Disappointing Life Quotes

... Basically, we live a short, disappointing life; and then we die. We fill up oor lives wi shite, things like careers and relationships tae delude oorsels that it isnae aw totally pointless. ~ Irvine Welsh

Considering the general context of the flow of time, it is very disappointing that human life lasts such a short time. ~ Eraldo Banovac

Can't I trust you to do anything right, Breanna? Mom says in a voice as cold as her anger is hot, completely unmoved by my tears. I'm used to disappointing my mother. It feels like I've done it all my life. And I realize in that moment that maybe I am as stupid as she always tells me. Because deep down, I'd had this small shred of hope, some sick deluded fantasy, that she'd say I did the right thing by telling the truth. ~ Sarah Darer Littman

What about you? What are you going to be?" I knew immediately I shouldn't have asked. His smile faded, and he looked down at his hands in his lap. I'd about had enough of tiptoeing around his illness. "How do you expect God to heal you if you don't even believe it?" I spoke firmly to make sure my own heart got the message as well. "I believe that you, Matthew Doyle, are going to be fine someday. So when I ask you what you want to do with your life, I ask cause I know you're going to have a life! I'm tired of all this moping around waiting to die malarkey." He raised his eyebrows and pushed himself forward in the chair. "I know what you believe, Ruby. You been saying it since the day you got here. And I ain't getting any better. You're just putting me in a position of disappointing you, and I can't hardly stand that. Don't you think I want a life?" "I don't know. Do you?" "Of course I do! ~ Jennifer H. Westall

It is disappointing how people tend not to read a broad range of material. When the poets only read poetry, the historians only read history, the theorists only read theory, and the philosophers only read philosophy, we experience a clear deficiency in poetry, history, theory, and philosophy. We are far away from Renaissance human beings sculpting themselves to be full and all encompassing in knowledge and life pursuits. ~ Anthony Leskov

It could be disappointment, too, Tiger, and you need to prepare yourself for that. But if it's disappointing, it doesn't have to be devastating, does that make sense? Life has this, life has that, and then something else comes along again, like a wave. We ride the waves. You go down, you go up, you go down, sometimes you just drift. ~ Kathleen Glasgow

Your job, throughout your entire life, is to disappoint as many people as it takes to avoid disappointing yourself. ~ Glennon Doyle

Jill told him that he just didn't understand what it meant to have been so promising your whole life and now to be so disappointing in the end. ~ Meg Wolitzer

An also, from the opposite perspective, it can be quite disappointing, when the one you want to share your life with will not share very much of his or her own life with you. The person who will not share their past is unlikely to see you in their future.
Love Professor - to Jennifer ~ Jennifer Cox

But it was true that for the first time, he was able to comprehend that the people he had grown to trust might someday betray him anyway, and that as disappointing as it might be, it was inevitable as well, and that life would keep propelling him steadily forward, because for everyone who might fail him in some way, there was at least one person who never would. ~ Hanya Yanagihara

After everything he'd built, planned, fought for, fretted over, dreamed of, this was the summation of his life; one disappointing son and two suitcases. ~ Khaled Hosseini

I'm just being me ... Success is more than just a wish or desire; it's a behavior. A byproduct of living this way is that I consistently draw the envy of haters while also disappointing those who have bet against me. But that's just me ... Unapologetically driven. ~ Steve Maraboli

We start off with high hopes, then we bottle it. We realise that we're all going to die, without really finding out the big answers. We develop all those long-winded ideas which just interpret the reality of our lives in different ways, without really extending our body of worthwhile knowledge, about the big things, the real things. Basically, we live a short disappointing life; and then we die. We fill up our lives with shite, things like careers and relationships to delude ourselves that it isn't all totally pointless. ~ Irvine Welsh

He knew Alec enough by now to know the conflicting impulses that warred in him. He was conscientious, the kind of person who believed that the others around him were so much more important than he was, who already believed he was letting everybody down. And he was honest, the kind of person that was naturally open about all he felt and wanted. Alec's virtues had made a trap for him; these two good qualities had collided painfully. He felt he could not be honest without disappointing everyone he loved. It was a hideous conundrum for him. It was as if the world had been designed to make him unhappy. ~ Cassandra Clare

