A Quote by Elif Batuman

I've gotten a lot of comfort from the philosophy of the Roman Stoics. For me, one of the most powerful ideas of Stoicism is that you can't pick or choose in the world what you want to happen and what you don't want to happen, and that actually if you did get to choose, the version you would come up with would be unsociable, lame, and basically less beautiful than the truth.
I've only gotten directly offered two or three movies, ever. I don't have the luxury of being able to say no a lot, and I don't really have the luxury of just getting to pick and choose certain things. If I did, I probably would choose even more different roles than I've played.
The dreams you choose to believe in come to be. When you feel in your innermost being that you will achieve what you set out to do, you open the way for miracles. Choose to believe something good can happen. Expecting it to happen energizes your goal and actually gives it momentum. What you expect to happen, happens. If you expect to succeed, you'll succeed
A lot of times as writers, you want to come up with the best possible story, and you bend it according to what you want to happen. I think one of the things that I always try to think about is what would really happen in a situation, what feels real.
I can choose whoever I want, in MMA things change very rapidly, sometimes you don't know what'll happen and there's a guy that upsets everybody. I could fight who the fans would like me to fight the most. For me that's important.
We’ve all seen the same situation happen to two people. One looks for the lesson, sets their shoulders back and presses on while the other asks ‘why does it always happen to me?’ You can choose not to sit on the fence. You can choose not to criticise. You must stand as guard at the door of your own mind and choose to be positive.
This was love, I supposed, and eventually I would come to know it. Someday it would choose me and I would come to know its spell, for long stretches and short, two times, maybe three, and then quite probably it would choose me never again.
I want there to be another independence referendum at some stage. I want Scotland to be independent, but I wouldn't choose to have it happen because England votes to come out of the E.U.
When we love another, we never ever seek to limit or restrict them in any way whatsoever. Love says, "My will for you is your will for you." Love says, "I choose for you what you choose for you." When I say, "I choose for you what I choose for you," then I'm not loving you. I'm loving me through you, because I'm getting what I want, rather than seeing you get what you want.
The reason I choose the stories I choose - and it's why it takes me so long to find ideas - is that I'm looking for that very thing. I want an idea that begins, I want a middle that is compelling and will bring readers along, and I definitely want an ending.
Over the years, there certainly have been plenty of ideas that I've had and given up on, but for this one, the only thing that was standing in its way was me doing it - I just had to write it... And then if it didn't happen, it didn't happen. But I didn't want it to be for lack of effort on my part, so I had hunch that it would be a good story and that we would work well together. And it certainly worked out that way.
Ruby inherited the Perl philosophy of having more than one way to do the same thing. I inherited that philosophy from Larry Wall, who is my hero actually. I want to make Ruby users free. I want to give them the freedom to choose.
Americans are very mobile and move around and choose the communities they want. On the ocean people would be even more mobile and empowered to link up with people they enjoyed, and detach and move away from people they did not. Increasing choice is a way to foster fulfillment in people's lives. I choose my friends and I'd prefer to choose my neighbors too.
'Mamma Mia' and 'Dallas' have proved to me that the things you dream about can happen. I don't ask myself, 'How did I get here?' but instead, 'I deserve to be here. I was right to think this would happen.' I'm a firm believer in the power we have in our minds to want something and pursue it in a sane and focused way.
I act probably a lot more than you see. I happen to choose movies that don't have much of a life, or I choose movies that are shown on cable instead of as features
I act probably a lot more than you see. I happen to choose movies that don't have much of a life, or I choose movies that are shown on cable instead of as features.
If I get lucky and I can choose, I would always choose a really good story and screenplay, even if I don't know the director. If there's a good screenplay, there's a chance that something good is going to happen.
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