Quotes & Sayings About Bad Decisions

Foreign policy is all about a universe of bad decisions, imperfect decisions; every situation is different. The dynamics, the atmospherics, the people, the pressures, the geopolitical realities shift. — Chuck Hagel

I found a Bible in his bedroom." Her shoulders sagged. So . . . that was why he'd summoned her. He'd discovered she'd failed to slam the door on Pieter's curiosity about faith and was going to interfere. "He asked if there was a Bible in the house, and I showed him where it was," she admitted. Oddly, Quentin didn't seem angry. He tugged on his collar and seemed merely a little embarrassed. "I'm willing to admit I've been wrong about that," he said. "I studied Christianity at college and understand the basic doctrines. The principles aren't bad, and if they bring Pieter comfort, I don't mind him exploring until he is an adult and ready to make his own decisions. — Elizabeth Camden

He usually gets what he wants. And what he wants is to keep you safe. He really cares about you, you know."

Her chest constricted with a strange combination of pleasure and pain. She tried to cover her emotions with a playful shrug. "Well, of course he does - I mean, what's not to like? I make incredibly bad, impulsive decisions. Plus, I'm lame, scarred, and crazy - the whole package. — Kathryn Knight

Good decisions come from experience. Experience comes from making bad decisions. — Mark Twain

She didn't want to. She loved you. She loves you now. Yes, she hurt you and she made a terrible mistake in leaving you. But your father made mistakes, too, and you will, as well. We all make bad choices - decisions that would better be left to rot in the bottom of the barrel. But we can't undo them. We can only move forward. — Tracie Peterson

My bad luck got tangled up with my bad decisions, and I'm paying for it. — Patrick Rothfuss

It is safe to assume that any individual or group you wish to influence has access to more wisdom than they currently use. It is also safe to assume that they also have considerably more facts than they can process effectively. Giving them even more facts adds to the wrong pile. They don't need more facts. They need help finding their wisdom. Contrary to popular belief, bad decisions are rarely made because people don't have all the facts. — Annette Simmons

Young people in the business have grown up and made the wrong decisions, or bad decisions, and haven't been good role models. To be someone that people look up to is important to me. — Justin Bieber

Making bad decisions and choosing the wrong partner can ruin your life for a long time, perhaps forever. — Karrine Steffans

That's what college is for - getting as many bad decisions as possible out of the way before you're forced into the real world. I keep a checklist of 'em on the wall in my room. — Jeph Jacques

But obviously, we can't afford to make some bad long-term decisions with regard to basic commitments our country has - trade those away for some short-term assistance that may or may not be there a month from now. — Fred Thompson

Our best intentions are often thwarted by external forces - forces that we ourselves set in motion long ago. Decisions, especially bad ones, create their own kind of momentum, and momentum can be a bitch to stop, as every athlete knows. — Andre Agassi

There are no bad people, there are people with insufficient information to make appropriate decisions. — Jacque Fresco

Taking chances for the people you care most about is easy. It's hard to take chances that might mean making bad decisions. But when I have to take chances about people I love, relationships, my daughter and immediate family, those decisions are easy. I make them without even thinking about it, it is usually something that just has to be done. You don't question anything, you just go for it. — Paul Walker

Bad decisions make good stories.
--from an Internet list. — Ellis Vidler

The most basic principle to being a free American is the notion that we as individuals are responsible for our own lives and decisions. We do not have the right to rob our neighbors to make up for our mistakes, neither does our neighbor have any right to tell us how to live, so long as we aren't infringing on their rights. Freedom to make bad decisions is inherent in the freedom to make good ones. If we are only free to make good decisions, we are not really free. — Ron Paul

A bad administrator is more concerned with reports than with decisions. He wants the hard record which he can display as an excuse for his errors. — Frank Herbert

The fact that you made worse decisions in the past shouldn't be an excuse to make bad decisions in the present. — Sanhita Baruah

There seldom is a single wave. Another way to look at it is, 'when it rains, it pours.' Good luck or bad luck often followed by more of the same. Whatever path you begin, it's almost impossible to change your direction. You're sent hurtling through space, crashing through experiences decided by the first few decisions you ever made. Binary choices set against something as simple as a yes or no in your earliest stages of development. As a Future Child, that would be your primitive choices in Genus. Actions, friendships, whether to smile in one moment or frown in the next. Those are all paths that, once set upon, are entirely unchangeable. At least, that's what I was designed to think. — Brandon R. Chinn

