I posted these at the start of last year. Saw them just now, smiled, and realized they’re all still relevant:
“It’s a dangerous business, Frodo, going out your front door. You step into the road, and if you don’t keep your feet, there’s no knowing where you might be swept off to.”
–J.R.R. Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring
“You’ll be bothered from time to time by storms, fog, snow. When you are, think of those who went through it before you, and say to yourself, ‘What they could do, I can do.'”
–Antoine de Saint Exupéry (quoting a fellow pilot), Wind, Sand and Stars
“But what use would it be plowing through that blackness?” asked Drinian.
“Use? replied Reepicheep. “Use, Captain? If you mean by filling our bellies or our purses, I confess it will be no use at all. So far as I know we did not set sail to look for things useful but to seek honour and adventures. And here is as great an adventure as ever I heard of, and here, if we turn back, no little impeachment on all our honours.”
–C.S. Lewis, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader