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Top 90 Charles Yu Quotes (2024 Update)

Charles Yu Quote: “If I could be half the person my dog is, I’d be twice the human I am.”

1. “If I could be half the person my dog is, I’d be twice the human I am.”

Charles Yu Quote: “This is what you have to ask yourself: Do you want to be good, or just seem good? Do you want to be good to yourself and others? Do you care about other people, always, sometimes, never? Or only when convenient? What kind of person do you want to be?”

2. “This is what you have to ask yourself: Do you want to be good, or just seem good? Do you want to be good to yourself and others? Do you care about other people, always, sometimes, never? Or only when convenient? What kind of person do you want to be?”

Charles Yu Quote: “Life is, to some extent, an extended dialogue with your future self about how exactly you are going to let yourself down over the coming years.”

3. “Life is, to some extent, an extended dialogue with your future self about how exactly you are going to let yourself down over the coming years.”

Charles Yu Quote: “Worry was my mother’s mechanic, her mechanism for engaging with the machinery of living. Worry was an anchor for her, a hook, something to clutch on to in the world. Worry was a box to live inside of, worry a mechanism for evading the present, for re-creating the past, for dealing with the future.”

4. “Worry was my mother’s mechanic, her mechanism for engaging with the machinery of living. Worry was an anchor for her, a hook, something to clutch on to in the world. Worry was a box to live inside of, worry a mechanism for evading the present, for re-creating the past, for dealing with the future.”

Charles Yu Quote: “For the past several years, I have gone to sleep every night in this same little pocket, the most uneventful piece of time I could find. Same exact thing every night, night after night. Total silence. Absolutely nothing. That’s why I chose it. I know for a fact nothing bad can happen to me in here.”

5. “For the past several years, I have gone to sleep every night in this same little pocket, the most uneventful piece of time I could find. Same exact thing every night, night after night. Total silence. Absolutely nothing. That’s why I chose it. I know for a fact nothing bad can happen to me in here.”

Charles Yu Quote: “You haven’t experienced awkwardness until you’ve seen a three-million-dollar piece of software cry.”

6. “You haven’t experienced awkwardness until you’ve seen a three-million-dollar piece of software cry.”

Charles Yu Quote: “But at the same time, I’m guilty, too. Guilty of playing this role. Letting it define me. Internalizing the role so completely that I’ve lost track of where reality starts and the performance begins. And letting that define how I see other people. I’m as guilty of it as anyone. Fetishizing Black people and their coolness. Romanticizing White women. Wishing I were a White man. Putting myself into this category.”

7. “But at the same time, I’m guilty, too. Guilty of playing this role. Letting it define me. Internalizing the role so completely that I’ve lost track of where reality starts and the performance begins. And letting that define how I see other people. I’m as guilty of it as anyone. Fetishizing Black people and their coolness. Romanticizing White women. Wishing I were a White man. Putting myself into this category.”

Charles Yu Quote: “How do you convince someone to change, to stop being afraid of himself? How do you convince yourself not to be so scared all the time?”

8. “How do you convince someone to change, to stop being afraid of himself? How do you convince yourself not to be so scared all the time?”

Charles Yu Quote: “You’re here, supposedly, in a new land full of opportunity, but somehow have gotten trapped in a pretend version of the old country.”

9. “You’re here, supposedly, in a new land full of opportunity, but somehow have gotten trapped in a pretend version of the old country.”

Charles Yu Quote: “You came here, your parents and their parents and their parents, and you always seem to have just arrived and yet never seem to have actually arrived.”

10. “You came here, your parents and their parents and their parents, and you always seem to have just arrived and yet never seem to have actually arrived.”

Charles Yu Quote: “Enjoy the elastic present, which can accommodate as little or as much as you want to put in there. Stretch it out, live inside of it.”

11. “Enjoy the elastic present, which can accommodate as little or as much as you want to put in there. Stretch it out, live inside of it.”

Charles Yu Quote: “Black and White always look good. A lot of it has to do with the lighting, designed to hit their faces just right. Someday you want the light to hit your face like that. To look like the hero. Or for a moment to actually be the hero.”

12. “Black and White always look good. A lot of it has to do with the lighting, designed to hit their faces just right. Someday you want the light to hit your face like that. To look like the hero. Or for a moment to actually be the hero.”

Charles Yu Quote: “As, everyone knows, water hates poor people. Given the opportunity, water will always find a way to make poor people miserable, typically at the worst time possible.”

13. “As, everyone knows, water hates poor people. Given the opportunity, water will always find a way to make poor people miserable, typically at the worst time possible.”

