Quotes About Uncertainty

Indecision is the source of chaos

If you follow Harkat, you might never return. Think seriously about this. If you go with Harkat and die, you won't be here to face Steve Leonard when the time comes, and your absence might have terrible repercussions for vampires everywhere. Is your short, grey-skinned friend worth such an enormous risk? I didn't have to think twice about that. Yes, I answered simply, and stepped through into unnatural, otherworldly greyness.

He did not smile. I don't believe in anything, but I'm too much of a gambler not to be affected by a lot of things.

Alice opened the door when I rang. She had on green pyjamas and held a hairbrush in one hand. She looked wearily at Quinn and spoke wearily: Bring it in. I took it in and spread it on a bed. It mumbled something I could not make out and moved one hand feebly back and forth, but its eyes stayed shut.

What do people think about my staying with Harrison with him chasing everything that's hot and hollow?

You're never satisfied until you've got two buts and an if attached to everything.

You're old enough to know that everybody except very crazy people and very stupid people suspect themselves now and then – or whenever they happen to think about it – of not being exactly sane. ? Dashiell Hammett, The Dain Curse, ch XIX

I don't have much of a life now, and from what I'm told I'll have even less where I'm going. If there's something wonderful on this ship, I want to know what it is. This is my only chance." -Peter

Your guess is as good as mine. Better, probably, because you haven't had four beers.

It was not knowing that was the seed of madness, loneliness, suspicion, fear.

How lame this is, how small, terrible. Or maybe it is beautiful. I can't decide if what I am doing is beautiful and noble and right, or small and disgusting.

You wouldn't believe what people will believe once they know our story. They're ready for anything, basically—will believe anything, because they've been thrown off-balance, are still wondering if any of this is true, our story in general, but aren't sure and are terrified of offending us.

cause of the coma was still a subject of some debate, Dr. Villalobos had said, but most likely, it was caused by stress

If [one] could eliminate this kind of uncertainty... [one] would eliminate most of the stressors of the world, and maybe, too, the wave of despair that was gathering in [her] chest. She'd been feeling this, this black rip, this loud tear, within her.

We knew nothing; the gaps in our knowledge were random and annoying. They were potholes—they could be patched but they multiplied without pattern or remorse. And even if we knew something, had read something, were almost sure of something, we wouldn't ever know the truth, or come anywhere close to it. The truth had to be seen. Anything else was a story, entertaining but more embroidered fib than crude, shapeless fact.

When I rest my head on the couch I know that it's coming, coming like something in the mail, something sent away for. We know it is coming, but are not sure when—weeks? months? She is fifty-one. I am twenty-one. My sister is twenty-three. My brothers are twenty-four and seven. We are ready. We are not ready. People know.

but her style of parenting was predicated on hoping for things over which she had little or no control.

It was also a good time to figure out this relationship with Tyler. We'd been going out for eight months by now, but our feelings were nomadic, too, hard to pin down. Or at least hard to talk about. We were very similar. We were wary of commitment. We ached for new experiences. We feared routine, conformity, and, most of all, the end of our youth. Of course we didn't say any of this – we didn't know how. We barely knew it ourselves.

No one has a plan for anything. I guess that's the crushing thing, the thing that drives us all crazy. We all think there must be someone very smart at the controls, spending the money, making plans for our schools, parks, everything. But then it's guys like you, who are just guys like me. No one has a fucking clue.

And for a good portion of the human race, because something has not already been, that is a good reason to fear it coming to be.

Necross: The wound! It will prove fatal -- but -- I am not worried! Cerebus: Really? Why not? Necross: Because that means I'll be dead in a few minutes . . . OOPS . . . better make that a few . . . seconds . . .

In times of change and uncertainty, when familiar landmarks have shifted or disappeared, it is understandable that we hanker after familiarity and straightforward answers. But the future of our world hinges on 'round-table' people who will

When you're not sure where you're going or what's really important to you, you'll never know when enough is enough.

Boy, that was an amorphous blob of undoability!