“We've put more effort into helping folks reach old age than into helping them enjoy it.”
Growing older changes how we see everything — time, love, ambition, regret. These quotes capture the full arc of aging, from the stubborn optimism of youth to the hard-earned clarity that only comes with years behind you. Whether you are twenty and curious or eighty and reflective, there is something here that will land.
“Legend: A lie that has attained the dignity of age.”
“We've put more effort into helping folks reach old age than into helping them enjoy it.”
“There probably aren't a lot of actors my age who tap dance.”
“Your body actually reminds you about your age and your injuries - the body has a stronger memory than your mind.”
“Rashness belongs to youth prudence to old age.”
“Men are like wine - some turn to vinegar, but the best improve with age.”
“I am firmly of the opinion that women who make a lot of effort to hang onto their looks in middle age (unless they are beauties, entertainers or prostitutes) are rather sad, as one should surely have something more substantial to recommend one by this time, such as kindness or cleverness.”
“Age is just a number. It's totally irrelevant unless, of course, you happen to be a bottle of wine.”
“I always looked really young for my age. And once I hit 23, 24 and 25, I was then allowed to play the cool 18-year-olds and stuff.”
“People tend to become more emotionally intelligent as they age and mature.”
“As winter strips the leaves from around us, so that we may see the distant regions they formerly concealed, so old age takes away our enjoyments only to enlarge the prospect of the coming eternity.”
“I never took guitar lessons. I took classical piano lessons from the age of six when we lived in Holland. And when we moved to America, it was just the typical thing except I was really good at it so was my brother.”
“My husband gave me a necklace. It's fake. I requested fake. Maybe I'm paranoid, but in this day and age, I don't want something around my neck that's worth more than my head.”
“The freethinking of one age is the common sense of the next.”
“I wanted to be a teacher. I love children, so I wanted to deal with children. Then I wanted to be a veterinarian. But by the age of ten or eleven, when I opened my mouth and said, 'Oh, God, what's this?' I kind of knew teaching and being a veterinarian were gonna have to wait.”
“Our Age of Anxiety is, in great part, the result of trying to do today's job with yesterday's tools and yesterday's concepts.”