Louis c. k. quotes

Most people are dead. Hitler. Ray Charles. Some other guys. But mostly those two.

My kids used to love math. Now it makes them cry. Thanks standardized testing and common core!

People are too afraid of uptown. A lot of people will tell you, like, "Don't go to Harlem. You can never go there. 'Cause as soon as you get there, they kill you." That's what people think. As soon as you arrive in Harlem, someone just stabs you in the face right away. That's people's image of Harlem: just everyone standing around waiting for lost white people to kill all day. "Did you see any? I didn't either."

Every year white people add 100 years to how long ago slavery was. I've heard educated white people say, 'slavery was 400 years ago.' No it very wasn't. It was 140 years ago...that's two 70-year-old ladies living and dying back to back. That's how recently you could buy a guy.

When I see two guys kissing, I'm like, how come I can't kiss one of those guys? They look like they're having a good time.

Every day starts, my eyes open and I reload the program of misery. I open my eyes, remember who I am, what I'm like, and I just go, 'Ugh'.

I've been having a lot of trouble sleeping as we all should. I dunno. You don't live that long. It doesn't matter.

Television for a child creates such a high bar of stimulus that nothing else competes. A beautiful day is absolute crap to a kid who watches tv.

Dating is horrible, it's awful. I don't get it. It's like you're standing there: 'Hi. Do you want to have sex and later wish you hadn't?' It's horrible. And it's awkward at 42 because I don't have the body or the drive. I just sit in the car and hope somebody gets in.

Comedy isn't polite and it isn't correct and it isn't accurate, even. It's just a mess. So that's the way that I approach it.

Black people have slavery. And white people have our own thing-stuff we went though that hurt us that we have to cope with. Like when they took our slaves away. That was really hard for us. So it's pretty even.

I've started to kind of hate people, and it's not because I have anything against them. It's just, I enjoy it. It's recreation.

My 13-year-old daughter leaves the house at 7:15 every morning and takes a smelly city bus to school way uptown. It's like 8 degrees out, and it's dark and she's got this morning face and I send her out there to take a bus. Meanwhile, my driver is sitting in a toasty Mercedes that's going to take me to work once both kids are gone. I could send her in the Mercedes and then have it come back to get me, but I can't have my kid doing that. I can't do that to her. Me? I earned that f—ing Mercedes. You better f—ing believe it.

There's no such thing as a cheap laugh.

Very few American parents give a crap about how they raise their kids. They put minimal effort into it. Who told you it's a good idea to buy a developing mind a video game?

Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime. Leave the dude alone and he'll figure it out.

I have a lot of beliefs, and I live by none of them - that's just the way I am they make me feel good about who I am.

Someday, one of your friends is gonna get divorced, it's gonna happen, and they're gonna tell you. Don't go, 'ohhhh I'm sorry.' That's a stupid thing to say. First of all you're making 'em feel bad for being really happy, which isn't fair. And second of all: divorce is always good news. I know that sounds weird, but it's true, because no good marriage has ever ended in divorce. It's really that simple.

How do women still go out with guys, when you consider the fact that there is no greater threat to women than men? We're the number one threat to women. Globally and historically, we're the number one cause of injury and mayhem to women... You know what our number one threat is? Heart disease.

I think you have to try and fail, because failure gets you closer to what you're good at.

You know what, it's not your life, it's life. Life is bigger than you, if you can imagine that. Life isn't something that you possess, it's something that you take part in and witness.

I've had, what, two years? Probably five good years. Before that I had twenty years of uncertainty and suffering and ego destruction and poverty. All those things. That'll always outweigh the good times.

Misery is wasted on the miserable.

When I read things like the foundations of capitalism are shattering, I'm like, maybe we need that. Maybe we need some time where we're walking around with a donkey with pots clanging on the sides.

To me, art supplies are always okay to buy.

I don't stop eating when I'm full. The meal isn't over when I'm full. It's over when I hate myself.

