Quotes about learning
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“Anyway, there is one thing I have learned and that is not to dress uncomfortably, in styles which hurt: winklepicker shoes that cripple your feet and tight pants that squash your balls. Indian clothes are better.”

George Harrison (1943–2001) British musician, former member of the Beatles

Shoe, Hurt, Clothes

“I learned not to worry so much about the outcome, but to concentrate on the step I was on and to try to do it as perfectly as I could when I was doing it.”

Steve Wozniak (1950) American inventor, computer engineer and programmer

“I'm afraid men are not always quite as clever as they think they are. You will learn that when you get a bit older, my girl.”

Roald Dahl book Matilda

Source: Matilda

Men, Girl, Thinking

“It can be… difficult to to learn how the world truly is, to see it in its true shape and form… most human beings never do. Most could not bear it.”

Cassandra Clare book Clockwork Angel

Source: Clockwork Angel

World

“Waiting silently is the hardest thing of all. I was dying to talk to Jim and about Jim. But the things that we feel most deeply we ought to learn to be silent about, at least until we have talked them over thoroughly with God.”

Elisabeth Elliot (1926–2015) American missionary

Source: Passion and Purity: Learning to Bring Your Love Life Under Christ's Control

God, Feeling, Waiting

“There are just some kind of men who-who're so busy worrying about the next world they've never learned to live in this one, and you can look down the street and see the results.”

Harper Lee book To Kill a Mockingbird

Source: To Kill a Mockingbird

Men, World, Business

“There is no shame in not knowing something. The shame is in not being willing to learn.”

Alison Croggon (1962) contemporary Australian poet, playwright and fantasy novelist

Source: The Naming

“I'm 38 and I'm single and I'm having my most intense and gratifying relationship with a dog. But we all learn about love in different ways, and this way happens to be mine.”

Caroline Knapp (1959–2002) American writer

Source: Pack of Two: The Intricate Bond Between People and Dogs

Love, Dogs, Way

“I learned to go into business only with people whom I like, trust, and admire.”

Warren Buffett (1930) American business magnate, investor, and philanthropist

People, Business

“I have learned that trying again is important and decisivness is good.

I have learned that silence hurts.

I have learned about starting over
and releasing pride.”

Sabrina Ward Harrison (1975) Canadian writer

Source: Spilling Open: The Art of Becoming Yourself

Silence, Hurt

“The task is to learn how to enjoy everyday life without diminishing other people's chances to enjoy theirs.”

Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (1934) Hungarian American psychologist

Life, People, Chance

“… it's not just learning that's important. It's learning what to do with what you learn and learning why you learn things that matters.”

Norton Juster (1929) American children's writer, academic, and architect

Variant: …it’s not just learning that’s important. It’s learning what to do with what you learn and learning why you learn things that matters.

“If he'd learned one thing while he'd been away, it was that loneliness is the most taboo subject in the world. Forget sex or politics or religion. Or even failure. Loneliness is what clears out a room.”

Douglas Coupland book Miss Wyoming

Source: Miss Wyoming

World, Religion, Sex, Failure

“Sometimes you meet yourself on the road before you have a chance to learn the appropriate greeting. Faced with your own possibilities, the hard part is knowing a speech is not required. All you have to say is yes.”

Pearl Cleage What Looks Like Crazy on an Ordinary Day

Source: What Looks Like Crazy on an Ordinary Day

Chance, Parting

“You got to know your limits. Once is enough, but you got to learn. A little caution never hurt anyone. A good woodsman has only one scar on him. No more, no less.”

Haruki Murakami book Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World

Source: Hardboiled Wonderland and the End of the World (1985), Chapter 24: Shadow Grounds
Source: Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World

Hurt

“A learned man is an idler who kills time by study.”

George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950) Irish playwright

Study, Time

“You get older and you learn there is one sentence just four worlds long and if you can say it to yourself it offers more comfort than almost any other. It goes like this… Ready ”
“Ready.”
“At least I tried.”

Ann Brashares book Sisterhood Everlasting

Source: Sisterhood Everlasting

World

“Men learn to love the woman they are attracted to. Women learn to become attracted to the man they fall in love with.”

