How many times have you tried to talk to someone about something that matters to you, tried to get them to see it the way you do? And how many of those times have ended with you feeling bitter, resenting them for making you feel like your pain doesn't have any substance after all? Like when you've split up with someone, and you try to communicate the way you feel, because you need to say the words, need to feel that somebody understands just how pissed off and frightened you feel. The problem is, they never do. "Plenty more fish in the sea, " they'll say, or "You're better off without them, " or "Do you want some of these potato chips?" They never really understand, because they haven't been there, every day, every hour. They don't know the way things have been, the way that it's made you, the way it has structured your world. They'll never realise that someone who makes you feel bad may be the person you need most in the world. They don't understand the history, the background, don't know the pillars of memory that hold you up. Ultimately, they don't know you well enough, and they never can. Everyone's alone in their world, because everybody's life is different. You can send people letters, and show them photos, but they can never come to visit where you live. Unless you love them. And then they can burn it down. Michael Marshall Smith
About This Quote

When we love someone and want to make them happy, we often try to make them understand the reasons why we feel the way we do. We may even offer our own experience or knowledge to back up our point of view. But in trying to make someone listen to another point of view, we often encounter resistance. This can be frustrating because it can be difficult for someone who is in pain to hear the realities of how the person's life has been structured. We all know that there are things that are beyond our control, but that doesn't mean that they don't hurt when they happen.

Source: Only Forward

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More Quotes By Michael Marshall Smith
  1. For women, the best aphrodisiacs are words. The G-spot is in the ears. He who looks for it below there is wasting his time.
  2. Silence before being born, silence after death: life is nothing but noise between two unfathomable silences.
  3. You can't find someone who doesn't want to be found.
  4. How many times have I told you not to believe everything you hear? Seek truth for yourself.
  5. Just as when we come into the world, when we die we are afraid of the unknown. But the fear is something from within us that has nothing to do with reality. Dying is like being born: just a change.
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