35 Profound Sadness Quotes

In the intricate tapestry of human emotions, sadness holds a unique place. It's a feeling that touches us all at various points in our lives, a sentiment that connects us through shared experiences of loss, longing, and reflection. Whether it's the melancholy notes of a song, the poignant lines of a poem, or the somber scenes of a movie, expressions of sadness can strike a chord deep within us, reminding us of our humanity. In this post, we have gathered 35 profound sadness quotes that encapsulate these moments of vulnerability and heartache, offering both solace and a mirror to our own feelings. Join us as we delve into these poignant words that echo the quiet, often hidden corners of our hearts.

1. “I'll never wake up in a good mood again.I'm tired of these stinky boots” - Jim Morrison

2. “You cannot protect yourself from sadness without protecting yourself from happiness.” - Jonathan Safran Foer

3. “A tragedy need not have blood and death; it's enough that it all be filled with that majestic sadness that is the pleasure of tragedy.” - Jean Racine

4. “. . . owning a dog always ended with this sadness because dogs just don't live as long as people do.” - John Grogan

5. “Sadness is a vice.” - Gustave Flaubert

6. “No one's ever going to shag you if you cry all the time.” - Richard Kelly

7. “Have I thought long to see this morning’s face,And doth it give me such a sight as this?” - William Shakespeare

8. “The man walked past me and stopped, observing the blood running down my neck."Your injury. Let us tend to it." He looked out through the open doorway and silently gestured to someone out there. "Our world," he said, "is far more advanced than yours. For reasons you'll understand shortly."A thin, bony, naked woman entered the room, carrying two small, white kittens. She sat one of the fluffy cats in my lap and stuffed the other down my shirt. She turned and left."There," said the large man. "The kittens will make your sad go away.” - David Wong

9. “I don’t know what they are called, the spaces between seconds– but I think of you always in those intervals.” - Salvador Plascencia

10. “I want her back" I said "I want HIM back"~Charlie” - Ann M. Martin

11. “I was wishing I was invisible. Outside, the leaves were falling to the ground, and I was infinitely sad, sad down to my bones. I was sad for Phoebe and her parents and Prudence and Mike, sad for the leaves that were dying, and sad for myself, for something I had lost.” - Sharon Creech

12. “I can't eat and I can't sleep. I'm not doing well in terms of being a functional human, you know?” - Ned Vizzini

13. “[F]or grief is felt not so much for the want of what we have never known, as for the loss of that to which we have been long accustomed.” - Pericles

14. “I think most people are just trying to be happy, and that most of their actions, however misguided, are in line with that goal. Most people just want to feel they belong somewhere, want to be loved, and want to feel they're important to someone. If you really examine all the wrongheaded and messed-up things they do, they can most often be traced back to that basic desire. The abusers, the addicted, the cruel and unpleasant, the manipulators --these are just people who started this quest for happiness in the basement of their lives. Someone communicated to them through word or deed that they were undeserving, so they think they have to claw their way there over the backs of others, leaving scars and creating damage. Of course, they only create more misery for themselves and others.” - Lisa Unger

15. “Every single dayI find it hard to sayI could be yours aloneYou will see somedayThat all along the wayI was yours to hold.” - Skillet

16. “sad things are beautiful only from a distancetherefore you just want to get away from themfrom a distance of one hundred and thirty years ....i'm going to distance myself until the world is beautiful” - Tao Lin

17. “She laughed so easily when she was happy. But also when she was sad.” - Janet Fitch

18. “too much happiness always overflowed into tears of sorrow.” - Amy Tan

19. “that was bad; i shouldn't have done thatto prevent you from entering a catatonic statei am going to maintain a calm facial expressionwith crinkly eyes and an overall friendly demeanori believe in a human being that is not upseti believe if you are working i should not be insaneor upset--why am i ever insane or upset and not working?i vacuumed the entire house this morningi cleaned the kitchen and the computer roomand i made you a meat helmet with computer paperthe opportunity for change exists in each moment, all moments are aloneand separate from other moments, and there are a limited number of momentsand the idea of change is a delusion of positive or negative thinkingyour hands are covering your faceand your body moves like a statuewhen i try to manipulate an appendageif i could just get you to cry tears of joy one more time” - Tao Lin

20. “Someday, beyond the clouds and all the world's wrongs, there will be love, compassion and justice, and we shall all understand.” - Flavia Weedn

21. “He hugged her tight, mixing their tears to be bottled and fermented, so they could be drunk on each other when this was all over.” - Pete Wentz

