Top 100 Breath By Breath Quotes
#1. Transformation occurs only when we remember, breath by breath, year after year, to move toward our emotional distress without condemning or justifying our experience.
Pema Chodron
#2. Ivy? I called as I went belowdecks, fear winding between my soul and reason when she didn't answer. The silence ate away at my hope like bitter acid, drop by drop, breath by breath.
Kim Harrison
#3. And not after, when we're clinging to each other like the world just fell apart and is slowly clicking back together, piece by piece, breath by breath . . . heartbeat by beautiful heartbeat.
Jenn Bennett
#4. Allow your acceptance of that to be a transformative experience. You do that by simply looking it square in the face and then moving on. You don't have to move fast or far. You can go just an inch. You can mark your progress breath by breath.
Cheryl Strayed
#5. Children are touched by heaven - their every breath, every laugh, every touch a sip of water to the desert wanderer. I could not have known this as a child, but I know it as a mother, a truth I learned as my own heart grew, bent, danced, and broke for each of my children
Nadia Hashimi
#6. Socrates: I'm afraid that it might actually be sacrilegious to stand idly by while morality is being denigrated and not try to assist as long as one has breath in one's body and a voice to protest with.
Plato
#7. Stewart loves me with a tiger's intensity, his need taking my breath away, his confidence in our relationship strong enough to not be bothered by the presence of another man. He stares into my soul as if he owns it, and shows his love with money, sex, and rare moments of time.
Alessandra Torre
#8. Sometimes life gives you a little punch in the stomach ... You just gotta catch your breath and keep going.
Tanya Masse
#9. Character teaches above our wills. Men imagine that they communicate their virtue or vice only by overt actions, and do not see that virtue or vice emit a breath every moment. There
Ralph Waldo Emerson
#10. Remember the darkness is never as permanent as it seems and find your path by being grateful for the next breath.
K.J. Kilton
#11. Side by side, breath for breath, beat for beat.
J.A. Belfield
#12. Wellness within is mindfulness and acceptance of what you are, what you feel inside and how it's always changing. That process is helped by being attentive to the breath as it moves through the body.
Rodney Yee
#13. The breath of song in your remembering eyes cascades fragile reflections of time-steeped sunsets tinting delicate snowflakes with the solitude of a sleeping forest where ancient secrets lie waiting, undisturbed by knowing, tranquil in the forgetfulness of yesterday's silvery silence
Sean Terrence Best
#14. There are many troubles which you cannot cure by the Bible and the hymn-book, but which you can cure by a good perspiration and a breath of fresh air.
Henry Ward Beecher
#15. I would rather dwell in the dim fog of superstition than in air rarefied to nothing by the air-pump of unbelief-in which the panting breast expires, vainly and convulsively gasping for breath.
Jean Paul
#16. Negative self talk costs more than even the richest person can afford. So be nice to yourself whenever possible ... and know that it is always possible.
Doug Pedersen
#17. I can be you hero baby.
I can kiss away the pain.
I will stand by you forever.
You can take my breath away
Enrique Iglesias
#18. She took him by the arm and pulled him down and put her lips on his. When she inhaled, she took in the breath of a thousand years and ten thousand miles. And yes, she tasted death. But
Stephen King
#19. A tall, straight-bodied, and by no means ill-favored young Highlander at close range is breath-taking.
Diana Gabaldon
#20. Cast up
the heart flops over
gasping 'Love'
a foolish fish which tries to draw
its breath from flesh of air
And no one there to hear its death
among the sad bushes
where the world rushes by
in a blather of asphalt and delay
Lawrence Ferlinghetti
#21. I knelt in front of life, folded my hands and prayed for some more time; there couldn't be any. My heart bled and so did my tearful eyes.
Time, they say, flies, but I saw it slowly passing by taking each of my tardy breaths with it as it walked out of my life ...
Sanhita Baruah
#22. An empty glass is perceived by the eyes as nothing,
in reality, this nothing is something, because it has air.
That something is what we call energy pervading everywhere,
for it is the breath of air which brings life into you.
Gian Kumar
#23. There are some men, great men, who were once pious and moral; these men act unwisely and are driven by the torment of their souls
Paul W. Feenstra
#24. Unless it's a soul-nourishing and breath-taking love, the kind that makes you wonder how you got along without them before you met them and makes you be a better, happier person, it is a waste of time. If the person cannot make you smile simply by thinking of them, they're not the one.
Carlos Salinas
#25. Whatever truth you contribute to the world will be one lucky shot in a thousand misses. You cannot be right by holding your breath and taking precautions.
