Mistake quotes
6.4K quotes on this topic — from poets, philosophers, and thinkers across history.
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Browse quotes that often appear alongside mistake — connected by shared ideas and recurring themes.
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"In the middle of the night, things well up from the past that are not always cause for rejoicing--the unsolved, the painful encounters, the mistakes, the reasons for shame or woe. But all, good or bad, give me food for thought, food to grow on."
"Don't be afraid of mistakes - There are none."
"Knowledge is not the same as morality, but we need to understand if we are to avoid past mistakes and move in productive directions. An important part of that understanding is knowing who we are and what we can do... Ultimately, we must synthesize our understandings for ourselves."
"You understand sleep when you are awake, not while you are sleeping. You can see mistakes in arithmetic when your mind is working properly; while you are making them you cannot see them. Good people know about both bad and evil; bad people do not know about either."
"It is a mistake to suppose that the whole issue is how to free man. The issue is to improve the way in which he is controlled."
"Life is the only real counselor; wisdom unfiltered through personal experience does not become a part of the moral tissue."
"Your mistake was not in imagining things you could not know—that is, after all, what imagination is for. Rather, your mistake was in unthinkingly treating what you imagined as though it were an accurate representation of the facts."
"The music is just like Detroit, a complete mistake. It's like George Clinton and Kraftwerk are stuck in an elevator with only a sequencer to keep them company."
"All the world began with a yes. One molecule said yes to another molecule and life was born. But before prehistory there was the prehistory of the prehistory and there was the never and there was the yes. It was ever so. I don’t know why, but I do know that the universe never began. Make no mistake, I only achieve simplicity with enormous effort."
"The only sure way to avoid making mistakes is to have no new ideas."
"I can't accept "our nervous age," since mankind has been nervous during every age. Whoever fears nervousness should turn into a sturgeon or smelt; if a sturgeon makes a stupid mistake, it can only be one: to end up on a hook, and then in a pan in a pastry shell."
"You need a combination of many things to get good results. Experience is one of these, and it can be very useful at the right moment. I don't know if it helps to go faster, but for sure it's an important element that has helped me a lot. Being experienced helps you to make fewer mistakes when you are on track. This is the positive side for being around for so many years!"
"Action first, mistakes second, lessons third."
"The mistake is that we cling to the body when it is the spirit that is really immortal."
"To expect truth to come from thinking signifies that we mistake the need to think with the urge to know."
"Even now I cannot help feeling that it is a mistake to think that the passion one feels in creation is ever really shown in the work one creates."
"I was born with God-given gifts of very talented musical ability and exceptoinal physical coordination. I always needed prodding to practice piano, violin, cornet or French horn. I had to be pulled away from any athletic participation. Now, at 63, I look back on my athletic feats - All-American, All-Pro Quaterback, College and Pro Football Hall of Fame - and I can honestly say I would trade these all if I had been smart enough to pursue my musical career. YOUNG PEOPLE - don't make the same mistake."
"Live all you can; it's a mistake not to."
"People mistake their limitations for high standards."
"We must not mistake kindness for weakness. Kindness isn't weak. Kindness is a certain type of strength."
