Quotes & Sayings About Not Perfect Family

The perfect family doesn't exist, nor is there a perfect husband or a perfect wife, and let's not talk about the perfect mother-in-law! It's just us sinners." A healthy family life requires frequent use of three phrases: "May I? Thank you, and I'm sorry" and "never, never, never end the day without making peace. — Pope Francis

Now, now, hear me out," Hamish went on. "We don't have to kidnap Garrett. Not if we kidnap the buyer."
"Or distract him," Angus added.
"Like the Bulgari job," Hamish said.
"You mean the job that landed half the DiMarco family in a South African prison?" Kat said.
Angus shrugged. "Nobody said it was perfect. — Ally Carter

Joseph spent most of his life not knowing why God had allowed his brothers to sell him into slavery, why he had allowed him to be brought to a foreign land, why he had allowed him to be falsely accused and thrown into prison. From behind bars, it must have all seemed so unjust. But from the summit of understanding that God later granted him, it all made perfect sense (Genesis 50:20). It was there he learned that the seemingly meandering ways of God weren't simply leading to the shaping of his character but also to the saving of his family (a lineage that led to Christ), preserving them through seven years of famine and prospering them for generations to come. — Ken Gire

Cooking is not about being the best or most perfect cook, but rather it is about sharing the table with family and friends. — Skye Gyngell

I've been out here pondering the meaning of life." "That bad, huh?" "Not so bad. They're good kids. Just drifting out into their own orbits already. It's natural, it's right. Though I guess I have this image ... I don't know ... " "Of some perfect, endless family life?" she said. "All happiness and McDonald's commercials?" "No McDonald's, but, yeah, I guess so. Something that doesn't just dissolve in a burst of cell phones and grumpiness, then whoosh away into biannual visits." "You're — Roland Merullo

She's not perfect, but she tries so hard for me. And I thank God, that she isn't, cause how boring that would be. — Brad Paisley

[Speaking of marriage and family] In this entire world there is not a more perfect, more complete image of God, Unity and Community. There is no other human reality which corresponds more, humanly speaking, to that divine mystery. — Pope John Paul II

Christmas is the perfect time to celebrate the love of God and family and to create memories that will last forever. Jesus is God's perfect, indescribable gift. The amazing thing is that not only are we able to receive this gift, but we are able to share it with others on Christmas and every other day of the year. — Joel Osteen

No, that's not the style of these people,' explained Maxy. 'You shouldn't think of these Bolsheviks as modern politicians. They were religious fanatics. Their Marxism was fanatical; their fervour was semi-Islamic; and they saw themselves as members of a secret military-religious order like the medieval Crusaders or the Knights Templar. They were ruthless, amoral and paranoid. They believed that millions would have to die to create their perfect world. Family, love and friendship were nothing compared to the holy grail. People died of gossip at Stalin's court. For a man like Satinov, secrecy was everything. — Simon Sebag Montefiore

Bonnie persuaded me to focus on the good, just for today: tomorrow I can call back and we will wallow in the total awfulness of Amy's behavior, which will surely lead to permanent estrangement and dead bodies. Just for today, I was supposed to try to remember three things: The baby is not falling off the earth, or headed to Afghanistan. So many things are going well: Everyone has good health. Jax is perfect. Even though I have acid and sewage and grippage in my stomach, which I have had many times before and will have many times again, I can build faith muscles by bearing my feelings of misery and powerlessness - a kind of Nautilus. Rumi said that through love, all pain would turn to medicine. But he never met my family. Or me. — Anne Lamott

I am too good at making you see what you want to see. It has been hard my whole life to make that picture seem so perfect. The perfect daughter in the perfect family who was after all not so perfect. There was again only the illusion of what outsiders wanted to see. — Abigail George

The best ones, are not the perfect ones. — Jonathan Anthony Burkett

People think they have a perfect idea of who you are from a four-second Snapchat video ... and fake blogs, stories, magazine covers. In reality, that's not the case. Nobody knows who I am except family and my close friends. — Kylie Jenner

