Quotes from Vera Nazarian

Respect the young and chastise your elders. It's about time the world was set aright.

The Gingerbread House has four walls, a roof, a door, a window, and a chimney. It is decorated with many sweet culinary delights on the outside. But on the inside there is nothing—only the bare gingerbread walls. It is not a real house—not until you decide to add a Gingerbread Room. That's when the stories can move in. They will stay in residence for as long as you abstain from taking the first gingerbread bite.

Wisdom is nothing more than the marriage of intelligence and compassion. And, as with all good unions, it takes much experience and time to reach its widest potential. Have you introduced your intellect to your compassion yet? Be careful; lately, intellect has taken to eating in front of the TV and compassion has taken in too many cats.

Once upon a time, began the story of you . Many perilous, wonderful, harrowing, brilliant, delightful, profound things happened. And yet—the most exciting twists and best turns are yet to come. And it absolutely does not matter how old or young you are. Like a bright carpet of wonders, enjoy the unrolling of your story.

No Temple made by mortal human hands can ever compare to the Temple made by the gods themselves. That building of wood and stone that houses us and that many believe conceals the great Secret Temple from prying eyes, somewhere in its heart of hearts, is but a decoy for the masses who need this simple concrete limited thing in their lives. The real Temple is the whole world, and there is nothing as divinely blessed as a blooming growing garden.

I tell the story to you now, but in each telling the story itself changes a little, changes direction, and that in turn changes you and me. So be very careful not only in how you repeat it but in how you remember it, goslings. More often than you realize it, the world is shaped by two things -- stories told and the memories they leave behind.

Why does every road eventually narrow into a point at the horizon? Because that's where the point lies.

Here's a new 'Blessing' for our time -- 'May Anderson Cooper never be sent to report on your town!

The sand in the hourglass runs from one compartment to the other, marking the passage of moments with something constant and tangible. If you watch the flowing sand, you might see time itself riding the granules. Contrary to popular opinion, time is not an old white-haired man, but a laughing child. And time sings.

Hope is the last thing that dies. Maybe because hope is one of those dratted things that is truly, honestly, genuinely immortal.

Is it folly to believe in something that is intangible? After all, some of the greatest intangibles are Love, Hope, and Wonder. Another is Deity. The choice to be a fool is yours.

Strange dreams are better than no dreams at all.

In the plains the grass grows tall, since there is no one to cut it. There is no one to water it either.

One sin seldom mentioned is that of killing time.

Science is an organized pursuit of triviality. Art is a casual pursuit of significance. Let's keep it in perspective.

A great ancient poet was blind. A great classical composer was deaf. Many of us are dumb. What have we to show for it?

The pyramid shape is said to hold many secrets and amazing properties. One of them is a sense of wonder.

Incidentally, the world is magical. Magic is simply what's off our human scale... at the moment.

I am happy. I have something to accomplish, create, and achieve. I am happy.

A long time ago people believed that the world is flat and the moon is made of green cheese. Some still do, to this day. The man on the moon is looking down and laughing.

Money is like fire. It is only good when there's just the right amount of it, when it's properly contained and under your control.

The other day, when I was deciding where to place a mountain range, how to make a river's flow detour around underground stalactite caves, and what precise color to give the sky at sunset, I realized I was God... or an artist and a writer.

Every story needs to be worth telling.

Dangling a carrot in front of a donkey—or anyone else for that matter—is not nice, and not fair, unless you eventually plan to give it up to them.