Sporadic Quotes

• Sporadic thoughts will pop into my head and I'll have to go write something down, and the next thing you know, I've written a whole song in an hour.

  Eminem

  Song, Writing, Down And

  "Eminem, Lil Wayne Named 'Gods Of Rock' By GQ" by Rob Markman, www.mtv.com. October 17, 2011.

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• Small things done consistently, though undramatic, yield more than the large and sporadic.

  Stephen Mansfield

  Yield, Done, Consistently

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• I have sporadic OCD cleaning moments around the house. But then I get lazy and I'm cured. It's a very inconsistent personality trait.

  Chris Hemsworth

  House, Personality, Lazy

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• Selfishness is the most constant of human motives. Patriotism, humanity, or the love of God may lead to sporadic outbursts sweep away the heaped-up wrongs of centuries; but they languish at times, while the love of self works on ceaselessly, unwearyingly,burrowing always at the very root of life, and heaping up fresh wrongs for other centuries to sweep away.

  Charles W. Chesnutt

  Roots, Self, African American

  Charles W. Chesnutt (2008). “The Portable Charles W. Chesnutt”, p.382, Penguin

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• I look a lot busier than I am, as I'm actually a rather sporadic, random person and I'll play a few gigs and then disappear for a while.

  Paul McCartney

  Play, Looks, Gigs

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• Prayer shouldn't be casual or sporadic, dictated only by the needs of the moment. Prayer should be as much a part of our lives as breathing.

  Billy Graham

  Christian, Prayer, Breathing

  Billy Graham (2012). “Hope for Each Day: Morning & Evening Devotions”, p.129, Thomas Nelson Inc

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• Writings like gambling. Unpredictable and sporadic successes make you more addicted, not less.

  M. John Harrison

  Writing, Gambling, Unpredictable

  "M John Harrison: a life in writing" by Richard Lea, www.theguardian.com. July 20, 2012.

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• Our society is so fragmented, our family lives so sundered by physical and emotional distance, our friendships so sporadic, our intimacies so 'in-between' things and often so utilitarian, that there are few places where we can feel truly safe.

  Henri Nouwen

  Distance, Emotional, Safe

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• So many low income people have seen so many failed promises broken and seen so many quacks and sporadic medicines offered to them that building trust takes a lot of time, takes a lot of patience.

  Jacqueline Novogratz

  Medicine, People, Broken

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• Disaster is rarely as pervasive as it seems from recorded accounts. The fact of being on the record makes it appear continuous and ubiquitous whereas it is more likely to have been sporadic both in time and place.

  Barbara Tuchman

  Records, Facts, Disaster

  Barbara W. Tuchman (2011). “A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous 14th Century”, p.18, Random House

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• It was one of those problematic occasions with long silences, sporadic coughs, and people saying isolated things like, "Well, isn't this nice.

  Terry Pratchett

  Nice, Long, People

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• Striving for happiness is a long, hard journey with many challenges. It requires eternal vigilance to win the victory. You cannot succeed with sporadic little flashes of effort. Constant and valiant living is necessary.

  Jack H. Goaslind

  Life, Success, Winning

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• All of us, I suspect, imagine that a world exists from which we alone have been excluded; all of us have our noses pressed against the glass. But if we contemplate our own lives, not the phantom life on the other side, we might find things in them to envy-a family that’s intact; a job we like; excellent health (the thing we take for granted and on which all happiness depends). Good fortune is there, however sporadic, however modest, however difficult to achieve. The trick is to recognize it.

  James Atlas

  Jobs, Glasses, Envy

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• When everything is added up, the frequent blows weighted against the sporadic triumphs, this is I have to say not just a vocation, it's a great gift. But you also know this, for your work, for your passion, every day is a rededication. Painters, dancers, actors, writers, filmmakers. It's the same for all of you, all of us. Every step is a first step. Every brush stroke is a test. Every scene is a lesson. Every shot is a school. So, let the learning continue.

