Quotes about mistake
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“A well adjusted person is one who makes the same mistake twice without getting nervous.”

Alexander Hamilton (1757–1804) Founding Father of the United States

“A stupid person can make only certain, limited types of errors; the mistakes open to a clever fellow are far broader.”

Source: Iorich (2010), p. 172  <br class="br">Context: A stupid person can make only certain, limited types of errors; the mistakes open to a clever fellow are far broader. But to the one who knows how smart he is compared to everyone else, the possibilities for true idiocy are boundless.

Stupidity, Error, Personality

“Those miserable women who blame the men who let them down for their misery and isolation enact every day the initial mistake of sacrificing their personal responsibility for themselves.”

Germaine Greer book The Female Eunuch

Source: The Female Eunuch

Women, Men, Personality

“I've been imitated so well I've heard people copy my mistakes.”

Jimi Hendrix (1942–1970) American musician, singer and songwriter

People

“Men often mistake killing and revenge for justice. They seldom have the stomach for justice.”

Robert Jordan (1948–2007) American writer

Nynaeve al'Meara
(15 November 1990)

Men, Justice, Revenge

“You make me thank god for every mistake I ever made, Because each one led me down the path that brought me to you.”

Pablo Neruda (1904–1973) Chilean poet

Source: The Poetry of Pablo Neruda

God

“She had an unequalled gift, especially pen in hand, of squeezing big mistakes into small opportunities.”

Henry James book Greville Fane

"Greville Fane" http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/etext01/gfane10.txt, from The Real Thing: and Other Tales (1893).

“The truth was, history repeated itself on a daily basis; mistakes were made over and over. People were haunted by what they had done, and by what they hadn't had time to do.”

Jodi Picoult (1966) Author

People, Truth, History, Time

“It's especially hard to admit that you made a mistake to your parents, because, of course, you know so much more than they do.”

Sean Covey (1964) author; business executive

Source: The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Teens: The Ultimate Teenage Success Guide

Parent, For Parents

“Your birth was no mistake or mishap, and your life is no fluke of nature. Your parents may not have planned you, but God did. He was not at all surprised by your birth. In fact, he expected it.”

Rick Warren (1954) Christian religious leader

Source: The Purpose Driven Life: What on Earth Am I Here for?

Life, God, Birth, Nature

“If you live long enough, you'll make mistakes. But if you learn from them, you'll be a better person. It's how you handle adversity, not how it affects you. The main thing is never quit, never quit, never quit.”

Bill Clinton (1946) 42nd President of the United States

Learning, Personality, Life

“We are not perfect. We make mistakes. We screw up but then we forgive and move forward.”

Nicholas Sparks book The Last Song

Source: The Last Song

Forgiveness, Perfection

“Excuse my mistakes, realize my limitations. Life is not easy as we know it on the earth.”

E.M. Forster book A Passage to India

Source: A Passage to India

Life

“Mistaking insolence for freedom has always been the hallmark of the slave.”

Wilhelm Reich book Listen, Little Man!

Source: Listen, Little Man!

Freedom

“But I do think that when people say 'a learning curve,' they make a mistake. Learning to me always seems to go in a straight, ignorant line and then, every so often, takes a jump straight upward.”

Diana Wynne Jones book Enchanted Glass

Source: Enchanted Glass

People, Thinking, Learning

“We often discover what will do, by finding out what will not do; and probably he who never made a mistake never made a discovery.”

Samuel Smiles (1812–1904) Scottish author

Source: Self-Help; with Illustrations of Character and Conduct (1859), Ch. XI : Self-Culture — Facilities and Difficulties.
Source: The Lives Of George And Robert Stephenson
Context: We learn wisdom from failure much more than from success. We often discover what will do, by finding out what will not do; and probably he who never made a mistake never made a discovery.

Success

“Anyone who can't learn from other people's mistakes simply can't learn, and that; s all there is to it. There is value in the wrong way of doing things. The knowledge gained from errors contributes to our knowledge base.”

Ben Carson (1951) 17th and current United States Secretary of Housing and Urban Development; American neurosurgeon

Source: Think Big: Unleashing Your Potential for Excellence

People, Way, Error, Knowledge

“The most expensive part of building is the mistakes.”

