Let them call me a rebel and welcome. I feel no concern from it. But should I suffer the misery of devils, were I to make a whore of my soul. - Thomas Paine

I'm not sure this is a world I belong in anymore. I'm not sure that I want to wake up. - Gayle Forman, If I Stay

Do you know what I see in you now? The usual aura. A steady golden yellow, healthy and strong, with spikes of purple here and there. But when I do this. . . .”He rested a hand on my hip, and my whole body tensed up. That hand moved around my hip, slipping under my shirt to rest on the small of my back. My skin burned where he touched me, and the places that were untouched longed for that heat.. The colors deepen, it burns more intensely, the purple increases. Why? Why, Sydney?” He used that hand on me to pull me closer. “Why do you react that way if I don’t mean anything to you?” There was a desperation in his voice, and it was legitimate. - Richelle Mead, The Indigo Spell

That dress…was a very, very good decision. I could write an entire poem on the virtues of your legs alone. You are a feast for the senses.” I laughed. “I don’t know about a feast. Maybe just an hors d'oeuvre.” He took my hand and wrapped it around his arm. “Not an hors d'oeuvre. The dessert. And I plan to spoil my appetite. - Colleen Houck

What about when someone doesn't need a shoulder? What if they need the arms? - Stephen Chbosky, The Perks of Being a Wallflower

Many people pray to be kept out of unexpected problems. Some people pray to be able to confront and overcome them. - Toba Beta, Betelgeuse Incident: Insiden Bait Al-Jauza

The most exquisite paradox… as soon as you give it all up, you can have it all. As long as you want power, you can't have it. The minute you don't want power, you'll have more than you ever dreamed possible. - Ram Dass

There is no part of one’s beliefs about oneself which cannot be modified by sufficiently powerful psychological techniques. There is nothing about oneself which cannot be taken away or changed. The proper stimuli can, if correctly applied, turn communists into fascists, saints into devils, the meek into heroes, and vice-versa. There is no sovereign sanctuary within ourseles which represents our real nature. There is nobody at home in the internal fortress. Everything we cherish as our ego, everything we believe in, is just what we have cobbled together out of the accident of our birth and subsequent experiences. With drugs, brainwashing, and other techniques of extreme persuasion, we can quite readily make a man a devotee of a different ideology, the patriot of a different country, or the follower of a different religion. - Peter J. Carroll

Hope for love, pray for love, wish for love, dream for love…but don’t put your life on hold waiting for love. - Mandy Hale, The Single Woman: Life, Love, and a Dash of Sass

The easiest thing to be in the world is you. The most difficult thing to be is what other people want you to be. Don't let them put you in that position. - Leo Buscaglia

We do not need to eat animals, wear animals, or use animals for entertainment purposes, and our only defense of these uses is our pleasure, amusement, and convenience. - Gary L. Francione

Felix believed that the answer to every problem involved penguins; but it wasn't fair to birds, and I was getting tired of teleporting them back home. Somewhere in Antarctica, a whole flock of Magellanic penguins were undergoing psychotherapy. - Rick Riordan, The Throne of Fire

I love to sleep. Do you? Isn't it great? It really is the best of both worlds. You get to be alive and unconscious. - Rita Rudner

sometimes we have absolutely no idea where we are, we need the smallest clue to show us where to begin. - Cecelia Ahern, The Book of Tomorrow

This is the best thing to wear for today, you understand. Because I don't like women in skirts and the best thing is to wear pantyhose or some pants under a short skirt, I think. Then you have the pants under the skirt and then you can pull the stockings up over the pants underneath the skirt. And you can always take off the skirt and use it as a cape. So I think this is the best costume for today. - Edith Bouvier Beale

He f**ks even better than he looks”, I settled on saying. Several heads turned. I didn’t care; I was pissed. “And that beautiful face is going to be clamped between my legs as soon as we get home, don’t you worry. - Jeaniene Frost, Destined for an Early Grave

If a man hasn't what's necessary to make a woman love him, it's his fault, not hers. - W. Somerset Maugham, The Painted Veil

Sometimes I think I must have a Guardian Idiot. A little invisible spirit just behind my shoulder, looking out for me...only he's an imbecile. - Spider Robinson, Off the Wall at Callahan's

When a youth was giving himself airs in the Theatre and saying, 'I am wise, for I have conversed with many wise men,' Epictetus replied, 'I too have conversed with many rich men, yet I am not rich!’. - Epictetus

Parents have this twisted belief that anyone under the age of about twenty simply can’t know what love is, like the age to love is assessed in the same way the law assesses the legal age to drink. They think that the ‘emotional growth’ of a teenager’s mind is too underdeveloped to understand love, to know if it’s ‘real’ or not.That's completely asinine. way. - J.A. Redmerski, The Edge of Never