Top 60 Sophie Cousens Quotes (2026 Update)

1. “You have to believe in a little magic when it comes to matters of the heart.”

— Sophie Cousens

2. “Sometimes life feels like a hamster wheel. You get caught up in the practicalities of existence and all the joy gets pushed aside in favor of necessity.”

— Sophie Cousens

3. “The truth is boring. People want to buy a dream, not be reminded of reality.” “You’re wrong – I think all any of us want in this world is something real.”

— Sophie Cousens

4. “Sea glass?” “It’s all over these beaches. It’s old glass – rubbish, worn down, and tumbled smooth by the sea,” he says, looking at the piece in my hand. “My mother used to collect it. She’d say the sea was trying to give us back something beautiful from the ugly things we throw away.”

— Sophie Cousens

5. “Be a good companion to yourself and you will never be lonely.” It was one of Leila’s highest aspirations: self-sufficiency.”

— Sophie Cousens

6. “Be a good companion to yourself and you will never be lonely” – that had to be the aspiration. She wanted to fuel her own fire. If you got your fuel from men, they could leave, and you’d be left alone in the cold.”

— Sophie Cousens

7. “The Roman poet Horace said: ‘Don’t hope or fear, but seize today, you must! And in tomorrow put complete mistrust.’ All any of us have is today.”

— Sophie Cousens

8. “You are spectacular. You have woken me up, and I never want to be asleep again.”

— Sophie Cousens

9. “Don’t marry a man you wouldn’t want to be divorced from, that’s what my aunt always told me. If a man isn’t kind to strangers, or at least respectful to his enemies, know that one day you might be a stranger to him, you might be his enemy.”

— Sophie Cousens

10. “I find places like this so packed with memories. Visiting them can be like opening a memory jar. You take off the lid and the smells and sounds of a place hit you, unlocking things folded away deep in your brain.”

— Sophie Cousens

11. “Most of us will never be the best at anything we do. It isn’t a reason not to do it.”

— Sophie Cousens

12. “Some people bring out the parts of yourself you like the most,” he says. “I like the version of myself I am when I’m with you.”

— Sophie Cousens

13. “When you are with someone for a long time, you grow into each other, like adjoining trees with tangled roots. It’s hard to extricate yourself and find the part that’s left – who you were before.”

— Sophie Cousens

14. “I will sign off hoping that you, dear reader, have a spirit level for your soul – be it a person, a place, or simply a cup of tea and a good book.”

— Sophie Cousens

15. “Where do you think the love goes, when no one’s left to tell the story?” Ted looks thoughtful for a moment, then he says, “Someone once told me that growing up feeling loved allows you to go on to love other people. Maybe love is simply a huge chain letter, passed down through the generations. The details of the stories begin not to matter.”

— Sophie Cousens

16. “Someone once told me that growing up feeling loved allows you to go on to love other people. Maybe love is simply a huge chain letter, passed down through the generations. The details of the stories begin not to matter.”

— Sophie Cousens

17. “People like to fill in the gaps, to paint their own picture, but no one really knows the truth of someone else’s story.”

— Sophie Cousens

18. “All of it faded eventually. In every relationship, that initial fluttering feeling would simmer down and then disappear... The ephemeral nature of it meant you had to think with your head.”

— Sophie Cousens

19. “Tide and time wait for no man.’ So get on your surfboard and catch that wave, even if you’re shaking like a rattle all the way in, because I’m yet to be reliably informed if there’s decent surf in heaven.”

— Sophie Cousens

20. “The human heart is like a flowerbed, Laura. Once the first blooms die, there’s room enough for something else to grow, but it will never be quite the same as that first flower, the initial thrill of seeing what your heart is capable of.”

— Sophie Cousens

21. “There is an old proverb: He who fears to suffer, suffers from fear.”

— Sophie Cousens

22. “She wanted to fuel her own fire. If you got your fire from men, they could leave, and you’d be left alone in the cold.”

— Sophie Cousens

23. “As women, we spend so much of our lives feeling obliged. Obliged to show up when we say we will, obliged to turn up with a smile, obliged to tell everyone, “I am fine.” But obligated is just another word for oppressed. The only person you are obligated to is yourself.”

— Sophie Cousens

24. “In this cynical world, isn’t there something wonderful about the pure, unbridled optimism of marriage? To stand up and say, ‘Screw the odds, I’m pinning my colors to the mast, bright and bold,’ because if you’re going to commit to anything in this life, shouldn’t it be love?”

— Sophie Cousens

25. “Life is change – if nothing’s changing, you aren’t living.”

— Sophie Cousens

26. “Maybe the only real legacy any of us can hope to leave is to be a link in the chain that keeps love flowing through the generations.”

— Sophie Cousens

27. “Maybe it was easier to be happy for other people when I felt my own soulmate might be just around the corner, but I keep turning corners, and no one is ever there.”

— Sophie Cousens

28. “You need to learn how to be a “me” before you can be a “we.”

— Sophie Cousens

29. “Minnie, you were like this light coming into my life – you dazzle me. But your light also made me see all these shadows in my own life, shadows I finally realized I had to deal with.”

— Sophie Cousens

30. “So, if I can’t look back, and I can’t look forward, I’m forced to live here, right now. Today I can sit around a campfire and talk to my friends. Today I can watch the sunset, even if the outline is getting hazy. Today I have made a new friend and I’m enjoying her company and her vibrant conversation.” He makes a single, slow nod in my direction. “The Roman poet Horace said: ‘Don’t hope or fear, but seize today, you must! And in tomorrow put complete mistrust.’ All any of us have is today.”

— Sophie Cousens

31. “I fall in love with myself, and I want someone to share it with me. I want someone to share me with me.”

— Sophie Cousens

32. “She saved the day, for someone else – as she always does. And I hope you’ll take this the right way,” Leila looked pensive for a moment, gazing slightly off focus into her champagne glass, “if I steal a Cooper family adage to say – all this, these wonderful people here today, this would never have happened to a Quinn Cooper. Some things are all Minnie, and I wouldn’t have you any other way.”

— Sophie Cousens

33. “He gets to have these lovely soul-searching chats with you – no commitment or expectation; then he gets to shag Little Miss Tinder when he likes – no commitment or expectation.”

— Sophie Cousens

34. “But the biggest adventure of all has simply been being your friend.”

— Sophie Cousens

35. “Quinn shrugged. “Better to be hated for what you are than loved for what you’re not.”

— Sophie Cousens

36. “He who fears to suffer, suffers from fear.”

— Sophie Cousens

37. “An orange carpet of leaves covered the footpaths and a crisp, low light shone through the tangle of tree boughs above her head. She picked up a perfect red leaf from the ground, examining the intricate pattern of vessels mapping its thin surface. So beautiful, yet only created to last such a short time before its role on this planet was over, and it would decay into mulch.”

— Sophie Cousens

38. “Don’t cry about something you wouldn’t cry about in five years’ time, and swim – swim when you can.′ Those were her two pieces of live advice.”

— Sophie Cousens

39. “The advice I’d give myself at twenty-six is probably the same advice I’ve tried to give myself every day since – unexpected things are going to happen and change is inevitable. The sooner you accept that, the better equipped you’ll be to roll with things when they crop up, and trust me, I’ve spent a lot of money on therapy to figure that out on your behalf. All the things that scared me when I was twenty-six ended up making my life a thousand times better.”

— Sophie Cousens

40. “Maybe we don’t have enough words to express sympathy. We have fifty ways to describe a cup of coffee, but I can only think of one way to say, “I’m sorry for your loss.”

— Sophie Cousens

41. “I quote: Do tigers worry about the volume of their roar? Do they play the pussycat so as not to offend? They do not. The patriarchy forces us to turn down the volume, but we must roar, and roar loudly, if we want to be heard. It’s the kind of language that makes me roll my eyes, but then I imagine turning to Money Belt Man and roaring at him to stop touching my leg, rather than cowering politely behind my headphones and a book. The thought brings a smile to my face.”

— Sophie Cousens

42. “I am not a phoenix. I am a dazed pigeon, looking for crumbs. But I am fine with that; being a phoenix looks exhausting.”

— Sophie Cousens

43. “I wear the gray in my hair as a badge of honor, the privilege of aging.”

— Sophie Cousens

44. “Because sometimes I feel conflicted; like I want to stand up to the patriarchy and everything, but I’d also quite like to be in love and have a boyfriend.”

— Sophie Cousens

45. “You’ll never regret a vacation, a night out, a night in, or buying the flowers. Show up for your friends. Wear the red lipstick. Savor the lack of responsibility. Everything will work out as it’s meant to, as long as you keep reaching for what you want.”

— Sophie Cousens

46. “This sounds horribly therapy-speak, but act with intention. Make your friends on purpose. Learn things on purpose. Enjoy things on purpose. Work hard on purpose. Have adventures on purpose. You’re sort of hunter-gathering for Future You at the same time as reveling in the uncomplicated optimism and strong liver function of being twenty-six.”

— Sophie Cousens

47. “Take a moment to enjoy where you are rather than always racing to get to the next exciting thing.”

— Sophie Cousens

48. “I think love is a seed. We choose to plant it, nurture it, and at the end of our lives, if we end up with a glorious old oak tree, with huge branches and plenty of shade, then that’s on us, not the cosmos.”

— Sophie Cousens

49. “If you believe everything is destined, then when things get hard, you’re more likely to pull the rip cord. There’s a sense of, ‘I shouldn’t have to compromise on anything, because if it’s meant to be, it’s meant to be.”

— Sophie Cousens

50. “I realize how much I take for granted. I am free to divorce, to date, to earn my own living, to be alone if I want to be, to choose my own happiness. How many women – people – throughout history have not had that, still do not have that?”

— Sophie Cousens