Misunderstanding Others Quotes & Sayings

Gemma shrugged. "It seems you have only yourself to blame for that misunderstanding. — K.M. Shea

Yes, it's beautiful,' said Gilbert, looking steadily down into Anne's uplifted face, 'but wouldn't it have been more beautiful still, Anne, if there had been no separation or misunderstanding ... if they had come hand in hand all the way through life, with no memories behind them but those which belonged to each other? — L.M. Montgomery

One age misunderstands another; and a petty age misunderstands all the others in its own nasty way. — Ludwig Wittgenstein

Meanings with no purpose are useful for meaningless debates on what the "meaner" meant. And that's what #politics is all about - misreading. — Will Advise

In minority communities there's a sensitivity, often a knee-jerk reaction, to critical representations. There's a misunderstanding of what an artist does. — Junot Diaz

Misunderstanding leads to more misunderstanding, as success leads to more success. — Girdhar Joshi

The battlefield is symbolic of the field of life, where every creature lives on the death of another. A realization of the inevitable guilt of life may so sicken the heart, that like Hamlet, or like Arjuna, one may refuse to go on with it. On the other hand, like most of the rest of us, one may invent a false finally unjustified image of oneself as an exceptional phenomenon in the world
not guilty as others are, but justified in one's inevitable sinning, because one represents the good. Such self-righteousness leads to a misunderstanding, not only of oneself, but of the nature of both Man and the Cosmos. The goal of the myth is to dispel the need for such life-ignorance by affecting a reconciliation of the individual consciousness with the universal will, and this is affected through a realization of the true relationship of the passing phenomena of time to the imperishable life that lives and dies in all. — Joseph Campbell

Misunderstanding - A "Missed Understanding" because of the human preference to Assumption over Clarification. — Drishti Bablani

I had utterly abandoned myself to Him. Could any choice be as wonderful as His will? Could any place be safer than the center of His will? Did not he assure me by His very presence that His thoughts toward us are good, and not evil? Death to my own plans and desires was almost deliriously delightful. Everything was laid at His nail-scarred feet, life or death, health or illness, appreciation by others or misunderstanding, success or failure as measured by human standards. Only He himself mattered. — V. Raymond Edman

When we don't directly ask for clarification, we tend to fill in the gaps with negative thoughts. These eventually become rooted in our minds as truths, and then everyone gets stuck in a cycle of misunderstanding and miscommunication. — Trish Cook

Where misunderstanding serves others as an advantage, one is helpless to make oneself understood. — Lionel Trilling

I just want to be able to live my share of existence without being obliged to detract from the existence of others. I don't belive in prophecies that favor suffering over common sense. I came naked into the world, I'll leave it naked, what I possess doesn't belong to me, and neither do other people's lives. All human unhappiness comes from this misunderstanding. You have to be prepared to give back what God has loaned you. No earthly thing belongs to you, not really. Neither the homeland you talk about nor the grave where you'll be dust among the dust. — Yasmina Khadra

See we just had a misunderstanding. I thought we lived in the U.S. of A., the United States of America. But actually we live in the U.S. of A., the United States of Advertising. Freedom of expression is guaranteed? If you've got the money! — Bill Hicks

Misunderstanding are always cause by the inability of appreciating one another's point of view. The best way to dispel ignorance of the doings of others is by a systematic spread of general knowledge. With this object in view, it is most important to aid exchange of thoughts intercourse. — Nikola Tesla

The surest way of misunderstanding revelation is to take it literally, to imagine that God spoke to the prophet on a long-distance telephone. Yet most of us succumb to such fancy, forgetting that the cardinal sin in thinking about ultimate issues is literal-mindedness. — Abraham Joshua Heschel

See, the thing is, I had a little misunderstanding with Trent Gibson in Pre-Calculus earlier. I dropped my textbook on his face - accidentally, while we were discussing some ... equations - and he thought I was trying to brain him. So of course, he narked to Shoemaker, and apparently accidents are grounds for disciplinary action these days. — Isobel Irons

A common understanding is the pivot and a common way to bond the disintegrated — Ernest Agyemang Yeboah

