#though

I thought, possibly, that what I really needed was to go where nobody knew me and start over again, with none of my previous decisions, conversations, or expectations coming with me. ↗

— Maggie Stiefvater

#start-over-again #thought #conversation

I am often described to my irritation as a 'contrarian' and even had the title inflicted on me by the publisher of one of my early books. (At least on that occasion I lived up to the title by ridiculing the word in my introduction to the book's first chapter.) It is actually a pity that our culture doesn't have a good vernacular word for an oppositionist or even for someone who tries to do his own thinking: the word 'dissident' can't be self-conferred because it is really a title of honor that has to be won or earned, while terms like 'gadfly' or 'maverick' are somehow trivial and condescending as well as over-full of self-regard. And I've lost count of the number of memoirs by old comrades or ex-comrades that have titles like 'Against the Stream,' 'Against the Current,' 'Minority of One,' 'Breaking Ranks' and so forth—all of them lending point to Harold Rosenberg's withering remark about 'the herd of independent minds.' Even when I was quite young I disliked being called a 'rebel': it seemed to make the patronizing suggestion that 'questioning authority' was part of a 'phase' through which I would naturally go. On the contrary, I was a relatively well-behaved and well-mannered boy, and chose my battles with some deliberation rather than just thinking with my hormones. ↗

— Christopher Hitchens

#contrarianism #dissent #dissidents #free-thought #harold-rosenberg

But far more numerous was the herd of such, Who think too little and who talk too much. ↗

— John Dryden

#loquacity #thoughtlessness #contemporary

Sometimes we have thoughts that even we don’t understand. Thoughts that aren’t even true—that aren’t really how we feel—but they’re running through our heads anyway because they’re interesting to think about. If you could hear other people’s thoughts, you’d overhear things that are true as well as things that are completely random. And you wouldn’t know one from the other. It’d drive you insane. What’s true? What’s not? A million ideas, but what do they mean? ↗

— Jay Asher

#thinking #thoughts #random

To risk life to save a smile on a face of a woman or a child is the secret of chivalry. ↗

— Dejan Stojanovic

#chivalry #dejan-stojanovic #life #literature #literature-quotes

There is no bigotry like that of "free thought" run to seed. ↗

— Horace Greeley

#like #run #seed #thought

If only yesterday could be my tomorrow then today wouldn't even matter. ↗

— Carroll Bryant

#philosophical #philosophy-of-life #philosphy-of-people #life

When I was a kid, I remember playing hockey outside and whenever you did, you thought about playing for Finland vs. Sweden. That's just the way it was. ↗

— Teemu Selanne

#did #finland #hockey #i #i remember

Oh, hon, it's the little courtesies that make life bearable, I find, wouldn't you agree? ↗

— Andrew Ashling

#politeness #thoughtfulness #life

... there are two ways of being unhappy. Not getting what you want is one. Getting what you want is the other. ↗

— Eckhart Tolle

#new-thought #spiritual #life