Love one another and you will be happy. It’s as simple and difficult as that.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
(Misattributed)
Cited by Wikiquote to The Complete Neurotic's Notebook (1980), but not found there, nor in The Neurotics Notebook (1965) or The Second Neurotic's Notebook (1966).
The actual source appears to be Michael Leunig (1945-2024), Australian cartoonist, poet, and artist.
Quotations by:
McLaughlin, Mignon
After the chills and fever of love, how nice is the 98.6 degrees of marriage!
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 1 (1965)
(Source)
Love looks forward, hate looks back, anxiety has eyes all over its head.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 1 (1963)
(Source)
When first we fall in love, we feel that we know all there is to know about life, and perhaps we are right.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 1 (1963)
(Source)
If you made a list of reasons why any couple got married, and another list of reasons for their divorce, you’d have a hell of a lot of overlapping.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 1 (1963)
(Source)
Love is the silent saying and saying of a single name.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 1 (1963)
(Source)
The hardest-learned lesson: that people have only their kind of love to give, not our kind.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 1 (1963)
We lavish on animals the love we are afraid to show to people. People might not return it; or worse, they might.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 1 (1963)
(Source)
The poor have the same basic pleasures of the rich, and the rich will always resent it.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 1 (1963)
(Source)
We are irritated by rascals, intolerant of fools, and prepared to love the rest. But where are they?
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 1 (1963)
(Source)
The marriage of convenience has this to recommend it: we are better judges of convenience than we are of love.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 1 (1963)
(Source)
We welcome passion, for the mind is briefly let off duty.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 1 (1963)
(Source)
Our children know we lie to them, but not — thank God — how much.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 2 (1963)
(Source)
Learning too soon our limitations, we never learn our powers.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 2 (1963)
(Source)
We tell our children things which we know are not so, but which we wish were so.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 2 (1963)
(Source)
We start out determined to see that our children are good; we soon settle for having them nice.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 2 (1963)
(Source)
Your children are neither as bad nor as good as you imagine. But then, neither are you.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 2 (1963)
(Source)
One of life’s few really reliable pleasures: to have a family you love, and to leave them for a week.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 2 (1963)
(Source)
The fault no child ever loses is the one he was most punished for.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 2 (1963)
(Source)
Women are good listeners, but it’s a waste of time telling your troubles to a man unless there is something specific you want him to do.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 3 (1963)
(Source)
Even cowards can endure hardship; only the brave can endure suspense.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 3 (1963)
(Source)
Try as we will, we cannot honestly recall our youth, for we have lost the feel of its main ingredient: suspense.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 3 (1963)
(Source)
Many who would not take the last cookie would take the last lifeboat.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 3 (1963)
(Source)
The total history of almost anyone would shock almost everyone.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 3 (1963)
(Source)
It is always safe to tell people that they’re looking wonderful.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 3 (1963)
(Source)
The proud man can learn humility, but he will be proud of it.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 3 (1963)
(Source)
We can never understand other people’s motives, nor their furniture.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 3 (1963)
(Source)
I hate being so intolerant, and I wouldn’t be if people didn’t deserve it.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 3 (1963)
(Source)
Every day of our lives we are on the verge of making those changes that would make all the difference.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 4 (1963)
(Source)
I’m afraid to win, and afraid to lose; I hate a draw and can’t stop competing; otherwise I’m fine.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 4 (1963)
(Source)
Nobody wants constructive criticism; it’s all we can do to put up with constructive praise.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 4 (1963)
(Source)
The neurotic circles ceaselessly above a fogged-in airport.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 4 (1963)
(Source)
Nostalgia for what we have lost is more bearable than nostalgia for what we have never had, for the first involves knowledge and pleasure, the second only ignorance and pain.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 4 (1963)
(Source)
If you have to do it every day, for God’s sake learn to do it well.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 4 (1963)
(Source)
We long for self-confidence, till we look at the people who have it.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 4 (1963)
(Source)
“Life is meant to be lived.” Telling that to most of us is as useful as telling a mouse that aluminum is meant to be made into cars.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 4 (1963)
(Source)
Courage can’t see around corners but goes around them anyway.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 4 (1963)
(Source)