Woody Allen (1935) American screenwriter, director, actor, comedian, author, playwright, and musician

Love, Women, Men

“I've learned that you shouldn't go through life with a catcher's mitt on both hands; you need to be able to throw some things back.”

Maya Angelou (1928–2014) American author and poet

Life

“I have learned the power of surviving.”

Philippa Gregory book The Boleyn Inheritance

Source: The Boleyn Inheritance

“I can't believe you married a justice nymph and have yet to learn anything from her. There are always three sides to every memory, Z. Yours, theirs, and the truth, which lies somewhere in between the two. (Acheron)”

Sherrilyn Kenyon (1965) Novelist

Source: Seize the Night

Truth, Justice, Memory

“I'd learned that some things are best kept secret.”

Nicholas Sparks book Dear John

Source: Dear John

Secret

“There are three parts to learning: information, knowledge and wisdom, A mere accumulation of information is not knowledge, and a treasure of knowledge is not in itself, wisdom.”

Rachel Caine (1962) American writer

Source: Ink and Bone

Wisdom, Knowledge, Parting

“We yearned for the future. How did we learn it, that talent for insatiability?”

Margaret Atwood book The Handmaid's Tale

Source: The Handmaid's Tale

Future

“You have to learn how to help a wounded child while still practicing mindful breathing. You should not allow yourself to get lost in action. Action should be meditation at the same time.”

Thich Nhat Hanh (1926) Religious leader and peace activist

Time, Help

“Some people will never learn anything, for this reason, because they understand everything too soon.”

Alexander Pope (1688–1744) eighteenth century English poet

Thoughts on Various Subjects (1727)
Source: Miscellanies in Verse and Prose. by Alexander Pope, Esq; And Dean Swift. in One Volume. Viz. the Strange and Deplorable Frensy of Mr. John Dennis. ... Epitaph on Francis Ch-Is. Soldier and Scholar. with Several More Epigrams, Epitaphs, and Poems.

People, Understanding

“One must learn to love, and go through a good deal of suffering to get to it, and the journey is always towards the other soul.”

D.H. Lawrence (1885–1930) English novelist, poet, playwright, essayist, literary critic and painter

Love, Soul, Suffering

“When no one you know tells the truth, you learn to see under the surface.”

Cassandra Clare book Lady Midnight

Source: Lady Midnight

Truth

“Throwing herself into learning helped Miri ignore the painful chill of solitude around her.”

Shannon Hale Princess Academy

Source: Princess Academy

Pain, Solitude, Help

“Happiness is pure kitsch; we come into the world to suffer and learn.”

Isabel Allende book La somma dei giorni

Source: La suma de los días

Happiness, World, Suffering

“Every one of us is a minor tragedy. Most of us learn to cope.”

Elizabeth Bear (1971) American novelist

Source: Whiskey and Water

“Imitation is not just the sincerest form of flattery - it's the sincerest form of learning.”

George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950) Irish playwright

“He tried to learn seductive phrases in all languages, but the only Swedish he had ever really needed was, "Do you serve anything aside from pickled fish?" and "If you wrap me in furs, I can pretend to be your little fuzzy bear.”

Cassandra Clare (1973) American author

Source: The Runaway Queen

Fish

“Passed years seem safe ones, vanquished ones, while the future lives in a cloud, formidable from a distance. The cloud clears as you enter it. I have learned this, but like everyone, I learned it late.”

Beryl Markham book West with the Night

Source: West with the Night

Future

“Ah, now, don't cry over lost years and forgetfulness. The tales tell what they can. The rest is for us to learn..”

Shannon Hale The Goose Girl

Source: The Goose Girl

Cry, Forgetting

“One of the things I'd learned… was how to take a compliment. Just say, "Thank you." It's the only response a confident person can make.”

Neil Strauss book The Game: Penetrating the Secret Society of Pickup Artists

Source: The Game: Penetrating the Secret Society of Pickup Artists

Confidence, Personality

“I learned to play the instruments of war," he said, "and paint in blood.”

Cassandra Clare The City of Lost Souls

Source: City of Lost Souls

War, Painting

“The great task of life is to learn the will of the Lord and then do it.”

Ezra Taft Benson (1899–1994) President of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

Life

“I'm learning how to taste everything.”