Walter Lippmann
#26. Life is not measured by the breaths we take, but by the moments that take your breath away - anon
Scarlett Flame
#27. There are days when I am haunted by a feeling that is blacker than the blackest melancholy. I have a contempt for humanity. I despise the people I have been fated to call my contemporaries. I feel suffocated by their filthy breath.
Friedrich Nietzsche
#28. All life is a breath exhaled by God. All dying is a breath inhaled by God.
Hermann Hesse
#29. By then I'd figured out the gift of failure, which is that it breaks through all that held breath and isometric tension about needing to look good: it's the gift of feeling floppier.
Anne Lamott
#30. This bud of love, by summer's ripening breath, May prove a beauteous flower when next we meet
William Shakespeare
#31. I forced myself to picture the last moments. The penultimate breath. A final sigh. And yet. It was always followed by another.
Nicole Krauss
#32. It felt as though I had been holding on to Sally all these years, by the tips of my fingers. Just holding on. She was like a moth, fragile and fleeting. One rough breath, one lurch , one tiny movement of your hand and she'd fly away from you.
Belinda Jeffrey
#33. It's a soft-sounding word, 'never,' but its velvety timbre can't hide its sharp edges ... Never pressed down on him. It grabbed him by the neck and shook him. He sucked in a deep breath, sucked in all that never and started to sneeze. Never filled his nose, his eyes, his soaking fur.
Kathi Appelt
#34. - ' That's nonsense young one,
Your dreams are not very logical '
- ' The only non-sense I see here,
is a living a life; blinded,
By all that could have taken your breath away.
Nikki Rowe
#35. Vic knelt by Lucas's side. 'You look like crap, by the way.'
'Thanks for breaking it to me gently.' Lucas took a deep breath, then groaned.
Claudia Gray
#36. I write in praise of the solitary act: of not feeling a trespassing tongue forced into one's mouth, one's breath smothered, nipples crushed against the ribcage, and that metallic tingling in the chin set off by a certain odd nerve: unpleasure.
Fleur Adcock
#37. Holding on to anything is like holding on to your breath. You will suffocate. The only way to get anything in the physical universe is by letting go of it. Let go & it will be yours forever.
Deepak Chopra
#38. Come now, be a man!' he thought. 'We are used to adversity; let's not be crushed by a mere disappointment, or else I shall have suffered for nothing. The heart breaks when it has swelled too much in the warm breath of hope, then finds itself enclosed in cold reality.
Alexandre Dumas
#39. The fog wasn't simply the steamy vapors off the bay caught and penned in by hills, but a soft breath of anonymity that shrouded and cushioned the bashful traveler.
Maya Angelou
#40. Well, technically, they're going to take my brain apart neuron by neuron. But yes, they'll probably just rip yours out.' Under his breath, the Doctor added, 'If they can find it . . .
Trevor Baxendale
#41. Morning breath is hydrogen sulfide released by bacteria consuming shed tongue cells while you mouth-breathe for eight hours; saliva normally washes the debris away.
Mary Roach
#42. The sun has come up and I am sitting by a window that is foggy with the breath of a life gone by.
Nicholas Sparks
#43. He pulled her hand to his chest. She was suddenly flooded by the oh-so-recent memory of lying against his chest, his strong arms around her, the warmth of his breath in her ear as he whispered to her.
Melanie Dickerson
#44. I've got some bad news for you, Larry. The sad truth is, I'd rather pull out my fingernails one by one than sleep with you." She slipped out of the low-slung car. "Your breath stinks, Lar, and let's just face it - you're a creep." She slammed the door with such force he winced visibly.
Christine Feehan
#45. First, I'm a writer; I look at things from a different point of view. The untrained eye is the eye that sees what's been missed.
Devon, from The Dragon's Breath by Jenna Lindsey
Jenna Lindsey
#46. Quoting Father Seraphim:
Our life hangs only by a breath. It is the thread that links you to the Father, the Source, which brought you into being. Be conscious of this thread, and go where you will. (27)
Jean-Yves Leloup
#47. I think my prose reads as if English were my second language. By the time I get to the end of a paragraph, I'm dodging bullets and gasping for breath.
Lynn Abbey
#48. All stories are true, Astrea. By speaking them aloud, we bring them to life. Once words mingle with breath and sound, they become something new and alive.
Hilary Thompson
#49. The problem with driving around Iceland is that you're basically confronted by a new soul-enriching, breath-taking, life-affirming natural sight every five goddamn minutes. It's totally exhausting.
Stephen Markley
#50. She took a deep breath, inhaling the musty smell of books. Truth be told, she thought the smell was kind of sexy. She'd had fantasies of having sex in a library. That was probably what happened when one spent those crucial hormone-filled years surrounded by books instead of boys.
Caroline Hanson
#51. I wasn't even sure I wanted a man in my life again; by that time I'd exhausted the notion that the answer to a man is another man, and I was out of breath.
