Quotes About Autonomy

We advise disciples not to follow anyone. Let them follow themselves. Each one should follow his resplendent and luminous inner Being.

I have only a general sense of the pain, of not being able to control my body and my thoughts. All I ever wanted was to have control- to be in charge of myself and the rest of the world.

Of all God's creatures there is only one that cannot be made the slave of the lash. That one is the cat.

Justice is my being allowed to do whatever I like. Injustice is whatever prevents my doing so.

ADESPOTICK  (ADESPO'TICK)   adj. Not absolute; not despotick.Dict.

I know, the little kids came with their mommies," Colleen said. "I'm glad we're old enough to come alone." She could still hear Colleen

Being alone is a matter of choice.

your body is so much more than a lesson to be learnt

Allowing yourself to stop reading a book - at page 25, 50, or even, less frequently, a few chapters from the end - is a rite of passage in a reader's life, the literary equivalent of a bar mitzvah or a communion, the moment at which you look at yourself and announce: Today I am an adult. I can make my own decisions.

I, Deanna Lambert, belong to no one and no one belongs to me. I don't know what to do.

All my life the only reliable person, the one I could count on, the one who hasn't abandoned me, is me.

So there you have it--my sorry tale. That's how something I though I controlled ended up controlling me.

Every time my parents bring up the subject of if I want to go back to Lake Hills or transfer somewhere else it makes me want to take more pills. Like that's even a possibility. Anything that might resemble a pill is under lock and key in our house. The next time I get my period, I'm going to have to ask Mom's permission for a Midol. She's probably going to ration my use of tampons in case I try to make a noose out of the strings.

The fate of your heart is your choice and no one else gets a vote

Only a weak person needed someone else around all the time.

I understood now. This voice, the one that had been trying to get my attention all this time, calling out to me, begging me to hear it -- it wan't Will's. It was mine.

It was so easy to disown what you couldn't recognize, to keep yourself apart from things that were foreign and unsettling. The only person you can be sure to control, always, is yourself. Which is a lot to be sure of, but at the same time, not enough.

Sure, it sucked to be lost, but I'd long ago realized I preferred it to depending on anyone else to get me where I needed to go. That was the thing about being alone, in theory or in principle. Whatever happened- good, bad, or anywhere in between- it was always, if nothing else, all your own.

Once I turned eighteen, I could cut myself off from everyone and finally get what I wanted, which was to be on my own, once and for all. ~Ruby, pg 38

It's only advice. Ignore it if you want.

Don't trust the natives, Olivia has told me, but I was already a step ahead of her. I didn't trust anyone. Not for directions, not for rides, and not for advice either. Sure it sucked to be lost, but I'd long ago realized I preferred it to depending on anyone else to get me where I needed to go. That was the thing about being alone, in theory or in principle. Whatever happened – good bad or anywhere in between – it was always, if nothing else, all your own.

but accepting help doesn"t have to mean giving up control.

She had made her choice, and this was it, where she felt safe, in a world she could, for the most part, control. Page 328

If life is a journey, wouldn't you rather be the person behind the wheel than the one just being carried along?