My bank is the worst. They are screwing me. You know what they did to me? They're charging me money for not having enough money. Apparently, when you're broke, that costs money.

I finally have the body I want. It’s easy, actually, you just have to want a really shitty body.

Life's too short to be an asshole, as an employer or as an employee.

Comedians and Feminists... are natural enemies, because stereotypically-speaking, feminists can't take a joke and... comedians can't take criticism.

I was in a hotel room in Dallas, and I was jerking off so much and so sadly and pathetically, that the phone rang, and I thought it's them, they're complaining. ... "Sir, could you please stop?"

You know when you see a mother someplace just melting down on her kid? She's like, 'Shut up, I hate you, you're ugly!'... Any parents there are thinking, 'What did that shitty kid do to that poor woman? That poor woman. I wish I could help.'

Comedians work great as actors because they're good under pressure. With a lot of actors, you have to make them feel like everything's going really well to get a good performance out of them. But, if you have a comedian on the set, you can tell them, 'Hey, you really are screwing this up,' and then they just get better.

I've learned from experience that if you work harder at it, and apply more energy and time to it, and more consistency, you get a better result. It comes from the work.

I was driving in Manhattan. There's traffic, nobody's moving... The guy behind me is honking just at me. He kept yelling at me. I decided that I'm gonna argue with this guy, but I'm gonna argue about something else. I'm not having his argument; I'm having mine. So, he's like, 'Go!' And I go, 'Well give me back my jacket!' And he stopped. I was like, 'Yeah, you got my jacket! Give it back! I said you could borrow it, not have it! You're stretching it out, you fat pig! Give it back, now!' He got back in his car, and he locked his doors.

My kids and I figured out that there’s a third kind of person, and I don’t know what you call them, but it’s somebody who sees that the glass is always full because it’s half full with water and half full with nothing, so that’s the third kind of person. I don’t know what it is.

[about being a father] I don't really remember what it was like before. Whatever I had going on, it was bullshit. It wasn't important. It's kind of a nice thing about being a dad. My identity is really about them now, and what I can do for them, so it sort of takes the pressure off of your own life. What am I going to do, who am I? Who cares, you've got to get your kids to school. So I like it that way.

I did a show in New Jersey in the auditorium of a technical high school ... Technical high school, that's where dreams are narrowed down. We tell our children, "You can do anything you want." Their whole lives. "You can do anything!" But this place, we take kids - they're 15, they're young - and we tell them, "You can do eight things. We got it down to eight for you."

If you're older, you're smarter. I just believe that. If you're in an argument with someone older than you, you should listen to 'em ... even if they're wrong, their wrongness is rooted in more information than you have.

Bill Gates has 90 billion dollars ... If I had 90 billion dollars, I wouldn't have it for long because I would just dream of all the crazy stuff I could do with it. This guy, 90 billion dollars. He could buy every baseball team and make them all wear dresses and still have 88 billion dollars.

What we've done with our modern food supply is absolute insanity. It's not even real any more. You used to be able to give a kid an apple and they would love it. Kids can't even taste apples any more. Apples taste like paper to kids now.

My ex-wife, she really didn't like the material that I did. And that's something I regret, that I wasn't more careful about making sure that she was O.K. with it. I just sort of didn't ask. So that's how that goes.

If you can survive disappointment, nothing can beat you

When I take my kids out for dinner or lunch, people smile at us.

People say, 'My phone sucks.' No, it doesn’t! The shittiest cellphone in the world is a miracle. Your life sucks. Around the phone.

When you write from your gut and let the stuff stay flawed and don't let anybody tell you to make it better, it can end up looking like nothing else.

Maybe God is an asshole...of course not, he's not an asshole, he's imaginary.

I just don't trust any of it. Every time I read something about how there's been another ridiculous climb of the Dow Jones, there's a part of me that goes, “This can't be good.” None of this is real money. You know what I mean? It's not like there's actually more of anything. It's just ideas. When people are getting richer and richer but they're not actually producing anything, it can't end well.