Laurie Halse Anderson Wintergirls

Source: Wintergirls

“Anyone can make a mistake…. It's how they learn from it and recover from it that shows their true worth.”

John Flanagan (1873–1938) Irish-American hammer thrower

Source: The Invaders

“I learn from my own daughter that you don’t have to be awake to cry.”

Jodi Picoult My Sister's Keeper

Source: My Sister's Keeper

Daughters, Cry

“He was twenty. I remembered twenty. I'd known everything at twenty. It took me another year to realize I knew nothing. I was still hoping to learn something before I hit thirty, but I wasn't holding my breath.”

Laurell K. Hamilton book Circus of the Damned

Source: Circus of the Damned

Hope

“It took me a long time to learn that mistakes aren't good or bad,
they're just mistakes, and you clean them up and go on.”

Kaye Gibbons book A Virtuous Woman

Source: A Virtuous Woman

Time

“I've learned that even when I have pains, I don't have to be one.”

Maya Angelou (1928–2014) American author and poet

Variant: I've learned that I still have a lot to learn.

Pain

“Only a short time ago, I learned that people laughed at me. Now I can see that unknowingly I joined them in laughing at myself. That hurts the most.”

Daniel Keyes book Flowers for Algernon

Source: Flowers for Algernon

People, Time, Hurt

“In the long history of humankind (and animal kind, too) those who learned to collaborate and improvise most effectively have prevailed.”

Charles Darwin (1809–1882) British naturalist, author of "On the origin of species, by means of natural selection"

History, Animals, For Team

“There is no Mr. Right because there is no Mr. Wrong. There is whoever is in front of us, and the perfect lessons to be learned from that person.”

Marianne Williamson (1952) American writer

Source: Return to Love

Personality, Perfection

“It is for God to punish wicked people; we should learn to forgive.”

Emily Brontë book Wuthering Heights

Source: Wuthering Heights

God, People, Forgiveness

“One of the most effective ways to learn about oneself is by taking seriously the cultures of others. It forces you to pay attention to those details of life which differentiate them from you.”

Edward T. Hall book The Silent Language

Source: The Silent Language

Life, Way

“Everything you need to know about life can be learned from a genuine and ongoing attempt to write”

Dani Shapiro (1962) Author

Source: Still Writing: The Perils and Pleasures of a Creative Life

Life

“Many times I have learned that, you never judge a book by its cover. Like people, it is the inside that counts.”

Shannon Hale (1974) American fantasy novelist

People, Books, Time

“When will people learn that just because you can make something doesn’t mean you should?”

Sara Gruen book Water for Elephants

Source: Water for Elephants

People

“To learn something, to master something, anything, is as sweet as first love.”

Geoffrey Wolff (1937) American writer

Love

“In order to learn, one must change one's mind.”

Orson Scott Card (1951) American science fiction novelist

Change

“Pain is a part of growing-up. It is how we learn..”

Dan Brown (1964) American author

Pain, Parting

“We are a sum total of what we have learned from all who have taught us, both great and small.”

Myles Munroe (1954–2014) Bahamian Evangelical Christian minister

Source: understanding your potential discovering the hidden you

“I decided I would put off the novel until I had gone to Europe and had a lover, and that I would never learn a word of shorthand. If I never learned shorthand I would never have to use it.”

Sylvia Plath book The Bell Jar

Source: The Bell Jar

Lovers

“The journey is difficult, immense. We will travel as far as we can, but we cannot in one lifetime see all that we would like to see or to learn all that we hunger to know.”

Loren Eiseley (1907–1977) US philosopher (1907-1977)

Hunger, Travel

“And if, in some distant place in the future, we see each other in our new lives, I will smile at you with joy, and remember how we spent a summer beneath the trees, learning from each other and growing in love.”

Nicholas Sparks book The Notebook

Source: The Notebook

Love, Smile, Tree, Distant

“The first lesson a revolutionary must learn is that he is a doomed man. Unless he understands this, he does not grasp the essential meaning of his life.”

Huey P. Newton book Revolutionary Suicide

Source: Revolutionary Suicide (1973), p. 3

Life, Understanding

“Learn, he says, that there will be hours, days
and months ahead of feeling absolutely terrible
and nothing can change that; neither new
girlfriends, health professionals, changes of diet, dope, humility, or
God.”

