Pale blue dot – Carl Sagan

pale-blue-dot
“Look again at that dot. That’s here. That’s home. That’s us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives.


The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every “superstar,” every ,” every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there – on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.”

 
– Carl Sagan
 
The Pale Blue Dot is a photograph of planet Earth taken in 1990 by the Voyager 1 spacecraft from a record distance of about 6 billion kilometers (3.7 billion miles) from Earth, as part of the solar system Family Portrait series of images. In the photograph, Earth is shown as a tiny dot (0.12 pixel in size) against the vastness of space. The Voyager 1 spacecraft, which had completed its primary mission and was leaving the Solar System, was commanded by NASA to turn its camera around and to take a photograph of Earth across a great expanse of space, at the request of Carl Sagan.

Love is a snowmobile – Matt Groening

“Love is a snowmobile racing across the tundra and then suddenly it flips over, pinning you underneath. At night, the ice weasels come.”
 
– Matt Groening
 

Witty saying – Voltaire

“A witty saying proves nothing.”
 
– Voltaire
 

Set love free. – Chuck Palahniuk

“If you love something set it free, but don’t be surprised if it comes back with herpes.”
 
– Chuck Palahniuk
 

Ever been in love? – Neil Gaiman

“Have you ever been in love? Horrible isn’t it? It makes you so vulnerable. It opens your chest and it opens up your heart and it means that someone can get inside you and mess you up.

You build up all these defences, you build up a whole suit of armour, so that nothing can hurt you, then one stupid person, no different from any other stupid person, wanders into your stupid life…You give them a piece of you. They didn’t ask for it. They did something dumb one day, like kiss you or smile at you, and then your life isn’t your own anymore.

Love takes hostages. It gets inside you. It eats you out and leaves you crying in the darkness, so simple a phrase like ‘maybe we should be just friends’ turns into a glass splinter working its way into your heart. It hurts. Not just in the imagination. Not just in the mind. It’s a soul-hurt, a real gets-inside-you-and-rips-you-apart pain. I hate love.”

 
– Neil Gaiman
 

Burdens and shoulders – Yiddish proverb

“God gave burdens, also shoulders.”
 
– Yiddish proverb
 

Life shrinks or expands – Anais Nin

“Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one’s courage.”
 
– Anais Nin
 

Categories
Quotes

Tell someone you love them, in German

Today, tell someone you love them, because life is short. But shout it at them in German, because life is also terrifying and confusing.
 
– Unknown
 

Impossible is not a fact, it’s an opinion – Muhammad Ali

“Impossible is just a big word thrown around by small men who find it easier to live in the world they’ve been given than to explore the power they have to change it. Impossible is not a fact. It’s an opinion. Impossible is not a declaration. It’s a dare. Impossible is potential. Impossible is temporary. Impossible is nothing.”
 
– Muhammad Ali
 

Nature’s veil – Alfred Nobel

“Hope is nature’s veil for hiding truth’s nakedness.”
 
– Alfred Nobel 

 

No winter lasts forever – Hal Borland

“No winter lasts forever; no spring skips it’s turn.”
 
– Hal Borland

 
 

Slow down – Lily Tomlin

“For fast-acting relief try slowing down.”
 
– Lily Tomlin
 
 

Generosity – Albert Camus

“Real generosity toward the future lies in giving all to the present.”
 
– Albert Camus
 
 

Unseen – Robert M. Pirsig

“We keep passing unseen through little moments of other people’s lives.”
 
– Robert M. Pirsig
 

Remembrance – Shakespeare

“Let us not burden our remembrances with a heaviness that is gone.”
 
– Shakespeare