A lot of stand-up specials for cable are meant to glorify the comedian. They put you in a really beautiful theater, and sometimes they even blow a little smoke in there to make it misty and sweet. They make the guy look like he's a big rock star. But comedy's not really glamorous. It doesn't enhance comedy for it to look good.

It's more fun to experience things when you don't know what's going to happen.

When I was first divorced, I started dating younger women, and it was really exciting. But after a while I was like, 'This is just dumb.'

I don't think women are better than men, I think men are a lot worse than women.

I read something in the paper that really confused me the other day. It said that 80 percent of the people in New York are minorities. Shouldn't you not call them minorities when they get to be 80 percent of the population? That's a very white attitude, don't you think? I mean, you could take a white guy to Africa and he'd be like 'Look at all the minorities around here! I'm the only majority.'

Friends should always tell you the truth. But please don’t.

You know the only thing happier than a three-legged dog? A four-legged dog.

Well, when I was younger, I lied all the time, because once you understand the power of lying, it's really like magic because you transform reality for people.

The greatest thing about having a child is putting yourself second in your own life. It's a massive gift to be able to say you're not the most important person to yourself.

The last jobs I had were fixing cars and covering football games for a local access tv station. As in driving the mobile van to the field, setting up 3 cameras, teaching depressed grownups and interns how to use them and directing the game from the van and then wanting to kill myself.

I used to like people more, but now I have children and that changes your life in a lot of ways. Like you spend time with people you never would have chosen to spend time with, not in a million years. I spend whole days with people, I'm like, "I never would have hung out with you. I didn't choose you. Our children chose each other based on no criteria by the way. They're the same size. They don't care who they make me hang out with."

It's hard having kids because it's boring... It's just being with them on the floor while they be children. They read Clifford the Big Red Dog to you at a rate of 50 minutes a page, and you have to sit there and be horribly proud and bored at the same time.

You’ll be fine. You’re 25. Feeling [unsure] and lost is part of your path. Don’t avoid it. See what those feelings are showing you and use it. take a breath. You’ll be okay. Even if you don’t feel okay all the time.

Technically, I've learned that having good legs and wind is good for being on stage. You have to be in shape and have endurance.

You need to build an ability to just be yourself, and not be doing something.

I wish I could know everything ever, like that would be my wish - that's what I hope heaven is, that they tell you who shot JFK and all that stuff.

Feeling unsure and lost is part of your path. Don't avoid it. See what those feelings are showing you and use it.

You can't answer a kid's question. A kid never accepts any answer. A kid never says, 'Oh, thanks. I get it.'... They just keep coming with more questions - why, why, why? - until you don't even know who the fk you are anymore at the end of the conversation. It's an insane deconstruction.

Self-love is a good thing but self-awareness is more important. You need to once in a while go ‘Uh, I’m kind of an asshole.’

I have a lot of beliefs... and I live by none of them...

When a person tells you that you hurt them, you don't get to decide that you didn't.

I killed my Facebook page years ago because time clicking around is just dead time. Your brain isn't resting and it isn't doing. I think people have to get their heads around this thing. All this unmitigated input is hurting folks.

Race doesn't mean what it used to in America anymore. It just doesn't. Obama's black, but he's not black the way people used to define that. Is black your experience or the color of your skin? My experience is as a Mexican immigrant, more so than someone like George Lopez. He's from California. But he'll be treated as an immigrant. I am an outsider. My abuelita, my grandmother, didn't speak English. My whole family on my dad's side is in Mexico. I won't ever be called that or treated that way, but it was my experience.

People come back from flights and tell you a story like it's a horror story. That's how bad they make it sound. They're like, 'It was the worst day of my life. We didn't board for 20 minutes and they made us sit there on the runway for 40 minutes.' Oh really? What happened next? Did you fly in the air, incredibly, like a bird? Did you partake in the miracle of human flight you non-contributing zero?'