Tell me, McFadden, what do you think of our beloved Mr. Chamberlain? Mac didn't care for such direct questions. All his adult life had been spent in the mentality of the gulag, never openly complaining, always seeming to conform, never risking a row. Perhaps that's why he had agreed to marry, not so much to avoid disappointing the lady but more because it was the simplest way to fit into the flow of things. ~ Michael Dobbs

My dad had a lot of bad luck. You could see his suffering, his terrible suffering, living a life that was disappointing and looking for another one. ~ Sam Shepard

Now is the time to get serious about living your ideals. How long can you afford to put off who you really want to be? Your nobler self cannot wait any longer. Put your principles into practice – now. Stop the excuses and the procrastination. This is your life! You aren't a child anymore. The sooner you set yourself to your spiritual program, the happier you will be. The longer you wait, the more you'll be vulnerable to mediocrity and feel filled with shame and regret, because you know you are capable of better. From this instant on, vow to stop disappointing yourself. Separate yourself from the mob. Decide to be extraordinary and do what you need to do – now. ~ Epictetus

If I didn't watch so much TV, real life wouldn't be so disappointing. ~ Mary Calmes

Dwelling on a disappointing situation is like walking through drying cement; eventually you will get stuck. Instead make a mental note, picked yourself up and continued living life. #forward ~ Carlos Wallace

The erasure of the personality is the fatal accompaniment to an existence which is concretely submissive to the spectacle's rules, ever more removed from the possibility of authentic experience and thus from the discovery of individual preferences. Paradoxically, permanent self-denial is the price the
individual pays for the tiniest bit of social status. Such an existence demands a fluid fidelity, a succession of continually disappointing commitments to false products. It is a matter of running hard to keep up with the inflation of devalued signs of life. Drugs help one to come to terms with this state of affairs, while madness allows one to escape from it. ~ Guy Debord

There is this book, Destroy All the Cars. It's about how caring about something deeply can also make you hate the world, because the world can be really disappointing. But don't worry
it's also funny, too. Because that's how you get through all the disappointment, right? You have to find it all funny. ~ David Levithan

No sensitive Christian can be satisfied with a distinction between righteousness and unrighteousness drawn only between communities, with each individual belonging unambiguously on one or the other side of the line. The behavior of "the righteous" is often very disappointing, while "the unrighteous" regularly perform in a manner that is much better than our theology might lead us to expect of them. Thus the need for a perspective that allows for both a rather slow process of sanctification in the Christian life and some sort of divine restraint on the power of sin in the unbelieving community. These theological adjustments to a religious perspective that might otherwise betray strong Manichean tones provide us with yet another reason for openness to a broad-ranging dialogue: Christians have good grounds for believing that their own weakness can be corrected by encountering the strengths of others. ~ Richard J. Mouw

One's work usually occupies more than half of one's waking life. Choosing work that does not bring happiness will lead to a life that is mostly disappointing. ~ Bo Bennett

Frustration... when our happiness or sadness looses control. The blissful intensity of sensations, the disappointing realisation that dissatisfaction is not enough. ~ Strohberry

The peculiar predicament of the present-day self surely came to pass as a consequence of the disappointment of the high expectations of the self as it entered the age of science and technology. Dazzled by the overwhelming credentials of science, the beauty and elegance of the scientific method, the triumph of modern medicine over physical ailments, and the technological transformation of the very world itself, the self finds itself in the end disappointed by the failure of science and technique in those very sectors of life which had been its main source of ordinary satisfaction in past ages.

As John Cheever said, the main emotion of the adult Northeastern American who has had all the advantages of wealth, education, and culture is disappointment.

Work is disappointing. In spite of all the talk about making work more creative and self-fulfilling, most people hate their jobs, and with good reason. Most work in modern technological societies is intolerably dull and repetitive.