Charles Yu Quote: “Unofficially, we understood. There was a ceiling. Always had been, always would be. Even for him. Even for our hero, there were limits to the dream of assimilation, to how far any of you could make your way into the world of Black and White.”

14. “Unofficially, we understood. There was a ceiling. Always had been, always would be. Even for him. Even for our hero, there were limits to the dream of assimilation, to how far any of you could make your way into the world of Black and White.”

Charles Yu Quote: “This is it. The root of it all. The real history of yellow people in America. Two hundred years of being perpetual foreigners.”

15. “This is it. The root of it all. The real history of yellow people in America. Two hundred years of being perpetual foreigners.”

Charles Yu Quote: “At some point in your life, this statement will be true: tomorrow you will lose everything forever.”

16. “At some point in your life, this statement will be true: tomorrow you will lose everything forever.”

Charles Yu Quote: “Whatever the reason, first place was always Solo, always, always, always, and second place was usually Chewbacca, because if you weren’t the one saving the galaxy, you might as well be eight feet tall and covered with hair.”

17. “Whatever the reason, first place was always Solo, always, always, always, and second place was usually Chewbacca, because if you weren’t the one saving the galaxy, you might as well be eight feet tall and covered with hair.”

Charles Yu Quote: “Sometimes when I’m brushing my teeth, I’ll look at the mirror and I swear my reflection seems kind of disappointed. I realized a couple of years ago that not only am I not super-skilled at anything, I’m not even particularly good at being myself.”

18. “Sometimes when I’m brushing my teeth, I’ll look at the mirror and I swear my reflection seems kind of disappointed. I realized a couple of years ago that not only am I not super-skilled at anything, I’m not even particularly good at being myself.”

Charles Yu Quote: “I don’t miss him anymore. Most of the time, anyway. I want to. I wish I could but unfortunately, it’s true: time does heal. It will do so whether you like it or not, and there’s nothing anyone can do about it. If you’re not careful, time will take away everything that ever hurt you, everything you have lost, and replace it with knowledge. Time is a machine: it will convert your pain into experience... It will force you to move on and you will not have a choice in the matter.”

19. “I don’t miss him anymore. Most of the time, anyway. I want to. I wish I could but unfortunately, it’s true: time does heal. It will do so whether you like it or not, and there’s nothing anyone can do about it. If you’re not careful, time will take away everything that ever hurt you, everything you have lost, and replace it with knowledge. Time is a machine: it will convert your pain into experience... It will force you to move on and you will not have a choice in the matter.”

Charles Yu Quote: “Once that gets going, doors start opening until they’re all open, the whole building buzzing until sunrise, as if nothing matters because nothing does matter because the idea was you came here, your parents and their parents and their parents, and you always seem to have just arrived and yet never seem to have actually arrived. You’re here, supposedly, in a new land full of opportunity, but somehow have gotten trapped in a pretend version of the old country.”

20. “Once that gets going, doors start opening until they’re all open, the whole building buzzing until sunrise, as if nothing matters because nothing does matter because the idea was you came here, your parents and their parents and their parents, and you always seem to have just arrived and yet never seem to have actually arrived. You’re here, supposedly, in a new land full of opportunity, but somehow have gotten trapped in a pretend version of the old country.”

Charles Yu Quote: “Desire is suffering. A simple equation, and a nice catchphrase. But flipped around, it is more troubling: suffering is desire.”

21. “Desire is suffering. A simple equation, and a nice catchphrase. But flipped around, it is more troubling: suffering is desire.”

Charles Yu Quote: “You want to tell a story? Grow a heart. Grow two. Now, with the second heart, smash the first one into bits.”

22. “You want to tell a story? Grow a heart. Grow two. Now, with the second heart, smash the first one into bits.”

Charles Yu Quote: “We break ourselves up into parts. To lie to ourselves, to hide things from ourselves. You are not you. You are not what you think you are. You are bigger than you think. More complicated than you think...”

23. “We break ourselves up into parts. To lie to ourselves, to hide things from ourselves. You are not you. You are not what you think you are. You are bigger than you think. More complicated than you think...”

Charles Yu Quote: “The path of a man’s life is straight, straight, straight, until the moment when it isn’t anymore, and after that it begins to meander around aimlessly, and then get tangled, and then at some point the path gets so confusing that the man’s ability to move around in time, his device for conveyance, his memory of what he loves, the engine that moves him forward, it can break, and he can get permanently stuck in his own history.”

24. “The path of a man’s life is straight, straight, straight, until the moment when it isn’t anymore, and after that it begins to meander around aimlessly, and then get tangled, and then at some point the path gets so confusing that the man’s ability to move around in time, his device for conveyance, his memory of what he loves, the engine that moves him forward, it can break, and he can get permanently stuck in his own history.”