Whatever decisions we make in life always have their respective consequences - good, better, best, or bad, worse, worst. — Kcat Yarza

That's what's wrong with the country. There are too many 'good soldiers' accepting too many bad decisions. — Shirley Chisholm

Any business model based around poor people making bad decisions out of ignorance and desperation always works. — Joe Hill

With all these forks in the roads of our path, why do so many choose to take the knife? — Anthony Liccione

Everyone is flawed, and Christians have bad days just like anyone else and make bad decisions just like anyone else. It's just that Christians have a loving Heavenly Father who is ready to help them; all they have to do is turn to Him and ask, — Kathleen Wiseman

I always feel bad for those who, in a sense, cede their authority to others, let others make major decisions about their life and actually believe them. When you're tiny, you have no choice. But as soon as your mind starts working, you pretty well figure it out. And you realize you're a hostage until you're old enough to leave. But as long as you have that goal - I will get out of here - you'll be OK. — Rita Mae Brown

The way a person thinks is the key to everything that follows -- good or bad, success or failure. A person's thinking -- the way he thinks -- is the foundation structure upon which a life is built. Thinking guides decisions. Thinking -- how a person thinks -- determines every choice. — Andy Andrews

A woman does not have to make decisions based on the need to survive. She can cut through issues, call shots as she sees them ... Many bad decisions are made by men in government because it is good for them personally to make bad public decisions. — Dianne Feinstein

We need policy change, and the most important thing people can do is to contribute and participate in the political process. We have to vote climate change deniers and people who will create subsidies for the fossil fuel industry out of office. We have to protest when bad decisions are being made about fracking or tar sands. — Josh Fox

The purpose of a free press, in which I believe believe it or not, is so that people can make rational decisions in a democracy. They'd already perverted the process so bad that was hard, but the point is valid. — John Ringo

When you lurch from one thing to the next, constantly scheming, or reacting to incoming fire, the mind gets exhausted. You get sloppy and make bad decisions. — Dan Harris

to be right in the wrong direction may be wrong; what then is the wrong direction? — Ernest Agyemang Yeboah

If someone you know makes a bad decision or uses bad judgment, it doesn't mean you have to allow that to alter your attitude. Why should you allow anyone else's bad decisions to send you into a tailspin of misery? — Joyce Meyer

In all situations where bad design decisions were made, people lacked some information that would have helped them make the right decision. — Jared Spool

The fact that we are culturally ignorant and we don't know what our heritage is, the price that we pay is that we act outside of ourselves almost all the time. We make very bad decisions how we deal with other people and their culture. — Wynton Marsalis

By now, I'm sure you can see that most of the things you want are stupid and most of the decisions you make are bad. — Allie Brosh

Good decisions are pearls on your neck.
Bad decisions are thorns in your side. — Matshona Dhliwayo

couldn't help but think, if I only made bad decisions for the rest of my life, at least I had made one really good decision with her. — Max Monroe

He'd undone all he could. You can be sorry, and you can be forgiven, but you can't call back the futures that your bad decisions lost — Orson Scott Card

That's why I made decisions; they were tough decisions but we shouldn't feel bad at all - don't look back with any regrets, that's how I made decisions as governor. — Scott McCallum

Be a balanced optimist. Nobody is suggesting that you become an oblivious Pollyanna, pretending that nothing bad can or ever will happen. Doing so can lead to poor decisions and invites people to take advantage of you. Instead, be a rational optimist who takes the good with the bad, in hopes of the good ultimately outweighing the bad, and with the understanding that being pessimistic about everything accomplishes nothing. Prepare for the worst but hope for the best - the former makes you sensible, and the latter makes you an optimist. — Dale Carnegie

I think that the episodes are like mini horror films really; the characters make bad decisions early on and these things just snowball for them and get worse and worse. And that's what I find funny. — Dave Rowntree

There's something up ahead,' I said. 'Something really bad.' 'So of course we're heading straight for it,' said Penny. 'At some point, we're going to have to sit down and have a serious talk about making better lifestyle decisions. — Simon R. Green

Remain Healthy All Day: Drink a spoonful of oil every morning. Reach up with your arms and extend your body to its full height. Use a warm towel to dry the cat. Consider a philosophical idea larger than your area of expertise. Avoid getting cancer. Chalk up bad decisions to outside influences. Don't take your father too seriously. Play a game where you close your eyes very tightly, and when you open your eyes, you have amnesia and you must draw the details of your life from your surroundings. Give up smoking, drinking, and poetic verse. Remind yourself how important you are to your friends or at least your animals. Wax the floor in socks. Enter into a healthy, monogamous relationship. Consider briefly the idea of a soulmate. Light an entire box of matches and throw it into the sink. Hold a metal rod to the heavens and beg for whatever comes next. — Amelia Gray

