60 Inspiring Family Relationship Quotes

Nov. 21, 2024, 6:45 a.m.

60 Inspiring Family Relationship Quotes

In today's fast-paced world, where technology often overshadows genuine human connection, nurturing family relationships becomes more crucial than ever. Families are the bedrock of support, love, and shared memories, serving as the foundation upon which we build our lives. Whether it's gathering for a meal, celebrating milestones, or simply enjoying everyday moments together, the bonds we cherish within our families provide strength, comfort, and joy. To celebrate these timeless connections, we've compiled a selection of 60 inspiring quotes that capture the essence of family love and unity. Let these words remind you of the power and warmth found within those closest to your heart.

1. “I've learned that regardless of your relationship with your parents, you'll miss them when they're gone from your life.” - Maya Angelou

2. “Sundays too my father got up earlyand put his clothes on in the blueblack cold, then with cracked hands that achedfrom labor in the weekday weather madebanked fires blaze. No one ever thanked him.I'd wake and hear the cold splintering, breaking.When the rooms were warm, he'd call, and slowly I would rise and dress, fearing the chronic angers of that house, speaking indifferently to him, who had driven out the coldand polished my good shoes as well.What did I know, what did I knowof love's austere and lonely offices?” - Robert Hayden

3. “The more you love,the more love you have to give.It's the only feeling we have which is infinite...” - Christina Westover

4. “Why do you think, A.J.," they say in unison, "that you find these boys so attractive?" I didn't say that this fiery chemical explosion leaps from somewhere inside me. Parents don't want to hear these things. I shrugged and said nothing. "Maybe you should try sitting on the intensity," Mom suggests, "just until your feelings catch up with reality.""We could chain you to the water heater," Dad offers, "until these little moments pass."You see what I'm up against.” - Joan Bauer

5. “...Families are Forever, and wondered if the slogan was meant as a promise or a threat.” - Brady Udall

6. “She wanted to ask him why they were all strangers who shared the same last name.” - Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

7. “But marrying within one's own family can get monotonous. One has heard all the same family stories, knows all the jokes and all the same recipes. No novelty.” - Margaret George

8. “If she were alive today, she would be ashamed of me. I'm trying to change that.” - Eric Wilson

9. “Often the right path is the one that may be hardest for you to follow. But the hard path is also the one that will make you grow as a human being.” - Karen Mueller Coombs

10. “Which meant it was time for the centerpiece of the celebration, the reason they were all gathered on Saturday, the weekly episode of what, as far as many of the Davidsons including Jody were concerned was the greatest television show ever made. Hee Haw. While Roy and Buck sang the opening song, everyone would bicker and talk back and forth, what was better about the show, the music or the humor, what have you, the natural result of 40 people crowded around one rabbit eared television set. But once Hee Haw started, the talking was over. After that, it was all about the love. And so was everything before, really.” - Brian Holers

11. “I've remembered that most of life is about small, essential connections, so unobtrusive, so elastic, that you scarcely realize they're actually holding you together. The big ones-the great, grand emotional bonds-those are the ones that break, the ones that fail you, the ones that give way and send you careening toward the foot of the bleak and jagged canyon. It's the tough, gnarled, unadorned ties that really do bind, that never let you fall all the way down into darkness.” - Sharon Shinn

12. “Bad luck doesn't have any chinks in it," he said with deep bitterness. "I was born a son of a bitch and I'm going to die a son of a bitch.” - Gabriel Garcia Marquez

13. “Sarene finally released him, wiping her eyes, disappointed in herself for crying again. Kiin simply placed a large hand on her shoulder and led her into the dining room, where the rest of the family sat around the table, even Adien.Lukel had been talking animatedly, but he cut off as he saw Sarene. "Speak the name of the lion," he said, quoting a Jindoeese proverb, "and he will come to feast.” - Brandon Sanderson

