Quotes About Challenge

The challenge for those of us who care about our faith and about a hurting world is to tell stories which will carry the words of grace and hope in their bones and sinews and not wear them like fancy dress.

If life is so bad, how come you're so happy?" "Did I say bad? I said it was tough. Nothing to make you happy like doing good on a tough job, now is there?

life ain't supposed to be nothing, 'cept maybe tough

Dammit, Trotter. Don't try to make a stinking Christian out of me.

Whoever heard of a king who was scared of tall trees and a little bit of water?

Some of us, no matter how hard we try, aren't meant to lead ordinary lives. Fate finds us. Gives us a shove.

You see, nothing is more immediate, more complete than the sense of smell. In an instant, it has the power to transport you. Your olfactory sense connects not to the memory itself, but to the emotion you felt when that memory was made. To recreate a scent memory is one of the most challenging, eloquent pursuits possible. It's poetry, in its most immediate form.

Are we at war with fate?

Anything worth doing has risks." Hortense paused. "And believe me, this is worth doing.

They call you Jatt? They call you Jutt? I'm gonna toss you in a rut! Then I'm gonna punch you in the gut!

Women need to become literary 'criminals,' break the literary laws and reinvent their own, because the established laws prevent women from presenting the reality of their lives.

I'll either get a medal or get committed.

The awful, ironic, glorious fix for the writing doldrums is to write the next page.

A novel in progress doesn't have a clear, forward process. It's messy, like a beloved, balky child.

knew better than to assume a straight shot at happiness: If we see a light at the end of the tunnel, he said, it's the light of an oncoming train.

Reading, which had been at the heart of my intellectual and emotional existence, was suddenly beyond my grasp. I was used to reading three or four books a week; now it was impossible. I did not read a serious work of literature or nonfiction, cover to cover, for more than ten years. The frustration and pain of this were immeasurable.

high altitude coupled with rigorous exercise can raise lithium levels. I became completely disoriented and totally incapable of navigating my way down the mountain.

Much like crossing the Bay Bridge when there is a storm over the Chesapeake, one may be terrified to go forward, but there is no question of going back.

He was twenty years old when he left New England. By the age of thirty he had exchanged Protestantism for Catholicism, anonymity for literary acclaim, and sanity for madness.

Even in climes/without snow/one cannot go/foward sometimes./Things test you./You are part of/the Donners or/part of the rescue:/a muleteer in/earflaps; a/formerly hearty/Midwestern farmer/perhaps. Both/parties trapped/within sight/of the pass.

Its was one of those events which at a crucial stage in one's development arrive to challenge and stretch one to the limit of one's ability and beyond, so that thereafter one has a new standard by which to judge oneself.

It was like being given a maths problem when your brain's exhausted, and you know there's some far-off solution, but you can't work up the energy even to give it a go. Something in me just gave up.

For their kind do not know what it is to risk everything in the endeavor to rise above the mediocre.

I remember a huge tiredness coming over me, a kind of lethargy in the face of the tangled mess before me. It was like being given a maths problem when your brain's exhausted, and you know there's some far-off solution, but you can't work up the energy even to give it a go.