On & On Constructing Beauty

"In the face of all the horror, the small-minded stupidity, the endless bloody wars, and inevitable death, people have gone on and on constructing things of beauty."

- Kieran Egan. Teaching as Story Telling. The Althouse Press: London, 1986 pg 109

Have a safe and Happy Halloween Everyone!

Story Plays to the Universal Desire

"Curiosity is the intellectual need to answer questions and close open patterns. Story plays to the universal desire by doing the opposite, posing questions and opening situations."

- Robert McKee. Story: Substance, Structure, Style, and the Principals of Screenwriting. ReganBooks: New York, 1997. pg 346

This is My Hit

"What happened to KRS-1's philosophy?

When did hip-hop become hypocrisy?

Consuming flock of sheep - that's society.

We need to change our media immediately.

They breathing shallow words, you gonna swallow what you heard?

Who's leading the leaders, who follows followers?

The world is a pitch for corporate advertising.

My thoughts ain't a bitch switching commercializing

Sky is falling, the earth is erupting

Don't believe everything you hear kid trust me

Analyze. Gotta question, ask it

Or be a market pitch for a specific demographic

Fourteen and a girl, you're the number one target in the world

Question even me gonna believe a catchy hook

Have I got substance?

I don't know take a look."

- Kyprios "This is My Hit" from the album "Say Something..."

It's Enough

"But there are sometimes in my life where being me, right now, where I am, is just like, enough."

- Angela on My So-Called Life

Do Just Half

"You've got to pat attention to the fundamentals. You have to work hard. You have to study. You have to pay attention to real things in life. If you do just half of what your parents tell you, you'll probably be twice as far ahead."

- Tom Brokaw

Stop at the Surface

"In life our eyes tend to stop at the surface. We’re so consumed by our own needs, conflicts, and daydreams that we rarely manage to take a step back and coolly observe what’s going on inside other human beings."

- McKee, Robert. Story: Substance, Structure, Style, and the Principals of Screenwriting. ReganBooks: New York, 1997. pg 254

We Need Story

"We need other people’s well-composed stories and insights to free us from our own habits, and we also need to see that we can read consciously, that there is a conversation between literature and life, our life."

- Joseph Gold. Read For Your Life: Literature as a Life Support System. Fitzhenry and Whiteside: Markham, 1990. pg 99

Welcome to TC!

Welcome to Thoughtful Cacophony, my on-line commonplace book.

I run different features here every weekday.

Motivational Mondays are the days where I share inspiractional quotations.

Tube Tuesdays I cull wisdom from television and movies

What Wednesdays!?! highlight great song lyrics.

Storied Thursdays explore my vast collection of quotes on Story.

Anything Goes Fridays are just that - anything goes.

If this is your first visit here, please visit the sidebar to search quotations by theme or label.

You might also want to check out

My Welcome Post

and The Entry that Started It All

Thanks for visiting. I hope you enjoy my ever-growing collection.

Is It Wallpaper We're Talking About

Brian tries to get some fatherly advice from the father of his crush.

Brian: "Let's say you're deciding between two particular patterns, and one of them you definitely know that you really like. And the other one is nice wallpaper and all, but you're not sure if it's really..."

Graham: "For you."

Brian: "Exactly. But the really great wallpaper, let's say, is like totally out of your price range. So, do you take the other wallpaper, even though you don't, let's say, desire it that much? Or do you wait until the really great wallpaper is cheaper."

Graham: "Well, I guess it depends on how badly you need wallpaper."

Brian: "I would say pretty badly."

You'll Always Miss If You Don't Try

"You miss 100% of the shots you never take."

- Wayne Gretzky

Another motivational quote for you. This one from the most prolific athlete Canada has ever produced, the famous Number 99, Wayne Gretzky.

Happy Monday Everyone!

We Are Predominantly Extroverted

"The danger of modern life is that we are so predominantly extroverted that we think our energy should always be outer-focused, and so we fight this push into ourselves."

- Bond, D. Stephenson, Living Myth: Personal Meaning as a Way of Life. Shambala, 1993 pg 83

Seemingly Disparate - Imaginatively Poised

"Our time is a time for crossing barriers, for erasing old categories—for probing around. When two seemingly disparate elements are imaginatively poised, put in apposition in new and unique ways, starting discoveries often result."

