Quote It! [NEW FEATURE!]

So I've been pondering a couple of more new feature ideas and one of them is here today! It is called Quote It! In this feature, I will be focusing on a specific book (or set of books) and adding the quotes below. I LOVE writing down quotes or conversations from books I read and trying to keep them - or take a picture of one and keep it - so I thought it would be fun to share them with all of you! Maybe you'll find a new quote that will inspire you, move you, or just make you smile!

The first book featured is

NOTE: The second to last quote in orange is a SPOILER!

Connecting takes energy. And it’s nothing against that specific person. Sometimes, you just don’t want to connect all the time.

–Adam (p.108)

I think people attach themselves to certain people, certain events, because those things have energy; they create an atmosphere. And there is a certain amount of energy that gets absorbed by an atmosphere.

–Drake (p.116)

You need to get out into the world. When you do that, the fences get wider and wider apart.

–Adam (p.157)

It can be good to see what else is out there. If only just to see it.

–Adam (p.158)

When something feels right, why, just because we’re turning a certain age, do we have to toss it all out in the name of some sort of adult success, in the name of growing up? Why do we always have to want something else, something better? What if it doesn’t actually get better? What if everyone out there is just lying to me and it really doesn’t get any better than this?

–Carter (p.158)

We're fascinated by the things we can’t figure out, by the things that don’t have a right or wrong answer. Even when we can’t explain them, we need to make some sort of sense out of them – create lists, find connections, map it out.

Maybe that’s why, when we can’t seem to figure out all sorts of other more commonplace mysteries (like why we all keep looking at the sky as if it might talk to us), we still need to try.

We think maybe it’s a lot like love, that need to make sense of the sky. We don’t know why we need it, we cant explain it when it happens or when it doesn’t happen, but we need it like we need air or food.

So we keep looking for it.

(p.159)

You can’t have fun all the time. Sometimes it’s hard. Sometimes it’s frustrating and miserable, sometimes people are mean, but you have to push through that. You’re talented. Sometimes being talented is just hard.

(p.186)

I didn’t really believe in the idea of regret because it was always based on what might have happened. People always held up the now, the concrete now, and compared it to what might have been, and that wasn’t a fair comparison.

(p.189)

…the stars give people a chance to imagine their own possibilities; they provide a reminder that each of us has the capacity to make our best future, to find our purpose.

(p.191)

I’m not sure we ever truly quit the things we love. We might not be practicing them, but that doesn’t mean we’ve quit them. I think, sometimes, things we love need to go dormant or come out in a different form for a while.

(Adam p.201)

…I was struck with how much we needed to know we were loved. We needed people to tell us, show us, remind us. I studied the stars wide above me, realizing it was because we knew how small we were that love mattered so much. Even when everything in the world pointed to the contrary, love carved out its own vast galaxy for us, made us the most important thing in it, at least to somebody.

(p.207)

I’d often wondered about peoples need to constantly remind themselves to be aware of living right now. It seemed sort of obvious to me. Of course we lived right now. When else would we be living?

(p.229)

It was weird to think one person might see me one way and another person might have a totally different impression of me based on a separate list of experiences.

(p.245)

Here’s a hint from Grown-up World. There’s no right way. Not really. Just perspective. We choose whether we succeed or fail. We do. It’s all our own spin on it. We create our own definition of success or failure. You can’t hold yourself up to other people’s versions of things. Not societies idea of things, and not other people’s. Your own. But regret…well, that’s a real thing. Take it from me. You should try things on, see if they fit you. If they don’t, it’s not failure. It’s a choice. But always let yourself have a choice, let yourself have possibilities. People say ‘Follow your dreams, blah blah blah,’ but no one’s checking up on that, no one’s out there with a clipboard saying, ‘Yes, Carter Moon. Dream followed!’ You’re accountable to yourself. So if you don’t ever take the chances, if you don’t ever at least try, you’re going to be sitting in that café when you’re forty wondering about them.

(p.250)

‘People like a Hollywood ending, Carter.’

‘Not all people.’

‘But you do.’

He was right. I did. I loved a Hollywood ending. Love the montage where they figured everything out to the swell of music, the scenes from the beach or skyscraper where everything worked out the way it should. Simple, lovely – hopeful. The way I wished the whole world could be.

But this wasn’t a movie. In life, we didn’t get to have credits roll to tell us when we’d come to the end of our epiphany arc. To know when to applaud. In life, there were no credit, no sound tracks. In life, things often didn’t work out. My brother might never get better. I might make the list for my parents but not choose the right answer. Because there were no right answers.

That was the great thing about growing up. We got to write our own endings, thousands of them, over and over. That was life. It was a million little endings. But it was also a million little beginnings. Even when other people thought we were writing them wrong. I didn’t know if Adam and I could make our separate worlds work in the future, but for today – we had a tour to finish.

Not everyone liked a Hollywood ending.

But I did. As long as it was my Hollywood ending.

(p.296)

Categories: feature, Quote It