Thinking quotes
95.1K quotes on this topic — from poets, philosophers, and thinkers across history.
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Browse quotes that often appear alongside thinking — connected by shared ideas and recurring themes.
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"I think novelists, when they write their books, end up having occasionally serving a purpose and playing roles that they never really fully either intended or even understood."
"You talk when you cease to be at peace with your thoughts; And when you can no longer dwell in the solitude of your heart you live in your lips, and sound is a diversion and a pastime. And in much of your talking, thinking is half murdered."
"The North thinks it knows how to make corn bread, but this is a gross superstition. Perhaps no bread in the world is quite as good as Southern corn bread, and perhaps no bread in the world is quite as bad as the Northern imitation of it."
"I think we never become really and genuinely our entire and honest selves until we are dead--and not then until we have been dead years and years. People ought to start dead, and they would be honest so much earlier."
"There's no evidence that registering guns reduces the level of gun violence. It's not that I don't think it's something worth doing, (but) it's something you do much later."
"Anger is a response that can lead to harm if we don't evaluate what we are upset about. Ask yourself what you are afraid of, as anger is almost always fear in disguise. If we think something or someone threatens us, we feel fear-fear that we are inadequate, that our lives are out of control, that things won't go our way. Then we fight. Find out what you're upset about. We rarely are upset for the reason we think."
"I never think it's right to chew gum in front of other people, but a lot of times I'll come in for a meeting chewing gum and I'll forget I'm chewing it. Then you don't want to swallow it because it stays in your system for seven years or something, so I've asked to throw it away. I've started to wonder if that's why I didn't get certain movies."
"I think that people are built the way that they’re built. There’s that Kate Moss quote that’s like ‘Nothing tastes as good as skinny feels’ and I can name a lot of things that taste better than skinny feels: bread, potatoes … a Philly cheesesteak and fries."
"I deserve to be happy and I think a lot of people stay in relationships for wrong reasons and instead of just looking at each other and just saying, 'you know, it's like sands of the hourglass, we learned our lessons, we can end in war or we can end in peace.'"
"I think that America is in danger of losing its adventurous spirit in the cause of some kind of illusion of safety, or substitute of law and order there."
"If you don't think it's safe, it probably isn't."
"I don't think people fully appreciate the trauma associated with losing. It takes a lot out of you, year after year."
"Songwriting is ... all about intuition - this thing pops into your head for a reason and it's up to you to follow it. It's like there's a spirit, or intuitive network, that comes through all of us, but most people don't take the time to think about it or remember it. These little things pop into our heads - it's just a process of intuition. The initial thought comes in a baby state, and you work on that some more."
"Formal education will make you a living; self-education will make you a fortune. A successful business owner never stops learning. They educate themselves on the things they need to learn, and they never stop growing. They never arrive at a certain point and think, ahhh... now I don't need to learn anymore."
"A flippant, frivolous man may ridicule others, may controvert them, scorn them; but he who has any respect for himself seems to have renounced the right of thinking meanly of others."
"Happiness comes most to persons who seek it least and think least about it. It is not an object to be sought, it is a state to be induced. It must follow and not lead. It must overtake you, and not you overtake it."
"I never had a hat, never wore one, but recently was given a brown suede duck-hunting hat. The moment I put it on I realized I was starved for a hat. I kept it warm by putting it on my head. I made plans to wear it especially when I was going to do any thinking. Somewhere in Virginia, I lost my hat."
"I think this is the most extraordinary collection of talent, of human knowledge, that has ever been gathered at the White House - with the possible exception of when Thomas Jefferson dined alone."
"I think what we lack isn't science, but poetry that reveals what the heart is ready to recognize"
"I used to think getting old was about vanity but actually it's about losing people you love."
