Pessimism Quotes

However, the struggle with that sentinel is, as a rule, not so hard as it may seem from a long way off, mainly in consequence of the antagonism between the ills of the body and the ills of the mind. If we are in great bodily pain, or the pain lasts a long time, we become indifferent to other troubles; all we think about is to get well. In the same way great mental suffering makes us insensible to bodily pain; we despise it; nay, if it should outweigh the other, it distracts our thoughts, and we welcome it as a pause in mental suffering. It is this feeling that makes suicide easy; for the bodily pain that accompanies it loses all significance in the eyes of one who is tortured by an excess of mental suffering. This is especially evident in the case of those who are driven to suicide by some purely morbid and exaggerated ill-humor. No special effort to overcome their feelings is necessary, nor do such people require to be worked up in order to take the step; but as soon as the keeper into whose charge they are given leaves them for a couple of minutes, they quickly bring their life to an end.When, in some dreadful and ghastly dream, we reach the moment of greatest horror, it awakes us; thereby banishing all the hideous shapes that were born of the night. And life is a dream: when the moment of greatest horror compels us to break it off, the same thing happens.

~ Arthur Schopenhauer

And as we should all know by now, anytime you predict failure you have an excellent chance of being right.

~ Jeff Lindsay

When you succumb to cynicism, darkness, pessimism and sarcasm you are amplifying imbalance and negativity.

~ Bryant Mcgill

I know that I'm doomed and I'm not going to struggle against my fate. I am only writing this down so that when you do not see me any more you will know that my enemy has finally triumphed.

~ Anna Kavan

So it is that supernatural horror is the product of a profoundly divided species of being. It is not the pastime of even our closest relations in the wholly natural world: we gained it, as part of our gloomy inheritance, when we became what we are. Once awareness of the human predicament was achieved, we immediately took off in two directions, splitting ourselves down the middle. One half became dedicated to apologetics, even celebration, of our new toy of consciousness. The other half condemned and occasionally launched direct assaults on this gift.

~ Thomas Ligotti

No more worlds like this / No more days like that

~ Thomas Ligotti

One can be a pessimist in thought but not in action.

~ Marty Rubin

Medicinal Spirit, Inside MirrorTherapy becomes a harmony, and that harmony is built on levels,No one knows how to upscale another, for it has to come from the inside grails,Striking inflicts at the mirror and hatred to the being of creator,Causes hate in mirror too and abused flesh to the author,Changes come from its prudence and rationalism liberation,Not its pardon,A mirror is but a substance of a conscious,But identity says let me fly when journeying from the subconscious to the conscious.

~ John Shelton Jones

Sorrow spares no one, and scars respect no person.

~ Sherrilyn Kenyon

I don't believe in pessimism. If something doesn't come up the way you want, forge ahead. If you think it's going to rain, it will.

~ Clint Eastwood

We have reached the end of one era, and now we don't know what is all around us. Because we're already in a new era, and it is very different from the old one. Science and the world of technology are both changing everything so quickly, even our bodies. So the original ancient culture was present here, but to no avail, at this point in history it has come to stop. It still has some effect, some kind of continuity, but it cannot analyse and reformulate things, it cannot impact things with absolute strength. The age to follow will be full of dangers. It will be full of difficulties. In all likelihood, it will not be a good future for mankind. It is even possible this new era will mean the end of mankind.

~ László Krasznahorkai

If there is anything in the life of any culture or period that gives good grounds for alarm, it is the rise of cultural pessimism, whose major passion is bitter hostility toward many or most of the people within the very culture the pessimists always feel they are intent on rescuing. When panic on one side is creating alarm on another, it is easy to forget there are always as good grounds for optimism as for pessimism, exactly the same grounds, in fact. That is because we are human. We still have every potential for good as we ever had, and the same presumptive claim to respect, our own respect in one another. We are still creatures of singular interest and value, agile of soul as we have always been and as we will continue to be even despite our errors and degradations for as long as we abide on this earth. To value one another is our greatest safety, and to indulge in fear and contempt is our gravest error.

~ Marilynne Robinson

The mind is an intricate mechanism that can be run on the fuels of both victory and defeatism.

~ Pat Conroy

I forgot what I was going to think.

~ Brian Spellman

Nothing can save you from hate, empty all your treasures and give it to people and one out of the multitudes will curse you, so live your life to please yourself and not others.

