Quotes on Persons

Even when a person has all of life's comforts - good food, good shelter, a companion - he or she can still become unhappy when encountering a tragic situation.

And human instinct is ancient and reliable, utterly mysterious and possibly capable of great genius. I believe that refined, fluent instincts are a person's most valuable asset. My own instincts have repeatedly guided me against the grain of logic and probability. When I have trusted and followed their direction, they have never been wrong. I don't know how or why. But I know that every significant experience-positive or negative-sharpens them and makes them more accurate.

Far too many people are looking for the right person, instead of trying to be the right person.

And did I pass?" The face of the old woman on my right was unreadable in the gathering dusk. On my left the younger woman said, "You don't pass or fail at being a person, dear.

What I find powerful is a person with the confidence to be her own self.

She's a person; the doctor pronounces her dead, not the news.

I have lived a long time, and one thing I have come to see is that one is well served by a degree of both humility and charity when judging the inner workings of another person's heart

It’s such a confidence trick, writing a novel. The main person you have to trick into confidence is yourself. This is hard to do alone.

Jealousy has the amazing power to illuminate a single person in an intense beam of light, keeping the multitude of others in total darkness.

A lonely, quiet person has observations and experiences that are at once both more indistinct and more penetrating than those of one more gregarious; his thoughts are weightier, stranger, and never without a tinge of sadness. . . . Loneliness fosters that which is original, daringly and bewilderingly beautiful, poetic. But loneliness also fosters that which is perverse, incongruous, absurd, forbidden.

Love is an act of faith in another person, not an act of surrender.

The natural distribution is neither just nor unjust; nor is it unjust that persons are born into society at some particular position. These are simply natural facts. What is just and unjust is the way that institutions deal with these facts.

You cannot be a Big person with a Small heart

You couldn't be more wrong," I said. "You are buying into the cross-stitched sentiments of your parents' throw pillows. You're arguing that the fragile, rare thing is beautiful simply because it is fragile and rare. But that's a lie, and you know it." "You're a hard person to comfort," Augustus said. "Easy comfort isn't comforting," I said.

If anybody thinks they should listen to me because I'm a professor at MIT, that's nonsense. You should decide whether something makes sense by its content, not by the letters after the name of the person who says it.

The person may have a scar, but it also means they have a story

Not until one person desires to keep his own bread for himself does hunger ensue.

I don’t think anyone who falls in love has a choice. You’re just pulled to that person like true north, whether it’s good for you or bound to break your heart.

criticism is dangerous, because it wounds a person's precious pride, hurt his sense of importace and arouse resentment.

But also remember: if you have any genuine feelings, hide them like treasure; never let anyone so much as suspect them, or you're lost. Instead of being the executioner, you'll be the victim. And if you ever fall in love, keep that absolutely secret! Never breathe a word until you're completely sure of the person to whom you open your heart. And to protect that love, even before you feel it, learn to despise the world.

When you say, "I need more confidence," what you're really saying is, "I need those people over there to approve of me." That is the desire to control other people and what they think. The first person who figures out how to do this owns the world.