If you can tell anyone about it, it’s not the worst thing you ever did.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 4 (1963)
(Source)
It does not undo harm to acknowledge that we have done it; but it undoes us not to acknowledge it.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 4 (1963)
(Source)
Irrelevant things may happen to you, but once they have happened they all become relevant.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 4 (1963)
(Source)
True remorse is never just a regret over consequence; it is a regret over motive.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 4 (1963)
(Source)
“Pull yourself together” is seldom said to anyone who can.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 4 (1963)
(Source)
The know-nothings are, unfortunately, seldom the do-nothings.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 5 (1963)
(Source)
The three horrors of modern life — talk without meaning, desire without love, work without satisfaction.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 5 (1963)
(Source)
From a wretched deed there is sometimes a good outcome, making penance even more unlikely than usual.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 5 (1963)
(Source)
We hear only half of what is said to us, understand only half of that, believe only half of that, and remember only half of that.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 5 (1963)
(Source)
What you have become is the price you paid to get what you used to want.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 5 (1963)
(Source)
We are all such a waste of our potential, like three-way lamps using one-way bulbs.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 5 (1963)
(Source)
Once you become self-conscious, there is no end to it; once you start to doubt, there is no room for anything else.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 5 (1963)
(Source)
If an article is attractive, or useful, or inexpensive, they’ll stop making it tomorrow; if it’s all three, they stopped making it yesterday.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 5 (1963)
(Source)
Altruism is a hard master; but so is opportunism.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 5 (1963)
(Source)
The neurotic feels like a Christmas shopper who keeps dropping his packages, and it’s raining.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 5 (1963)
(Source)
Many of us go through life feeling as an actor might feel who does not like his part, and does not believe in the play.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 5 (1963)
(Source)
Hope is the feeling we have that the feeling we have is not permanent.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 5 (1963)
(Source)
This phrase is often cited to Jean Kerr. That's because she paraphrases it in her play, Finishing Touches, Act 3 (1974):FELICIA: Do you know the book The Neurotic's Notebook? There's a line in it I say to myself when I get discouraged. It goes: "Hope is the feeling you have that the feeling you have isn't permanent."
We all have a pretty clear understanding of goodness, but it seldom applies to the situation we’re in at the moment.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 5 (1963)
(Source)
In life, as in restaurants, we swallow a lot of indigestible stuff just because it comes with the dinner.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 5 (1963)
(Source)
Each generation must watch the next, throwing away its golden opportunities.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 5 (1963)
I tell you this, and I tell you plain:
What you have done, you will do again;
You will bite your tongue, careful or not,
Upon the already-bitten spot.Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 5 (1963)
(Source)
We hear only half of what is said to us, understand only half of that, believe only half of that, and remember only half of that.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 5 (1963)
(Source)
Hope is the feeling we have that the feeling we have is not permanent.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 5 (1963)
(Source)
If it came true, it wasn’t much of a dream.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 5 (1963)
(Source)
An old racetrack joke reminds you that your program contains all the winners’ names. I stare at my typewriter keys with the same thought.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 5 (1963)
(Source)
It’s impossible to be loyal to your family, your friends, your country, and your principles, all at the same time.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 5 (1963)
(Source)
Every group feels strong once it has found a scapegoat.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 6 (1963)
(Source)
It is important to our friends to believe that we are unreservedly frank with them, and important to friendship that we are not.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 6 (1963)
(Source)
Every group of six or more has its inner circle, its outer circle, and its hangers-on.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 6 (1963)
(Source)
Most of us would try to be noble, if we just had a claque we could depend on.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 6 (1963)
(Source)
Revenge leads to an empty fullness, like eating dirt.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 6 (1963)
(Source)
Every society honors its live conformists, and its dead troublemakers.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 7 (1963)
(Source)
Injure a businessman and he’ll try to make you sorry; injure an artist and he’ll try to make you immortal.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 7 (1963)
(Source)
Few of us write great novels; all of us live them.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 7 (1963)
(Source)
Learn a little of anything, and you’re ready to proselytize.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 7 (1963)
(Source)
In the theater, as in life, we prefer a villain with a sense of humor to a hero without one.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 7 (1963)
(Source)
We have to call it “freedom”: who’d die for “a lesser tyranny”?