~ Michael Bassey Johnson

If the journey to success and happiness was hundred miles, some people would calculate it by meters and get discouraged by the numbers they come up with.

~ Hafiz

If there is any hell more unprincipled than our rulers, and we, the ruled, I feel curious to see it.

~ Henry David Thoreau

People who are too optimistic seem annoying. This is an unfortunate misinterpretation of what an optimist real

~ Vera Nazarian

It is the most ambitious and driven among us who are the most sorely in need of having our reckless hopes dampened through immersive dousings in the darkness which religions have explored. This is a particular priority for secular Americans, perhaps the most anxious and disappointed people on earth, for their nation infuses them with the most extreme hopes about what they may be able to achieve in their working lives and relationships.

~ Alain De Botton

The author says people are guilty of wrecking the present because the future was bound to be a wreck.

~ T.h. White

Life belongs to optimists. Pessimists are just viewers. Making it real, starts with our attitude.

~ Cathy Burnham Martin

Thankfulness is an attitude of possibilities, not an attitude of liabilities.

~ Craig D. Lounsbrough

The optimist proclaims that we live in the best of all possible worlds, and the pessimist fears this is true.

~ James Branch Cabell

The man who is a pessimist before 48 knows too much, if he is an optimist after it he knows too little.

~ Mark Twain

I will be the first to admit that I am a pessimist by nature. It is, after all, the wisest way to be. We pessimists have everything to gain, whereas optimists have a fifty-fifty chance of being disappointed.

~ Tamar Myers

Cynicism masquerades as wisdom, but it is the farthest thing from it. Because cynics don’t learn anything. Because cynicism is a self-imposed blindness, a rejection of the world because we are afraid it will hurt us or disappoint us.

~ Stephen Colbert

Sometimes a pessimist is only an optimist with extra information.

~ Idries Shah

You predicted quick victory. Now it’s going to get hopelessly complicated. Jesus, don’t you know any better than that by now?

~ Jim Butcher

The spirit of the gospel is optimistic; it trusts in God and looks on the bright side of things. The opposite or pessimistic spirit drags men down and away from God, looks on the dark side, murmurs, complains, and is slow to yield obedience.

~ Orson F. Whitney

The optimist lives on the peninsula of infinite possibilities, the pessimist is stranded on the island of perpetual indecision.

~ William Arthur Ward

...if you live feeling likeYour glass is half empty, well,It may as well be empty all the way.

~ Mattie J.t. Stepanek

We're living among infinite possibilities. And the prevalent philosophies of post-modernist pessimism that come out of the universities are really a major tragedy. The opportunities for progress and change… are absolutely tremendous. Anybody who tells you that we're running out of resources or in a terrible mess--they are idiots. We can't run out of resources. Resources exist when the human mind sees how to use something. To say we are running out of resources is like saying we are running out of brain cells.

~ Robert Anton Wilson

Though nihilism has been relentlessly criticized for overemphasizing the dark side of human experience, it might be equally true that this overemphasis represents a needed counterbalance to shallow optimism and arrogant confidence in human power. Nihilism reminds us that we are not gods, and that despite all of the accomplishments and wonders of civilization, humans cannot alter the fact that they possess only a finite amount of mastery and control over their own destinies.

~ John Marmysz

Seeing the glass as half empty is more positive than seeing it as half full. Through such a lens the only choice is to pour more. That is righteous pessimism.

~ Criss Jami

A man may be a pessimistic determinist before lunch and an optimistic believer in the will's freedom after it.

~ Aldous Huxley

For you the cup isn't half full or half empty, you're always topping it up.

~ Rowena Cory Daniells

...studies show that in general, optimists die ten years earlier than pessimists.I find that hard to believeOf course you do, you're an optimist. You have a misguided belief that things will go your way. You don't see the dangers till it's too late. Pessimists are more realistic. That seems like a sad way to govern your life.It's a safe way to govern your life.

~ Susin Nielsen

When you are a pessimist and the bad thing happens, you live it twice,' Amos liked to say. 'Once when you worry about it, and the second time when it happens.

~ Michael Lewis

We choose the prism that we use to view life. Life can be a mystical tour or an outright bummer. We can live our life with the taint of aftermath or look forward to embracing each beguiling day with renewed energy and enthusiasm.

~ Kilroy J. Oldster

Some people are optimists. Some people are pessimists. I'm just a realist who believes that some things are worth fighting for.

~ C. Joybell C.