Why Quotes

“He who has a why to live for can bear almost any how.”
― Friedrich Nietzsche

“I'm in love with you, and I'm not in the business of denying myself the simple pleasure of saying true things.”
― John Green, The Fault in Our Stars

“There is much asked and only so much I think I can or should answer, and so, in this post I would like to give a few thoughts on what seemed to be the overwhelming question: “WHY?”
And here is the best answer I can give: Because.
Because sometimes, life is damned unfair.
Because sometimes, we lose people we love and it hurts deeply.
Because sometimes, as the writer, you have to put your characters in harm’s way and be willing to go there if it is the right thing for your book, even if it grieves you to do it.
Because sometimes there aren’t really answers to our questions except for what we discover, the meaning we assign them over time.
Because acceptance is yet another of life’s “here’s a side of hurt” lessons and it is never truly acceptance unless it has cost us something to arrive there.
Why, you ask? Because, I answer.
Inadequate yet true.”
― Libba Bray

“People are shitty for a lot of reasons. Sometimes they're just shitty people. Sometimes people have been shitty to them and, even though they don't realize it, they take that shitty upbringing and go out into the world and treat others the same way. Sometimes they're shitty because they're afraid. Sometimes they choose to be shitty to others before others can be shitty to them. So it's like self-defensive shittiness.”
― Jennifer Niven, Holding Up the Universe

“In terms of doing things I take a fairly scientific approach to why things happen and how they happen. I don't know if there's a god or not...”
― Bill Gates

“Every broken heart has screamed at one time or another: Why can't you see who I truly am?”
― Shannon L. Alder

“Once we get to know where and why the skeletons of the past are buried, we can start wading across our muddled memories into the open plains of a new horizon. ("Going back to yesterday")”
― Erik Pevernagie

“Why should I even bother? What's the point, really?"
He thought for a moment. "Who says there has to be a point?" he asked. "Or a reason. Maybe it's just something you have to do.”
― Sarah Dessen, Along for the Ride

“No - no - no!" someone was shouting. "No! Fred! No!"

And Percy was shaking his brother, and Ron was kneeling beside them, and Fred's eyes stared without seeing, the ghost of his last laugh still etched upon his face.”
― J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

“A Mark that spoke of loss was still a Mark, a remembrance. You could not lose something you never had.”
― Cassandra Clare, Clockwork Princess

“Rough as life can be, I know in my bones we are supposed to stick around and play our part. Even if that part is coughing to death from cigarettes, or being blown up young in a house with your mother watching. And even if it's to be that mother. Someone down the line might need to know you got through it. Or maybe someone you won't see coming will need you. Like a kid who asks you to help him clean motel rooms. Or some ghost who drifts your way, hungry. And good people might even ask you to marry them. And it might be you never know the part you played, what it meant to someone to watch you make your way each day. Maybe someone or something is watching us all make our way. I don't think we get to know why. It is, as Ben would say about most of what I used to worry about, none of my business.”
― Bill Clegg, Did You Ever Have a Family

“When we understand people;
when we understand situations;
when we understand what matters;
when we understand the why’s, the what’s and the how’s;
when we understand the trigger of actions, we least inflict pain on ourselves and unto others.”
― Ernest Agyemang Yeboah

“So why do I write, torturing myself to put it down? Because in spite of myself I've learned some things. Without the possibility of action, all knowledge comes to one labeled "file and forget," and I can neither file nor forget. Nor will certain ideas forget me; they keep filing away at my lethargy, my complacency. Why should I be the one to dream this nightmare?”
― Ralph Ellison

“Why?' He asked.
'Why what?' What could I say? Noah, despite you being an asshole, or maybe because of it, I'd like to rip off your clothes and have your babies. Don't tell.”
― Michelle Hodkin, The Unbecoming of Mara Dyer

“Why do people kill themselves?

I think they do it when they can no longer find a reason to keep going. When nothing in heir lives is good enough to balance out the bad. And they do it when they no longer have the courage to carry on past some recent painful experience. They commit what is, in the end, a desperate, final call for help, that is hopefully heard in time by someone else.