- McLuhan, Marshall and Quentin Fiorce. The Medium is the Massage: An Inventory of Effects. Penguin Books: Toronto, 2003, pg 10

One Day

"Ever wonder how one day's a blessing, the next a curse

What you do in a day affects the whole universe.

It's mysterious but here it is, energy swells

From lands full of sand to the liberty bells.

From advanced organisms to single cells

From those livin' in heaven to those dwellin' in hell.

Yesterday talkin' to self I told Prevail,

The power in 24 hours can change and compel,

Listen closely yo it gets stranger still.

One day a child's born with a brain to build

One verse at a time, I live mine through music

One day a teacher but always a student

One day."

- Prevail of Swollen Members on Kyprios's song "One Day" from the album "Say Something..."

Time Grants Us Something

"When things are working right in the universe, a loss of innocence is usually followed, in time, by an increase in humanity...Time is funny like that. For everything it robs us of, it grants us something. Sometimes it's a new friend, sometimes it's a better understanding of ourselves. Sometimes, it's just a perfect day."

- Narrator on Everwood

Discover Ability

"It is a fine thing to have ability, but the ability to discover ability in others is the true test."

- Elbert Hubbard

We Always Believe in It

"Science, once the great explicator, garbles life with complexity and perplexity. Who can listen without cynicism to economists, sociologists, politicians? Religion, for many, has become an empty ritual that masks hypocrisy. As our faith in traditional ideologies diminishes, we turn to the source we still believe in: the art of story."

- Robert McKee. Story: Substance, Structure, Style, and the Principals of Screenwriting. ReganBooks: New York, 1997. pg 12

No Escape From Ourselves

"When we read, we do not truly escape—there is no escape from ourselves; there is relief from our chaos; we reorganize and regenerate."

- Joseph Gold. Read For Your Life: Literature as a Life Support System. Fitzhenry and Whiteside: Markham, 1990. pg 331

Why

"Why do you always do this to me?

Why?

Couldn't you just see through me?

How come, you act like this, like you just don't care at all.

Do you expect me to believe I was the only to fall?

I can feel, I can feel you near me, even though you're far away.

I can feel you, I can feel you baby

It's not supposed to feel this way

I need you, I need you, more and more each day

It's not supposed to be hurt this way,

I need you, I need you, I need you."

- Avril Lavigne "Why" from the My World CD

8 Minute Time Travel

"Even just glancing at the sun, you're looking at the sun as it was eight minutes ago. If the sun were to wink out right now, and I assure you as an astrophysicist that's not gonna happen, but if it did, we wouldn't know about it for eight minutes.

Forget about living every day as if it's your last, live every eight minutes as if it's your last."

- Jaymie Matthews "Layman's Guide to Time Travel" bonus feature from Stargate: Continuum DVD.

Build Something on It

"Whatever your lot in life, build something on it."

- taken from "443 character quotes and words of wisdom" from Deb Austin Brown's Growing Character.

Happy Monday Everyone!

Motivation Doesn't Last

"People say that motivation doesn't last. Well, neither does bathing. That's why I recommend it daily."

- Zig Ziglar. Newsletter 2, October 2007

Language Fails

"Language is more efficient than any other form of human communication except in one or two special cases, where a touch might be the most efficient signal."

- Joseph Gold. Read For Your Life: Literature as a Life Support System. Fitzhenry and Whiteside: Markham, 1990. pg 68

Sometimes language fails. It's at those times that a hug is the only thing you can say. Great quote.

The Man I Ain't Yet

"If you're the queen, maybe there's a king behind the joker...
I hate I can't do everything that I'm supposed to
My life is but a dream in view, I see I'm getting closer,
But what that mean to you?
You feel I need to grow up and get a scenic view
instead of try to blow up and do what real people do - work until they croak
'cause two and two makes four and that's what makes sense.
Thanks for waiting for the man that I ain't yet."

I really felt this song and this lyric. I don't know who it is by though. If you do, please help me out and respond in a comment. Thanks.

The song came from WFMU's Coffee to Go podcast from 26/08/2008 and the song was 5 minutes in.

This is a good podcast that plays only hip-hop demos from up and coming groups. They often put up the playlist so you know what songs they played. They didn't do this for this episode so please help me out if you know the name of this song and artist.