Top 100 I Failed Quotes
#1. I was raised on John D. MacDonald's Travis McGee series. Something about this genre - hard-boiled-private-eye-with-heart-of-gold - never failed to take me away from whatever difficulties haunted my daily world to a wonderful land where I was no more than an enthralled spectator.
Alan Furst
#2. The frightful engines of ecclesiastical councils, of diabolical malice, and Calvinistical good-nature never failed to terrify me exceedingly whenever I thought of preaching.
John Adams
#3. I don't believe in the so-called Olympic spirit. I speak from personal experience. When China hosted the Games, it failed to include the people. The event was constructed without regard for their joy.
Ai Weiwei
#4. You should know, I tried for many years not to be in love with you, but I failed. And I really did try very hard. But it was not possible, and it never has been, because I have actually loved you from very early in our relationship. Possibly as early as our first meeting.
Augusten Burroughs
#5. I was supposed to be powerless, and as a result they failed to see that I possessed claws.
Nenia Campbell
#6. I wanted to be a huge star and I have failed.
John Otway
#8. Me: Don't thank me, Sydney. You shouldn't thank me, because I failed miserably at trying not to fall in love with you.
Colleen Hoover
#9. I failed math twice, never fully grasping probability theory. I mean, first off, who cares if you pick a black ball or a white ball out of the bag? And second, if you're bent over about the color, don't leave it to chance. Look in the damn bag and pick the color you want.
Janet Evanovich
#10. Mom also hinted a couple of times that it was good I was going to college, since with one failed marriage behind me, I 'd have trouble landing a good husband and would need something to fall back on. "A package that's been opened once doesn't have the same appeal".
Jeannette Walls
#11. My mother tried to teach me when I was a small child to sing but failed because of my inability to carry a tune.
Heber J. Grant
#12. If I don't cry while writing a key emotional scene, my gut feeling is it's failed.
Jojo Moyes
#13. When I began writing songs, there was a pretty direct line between what was happening in my life and what I wrote about. So my first album was really all about my failed attempts to make a particular relationship work.
Erin McKeown
#14. Let's cut to the chase, the sharia controversy. I don't think I, or my colleagues, predicted just how enormous the reaction would be. I failed to find the right words. I succeeded in confusing people. I've made mistakes - that's probably one of them.
Rowan Williams
#15. I think if the average person that uses AOL can't physically see the changes in the company, we've failed.
Tim Armstrong
#16. So the cluviel dor was a test of Eric's sincerity, in Niall's eyes. And the cluviel dor was a test of my love for Eric, in Eric's eyes," I said. "And we both failed the test.
Charlaine Harris
#17. I have to try and uplift the standard of living for the people in Zambia. If I cannot do that, I will have failed.
Michael Sata
#18. Yeah. I failed R&R in school. I was too busy studying for my anal retention classes.
Rosanna Leo
#19. In every business I had ever started, even ones that had totally failed, I had kept good relations with the investors.
James Altucher
#20. I completely failed to see the value in memorizing the stupid periodic table of elements.
Inara Scott
#21. In other words, I think that if an audience listens to something as an experience of how in tune it is or something of that kind, that the whole point is somehow being missed, and the music has failed.
John Eaton
#22. More times than not, it's a failed endeavor. You will fail more times than you succeed. But I think you need those failed endeavors.
Ben Gibbard
#23. I used to dream about escaping my ordinary life, but my life was never ordinary. I had simply failed to notice how extraordinary it was.
Ransom Riggs
#24. Because she is my sister and I am her protector. And since I failed in that duty in life, I will satisfy it in death.
Anna Kay Akana
#25. This is a terrible confession to make, but after I left the Army I had a number of things to try. I had a great conceit to think that if all else failed I could always go to Hollywood. So when all else did fail I really went to Hollywood. And then I found out how wrong I was.
David Niven
#26. Introduce me to someone who has never failed; I'll introduce you to someone who has never tried.
Anthony Labson
#27. My aspiration to become a jurist had been laid to rest in the Graveyard of Failed Hopes, an all-female establishment. The sorrow of it had faded, but regret remained, and I'd taken to wondering if the Fates might be kinder to a different girl.