Get used to planning ahead of time some if not all of your meals in the initial weeks of following my eating plan. This will help you have the right foods on hand when you get hungry. Hunger and tempting foods make for bad decisions! — Bob Harper

It is unwise to trust your own judgment. "He who trusts in himself is a fool, but he who lives by wisdom will escape" (CJB, Proverbs 28:26). Many people have made bad financial investments because they based their decisions on their own judgment and pride. The Tanakh warns, "Pride goes before destruction, and arrogance before failure" (CJB, Proverbs 16:18). "Before being ruined, a person's heart is proud" (CJB, Proverbs 18:12). The — H.W. Charles

Bad decisions create a good lessons, photos however create a good stories. — Solita

I find it hard to take chances that might mean making bad decisions. — Paul Walker

As we have pointed out, the principle of the tree of knowledge is to be independent of God. It means that we make our decisions independently. Although Cain performed a good deed, it was independent of God. Everything that is good yet independent of God results in death. This is similar to insulation which severs the flow of electricity. Regardless of the substance that is used as insulation - it may even be diamond - electricity is cut off nonetheless. As long as it causes insulation, it does not matter whether the material is good or bad. Likewise, if a thing keeps us away from God, it brings death, regardless of how good it is. — Witness Lee

Just because you are embarrassed to admit that you're still living the consequences of bad decisions made 5, 10, 20 years ago shouldn't stop you from making good decisions now. If you let pride stop you, you will hate life 5, 10, and 20 years from now for the same reasons. — Tim Ferriss

Perfect decision-making is both unimportant and impossible, and what matters more is forward momentum and a tight, fact-based feedback loop to quickly recognize and reverse bad decisions. — Anonymous

It's not enough just to laugh at good fortune and say, 'Enough already.' You have to really mean it
that you have enough. And because you mean it, you take the surplus and you give it away. Similarly, when bad fortune comes, you bear it until it becomes unbearable
your family is hungry, or you can no longer function in your work. And then again you say, 'Enough already,' and you change something. You move; you change careers; you let your spouse make all the decisions. Something. You don't endure the unendurable. — Orson Scott Card

You know in politics you are dealing in the realm of choices. You don't always have clear-cut decision between a thoroughly principled position and a thoroughly unprincipled one. You're making snap decisions with paucity of information, generally trying to do the best that you can, but you will make errors, and sometimes it's a decision between a bad and a worse alternative. It has to be done, because we need to order our society, and of politics it can literally be said: Bad job, but someone's got to do it. — Peter Costello

Bad information is a disease that attacks the brain. It messes with your head, making you do things that you shouldn't, causing you to make wrong decisions. Just as a potent virus co-opts your cells' machinery, bad information can co-opt your behavior. It can alter the way you interact with the world and, as a result, it can change the world. — Charles Seife

I want to sleep with people, steal, get run out of town, leave my fingerprints on every scene. We have a name for it, our generation. It's our Baghdad."
"Your what?"
"My Baghdad," Tommy said laughing, knowing it was dumb, savoring the dumbness, and maybe also its truth. "The situation you get into knowing it's fucked-up but you keep doing it anyway, making it an even bigger disaster. Everyone gets one, but that's how you learn. It builds character, makes you dirty and real. You know you're a superpower when you can lose every war and still be a superpower. Maybe you're a superpower because you can afford to lose them. Same here. There should be a Web site that records all the risks a person has taken, all the famous people they've met, all their gnarly trips and bad decisions. Like a Web site that ranks who's lived the most."
"Isn't that called Facebook?" Mills asked. — Christopher Bollen

Bad stories can create good people, and I wanted to protect them from those bad stories so they could live with the good person they'd created without ever worrying about what I had to go through to become that person. I kept those secrets because I needed to ... and sometimes it's OK to make those kinds of decisions for the sake of your own happiness. — Carrie Hope Fletcher

We are Jesus Christ's; we belong to him. But even more, we are increasingly him. He moves in and commandeers our hands and feet, requisitions our minds and tongues. We sense his rearranging: debris into the divine, pig's ear into silk purse. He repurposes bad decisions and squalid choices. Little by little, a new image emerges. — Max Lucado