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 7 (1963)
(Source)
No matter how brilliantly an idea is stated, we will not really be moved unless we have half-thought of it ourselves.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 7 (1963)
(Source)
Everybody can write; writers can’t do anything else.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 7 (1963)
(Source)
Life’s most painful condition: to be almost a celebrity.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 7 (1963)
(Source)
Despair is anger with no place to go.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 8 (1963)
(Source)
According to Oscar Wilde, all that experience teaches us is that history repeats itself, and that the sin we do once and with loathing we will do many times and with pleasure. But the neurotic knows that the sin he does once and with loathing he will do many times and with loathing.
A little embarrassment prevents a lot of goodness.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 8 (1963)
(Source)
Those who turn to God for comfort may find comfort but I do not think they will find God.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 8 (1963)
(Source)
Many are saved from sin by being so inept at it.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 8 (1963)
(Source)
We’d all like a reputation for generosity, and we’d all like to buy it cheap.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 9 (1963)
(Source)
Anything you do from the heart enriches you, but sometimes not till years later.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 9 (1963)
(Source)
No problem of any consequence can be tackled head on.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 9 (1963)
(Source)
The neurotic doesn’t know how to cope with his emotional bills; some he keeps paying over and over, others he never pays at all.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 9 (1963)
(Source)
In retrospect, our triumphs could as easily have happened to someone else; but our defeats are uniquely our own.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 9 (1963)
(Source)
Cash is the one gift everyone despises and no one turns down.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 9 (1963)
(Source)
Don’t fool yourself that important things can be put off till tomorrow; they can be put off forever, or not at all.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 10 (1963)
(Source)
One day you are an apprentice and everybody’s pet; the next you are coldly expected to deliver. There is never sufficient warning that the second day is coming.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 10 (1963)
(Source)
The fear of being laughed at makes cowards of us all.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 10 (1963)
(Source)
The neurotic longs to touch bottom, so at least he won’t have that to worry about anymore.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 10 (1963)
(Source)
The uses of a dictionary: at thirteen we look up lewd, licentious, lascivious; at thirty, febrile and inchoate; at fifty, endostosis.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 10 (1963)
(Source)
The past is rich in lessons from which we would greatly profit except that the present is always so full of Special Circumstances.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 10 (1963)
(Source)
What you were sure of yesterday, you know now to be false, but what you are sure of today is absolutely true.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 10 (1963)
(Source)
The past is strapped to our backs. We do not have to see it; we can always feel it.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 10 (1963)
(Source)
In every group of intimidated people, each thinks “I will rebel,” but each waits for the others.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 10 (1963)
(Source)
A successful marriage requires falling in love many times, always with the same person.
Love unlocks doors and opens windows that weren’t even there before.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 1 (1966)
(Source)
Some marriages break up, and some do not, and in our world you can usually explain the former better than the latter.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 1 (1966)
(Source)
The ideal home: big enough for you to hear the children, but not very well.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 2 (1966)
(Source)
Your children tell you casually years later what it would have killed you with worry to know at the time.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 2 (1966)
(Source)
If your children spend most of their time in other people’s houses, you’re lucky; if they all congregate at your house, you’re blessed.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 2 (1966)
(Source)
There’s no way to repay a mother’s love, or lack of it.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 2 (1966)
(Source)
Men who don’t like girls with brains don’t like girls.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 3 (1966)
(Source)
Originally published in McLaughlin's "The Neurotic's Notebook" column in The Atlantic, some time in 1965.
