Hurt quotes
5.7K quotes on this topic — from poets, philosophers, and thinkers across history.
Explore further
Browse quotes that often appear alongside hurt — connected by shared ideas and recurring themes.
Quote collection
Follow a thought to its author, or read the full quote page.
"We are like horses who hurt themselves as soon as they pull on their bits - and we bow our heads. We even lose consciousness of the situation, we just submit. Any re-awakening of thought is then painful."
"I am filled with fear and tormented with terrible visions of pain. Everywhere people are hurting one another, the planet is rampant with injustices, whole societies plunder groups of their own people, mothers imprison sons, children perish while brothers war. O, woe."
"...it is not the big events that hurt the most but rather the smallest questionable shift in tone at the end of a spoken word that can plow most deeply into the heart."
"It feels good to be winded, having trouble breathing, chest hurts [during a workout]... I'm alive."
"There is so much hurt in this game of searching for a mate, of testing, trying. And you realize suddenly that you forgot it was a game, and turn away in tears."
"The hurt you embrace becomes joy."
"I don't know about bores. Maybe you shouldn't feel too sorry if you see some swell girl getting married to them. They don't hurt anybody most of them, and maybe they're all terrific whistlers or something. Who the hell knows? Not me."
"Poverty is a lot like childbirth - you know it is going to hurt before it happens, but you'll never know how much until you experience it."
"What it boils down to is that each person has his own ways of coping with trauma and grief, with the pain of life, and astrology was one of mine. Don't criticize me, I wanted to say, until you have stood in my place. This helped me. Nobody was hurt by it."
"The things that have acquired unity are these: Heaven by unity has become clear; Earth by unity has become steady; The Spirit by unity has become spiritual; The Valley by unity has become full; All things by unity have come into existence."
"Alcohol, tobacco, and pharmaceutical drugs are legal, but they can hurt a lot of people."
"His master’s pain was his pain. And it hurt him more for his master to be sick than for him to be sick himself. When the house started burning down, that type of Negro would fight harder to put the master’s house out than the master himself would. But then you had another Negro out in the field. The house Negro was in the minority. The masses—the field Negroes were the masses. They were in the majority. When the master got sick, they prayed that he’d die. If his house caught on fire, they'd pray for a wind to come along and fan the breeze."
"Kenny Norton hit me so hard that it still hurts. Now there was a case of two fighters who did not like each other."
"Nature....she will hang the night stars so that I may walk abroad in the darkness without stumbling, and send word the wind over my footprints so that none may track me to my hurt: she will cleanse me in great waters, and with bitter herbs make me whole."
"A sharp knife cuts the quickest and hurts the least."
"When pain is unbearable it destroys us; when it does not it is bearable."
"I like to work in the morning. I like to sometimes go to a place where I'm all alone where I'm not going to get a phone call early that hurts my feelings, because once my feelings are hurt, I'm dead in the water."
"Grass [marijuana] probably helped me as much as it hurt me. Especially as a performer. When you're high, it's easy to kid yourself about how clever certain mediocre pieces of material are. But, on the other hand, pot opens windows and doors that you may not be able to get through any other way."
"Grass probably helped me as much as it hurt me. Especially as a performer."
"How I wish I could hug everyone and tell them that it's okay. It's okay to be scared and angry and hurt and selfish. It's part of being human."