What is home? My favorite definition is "a safe place," a place where one is free from attack, a place where one experiences secure relationships and affirmation. It's a place where people share and understand each other. Its relationships are nurturing. The people in it do not need to be perfect; instead, they need to be honest, loving, supportive, recognizing a common humanity that makes all of us vulnerable. — Gladys M. Hunt

You are the type of female who grows more lovely, not by false paints or creams, but by being a complete woman, a woman who knows intelligence, sympathy, forgiveness, generosity, and love of family. I cannot imagine a more perfect combination. — Regina Jeffers

When I forget that the only way that God could stand to have me in his family was by crushing the Son he loves-that without the perfect record of someone else I could not stand before his judicious holiness, that on my own I do not have within me either the desire or the power to please God-I am tempted to believe that I'm really pretty good. And although I might need a nip or tuck, if I try hard enough, I can accomplish all he has called me to. It's when we forget the gospel, when we think we're not really all that bad, not so much in need, not so far from Christlikeness, that pride, arrogance, and the inevitable guilt crush hope and faith. — Elyse M. Fitzpatrick

God was never about making me spiffy; God was about making me new.
New doesn't always look perfect. Like the Easter story itself, new is often messy. New looks like recovering alcoholics. New looks like reconciliation between family members who don't actually deserve it. New looks like every time I manage to admit I was wrong and every time I manage to not mention when I'm right. New looks like every fresh start and every act of forgiveness and every moment of letting go of what we thought we couldn't live without and then somehow living without it anyway. New is the thing we never saw coming- never even hoped for- but ends up being what we needed all along. — Nadia Bolz-Weber

Dear sisters, many of you are endlessly compassionate and patient with the weaknesses of others. Please remember also to be compassionate and patient with yourself.
In the meantime, be thankful for all the small successes in your home, your family relationships, your education and livelihood, your Church participation and personal improvement. Like the forget-me-nots, these successes may seem tiny to you and they may go unnoticed by others, but God notices them and they are not small to Him. If you consider success to be only the most perfect rose or dazzling orchid, you may miss some of life's sweetest experiences. — Dieter F. Uchtdorf

I'm a blowfish. I'm not a shark, I'm a blowfish. So that perfect example about me hitting my head [he walked into a street sign and it was caught by paparazzi], it's like a blowfish. I wasn't coming out of my house going to a paparazzi's house to attack them. I'm defending my family in front of my own house. I'm defending my name as someone's screaming something negative at me. That's a blowfish. People have me pinned as a shark or a predator in some way, and in no way am I that. I wouldn't want to hurt anyone. I want to defend people. I want to help people. — Kanye West

In a big family the first child is kind of like the first pancake. If it's not perfect, that's okay, there are a lot more coming along. — Antonin Scalia

You all looked so happy together in the photograph. You looked like the
perfect family. Is there such a thing anymore because if there is, my happy
little unit was definitely not in the queue when they were handing out the
titles. — Cecelia Ahern

It's very simple: I want his love. I need Christian Grey to love me. This is why I am so reticent about our relationship
because on some basic, fundamental level, I recognize within me a deep-seated compulsion to be loved and cherished. And because of his fifty shades, I am holding myself back. The BDSM is a distraction from the real issue. The sex is amazing, he's wealthy, he's beautiful, but this is all meaningless without his love, and the real heart-fail is that I don't know if he's capable of love. He doesn't even love himself. I recall his self-loathing, her love being the only form he found acceptable. Punished
whipped, beaten, whatever their relationship entailed
he feels undeserving of love. Why does he feel like that? How can he feel like that? His words haunt me: It's very hard to grow up in a perfect family when you're not perfect. I close my eyes, imagining his pain, and I can't begin to comprehend it. — E.L. James

Family or love or romance, whatever it is, is not restricted to perfect people. If it were, it wouldn't exist. All of that comes out in my work in some way. — Sara Zarr

