Do you know somebody who talks a lot and would like them to stop talking? What can you convince yourself or others to talk less and do more?
The following quotes will give you ideas of how to tell others to stop talking too much and ultimately help you appreciate silence and listen more than being busy in talking.
Table of Contents
Funny ways to tell others they are talking too much
1. If people would only talk about what they understood, Earth would be a very quiet place. Albert Einstein
2. If talk is cheap, then being silent is expensive. And many people it seems, can’t afford to buy into it. –Anthony Liccione
3. The trouble with her is that she lacks the power of conversation but not the power of speech. George Bernard Shaw
4. If gossip were food, you would be overweight. Unknown
5. Not every person that speaks less than you do is more ignorant than you are. Mokokoma Mokhonoana
6. There’s zero correlation between being the best talker and having the best ideas. Susan Cain
7. If you don’t understand my silence, how will you understand my words? Unknown
8. If you want to get over a problem, stop talking about it. Your mind affects your mouth and your mouth affects your mind. It’s difficult to stop talking about a situation until you stop thinking about it. Joyce Meyer
9. Better to keep quiet and let people think you're an idiot than speak up and confirm it. – Rodney Dangerfield Share on X
10. Never fail to know that if you are doing all the talking, you are boring somebody. Helen Gurley Brown
11. Too much talking can hurt you. Carol York
12. If you exercise like your mouth, you’d be in good shape. Unknown
13. Talking too much and they think you’re a fool. Be silent and they become curious. Unknown
14. A loud mind is greater than a loud mouth. ― Matshona Dhliwayo
15. The chief drawback with men is that they are too talkative. –Marilyn Monroe
16. When you have nothing to say, say nothing. – Charles Caleb Colton
17. It was impossible to get a conversation going, everybody was talking too much. Yogi Berra Share on X
Related: Quiet People Quotes
Inspiring quotes about talking too much
18. A dog is not considered a good dog because he is a good barker. A man is not considered a good man because he is a good talker. The Buddha (Siddhārtha Gautama)
19. Talking much about oneself can also be a means to conceal oneself. Friedrich Nietzsche
20. Our world is now so noisy … it is just hard to listen, tiring to listen. – Julian Treasure, 5 ways to listen better
21. Listening is our access to understanding. And only without conscious listening, A world where we don’t listen to each other at all is a very scary world indeed. – Julian Treasure, 5 ways to listen better
22. A fool is made more of a fool, when their mouth is more open than their mind. ― Anthony Liccione
23. Constantly talking isn’t necessarily communicating. – Charlie Kaufman
24. One thing talk can’t accomplish is communication. This is because everybody’s talking too much to pay attention to what anyone is saying. P. J. O’Rourke
25. It sounded to him like the noise of too many mouths that talk and too few minds that think. ― Lisa Unger, Heartbroken
26. Talk low, talk slow, and don’t say too much. John Wayne
27. We are becoming desensitized. Our media have to scream at us with headlines in order to get our attention and that means it’s harder for us to pay attention to the quiet, the subtle, the understated. This is a serious problem that we are losing our listening. This is not trivial. – Julian Treasure, 5 ways to listen better
28. …co-rumination: the problem of talking too much about anything. Specifically,… when girls rehash their problems excessively, it leads to depression, anxiety, and a sense of hopelessness. Levine
29. The loner who looks fabulous is one of the most vulnerable loners of all. Anneli Rufus
30. Most people talk when they have nothing to say. I'm not talking because I have too much to say. None of which I'd want you to hear. Megan McCafferty Share on X
31. All sorrow has its root in man’s inability to sit quiet in a room by himself. Blaise Pascal
32. Life isn’t about just talking, it’s about thinking too. Marie Symeou
33. Half the world is composed of people who have something to say and can’t, and the other half who have nothing to say and keep on saying it. Robert Frost
34. Sometimes I just shut down and don’t talk to anyone for days. It’s nothing personal. Sonya Teclai
35. Those who talk about others, have lots to hide about themselves. We’re talking too much about what goes on in the stands, nothing about what goes on on the court. Kevin Durant
36.Great people talk about ideas, average people talk about themselves, and small people talk about others. ― John C. Maxwell, The 360 Degree Leader: Developing Your Influence from Anywhere in the Organization
37. Talking too much is a far greater social fault than talking too little. Eleanor Roosevelt
38. Talking is fantastically overrated. Too many people do too much of it. It stuns the hell out of me how so many people like to talk. Sharkey, for example. If talking is so good for you, what the hell is Sharkey doing here? The guy tears me up. Talking does not heal you. Talking just adds to the noise pollution in the world. If we were really serious about going green, then maybe we’d all just be quiet.― Benjamin Alire Sáenz, Last Night I Sang to the Monster
39. I don’t like talking too much about my personal life, but it all goes into my work. Ottessa Moshfegh