There are people that really live by doing the right thing, but I don't know what that is, I'm really curious about that. I'm really curious about what people think they're doing when they're doing something evil, casually. I think it's really interesting, that we benefit from suffering so much, and we excuse ourselves from it.

People get successful and they start saying, 'Well of course I am! I was chosen! I'm special!' No, you're not.

What happens after you die? Lot's of things happen after you die - they just don't involve you

Talking is always positive. That's why I talk too much.

Whenever I've encountered a Christian saying, 'Why don't you stop talking like that so I can hear you?' I think, 'Well you're the one putting the earmuffs on, but I wish you could hear me because I like you.'

One thing I learned from drinking is that if you ever go Christmas caroling, you should go with a group of people. And also go in mid-December.

Everything is amazing and nobody is happy

Human kindness has no reward. You should give to others in every way you see. expect absolutely nothing from anyone. It should be your goal to love every human you encounter. All human suffering that you're aware of and continues without your effort to stop it becomes your crime.

I ate too much and masturbated too recently, you know? It's bad to like jerk off and run out the door, 'cause you run into somebody. "Oh, she knows..." You got to take some time alone to process the shame.

I've had two great years, probably five good years. So I had 20 years of just kind of uncertainty and suffering and ego destruction and poverty. All these things. There's no way I'm ever going to catch up to the misery years. It's impossible... If I don't do anything dumb or I don't get a disease or something, and then I've got to five to eight years I think where it'll really be great and then it will start to degenerate like uranium, you know?

I don't like waking up. I feel like staying in bed usually, but I can't because I've got two kids standing next to my bed, just eager to live another day.

All these words we use, anybody can be a genius now. It used to be you had to have a thought no one ever had before or you had to invent a number. Now, it’s like, “Hey, I’ve got a cup in case we need another cup.” “Dude, you’re a genius!”

I just love learning. I think learning is how you live. The verb of my life is learning.

In 27 years doing this, I've seen a handful of truly great, masterful standup sets. One was Tig Notaro last night at Largo.

The only road to doing good shows, is doing bad shows.

The part that's difficult is being single, at 41, after 10 years of marriage and two kids. That's like having a bunch of money in a currency of a country that doesn't exist anymore.

Young people don't even consider that it's a good idea to be out on the fringe, which is where good ideas come from.

My uncles were all funny. My dad wasn't funny, but my uncles were all funny. Now I go back and I like him better than them, they were manipulative funny.

The problem is, the more famous you get, the more people see you who didn't choose to.

There's a reason it's called 'girls gone wild' and not 'women gone wild'. When girls go wild, they show their tits. When women go wild, they kill men and drown their kids in a tub.

My last name is Szekely. Sounds like Saykay. When I was a little kid I had an instructor in camp who called me Shnizneckely. He would make fun of my name and it hurt my feelings because I was a little pussy and I cried. He said, 'Well, how do you say it?' I said, Seekay. So he wrote 'C.K' on my jersey and everything. He made my name 'C.K' and I just stuck with it.

I was raised by a hard-working single mother, so my first role model was a woman. My only caretaker was a woman, and I have three sisters, so my community was girls. I have two girls, and my dog is a girl. My dead dog was a girl. I don't know. I guess I've always keyed in on that perspective.

If you think everything you've done is great, you're probably dumb.

One time I was at a swimming pool with my kids, a public pool. I had my daughter, my six year old, on my arm like this. She was like clamped on, and she's kicking. ... And then she got off and another random child just clamped on. It's like a rat. "Get off of me." "But I love you." "I don't know you, kid."

When you're a father in a marriage, you sort of become the mother's assistant, and you sort of get a list from her every day, and you do, you know, you run down the list, and it feels very much like a chore. And a lot of fathers live in kind of an avoidance. They sit on the toilet for several hours a day... Oh, honey, it took me 40 minutes to go to the post office... But once you become a dad without the mom there, you have to take it all on, and you sort of activate male skills that you didn't know you could apply to fatherhood.

