Quotes About Perspective

Pick ten strangers and stick them in a room, and ask them which of us they feel sorrier for - you or me - and we all know who they'll choose.

it's quite difficult to know who owns a story. Is it the writer, who crafted it? The characters, who carry the plot forward? Or you, the reader, who breathes life into them? Or perhaps none of the three can exist without the other. Perhaps without this magical combination, a story would be nothing more than words on a page.

You know, Michael, I used to sit around looking for a way to make sense of what happened, like there was some kind of answer I could find if I just looked hard enough. Then one day I realized that if there had been one, Dave would still be here. And I wondered if this...this feeling that I couldn't figure it all out...was what Dave had been feeling, too.

He wished he knew what to say to make her feel better, but the truth was, he didn't feel all that great himself and he didn't know if there were even any words in the English language to take away this kind of stunning shock, this understanding that the world isn't the place you thought it was.

I know this much: morality is meant to be a clear line, but it's not really. Things change. Shit happens. Who we are is about not what we do, but why we tell ourselves we do it.

How can you ricochet from a moment where you are on top of the world to one where you are crawling at rock bottom

To be fair, I am not the same man. The one who listened. The one who believed her.

but I used to think, Josef says quietly, that there are some weeds that are just as beautiful as flowers. (pg 134)

But sometimes the key to happiness is just expecting a little bit less. That way, you'll never be disappointed.

But sometimes the key to happiness is just expecting a little bit less.

Sometimes the key to happiness is just expecting a little bit less. That way, you'll never be dissappointed.

Just so you know, I begin, when they say 'Once upon a time'... they're lying. It's not once upon a time. It's not even twice upon a time. It's hundreds of times, over and over, every time someone opens up the pages of this dusty old book.

You have a choice. You can just go on the facts and form your own opinions. Or you can hold the truth in your hands, and see it for the gift it is.

Being a mother gives you a singular sort of vision, a prism through which you can see your child with many different faces all at once. It is the reason you can watch him shatter a ceramic lamp, and still remember him as an angel.

I find myself staring at the goldfish. Bright as a penny, he swims in circles, happy to be going nowhere.

It's like a telescope. My dad, no matter what he's doing, zooms right in so he can't see anything except what's right there with him at that minute. My mom, she's always on wide angle.

The crisis might be what sticks in my mind, but the in-between moments are the ones I would not have missed for the world.

In other words, what looks like cruel and heartless from one angle might, from another, actually be the only way to protect your family. -Lucas

Happiness was relative

A lot of people have opinions, but I don't think they ever ask themselves why their opinions are what they are.

There are just as many stories to be told in the dark spots as there are in the bright ones.

At seventeen, the smallest crises took on tremendous proportions; someone else's thoughts could take root in the loam of your own mind; having someone accept you was as vital as oxygen.

What did you say to the people who had given you life, when you were about to intentionally throw that gift away?

But identification is not the same as knowing someone through and through—the man you fell in love with years ago might look the same and speak the same and smell the same yet be completely different.