It's okay to feel bad about how things went down, but it's not okay to drown in guilt and regret every day for having made decisions other people don't agree with. At some point, we all have to man up and decide to do what we have to do, despite the people around us who try to get in the way. — M-E Girard

[Our] problems boil down to one of moral choices.
God wanted a world based on moral values,
thus He created mankind with the ability to respond to moral choices.
Faced with the moral option of living selfishly or unselfishly, people can and do make wrong decisions. We are free to choose, but we reap the consequences of bad moral decisions. — Billy Graham

Didn't she remember that being single is more than just following your whims - that it also means having nobody to help you make difficult decisions, or comfort you at the end of a bad week? — Kate Bolick

Everything you do in life, whether it's good or bad, makes you who you are. Don't maybe your decisions to death because you can't change them. — Karyn Bosnak

Taxes cause the most bad business decisions. — James Cook

We, as conservative intellectuals, should not be in the business of making excuses for bad parliamentary decisions by Republican leaders in Congress. — David Frum

What it comes down to for me is that I'd rather us make bad decisions as a group, than to live in the absence of freedom. — Blake Crouch

You don't sit around looking for reasons to do the right thing; it's the bad decisions that require creative reasoning. — Andy Stanley

The past is a rich resource on which we can draw in order to make decisions for the future, but it does not dictate our choices. We should look back at the past and select what is good, and leave behind what is bad. — Nelson Mandela

Bad decisions made with good intentions, are still bad decisions. — James C. Collins

Bad decisions can pile up to make a wall between you and what God wants you to do. — Craig Groeschel

The thing about bad decisions is that they don't feel like bad decisions when you're making them. They feel like the obvious choice, the of-course-that-makes-sense move. They feel, somehow, inevitable. — Jennifer Weiner

Everybody get drunk and make bad decisions. — Gilbert Arenas

Getting what you want means making the decisions you need to make to get what you want.
Not the decisions those around you think you should make.
Making the safe decision is full, predictable and elads nowhere new.
The unsafe decision causess you to think and respond in a way you hadn't thought of.
And that thought will lead to other thoughts which will help you achieve what you want.
Start taking bad decisions and it will take you to a plce where others only dream of being. — Paul Arden

This, of course, is the big dance of capitalism: how to keep morality from gumming up the gears of profit, how to convince people to make bad decisions without seeing them as bad. — Steve Almond

He could offer her nothing but the truth. "You will make mistakes. You will make decisions, and sometimes you will regret those choices. Sometimes there won't be a right choice, just the best of several bad options. I don't need to tell you that you can do this - you know you can. I wouldn't have sworn the oath to you if I didn't think you could. — Sarah J. Maas

I really do know what I want with my life. I think that keeps me from making bad decisions and spending time doing stuff I don't enjoy. — Tove Styrke

You aren't allowed to decide because you are really bad at making decisions. — Allie Brosh

Making bad decisions is a part of life. Blaming others for your bad decisions is immature. — Mi

I think "majority" is one of my least favorite words. It's so often used to justify bad decisions. — Emma Newman

I'm only guilty of having good hygiene and making bad decisions. — J.C. Wickhart

Each day becomes as a learning environment that provides an unexpected teachings:
. Everything you see is an opportunity to learn.
. Every word you hear is an opportunity to learn.
. Good or bad decisions you make each day are the opportunity to learn. Every experience you come across becomes a lesson of the day. Every failure you encounter can be your teacher. — Euginia Herlihy

That's why it is so dangerous to use infatuation as a sign to pursue a relationship. If you and I don't know the difference between infatuation and love, we are destined to make some of the dumbest and most regrettable decisions we'll ever make. These bad decisions come with heavy and painful price tags. So you see, it's imperative in this tricky business of "falling in love" that we take the time to clearly define what we mean by the word "love." The investment will pay off handsomely. We can actually learn how to avoid future relational baggage and how to recognize authentic love relationships when we clarify two crucial issues: (1) what love is, and (2) what the difference is between love and infatuation. — Chip Ingram

Good decisions can have bad short-term outcomes but be great for the business long-term. — Gerry Schwartz

It was time to stand up for herself and move forward, not cower in submission as other people made bad decisions for her. — Angie Stanton

Americans, more than most people, believe that history is the result of individual decisions to implement conscious intentions. For Americans, more than most people, history has been that ... This sense of openness, of possibility and autonomy, has been a national asset as precious as the topsoil of the Middle West. But like topsoil, it is subject to erosion; it requires tending. And it is not bad for Americans to come to terms with the fact that for them too, history is a story of inertia and the unforeseen. — George Will

No decision-making system is going to guarantee corporate success. The strategic decisions that corporations have to make are of mind-numbing complexity. But we know that the more power you give a single individual in the face of complexity and uncertainty, the more likely it is that bad decisions will get made. — James Surowiecki

As seemingly impossible as it may seem of having zero regrets, when I look at my life now and all the mistakes I've made, all the bad decisions I've made, all the things I could have done differently or done more in, I don't think I would have changed anything. — Apolo Ohno

Because many of us make mistakes that can have bad consequences, some intellectuals believe that it is the role of government to intervene and make some of our decisions for us. From what galaxy government is going to hire creatures who do not make mistakes is a question they leave unanswered. — Thomas Sowell

organizations learn by making decisions, even bad ones. — Patrick Lencioni

Everything's not black and white. We choose to make bad decisions or not. I wanted to explore that and shine a light on it. Chip is trying to be a better person and lead a better life. His methods are just super flawed. — Will Arnett

When the corporation's investment capital becomes impatient for growth, good money becomes bad money because it triggers a subsequent cascade of inevitable incorrect decisions. Innovators who seek funding for the disruptive innovations that could ultimately fuel the company's growth with a high probability of success now find that their trial balloons get shot down because they can't get big enough fast enough. Managers of most disruptive businesses can't credibly project that the business will become very big very fast, because new-market disruptions need to compete against nonconsumption and must follow an emergent strategy process. Compelling them to project big numbers forces them to declare a strategy that confidently crams the innovation into a large, existing, and obvious market whose size can be statistically substantiated. This means competing against consumption. — Clayton M Christensen

A lonely person on a college campus is never more than a few minutes and a bad decision from company. — Thomm Quackenbush

The next day round about ten o'clock I was walking down Welbeck Street. I was in a bad temper. By daylight the whole project seemed very much less attractive. I felt that to be snubbed by a film star would put me in a bad state of mind for months. But I regarded the matter as something which had been decided and which now simply had to be carried out. I often used this method for deciding difficult cases. In stage one I entertain the thing purely as a hypothesis, and in stage two I count my stage one thinking as a fixed decision on which there is no going back. I recommend this technique to any of you who are not good at making decisions. — Iris Murdoch

When emotion is entirely left out of the reasoning picture, as happens in certain neurological conditions, reason turns out to be even more flawed than when emotion plays bad tricks on our decisions. — Antonio R. Damasio

Short version: it doesn't matter how many bad decisions you just made, your job is to make the next one correct. — Steven Brust

I would say my best decision I ever made was to pursue my dream and give it my all. Thankfully, I have not yet made really bad decisions, I'm the kind of person to play it on the safe side. — Zendaya

Your ego's job isn't to serve you. Its only job is to keep itself in power. And right now, your ego's scared to death cuz it's about to get downsized. You keep up this spiritual path, baby, and that bad boy's days are numbered. Pretty soon your ego will be out of work, and your heart'll be making all the decisions. So your ego's fighting for its life, playing with your mind, trying to assert its authority, trying to keep you cornered off in a holding pen away from the rest of the universe. Don't listen to it. — Elizabeth Gilbert

Start taking bad decisions and it will take you to a place where others only dream of being. — Paul Arden

People turn to meditation because they want to make good decisions, break bad habits & bounce back better from disappointments. — Sharon Salzberg

The Dopey Science Creed: 1. I maintain that my life has no purpose and no meaning. The same is true for the entire universe. There is no purpose to anything. 2. I affirm that my morals come from my genes and my conditioning, not from decisions I make. Free will is an illusion. My personal identity is an illusion. 3. There are no "good" deeds, or "good people." There is no "bad," "evil," or "wrong" either. 4. Every report of encounters with spirits, angels, ghosts, and supernatural beings is bunk. The credibility or number of witnesses doesn't matter - it's all bunk. 5. I am my physical brain and nothing more. The death of my body is the death of me. — Alex Tsakiris

I have made some bad decisions ... and done some things I regret in my life ... but without a doubt ... what I regret the most ... is divorcing you. If you tell me there is hope, that one day you'll be Mrs. Rawlings again, I will wait. — Aleatha Romig

Lawyers for abused kids can challenge bad agency decisions because they can always bring a lawsuit. A volunteer cannot.#barahona — Andrew Vachss

My life is littered with bad decisions. — Will Forte