Adult Quotes & Sayings

She walks a tightrope between psycho and smokin'. — Daniel Marks

Why do you want to touch me? I'm nothing. I'm no one. — T.M. Frazier

But there is something that's a great deal more important than parental approval: learning to do without it. That's what it means to become an adult. — William Deresiewicz

I had my knife in hand before I realized I'd reached for it and had kicked open the ... front door before it ever occurred to me that it might have already been unlocked. — Jennifer Lynn Barnes

Parental Alienation is an emotional act of violence that is aimed at an adult, but critically wounds a child. — Steve Maraboli

A vigorous five-mile walk will do more good for an unhappy but otherwise healthy adult than all the medicine and psychology in the world. — Paul Dudley White

I published my first book in 1982 - a collection of Irish folklore called Irish Folk & Fairy Tales. It is still in print today. My first young adult book was published a couple of years later, and I've been writing in both genres ever since. — Michael Scott

I'll give you what you want, Sloane," he said. "What we both want. But think long and hard before you come to me. There are things that I like. Things that I want and expect from the woman in my bed. And I don't play by anyone's rules but my own. — J. Kenner

I am an adult, but a damaged one. — S.J. Watson

Yes, I'm Daniel Tahi. I know what your lips taste like.I know you roll your eyes when you think someone is an idiot. I know that you wish you were six inches shorter because you hate being taller than most of the boys you've ever met. Your name is tattooed across my chest and written on my heart.You are a fire daughter of earth, fanua afi and I am vasa loloa,son of the ocean. I am yours ... And you can't even remember who I am. — Lani Wendt Young

I am German, yes, but I am not a Nazi. There is a difference, and one day I hope you understand that. — Caroline Leech

But eggshells were made to be broken, and slamming into a 100-story skyscraper at the speed of light would likely do the deed. — Maureen A. Miller

Fall, sweetheart. I'll catch you. — Shelly Crane

Fogged, bogged gates of Brume, barrier to my home; Timeless, faceless watchers loom, but I am allowed to roam. — Christina Mercer

Such a distant, forgotten thing, this Light. — Brian A. McBride

It seemed to me that every adult did something terrible sooner or later. And every child, I thought, sooner or later becomes an adult. — Lemony Snicket

Where there is light, there is a way out of the darkness — Ashley Earley

Our group pressed west on what was left of Highway 93, toward the pass leading to Las Vegas. Sand covered the road in loose drifts so deep the horses' hooves sank into them. The metal highway signs were bent low by the strong wind, and above us, billboards that once screamed ads for the casinos were now stripped of their promises of penny slots and large jackpots. The raw boards underneath were exposed, like showgirls without their makeup. Some signs had been blown over completely and lay half-buried under mounds of sand, like sleeping animals.
Cars dotted the highway, their paint scoured off and dead tumbleweeds caught underneath them. Their windows were fogged with death, and despite my effort not to look, my eyes were drawn to the blurred images of the still forms inside. I tried to concentrate on the dark road ahead of us instead. — Kirby Howell

I guess just personally I've become a bolder person in my day-to-day. I think a lot of it came from moving to Brooklyn. I just sort of became an adult and started speaking up for myself and not apologising for myself. — Fernando Torres

Children who have the freedom to explore a variety of things and discard them when they no longer make sense do not feel like failures when they choose to drop something. Instead they see it as another experience from which to learn a bit about something and a lot about themselves. This is a much better attitude than the child who is forced to stay, being told to suck it up and stick it out, who begins to feel powerless and resentful. As an adult this child is more likely, for example, to stay in an unhappy career so as not to look or feel like a failure, though he will definitely feel trapped. — Pam Laricchia

So?" Mac says.
I shrug.
"Oh, come on! Don't tell me you didn't feel something? That you didn't enjoy it?"
"It was nice, I guess."
"You guess?" Mac laughs and swipes his hair from his brow. "Tough crowd."
"Yeah, well, I guess you are an acquired taste. — Ashley Mansour

All I really want to do today is go to the book store, drink coffee and read. — Ann Marie Frohoff

Talk to me. Say something, anything," he pleaded quietly as if he was trying to tame a wild animal.
"There's nothing to say."
He looked up and lowered his eyebrows on his eyes. "Why did you kiss me? — Stephanie Witter

In matters concerning religion, I consider myself not a child but an adult with 35 years of experience. — Mahatma Gandhi

