Doug Coupland

Explore inspiring quotes by Doug Coupland, a remarkable figure whose words continue to inspire and motivate people around the world.

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future

5 quotes

failure

5 quotes

money

3 quotes

family

3 quotes

business

2 quotes

car

2 quotes

change

2 quotes

dreams

2 quotes

Featured Quotes by Doug Coupland

Some of the most memorable quotes from this author

"Everybody past a certain age, regardless of how they look on the outside, pretty much constantly dreams of being able to escape from their lives."

— Doug Couplandage

"The time you feel lonely is the time you most need to be by yourself."

— Doug Couplandalone

"The capacity for not feeling lonely can carry a very real price, that of feeling nothing at all."

— Doug Couplandalone

"Sometimes the best lighting of all is a power failure."

— Doug Couplandbest

"Handmade presents are scary because they reveal that you have too much free time."

— Doug Couplandbirthday

"Most people have no idea how to politely answer a phone. The English do, and it's been their only major business advantage for the past two centuries."

— Doug Couplandbusiness

All Quotes by Doug Coupland

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"Everybody past a certain age, regardless of how they look on the outside, pretty much constantly dreams of being able to escape from their lives."

-Doug Coupland

ageView Quote

"The time you feel lonely is the time you most need to be by yourself."

-Doug Coupland

aloneView Quote

"The capacity for not feeling lonely can carry a very real price, that of feeling nothing at all."

-Doug Coupland

aloneView Quote

"Sometimes the best lighting of all is a power failure."

-Doug Coupland

bestView Quote

"Handmade presents are scary because they reveal that you have too much free time."

-Doug Coupland

birthdayView Quote

"Most people have no idea how to politely answer a phone. The English do, and it's been their only major business advantage for the past two centuries."

-Doug Coupland

businessView Quote

"The real killers in the business world aren't the ones who aim for the top, it's the ones who aim for two notches below the top."

-Doug Coupland

businessView Quote

"Canadians can easily 'pass for American' as long as we don't accidentally use metric measurements or apologize when hit by a car."

-Doug Coupland

carView Quote

"If God drives a car, He'd drive a 1973 Ford LTD Brougham sedan with a claret-colored vinyl roof, with oxblood leather upholstery and an opera window."

-Doug Coupland

carView Quote

"If you don't change, then what's the point of anything happening to you?"

-Doug Coupland

changeView Quote

"Human beings are the only animal that thinks they change who they are simply by moving to a different place. Birds migrate, but it's not quite the same thing."

-Doug Coupland

changeView Quote

"If human beings had genuine courage, they'd wear their costumes every day of the year, not just on Halloween."

-Doug Coupland

courageView Quote

"Workshops and seminars are basically financial speed dating for clueless people."

-Doug Coupland

datingView Quote

"We want our idols to be dead because it makes death a much less scary place."

-Doug Coupland

deathView Quote

"Flying dreams mean that you're doing the right thing with your life."

-Doug Coupland

dreamsView Quote

"Everybody past a certain age, regardless of how they look on the outside, pretty much constantly dreams of being able to escape from their lives."

-Doug Coupland

dreamsView Quote

"High school is such a shared experience in North American culture."

-Doug Coupland

experienceView Quote

"Big companies are like marching bands. Even if half the band is playing random notes, it still sounds kind of like music. The concealment of failure is built into them."

-Doug Coupland

failureView Quote

"Sometimes failure isn't an opportunity in disguise, it's just you."

-Doug Coupland

failureView Quote

"Failure is authentic, and because it's authentic, it's real and genuine, and because of that, it's a pure state of being."

-Doug Coupland

failureView Quote

"If a building looks better under construction than it does when finished, then it's a failure."

-Doug Coupland

failureView Quote

"Sometimes the best lighting of all is a power failure."

-Doug Coupland

failureView Quote

"People are pretty forgiving when it comes to other people's families. The only family that ever horrifies you is your own."

-Doug Coupland

familyView Quote

"It's very strange that most people don't care if their knowledge of their family history only goes back three generations."

-Doug Coupland

familyView Quote

"Everybody has basically the same family, it's just reconfigured slightly differently from one to the next."

-Doug Coupland

familyView Quote

"Forget about being world famous, it's hard enough just getting the automatic doors at the supermarket to acknowledge our existence."

-Doug Coupland

famousView Quote

"You pretend to be more eccentric than you actually are because you fear you are an interchangeable cog."

-Doug Coupland

fearView Quote

"I know it's not cat food, but what exactly is it that they put inside of tinned ravioli?"

-Doug Coupland

foodView Quote

"There's nothing cure or funny or lovable about being cheap. It's a total turn-off."