Margaret Atwood
#52. Without intention, all these postures, these breathing practices, meditations, and the like can become little more than ineffectual gestures. When animated by intention, however, the simplest movement, the briefest meditation, and the contents of one breath cycle are made potent.
Donna Farhi
#53. I came in haste with cursing breath, And heart of hardest steel; But when I saw thee cold in death, I felt as man should feel. For when I look upon that face, That cold, unheeding, frigid brown, Where neither rage nor fear has place, By Heaven! I cannot hate thee now!
Alfred Lord Tennyson
#54. He continued holding her but slid her soft frame down his body until her lips were even with his. She wound her hands through his hair, her hot mouth tasting his as their breaths mingled. Much hotter breath blew on his cheek, followed by a knicker and a wet nose.
Abigail Sharpe
#55. As for myself, my course is clear. A British subject I was born - a British subject I will die. With my utmost effort, with my latest breath, will I oppose the 'veiled treason' which attempts by sordid means and mercenary proffers to lure our people from their allegiance.
John A. Macdonald
#56. What if the very reason we have breath is because we have been saved for a global mission? And what if anything less than passionate involvement in global mission is actually selling God short by frustrating the very purpose for which he created us?
David Platt
#57. Alone for a few precious seconds, he drew in a deep breath. He stood on a ruined street in a ruined city. Destruction stretched for kilometers in every direction, all caused by a single man for whom vengeance had devolved into madness.
G.S. Jennsen
#58. It was time. One breath - another. She was the heir of fire. She was fire, and light, and ash, and embers. She was Aelin Fireheart, and she bowed for no one and nothing, save the crown that was hers by blood and survival and triumph. Aelin
Sarah J. Maas
#59. With each breath, you take into your body 10 sextillion atoms, and - owing to the wind's ceaseless circulation - over a year's time you have intimate relations with oxygen molecules exhaled by every person alive, as well as by everyone who ever lived.
Guy Murchie
#60. He moves closer and leans down so I will look at him. And I feel sick, literally nauseated by the smell of bourbon on his breath. And yet I still want to fold myself up and put my entire body in his arms. I am loving him and hating him at the same time.
Kathryn Stockett
#61. If you get to a point where something happens today to stress you out, take a breath & center your thoughts on peace. Ignored thoughts die.
Ace Antonio Hall
#62. Poetry should be vital
either stirring our blood by its divine movements or snatching our breath by its divine perfection. To do both is supreme glory, to do either is enduring fame.
Augustine Birrell
#63. I'm tired of being afraid," she said, her breath hitching. Shane shook his head. "The definition of courage is action in the face of fear. By that definition, sweetness, you're the bravest person I know.
Laura Kaye
#64. And so you have a life that you are living only now, now and now and now, gone before you can speak of it, and you must be thankful for living day by day, moment by moment a life in the breath and pulse and living light of the present
Wendell Berry
#65. We live in an ocean of air like fish in a body of water. By our breathing we are attuned to our atmosphere. If we inhibit our breathing we isolate ourselves from the medium in which we exist. In all Oriental and mystic philosophies, the breath holds the secret to the highest bliss.
Alexander Lowen
#66. Tis admirable to consider, how Powerful the Kings are, yet they move by the Breath of their People.
William Penn
#67. Energy is the continuum that unites body and mind. When the two are not as one, life becomes unbalanced. Every breath of air and every sound you hear can be polluted by an existence without promise.
C.A. Jamison
#68. I do." He was clearly amused by my disdain. "We have only been speaking for two minutes, Paige. Try not to waste all your sarcasm in one breath."
I wanted to kill him. As it happened, I couldn't.
Samantha Shannon
#69. And I couldn't catch my breath, and my lungs were acting desperate, gasping, pulling me out of the bed trying to find a position that could get them air, and I was embarrassed by their desperation,
John Green
#70. Flung is too harsh a word for the rush of the world. Blown is more like it, but blown by a generous, unending breath.
Annie Dillard
#71. Dull indeed would be the man that did not feel the thrill awakened by the first glimpse of brilliant color in the orchard, and the cheery warbling notes borne to our ears on the first gentle breath of spring!
Arthur Cleveland Bent
#72. A muscle moved in Tucker's jaw. He said, You mean you want berating space. I breath better when you are close by.
Josh Lanyon
#73. A little," panted Mrs. Peagrim, who, though she danced often and vigorously, was never in the best of condition, owing to her habit of neutralizing the beneficent effects of exercise by surreptitious candy-eating. "I'm a little out of breath.
P.G. Wodehouse
#74. Ours is an age in which thousands are driven daily from their homelands by the unforgiving brutalities of war, terrorism, political oppression, starvation, disease, economic piracy, and the relentless suffocation of that singular breath which makes human beings individuals.
