Mignon Mclaughlin Quotes

They threaten me with lung cancer, and still I smoke and smoke. If they'd only threaten me with hard work, I might stop. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

It's wonderful to watch a pretty woman with character grow beautiful. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

If you must reread old love letters, better pick a room without mirrors. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

The hardest learned lesson: that people have only their kind of love to give, not our kind. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

The next voice you hear will undoubtedly be your own. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Each day, the American housewife turns toward television as toward a lover. She feels guilty about it, and well she might, for he's covered with warts and is only after her money. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Mumps, measles, and puppy love are terrible after twenty. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Mama does everything for the baby, who responds by saying Dada first. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

The neurotic feels as though trapped in a gas-filled room where at any moment someone, probably himself, will strike a match. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

If I knew what I was so anxious about, I wouldn't be so anxious. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Men really prefer reasonably attractive women; they go after the sensational ones to impress other men. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

The fault we admit to is seldom the fault we have, but it has a certain relationship to it, a somewhat similar shape, like that of a sleeve to an arm. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

There's no way to repay a mother's love, or lack of it. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

There are three iron links in the neurotic's chain: unloving, unlovable, unloved. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

The ideal home: big enough for you to hear the children, but not very well. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Anywhere you go liking everyone, everyone will be likeable. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

The know-nothings are, unfortunately, seldom the do-nothings. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Your money, or your life. We know what to do when a burglar makes this demand of us, but not when God does. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

People keep telling us about their love affairs, when what we really want to know is how much money they make and how they manage on it. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

The total history of almost anyone would shock almost everyone. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

The neurotic has perfect vision in one eye, but he cannot remember which. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Boredom is often the cause of promiscuity, and always its result. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Most of our diversions do not so much delay death as accustom us to it. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

I'm afraid to win, and afraid to lose; I hate a draw and can't stop competing; otherwise I'm fine. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Every creatures stalks some other, and catches it, and is caught. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

When their children fail to charm others, few parents can stay neutral. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

A love that lasts for twenty years may be better than love, but it isn't love. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Be glad that you're greedy; the national economy would collapse if you weren't. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

There are now electrical appliances with the main unit so sealed in that it cannot be got at for repair. There have always been human beings like that. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

One of life's few really reliable pleasures: to have a family you love, and to leave them for a week. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

An old racetrack joke reminds you that your program contains all the winners' names. I stare at my typewriter keys with the same thought. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

We are like people with short-term leases on summer cottages; we can never seem to make our provisions come out even with our stay. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

In the arithmetic of love, one plus one equals everything, and two minus one equals nothing. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

If you hate your lot but wouldn't trade it, it's not your lot you hate. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

As we are human, we can't do what we can't do; as we're neurotic, we can't do what we can. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

It's innocence when it charms us, ignorance when it doesn't. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Forget about calories - everything makes thin people thinner, and fat people fatter. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Most of us become parents long before we have stopped being children. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Minor vices lead to major ones, but minor virtues stay put. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Character is what emerges from all the little things you were too busy to do yesterday, but did anyway. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

If you have to do it every day, for God's sake learn to do it well. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

I know which side my bread is buttered on: the side which falls on the carpet. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Love requires a willingness to die; marriage, a willingness to live. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

We wake in the night, to stereophonic silence. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Beauty often fades, but seldom so swiftly as the joy it gives us. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

We often pray to be better, when in truth we only want to feel better. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Creative work is one of life's greatest pleasures, and the only one we will gladly interrupt. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Most of us would rather risk a catastrophe than read the instructions. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Spiritual sloth, or acedia, was known as The Sin of the Middle Ages. It's the sin of my middle age, too. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Good food, good sex, good digestion, good sleep: to these basic animal pleasures, man has added nothing but the good cigarette. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Men feel that women somehow drag them down, and women feel that way about men. It's possible that both are right. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

The soul may sleep and the body still be happy, but only in youth. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Neurotics think of the past with resentment, and the future with dread; the present just doesn't exist. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

It must infuriate our children to see us always so much more forbearing with everybody else's. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

We lavish on animals the love we are afraid to show to people. They might not return it; or worse, they might. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

We are irritated by rascals, intolerant of fools, and prepared to love the rest. But where are they? ~ Mignon McLaughlin

The neurotic circles ceaselessly above a fogged-in airport. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

It is important to our friends to believe that we are unreservedly frank with them, and important to friendship that we are not. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Many of us go through life feeling as an actor might feel who does not like his part and does not believe in the play. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

The young do not need God, and the old cannot find Him. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

In any family, measles are less contagious than bad habits. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Tough and funny and a little bit kind: that is as near to perfection as a human being can be. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Every group feels strong once it has found a scapegoat. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Being neurotic is like shooting fish in a barrel, and missing them. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

I tell you this, and I tell you plain
What you have done, you will do again
You will bite your tongue, careful or not
Upon the already-bitten spot ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Women usually love what they buy, yet hate two-thirds of what is in their closets. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Some marriages break up, and some do not, and in our world you can usually explain the former better than the latter. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

We waste a lot of time running after people we could have caught by just standing still. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

People will disapprove of you if you're unhappy, or if you're happy in The Wrong Way. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Affairs are just as disillusioning as marriage, and much less restful. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Naturally, the neurotic wants you to love him twice as much, for he's going to cut it in half anyway. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

When hope is hungry, everything feeds it ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Anything you do from the heart enriches you, but sometimes not till years later. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Suburb: a place that isn't city, isn't country, and isn't tolerable. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Altruism is a hard master, but so is opportunism. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

We'd all like a reputation for generosity, and we'd all like to buy it cheap. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Neurotics would like to sleep all the time, and to be awakened only when there is good news. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

God doesn't measure His bounty, but oh how we do! ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Nymphomaniac: a woman as obsessed with sex as an average man. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

A hypochondriac is one who has a pill for everything except what ails him. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

When suffering comes, we yearn for some sign from God, forgetting we have just had one. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Women are good listeners, but it's a waste of time telling your troubles to a man unless there's something specific you want him to do. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

My thoughts, I guess, are bitter: who but the bitter have thoughts? ~ Mignon McLaughlin

When the pain is great enough, we will let anyone be doctor. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Many are saved from sin by being so inept at it. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Goods are displayed by thousands of shopkeepers with a sense of beauty that finds no other outlet. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

It's the most unhappy people who most fear change. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

A new wound makes all the old ones ache again. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

I've been hiding from God, and I'm appalled to find how easy it is. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Revenge leads to an empty fullness, like eating dirt. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

At night, neurotics may toil not, but oh how they spin! ~ Mignon McLaughlin

The two main hazards of psychoanalysis: that it might fail, and that if it succeeds, you'll never be able to forgive yourself for all those wasted years. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Comfort, or revelation: God owes us one of these, but surely not both. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

We all become great explorers during our first few days in a new city, or a new love affair. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

No one really listens to anyone else, and if you try it for a while you'll see why. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Don't fool yourself that important things can be put off till tomorrow; they can be put off forever, or not at all ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Nobody knows the trouble we've seen-but we keep trying to tell them. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

The time to begin most things is ten years ago. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Few of us write great novels; all of us live them. ~ Mignon McLaughlin

Many things can make you miserable for weeks; few can bring you a whole day of happiness. ~ Mignon McLaughlin