You treat a kid with respect and as an adult you talk to them as if they're smart people. But you don't throw at them the trappings of adulthood and you know, the darker stuff. — Dave Eggers

I don't want to be the anchor around his feet. I want to be the sky. I want to be the colorful weird name. — Pella Grace

He ran his hand from my wrist up to the crook of my elbow and then to my shoulder. "When I was a little kid, my dad would come to my room at night to say a prayer with me. He used to say, 'Lord, We know there's a little girl out there who's meant for Henry. Please protect her and raise her up right.'" His voice changed to something slower and more country when he mimicked his dad. He smiled at the memory, and then he put his mouth near my ear and whispered. "You were that little girl. — Laura Anderson Kurk

This is a very challenging moment for educators. Our children are headed for a much more networked existence, one that allows for learning to occur 24, 7, 365, one that renders physical space much less important for learning, one that will challenge the relevance of classrooms as currently envisioned, and one that challenges our roles as teachers and adult learners. — Will Richardson

In childhood our credulity serves us well. It helps us to pack, with extraordinary rapidity, our skulls full of the wisdom of our parents and our ancestors. But if we don't grow out of it in the fullness of time, our ... nature makes us a sitting target for astrologers, mediums, gurus, evangelists, and quacks. We need to replace the automatic credulity of childhood with the constructive skepticism of adult science. — Richard Dawkins

'The Piano Lesson' is very sophisticated, easily the most adult or complex material I've attempted. It's the first film I've written that has a proper story, and it was a big struggle for me to write. It meant I had to admit the power of narrative. — Jane Campion

Flashes of my past lives kept crawling across my vision. I had Akima's laugh, Eve's blind ability to love, and Marrah's unwavering belief in family. I was all of these women and none of them. Their souls carried along inside of me but unmistakable from my own.
I saw their lives in pieces, their triumphs and sorrows, loved ones gained and lost. They were all different yet somehow the same. We were sisters and daughters, lovers and wives.
Pacey O'Brien-Lilith — Ashley Jeffery

Life was all about choices. You chose what to make out of what you had. And I wasn't going to let it make me its bitch. I could be a mature adult who knew her limits. I could be a good person. Maybe not all the time, but enough. — Mariana Zapata

Adult Swim's philosophy is, 'Put it on the air and if it works, great. If it doesn't, take it down and try again.' It's a refreshing way to do TV, I think. — Eric Wareheim

I was fourteen when I fell in love with a goddess. Goddesses have that effect, even on teenagers. — Debbie Howells

I had always heard rumors of her, Nanook thought, she who can control the wind, the water, the earth, and fire ... she who can talk to time. But those were old myths of a woman who lived many thousands of years ago, the first daughter of the Earth. There is a prophecy that she will return again, during the end times -- every religion has someone like that, someone to wait for and put your faith in, but my culture had mostly covered up her existence. We had a god of the sea, a god of the land, a god of the air, a god of fire, but no one who could control all of the elements. We spoke, only in whispers, of the ancient bloodline -- the descendents of the Great Mother. Too many superstitious minds, too many men concerned only with their own power and position, had heard these whispers in the past and taken gruesome steps to erase the descendents. The lineage was said to be broken, the blood of the Great Mother spilled for the last time. — Sarah Warden

You can sit down with that fearful child inside and be gentle with him or her. You might say something like this: Dear little child, I am your adult self. I would like to tell you that we are no longer a baby, helpless and vulnerable. We have strong hands and strong feet; we can very well defend ourselves. So there is no reason why we have to continue to be fearful anymore. — Thich Nhat Hanh

I mean, it's never too late to decide to do something else. Becoming an adult doesn't mean that you suddenly have all the answers. — Emma Straub

I'm usually working either on a picture book and a young adult book, or a middle grade book and a young adult book. When I get bored with one, I move to the other, and then I go back. — Jacqueline Woodson

A child's death is really of less value than an adult's. I mean, what could you really accomplish in a year? Not much, and that's not even talking about, you know, pay-wise. — Zach Braff

In many countries adult pornography legislation is an attempt to legislate something else. — Eric Schmidt

The real first kiss is the one that tells you what it feels like to be an adult and doesn't let you be a child anymore. The first kiss is the one that you suffer the consequences of. It was as if I had been playing Russian roulette and finally got the cylinder with the bullet in it. — Heather O'Neill