The thing is, comedy's gone in a weird direction. People are really into ironic comedy and fakeness and cleverness.

I get mad like anybody else does, but being able to laugh about getting mad is very healthy, and my kids know that.

People say there's delays on flights. Delays, really? New York to California in five hours, that used to take 30 years, a bunch of people used to die on the way there, have a baby, you would end up with a whole different group of people by the time you got there. Now you watch a movie and [go to the toilet] and you're home.

People are always fighting for attention with things now because there's so much content. Actually, if you don't tell people stuff - you just keep your mouth shut - you don't have to whisper it, you just don't yell. Take the bullhorn off your mouth and it's a secret.

Life isn't something you possess. It's something you take part in, and you witness.

There's nowhere I won't go. As long as it's horribly, horribly true and/or wrong.

Everything that's difficult you should be able to laugh about.

I’m bored’ is a useless thing to say. I mean, you live in a great, big, vast world that you’ve seen none percent of. Even the inside of your own mind is endless; it goes on forever, inwardly, do you understand? The fact that you’re alive is amazing, so you don’t get to say ‘I’m bored.

I have a crazy amount of different jobs, so the way I manage that is to not do more than one at a time. It's like old computers that had small memory chips, they would do something called swapping, where they would fill the memory with one task, do it and get it out.

I'm a good citizen. I'm a good father. I recycle and I masturbate.

Here's how my brain works: It's stupidity, followed by self-hatred, and then further analysis.

I found out that I'm a pretty bad father. I make a lot of mistakes and I don't know what I'm doing. But my kids love me. Go figure.

I love being married. It's great. But I hate arguing. I hate fighting. You know what I do now? When we get in an argument, I just take her side against me. It's just easier; it goes quicker. She's like, "What's wrong with you?" And I'm like, "I know! Damn it! Argh!"

I'd like to name my kid a whole phrase. You know, something like Ladies and Gentlemen. That'll be a cool name for a kid. This is my son, Ladies and Gentlemen! Then, when he gets out of hand, I get to go, Ladies and Gentlemen, please!

I'm bored' is a useless thing to say. You live in a great, big, vast world that you've seen none percent of.

If you're a woman and a guy's ever said anything romantic to you, he just left off the second part that would have made you sick if you could have heard it.

I don't have a room full of writers pitching ideas. It's just me out of my head.

Perception is created and twisted so quickly.

Some things I think are very conservative, or very liberal. I think when someone falls into one category for everything, I'm very suspicious. It doesn't make sense to me that you'd have the same solution to every issue.

The only time you should look in your neighbor's bowl is to make sure that they have enough. You don't look in your neighbor's bowl to see if you have as much as them.

It's a positive thing to talk about terrible things and make people laugh about them.

Apple embodies a lot of what have been defined as feminine traits: an emphasis on intuitive design, intellect, a strong sense of creativity, and that striving to always make the greatest version of something.

Why can't we have racism that's ignorant but nice? You could have stereotypes that are positive about race. You could say, "Those Chinese people, they can fly!" "You know about the Puerto Ricans? They're made of candy!"

You ever go to shop for tuna, and it says "dolphin safe", and you look at it and kind of go, "Yeah, but"-like somehow you think it's not going to be as good? Like, "I want to do the right thing-but it's probably kind of bland without the dolphin."

When you have bacon in your mouth, it doesn't matter who's president.

I didn't make any kind of grades in high school. My mother was a single mom, putting my three sisters through college, and I was such a bad student that I knew I had no right to take her money. But I loved being in classes and learning. I took in a huge amount of what I learned, but I had a feeling of always being behind and being in trouble.

You're a tourist in sexual perversion. I'm a prisoner there.

I always tell my kids to cut a sandwich in half right when you get it, and the first thought you should have is somebody else. You only ever need half a burger.