-Doug Coupland

funnyView Quote

"In the future, torture will once again become the recreational sport of the rich."

-Doug Coupland

futureView Quote

"I think that in the future, clocks won't say three o'clock anymore. They'll just get right to the point and rename three o'clock 'Pepsi.'"

-Doug Coupland

futureView Quote

"When future archaeologists dig up the remains of California, they're going to find all of those gyms their scary-looking gym equipment, and they're going to assume that we were a culture obsessed with torture."

-Doug Coupland

futureView Quote

"It also allows you to look as though you're not particularly from the present, future or past, either."

-Doug Coupland

futureView Quote

"The future and eternity are two entirely different things."

-Doug Coupland

futureView Quote

"A bland smile is like a green light at an intersection, it feels good when you get one, but you forget it the moment you're past it."

-Doug Coupland

goodView Quote

"If you don't have a spiritual practice in place when times are good, you can't expect to suddenly develop one during a moment of crisis."

-Doug Coupland

goodView Quote

"Unhappiness is something we are never taught about we are taught to expect happiness, but never a Plan B to use to use when the happiness doesn't arrive."

-Doug Coupland

happinessView Quote

"It's very strange that most people don't care if their knowledge of their family history only goes back three generations."

-Doug Coupland

historyView Quote

"We live in an era with no historical precedents. History is no longer useful as a tool in helping us understand current changes."

-Doug Coupland

historyView Quote

"If someone decides to be a musician now, it means because there is no hope of money at the end of it, it means they really want to be a musician. And if someone is writing now, there is no hope for money at the end of it."

-Doug Coupland

hopeView Quote

"It's very strange that most people don't care if their knowledge of their family history only goes back three generations."

-Doug Coupland

knowledgeView Quote

"Depression is when you have lots of love, but no one's taking."

-Doug Coupland

loveView Quote

"Men won't read any email from a woman that's over 200 words long."

-Doug Coupland

menView Quote

"People will always choose more money over more sex."

-Doug Coupland

moneyView Quote

"If someone decides to be a musician now, it means because there is no hope of money at the end of it, it means they really want to be a musician. And if someone is writing now, there is no hope for money at the end of it."

-Doug Coupland

moneyView Quote

"I think money is due for some sort of collapse. People are going to realize that money has a half-life, like radioactive elements."

-Doug Coupland

moneyView Quote

"Big companies are like marching bands. Even if half the band is playing random notes, it still sounds kind of like music. The concealment of failure is built into them."

-Doug Coupland

musicView Quote

"Nature is one great big wood-chipper. Sooner or later, everything shoots out the other end in a spray of blood, bones and hair."

-Doug Coupland

natureView Quote

"If cats were double the size they are now, they'd probably be illegal."

-Doug Coupland

petView Quote

"Forget sex or politics or religion, loneliness is the subject that clears out a room."

-Doug Coupland

politicsView Quote

"Sometimes the best lighting of all is a power failure."

-Doug Coupland

powerView Quote

"Before machines the only form of entertainment people really had was relationships."

-Doug Coupland

relationshipView Quote

"The person who needs the other person the least in a relationship is the stronger member."

-Doug Coupland

relationshipView Quote

"Forget sex or politics or religion, loneliness is the subject that clears out a room."

-Doug Coupland

religionView Quote

"Christmas makes everything twice as sad."

-Doug Coupland

sadView Quote

"A bland smile is like a green light at an intersection, it feels good when you get one, but you forget it the moment you're past it."

-Doug Coupland

smileView Quote

"Technology favors horrible people."

-Doug Coupland

technologyView Quote

"The time you feel lonely is the time you most need to be by yourself."

-Doug Coupland

timeView Quote

"There's much to be said for feeling numb. Time passes more quickly. You eat less, and because numbness encourages laziness, you do fewer things, good or bad, and the world's probably a better place for it."

-Doug Coupland

timeView Quote

"Christmas makes everything twice as sad."

-Doug Coupland

christmasView Quote

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Doug Coupland

Top Categories by Doug Coupland

future

failure

money

family

business

car

change

dreams

Featured Quotes by Doug Coupland

All Quotes by Doug Coupland

"Everybody past a certain age, regardless of how they look on the outside, pretty much constantly dreams of being able to escape from their lives."

"The time you feel lonely is the time you most need to be by yourself."

"The capacity for not feeling lonely can carry a very real price, that of feeling nothing at all."

"Sometimes the best lighting of all is a power failure."

"Handmade presents are scary because they reveal that you have too much free time."

"Most people have no idea how to politely answer a phone. The English do, and it's been their only major business advantage for the past two centuries."