14. “Your god, sir, is the World. In my eyes, you, too, if not an infidel, are an idolater. I conceive that you ignorantly worship: in all things you appear to me too superstitious. Sir, your god, your great Bel, your fish-tailed Dagon, rises before me as a demon. You, and such as you, have raised him to a throne, put on him a crown, given him a sceptre. Behold how hideously he governs! See him busied at the work he likes best -- making marriages. He binds the young to the old, the strong to the imbecile. He stretches out the arm of Mezentius and fetters the dead to the living. In his realm there is hatred -- secret hatred: there is disgust -- unspoken disgust: there is treachery -- family treachery: there is vice -- deep, deadly, domestic vice. In his dominions, children grow unloving between parents who have never loved: infants are nursed on deception from their very birth: they are reared in an atmosphere corrupt with lies ... All that surrounds him hastens to decay: all declines and degenerates under his sceptre. Your god is a masked Death.” - Charlotte Brontë

15. “...I’m sorry you grew up without me and that fatherly moments came second hand like clothing and toys from your brothers...” - S. Clifford

16. “Probably there is nothing in human nature more resonant with charges than the flow of energy between two biologically alike bodies, one of which has lain in amniotic bliss inside the other, one of which has labored to give birth to the other. The materials are here for the deepest mutuality and the most painful estrangement.” - Adrienne Rich

17. “It was the sibling thing, I suppose. I was fascinated by the intricate tangle of love and duty and resentment that tied them together. The glances they exchanged; the complicated balance of power established over decades; the games I would never play with rules I would never fully understand. And perhaps that was key: they were such a natural group that they made me feel remarkably singular by comparison. To watch them together was to know strongly, painfully, all that I'd been missing.” - Kate Morton

18. “Unfortunately, some family members are so psychotic that no matter how hard you try to forge a healthy relationship, nothing will help. Now that you're an adult, take refuge in the fact that some things are beyond your control. You owe it to yourself to steer clear of people who are harmful to your health.” - Andrea Lavinthal

19. “When I was about nine, my siblings and I fell out of our moving van at an intersection. My dad didn’t notice for about five blocks. It was back before seat belts. It was also back before parents used any sort of common sense whatsoever. It was a time when you didn’t raise your children. You just fed them and they got bigger.” - Dina Kucera

20. “There are millions of people out there who live this way, and their hearts are breaking just like mine. It’s okay to say, “My kid is a drug addict or alcoholic, and I still love them and I’m still proud of them.” Hold your head up and have a cappuccino. Take a trip. Hang your Christmas lights and hide colored eggs. Cry, laugh, then take a nap. And when we all get to the end of the road, I’m going to write a story that’s so happy it’s going to make your liver explode. It’s going to be a great day.” - Dina Kucera

21. “He trailed his eyes down over her beautiful breasts then told her, “You’re going to keep your mouth shut and I’m going togive you that Orgasm you asked for.” He thought for a moment she was going to tell him to get lost, but instead she leaned her head back against the wall and pushed her hips out toward him.” - Ella Frank

22. “He paused leaning over to lay his lips on hers, “It’s time to feel again. Let me save you from yourself. You were drowning when I found you, but I’m not letting you go, not without a fight.” He kissed her sweetly and moved back standing up and over her. Lena looked up at his out stretched hand.“Take my hand Lena.” He offered and she knew he meant it in a way that went far beyond offering to help her stand.” - Ella Frank

23. “I believe in fate and I believe you were supposed to walk into my life, so Mason could walk into yours.” - Ella Frank

24. “Rejection is an opportunity for your selection.” - Bernard Branson

25. “Life was good. Everything was going right. It was almost scaring him because usually when things were going this well it was the calm before the storm hit.” - Michelle Sutton

26. “Though I may accumulate a great deal of riches in this world, it is only my wealth of knowledge, talents, and emotional bonds that I keep when I leave.” - Richelle E. Goodrich