Charles Yu Quote: “He’s asking to be treated like an American. A real American. Because, honestly, when you think American, what color do you see? White? Black?”

25. “He’s asking to be treated like an American. A real American. Because, honestly, when you think American, what color do you see? White? Black?”

Charles Yu Quote: “Ever catch yourself in the middle of saying something you know you’ll regret? Something so mean you know you should stop immediately but some part of your brain kicks in and won’t let you stop?”

26. “Ever catch yourself in the middle of saying something you know you’ll regret? Something so mean you know you should stop immediately but some part of your brain kicks in and won’t let you stop?”

Charles Yu Quote: “What is it about an Asian Man that makes him so hard to assimilate?”

27. “What is it about an Asian Man that makes him so hard to assimilate?”

Charles Yu Quote: “This is the dream. Sustainable employment. Some semblance of work-life balance. Talk white. Not a lot. Get contact lenses. Smile. They will assume you’re smart. The less you say, the better. Try to project: Responsible, Harmless.”

28. “This is the dream. Sustainable employment. Some semblance of work-life balance. Talk white. Not a lot. Get contact lenses. Smile. They will assume you’re smart. The less you say, the better. Try to project: Responsible, Harmless.”

Charles Yu Quote: “Sometimes at night I worry about TAMMY. I worry that she might get tired of it all. Tired of running at sixty-six terahertz, tired of all those processing cycles, every second of every hour of every day. I worry that one of these cycles she might just halt her own subroutine and commit software suicide. And then I would have to do an error report, and I don’t know how I would even begin to explain that to Microsoft.”

29. “Sometimes at night I worry about TAMMY. I worry that she might get tired of it all. Tired of running at sixty-six terahertz, tired of all those processing cycles, every second of every hour of every day. I worry that one of these cycles she might just halt her own subroutine and commit software suicide. And then I would have to do an error report, and I don’t know how I would even begin to explain that to Microsoft.”

Charles Yu Quote: “And you think: no. It won’t be somewhere else. It will be here, again, in Chinatown, next year, same place. To be yellow in America. A special guest star, forever the guest.”

30. “And you think: no. It won’t be somewhere else. It will be here, again, in Chinatown, next year, same place. To be yellow in America. A special guest star, forever the guest.”

Charles Yu Quote: “I was headed for an entire life spent alone, pitying myself for not being more, ignoring all those people who actually ask me to be more, because they see it in me.”

31. “I was headed for an entire life spent alone, pitying myself for not being more, ignoring all those people who actually ask me to be more, because they see it in me.”

Charles Yu Quote: “Within a science fictional space, memory and regret are, when taken together, the set of necessary and sufficient elements required to produce a time machine.”

32. “Within a science fictional space, memory and regret are, when taken together, the set of necessary and sufficient elements required to produce a time machine.”

Charles Yu Quote: “You wish your face was more – more, something. You don’t know what. Maybe not more. Less. Less flat. Less delicate. More rugged. Your jawline more defined. This face that feels like a mask, that has never felt quite right on you. That reminds you, at odd times, and often after two to four drinks, that you’re Asian. You are Asian! Your brain forgets sometimes. But then your face reminds you.”

33. “You wish your face was more – more, something. You don’t know what. Maybe not more. Less. Less flat. Less delicate. More rugged. Your jawline more defined. This face that feels like a mask, that has never felt quite right on you. That reminds you, at odd times, and often after two to four drinks, that you’re Asian. You are Asian! Your brain forgets sometimes. But then your face reminds you.”

Charles Yu Quote: “This, then, is my choice: I can allow the events of my life to happen to me. Or I can take those very same actions and make them my own. I can live in my own present, risk failure, be assured of failure.”

34. “This, then, is my choice: I can allow the events of my life to happen to me. Or I can take those very same actions and make them my own. I can live in my own present, risk failure, be assured of failure.”

Charles Yu Quote: “Maybe we spend most of our decades being someone else, avoiding ourselves, maybe a man is only himself, his true self, for a few days in his entire life.”

35. “Maybe we spend most of our decades being someone else, avoiding ourselves, maybe a man is only himself, his true self, for a few days in his entire life.”

Charles Yu Quote: “Sadness was the driver, the motor of his invention, the engine of his creativity.”

36. “Sadness was the driver, the motor of his invention, the engine of his creativity.”

Charles Yu Quote: “All of her heart, a meaningless phrase, but correct and precise, too. She used her heart to love him, not her head, and not her words and not her thoughts or ideas or feelings or any other vehicle or object or device people use to deliver love or love-like things.”