Ken Follett book The Pillars of the Earth

Source: The Pillars of the Earth

Parting

“it’s only by studying the mistakes of the past,” Lucien
said mildly, “that we can even have a future”

Meg Cabot (1967) Novelist

Source: Insatiable

Study, Past, Future

“There are no mistakes. The events we bring upon ourselves, no matter how unpleasant, are necessary in order to learn what we need to learn; whatever steps we take, they're necessary to reach the places we've chosen to go.”

Richard Bach (1936) American spiritual writer

The Bridge Across Forever (1984)
Source: The Bridge Across Forever: A True Love Story

Learning

“one who makes no mistakes makes nothing”

Giacomo Casanova (1725–1798) Italian adventurer and author from the Republic of Venice

“There was my name up in lights. I said, 'God, somebody's made a mistake.' But there it was, in lights. And I sat there and said, 'Remember, you're not a star.' Yet there it was up in lights.”

Marilyn Monroe (1926–1962) American actress, model, and singer

Source: Fragments: Poems, Intimate Notes, Letters

God, Star, Light

“Live all you can; it's a mistake not to.”

Henry James book The Ambassadors

Source: The Ambassadors

Motivational, Beauty, Faith

“Let me never fall into the vulgar mistake of dreaming that I am persecuted whenever I am contradicted.”

Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882) American philosopher, essayist, and poet

8 November 1838
1820s, Journals (1822–1863)
Source: Emerson in His Journals

Dreams, Attitude

“Mind your own Brazilian!" The words fly out of my mouth before I can stop them. Oops.

OK. The trick when you've said something embarrassing by mistake is to pretend nothing happened.”

Sophie Kinsella book I've Got Your Number

Source: I've Got Your Number

Flying

“We made too many wrong mistakes.”

Yogi Berra (1925–2015) American baseball player, manager, coach

What Time Is It? You Mean Now?: Advice for Life from the Zennest Master of Them All, Simon and Schuster, 2003, ISBN 0743244532, p. 75
On why the Yankees lost the 1960 series to the Pittsburgh Pirates.
Yogiisms

“It is a mistake to think you can solve any major problems just with potatoes.”

Douglas Adams Life, the Universe and Everything

Source: Life, the Universe and Everything

Problem, Thinking

“Life is still life. It’s still tough, complicated, and more than a little messy, with lessons to be learned, mistakes to be made, triumphs and disappointments to be had, and not every day is meant to be a party.”

Alyson Nöel book Dark Flame

Source: Dark Flame

Life, Disappointment, Learning

“Those at too great a distance may, I am well aware, mistake ignorance for perspective.”

Carl Sagan (1934–1996) American astrophysicist, cosmologist, author and science educator

Introduction (p. 7)
The Dragons of Eden (1977)
Source: Dragons of Eden: Speculations on the Evolution of Human Intelligence

“The dreamers, those who misread the actual state of affairs and act upon their emotions, are often the source of the greatest mistakes in history—the wars that are not thought out, the disasters that are not foreseen”

Robert Greene book The 50th Law

Source: The 50th Law

War, History

“Besides, life isn't meant to be safe. It's only in our mistakes, our errors, and our faults that we grow and truly live.”

Glenn Beck (1964) U.S. talk radio and television host

Life, Error

“Every artist is linked to a mistake with which he has a particular intimacy. All art draws its origin from an exceptional fault, each work is the implementation of this original fault, from which comes a risky plenitude and new light.”

Maurice Blanchot (1907–2003) French writer, philosopher, and literary theorist

Art, Light, Drawing

“I made mistakes in drama. I thought drama was when actors cried. But drama is when the audience cries.”

Frank Capra (1897–1991) Sicilian-born American film director

1001 quotations to inspire you before you die, Quintessence Editions Ltd., 2016, ISBN 978-1-84403-895-4

“If we experience any failures or setbacks, we do not forget them because they offend our self-esteem. Instead we reflect on them deeply, trying to figure out what went wrong and discern whether there are any patterns to our mistakes.”