O.K., then, all right, they would adopt a white-trash dog. Ha ha. They could name it Zeke, buy it a little corncob pipe and a straw hat. She imagined the puppy, having crapped on the rug, looking up at her, going, Cain't hep it. But no. Had she come from a perfect place? Everything was transmutable. She imagined the puppy grown up, entertaining some friends, speaking to them in a British accent: My family of origin was, um, rather not, shall we say, of the most respectable ...
Ha ha, wow, the mind was amazing, always cranking out these - — George Saunders

Everett Walsh!" Chloe exclaimed. I fell off the bed laughing.
Liz folded her arms and tried to scowl at us, but I could tell she was having a hard time keeping a straight face. "What's wrong with Everett Walsh?" she sputtered."I didn't know when she wrote this in seventh grade that Hayden would hook up with him later.I saw him first."
"He's so straitlaced," Chloe said. "Not exactly the ideal hero of a romance."
"Watch out for his mama," I advised Liz.
"I was answering the question you asked," Liz told Chloe self-righteously. "If your family threatened you with an arranged marriage in the 1800s,you'd want someone on your side who was very mature and organized,who could approach the situation logically and help you out of it.In the 1800s, Everett Walsh would have been a barrister.He'd be perfect for the job."
"I'd rather have the evil viscount," I said. — Jennifer Echols

If you can get the other party to reveal their problems, pain, and unmet objectives - if you can get at what people are really buying - then you can sell them a vision of their problem that leaves your proposal as the perfect solution. Look at this from the most basic level. What does a good babysitter sell, really? It's not child care exactly, but a relaxed evening. A furnace salesperson? Cozy rooms for family time. A locksmith? A feeling of security. Know the emotional drivers and you can frame the benefits of any deal in language that will resonate. — Chris Voss

My family had all kinds of complications in relationships. I would like to meet the person who did not. Since when is being absolutely perfect what being a human is? What do we gain from that? — Anthony Edwards

You have plenty of time; it's only twelve o'clock."

Passepartout pulled out his big watch. "Twelve!" he exclaimed; "why, it's only eight minutes before ten."

"Your watch is slow."

"My watch? A family watch, monsieur, which has come down from my great-grandfather! It doesn't vary five minutes in the year. It's a perfect chronometer, look you."

"I see how it is," said Fix. "You have kept London time, which is two hours behind that of Suez. You ought to regulate your watch at noon in each country."

"I regulate my watch? Never!"

"Well, then, it will not agree with the sun."

"So much the worse for the sun, monsieur. The sun will be wrong, then! — Jules Verne

Mabel Rose Chen was a perfect daughter. She knew this because everybody said it.
...
The thing about being a perfect daughter was that nobody suspected you might not be so perfect. That maybe you were fascinated by the fact that you belonged to this powerful family, and maybe you weren't so great at violin or tennis or French, but you were very, very good at spying. — Jude Watson

Our notion of the perfect society embraces the family as its center and ornament, and this paradise is not secure until children appear to animate and complete the picture. — Amos Bronson Alcott

It's very hard to grow up in a perfect family when you're not perfect. — E.L. James

We'll be together there," said Valentine. "As we should be." That sounds terrific,thought Clary.Just you, your comatose wife, your shell-shocked son, and your daughter
who hates your guts. Not to mention that your two kids may be in love with each other. Yeah, that sounds like
a perfect family reunion. — Cassandra Clare

I love you. I know the real you too. You think I don't but how easily you forget I was the one who bailed you out of trouble over and over again as kids. I didn't ask the perfect Ashton to be my girlfriend when I was fourteen years old. I asked the only Ash I'd ever known. You changed all on your own. I'm not going to lie. I was proud of the girl you had become. My world was complete. I had the perfect family, perfect girl, perfect future. I let myself forget the other girl you once were. — Abbi Glines

