Quotes About Understanding

My mother has said that it's often better for a husband and wife not to understand each other too well," he [Rupert] said. "A little mystery keeps a marriage more interesting, she says.

Looking at a man as though he was something the horse left behind isn't the way to elicit confidences.

If someone listens, or stretches out a hand, or whispers a kind word of encouragement, or attempts to understand a lonely person, extraordinary things begin to happen.

I get along with all the women singers, but especially Dolly Parton. We talk the same hillbilly language.

I ain't got much education, but I got some sense.

what the willows don't know won't make them weep

Religion is hard. You either see Jonah in the belly of the whale or you don't, my dark sister. It's all on the inside.

Good grief, Molly. He doesn't scare you?" "Of course not." "But he's..." "He's sweet," Molly insisted. Dare snorted. "He's still listening.

His jaw locked. "You don't know shit about me." She put her hands at either side of his face and smiled with too much emotion. "You want to know what I think?" For some reason, tension pulled at him. "Probably some idiotic romanticized nonsense." When her confidence didn't falter, he made a sound of disgust. "All right, go ahead and tell me." "I think you're the one who doesn't know shit about you

His back to the room, Jackson said, "I need a Chris." Because Chris was gay, Dare choked and Trace laughed.

But love was strange. It distorted your perspective and played havoc with your logic.

Dating was so much easier when we were younger because we all spoke the same cryptic code and understood the rules of engagement. "Shelly, ask Suzie to ask Mary to ask Mike to ask Billy if he likes me. But tell her not to let him know that I like him. Well OK, she can tell Billy that I like him, but not that I like him, like him."

It's impossible to get to know people deeply and not come to like them.

I remember a quote from Einstein: "No problem can be solved from the same level of consciousness that created it.

Forgiveness is a tricky thing, in the way that apologies can be. Are you apologizing because it makes you feel better or because it will make the other person feel better?

Next time you're about to rule out some guy because he's not your ideal, try to focus on the good things about him, because some guy is going to have to focus on the good things about you, even though he may have wanted someone more easygoing or taller. Every time you start to dissect some guy, note that he's willfully ignoring all of this in order to go out with you.

We are mirrors reflecting mirrors reflecting mirrors, showing one another what we can't yet see.

Your misery doesn't change their situation. You can't lessen their misery by carrying it for them inside you.

In idiot compassion, you avoid rocking the boat to spare people's feelings, even though the boat needs rocking and your compassion ends up being more harmful than your honesty. People do this with teenagers, spouses, addicts, even themselves. Its opposite is wise compassion, which means caring about the person but also giving him

I regularly made an effort to remember one of the most important lessons from my training: There's no hierarchy of pain. Suffering shouldn't be ranked, because pain is not a contest. Spouses often forget this, upping the ante on their suffering—I had the kids all day. My job is more demanding than yours. I'm lonelier than you are. Whose pain wins—or loses?

Its opposite is wise compassion, which means caring about the person but also giving him or her a loving truth bomb when needed.

Sometimes you have to take a leap of faith and experience something before its meaning becomes apparent.

Perhaps men apologize preemptively, by holding their tears back.

You know what I love about Rosie?" he says. "She's the only one who doesn't ask things of me. The only one who isn't, in one way or another, disappointed with me—or at least, she wasn't before she bit me! Who wouldn't love that?" He laughs loudly, like we're at a bar and he's just tossed out a breezy one-liner.