I Quotes
Browse famous quotes beginning with I. This page is a child index of the full Popular Quotes A-Z directory.
“I used to think a partner would complete me, but I now understand that no one can ever complete a person but himself. Instead of being a half-moon waiting for another half to complete me, I now aspire to be a full moon. Whole and beautiful.”
“I used to think a wedding was a simple affair. Boy and girl meet, they fall in love, he buys a ring, she buys a dress, they say I do. I was wrong. That's getting married. A wedding is an entirely different proposition.”
“I used to think about Alice in Wonderland, how she just fell down that hole and she was falling and falling and she was just not grabbing for anything or anything like that. And at one point in my life, she was like a role model to me because of the fact that she—she just fell and waited to see where she was going to land, you know. So for all of us I think we—we shy away from these feelings. And in the process of that, our ability to hold them, our ability to live from that place, diminishes. And the way to become more comfortable, more at ease, in a shifting, changing world—which has always been the case actually—is to make friends with the feelings that are evoked by nothing to hold on to.”
“I used to think about giving my life up for things, but I didn't understand what 'giving your life' really was until it was right there, about to be taken from me”
Source: Allegiant Collector's Edition
“I used to think about how I was conceived quite a lot when I was about 10 or 11, but I don't think about it at all now that so many other babies have been born in the same way.”
“I used to think about how nice it would be to visit the planets. Of course, I didn't expect to see in my lifetime what has happened. I knew it would happen some day, but it came along faster than I at first thought.”
“I used to think about how the indeterminacy inherent in the uncertainty principle might be construed as a limiting factor, and yet today I leverage it to make determinative alterations to reality.”
Source: Mercy Ai: Age of Discovery
“I used to think about it more, but you reach a certain age, you know who you are. Now, I live in a little room out in the country behind a bar... work four nights a week... in between I drink. And there ain't nobody there to stop me. I know who I am. And after all these years, there's a... victory in that.”
“I used to think about video games, "This is clearly an amazing, new narrative medium, and it's going to be mind-blowing when people get to grips with what's possible within this medium." It took us a century to get really good at film. Video games are at a much earlier stage.”
“I used to think all poets were Byronic Mad, bad and dangerous to know. And then I met a few. See Lamb 486:25.”
“I used to think anxiety and insomnia drove me to success, but it was the stillness that let me be good at anything. When you extend the seconds of stillness, that's when you're able to think and learn.”
“I used to think anyone doing anything weird was weird. Now I know that it is the people that call others weird that are weird.”
“I used to think as I looked out on the Hollywood night — there must be thousands of girls sitting alone like me, dreaming of becoming a movie star. But I'm not going to worry about them. I'm dreaming the hardest.”
“I used to think as I looked out on the Hollywood night, 'There must be thousands of girls sitting alone like me dreaming of being a movie star.' But I'm not going to worry about them. I'm dreaming the hardest.”
Source: My Story
“I used to think being healthy was eating organic, but I now realize it is identifying and correcting nutritional deficiencies with supplements and identifying environmental sensitivities.”
“I used to think being loved was the greatest thing to think about, but now I know love is never satisfied just thinking about it.”
Source: Love Does: Discover a Secretly Incredible Life in an Ordinary World
“I used to think business was 50 percent having the right people. Now I think it's 80 percent.”
“I used to think Cape Wind was a great idea. That was when Ted Kennedy was alive and railing about how he might spill his Chivas if he had to keep maneuvering the Mya around all those noisy seagull-murdering wind turbines. Anything Ted Kennedy was against, I was for.”
“I used to think drinking was the only way to be happy. Now I know there is no way to be happy.”
“I used to think feminism was a liberating force - now I see many of those people are just censors under a different name.”
“I used to think freedom meant doing whatever you want. It means knowing who you are, what you are supposed to be doing on this earth, and then simply doing it.”
Source: Writing Down the Bones: Freeing the Writer Within
“I used to think freedom was freedom of speech, freedom of the press, freedom of conscience. But freedom is the whole life of everyone. Here is what it amounts to: you have to have the right to sow what you wish to, to make shoes or coats, to bake into bread the flour ground from the grain you have sown, and to sell it or not sell it as you wish; for the lathe operator, the steelworker, and the artist it’s a matter of being able to live as you wish and work as you wish and not as they order you to. And in our country there is no freedom – not for those who write books nor for those who sow grain nor for those who make shoes.” (Grossman, p. 99) He noted that “In people’s day-to-day struggle to live, in the extreme efforts workers put forth to earn an extra ruble through moonlighting, in the collective farmers’ battle for bread and potatoes as the one and only fruit of their labor, he [Ivan Grigoryevich] could sense more than the desire to live better, to fill one’s children’s stomachs and to clothe them. In the battle for the right to make shoes, to knit sweaters, in the struggle to plant what one wished, was manifested the natural, indestructible striving toward freedom inherent in human nature. He had seen this very same struggle in the people in camp. Freedom, it seemed, was immortal on both sides of the barbed wire.” (Grossman, p. 110)”
Source: Forever Flowing
“I used to think getting old was about vanity but actually it's about losing people you love.”
“I used to think getting to know you would make me fall more in love with you. I had no idea you would turn out to be completely different from what you portrayed. You know what I liked you better when I didn't know you.”
“I used to think God guided us by opening and closing doors, but now I know sometimes God wants us to kick some doors down.”
Source: Love Does: Discover a Secretly Incredible Life in an Ordinary World
“I used to think God wouldn’t talk to me, but now I know I’m just selective with what I choose to hear.”