Aberjhani
#75. I feel most alive, most electric with faith, breath, and courage, when I think of God as a current that runs through all that is. Not by will or by choice. Not as a benediction but because there are laws even God must obey.
Tracy K. Smith
#76. One can observe that such changes in the breath are the direct result of your reaction to thoughts. If you can simply dismiss the thoughts by giving them no value then the breathing will find its own medium and become subtle.
Stephen Richards
#77. Her virtues, graced with external gifts, Do breed love's settled passions in my heart; And like as rigour of tempestuous gusts Provokes the mightiest hulk against the tide, So am I driven by breath of her renown Either to suffer shipwreck or arrive Where I may have fruition of her love.
William Shakespeare
#78. Listen to the breath of the rain."
They were silent for a minute. Dillon closed his eyes and tried to grasp at what Hunter experienced. Hunter moved closer and put the heat of his breath in Dillon's ear. "I want you to make love to me by the rhythm of the rain," he whispered.
Brandon Shire
#79. Every time we forget to breathe or our minds wander or we're hijacked by feelings or sensations, we gently bring ourselves back to the breath, again and again.
Sharon Salzberg
#80. Command by instinct is swifter, subtler, deeper, more accurate, more in touch with reality than command by conscious mind. The discovery takes one's breath away.
Michael Novak
#81. What Lily craved was the darkness made by enfolding arms, the silence which is not solitude, but compassion holding its breath.
Edith Wharton
#82. Remember that life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away!
Vicki Corona
#83. The reputation of a woman may also be compared to a mirror of crystal, shining and bright, but liable to be sullied by every breath that comes near it.
Miguel De Cervantes
#84. Pretty, but badly dressed," breath of an oracle which had passed by her and vanished after depositing in her heart one of the two germs which must afterwards fill the whole life of the woman, coquetry. Love is the other.
Victor Hugo
#85. I took a deep breath and said: "I fell in love with a vampire."
And like that, I was blinded by light.
Richelle Mead
#86. From inaccessible mountain range by way of desert untrod by human foot to the ends of the unknown seas, the breath of the everlasting creative spirit is felt, rejoicing over every speck of dust that hearkens to it and lives.
Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe
#87. His voice was like honey and velvet. "Death, that hath sucked the honey of thy breath, hath had no power yet upon thy beauty," he murmured, and I recognized the line spoken by Romeo in the tomb.
Stephenie Meyer
#88. I am moved by the multitudes of your intelligence and sometimes, returning, I become the sea - in love with your speed, your heaviness and breath.
Frank O'Hara
#89. Some of my Arcanum bunkmates taught me a card game called dogs-breath. I returned the favor by giving an impromptu lesson in psychology, probability, and manual dexterity. I won almost two whole talents before they stopped inviting me back to their games.
Patrick Rothfuss
#90. In the day-to-day life of a traveling musician, it's easy to miss so many details. The world goes by at high-speed; it will take your breath away.
Eric Burdon
#91. Every breath taken in by the man
Who loves, and the woman who loves,
Goes to fill the water tank
Where the spirit horses drink.
Robert Bly
#92. Something in us is telling us we're moving too fast, at a pace dictated by machines rather than by anything human, and that unless we take conscious measures, we'll permanently be out of breath.
Pico Iyer
#93. When we sit in meditation, we are closer than usual to the world as it is. By simply bringing body, breath, and mind together in the present moment, we touch Buddha; we touch reality, and we are in the world as it is. Most people's experience in this state is peaceful and rejuvenating.
Andrew Furst
#94. I'd walked to school like it was any other day. Like my heart wasn't breaking. Like my head wasn't reeling and my feet weren't weighted down by the sudden and tragic onset of clinical depression, making each breath a trial, each step a struggle. I totally needed a car.
Darynda Jones
#95. Six seconds in, six seconds out- no choice anymore. Don't mess this up. If I mess up, even by a second, I have to start the breath cycle all over again. That's the rule. The unbreakable rule.
Kate Ellison
#96. One of yoga's great gifts to making is the discovery of the link that exists between energy, breath, and mind. As you change one, you also change the other two. If you excite one, the other two become excited and, conversely, if you calm one, the other two respond by becoming calm also.
John Novak
#97. Sweet is the breath of praise when given by those whose own high merit claims the praise they give.
Hannah More
#98. Hope is the fuel that raises our standards. Losing it deletes our most basic desires.
Doug Pedersen
#99. This is man, who, if he can remember ten golden moments of joy and happiness out of all his years, ten moments unmarked by care, unseamed by aches or itches, has power to lift himself with his expiring breath and say: I have lived upon this earth and known glory!
Thomas Wolfe
