The gods' most savage curses come upon us as answers to our own prayers. Prayer is a dangerous business.

I need words that mean more than they mean, words not just with height and width, but depth and weight and, and other dimensions that I cannot even name.

Events may be horrible or inescapable. Men have always a choice - if not whether, then how, they may endure.

This wasn't prayer anyway, it was just argument with the gods.Prayer, he suspected as he hoisted himself up and turned for the door, was putting one foot in front of the other. Moving all the same.

Well, it is a particular sin to permit grief for what is gone to poison the praise for what blessings remain to us.

It wasn't a case of storming heaven. It was a case of letting heaven storm you.

But personally, I think [sainthood] is not so much the growth of virtue, as simply the replacement of prior vices with an addiction to one's god.

Everyone has a weakness but I have two, everything you say and everything you do.

"Worry" is a word that I don't allow myself to use.

Life is a long drawn out lie, with a sniffling sigh at the end of it.

Four things to learn in life: To think clearly without hurry or confusion; To love everybody sincerely; To act in everything with the highest motives; To trust God unhesitatingly.

Gymnastics is not at all as popular as, for example, soccer. Gymnastics as a sport isn't promoted very well.

Valentine's Day is different for old people. At this age I receive chocolates in boxes shaped like artificial hearts.

All children are natural actors, and I'm still a kid. If you grow up completely, you can never be an actor.

He was outwardly calm but inwardly bleeding to death.

No one was there. Some teammates, huh? I guess they didn't want to get their lip busted like the gentleman I busted. Sorry for that sir.

The human mind is incredible. It can do nothing without belief, yet practically anything with it. —Elana's father