There is no such thing as helplessness. It's just another word for giving up. — Jefferson Smith

Time is a thief. A killer. Time is killing him. — Laura Kreitzer

Sometimes books feel like the only thing that keep her sane. Actually, she knows that they're the only reason she's still even vaguely okay right now. That's what she clings to: reading great books and seeing great films and, for as long as she's immersed in them, being able to forget, if only for a short time, about the reality of her life. — Steph Bowe

I've come to realize we're all two different people. Our younger, innocent self that's inevitably mangled along the highway of life, and our tougher adult personal that evolves from the wreckage. — Phil Stern

Adam stared down at me, his expression thunderous. "It was you. I know it was you."
My head was rocking side to side before I could stop it. "No." I wrenched my hand free of his. "You're wrong."
"I'm not!" Anger blazed hot behind his eyes as they burned into me. "Look at me, Kia! Look me in the eye and tell me you're not her. — Airicka Phoenix

You don't put pressure on me to be something I'm incapable of being. You accept me exactly how I am. — Colleen Hoover

You can't doubt so much, Psyche — Francesca Lia Block

In nature, a child finds freedom, fantasy, and privacy: a place distant from the adult world, a separate peace. — Richard Louv

While I wouldn't wish being teased on anyone, I think it eventually leads to a kind of solidarity in adult life. The few people I know who weren't picked on in school are people I find I can't relate to on much more than a surface level. There's a sensitivity that comes with feeling like an outsider at some point in your life. — Anna Kendrick

I had chosen to be an adult and I didn't want any charity - not even from my parents. This was one thing I was determined about. — Preeti Shenoy

In adult centers the nerve paths are something fixed, ended, immutable. Everything may die, nothing may be regenerated. — Santiago Ramon Y Cajal

I'm probably better known in the US as a YA writer, I have a huge body of adult horror and fantasy behind me. — Michael Scott

Designer clothes worn by children are like snowsuits worn by adults. Few can carry it off successfully. — Fran Lebowitz

Every adult life could be said to be defined by two great love stories. The first - the story of our quest for sexual love - is well known and well charted, its vagaries form the staple of music and literature, it is socially accepted and celebrated. The second - the story of our quest for love from the world - is a more secret and shameful tale. If mentioned, it tends to be in caustic, mocking terms, as something of interest chiefly to envious or deficient souls, or else the drive for status is interpreted in an economic sense alone. And yet this second love story is no less intense than the first, it is no less complicated, important or universal, and its setbacks are no less painful. There is heartbreak here too. — Alain De Botton

If you want to be creative, stay in part a child, with the creativity and invention that characterizes children before they are deformed by adult society. — Piaget

I'm pretty much in love with 'Adult Swim.' — T-Pain

It wasn't premeditated. It was what needed to be done. So I did it. — Milly Silver

Past memories strobed before him, flashes of joy blackened by the present. Reality teased, then beckoned, home likewise. Confusion dimmed, the answer clear. This could end. Would end. In one of two ways.
Still he refused, not ready for either. — Marcha A. Fox

You speak baby gibberish?' asked Jack.
'Fluently. The adult-education center ran a course, and I have a lot of time on my hands.'
'So what did he say?'
'I don't know.'
'I thought you said you spoke gibberish?'
'I do. But your baby doesn't. I think he's speaking either
pre-toddler nonsense, a form of infact burble or an obscure dialect of
gobbledygook. In any event, I can't understand a word he's saying.'
'Oh. — Jasper Fforde

... The freshly devoured peppermint she loved lofted from her breath and up to his nose with her loud bellow of Father in his ear, and Caxton was sure that he could smell that scent now out in the crisp night air. "You demon!" he screamed with all his might. ... — Jettie Necole

And Vicky also told her sister that all girls at the Health Centre considered that men were born crazy, if not down-right stupid.They were prepared to do crazy things & pay high prices just to prove how "macho" they were, when it came to young pretty girls. And the sisters tittered with laughter at the thought of the old men who enjoyed drinking Phyllis' urine & the young men who ate cucumber sandwiches filled with her excrement. And thus Vicky told Phyllis that although one should not take candy off children, it was quite in order to take money off crazy & stupid rich men.[MMT] — Nicholas Chong

Chemistry's a tricky thing, and if I'm not feeling it, I'm not gonna pretend. — Faith Sullivan