Charles Bukowski (1920–1994) American writer

God, Health, Feeling, Change

“I think that, with age, people come to realize that death is inevitable. And we need to learn to face it with serenity, wisdom and resignation. Death often frees us from a lot of senseless sufferings.”

Paulo Coelho book The Devil and Miss Prym

Source: The Devil and Miss Prym

Death, Wisdom, People, Age

“Learning is never wrong. Even learning how to kill isn't wrong. Or right. It's just a thing to learn, a thing I can teach you. That's all.”

Robin Hobb book Assassin's Apprentice

Source: Assassin's Apprentice

“A man's truest self realizations might require him, above all, to learn to close his eyes: to let himself be taken unawares, to follow his dark angel, to risk his illegal instincts.”

Jean Cocteau (1889–1963) French poet, novelist, dramatist, designer, boxing manager and filmmaker

Angels

“See, when you mess something up, you learn for the next time. It's when people compliment you that you're in trouble. That means they expect you to keep it up.”

Ned Vizzini book It's Kind of a Funny Story

Source: It's Kind of a Funny Story

People, Time

“I learned: the first lesson of my life: nobody can face the world with his eyes open all the time.”

Salman Rushdie book Midnight's Children

Source: Midnight's Children

Life, World, Time

“To live your best life now, you must learn to trust God’s timing, you may not think He’s working, but you can be sure that right now, behind the scenes, God is arranging all the pieces to come together to work out His plan for your life.”

Joel Osteen (1963) American televangelist and author

Source: Your Best Life Now: 7 Steps to Living at Your Full Potential

Life, God, Thinking, Time

“There we will, I pray, remain and learn and grow until the time when we will rise together to the ultimate heights, changing in appearance but never in devotion, sharing the transcendent glory of our love through all eternity.”

Richard Matheson book What Dreams May Come

Source: What Dreams May Come

Love, Appearance, Change, Time

“You've learned that every good lie is threaded with truth and every accepted truth leaks lies.”

Dennis Lehane (1965) Novelist

Truth, Lie

“Learning

To believe you are magnificent. And gradually to discover that you are not magnificent. Enough labor for one human life.”

Czeslaw Milosz (1911–2004) Polish, poet, diplomat, prosaist, writer, and translator

Life

“Life is about learning; when you stop learning, you die.”

Tom Clancy (1947–2013) American author

As quoted in The Appraiser's Handbook : A Guide for Doctors (2007) by Nick Lyons, Susanne Caesar, Abayomi McEwen, p. 11.

Life

“Education is what survives when what has been learned has been forgotten.”

B.F. Skinner (1904–1990) American behaviorist

"New methods and new aims in teaching", in New Scientist, 22(392) (21 May 1964), pp.483-4.

Education

“Let go of certainty. The opposite isn't uncertainty. It's openness, curiosity and a willingness to embrace paradox, rather than choose up sides. The ultimate challenge is to accept ourselves exactly as we are, but never stop trying to learn and grow.”

Tony Schwartz (1952) American writer

“You must learn to love only that which cannot be stolen.”

Alice Walker (1944) American author and activist

Love

“State propaganda, when supported by the educated classes and when no deviation is permitted from it, can have a big effect. It was a lesson learned by Hitler and many others, and it has been pursued to this day.”

Noam Chomsky (1928) american linguist, philosopher and activist

Source: Media Control: The Spectacular Achievements of Propaganda

Education, Support

“It was a lesson most people learned much earlier; that even friendship could have an undisclosed shelf life. That loyalty and affection, so consuming and powerful, could dissipate like fog.”

Jennifer Haigh (1968) Novelist

Source: The Condition

Life, Friendship, People, Loyalty

“So I learned to hold my tongue and to turn my features into an indifferent mask so that no one could ever read my thoughts.”

Suzanne Collins The Hunger Games

Katniss Everdeen, p. 5
Source: The Hunger Games trilogy, The Hunger Games (2008)

Reading, Indifference

“Learning is experience. Everything else is just information.”

Albert Einstein (1879–1955) German-born physicist and founder of the theory of relativity

“See, Jace never learned how to flirt properly, because he was raised by a murderous sociopath.”

