The love that is never to be realized will often remain a man's guiding ideal.