The gap between understanding and misunderstanding can best be bridged by thought! — Ernest Agyemang Yeboah

Many well-meaning Dutch people have told me in all earnestness that nothing in Islamic culture incites abuse of women, that this is just a terrible misunderstanding. Men all over the world beat their women, I am constantly informed. In reality, these Westerners are the ones who misunderstand Islam. The Quaran mandates these punishments. It gives a legitimate basis for abuse, so that the perpetrators feel no shame and are not hounded by their conscience of their community. I wanted my art exhibit to make it difficult for people to look away from this problem. I wanted secular, non-Muslim people to stop kidding themselves that Islam is peace and tolerance. — Ayaan Hirsi Ali

Suppose that a person writes what she must. That is only the first step of becoming a writer. The work must survive the moment of creation. It must get out to an audience. She or he must dare to show the work. She must risk ridicule, misunderstanding, scandal, condemnation, & what's often worse, none of the above: silence. No attention at all. — Marge Piercy

Misunderstanding of the dream. In the ages of crude primeval culture man believed that in dreams he got to know another real world; here is the origin of all metaphysics. — Friedrich Nietzsche

There are always more questions. Science as a process is never complete. It is not a foot race, with a finish line ... People will always be waiting at a particular finish line: journalists with their cameras, impatient crowds eager to call the race, astounded to see the scientists approach, pass the mark, and keep running. It's a common misunderstanding, he said. They conclude there was no race. As long as we won't commit to knowing everything, the presumption is we know nothing. — Barbara Kingsolver

She spoke seven languages, including Mandarin and Polish, and was finishing up her master's in Intercultural Misunderstanding, which just has to be Europe's next growth industry. — Michael Lewis

Stop being astounded by the realization that sex is the object of such misunderstanding and of such automatic clumsiness that it implies either a universal loathing or a universal veneration (which are much the same thing). — Philippe Sollers

The text has disappeared under the interpretation. — Friedrich Nietzsche

Judgement of others and ourselves always comes from a place of fear. It is fear that keeps us from living authentically all that we say we value. — Shannon L. Alder

When however small a measure of jealousy is mixed with misunderstanding, there is going to be trouble. — John Irving

I think my reputation will look after itself," Holmes said. "If they hang me, Watson, I shall leave it to you to persuade your readers that the whole thing was a misunderstanding. — Anthony Horowitz

Kindness works simply and perseveringly; it produces no strained relations which prejudice its working; strained relations which already exist it relaxes. Mistrust and misunderstanding it puts to flight, and it strengthens itself by calling forth answering kindness. Hence it is the furthest reaching and the most effective of all forces. — Albert Schweitzer

Don't waste your time trying to explain yourself to people that are committed to misunderstanding you. Instead, commit your time to explaining who they are to them. When you get a person to see the positive similarities you share, it begins to restore the loss of respect between you. — Shannon L. Alder

We were destined to collide but the river of misunderstanding left us at the opposite banks. — Neetesh Dixit

The notion that we are separate is not really true; it's all made up. It's all conjured up in our mind. It's one big dream that we have. The difficulty with this dream is that almost everybody around us is having the same dream. It's essentially the collective dream of humanity. So it's not just you or me that's dreaming; almost all human beings are also having this dream of being separate, of being completely other than the world around them. What this means is that we really have to look within ourselves quite deeply, because we're not only looking beyond our own deluded mind, our own misunderstanding; we're looking beyond the delusion of the entirety of humanity. — Adyashanti

And a great misunderstanding is that children think their parents are grown-up, and parents feel obliged to act as if they were. — Anna Quindlen

People, in general, tend to project onto others their own state of mind. Well-meaning people inevitably assume other people are well meaning. People who cheat assume everyone cheats. People who deceive assume everybody deceives.
Confessions of a Whistle-Blower: Lessons Anna C. Salter. Ethics & Behavior, Volume 8, Issue 2 June 1998 — Anna C. Salter

To study foreign affairs without putting ourselves into others' shoes is to deal in illusion and to prepare students for a lifelong misunderstanding of our place in the world. — Paul Gagnon