Marriage and family life are disappointing. Even among defenders of traditional family values, e.g., Christians and Jews, a certain dreariness must be inferred, if only from the average time of TV viewing. Dreary as TV is, it is evidently not as dreary as Mom talking to Dad or the kids talking to either.

School is disappointing. If science is exciting and art is exhilarating, the schools and universities have achieved the not inconsiderable feat of rendering bot ~ Walker Percy

'The Social Network' was probably one of the two or three things I've done in my life that I'm most proud of. I'm not going to engage in what about it was disappointing. There's nothing about it I was disappointed in. ~ Scott Rudin

Meeting writers is always so disappointing. I got over wanting to meet live writers quite a long time ago. There is this terrific book that has changed your life, and then you meet the author, and he has shifty eyes and funny shoes and he won't talk about anything except the injustice of the United States income tax structure toward people with fluctuating income, or how to breed Black Angus cows, or something. ~ Ursula K. Le Guin

To refer even in passing to unpublished or struggling authors and their problems is to put oneself at some risk, so I will say here and now that any unsolicited manuscripts or typescripts sent to me will be destroyed unread. You must make your way yourself. Why you should be so set on the nearly always disappointing profession is a puzzling question. ~ Kingsley Amis

Now we live in fairyland. The only lightly disappointing thing about this land is that it is smaller than the real world has ever been. ~ Frigyes Karinthy

The pouches under his eyes were like purses that contained the smuggled memories of a disappointing life. ~ Graham Greene

Let go of all expectations, and you shall never be disappointed. I find that rather disappointing to never be disappointed is very expected. Therefore let's only let go of those expectations we know will disappoint us and let's expect to be disappointed sometimes. Life is beautiful that way. ~ Nicole Haslam

Life is painful and disappointing. It is useless, therefore, to write new realistic novels. We generally know where we stand in relation to reality and don't care to know any more. ~ Michel Houellebecq

But I don't think any parent can expect to escape this life without disappointing his child at some point. And the same could be said the other way around. We all of us fall short now and again, and disappoint someone dear to us, or ourselves. Thankfully, my parents have always been the forgiving sort. ~ Julie Klassen

You are someone who is different, but who wants to be the same as everyone else. And that in my view is a serious illness. God chose you to be different. Why are you disappointing God with this kind of attitude? ~ Paulo Coelho

Few things in life are more disappointing than knowing your parents aren't being honest with you. ~ Riley Sager

It can be very hard to accept how disappointing life is, Harper, because that's what it is, and you have to accept it. With faith and time and hard work you reach a point where ... where the disappointment doesn't hurt as much, and then it gets easy to live with. Quite easy. Which ... is in its own way a disappointment. ~ Tony Kushner

Living your problems and loving them like locked rooms is much different from denying them or capitulating to them. It is believing that God is with you in the imperfect, even disappointing circumstances of your life. It is saying to Him with faith in your heart. ~ Steven Furtick

Knowing about God is crucially important for the living of our lives. As it would be cruel to an Amazonian tribesmen to fly him to London, put him down without explanation in Trafalgar Square and leave him, as one who knew nothing of English or England, to fend for himself, so we are cruel to ourselves if we try to live in this world without knowing about the God whose world it is and who runs it .The world becomes a strange, mad, painful place, and life in it a disappointing and unpleasant business, for those who do not know about God. Disregard the study of God, and you sentence yourself to stumble and blunder through life blindfold, as it were , with no sense of direction, and no understanding of what surrounds you. This way you can waste your life and lose your soul. ~ J.I. Packer

The ordinary man places his life's happiness in things external to him, in property, rank, wife and children, friends, society, and the like, so that when he loses them or finds them disappointing, the foundation of his happiness is destroyed. ~ Arthur Schopenhauer

Democracy is a revelation, but it's complicated. There are elections to hold, politics to create, rights to assert, grievances to settle and institutions to build. To many, it's exhilarating. For others, it can be disappointing when it turns out that democracy doesn't immediately make life better. ~ Atifete Jahjaga

