Quotes about Misunderstanding
The world is divided into those who understand me and those who don't. In the case of the latter, I simply leave them to torment themselves trying to gain my sympathy.
— Paulo Coelho
God works to will, and He is ready to work to do, but, alas! many Christians misunderstand this. They think because they have the will, it is enough, and that now they are able to do. This is not so. … The power to do is not a permanent gift, but must be each moment received from the Holy Spirit.
— Andrew Murray
Often we judge ourselves by our intentions and everyone else by their actions. It is possible to intend one thing while communicating something totally different. Sometimes our true motives are cleverly hidden even from us.
— John Bevere
Man's disposition voluntarily so inclines to falsehood that he more quickly derives error from one word than truth from a wordy discourse.
— John Calvin
People understand me so poorly that they don't even understand my complaint about them not understanding me.
— Soren Kierkegaard
Mankind's greatest achievements have come about by talking and its greatest failures by not talking. It doesn't have to be like this.
— Stephen Hawking
He who takes offense when no offense is intended is a fool, and he who takes offense when offense is intended is a greater fool.
— Brigham Young
His light tone, in which, had her nerves been steadier, she would have recognized the mere effort to bridge over an awkward moment, jarred on her passionate desire to be understood. In her strange state of extra-lucidity, which gave her the sense of being already at the heart of the situation, it seemed incredible that any one should think it necessary to linger in the conventional outskirts of word-play and evasion.
— Edith Wharton
He could not bear the thought that a barrier of words should drop between them again
— Edith Wharton
It did not occur to her that Selden might have been actuated merely by the desire to spend a Sunday out of town: women never learn to dispense with the sentimental motive in their judgments of men.
— Edith Wharton
Most of your statues in churches do not correspond to the picture I have of you. In the statues you are shown very much like a nun, with a rosary in your hand. You are smiling serenely. But nuns have no children. You have. Your true likeness has yet to be depicted.
— Richard Wurmbrand
Families break up when they get hints you don't intend and miss hints that you do.
— Robert Frost