More Relationship Quotes and a Writing Tip

Hey, Authors! A few posts ago I gave some relationship quotes to build stories around. Well, here are some more I have collected. Surely one or more of these will resonate so you can create a viable story premise.

To turn one of these into a story premise, try these steps:

1)   Select a quote that speaks to you. (I know, that is so woo-woo! Just do it!)

2)   Identify the characters that first come into your mind for the roles in this relationship.

3)   Describe each character’s perspective on or relationship to the quote in 25 words or fewer. (Do you know that most people misuse “less” and “fewer”?)

4)   Where is this happening and when? What is the relationship of the characters to the where and when?

5)   Write down five “what ifs”: (Using the first one below) What if a woman’s boyfriend doesn’t come home one night? What if he called later to say he was in trouble and couldn’t make it there? What if the reason he didn’t come home was that a love child showed up at work hunting for her father? What if the woman saw her lover and his child, not knowing of the relationship? What if the child is malevolent and wants to hurt her birth father?

6)   See how that worked? If you don’t have a story idea going after 5 what-if’s, maybe you should choose another line of work.

So read, enjoy, and speculate with the relationship quotes below. Can’t wait to read your book!

Having someone wonder where you are when you don't come home at night is a very old human need.  ~Margaret Mead

Man is a knot into which relationships are tied.  ~Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, Flight to Arras, 1942, translated from French by Lewis Galantière

If you want to feel rich, just count the things that money can’t buy. ~Proverb

Shared joy is a double joy; shared sorrow is half a sorrow.  ~Swedish Proverb

Remember, we all stumble, every one of us.  That's why it's a comfort to go hand in hand.  ~Emily Kimbrough

If you don’t risk anything, you risk even more. ~Erica Jong

Don't smother each other.  No one can grow in the shade.  ~Leo Buscaglia

For lack of an occasional expression of love, a relationship strong at the seams can wear thin in the middle.  ~Robert Brault

Sometimes it is the person closest to us who must travel the furthest distance to be our friend.  ~Robert Brault

Assumptions are the termites of relationships.  ~Henry Winkler

Life is like a moustache. It can be wonderful or terrible. But it always tickles. ~Nora Roberts

I like her because she smiles at me and means it.  ~Anonymous

Hope is a waking dream. ~Aristotle

Someone to tell it to is one of the fundamental needs of human beings.  ~Miles Franklin

In the end, who among us does not choose to be a little less right to be a little less lonely.  ~Robert Brault

You can kiss your family and friends good-bye and put miles between you, but at the same time you carry them with you in your heart, your mind, your stomach, because you do not just live in a world but a world lives in you.  ~Frederick Buechner

Present your family and friends with their eulogies now - they won't be able to hear how much you love them and appreciate them from inside the coffin.  ~Anonymous

Piglet sidled up to Pooh from behind.  "Pooh!" he whispered.  "Yes, Piglet?"  "Nothing," said Piglet, taking Pooh's paw.  "I just wanted to be sure of you."  ~A.A. Milne

I felt it shelter to speak to you.  ~Emily Dickinson

Are we not like two volumes of one book?  ~Marceline Desbordes-Valmore

Trouble is part of your life, and if you don't share it, you don't give the person who loves you enough chance to love you enough.  ~Dinah Shore

Lust is easy.  Love is hard.  Like is most important.  ~Carl Reiner

Relationship Quotes

This morning was your last chance to vote. Thanks for helping choose my NaNoWriMo topic!

Are you on Facebook or Twitter? Then you know how many times people post advice or aphorisms or motivational quotes. Sometimes with attribution, often not.

I thought I would share with you some of the ones I have collected from there. I’m sure you have your own you could add. If so, feel free to do so in the comments section below.

For writers, I think these quotes could easily function as story premises. Take #1 below. Can’t you see a story about the persistence of love? They encounter various travails, sometimes he gives up, sometimes she does, but in the end they work together and never give up, together.

Or the last quote on the list: I see a humorous book where the straitlaced friend and the adventuresome one have conflicts over each of their behavior patterns. Then the straitlaced one unlaces her straits and does something REALLY stupid, and who is there for her? Right!

So take what you want from this list, add to it, and you will never lack for story ideas! Oh, and you might want to run your relationships with some of these ideas in mind.

A perfect relationship isn’t actually perfect. It’s just one where both people never give up.

If you love someone tell them because hearts are often broken by words left unspoken.

Men are like coffee--best when they are strong, hot, and don’t let you sleep at night.

Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle.   Plato

Hurt me with the truth, but never comfort me with a lie.

Laugh when you can, apologize when you should, and let go of what you can’t change.   Noelltty.tumblr.com

You can’t start the next chapter of your like if you keep re-reading your last one.

We don’t meet people by accident. They are meant to cross our path for a reason.

Love is friendship set to music.   Joseph Campbell

Good friends don’t let you do stupid things--alone.