#deter

[I]t's difficult to make people see that what you have been taught counts for nothing, and that the only things worth having are the things you find out for yourself. Also, that when so many brands of what Chesterton calls 'fancy souls' and theories of life are offered you, there is no sense in not looking pretty carefully to see what you are going in for. [...] It isn't a case of 'Here is the Christian religion, the one authoritative and respectable rule of life. Take it or leave it'. It's 'Here's a muddling kind of affair called Life, and here are nineteen or twenty different explanations of it, all supported by people whose opinions are not to be sneezed at. Among them is the Christian religion in which you happpen to have been brought up. Your friend so-and-so has been brought up in quite a different way of thinking; is a perfectly splendid person and thoroughly happy. What are you going to do about it?' -- I'm worrying it out quietly, and whatever I get hold of will be valuable, because I've got it for myself; but really, you know, the whole question is not as simple as it looks. ↗

— Dorothy L. Sayers

#diversity #guidance #life #meaning-of-life #self-determination

Growth of consciousness does not depend on the might of the intellect but on the conviction of the heart. ↗

— Wayne Gerard Trotman

#consciousness #conviction #determination #development #heart

Harry witnessed Professor McGonagall walking right past Peeves who was determinedly loosening a crystal chandelier and could have sworn he heard her tell the poltergeist out of the corner of her mouth 'It unscrews the other way. ↗

— J.K. Rowling

#j-k-rowling #mcgonagall #peeves #poltergeist #determination

You know something? There are sandstorms that strip man and horse and bury them — I've seen them. I saw bones piled higher than my head for the folly of a bad king and those who wanted his throne. I lived through a blizzard that froze every other living creature solid. Against those things, you're only a man. I can deal with you. ↗

— Tamora Pierce

#hardships #higher-living

The information encoded in your DNA determines your unique biological characteristics, such as sex, eye color, age and Social Security number. ↗

— Dave Barry

#biological #characteristics #color #determines #dna

I would argue that the next President, either Bush or Gore, should strike a 'national' posture, exhibiting generosity toward the defeated opponent, but proceeding with determination to implement an agenda. ↗

— Richard V. Allen

#argue #bush #defeated #determination #either

Excellence, then, is a state concerned with choice, lying in a mean, relative to us, this being determined by reason and in the way in which the man of practical wisdom would determine it. ↗

— Aristotle

#choice #concerned #determine #determined #excellence

You cannot change what you are, only what you do. ↗

— Philip Pullman

#change #life #self-determination #change

The future will be determined in part by happenings that it is impossible to foresee; it will also be influenced by trends that are now existent and observable. ↗

— Emily Greene Balch

#determined #existent #foresee #future #happenings

Israel reoccupied the cities of the West Bank by a unilateral action, and reestablished the civil and military occupation by a unilateral action, and it is the one that determines whether or not a Palestinian citizen has the right to reside in any part of the Palestinian Territory. ↗

— Mahmoud Abbas

#any #bank #cities #citizen #civil