There is nothing novel about trying to become happy. And one can become happy, within certain limits, without any recourse to the practice of meditation. But conventional sources of happiness are unreliable, being dependent upon changing conditions. It is difficult to raise a happy family, to keep yourself and those you love healthy, to acquire wealth and find creative and fulfilling ways to enjoy it, to form deep friendships, to contribute to society in ways that are emotionally rewarding, to perfect a wide variety of artistic, athletic, and intellectual skills - and to keep the machinery of happiness running day after day. There is nothing wrong with being fulfilled in all these ways - except for the fact that, if you pay close attention, you will see that there is still something wrong with it. These forms of happiness aren't good enough. Our feelings of fulfillment do not last. And the stress of life continues. — Sam Harris

What I've learned from my own journey, and from my family's experience with cancer, is how important it is to stay positive and move forward. Not every day is going to be perfect; that's life. But staying positive is going to get you to the next day. — Bonnie Blair

Though I'm not sure, I thought I saw women dressed in black, with her head and face covered by a black veil, duck behind a tree as we approached the road and parked car. Hiding so we wouldn't see her. But I caught a glimpse, enough to reveal the rope of lustrous pearls she wore. Pearls that were there for a thin white hand to lift and nervously, out of long habit, twist and untwist into a knot. Only one women I knew did that
and she was the perfect one to wear black, and should run to hide!
Forever hide! Color all her days black! Every last one! — V.C. Andrews

Are you aware that a healthy level of self-esteem is directly related to your ability to forgive yourself and others? It is. How so, you may ask? When you accept that you are no better or worse than anyone else and that you're not perfect and neither is anyone else you'll see the wisdom and reasonableness of forgiving yourself and others. A healthy level of self-esteem will also enable you to take responsibility for your words and actions and establish and maintaining healthy personal boundaries. The more you appreciate and respect yourself the more you'll be able to appreciate and respect others and others will find it easy to appreciate and respect you. — George Araiza

Being perfect is not about that scoreboard out there. It's not about winning. It's about you and your relationship with yourself, your family and your friends. Being perfect is about being able to look your friends in the eye and know that you didn't let them down because you told them the truth. And that truth is you did everything you could. There wasn't one more thing you could've done. Can you live in that moment as best you can, with clear eyes, and love in your heart, with joy in your heart? If you can do that gentleman - you're perfect! — Billy Bob Thornton

It's not that parents love their children less than in generations past. It's that they no longer receive consistent societal support for the belief that parenting is their highest priority ... TV messages championed rather then detracted from wholesome ideals ... maybe "the old days" before the societal changes of the '60s weren't perfect, but they allowed a bevy of family-friendly forces to surround parents with encouragement for their mission ... — Diane Medved

You can't fix this,' she ground out.
'That is not true. There is nothing anyone could hold over you that could not be overcome.'
'By what?' she demanded. 'Rainbows and sprites and the everlasting good wishes of your family? It won't work, Gregory. It won't. The Bridgertons may be powerful, but you cannot change the past, and you cannot bend the future to suit your whims ... You don't understand. You can't possibly. You are all so happy, so perfect.'
'We are not.'
'You are. You don't even know that you are, and you can't conceive that the rest of us are not, that we might struggle and try and be good and still not receive what we wish for. — Julia Quinn

This was true enough, though it did not throw any light upon my perplexity. If we had heard of it to start with, it is possible that all the family would have considered the possession of a ghost a distinct advantage. It is the fashion of the times. We never think what a risk it is to play with young imaginations, but cry out, in the fashionable jargon, 'A ghost! - nothing else was wanted to make it perfect.' I should not have been above this myself. I should have smiled, of course, at the idea of the ghost at all, but then to feel that it was mine would have pleased my vanity. Oh, yes, I claim no exemption. The girls would have been delighted. I could fancy their eagerness, their interest, and excitement. No; if we had been told, it would have done no good - we should have made the bargain all the more eagerly, the fools that we are. ("The Open Door") — Mrs. Oliphant

