Situation Quotes - Page 5

• nothing good ever comes out of denying the truth about our situation.

  Sarah Ban Breathnach

  Truth, Denial, Denying The Truth

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• Women are safer in perilous situations and emergencies than men, and might be still more so if they trusted themselves more confidingly to the chivalry of manhood.

  Nathaniel Hawthorne

  Trust, Men, Might

  Nathaniel Hawthorne (2015). “The Marble Faun”, p.342, Booklassic

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• Man little knows what calamities are beyond his patience to bear till he tries them; as in ascending the heights of ambition, which look bright from below, every step we rise shows us some new and gloomy prospect of hidden disappointment; so in our descent from the summits of pleasure, though the vale of misery below may appear, at first, dark and gloomy, yet the busy mind, still attentive to its own amusement, finds, as we descend, something to flatter and to please. Still as we approach, the darkest objects appear to brighten, and the mortal eye becomes adapted to its gloomy situation.

  Oliver Goldsmith

  Disappointment, Ambition, Eye

  Oliver Goldsmith (1854). “The Works of Oliver Goldsmith: Poetical works. Dramas. The vicar of Wakefield”, p.376

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• The most sympathetic of men never fully comprehend woman's concrete situation.

  Simone de Beauvoir

  Men, Sympathetic, Concrete

  Simone de Beauvoir (1963). “Nature of the second sex”

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• Meanwhile, the empty forms of social behavior survive inappropriately in business situations. We all know that when a business sends its customers 'friendly reminders,' it really means business.

  Judith Martin

  Mean, Friendly, Social Behavior

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• Gratitude turns negative energy into positive energy. There is no situation or circumstance so small or large that it is not susceptible to gratitude's power.

  Melody Beattie

  Gratitude, Positive Energy, Negative

  Melody Beattie (2013). “Melody Beattie 4 Title Bundle: Codependent No More and 3 Other Best Sellers by Melody Beattie: A collection of four Melody Beattie best sellers”, Hazelden Publishing

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• Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos to order, confusion to clarity. It can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend. It turns problems into gifts, failures into successes, the unexpected into perfect timing, and mistakes into important events. It can turn an existence into a real life, and disconnected situations into important and beneficial lessons. Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today, and creates a vision for tomorrow. Gratitude makes things right.

  Melody Beattie

  Gratitude, Mistake, Real

  Melody Beattie (2013). “Melody Beattie 4 Title Bundle: Codependent No More and 3 Other Best Sellers by Melody Beattie: A collection of four Melody Beattie best sellers”, Hazelden Publishing

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• Few situations - no matter how greatly they appear to demand it - can be bettered by us going beserk.

  Melody Beattie

  Peace, Demand, Matter

  Melody Beattie (1990). “The Language of Letting Go”, p.161, Hazelden Publishing

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• I own that there is a haughtiness and fierceness in human nature which will cause innumerable broils, place men in what situation you please.

  Edmund Burke

  Men, Humanity, Haughtiness

  Edmund Burke (2016). “Delphi Complete Works of Edmund Burke (Illustrated)”, p.32, Delphi Classics

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• Our human situation no longer permits us to make armed dichotomies between those who are good and those who are evil, those who are right and those who are wrong. The first blow dealt to the enemy's children will sign the death warrant of our own.

  Margaret Mead

  Children, Blow, Evil

  Margaret Mead (1964). “Continuities in Cultural Evolution”, p.323, Transaction Publishers

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• most people prefer to carry out the kinds of experiments that allow the scientist to feel that he is in full control of the situation rather than surrendering himself to the situation, as one must in studying human beings as they actually live.

  Margaret Mead

  Science, People, Study

  Margaret Mead (1972). “Blkberry Winter”

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• If you know someone who's depressed, please resolve never to ask them why. Depression isn't a straightforward response to a bad situation; depression just is, like the weather.

  Stephen Fry

  Depression, Weather, Being Depressed

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• Wit is artificial; humor is natural. Wit is accidental; humor is inevitable. Wit is born of conscious effort; humor, of the allotted ironies of fate. Wit can be expressed only in language; humor can be developed sufficiently in situation.

  Agnes Repplier

  Humor, Fate, Effort

  Agnes Repplier (1893). “Essays in Idleness”, Boston and New York, Houghton, Mifflin

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• I never heard of anybody who admired the character of sheep. Even the gentlest human personalities in contact with them are annoyed by their lack of brains, courage and initiative, by their extraordinary ability to get themselves into uncomfortable or dangerous situations and then wait in inert helplessness for someone to rescue them.

  Dorothy Canfield Fisher

  Character, Dangerous Situations, Sheep

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• It is a common observation that those who dwell continually upon their expectations are apt to become oblivious to the requirements of their actual situation.

  Charles Sanders Peirce

  Acceptance, Expectations, Requirements

  Charles Sanders Peirce (1958). “Selected Writings (Values in a Universe of Chance)”, p.19, Courier Corporation

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• The language of religion can alone suit every situation and every mode of feeling.

  Madame de Stael

  Feelings, Religion, Suits

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• Of all human sentiments, enthusiasm creates the most happiness; it is the only sentiment in fact which gives real happiness, the only sentiment which can help us to bear our human destiny in any situation in which we may find ourselves.

  Madame de Stael

  Real, Destiny, Giving

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• The thing that must be preserved in all situations whatever is the reputation of one's character.

  Madame de Stael

  Character, Reputation

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• [On women's role in the home:] Every wife, mother and housekeeper feels at present that there is some screw loose in the household situation.

  Elizabeth Cady Stanton

  Mother, Women, Home

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• In youth our most bitter disappointments, our brightest hopes and ambitions, are known only to ourselves. Even our friendship and love we never fully share with another; there is something of every passion, in every situation, we conceal.

  Elizabeth Cady Stanton

  Disappointment, Passion, Ambition

  Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan Brownell Anthony, Ellen Carol DuBois (1992). “The Elizabeth Cady Stanton-Susan B. Anthony reader: correspondence, writings, speeches”, Northeastern Univ Pr

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• Ours is the first society in history in which parents expect to learn from their children, rather than the other way around. Such a topsy-turvy situation has come about at least in part because, unlike the rest of the world, we are an immigrant society, and for immigrants the only hope is in the kids.

  Shana Alexander

  Children, Kids, Parent

  Shana Alexander (1976). “Talking woman”

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• You can go into all sorts of situations with a camera and people will think they should serve it.

  Susan Sontag

  Photography, Thinking, People

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• When you look around at the six people that you spend the most time with, that's who you are. I think that in making those decisions in who you are going to be married to, who your friends are going to be, those are really huge, critical, life decisions. Who gets to talk to you everyday, is almost like the food that you eat. It is a very huge critical situation to choose who the people are that you are spending your life with, spending your time with and who you are choosing to give your love and everything to.

  Will Smith

  Love, Life, Friends

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• Our dreams of a pure virtue are dissolved in a situation in which it is possible to exercise the virtue of responsibility toward a community of nations only by courting the prospective guilt of the atomic bomb.

  Reinhold Niebuhr

  Dream, Responsibility, Exercise

  Reinhold Niebuhr (2015). “Reinhold Niebuhr: Major Works on Religion and Politics: (Library of America #263)”, p.551, Library of America

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• The spiritual commitment is to make every situation an object of devotional connection.

  Marianne Williamson

  Spiritual, Commitment, Connections

  Marianne Williamson (2013). “Illuminata: Thoughts, Prayers, Rites of Passage”, p.34, Random House

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