Remember, there were dragons long before men came into the world. Why, it was none other than The Great Dragons of Yore who invented the idea of knighthood. Yes, yes, that's right! Dragons had knights, Kings, princesses and queens long before men crawled out of the muck. — Sully Tarnish

Not even a repeat of Dawson's Creek makes me feel better. — Susane Colasanti

Looking around, I saw so many unhappy adults, people who loathed their jobs, and I didn't want to be one of them. — Patrick DeWitt

My book group has one rule: no books for adults. We read young adult fiction only. — Lev Grossman

Her heart fluttered. It had only been a few hours, but it felt like a lifetime since she saw him last. She seriously felt addicted to that boy. — Julia Crane

Conservatives want to be your daddy, telling you what to do and what not to do. Liberals want to be your mommy, feeding you, tucking you in, and wiping your nose. Libertarians want to treat you as an adult. — David Boaz

Almost everyone I've ever met who overeats is doing so on behalf of an old self (a discouraged child, an unpopular teenager, a self conscious young adult) who no longer exists. — Deepak Chopra

Now it's like my whole body is suddenly in revolt. No more. Not one day more. Not one more hour. My body wants sex. — Ruby Redhead

Oh maturity's a wrapped up package deal so it seems
And ditching teenage fantasy means ditching all your dreams
All your friends and peers and family solemnly tell you you will
Have to grow up be an adult yeah be bored and unfulfilled
Oh when no ones yet explained to me exactly what's so great
About slaving 50 years away on something that you hate, about meekly shuffling down the path of mediocrity
Well if that's your road then take it but it's not the road for me. — Frank Turner

Her armpits were still slightly wet & she examined them one by one. No hair. This was one of her greatest assets over her sister who had underarm hair.Her slender arms & long legs were also free of hair. She had only a little bit of pubic hair, she noticed. It must be terrible to have lots of ugly underarm & thick coarse arm & leg hairs that you had to shave off daily, she thought. A bit more pubic hair, she wouldn't mind, she decided. But they tended to tickle men's nostrils & make them sneeze.[MMT] — Nicholas Chong

Once I got my driver's license everybody treated me like I was an adult. — Candace Cameron Bure

England has been praised for turning out intelligent, adult pictures whereas Hollywood has been severely censured for turning out junk. I don't think criticism is a valid one because, in defense of Hollywood, we have censorship problems England doesn't have. I'm not speaking of the license to do sexy stuff. I'm speaking of the license to present adult ideas and viewpoints, which we lack and which means in turn that many of our pictures lack intelligent content. — John Garfield

I wish I had been less keen to inject my own opinions, but I was a teenager and your teenage self is generally an idiot compared to the adult you. That's the way it should be. If it's the other way around, you have a problem. — Emma Forrest

She smiled the most extraordinary smile and Egg knew his life would never be the same again. — Jamie Scallion

As soon as Neil is out of the shower, he texts Peter.
You up? he asks.
And the reply comes instantly:
For anything. — David Levithan

As a kid, I would get my parents to drop me off at my local library on their way to work during the summer holidays, and I would walk home at night. For several years, I read the children's library until I finished the children's library. Then I moved into the adult library and slowly worked my way through them. — Neil Gaiman

Uh, got into a fight with the kitchen or something?" he asked, smirking.
I ran my hands through my hair and felt remains of the fruit as I did and cringed. Well, this must be attractive. I motioned for him to come into the living room and shut the door behind him.
"Something like that," I replied coolly.
He walked past me and went to the kitchen, probably to get a better look. "Well, I see you won. The fruit won't be going anywhere anytime soon. Maybe the apples. Those look like they need some more killing. — Christie Cote

It is in playing and only in playing that the individual child or adult is able to be creative and to use the whole personality, and it is only in being creative that the individual discovers the self. — D.W. Winnicott

When Grant Blue reaches me, he bends his head down close enough that I can smell the soap and promise on his skin. Clean living and popularity - It's quite the aftershave, let me tell you. If I'm being honest, the fact that he even has to bend to talk to me is making me want to swoon a little ... But just a little. — Isobel Irons

He's treating her like she's fourteen and he's a normal adult, acting like he's taken her under his wing. Like he needs her detecting skills, same as Barrons did to Mac, and she's falling for it, same as Mac. He's lining up his dominoes, so they fall more easily when he feels like pushing them over, conserving energy so he doesn't have to hunt her when he's ready to kill her. — Karen Marie Moning

