Dissatisfaction Quotes

“Be thankful for what you have; you'll end up having more. If you concentrate on what you don't have, you will never, ever have enough.”
― Oprah Winfrey

“Are these things really better than the things I already have? Or am I just trained to be dissatisfied with what I have now?”
― Chuck Palahniuk, Lullaby

“What happens when perfection isn't good enough?”
― Scott Westerfeld, Pretties

“She had known happiness, exquisite happiness, intense happiness, and it silvered the rough waves a little more brightly, as daylight faded, and the blue went out of the sea and it rolled in waves of pure lemon which curved and swelled and broke upon the beach and the ecstasy burst in her eyes and waves of pure delight raced over the floor of her mind and she felt, It is enough! It is enough!”
― Virginia Woolf, To the Lighthouse

“Much of what we called "depression" was really dissatisfaction, a result of setting a bar impossibly high or expecting treasures we weren't willing to work for.”
― Mitch Albom, Have a Little Faith: a True Story

“Čovjek je proklet, i žali za svim putevima kojima nije prošao.”
― Meša Selimović, Death and the Dervish

“Our country is the best country in the world. We are swimming in prosperity and our President is the best president in the world. We have larger apples and better cotton and faster and more beautiful machines. This makes us the greatest country in the world. Unemployment is a myth. Dissatisfaction is a fable. In preparatory school America is beautiful. It is the gem of the ocean and it is too bad. It is bad because people believe it all. Because they become indifferent. Because they marry and reproduce and vote and they know nothing.”
― John Cheever

“He wished he could be anywhere else and anyone else but Here and Him.”
― James R. Silvestri, Hawthorn Road

“We are never so much disposed to quarrel with others as when we are dissatisfied with ourselves.”
― William Hazlitt, Characteristics: In the Manner of Rochefoucault's Maxims

“Ce monde, tel qu'il est fait, n'est pas supportable. J'ai donc besoin de la lune, ou du bonheur, ou de l'immortalité, de quelque chose qui soit dément peut-être, mais qui ne soit pas de ce monde.”
― Albert Camus, Caligula

“He was marked out by his relentless ability to find fault with others' mediocrity--suggesting that a certain type of intelligence may be at heart nothing more or less than a superior capacity for dissatisfaction.”
― Alain de Botton, The Pleasures and Sorrows of Work

“Happiness is the most tired word in any language.”
― Erol Ozan

“When you aren't satisfied with what has already been done, make something better. That is the greatest responsibility and the true freedom of creativity. The freedom is in that it doesn't need to complain.”
― Criss Jami, Killosophy

“We've had enough." He took back the report and jammed it under his arm. "We've had a bellyful, in fact."
"And like everyone who's had enough," said Control as Alleline noisily left the room, "he wants more.”
― John le Carré, Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy

“I'm a woman; in so many ways I've been programmed to please. I took the job and spent time hunkered over figures, budgets, charts, and fiscal-year projections. I tried, but I hated it.

"Working at a job you don't like is the same as going to prison every day," my father used to say. He was right. I felt imprisoned by an impressive title, travel, perks, and a good salary. On the inside, I was miserable and lonely, and I felt as if I was losing myself. I spent weekends working on reports no one read, and I gave presentations that I didn't care about. It made me feel like a sellout and, worse, a fraud.

Now set free, like any inmate I had to figure out what to do with the rest of my life.”
― Kathleen Flinn, The Sharper Your Knife, the Less You Cry: Love, Laughter, and Tears at the World's Most Famous Cooking School

“I needed a new mystery.”
― John Fowles, The Magus

“But she—her life was cold as a garret whose dormer window looks on the north, and ennui, the silent spider, was weaving its web in the darkness in every corner of her heart.”
― Gustave Flaubert, Madame Bovary

“The confusing lesson whipped Frankie's anger into something she had never felt before. It was like an emotional meringue - the airy feeling of loneliness topped with the hard crisp of injustice. Yet its taste was far from sweet.”
― Lisi Harrison, Monster High

“Love in this life is expanded by our anticipation of the next life. Those who love under God are never satisfied with small love, or love bound by the flaws of human emotion. Those who love under God dream of another life where they can experience it and live it in God's perfect form, so they seek to build it in this life as much as possible.”
― Criss Jami, Diotima, Battery, Electric Personality

“You know how it feels when you're someplace and you ask yourself, Why am I here? That's how it is with me all the time. I can't wait to leave. To go from wherever I am to some other place. It never ends.”
― Etgar Keret, The Girl on the Fridge

“Mrs. Bostwick’s face was heavy and lethargic, without any strength or delicacy, and it bore the deep marks of what must have been a habitual dissatisfaction.”
― John Williams, Stoner

“These women relied on Shah Rukh when they found the real world and all its pandemics and practicalities inhospitable.

Because only the deepest dissatisfaction with reality drives us to dwell in fantasy.”
― Shrayana Bhattacharya, Desperately Seeking Shah Rukh: India's Lonely Young Women and the Search for Intimacy and Independence

“Our education system would be betraying its master, capitalism, if it taught us to be content with what we have. Or if it told us about the fruits of practicing minimalism.”
― Mokokoma Mokhonoana

“So often lately he'd come to realize that things were not as they seemed. There were hidden facets to everything. You'd think you had what you wanted in your grasp and, when you looked closely, it wasn't what it had seemed to be from a distance.”
― Anne McCaffrey, The White Dragon

“Magazines are part of the global dissatisfaction industrial complex.”
― Sarai Walker, Dietland

“If I learned anything it was that no matter how much material comfort you throw at a human being, we will always find something to be miserable about. We are programmed for dissatisfaction. We always want more.”
― Graeme Macrae Burnet, Case Study

“...
Halit Ayarcı çok terbiyeli bir şekilde esnedi:
- Yine aynı mesele... dedi. Daha doğrusu hep aynı mesele! Aziz dostum, siz şifa kabul etmez bir gayrimemnunsunuz... Bu işlerde bilmek ikinci derecede kalır. Yapmak vardır, sadece yapmak... Sonra kendi kendine konuşur gibi ilâve etti:
- Bilgi bizi geciktirir. Zaten ne sonu, ne de gayesi vardır. Mesele yapmak ve yaratmaktadır. Bilselerdi, bilselerdi... Fakat bilselerdi bunu yapamazlardı. Bu heyecana, bu icada, bu kendiliğinden bulmağa erişemezlerdi. Bilgileri buna mâni olurdu. Kızınız bu geceyi yarattı. Ne ile? Yaratma kabiliyetiyle... Çünkü yaratmak, yaşamanın ta kendisidir. Biz yaşayan, yaşamayı tercih eden insanlarız. Siz istediğiniz kadar somurtun!
...”
― Ahmet Hamdi Tanpınar, Saatleri Ayarlama Enstitüsü

“Our being satisfied eventually irritates our mind.”
― Mokokoma Mokhonoana

“He really liked her—especially the way her femininity stimulated him. Alejandra was the type of girl that never let a boy entirely have her. If his lips tried to go for a random peck, she would turn the opposite way and smile a “no.” They would be seated at a restaurant and her peppy, shy voice would say, “Thank you for taking me here, but don’t expect anything.” He felt like he had her slippery heart in his hands, but never held it—instead her heart levitated, floating a few centimeters above his twitching fingertips, shining like a fickle disco ball, magnetized in the air by Alejandra’s masterfully crafted tension. She perfected this practice and learned it from her older sister. Except Alejandra felt that she was not as intelligent or gorgeous as other women, and that this prowess was all she had.”
― Karl Kristian Flores, A Happy Ghost

“Before you give up, think about why you held on for so long.”
― Shopno