37. “All of her heart, a meaningless phrase, but correct and precise, too. She used her heart to love him, not her head, and not her words and not her thoughts or ideas or feelings or any other vehicle or object or device people use to deliver love or love-like things.”

Charles Yu Quote: “On the worst days, I feel fine. On the best days, I know I am not.”

38. “On the worst days, I feel fine. On the best days, I know I am not.”

Charles Yu Quote: “How many times have I failed before? How many times have I stood here like this, in front of my own image, in front of my own person, trying to convince him not to be scared, to go on, to get out of this rut? How many times before I finally convince myself, how many private, erasable deaths will I need to die, how may self-murders is it going to take, how many times will I have to destroy myself before I learn, before I understand?”

39. “How many times have I failed before? How many times have I stood here like this, in front of my own image, in front of my own person, trying to convince him not to be scared, to go on, to get out of this rut? How many times before I finally convince myself, how many private, erasable deaths will I need to die, how may self-murders is it going to take, how many times will I have to destroy myself before I learn, before I understand?”

Charles Yu Quote: “Time is a machine: it will convert your pain into experience. Raw data will be compiled, will be translated into a more comprehensible language. The individual events of your life will be transmuted into another substance called memory and in the mechanism something will be lost and you will never be able to reverse it, you will never again have the original moment back in its uncategorized, unprocessed state. It will force you to move on and you will not have a choice in the matter.”

40. “Time is a machine: it will convert your pain into experience. Raw data will be compiled, will be translated into a more comprehensible language. The individual events of your life will be transmuted into another substance called memory and in the mechanism something will be lost and you will never be able to reverse it, you will never again have the original moment back in its uncategorized, unprocessed state. It will force you to move on and you will not have a choice in the matter.”

Charles Yu Quote: “I am transcribing a book that I have, in a sense, not yet written, and in another sense, have always written, and in another sense, am currently writing, and in another sense, am always writing, and in another sense, will never write.”

41. “I am transcribing a book that I have, in a sense, not yet written, and in another sense, have always written, and in another sense, am currently writing, and in another sense, am always writing, and in another sense, will never write.”

Charles Yu Quote: “Her love for him is not something that can be changed – it’s physics, not emotion: It’s the exact weight of radium. It is vast and it is exact. It is tender and finite and inexhaustible. Her love for him is a fact. Her love for him is a brutal fact about the world.”

42. “Her love for him is not something that can be changed – it’s physics, not emotion: It’s the exact weight of radium. It is vast and it is exact. It is tender and finite and inexhaustible. Her love for him is a fact. Her love for him is a brutal fact about the world.”

Charles Yu Quote: “Most people I know live their lives moving in a constant forward direction, the whole time looking backward.”

43. “Most people I know live their lives moving in a constant forward direction, the whole time looking backward.”

Charles Yu Quote: “The thing about building a castle in the air is it’s easy. You build up. It’s like a little ladder, then you start building a castle in the air. Then, you destroy the ladder. And your castle is floating.”

44. “The thing about building a castle in the air is it’s easy. You build up. It’s like a little ladder, then you start building a castle in the air. Then, you destroy the ladder. And your castle is floating.”

Charles Yu Quote: “Ever since you were a boy, you’ve dreamt of being Kung Fu Guy.”

45. “Ever since you were a boy, you’ve dreamt of being Kung Fu Guy.”

Charles Yu Quote: “It’s like all technology: either not powerful enough or too powerful. It will never do exactly what you want it to do.”

46. “It’s like all technology: either not powerful enough or too powerful. It will never do exactly what you want it to do.”

Charles Yu Quote: “You can only go to places that you will let yourself go.”

47. “You can only go to places that you will let yourself go.”

Charles Yu Quote: “As everyone knows, water hates poor people.”

48. “As everyone knows, water hates poor people.”

Charles Yu Quote: “My father built a time machine and then he spent his whole life trying to figure out how to use it to get more time. He spent all the time he had with us thinking about how he wished he had more time, if he could only have more time.”

49. “My father built a time machine and then he spent his whole life trying to figure out how to use it to get more time. He spent all the time he had with us thinking about how he wished he had more time, if he could only have more time.”

Charles Yu Quote: “I can see how I am always in perpetual motion through time, how I can never stop, obsessed with the past, projecting myself into the future, clutching at and always failing to grasp the wisp of now.”

50. “I can see how I am always in perpetual motion through time, how I can never stop, obsessed with the past, projecting myself into the future, clutching at and always failing to grasp the wisp of now.”

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