27. “I’d put more distance between us. Having us here, always together hasn’t allowed for any fondness to grow between us.” - Courtney Miller Santo

28. “Anyway, it was Oscar who called me to remind me that our nephew, Lydia's son Garnett, was turning eleven years old. Fuck my life. I hated that kid. He smelled like asparagus, and he sweated way too much for a healthy child; but then Garnett, given his propensity for biting teachers and catching chipmunks in the backyard only to bury them alive, was no normal kid. He was a case study for sociopathic behavior in the making. A walking, talking, farting, sweaty, odorous, chipmunk-burying cry for help.” - Richard J. O'Brien

29. “However hard and however long we love someone who has died, they can never love us back. At least that is how it feels...” - Rosamund Lupton

30. “Sometimes family is just not what you were born into.” - Chelesbells

31. “Hades," Kronos growled. "I hope you and the ladies have come to pledge your allegiance." "I'm afraid not." Hades sighed. "My son here convinced me that perhaps I should prioritize my list of enemies." He glanced at me with distaste. "As much as I dislike certainupstart demigods, it would not do for Olympus to fall. I would miss bickering with my siblings. And if there is one thing we agree on—it is that you were a TERRIBLE father.” - Rick Riordan

32. “This is how it essentially is for Bunny Junior. He loves his dad. He thinks there is no dad better, cleverer, or more capable, and he stands there beside him with a sense of pride — he's my dad — and he also, of course, stands beside him because he has nowhere else to go.” - Nick Cave

33. “What about Danny Thomas?" Uncle Hal asks. "What happened to him?"Dead," Uncle Abdelhafiz says. "Nice Lebanese boy.""Never mind about Danny Thomas, look what happened to your whole family! Look at your cousin Farouq, Great Uncle Ziad, Auntie Seena and Jimmy's son Jalal," Aunt Jean cuts in disapprovingly."Dead, dead, dead, and in jail.” - Diana Abu-Jaber

34. “You'd think family would be the one sure thing in life, the gimme? Points you got just for being born? So much thick, meaty stuff bound you to these people, so many interlocking spirals of history, genetics, common cause, and struggle that it should be the most basic of all drives, that you would strive to protect and love one another, yet this bond that should be the big no-brainer was in fact the hardest thing.” - Ben Fountain

35. “If you could figure out how to live with family then you'd gone a long way toward finding your peace.” - Ben Fountain

36. “Rose leaned against the bathroom door. Here it was — her real life, the truth of who she was, barreling down on her like a bus with bad brakes. Here was the truth — she wasn’t the kind of person Jim could fall in love with. She wasn’t what she’d made herself out to be — a cheerful, uncomplicated girl, a normal girl with a happy, orderly life, a girl who wore pretty shoes and had nothing more pressing on her mind that whether ER was a rerun this week. The truth was in the exercise tape she didn’t have time to unwrap, let alone exercise to; the truth was her hairy legs and ugly underwear. Most of all, the truth was her sister, her gorgeous, messed-up, fantastically unhappy and astoundingly irresponsible sister.” - Jennifer Weiner

37. “Ladies if A Man is More Invested and Concerned About Your Assets....He Is A Liability” - Mo Stegall From The Hand of Delilah

38. “The boughs, without becoming detached from the trunk grow away from it.” - Victor Hugo

39. “I could feel the hard part of Mom very strongly that time. It was like a stone in her that grew bigger every time my father lost his temper, right under her heart. Feeling the stone in her calmed me down. It told me that she would always be there for me.” - Kaimana Wolff

40. “Places are supposed to look smaller when you go back to them, but my road just looked schizoid. A couple of the houses had had nifty little makeovers involving double glazing and amusing faux-antique pastel paint; most of them hadn't. Number 16 looked like it was on its last legs: the roof was in tatters, there was a pile of bricks and a dead wheelbarrow by the front steps, and at some point in the last twenty years someone had set the door on fire. In Number 8, a window on the first floor was lit up, gold and cozy and dangerous as hell.” - Tana French