When we are holding tight to the iron rod, we are in a position to place our hands over theirs and walk the strait and narrow path together. Our example is magnified in their eyes. They will follow our cadence when they feel secure in our actions. We do not need to be perfect-just honest and sincere. Children want to feel as one with us. When a parent says, "We can do it! We can read the scriptures daily as a family," the children will follow! — Rosemary M. Wixom

In order to change, however, you have to be willing to acknowledge the need for change - in other words, you have to come to terms with the fact that everything in your life isn't perfect. There is this concept - among not just Scientologists, but everyone - that we are all supposed to have it together. Whether it's our work, love lives, family relationships, or even feelings about ourselves, we need to present this idealized image to others. We are so conditioned when asked "How are you?" to say "Good" or "Great." But why not "I don't know. I hate everyone today." Why are we so scared to be judged imperfect or to talk about how we really feel? To be authentic? If we can just tell each other how and what we are really doing, step outside of what we believe others think we should be, the result can be therapeutic. — Leah Remini

If you have friends or family who are not practicing, give them your company and not your judgment. They need your patience and your love. Allah is sufficient for judgment and He subhanahu wa ta'ala is a perfect Judge. We are not. — Nouman Ali Khan

I haven't had a lot of good, soft things in my life," he said against my forehead. "Not since my family sent me away. Apart from being your sire and feeling that pull to you, it's that goodness, that softness and warmth, along with the resolve and strength in you, that I love. Being turned hasn't taken that from you. If someone were going to design the perfect mate for me, it would be you. Even when you infuriate me with your pigheaded stubbornness and your temper and incredible lack of anything resembling self-preservation - "
"Stop describing me please."
"You're the most fascinating, maddening, adorable creature I've ever met," he said, sighing and pushing my hair out of my eyes. "So, when I seem possessive or I'm raving like a lunatic, it's just that part of me is still very afraid that I'll lose that - that I'll lose you. I love you. — Molly Harper

By then I was selling the hell out of Buicks at night. So I got a little place of my own and moved her in with me. Now we're pals. Family. It's not perfect. Sometimes it's damn hard. But I look after her and she squeals with delight when I come home, and the sum total of sadness in the world is less than it would have been.

Her real name is Isabelle.

A pretty, pretty name. — George Saunders

Jimmy rolled his eyes. 'What problems do you have? You have the perfect family. Your dad is perfect. Your brother and sister aren't pestering you all the time. And your mom never screams at you for anything.'
'That's only because she doesn't know anything. 'He lifted an eyebrow and tilted his head toward his friend. 'It's all in how you play your cards, young Padawan. — Wade Kelly

New doesn't always look perfect. Like the Easter story itself, new is often messy. New looks like recovering alcoholics. New looks like reconciliation between family members who don't actually deserve it. New looks like every time I manage to admit I was wrong and every time I manage to not mention when I'm right. New looks like every fresh start and every act of forgiveness and every moment of letting go of what we thought we couldn't live without and then somehow living without it anyway. New is the thing we never saw coming - never even hoped for - but ends up being what we needed all along. It — Nadia Bolz-Weber

We could scrub the floor for a tired friend, or dress a wound for a patient in a hospital, or lay the table and wash up for the family; but we shall not do it in martyr spirit or with that worse spirit of self-congratulation, of feeling that we are making ourselves more perfect, more unselfish, more positively kind.

We shall do it just for one thing, that our hands make Christ's hands in our life, that our service may let Christ serve through us, that our patience may bring Christ's patience back to the world. — Caryll Houselander

The world was not perfect. It was dark, evil, and full of monsters in human disguise. The world's a horrible place, and you were no safer surrounded by family than you were wandering the streets alone. — Natasha Preston

Family life is a bit like a runny peach pie - not perfect but who's complaining? — Robert Breault

The family therapist David Freeman once concluded a public lecture on intimacy and relationships by saying that if there was any one thing he hoped his audience would remember from his talk, it was the awareness that one does not know his or her spouse, his or her children. We may believe we have a perfect idea of why they act as they do, when in reality our beliefs reflect no more than our own anxieties. — Gabor Mate