Source: Love Does: Discover a Secretly Incredible Life in an Ordinary World
“I used to think great teachers inspire you. Now I think I had it wrong. Good teachers inspire you; great teachers show you how to inspire yourself every day of your life. They don't show you their magic. They show you how to make magic of your own.”
“I used to think hard work made me come alive, honestly. I used to have a daily work schedule with millions of things on it and I thought, "This is wonderful!"”
“I used to think healing meant fixing yourself. But maybe it’s just about feeling yourself again. Messy. Leaky. Alive.”
Source: Lola Bloom The Flamingo Diaries: A Midlife Memoir-in-Motion
“I used to think honesty lived in the mind..
A principle, a decision, something sharpened by logic.
But here’s the catch: when I try to be honest,
I notice it asks for more than logic.
It asks me to stay real, even when it hurts.
It asks the heart to stop editing itself.
It urges the soul to stand without disguise.
It isn’t a rule one follows.
It is a courage one becomes.
Its arrival does not announce a victory.
Sometimes, it offers nothing in return.
It simply lets us meet ourselves.”
“I used to think I actually was Batman.”
“I used to think I could learn about Jesus by studying Him, but now I know Jesus doesn't want stalkers.”
Source: Love Does: Discover a Secretly Incredible Life in an Ordinary World
“I used to think I could shape the circumstances around me, but now I know Jesus uses circumstances to shape me.”
Source: Love Does: Discover a Secretly Incredible Life in an Ordinary World
“I used to think I had all the time in the world to do everything I wanted. But what's the use of having all the time in the world if you're always wasting it on things that don't mean a thing?”
Source: Dinner for Two
“I used to think I had ambition... but now I'm not so sure. It may have been only discontent. They're easily confused.”
Source: ALL THIS, and HEAVEN TOO
“I used to think I had no will to power. Now I perceive that I vented it on thoughts, rather than people. Conquering an unknown province of knowledge. Getting the better of a problem. Forcing ideas to associate or come apart. Bullying recalcitrant words to assume a certain pattern. All the fun of being a dictator without any risks and responsibilities.”
Source: The collected works of Aldous Huxley
“I used to think I had to stay frozen in time. No amount of Botox will keep up.”
“I used to think I knew everything. I was a "smart person" who "got things done," and because of that, the higher I climbed, the more I could look down and scoff at what seemed silly or simple, even religion.
But I realized something as I drove home that night: that I am neither better nor smarter, only luckier. And I should be ashamed of thinking I knew everything, because you can know the whole world and still feel lost in it. So many people are in pain-no matter how smart or accomplished-they cry, they yearn, they hurt.But instead of looking down on things, they look up, which is where I should have been looking, too. Because when the world quiets to the sound of your own breathing, we all want the same things:comfort, love, and a peaceful heart.”
Source: Have a Little Faith: A True Story
“I used to think I knew everything, but older you get the more you see other areas. If you could read everything about both sides, you'll pretty much be in the middle again, which is the state you had when you were totally ignorant. So my theory is if you maintain total ignorance - which isn't easy, but I try - you'll be just as far ahead as if you'd spent days and days reading about the whole issue. And you have that much extra time to play Pac-man.”
“I used to think I knew what was right and what was wrong, and who the good guys are, and who the bad guys are. Then the world got very gray, and I didn't know anything for a long time”
Source: Laurell K. Hamilton's Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter collection 11-15
“I used to think I’m a human behavior expert, but more and more I’m beginning to realize, I’m just a wildlife expert, because the core horrors that torment society are caused not by human behavior, but by the animal within the humans.”
Source: Tierra Carta: Naskar Charter of Earth
“I used to think I’m a human behavior expert, but more and more I’m beginning to realize, I’m just a wildlife expert, because the core horrors that torment society are caused not by human behavior, but by the animal within the humans. Prejudice, dogma, ultraindividualism, nationalism, fascism, fundamentalism, these are not problems of human behavior, these are classic cases of animal nature.”
Source: Tierra Carta: Naskar Charter of Earth
“I used to think I must never tell anybody about this discovery of mine. No one else must know about this place that made me yearn to dissolve until I became a particle of light itself. The way the light cohered in one place was unearthly. I gazed at its stillness without ever going in through the gate.”
Source: Territory of Light
“I used to think I needed their love to feel whole. Now I know: I only ever needed my own.”
Source: The Choice to Heal: A Memoir of Breaking the Cycle
“I used to think I preferred getting old to the alternative, but now I'm not sure. Sometimes the momotony of bingo and sing-alongs and ancient dusty people parked in the hallway in wheelchairs makes me long for death. Particularly when I rememver that I'm one of the ancient dusty people, filed away like some worthless tchotchke.”
“I used to think I sewed us together at the edges with my own hands, pulled the stitches tight and I could unpick them any time I wanted. Now I think it always ran deeper than that and farther, underground; out of sight and way beyond my control.”
“I used to think I should like to be a bookbinder or bookseller it seemed to me a most delightful trade and I wished or thought of nothing better. More lately I thought I should be a minister, it seemed so serious and useful a profession, and I entered but little into the merits of religion and the duties of a minister. Every one dissuaded me from the notion, and before I arrived at any age to require a real decision, science had claimed me.”
“I used to think...,' I trail off. 'I used to think life would go like this: You get bashed around a bit, fuck up, lose people, and in the process figure out what really matters. But now...'
He sips from my water glass.
'It's more like figuring out that your life was never even about you, to begin with. You're not the hero. You're just someone in the cast.”
“I used to think I was a little unstable, and then I met every girl I've ever dated.”
“I used to think I was a singer; I had my own delusions about it.”