41. “the harsh truth of every relationship, even between those who love each other, like fathers and sons and daughters, or husbands and wives, is that the love is always unequal.” - Karl Taro Greenfeld

42. “That so many thousands of children around the world are available for adoption is a sign of our impoverished humanity. That so many persons around the world open their hearts and homes each year to embrace a few of these children is a lasting testimony to humanity's enduring nobility.” - Deborah A. Beasley

43. “A family is like medicine." She twisted her lips into a sardonic smile. "Best in small doses.” - Alexandra Ivy

44. “Do you enjoy holidays with your family? I don't mean your mom and dad family, but your uncle and aunt and cousin family? Personally, I do. There are several reasons for this. First, I am very interested and fascinated by how everyone loves each other, but no one really likes each other. Second, the fights are always the same.” - Stephen Chbosky

45. “But in that moment when my brother took the field, all that washed away, and everyone was proud... I looked up at my dad, and he was smiling. I looked at my mom, and she was smiling even though she was nervous about my brother getting hurt, which was strange because it was a VCR tape of an old game, and she knew he didn't get hurt.” - Stephen Chbosky

46. “Ian, man, I didna tell ye because I didna wish to lose you too. My brother was gone, and my father. I didna mean to lose my own heart's blood as well. For you are dearer to me even than home and family, love.'She cast a lopsided smile at Jamie. 'And that's saying quite a bit.” - Diana Gabaldon

47. “If we're to be judged by our parents and grandparents, then we all may as well impale ourselves upon jagged bits of rock.” - Kristin Cashore

48. “If our family was an airline, Mom was the hub and we were the spokes. You rarely went anywhere nonstop; you went via Mom, who directed the traffic flow and determined the priorities: which family member was cleared for takeoff or landing. Even my father was not immune to Mom's scheduling, though he was given more leeway than the rest of us.” - Will Schwalbe

49. “Comparing marriage to football is no insult. I come from the South where football is sacred. I would never belittle marriage by saying it is like soccer, bowling, or playing bridge, never. Those images would never work, only football is passionate enough to be compared to marriage. In other sports, players walk onto the field, in football they run onto the field, in high school ripping through some paper, in college (for those who are fortunate enough) they touch the rock and run down the hill onto the field in the middle of the band. In other sports, fans cheer, in football they scream. In other sports, players ‘high five’, in football they chest, smash shoulder pads, and pat your rear. Football is a passionate sport, and marriage is about passion. In football, two teams send players onto the field to determine which athletes will win and which will lose, in marriage two families send their representatives forward to see which family will survive and which family will be lost into oblivion with their traditions, patterns, and values lost and forgotten. Preparing for this struggle for survival, the bride and groom are each set up. Each has been led to believe that their family’s patterns are all ‘normal,’ and anyone who differs is dense, naïve, or stupid because, no matter what the issue, the way their family has always done it is the ‘right’ way. For the premarital bride and groom in their twenties, as soon as they say, “I do,” these ‘right’ ways of doing things are about to collide like two three hundred and fifty pound linemen at the hiking of the ball. From “I do” forward, if not before, every decision, every action, every goal will be like the line of scrimmage. Where will the family patterns collide?In the kitchen. Here the new couple will be faced with the difficult decision of “Where do the cereal bowls go?” Likely, one family’s is high, and the others is low. Where will they go now? In the bathroom. The bathroom is a battleground unmatched in the potential conflicts. Will the toilet paper roll over the top or underneath? Will the acceptable residing position for the lid be up or down? And, of course, what about the toothpaste? Squeeze it from the middle or the end? But the skirmishes don’t stop in the rooms of the house, they are not only locational they are seasonal. The classic battles come home for the holidays. Thanksgiving. Which family will they spend the noon meal with and which family, if close enough, will have to wait until the nighttime meal, or just dessert if at all? Christmas. Whose home will they visit first, if at all? How much money will they spend on gifts for his family? for hers? Then comes for many couples an even bigger challenge – children of their own! At the wedding, many couples take two candles and light just one often extinguishing their candle as a sign of devotion. The image is Biblical. The Bible is quoted a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one. What few prepare them for is the upcoming struggle, the conflict over the unanswered question: the two shall become one, but which one? Two families, two patterns, two ways of doing things, which family’s patterns will survive to play another day, in another generation, and which will be lost forever? Let the games begin.” - David W. Jones