  Martin Scorsese

  Passion, School, Blow

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• I went to a lot of different high schools. I had quite a sporadic schooling experience. I went to school in England briefly, to boarding school, and I went to a few different ones in Australia as well. I'm really lucky! I have friends in most countries.

  Alice Englert

  Country, School, Australia

  "Alice Englert Spills 'Beautiful Creatures' Secrets!". Interview with Kaitlin Menza, www.seventeen.com. February 7, 2013.

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• If mankind is to profit freely from the small and sporadic crop of the heroically gifted it produces, it will have to cultivate the delicate art of handling ideas. Psychology is now able to tell us with reasonable assurance that the most influential obstacle to freedom of thought and to new ideas is fear; and fear which can with inimitable art disguise itself as caution, or sanity, or reasoned skepticism, or on occasion even as courage.

  Wilfred Trotter

  Art, Freedom, Hero

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• For our democracy has been marred by imperialism, and it has been enlightened only by individual and sporadic efforts at freedom.

  Pearl S. Buck

  Women, Democracies Have, Effort

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• Individual talent is too sporadic and unpredictable to be allowed any important part in the organization society. Social systems which endure are built on the average person who can be trained to occupy any position adequately if not brilliantly.

  Stuart Chase

  Average, Organization, Important

  Stuart Chase (1948). “The Proper Study of Mankind ...: An Inquiry Into the Science of Human Relations”, New York : Harper

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• The propagandist must utilize all of the technical means at his disposal - the press, radio, TV, movies, posters, meetings, door-to-door canvassing...There is no propaganda as long as one makes use, in a sporadic fashion and at random, of a newspaper article here, a poster or radio program there.

  Jacques Ellul

  Fashion, Mean, Doors

  "Propaganda: The Formation of Men's Attitudes" by Jacques Ellul, translated by Konrad Kellen & Jean Lerner, Vintage Books, New York, (p. 9), 1973.

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• Pace yourself in your reading. A little bit every day really adds up. If you read during sporadic reading jags, the fits and starts will not get you anywhere close to the amount of reading you will need to do. It is far better to walk a mile a day than to run five miles every other month. Make time for reading, and make a daily habit of it, even if it is a relatively small daily habit.

  Douglas Wilson

  Running, Reading, Add

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• At night my father often heard sporadic gunfire mixed in with the sound of dogs howling. If the war came closer, soon there would be only minor difference between shooting a dog and shooting a man.

  Dinaw Mengestu

  Dog, Father, War

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• It frankly does not make sense to occasionally 'fill up' with water, with long periods of dehydration in between. The same thing is true spiritually. Spiritual thirst is a need for living water. A constant flow of living water is far superior to sporadic sipping.

  David A. Bednar

  Spiritual, Long, Water

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• Sporadic and shallow dipping in the doctrine of Christ and partial participation in His restored Church cannot produce the spiritual transformation that enables us to walk in a newness of life. Rather, fidelity to covenants, constancy of commitment, and offering our whole soul unto God are required if we are to receive the blessings of eternity.

  David A. Bednar

  Spiritual, Commitment, Blessing

  "Ye Must Be Born Again". David A. Bednar's address at the General Conference of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, www.lds.org. April 2007.

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• Not bad in short, though the last one [understanding the language of animals], isn't half as useful as you might expect, since when all's said and done the language of the beasts tends to revolve around: a) the endless hunt for food, b) finding a warm bush to sleep in the evening, and c) the sporadic satisfication of certain glands. (Many would argue that the language of human kind boils down to this too)

  Jonathan Stroud

  Sleep, Animal, Understanding

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• For me parks are good when first of all, they're not impeccable, and when solitude has appropriated them in such a way that solitude itself becomes an emblem, a defining trait for walkers, sporadic at best, who in my opinion should be irrevocably lost or absorbed in thought, and a bit confused, too, as when one walks through a space that's at once alien and familiar.

  Sergio Chejfec

  Confused, Space, Solitude

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