"The real killers in the business world aren't the ones who aim for the top, it's the ones who aim for two notches below the top."

"Canadians can easily 'pass for American' as long as we don't accidentally use metric measurements or apologize when hit by a car."

"If God drives a car, He'd drive a 1973 Ford LTD Brougham sedan with a claret-colored vinyl roof, with oxblood leather upholstery and an opera window."

"If you don't change, then what's the point of anything happening to you?"

"Human beings are the only animal that thinks they change who they are simply by moving to a different place. Birds migrate, but it's not quite the same thing."

"If human beings had genuine courage, they'd wear their costumes every day of the year, not just on Halloween."

"Workshops and seminars are basically financial speed dating for clueless people."

"We want our idols to be dead because it makes death a much less scary place."

"Flying dreams mean that you're doing the right thing with your life."

"Everybody past a certain age, regardless of how they look on the outside, pretty much constantly dreams of being able to escape from their lives."

"High school is such a shared experience in North American culture."

"Big companies are like marching bands. Even if half the band is playing random notes, it still sounds kind of like music. The concealment of failure is built into them."

"Sometimes failure isn't an opportunity in disguise, it's just you."

"Failure is authentic, and because it's authentic, it's real and genuine, and because of that, it's a pure state of being."

"If a building looks better under construction than it does when finished, then it's a failure."

"Sometimes the best lighting of all is a power failure."

"People are pretty forgiving when it comes to other people's families. The only family that ever horrifies you is your own."

"It's very strange that most people don't care if their knowledge of their family history only goes back three generations."

"Everybody has basically the same family, it's just reconfigured slightly differently from one to the next."

"Forget about being world famous, it's hard enough just getting the automatic doors at the supermarket to acknowledge our existence."

"You pretend to be more eccentric than you actually are because you fear you are an interchangeable cog."

"I know it's not cat food, but what exactly is it that they put inside of tinned ravioli?"

"There's nothing cure or funny or lovable about being cheap. It's a total turn-off."

"In the future, torture will once again become the recreational sport of the rich."

"I think that in the future, clocks won't say three o'clock anymore. They'll just get right to the point and rename three o'clock 'Pepsi.'"

"When future archaeologists dig up the remains of California, they're going to find all of those gyms their scary-looking gym equipment, and they're going to assume that we were a culture obsessed with torture."

"It also allows you to look as though you're not particularly from the present, future or past, either."

"The future and eternity are two entirely different things."

"A bland smile is like a green light at an intersection, it feels good when you get one, but you forget it the moment you're past it."

"If you don't have a spiritual practice in place when times are good, you can't expect to suddenly develop one during a moment of crisis."

"Unhappiness is something we are never taught about we are taught to expect happiness, but never a Plan B to use to use when the happiness doesn't arrive."

"It's very strange that most people don't care if their knowledge of their family history only goes back three generations."

"We live in an era with no historical precedents. History is no longer useful as a tool in helping us understand current changes."

"If someone decides to be a musician now, it means because there is no hope of money at the end of it, it means they really want to be a musician. And if someone is writing now, there is no hope for money at the end of it."

"It's very strange that most people don't care if their knowledge of their family history only goes back three generations."

"Depression is when you have lots of love, but no one's taking."

"Men won't read any email from a woman that's over 200 words long."

"People will always choose more money over more sex."

"If someone decides to be a musician now, it means because there is no hope of money at the end of it, it means they really want to be a musician. And if someone is writing now, there is no hope for money at the end of it."

"I think money is due for some sort of collapse. People are going to realize that money has a half-life, like radioactive elements."

"Big companies are like marching bands. Even if half the band is playing random notes, it still sounds kind of like music. The concealment of failure is built into them."

"Nature is one great big wood-chipper. Sooner or later, everything shoots out the other end in a spray of blood, bones and hair."

"If cats were double the size they are now, they'd probably be illegal."

"Forget sex or politics or religion, loneliness is the subject that clears out a room."

"Sometimes the best lighting of all is a power failure."

"Before machines the only form of entertainment people really had was relationships."

"The person who needs the other person the least in a relationship is the stronger member."

"Forget sex or politics or religion, loneliness is the subject that clears out a room."

"Christmas makes everything twice as sad."

"A bland smile is like a green light at an intersection, it feels good when you get one, but you forget it the moment you're past it."

"Technology favors horrible people."

"The time you feel lonely is the time you most need to be by yourself."

"There's much to be said for feeling numb. Time passes more quickly. You eat less, and because numbness encourages laziness, you do fewer things, good or bad, and the world's probably a better place for it."

"Christmas makes everything twice as sad."

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