And what if it's not heard in time? I ask although I know the answer.

Then they die.”
― Mary Beth Miller, Aimee

“Why, if its going to be allright, do we see it getting worse every day?”
― Jeanne DuPrau, The City of Ember

“For as long as there's anyone to ask 'Why?' the answer will always be, 'Why not?”
― Vera Nazarian, The Perpetual Calendar of Inspiration

“All knowledge meets an end at the question '...Why?”
― Criss Jami, Healology

“I try to maintain a positive attitude at all times, because clients notice little things like that, and if you're frowning and crying all the time and saying "why? why?", they get worried.”
― John Swartzwelder, The Time Machine Did It

“Ah, but my dear sir, the why must never be obvious. That is the whole point.”
― Agatha Christie, Five Little Pigs

“I write because, if I don't, my characters will murder me in my sleep.”
― Astrid Cruz

“Why didn't they ask the Evans?”
― Agatha Christie, Why Didn't They Ask Evans?

“There is always the question why
And there is always life,
Which doesn't need an answer.”
― Dejan Stojanovic

“There is nothing that makes us feel so good as the idea that someone else is an evildoer.”
― Robert Lynd

“I don't spend a lot of time asking "WHY?" Instead I focus on what I should do now or how I should react." (p.180)”
― Jeff Dixon-The Key To The Kingdom

“Why, Mr. Anderson?, Why, why?.

Why do you do it? Why, why get up?.


Why keep fighting?.


Do you believe you're fighting...for something?.

For more than your survival?.

Can you tell me what it is?.

Do you even know?; Is it freedom?, Or truth?.

Perhaps peace?. Could it be for love?


Illusions, Mr. Anderson.


Vagaries of perception.


Temporary constructs of a feeble human intellect trying desperately to justify an existence that is without meaning or purpose.

And all of them as artificial as the Matrix itself, although... only a human mind could invent something as insipid as love.


You must be able to see it, Mr. Anderson.

You must know it by now, You can't win.

It's pointless to keep fighting.


Why, Mr. Anderson?.


Why?, Why do you persist?.




Agent Smith ( Matrix Revolutions Movie, 2003 ).”
― William Irwin, More Matrix and Philosophy: Revolutions and Reloaded Decoded

“All this happened in much less time than it takes to tell, since I am trying to interpret for you into slow speech the instantaneous effect of visual impressions.”
― Joseph Conrad, Lord Jim

“Perry was leaning into my mother as he listened to what she said. They talked so close. He only leaned closer, his hands on the table, his leg touching hers.
"It's so risky," my mother said. "Why are you doing this?"
"Because I'm human being. Because we're all human beings."
My mother closed her eyes and winced. Maybe her hearing aid was ringing and bothering her, but as I watched her turn down the volume, I wanted to tell her right then that she couldn't quiet all those outside voices forever.”
― Margaret McMullan, Sources of Light

“Bullets an stuff be flying all over. It is something I simply cannot understand - why in hell is we doing all this, anyway? Playing football is one thing. But this, I do not know why. Goddamn.”
― Winston Groom, Forrest Gump

“People mess up. We lie, exaggerate, betray, hurt, and abandon each other. When we hear that this has happened, it makes sense to feel anger, pain, confusion, and sadness. But to move immediately to punishment means that we stay on the surface of what has happened.

To transform the conditions of the "wrongdoing", we have to ask ourselves and each other, "Why?"

Even--especially--when we are scared of the answer.

It's easy to decide a person or group is shady, evil, psychopathic. The hard truth (hard because there's no quick fix) is that long-term injustice creates most evil behavior. The percentage of psychopaths in the world is just not high enough to justify the ease with which we assign that condition to others.

In my mediations, "why?" is often the game-changing, possibility-opening question. That's because the answers rehumanize those we feel are perpetuating against us. "Why?" often leads us to grief, abuse, trauma, mental illness, difference, socialization, childhood, scarcity, loneliness.

Also, "Why?" makes it impossible to ignore that we might be capable of a similar transgression in similar circumstances.

We don't want to see that.”
― Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha