Top 200 Lisa See Quotes (2025 Update)
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51. “I’d never waste the hours of light in the darkness of slumber.”

— Lisa See

52. “If you work hard, you will eat easy. If you work easy, you will eat hard.”

— Lisa See

53. “I think all women have a friend who at some point dumped them or betrayed them or deeply disappointed them. And at the same time all women have a friend who they dumped or betrayed or hurt in some way. That’s universal in women’s friendships.”

— Lisa See

54. “For a tree that has many branches, even a small breeze will shake some loose.”

— Lisa See

55. “Rice is to nourish,” A-ma says. “Tea is to heal. Always remember that food is medicine, and medicine is food. If you take care of the trees, the trees will take care of you.”

— Lisa See

56. “No one picks a friend for us; we come together by choice. We are not tied together through ceremony or the responsibility to create a son; we tie ourselves together through moments. The spark when we first meet. Laughter and tears shared. Secrets packed away to be treasured, hoarded, and protected. The wonder that someone can be so different from you and yet still understand your heart in a way no one.”

— Lisa See

57. “The classics tell us that, in relationships, the one between teacher and student comes second only to the one between parent and child.”

— Lisa See

58. “We were to be like long vines with entwined roots, like trees that stand a thousand years, like a pair of mandarin ducks mated for life.”

— Lisa See

59. “He was in my hair, my eyes, my fingers, my heart. I day-dreamed about what he was doing, thinking, seeing, smelling, feeling. I could not eat for thoughts of him.”

— Lisa See

60. “My home is here with this family I’ve built from scraps of tragedy.”

— Lisa See

61. “I’ve come to believe that part of lovesickness comes from this conflict between control and desire. In love we have no control. Our hearts and minds are tormented, teased, enticed and delighted by the overwhelming strength of emotions that make us try to forget the real world.”

— Lisa See

62. “The three most important powers are Heaven, Earth and Man. The three luminaries are the Sun, the Moon and the Stars. Opportunities given by Heaven are not equal to the advantages afforded by Earth, while the advantages of Earth do not match the blessings that come from harmony among men.”

— Lisa See

63. “I’ve never thought much about whether I was happy or if I had fun as a child. I was a so-so girl who lived with a so-so family in a so-so village. I didn’t know that there might be another way to live, and I didn’t worry about it either.”

— Lisa See

64. “Maybe our lives are like gigantic jigsaw puzzles. You find the right piece and suddenly the whole picture has meaning.”

— Lisa See

65. “A single spark is not enough to warm a room nor is a single seed enough to grow a fruitful crop. Deep love – true heart love – must grow.”

— Lisa See

66. “When the sun is shining, think of the time it won’t be, because even when you’re sitting in your house with the doors shut, misfortune can fall from above. Page 279.”

— Lisa See

67. “If there is happiness at age three, it will last until you reach eighty.”

— Lisa See

68. “What stays with me most is a general sense of loss, unease, and longing for the past that cannot be relieved.”

— Lisa See

69. “She’s grabbed onto old traditions-outdated traditions- in the same way I latch onto them now: as a means of survival, as a way to hang on to ghost memories.”

— Lisa See

70. “Let those who believe, believe. Let those who doubt, doubt.”

— Lisa See

71. “It’s said that great sorrow is no more than a reflection of one’s capacity for great joy. I see it from the opposite direction. I’m happy, but there’s an empty space inside me that will never stop suffering from the loss of Yan-yeh.”

— Lisa See

72. “Maybe stories and memories are destined to be incomplete...”

— Lisa See

73. “Dreamers are born to be disappointed.”

— Lisa See

74. “Maybe we’re all like that with our mothers. They seem ordinary until one day they’re extraordinary.”

— Lisa See

75. “Every pandemic in the history of the world has come from China.”

— Lisa See

76. “Suffering has brought clarity into my life. Maybe the things that have happened to me are punishment for what I did in a previous life, maybe they were fate or destiny, and maybe they’re all just part of a natural cycle – like the short but spectacular lives of cherry blossoms in spring or leaves falling away in autumn.”

— Lisa See

77. “All things not at peace will cry out.”

— Lisa See

78. “When fortune comes, do not enjoy all of it; when advantage comes, do not take all of it.”

— Lisa See

79. “I know a lot about women and their suffering, but I still know almost nothing about men.”

— Lisa See

80. “If you try to live, you can live on well.”

— Lisa See

81. “You are not being punished for your anger. You’re being punished by your anger.”

— Lisa See

82. “When the string breaks while working, there is still the rope. When the oars wear out, there is still the tree, ” she recited. “You feel you can’t go on, but you will.”

— Lisa See

83. “A weak man always seeks to hurt those lower than he.”

— Lisa See

84. “To us, she was like a rare bird that had escaped its cage and was roaming through a courtyard of common chickens.”

— Lisa See

85. “Her house is the nest where she hides the joy, laughter, sorrows, and regrets of her life.”

— Lisa See

86. “I was a haenyeo – independent and resilient – but I’d missed my husband.”

— Lisa See

87. “When you lose your home country, what do you preserve and what do you abandon?”

— Lisa See

88. “Peony, think of your own feet when you do this. You know how the toes are tucked under and how your mid-foot is folded in on itself? We accomplish this by rolling the bones under the foot as if you were rolling a sock. Can you do that?”

— Lisa See

89. “I am an eighth Chinese, and I come from a large Chinese-American family in Los Angeles.”

— Lisa See

90. “Parents exist in children,” Grandmother said to bolster my confidence. “Your mother will always exist in you. She will give you strength wherever you go.”

— Lisa See

91. “That I had been shallow, stubborn, and selfish did not alter the gravity and stupidity of what I had done. I had made the greatest mistake for a woman literate in nu shu: I had not considered texture, context, and shades of meaning.”

— Lisa See

92. “Hyacinth bean and papayas, long vines, deep roots. Palm trees outside the garden walls, with deep roots, stand a thousand years.”

— Lisa See

93. “When you do things in a soft way, you make the other people believe they’ve thought up something to do for you, when actually you’re directing them.” Later, Ruth.”

— Lisa See

94. “I have a whole life to tell; I have nothing left to lose and few to offend.”

— Lisa See

95. “I accepted these limitations, knowing that my worth was based entirely on the child growing inside me.”

— Lisa See

96. “Always remember If you don’t love tea, you can’t make good tea.”

— Lisa See

97. “You can’t learn about living unless you live. You can’t live unless you take a chance; and your living is limited by the chances you take.”

— Lisa See

98. “Men are so sure of themselves, and they have such courage and conviction. They believe-truly believe- that they can make things happen just by speaking the words, and in many cases they can.”

— Lisa See

99. “You’ll never get a marriage proposal if you have to rely on your needlework.”

— Lisa See

100. “You cannot refuse to eat just because there’s a chance of being choked.”

— Lisa See