Robert Greene book Mastery

Source: Mastery

Failure, Forgetting

“We all make mistakes, don't we? But if you can't forgive yourself, you'll always be an exile in your own life.”

Curtis Sittenfeld (1975) Novelist, short story writer

Source: Sisterland

Life, Forgiveness

“College: two hundred people reading the same book. An obvious mistake. Two hundred people can read two hundred books.”

John Cage (1912–1992) American avant-garde composer

Source: M: Writings '67-'72

People, Books, Reading

“Adrian frowned.
'Is that a noose?'
'It's a tie!' I cried, trying not to feel offended. He laughed, clearly delighted at this.
'My mistake.”

Richelle Mead book The Indigo Spell

Source: The Indigo Spell

Feeling

“Failure concentrates the mind wonderfully. If you don't make mistakes, you're not trying hard enough.”

Jasper Fforde book The Well of Lost Plots

Source: The Well of Lost Plots

Failure

“When you find your path, you must not be afraid. You need to have sufficient courage to make mistakes.”

Paulo Coelho book Brida

Source: Brida (1990).
Context: When you find your path, you must not be afraid. You need to have sufficient courage to make mistakes. Disappointment, defeat, and despair are the tools God uses to show us the way.

Courage, Motivational

“Learn from the mistakes of others you won't have time to make them all your self”

Jill Shalvis (1963) American writer

Source: Simply Irresistible

Learning, Time

“It is a sin to believe evil of others but it is seldom a mistake.”

Garrison Keillor (1942) American radio host and writer

Evil

“If I listened to your advice, I'd be making your mistakes instead of my own.”

Lisa Kleypas book Christmas Eve at Friday Harbor

Source: Christmas Eve at Friday Harbor

“Live all you can — it's a mistake not to. It doesn't so much matter what you do in particular, so long as you have your life. If you haven't had that, what have you had?”

Henry James book The Ambassadors

Source: The Ambassadors (1903), book V, ch. II.
Context: Live all you can — it's a mistake not to. It doesn't so much matter what you do in particular, so long as you have your life. If you haven't had that, what have you had?.. What one loses one loses; make no mistake about that... The right time is any time that one is still so lucky as to have.. Live!

Life

“I've got to keep breathing. It'll be my worst business mistake if I don't.”

Steve Martin (1945) American actor, comedian, musician, author, playwright, and producer

Business

“When your daddy walked through the house he was so big he filled it up. That was my first mistake. Not to make him leave room for me.”

August Wilson Fences

Source: Fences

Housing

“I don't forgive people because I'm weak, I forgive them because I am strong enough to know people make mistakes.”

Marilyn Monroe (1926–1962) American actress, model, and singer

People, Forgiveness, Strong

“The Great Depression in the United States, far from being a sign of the inherent instability of the private enterprise system, is a testament to how much harm can be done by mistakes on the part of a few men when they wield vast power over the monetary system of a country.”

Milton Friedman (1912–2006) American economist, statistician, and writer

Source: (1962), Ch. 3 The Control of Money, p. 50

Men, Parting, Country

“We all find out the people who are supposed to take care of us are human eventually. That they make mistakes.”

Cassandra Clare book Lady Midnight

Source: Lady Midnight

People

“It is what it is. You are what you it. There are no mistakes.”

Tom Robbins (1932) American writer

Success, Hurtful, Graduation, For Men

“Great teams do not hold back with one another. They are unafraid to air their dirty laundry. They admit their mistakes, their weaknesses, and their concerns without fear of reprisal.”

Patrick Lencioni (1965) American writer

Source: The Five Dysfunctions of a Team: A Leadership Fable

Fear, For Team

“He was my father. I own half his genes, and all of his history. Believe this: the mistakes are part of the story. I am born of a man who believed he could tell nothing but the truth, while he set down for all time the Poisonwood Bible.”

Barbara Kingsolver The Poisonwood Bible

Source: The Poisonwood Bible

Truth, History, Time, Parting

“Maybe you expected marriage to be perfect - I guess that's where you and I are different. See, I thought it would be all about making mistakes, but doing it with someone who's there to remind you what you learned along the way.”