Nobody really listens to anyone else, and if you try it for a while you’ll see why.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 3 (1966)
(Source)
Men are convinced that women have it easy, but they haven’t convinced many women.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 3 (1966)
(Source)
The way to a man’s heart is through his stomach, especially if you tell him how flat it is.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 3 (1966)
(Source)
Character is what emerges from all the little things you were too busy to do yesterday, but did anyway.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 4 (1966)
(Source)
Tough and funny and a little bit kind: that is as near to perfection as a human being can be.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 4 (1966)
(Source)
Don’t be yourself — be someone a little nicer.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 4 (1966)
(Source)
In the arithmetic of love, one plus one equals everything, and two minus one equals nothing.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 4 (1966)
(Source)
Neurotic: someone who can go from the bottom to the top, and back again, without ever once touching the middle.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 4 (1966)
(Source)
The only kind of courage that matters is the kind that gets you from one moment to the next.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 4 (1966)
(Source)
Other people’s truth may comfort us, but only your own persuades us.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 4 (1966)
(Source)
Nobody knows the trouble we’ve seen — but we keep trying to tell them.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 4 (1966)
(Source)
Ours is not the only story, just the most interesting one.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 4 (1966)
(Source)
The neurotic feels as though strapped in a gas-filled room where at any moment someone, probably himself, will strike a match.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 4 (1966)
(Source)
Never turn down the chance of an adventure, unless such chances are coming thick and fast, and maybe not even then.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 4 (1966)
(Source)
For the happiest life, rigorously plan your days, leave your nights open to chance.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 4 (1966)
(Source)
Variant: "For the happiest life, days should be rigorously planned, nights left open to chance."
The neurotic feels as though trapped in a gas-filled room where at any moment someone, probably himself, will strike a match.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 4 (1966)
(Source)
There’s no such thing as a humdrum life; to the person living it, it’s all peaks and abysses.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 4 (1966)
(Source)
Of course no one is so sensitive as you, but try to remember they think they are.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 4 (1966)
(Source)
Things are never so bad that they can’t get worse. But they’re sometimes so bad they can’t get better.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 5 (1966)
(Source)
The head never rules the heart, but just becomes its partner in crime.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 5 (1966)
(Source)
“Let your conscience be your guide” is a silly thing to say to a good man, or a bad one.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 5 (1966)
(Source)
If I knew what I was so anxious about, I wouldn’t be so anxious.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 5 (1966)
(Source)
The way the neurotic sees it: bars on his door mean that he’s locked in; bars on your door mean that he’s locked out.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 5 (1966)
(Source)
Love gives no warning and no quarter; it is sneaky and cruel; if we weren’t so lonely, we’d never put up with it.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 5 (1966)
(Source)
We vaguely know the rules, and the system of scoring, but for God’s sake why don’t they tell us how long the game is?
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 5 (1966)
(Source)
If you are brave too often, people will come to expect it of you.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 5 (1966)
(Source)
The time to begin most things is ten years ago.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 5 (1966)
(Source)
There’s only one person who needs a glass of water oftener than a small child tucked in for the night, and that’s a writer sitting down to write.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 7 (1966)
(Source)
When threatened, the first thing a democracy gives up is democracy.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 7 (1966)
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My religious position: I think that God could do a lot better, and I’m willing to give Him the chance.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 8 (1966)
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“Your money or your life.” We know what to do when a burglar makes this demand of us, but not when God does.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 8 (1966)
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We are all born brave, trusting and greedy, and most of us manage to remain greedy.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 9 (1966)
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There are a handful of people whom money won’t spoil, and we all count ourselves among them.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 9 (1966)
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When you let money speak for you, it drowns out anything else you meant to say.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 9 (1966)
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I have an understanding with my husband: on any day when I haven’t done any writing, I must play him three games of chess. The trouble is, if I have been working, I enjoy the chess; if not, all I want to play is Russian roulette.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 10 (1966)
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It’s innocence when it charms us, ignorance when it doesn’t.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 10 (1966)
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Loneliness, insomnia, and change: the fear of these is even worse than the reality.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 10 (1966)
There are so many things that we wish we had done yesterday, so few that we feel like doing today.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 10 (1966)
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If you jot down every silly thought that pops into your head, you will soon find out everything you most seriously believe.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 10 (1966)
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I know which side my bread is buttered on: the side which falls on the carpet.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 10 (1966)
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A neurotic is someone who’s afraid to see himself as he’s afraid others see him.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 10 (1966)
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The human comedy can keep amusing you, but only if you keep your distance.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotic’s Notebook, ch. 10 (1966)
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Our strength is often composed of the weakness that we’re damned if we’re going to show.
Mignon McLaughlin (1913-1983) American journalist and author
The Second Neurotics Handbook, ch. 10 (1966)
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