Since we tend to see ourselves primarily in the light of our intentions, which are invisible to others, while we see others mainly in the light of their actions, which are all that's visible to us, we have a situation in which misunderstanding and injustice are the order of the day. — John G. Bennett

And in fact, Soviet films, which flooded the cinemas of all Communist countries in that cruelest of times, were saturated with incredible innocence and chastity. The greatest conflict tat could occur between two Russians was a lovers' misunderstanding: he thought she no longer loved him; she thought he no longer loved her. But in the final scene they would fall into each others' arms, tears of happiness trickling down their cheeks. — Milan Kundera

We're all born with selfish desires, so we can all relate to those feelings in others. But kindness is something made individually by each person ... so it's easy to misunderstand when others are trying to be kind to you. — Natsuki Takaya

It would be a great misunderstanding of this doctrine to suppose that it is one of selfish indifference about the well-being of others'. — John Stuart Mill

Many depressed people have been hurt and rejected by others. They feel as though basic relational needs have not been met, and they will be stuck in depression until they are. Rejection from parents, spouses, or friends has left a profound emptiness that feels like an emotional handicap. What does this have to do with the heart? Consider first the example of Jesus. He is God, but he was truly human. If anything is clear from his life, he didn't get love from people, he never prayed that he would know the love of other people, and he didn't seem emotionally undone by rejection and misunderstanding. Rather, his deepest needs, as noted in his prayers, were for the glory of his Father to be revealed and for his spiritual children to be protected from the evil one and united in love (John 17). The — Edward T. Welch

It is a common error to assume that the lack of a formal education means that shoemakers, weavers, peasants or indigenous peoples cannot be intellectuals. We may even find it difficult to believe that they could acquire a significant book collection, let alone be interested in or engage in philosophy or pass on proper knowledge, not just 'culture' or 'traditions,' to others. Such a misunderstanding excludes many people from history because it assumes they can have no impact on history, or even be affected by it.
Story of a Death Foretold: The Coup Against Salvador Allende, September 11, 1973 — Oscar Guardiola-Rivera

Raw and delicate, poignant and poetic, Shelby Smoak's Bleeder exposes the sorrow and sometimes sweetness of coming to age with HIV. In a world of misunderstanding and stigmas, the young Smoak searches for love and acceptance, and his readers can't help but find themselves becoming emotionally attached to him. His is an observant and encompassing story, noticing the brilliance of existence that others might take for granted. The sunsets written here are more lovely than in life. — Jenny Boully

Lying is the work of people who are told their truths have no value.
The labour of survival is laden with myth and misunderstanding.
Silence is the work of people who can't comprehend that change is possible. — Amber Dawn

Through a misunderstanding one native visitor was shot on board one of the ships, and a dozen others were shot ashore, while the Europeans got off with the loss of one tablecloth and of a few hats which were stolen while they had them on their heads. — Thor Heyerdahl

When I look back, my greatest accomplishment in high school has nothing to do with competition and winning. I learned to use my own judgement and not to follow others blindly. I learned to judge myself based on my own standards. I learned to find my own voice. I learned to speak my own truth. I have nothing to show for these achievements, no grades, no medals, trophies, or diploma. Yet these are the achievements that can't be taken away by loss, failure, or misunderstanding. — Cara Chow

A great woe underpinning the sorrows of the world today is this: so many people think they are far better than others and they are too righteous than others, and they know far better than others, and such thoughts give them reasons for an otherwise action! — Ernest Agyemang Yeboah

Have you ever considered, beloved other, how invisible we are to each other? We look at each other without seeing. We listen to each other and hear only a voice inside out self.
The words of others are mistakes of our hearing, shipwrecks of our understanding. How confidently we believe OUR meanings of other people's words. — Fernando Pessoa

Fear.' My mother had warned me of its power, but I had misunderstood, as children often do. I'd thought it was the fear of others that I needed to guard against, but it was my own terror. Because of that misunderstanding, I'd let the fear take root inside me until it clouded my thoughts and affected how I saw the world. Fear — Deborah Harkness

Get specific sooner and reap many rewards. The specific detail or example proves the general conclusion, not the reverse. The more specific you are abut anything the more clear you become, for yourself and in telling others. Thus you reduce the chance of others misunderstanding you. And you become more compelling, credible and memorable. — Kare Anderson

At the same time I think it is absolutely necessary that there be no confusion, no misunderstanding that if the Iraqis.. do not comply, then there will be consequences and those consequences will involve the use of military force to disarm them through changing the regime. — Colin Powell

What is surprising is not the magnitude of our forecast errors, but our absence of awareness of it. This is all the more worrisome when we engage in deadly conflicts: wars are fundamentally unpredictable (and we do not know it). Owing to this misunderstanding of the causal chains between policy and actions, we can easily trigger Black Swans thanks to aggressive ignorance-like a child playing with a chemistry kit. — Nassim Nicholas Taleb

No one goes anywhere alone, least of all into exile - not even those who arrive physically alone, unaccompanied by family, spouse, children, parents, or siblings. No one leaves his or her world without having been transfixed by its roots, or with a vacuum for a soul. We carry with us the memory of many fabrics, a self soaked in our history, our culture; a memory, sometimes scattered, sometimes sharp and clear, of the streets of our childhood, of our adolescence; the reminiscence of something distant that suddenly stands out before us, in us, a shy gesture, an open hand, a smile lost in a time of misunderstanding, a sentence, a simple sentence possibly now forgotten by the one who had said it. — Paulo Freire

They have the unique ability to listen to one story and understand another. — Pandora Poikilos

As long as we love, we lend to the beloved object qualities of mind and heart which we deprive him of when the day of misunderstanding arrives. — Philibert Joseph Roux

Of course cher . A proper southern woman never allows a simple misunderstanding get in the way of hospitality. — Jaye Wells

motherhood is like this: a series of tiny moments that add up to an enormous love, with lots of other moments of frustration and misunderstanding and complexity woven in between. — Allison Winn Scotch

Because we can't communicate, there's a lot of misunderstanding. — Chen Shui-bian

Actually," the chief guardian said in a calm voice, "you have no rights at all. But I am going to tell you the decision so that there will be no misunderstanding. "The orphan girl Kira will stay. She will have a new role." He gestured toward the Singer's robe, still spread out on the table. "Kira," he said, looking at her, "you will continue your mother's work. You will go beyond her work, actually, since your skill is far greater than hers was. First, you will repair the robe, as your mother always did. Next, you will restore it. Then your true work will begin. You will complete the robe. — Lois Lowry

The fact is that much misunderstanding is often caused by our modern attempts to limit too strictly the meaning of a Greek word. — Gilbert Murray

There are those that wonder which is worse: Not being able to reach out or not having anyone to reach for. There are some that ponder which is the greater ache: Not being able to tell or not having anyone that cares enough to ask. Perhaps it's not one person that is to blame, but both. — Donna Lynn Hope

Not to understand something is better than misunderstanding it. — Vj Nadar

Violence has given anger a bad name. — Marty Rubin

Whoever is free from prejudice should be ready to face misunderstanding. — Lion Feuchtwanger

A man with a camera was always suspected of being a spy. Moreover, the Jews did not want to be photographed, due to a misunderstanding of the prohibition against making graven images (photography had not been invented when the Torah was written!). I was forced to use a hidden camera ... — Roman Vishniac

Based on our badly borrowed misunderstanding of the words 'secular' and 'spiritual' we seem
to have become blinded by the dominant intellectual ideology of our times, according to which schools as secular organizations are supposed to not have anything to do with matters of the spirit. Education has, therefore, become concerned only with matters of material life (eventually leading to commodification)... This dichotomy between 'education for social success' and education for spirit' must go if we want to make Indian Education more relevant for the future of India. Education needs to become more integral, more complete through a meaningful synthesis of the two. — Beloo Mehra