With two children of my own, I know what it means to balance the demands of family and career - and let's not even talk about finding a date for myself. Rabbi Shmuley keeps telling me he'll find me the perfect woman. My response is, 'As long as she's not a journalist'. — Michael Jackson

Nobody's perfect, but I hold myself accountable. I think about the choices I make because they not only affect me, they affect all of my fans and my family. — Joey Lawrence

I think my husband and dad were both very happy that I had a baby boy, to get some testosterone in the family, because there are a lot of girls. It's not a perfect family, but it's a strong family. The nice thing is how the different ages interact. — Jade Jagger

The Sanscrit language, whatever be its antiquity, is of a wonderful structure; more perfect than the Greek, more copious than the Latin, and more exquisitely refined than either, yet bearing to both of them a stronger affinity, both in the roots of verbs and the forms of grammar, than could possibly have been produced by accident; so strong indeed, that no philologer could examine them all three, without believing them to have sprung from some common source, which, perhaps, no longer exists; there is a similar reason, though not quite so forcible, for supposing that both the Gothic and the Celtic, though blended with a very different idiom, had the same origin with the Sanscrit; and the old Persian might be added to the same family. — William Jones

I don't care if Todd Rand is as kind as Jesus himself, my place was with you and I will never regret that. You and Damien and Spencer gave Dominique and me an amazing life that I love more than I can ever tell you. Things worked out the way they were supposed to. This family was always the best option for me, Dante, the only option I'd ever have chosen if I'd been given the choice. This changes nothing in my heart. We were all meant to be together, meant to make up a family that defied the odds. I hope that Todd and Flynn are wonderful and that I can have relationships with both, but if they don't want to know me, I'm not going to be upset. I already have the perfect family for me, and since you're the head of this family, that's on you. — Ella Fox

In one family, every little plan or question is discussed amid bickering and irritation. In another, without the least effort, every discussion goes on amid perfect peace. This is just as easy, and infinitely more agreeable: only, in many homes it does not happen to be the family habit. — Charles Buxton

There is nothing like roast chicken. It is helpful and agreeable, the perfect dish no matter what the circumstances. Elegant or homey, a dish for a dinner party or a family supper, it will not let you down. — Laurie Colwin

I have always been very open and honest about this part of my life with my friends, my family, and my colleagues. In a perfect world, I don't think it's anyone else's business, but I do think there is value in standing up and being counted. I'm not an activist, but I am a human being and I don't give that up by being a journalist. — Anderson Cooper

I had been granted unusual freedom and responsibility at an early age, for which I should have been grateful in the extreme, but I wasn't. Instead, I felt oppressed by the old man's expectations. It was drilled into me that anything less than winning was failure. In the impressionable way of sons, I did not consider this rhetorically; I took him at his word. And that's why later, when long-held family secrets came to light, when I noticed that this deity who asked only for perfection was himself less than perfect, that he was in fact not a deity at all - well, I wasn't able to shrug it off. I was consumed instead by a blinding rage. The revelation that he was merely human, and frightfully so, was beyond my power to forgive. Two — Jon Krakauer

Maybe becoming a spiritually healthy family is not about becoming a perfect family but rather following a perfect God together. And in doing so, to find peace with Him, our pasts, and our family members. — Michelle Anthony

My family are amazing. I had like, the perfect upbringing. It sucks for people like Lindsey [Lohan], but it's not her fault she's so off the rails. — Kristen Stewart

Versailles has only existed for seven years. It does not have any ancient traditions. It was made by Colbert, the commoner. It is full of nobles, true; but you fool yourself if you believe that they feel comfortable there - feel as if they belong. No, it is you, mademoiselle, who are the perfect courtier of Versailles, you whom the others shall envy, once you go there and establish yourself. My father feels himself slipping down, sees his family losing its wealth, its influence. He throws a rope up, hoping that someone on higher and firmer ground will snatch it out of the air and pull him to safety - and that someone is you, mademoiselle. — Neal Stephenson