Sarah Dessen Quotes

I don't know anybody's road who's been paved perfectly for them, there are no manuals, you don't know what life has in store for you.

Like everybody, I'm making up my life as I go along.

I don't know what my path is yet. I'm just walking on it.

I moved to New York when I was 17 and I had no idea what I was doing. I really thought I was going to take that city by storm and it taught me a lot; it was like the school of life. For me, it was like a series of really hilarious experiences in New York with getting jobs and getting fired.

When you're in your early 20s, you go ahead and do everything. And it's very hard to judge yourself.

I'm at the transition place myself, still playing high school girls but moving to a stage when I'm playing older roles and going to the places of stillness and wisdom and knowledge and weight. It's exciting and scary.

If I could write a letter to my teenage self, I'd probably say something like: 'You ain't gonna believe what will become of you.'

Live your questions now, and perhaps even without knowing it, you will live along some distant day into your answers.

Everybody has a different journey. Everybody has a different path, and you don't really know what to expect. All you know is to just keep plugging away, and you hope something will come through and something will happen.

I just did in my early twenties what most did when they were teenagers, being free and exploring and making mistakes, but I did it in France. I did it privately.

I'm 80 years old, and I don't know what I'm going to be when I grow up.

I'm so thankful for that struggling period. That time is really great where you have no idea what's going to happen.

But it's a journey and the sad thing is you only learn from experience, so as much as someone can tell you things, you have to go out there and make your own mistakes in order to learn.

Sometimes I think back to everything I've been through, and I wonder, 'Man, how the hell did I get here?'

I feel like I'm exactly where I'm supposed to be, which is both settling and terrifying. The roller coaster is going, and there is no jumping off at this point unless I just go nuclear. It's a really interesting part of the whole journey.

I was always in a big hurry to do everything. Before I was 20, I was married twice and had two kids. But I don't regret any of it. I learned a lot about myself. I had a lot to say for someone my age, real early on.

When I think back on it, it's amazing what happens to us as we move out into the world.

Life doesn't come with an instruction manual.

Sometimes life is so crazy, you have to go through something to be able to find out what you're supposed to talk about next, and I think that's what happened to me.

Life flies by, and it's easy to get lost in the blur. In adolescence, it's 'How do I fit in?' In your 20s, it's 'What do I want to do?' In your 30s, 'Is this what I'm meant to do?' I think the trick is living the questions. Not worrying so much about what's ahead but rather sitting in the grey area - being OK with where you are.

It's all part of my journey - I've done a lot of stupid things, but you learn by your mistakes.

You don't reach points in life at which everything is sorted out for us. I believe in endings that should suggest our stories always continue.

My path has not been determined. I shall have more experiences and pass many more milestones.

Life is an aggregate of experience, which continually surprises us.

I liked being a teenager, but I would not go back for all the tea in China.