It's precisely the disappointing stories, which have no proper ending and therefore no proper meaning, that sound true to life. ~ Max Frisch

Poets and songwriters speak highly of spring as one of the great joys of life in the temperate zone, but in the real world most of spring is disappointing. We looked forward to it too long, and the spring we had in mind in February was warmer and dryer than the actual spring when it finally arrives. We'd expected it to be a whole season, like winter, instead of a handful of separate moments and single afternoons. ~ Barbara Holland

If you want to live an authentic, meaningful life, you need to master the art of disappointing and upsetting others, hurting feelings, and living with the reality that some people just won't like you. It may not be easy, but it's essential if you want your life to reflect your deepest desires, values, and needs. ~ Cheryl Richardson

You have to play the character in the best way you know how and do what you need to do in order to bring that character to life and not worry about the millions of people that you may be disappointing! ~ Emma Stone

Do you know that moment when you paint a landscape as a child and, when you're maybe under seven or something, the sky is just a blue stripe across the top of the paper? And then there's that somewhat disappointing moment when the teacher tells you that the sky actually comes down in amongst all the branches. And it's like life changes at that moment and becomes much more complicated and a little bit more boring, as it's rather tedious to fill in the branches ... ~ Alan Rickman

It's so disappointing, to put it mildly, that people know so much about my life. Because it means that they're always trying to look at my books in terms of my life. ~ Salman Rushdie

I like to do drama, something about life that could be disappointing. ~ Ang Lee

Life seems terrible and disappointing, so you need to find something you need to make you stick around. Music that makes me happiest is the saddest music, with the most emotional feel. ~ Josh Klinghoffer

I suppose a good recipe for life would be to allow nothing into it, knowingly at least, which is bitter.

It's disappointing we aren't able to simply spit people out that don't taste well. ~ Scott Hildreth

Life could be enormously disappointing and still be good. ~ Cynthia Ruchti

If we stay where we are, where we're stuck, where we're comfortable and safe, we die there. We become like mushrooms, living in the dark, with poop up to our chins. If you want to know only what you already know, you're dying. You're saying: Leave me alone; I don't mind this little rathole. It's warm and dry. Really, it's fine.
When nothing new can get in, that's death. When oxygen can't find a way in, you die. But new is scary, and new can be disappointing, and confusing - we had this all figured out, and now we don't.
New is life. ~ Anne Lamott

SIREN, n. One of several musical prodigies famous for a vain attempt to dissuade Odysseus from a life on the ocean wave. Figuratively, any lady of splendid promise, dissembled purpose and disappointing performance. ~ Ambrose Bierce

It is very disappointing that there are many people willing to do everything to live comfortably except to work hard. ~ Eraldo Banovac

How disappointing would it be get to heaven and find out God created life to be enjoyed while all we did was worry? ~ Donald Miller

Open your eyes and see how many gifts there are to unwrap. Notice the presence of your presents. It's not your life that is disappointing: it's your mind. ~ Gregg Krech

HANNAH: It can be very hard to accept how disappointing life is, Harper, because that's what it is, and you have to accept it. With faith and time and hard work you reach a point where ... where the disappointment doesn't hurt as much, and then it gets easy to live with. Quite easy. Which ... is in its own way a disappointment. But. There. ~ Tony Kushner

Growing older is an opportunity for you to increase your value and competence as the neural connections in your hippocampus and throughout your brain increase, weaving into your brain and body the wisdom of a life well lived, which allows you to stop living out of fear of disappointing others and being imperfect. Ageless living is courageous living. It means being undistracted by the petty dramas of life because you have enough experience to know what's not worth worrying about and what ought to be your priorities. ~ Christiane Northrup

Less disappointing than life, great works of art do not begin by giving us all their best. ~ Marcel Proust

Freedom of choice is possible. Life is going to unfold however it does: pleasant or unpleasant, disappointing or thrilling, expected or unexpected, all of the above! What a relief it would be to know that whatever wave comes along, we can ride it out with grace [p. 35]. ~ Sylvia Boorstein