Be the kind of grown up you needed as a child. — Jill Telford

I rub my hand down my face, frustrated. This girl in front of me tests my patience like hell.
When she ran to me after her dad kicked her out, I thought she still had feelings for me. She needed a place to stay, and I needed her. I offered her a room, thinking if she was around me every day, she would remember she loves me. I was dead wrong. Somewhere along the way, we switched roles, I became the one who so desperately needed her and she became cold and closed off. She isn't my savior; she's my punishment. — Brittany Butler

Vicky had once told her that she should not be ashamed of her pubic hair. Pubic hair was what men expected to see on women. Vicky said that there was a young prostitute at the Centre who had no pubic hair & many customers were known to shy off her because they thought that she was diseased. So Phyllis was resigned to displaying her pubic hair to all who wanted to see it.[MMT] — Nicholas Chong

She is something else. — C.J. Duggan

The State insists that, by thus quarantining the general reading public against books not too rugged for grown men and women in order to shield juvenile innocence, it is exercising its power to promote the general welfare. Surely this is to burn the house to roast the pig ... The incidence of this enactment is to reduce the adult population of Michigan to reading only what is fit for children. — Felix Frankfurter

Affection between adults - if they are really adult in mind and not merely grown up children - and creatures so relatively selfish and cruel as children necessarily are without knowing it or meaning it, cannot be called natural. — George Bernard Shaw

You dream that you want to be a monster maker when you grow up, and that's what happened. I refused to take no for an answer. I just was a very driven kid, who's now a very driven semi-adult. — Howard Berger

There was no 'I' in team, but there was meat in team. And we were all dead meat. — Jennifer Lane

Sometimes, when you're feeling you're lowest, the real you is summoned~And you understand, maybe for the first time ever, how grand you are, because you discover that vulnerable doesn't mean powerless, scared doesn't mean lacking in beauty, and uncertainty doesn't mean that you're lost~These realizations alone will set you on a journey that you will take you far beyond what you used to think of as extraordinary.~There is always a bright side, The Universe — Mike Dooley

You do resemble me," the duke said. "The question is, does your blood run hot or cold? — Nicole Luiken

As you become an adult, shame gets introduced and reintroduced constantly to you. So where something that, to a child, just is what it is - you know, your father's violent but he loves you and that's just the way it is - later on you realize that this is like different, shameful, blah blah blah. — Justin Torres

Do you ever wear leather?" the guy asks.
"What?"
"Leather. Do you like leather?"
"It doesn't exactly wipe me out."
"I like to see boys in leather."
I look at him cool. "Okay," I say, "what is it you want and how much are you willing to pay for it?"
"I've got a leather jacket upstairs...Would you put it on?"
"Just put it on?"
"I'll go and get it."
He leaves the horror hole and returns a few minutes later holding a leather flying jacket with a lambswool collar. There are tears in the jacket's sleeves, and the lambswool is yellow with age. John Wayne could've worn it in one of those crappy war films he made. "Put it on," the guy says.
I give him a spiky smile and put on the jacket. "Okay, where's the plane, and what time's take-off?"
"Drop your jeans and turn around. — Eric Bishop-Potter

I'm not like you. I've never cared about keeping relationships or sparing people's feelings. All I've ever cared about is power: how to get it, and how to keep it. I told you as much when we met. — Rachel E. Carter

I should have guessed you were Jace's sister," he said. "You both have the same artistic talent."
Clary paused, her foot on the lowest stair. She was taken aback. "Jace can draw?"
Nah." When Alec smiled, his eyes lit like blue lamps and Clary could see what Magnus had found so captivating about him. "I was just kidding. He can't draw a straight line. — Cassandra Clare

Their meal was illuminated by torches, which Gwen found were utterly without fire. What the children called torches were really just small platforms on tall, wooden poles. The reason they radiated light was because fairies had flown up to them to waltz and glow on the tiny dance floors. — Audrey Greathouse

I don't want to kill you, but I must. For the good of the country. — Kyra Dune

If you're single, use this time now to make the biggest impact you can for God's Kingdom. Enjoy how God uses you as a single adult to show His love to others because you are in a unique place to minister to others where married adults could not! — Jack Graham