50. “It may be that psychologists are off-base in their preoccupation with children’s need to feel that their father or some other parent loves them. It also seems valid to consider the child’s desire to feel that a parent actually likes them, as love itself is so automatic and preprogrammed in a parent that it isn’t a very good test of whatever it is that the typical child feels so anxious to pass the test of” - David Foster Wallace

51. “They say that time is relative. I think the way it's treating me it's a distant one, maybe a bad uncle, and not welcome in my house this Christmas!!” - Neil Leckman

52. “The debt we owe our parents can never be squared, and jolly good too, because doing so would threaten to nullify all relationship, all emotional commerce between the two generations. Being in debt, just like being in credit, means an active interest applies between the two parties and, once the debt is taken care of, the interest is bound to wane.” - Robert Rowland Smith

53. “Life is real, not ideal.” - Heather Muzik

54. “Family… that was my older sister Tiffany as well. My emotional spectrum for her covered everything from “my dearest sister, foundation of my heart and soul” up to “you fucking bitch, go and get run over by a train, please”. We had quite a normal sibling relationship, I assume.” - Hasimir Fenrig

55. “Speaking generally, however, when you interact with someone else, you are doing outer work (physical time, play time, connecting time) ... as many sociologists have pointed out, this area of life used to dominate everyday existence, at a time when families sat around the fire of an evening and ate every meal together. That's no longer true. Families today are often loose constellations. Contact is intermittent and rushed. everyone has their own space. Activity is scattered all around town, not confined to the home. Cars have made everyone mobile, but central heating may be the most powerful force in shaping modern society.” - Deepak Chopra

56. “When a woman once asked Joe how he could come from such a magnificent home and such a good family and still become a gangster, Joe's answer was two-pronged: (a) he wasn't a gangster, he was an outlaw; (b) he came from a magnificent house not a magnificent home.” - Dennis Lehane

57. “Every moment of our lives we make choices. Most we don’t even know we’re making, they’re so dull or routine or automatic. Some are beyond explanation—like my mom choosing Wyatt’s memory over Dad and me.” - Laura Anderson Kurk

58. “Sometimes, in the stillness of my room, my mom’s voice came to me, repeating things she’d said for months. Like, “My skin is melting off my face, isn’t it?” And, “My whole body feels dead from the crap they’re pouring into me. Do I look green to you?” And, “When I’m naked, I can see my heart beating.” - Laura Anderson Kurk

59. “As a young man I started searching for my own identity by looking into family, friends and insideMyself. My mother always taught us to live free even when confined, meaning “never let anyone break you down physically or mentally.” Since my living environment was so heavily impacted with violence and illegal activity I found myself adapting to social norms that later in my adult life would negatively affect me. For example, certain physical reactions that were acceptable, as a child would give you a reputation on the street as tough guy, don’t mess with him. The same mentality later in life, as a man would label you as a predator of some sort and a woman abuser. It was hard to understand the true value of a man and all his worth and everything he is capable of achieving, when you’re surrounded by pimps, hustlers and con men that all may make more money than the men with trade jobs and have more of an appealing lifestyle for the short- term progress.” - Rubin Scott

60. “And you, Mom. I loved you. You've asked if i felt and understood that you loved me. of course I did. And you know this. I loved your love because it kept me safe and happy and wanted, and it existed beyond words and hugs and eyes.” - Lisa Genova