Diana Peterfreund (1979) American writer

Source: Shadowhunters and Downworlders: A Mortal Instruments Reader

“You don't need to show off your body to catch a boy's eye. You'd best learn that early on, or you'll be bringing home the worst sort of boy.”

Danielle Steel (1947) American author of romance novels

Home, Boy

“There are three kinds of men: The ones that learns by reading. The few who learn by observation. The rest of them have to pee on the electric fence for themselves.”

Will Rogers (1879–1935) American humorist and entertainer

The Manly Wisdom of Will Rogers (2001)
Variant: There are three kinds of men. The one that learns by reading. The few who learn by observation. The rest of them have to pee on the electric fence for themselves.

Men

“I'd learn that it's not just where you go, but how you choose to get there. So I pulled that sign off the green bike - ENJOY YOUR RIDE! - and went inside to take the first step toward doing just that.”

Sarah Dessen book Along for the Ride

Source: Along for the Ride

“he's a genius, she's a genius, wow, you know alot of geniuses, you should meet some stupid people sometime, you might learn something”

Woody Allen (1935) American screenwriter, director, actor, comedian, author, playwright, and musician

People, Stupidity

“Tonight, I've finally learned to tell fantasy from reality. And, knowing the difference, I choose fantasy.”

David Henry Hwang M. Butterfly

Source: M. Butterfly

Reality

“I didn't set out to discover a truth. I was actually sent to the Outer Fringes to conduct a chair census and learn some humility. But the truth inevitably found me, as important truths often do, like a lost thought in need of a mind.”

Jasper Fforde (1961) British novelist

Source: Shades of Grey

Truth

“What we have to learn, in both meditation and in life, is to be free of
attachment to the good experiences, and free of aversion to the negative ones.”

Sogyal Rinpoche (1947–2019) Tibetan Dzogchen lama of the Nyingma tradition

Life

“I wanted to tell her that being loved is a talent too, that it takes as much guts and as much work as loving; that some people, for whatever reason, never learn the knack”

Tana French book The Likeness

Source: The Likeness

Love, People

“To learn something new, take the path that you took yesterday.”

John Burroughs (1837–1921) American naturalist and essayist

“Everything I know, I learned from dogs.”

Nora Roberts (1950) American romance writer

Source: The Search

Dogs

“Only if the third necessary thing could be given us. Number one, as I said: quality of information. Number two: leisure to digest it. And number three: the right to carry out actions based on what we learn from the interaction of the first two.”

Ray Bradbury book Fahrenheit 451

Source: Fahrenheit 451

“What kind of scholar was I? Or was I a scholar at all? My ignorance was enormous. Beside it my knowledge was nothing. My hunger for learning, not so much to improve my lot as to understand my world, had led me to study and to thought. Reading without thinking is as nothing, for a book is less important for what it says than for what it makes you think.”

Louis L'Amour book The Walking Drum

Source: The Walking Drum (1984), Ch. 25

Hunger, Books, World, Understanding

“it's not a question but a lesson learned in time”

Don W. Green

Question, Time

“Most important thing in life is learning how to fall.”

Jeannette Walls book Half Broke Horses

Source: Half Broke Horses

Life, For Him

“I'm not perfect, either. In the end, it's only God's judgement that matters, and I've learned enough to know that no one can presume to know the will of God.”

Nicholas Sparks book Dear John

Source: Dear John

God, Perfection

“It is so pleasant to learn about new things. Every day I find how little I know, but I do not feel discouraged since God has given me an eternity in which to learn more.”

Helen Keller book The Story of My Life

Source: The Story of My Life

God, Feeling

“We have flown the air like birds and swum the sea like fishes, but have yet to learn the simple act of walking the earth like brothers.”

Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929–1968) American clergyman, activist, and leader in the American Civil Rights Movement

1960s, The Quest for Peace and Justice (1964)
Context: There is a sort of poverty of the spirit which stands in glaring contrast to our scientific and technological abundance. The richer we have become materially, the poorer we have become morally and spiritually. We have learned to fly the air like birds and swim the sea like fish, but we have not learned the simple art of living together as brothers.

Bird, Fish, Sea