22. “I know the difference between sadness and depression. Clinical depression has no source from which it springs-it just is. Intractable sadness has nothing to do with synapses, or brain chemistry, or essential salts, it's born of something. It's the product of injustice and helplessness. It can be anesthetized, I suppose, but it's there, unaltered, when the medication wears off, like an intruder who has broken into your house and is still there every morning when you wake up.Given the choice, I would rather be depressed. I've come back from depression.” - Ka Hancock

23. “The place in her, though, where her tears should have come from, was rough and dry. No, she didn't find any tears in herself to cry for the storyteller.The storyteller didn't exist anymore.” - Antonia Michaelis

24. “Crying out loud but there is no one to regret it ,Smile a little and they'll join the party” - Naim Ibn Iqbal Khan نعيم خا

25. “A tear rolled down my cheekAnd more came downUntil tears rolled down like a stream.My eyes were blind with tears for you.They washed my eyes till I could see.” - Calvin O'John

26. “A whole tree of lightning stood in the sky. She kept looking out the window, suffused with the warmth from the fire and with the pity and beauty and power of her death. The thunder rolled.” - Eudora Welty

27. “I'm always telling myself I don't have many feelings. Even when something does affect me I'm only moderately moved. I almost never cry. It's not that I'm stronger than the ones with teary eyes, I'm weaker. They have courage. When all you are is skin and bones, feelings are a brave thing. I'm more of a coward. The difference is minimal though, I just use my strength not to cry. When I do allow myself a feeling, I take the part that hurts and bandage it up with a story that doesn't cry, that doesn't dwell on homesickness.” - Herta Müller

28. “She has failed. She wishes she didn't mind. Something, she thinks, is wrong with her.” - Michael Cunningham

29. “In other words, I was a moderately happy penguin who was occasionally attacked by sadness.” - Takuji Ichikawa

30. “Like love, mourning affects the world—and the worldly—with unreality, with importunity. I resist the world, I suffer from what it demands of me, from its demands. The world increases my sadness, my dryness, my confusion, my irritation, etc. The world depresses me.” - Roland Barthes

31. “She has been surprised by grief, its constancy, its immediacy, its unrelenting physical pain.” - Michelle Latiolais

32. “My heart was in a perpetual state of sadness and the only relief I could find were in those cathartic cries. I lived a fragile existence.” - Fisher Amelie

33. “She looked at me with those empty eyes, and I thought, I'm going to make sure I fill them up with something.” - Cath Crowley

34. “The next morning I told Mom I couldn't go to school again. She asked what was wrong. I told her, “The same thing that’s always wrong.” “You’re sick?” “I'm sad.” “About Dad?” “About everything.” She sat down on the bed next to me, even though I knew she was in a hurry. “What's everything?” I started counting on my fingers: “The meat and dairy products in our refrigerator, fistfights, car accidents, Larry–” “Who's Larry?” “The homeless guy in front of the Museum of Natural History who always says ‘I promise it’s for food’ after he asks for money.” She turned around and I zipped her dress while I kept counting. “How you don’t know who Larry is, even though you probably see him all the time, how Buckminster just sleeps and eats and goes to the bathroom and has no ‘raison d’etre’, the short ugly guy with no neck who takes tickets at the IMAX theater, how the sun is going to explode one day, how every birthday I always get at least one thing I already have, poor people who get fat because they eat junk food because it’s cheaper…” That was when I ran out of fingers, but my list was just getting started, and I wanted it to be long, because I knew she wouldn't leave while I was still going. “…domesticated animals, how I have a domesticated animal, nightmares, Microsoft Windows, old people who sit around all day because no one remembers to spend time with them and they’re embarrassed to ask people to spend time with them, secrets, dial phones, how Chinese waitresses smile even when there’s nothing funny or happy, and also how Chinese people own Mexican restaurants but Mexican people never own Chinese restaurants, mirrors, tape decks, my unpopularity in school, Grandma’s coupons, storage facilities, people who don’t know what the Internet is, bad handwriting, beautiful songs, how there won’t be humans in fifty years–” “Who said there won't be humans in fifty years?” I asked her, “Are you an optimist or a pessimist?” She looked at her watch and said, “I'm optimistic.” “Then I have some bed news for you, because humans are going to destroy each other as soon as it becomes easy enough to, which will be very soon.” “Why do beautiful songs make you sad?” “Because they aren't true.” “Never?” “Nothing is beautiful and true.” - Jonathan Safran Foer

35. “There’s always been sadness hidden at the core of Hitch, but it’s never been big enough to taste. Occasionally, I’d get a whiff of it, salty on the wind, but it never pressed in between us like it does now, threatening to drown us both.” - Stacey Jay