Sue Monk Kidd
#28. I was always a liar. But one thing I failed to realize about being a liar is that you know when you are deceiving someone else, but when you deceive yourself you believe you are telling the truth.
Jack Gantos
#29. The first thing that I really understood politically and was old enough to get was the failed assassination attempt on Reagan.
Ben Affleck
#30. sometimes we have to face the unwilling part of our live. i'm failed to facing the unbreakable fact that i falling in love with the one who just passed my life...
Li Huang
#31. Wolfgang Tillman's stunning large-scale pictures, being shown for the first time, were so offhand I failed to see them as art.
Jerry Saltz
#32. I had been interested in science from when I was very young, but after a disastrous summer lab experience in which every experiment I tried failed, I decided on graduating from college that I was not cut out to be a scientist.
Martin Chalfie
#33. I have not failed 700 times. I have not failed once. I have succeeded in proving that those 700 ways will not work. When I have eliminated the ways that will not work, I will find the way that will work.
Thomas A. Edison
#34. I stopped rowing for a moment to glug down some water, but it was warm, tasted of plastic, and failed to refresh. I yearned for an ice-cold drink - preferably one with bubbles and alcohol in it.
Roz Savage
#35. It never failed - I'd buy a new journal, write like a madwoman for ten pages, then lose total interest in the process. Three months later, I'd start the whole process all over again. I think I just liked buying new notebooks.
MaryJanice Davidson
#36. As a New York Times article points out, failure has been transformed from an action (I failed) to an identity (I am a failure). This is especially true in the fixed mindset.
Carol S. Dweck
#37. When you're buying a pair of TOMS, if you don't feel like you're part of a community, then I've failed.
Blake Mycoskie
#38. I think that when we're talking about youth violence, we're talking about kids who don't have opportunities, so they're engaged in a certain degree of lawlessness, because we as a society have failed them.
Matt Gonzalez
#39. The hope and change the Democrats had in mind was nothing more than a retread of the failed and discredited socialist policies that have been the enemy of freedom for centuries all over the world. I fear America is teetering towards tyranny.
Jim DeMint
#40. And you think that's going to work?" Dink, dink, dink, dink. "Oh, shut up." Gemma turned and went into the bathroom as he tried not to gloat.
"What?" Dink. "I didn't say a thing." Dink. And with that, he failed to not gloat.
Kathleen Brooks
#41. I had never been able to believe that God would give us poor frail humans only one chance at making it
that we would be assigned to some kind of hell because we failed during one experience of mortal life ... So the concepts of karma and reincarnation made logical sense to me.
Jane Goodall
#42. There have been times when I have failed. But there have never been times when I thought I would fail
Michael Jordan
#43. It has been said that if you aim at nothing in life, you are likely to hit nothing! I have never had anyone come to me and say, 'Venita, I plan to fail.' Yet I have observed many who failed to plan and who unfortunately met with the same dismal results.
Venita VanCaspel
#45. I have sometimes done cartoons that are hurtful to people - immature, spiteful stuff. Some are so self-indulgent, and some have just failed. I look back and sometimes cringe. But one regret as I get older is that I haven't been radical and wild enough.
Michael Leunig
#46. I think I've failed every test I've ever taken. If there was a failure I would have been it.
Lisa Marie Presley
#47. I've probably failed more often than anybody else in Silicon Valley. Those don't matter. I don't remember the failures. You remember the big successes.
Vinod Khosla
#48. Walking out with the people, I didn't know which was more exciting, the air race, the parachute jump that failed, or the cunt.
Charles Bukowski
#49. My success was due to good luck, hard work, and support and advice from friends and mentors. But most importantly, it depended on me to keep trying after I had failed.
Mark Warner
#50. I was attending the University of Alberta. I was going to be a high school teacher, like my parents. I failed - no, I didn't fail a class, I just barely passed. I really didn't try. It was Canadian history, through the plays of the time. My God, those were boring plays.
Nathan Fillion
#51. I'm such a failed politician that all of my rivals have disappeared, on both sides.
Ehud Barak
#52. As a youth I got my jollies by confronting my professors with facts that ran completely contrary to what they were trying to ram into our thick skulls. His expressions of bafflement and anger had never failed to amuse me.