Jodi Picoult book Handle With Care

Source: Handle with Care

Marriage, Way, Learning, Perfection

“What I sometimes mistake for ecstasy is simply the absence of grief.”

Sarah Kane book Crave

Source: Crave

“Sure. My ego's had enough time to recover a modicum of dignity. Let's make sure we crush it again before I mistake myself for a god. -Acheron”

Sherrilyn Kenyon (1965) Novelist

Source: Acheron

God, Time

“I'm not sure what I am anymore… Sometimes I think I'm nothing but what other people have done to me―a big collection of brainwashing, surgeries, and cures… That, and all the mistakes I've made. All the people I've disappointed.”

Scott Westerfeld book Specials

Source: Specials

People, Disappointment, Thinking

“Parents always make their worst mistakes with their oldest children. That's when parents know the least and care the most, so they're more likely to be wrong and also more likely to insist that they're right.”

Orson Scott Card book Xenocide

Source: Xenocide

Children, Parent

“Take chances! Get messy! Make mistakes!”

Joanna Cole (1944) American children's books author

Chance

“Women have been repeating the same mistake since time began: falling for a man’s potential. We rarely see it the same way, and even more rarely care to achieve it.”

Karen Marie Moning (1964) author

Source: The Alpha Alternative: JZB Sex Scene

Women, Way, Time

“We stigmatize mistakes. And we're now running national educational systems where mistakes are the worst thing you can make -- and the result is that we are educating people out of their creative capacities.”

Ken Robinson (1950) UK writer

People, Education

“The physician can bury his mistakes, but the architect can only advise his clients to plant vines.”

Frank Lloyd Wright (1867–1959) American architect (1867-1959)

New York Times Magazine (4 October 1953) Sometimes paraphrased: "A doctor can bury his mistakes, but the architect can only advise his clients to plant vines."

“Every great mistake has a halfway moment, a split second when it can be recalled and perhaps remedied.”

Pearl S. Buck (1892–1973) American writer

Source: What America Means to Me (1943), Ch. 10

“Love was above everything else, and there was no hatred in love, only the occasional mistake.”

Paulo Coelho book Brida

Source: Brida

Love

“I often make the mistake of thinking that something that is obvious to me is just as obvious to everyone else.”

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie We Should All Be Feminists

Source: We Should All Be Feminists

Thinking

“as imperfect human beings, any of us, all of us, are subject at some time or another to make mistakes!”

Brenda Jackson (1953) American writer

Source: Perfect Timing

Time

“When we are confronted by failure and mistakes, we can leave them behind and go on with our lives.”

Ben Carson (1951) 17th and current United States Secretary of Housing and Urban Development; American neurosurgeon

Source: Think Big: Unleashing Your Potential for Excellence

Failure

“Don't lie about it. You made a mistake. Admit it and move on. Just don't do it again. Ever”

Anthony Bourdain book Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly

Source: Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly

Lie

“The mistakes don't matter. It's what you do when you mess up that does.”

Kim Harrison (1966) Pseudonym

Source: Early to Death, Early to Rise

“It is a mistake to regard age as a downhill grade toward dissolution. The
reverse is true. As one grows older, one climbs with surprising strides.”

George Sand (1804–1876) French novelist and memoirist; pseudonym of Lucile Aurore Dupin

Age

“Mistakes are a part of being human. Appreciate your mistakes for what they are: precious life lessons that can only be learned the hard way. Unless it's a fatal mistake, which, at least, others can learn from.”

Al Franken (1951) American comedian and politician

Oh, the Things I Know (2002)

Parting

“The biggest mistake we could ever make in our lives is to think we work for anybody but ourselves.”

Brian Tracy (1944) American motivational speaker and writer

Thinking

“I am what I want to be," he said. "You forgot that— and that was your mistake.”

L.J. Smith (1965) American author

Source: The Kill

“Trust your own instinct. Your mistakes might as well be your own, instead of someone else's.”

Billy Wilder (1906–2002) American filmmaker

“It would be a terrible mistake to go through life thinking that people are the sum total of what you see.”

