Jonathan Franzen Quotes

It wasn’t so much that I was positive. I just wasn’t fully subscribing to such a negative way of thinking anymore.

Life is going by. Don't waste a minute being negative, offended, or bitter. Choose to be happy.

It's easy to be negative.

I don't run around feeling infused with positivity, but I'll have to be taking my last breath before I'll admit I'm dying. So I'm either optimistic or in denial.

Quentin Crisp said it to me; now I say it to you: say yes to everything.

I want no part of making any contribution whatsoever to the despair which eventually follows downbeat thinking.

I'm not cynical.

Pessimism of the spirit; optimism of the will.

Do not let yourself be tainted with a barren skepticism.

I am not a big fan of positive thinking. The term suggests that there is something negative that you have to counteract by being positive. That is an artificial duality.

Being positive is like going up a mountain. Being negative is like sliding down a hill. A lot of times, people want to take the easy way out, because it's basically what they've understood throughout their lives.

The optimist proclaims that we live in the best of all possible worlds; and the pessimist fears this is true.

Some people only look at the good stuff and some people only look at the bad stuff.

I'm always fighting the cup-is-half-empty way of being, versus the cup-is-half-full. I'm always fighting the pessimistic versus the positive.

Nobody can ever say that being negative ever helped them at all - not in any way.

I always focus on the negatives.

Regrets are ridiculous, so I don’t regret, no.

I don't do that kind of negativity. If you put your energy into thinking about how much the fall would hurt, you're already halfway down.

Those who believe they can't repel the positive; they use the negative side of their talisman. Those who believe they can repel the negative; they use the positive side.

I am guilty of the great crime of optimism.

People think it’s easy to be cynical and pessimistic, but it’s incredibly hard work. It’s much easier to be hopeful.

I usually don't get too bogged down with my personal problems because that's a one-way street if you get yourself into a negative frame of mind and only see the dark side of life.

A healthy person goes 'Yes,' 'No,' and 'Whoopee!' An unhealthy person goes 'Yes, but,' 'No, but,' and 'No whoopee.

I don't really have the luxury to be bitter. I don't have the luxury of having negative things in my life.

Ours is a bad, bad world, but does that mean nothing's good? Does it mean we have run out of things for which to be grateful? No, no, a thousand times, no!