Lia Habel
#53. Whenever I have tried to write for other people, that's when my writing has failed, when nobody wanted to read it or buy it. But it's only when I've been able to write a story that makes me excited, only then have other people wanted to read it.
Patrick Ness
#54. When I have tried and failed, I shall have failed.
Sophocles
#55. At Moscow's Bolshoi Ballet Academy, I studied under a brilliant and fiery teacher. This tiny, stuttering old man flew into a rage if his students' white socks failed to reach mid-calf level. Nor could he tolerate floppy hair. We wore hairnets to class - an athletic brigade of short order cooks.
Sascha Radetsky
#56. I tried to picture her in a class, any class, anywhere on campus, and failed miserably. I pictured her frolicking in a forest glade around some guy she'd just sacrificed to a heathen god. That image worked way better.
Maggie Stiefvater
#57. (He tells fortunes by throwing palm nuts and reading their patterns but I failed to clarify that because I was looking for an excuse to write "stare at my nuts.")
Cory O'Brien
#58. I knew that, in a large degree, we were trying an experiment
that of testing whether or not it was possible for Negroes to build up and control the affairs of a large education institution. I knew that if we failed it wold injure the whole race.
Booker T. Washington
#59. I guess my biggest failure was not getting reelected. [The loss taught me] not to ever let American hostages be held for 444 days in a foreign country without extracting them. I did the best I could, but I failed.
Jimmy Carter
#60. I've been called a funny person, for a long time. I don't know that I know anything about comedic acting. I'm not a good improver, which is what a lot of comedic actors are really good at. I have failed miserably when I've been asked to improvise.
John Cho
#61. My job is to call attention to the things that I think are the difference between winning and losing. If I can't do that then I have failed as a coach.
Bill Parcells
#62. The error was not yours, Somerled," Eyvind said quietly, moving to the doorway. "It was mine. I failed to teach you the one lesson you could not do without: how to be a man.
Juliet Marillier
#63. When I started out I was a failed actor.
David Mamet
#64. You'll have to fall in love at least once in your life, or Paris has failed to rub off on you.
E.A. Bucchianeri
#65. Of course the servants had chosen not to follow me; I'd failed them already by refusing to be a man they could believe in.
Megan Whalen Turner
#66. I had a pretty bad time when I was an undergraduate at Cornell University. I failed out of school. I was much, much heavier.
Victor LaValle
#67. Ah, that 'if.' But it's of no use to despond. I can but do that, when I have tried everything and failed, and even then it won't serve me much.
Charles Dickens
#68. I just assume that I'll fail at something for several years - that I'll try my hardest and still fail for several years. With writing, that turned out to be wrong. I tried my hardest and failed for about fifteen years.
Philipp Meyer
#69. I failed at the biggest things there are in life. I failed in my health, I failed in my marriage, I failed in everything, and I've picked myself up and gone on.
Sharon Stone
#70. I gambled and I lost. I failed in securing my options for this choice for myself, but I succeeded in verifying the Dark Age is still with us.
Jack Kevorkian
#71. I can officially state that my government and myself believe that all over Europe we need to open a debate on the 'drug question' in order to create more coherent and human policies with better perspectives ... The policy of criminalizing consumers has failed, creating many problems to our society.
George Papandreou
#72. I'd failed my first hooded box test at S&T, but the lesson learned wasn't one I'd forget. Assess, prioritize, and act.
Mark Owen
#73. I'd spent time with all those girls trying to find someone who outshone you, who I thought I could want more, and I failed. I felt hopeless.
Kiera Cass
#74. There will never again be a moment where I look at you and don't remember how amazing it feels to be inside you. Do you understand that my body is going to crave you every time I see you?" Gracelyn merely nodded. Her voice failed her.
Jessica Jayne
#75. No," Threepio responded, "I don't think he likes you at all." A second beep failed to alter the stern tone in the taller robot's voice. "No, I don't like you, either.
George Lucas
#76. I have tried 99 times and have failed, but on the 100th time came success.
Albert Einstein
#77. You believe you have failed. But you - created from dust - cannot see as I see.
R.J. Larson
#78. I hold, as an article of faith, that the worth of an organisation can be accurately measured as the reciprocal of how many Hollywood beautiful people it attracts. It has never failed me yet.