Women always said things like that, and it made him crazy. It's as if every conversation with a woman was a test, and men always failed it, because they always lacked the key to the code and so they never quite understood what the conversation was really about. If, just once, the man could understand, really comprehend the whole of the conversation, then the perfect union between male and female would be possible. But instead men and women continue to cohabit, even to love each other, without ever quite crossing over the chasm of misunderstanding between them. — Orson Scott Card

Fellow-feeling ... is the most important factor in producing a healthy political and social life. Neither our national nor our local civic life can be what it should be unless it is marked by the fellow-feeling, the mutual kindness, the mutual respect, the sense of common duties and common interests, which arise when men take the trouble to understand one another, and to associate together for a common object. A very large share of the rancor of political and social strife arises either from sheer misunderstanding by one section, or by one class, of another, or else from the fact that the two sections, or two classes, are so cut off from each other that neither appreciates the other's passions, prejudices, and, indeed, point of view, while they are both entirely ignorant of their community of feeling as regards the essentials of manhood and humanity. — Theodore Roosevelt

We must learn to outgrow our egos in exchange for constructive dialogue rather than debate. In addition, we must be capable of stating problems and proposing solutions clearly and succinctly, without distortion of meaning or misunderstanding, even when these solutions are radically opposed to accepted norms. — Jacque Fresco

Maddie was about to follow when a girl beside her said, "Excuse me." Her hair was red, and her cheeks were dusted with light brown freckles. She had a mouth that seemed to want to smile, but for some reason her lips were tight. "I have been standing here for two entire minutes waiting for a seat." "Oh!" said Maddie. "I'm so sorry. I think there's been some kind of misunderstanding." She leaned closer and whispered helpfully, "The seats here don't come to you. You have to walk over to them." The girl's mouth gaped as if she was insulted. Maddie nodded sympathetically. "I agree," Maddie said. "I've often thought that chairs that come to you are a hexcellent idea. — Shannon Hale

The growing pains of ... being an actor, that was a little frustrating at times because you feel like you have great capacity to do many things. And yet there seems to be a misunderstanding about who you are and what you're trying to do. And that requires patience, and people eventually will understand. — Matt Dillon

The lectures you deliver
may be wise and true,
But I'd rather get my lessons
by observing what you do.
I may not understand
the high advise you like to give,
But there's no misunderstanding
how you act and how you live. — Edgar Guest

My family was very conservative, and I had a traditional upbringing. I was not brought up to be a sex symbol, nor is it in my nature to be one. The fact that I became one is probably the loveliest, most glamorous and fortunate misunderstanding. — Raquel Welch

Algernon. Good heavens! Is marriage so demoralising as that? Lane. I believe it is a very pleasant state, sir. I have had very little experience of it myself up to the present. I have only been married once. That was in consequence of a misunderstanding between myself and a young person. Algernon. — Oscar Wilde

Misunderstanding may arise by confusing the Buddhist and scientific definitions of death. Within the scientific system you spoke quite validly of the death of the brain and the death of heart. Different parts of the body can die separately. However, in the Buddhist system, the word death is not used in that way. You'd never speak of the death of a particular part of the body, but rather of the death of an entire person. When people say that a certain person died, we don't ask, "Well, which part died?" — Dalai Lama

Endless conflicts. Endless misunderstanding. All life is that. Great and little cannot understand one another. — H.G.Wells

Many seniors understand that Social Security is social insurance as opposed to a program where we put money aside for our own retirement. But most elderly individuals think they're getting their money back. So it isn't selfishness as much as a misunderstanding. — Richard Lamm

When enemies, the intellect and the heart only see one another as the hater and the fool. — Criss Jami

To call it a "setback" is like calling the Expulsion from Eden a minor misunderstanding. — Sharon Kay Penman

Telling someone something he does not understand is pointless, even if you add that he will not be able to understand it. — Ludwig Wittgenstein

As all advocates of feminist politics know most people do not understand sexism or if they do they think it is not a problem. Masses of people think that feminism is always and only about women seeking to be equal to men. And a huge majority of these folks think feminism is anti-male. Their misunderstanding of feminist politics reflects the reality that most folks learn about feminism from patriarchal mass media. — Bell Hooks