40. Most people talk too much, and what they do say is often just noise or irrelevant gibberish designed to keep themselves entertained. ― Stuart Wilde, Silent Power
41. Isn’t it splendid to think of all the things there are to find out about? It just makes me feel glad to be alive–it’s such an interesting world. It wouldn’t be half so interesting if we know all about everything, would it? There’d be no scope for imagination then, would there?But am I talking too much? People are always telling me I do. Would you rather I didn’t talk? If you say so I’ll stop. I can STOP when I make up my mind to it, although it’s difficult. Lucy Maud Montgomery
Do more and talk less
42. The way to get started is to quit talking and begin doing. – Walt Disney
43. Busy hands achieve more than idle tongues. – Matshona Dhliwayo
44. Lovers of words have no place where honest work must be done. ― Karen Essex, Stealing Athena
45. Weak people talk and do not act, strong people act and keep quiet. Eliphas Levi Share on X
46. JUST SHUT UP talking about what you’re going to do and JUST DO IT! Then you can talk. ― Sotero M Lopez II
47. It’s easy to talk big, but the important thing is whether or not you clean up the shit. – Haruki Murakami
48. Less talk – more work! There is too much talking going on. Because of excessive talking, spiritual energy is being wasted. Sathya Sai Baba
Talking less and remaining in silence
49. You need to train yourself to be comfortable with silence, particularly when dealing with cultures that respect silence more than we do in the West. ― Tony Buon, The Leadership Coach
50. You see things. You keep quiet about them. And you understand. Stephen Chbosky
51. It is indeed a radical act of love just to sit down and be quiet for a time by yourself. Jon Kabat Zinn
52. Silence is not empty. It’s full of answers. Unknown
53. Be quiet, so that life may speak. Leo Babauta
54. I swear to you, there are divine things more beautiful than words can tell. Walt Whitman
55. So, if you are too tired to speak, sit next to me, because I, too, am fluent in silence. R. Arnold
56. He who knows does not speak; he who speaks does not know. – Lao Tse
57. Confidence is silent. Insecurities are loud. – unknown
58. Silence is beautiful, not awkward. The human tendency to be afraid of something beautiful is awkward. Elliot Kay
59. Silence is only frightening to people who are compulsively verbalizing. William S. Boroughs
60. If you kept very quiet, people filled in the silences themselves, offering more information than they had originally intended to give. – Martina Cole
61. Silence isn't always agreement. Sometimes people no longer argue because they no longer care. ― Joyce Rachelle Share on X
62. There’s nothing worthless about being wordless, it will only save your mouth from talking gibberish. ― Michael Bassey Johnson
63. An inability to stay quiet is one of the conspicuous failings of mankind. – Walter Bagehot
64. Wise men, when in doubt whether to speak or to keep quiet, give themselves the benefit of the doubt, and remain silent. Napoleon Hill
65. There is real comfort in being quiet. Justina Chen
66. We have two ears and one mouth and we should use them proportionally. Susan Cain
67. The more you talk, the less people listen. Meg White
68. The less I talk, the more my words have impact, the more people listen. Maxime Lagacé
69. Take time to be quiet. – Zig Ziglar
70. Sometimes what speaks most about a person is when they choose to be silent. – unknown
71. The quieter you become, the more you can hear. – unknown
72. Silence is a fence around wisdom. – unknown
73. Weak people talk and don’t act. Strong people act and keep quiet. – Eliphas Levi
74. Never assume that loud is strong and quiet is weak. – unknown
75. Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak out and remove all doubt. Abraham Lincoln
76. In order to understand the world, one has to turn away from it on occasion. Albert Camus
77. If you sit quiet long enough, you find out what people really think. – Carol Bartz
78. Silence is a source of great strength. - Lao Tzu Share on X
79. Quieting your mind is the doorway to a peaceful soul. ― Clyde Lee Dennis
80. Understand that half the game is keeping quiet, and carefully watching those around you. Robert Greene
81. If you let a person talk long enough you’ll hear their true intentions. Listen twice, speak once. Tupac Shakur
82. Silence , just 3 minutes a day of silence is a wonderful exercise to reset you ears, and to recalibrate so that you can hear the quiet again. Second, I call this a mixer, even if you are in a noisy environment, listen to how many individual channels there are. Third, savouring, it’s about enjoying mundane sounds. Mundane sounds can be very interesting if you pay attention. – Julian Treasure, 5 ways to listen better
83. Most of the successful people I’ve known are the ones who do more listening than talking. – Bernard M. Baruch
84. You do not need to leave your room. Remain sitting at your table and listen. Do not even listen, simply wait, be quiet, still and solitary. The world will freely offer itself to you to be unmasked, it has no choice, it will roll in ecstasy at your feet. Franz Kafka
85. The word “listen” contains the same letters as the word “silent”. – Alfred Brendel
86. Introverts think carefully before they speak. We can be excellent public speakers because we prepare carefully. Sophia Dembling
Bonus: an Hilarious Monologue About People Who Talk Too Much (video)