Barry Williams
#79. The moment of crisis had come, and I must face it. My old fears, my diffidence, my shyness, my hopeless sense of inferiority, must be conquered now and thrust aside. If I failed now I should fail forever.
Daphne Du Maurier
#80. It never pleases me to punish willful disobedience, Isabel. Having to punish you for that sort of thing means I've failed to communicate what it is I expect out of you. It means I'm failing you as a Dom if you don't understand what my wants and needs are, and I hate failing at anything.
Ella Dominguez
#81. Well," she said, "if I were the enemy commander, and our assault had failed three times, and I wanted to make a fourth, I don't think I'd attack with fewer men. But that's just me."
"Shut up, Loiosh."
"I beg your pardon?"
"Never mind. Private joke.
Steven Brust
#82. Of course you know this difference as well as I do, only you failed to draw from it the conclusions for the tactics in Western Europe, at least as far as I am able to judge from your works.
Herman Gorter
#83. I went to an audition for a Harry Belafonte Roaring Twenties special for choreographer Donald McKayle, but I failed.
Judith Jamison
#84. I would rather live a life with a hundred failed dreams created on my own terms, than one successful reality, created on the terms of another.
Thurman P. Banks Jr.
#85. And I knew then that I had failed. And I remembered that I had expected to fail.
Ta-Nehisi Coates
#86. I want you to go back to your memories and count the times you failed and then, count the times you broke through those barriers to win again.
Kenya Wright
#87. I had done one failed pilot. I remember, when it failed, I was like, 'Oh my God, how does someone survive this? That's it - that's the end of my career; it's over.'
John Krasinski
#88. I think failing is the best way to keep you grounded, curious, and humble. Success is dangerous because often you don't understand why you succeeded. You almost always know why you've failed. You have a lot of time to think about it.
Mark Pincus
#89. My life changed four months ago, and I utterly failed to understand that until just recently, and therefore ... I may have omitted to tell you that I love you." He took a breath. "That's all.
K.J. Charles
#90. People in the news media after I got caught said how could you have not caught this guy? He had 50 corrections in four years. That's a lot of corrections. Well what they failed to look at is how many stories there were and out of 700 plus stories, 50 corrections is not a high amount.
Jayson Blair
#91. Didn't i tell you they were only windmills? And someone with windmills on the brain could have failed to see that!
Miguel De Cervantes Saavedra
#92. I have disappointed and failed to live up to the standard I expected of myself.
Eliot Spitzer
#93. But when I failed, I convinced myself that the failures were evidence of the "real" me, and the successes were the "fake" me fooling people.
Megyn Kelly
#94. There are so many bad songs that have incredible videos. It's pretty amazing, actually. The power of putting images to music is hypnotizing. It's a real power. That's a realm that I've failed at completely.
Devendra Banhart
#95. Humans, I was discovering, believed they were in control of their own lives, and so they were in awe of questions and tests, as these made them feel like they had a certain mastery over other people, who had failed in their choices, and who had not worked hard enough on the right answers.
Matt Haig
#96. Don't be disgusting.
Don't dare me. I majored in disgusting at Gulag Community College. Lucrezia Borgia taught cooking, and Madame Defarge taught knitting. Emperor Nero taught violin and also led the cheerleading squad. I skipped all my classes and failed with distinction.
Gregory Maguire
#97. I'm a failed poet. Maybe every novelist wants to write poetry first, finds he can't, and then tries the short story, which is the most demanding form after poetry. And, failing at that, only then does he take up novel writing.
William Faulkner
#98. And I really wanted a driver's license. I was 43, had my learner's permit and had failed the test once already - but that was in Riverhead, on Long Island.
Suzanne Vega
#99. When a forty-minute swim in the Hendrix's underground pool failed to dispel either the longing for Miriam Bancroft's torrid company or the Merge Nine hangover, I did the only thing I felt equipped for. I ordered painkillers from room service, and went shopping.
Richard K. Morgan
#100. Everyone who feels stuck in the Obama economy is right to focus on the here and now. And I hope you understand this too, if you're feeling left out or passed by: You have not failed, your leaders have failed you.
Paul Ryan