Jonathan Tropper (1970) American writer

This Is Where I Leave You (2009), 2014-January-15 http://books.google.co.uk/books/about/This_Is_Where_I_Leave_You.html?id=3jVps2Z9LQcC, <br class="br">Source: This is Where I Leave You

Life, People, Thinking

“Don't argue for other people's weaknesses. Don't argue for your own. When you make a mistake, admit it, correct it, and learn from it / immediately.”

Stephen R. Covey (1932–2012) American educator, author, businessman and motivational speaker

People, Learning

“And certainly, the mistakes that we male and female mortals make when we have our own way might fairly raise some wonder that we are so fond of it.”

George Eliot book Middlemarch

Source: Middlemarch

Way

“I have learned from my mistakes, and I am sure I can repeat them exactly”

Peter Cook (1937–1995) British architect

Learning, Funny

“History,' Mari muttered, as if she'd overheard his thoughts. 'Why do we need to know what happened before we were born?'

'So hopefully we get smarter and don't make the same mistakes again.”

Cinda Williams Chima (1952) Novelist

Source: The Demon King

History

“One of the biggest mistakes girls can make concerning their romantic life is sitting around waiting for their prince to find them, rather than getting out there and finding him themselves.”

Meg Cabot (1967) Novelist

Life, Girl, Waiting

“My friend Terry says that when you need to make a decision, in your work or otherwise, and you don’t know what to do, just do one thing or the other, because the worst that can happen is that you will have made a terrible mistake.”

Anne Lamott (1954) Novelist, essayist, memoirist, activist

Decision

“it is an easy mistake to think that non-talkers are non-feelers.”

Wallace Stegner (1909–1993) American historian, writer, and environmentalist

Thinking

“If only she could be so oblivious again, to feel such love without knowing it, mistaking it for laughter and bread with only the scent of jam spread on top of it. It was the best time of her life.”

Markus Zusak book The Book Thief

Source: The Book Thief

Love, Life, Feeling, Laughter

“The first mistake of art is to assume that it's serious.”

Lester Bangs (1948–1982) American music critic and journalist

Art

“Formerly, when religion was strong and science weak, men mistook magic for medicine; now, when science is strong and religion weak, men mistake medicine for magic.”

Thomas Szasz (1920–2012) Hungarian psychiatrist

"Science and Scientism", p. 115.
The Second Sin (1973)

Men, Religion, Strong, Science

“Your birth is a mistake you'll spend your whole life trying to correct.”

Chuck Palahniuk book Invisible Monsters

Source: Invisible Monsters

Life, Birth

“I make lots of mistakes. I try hard not to make the same mistake more than three or four times.”

Janet Evanovich Three to Get Deadly

Source: Three to Get Deadly

Time

“Mistakes, mistakes, it's all I seem capable of at times.”

Markus Zusak book The Book Thief

Source: The Book Thief

Time

“Fellowship is a place of grace, where mistakes aren't rubbed in but rubbed out. Fellowship happens when mercy wins over justice.”

Rick Warren (1954) Christian religious leader

Source: The Purpose Driven Life: What on Earth Am I Here for?

Justice

“I am glad that I paid so little attention to good advice; had I abided by it I might have been saved from some of my most valuable mistakes.”

Edna St. Vincent Millay (1892–1950) American poet

“It seems I make a lot of mistakes and it seems that I am not allowed any.”

Charles Bukowski (1920–1994) American writer

“Facts do not convey truth. That's a mistake. Facts create norms, but truth creates illumination.”

Werner Herzog (1942) German film director, producer, screenwriter, actor and opera director

Truth

“A man goes to knowledge as he goes to war: wide-awake, with fear, with respect, and with absolute assurance. Going to knowledge or going to war in any other manner is a mistake, and whoever makes it might never live to regret it”

Carlos Castaneda (1925–1998) Peruvian-American author

Source: The Wheel of Time: Shamans of Ancient Mexico, Their Thoughts About Life, Death and the Universe, (1998), Quotations from The Teachings of Don Juan (Chapter 4)

War, Fear, Knowledge