14 Thought-Provoking Charles Bukowski Life Quotes

Have you ever heard of Charles Bukowski?

Even if you haven’t, all you need to know is that you’re in for a treat for the mind.

Charles Bukowski doesn’t hold back when it comes to living your life and igniting your creativity.

With thousands of poems, short stories and over sixty books under his name, Bukowski’s knowledge is surely able to make you think for yourself so you can do something about your life.

I’ve added my own points in some of the quotes below.

Charles Bukowski Quotes

1) “Find what you love and let it kill you.” – Charles Bukowski

I love how he put it. Find that passion and let it kill you. Let it take over your life.

I think it perfectly portrays passion and how it runs deep. Let it seep into your everyday life and that’s how you truly follow your heart.

Yep. Passion isn’t just a hobby.

2) “How the hell could a person enjoy being awakened at 6:30AM, by an alarm clock, leap out of bed, dress, force-feed, shit, piss, brush teeth and hair, and fight traffic to get to a place where essentially you made lots of money for somebody else and were asked to be grateful for the opportunity to do so?” – Charles Bukowski

3) “Almost everyone is born a genius and buried an idiot.” – Charles Bukowski

I guess other people, society and essentially life itself gets in the way of your born being special. It’s up to you to harness your inner genius.

4) “What matters most is how well you walk through the fire.” – Charles Bukowski

Because real character is built through hardship and challenges. Anything less is kind of easy. Everyone can do that.

5) “We are here to drink beer. We are here to kill war. We are here to laugh at the odds and live our lives so well that death will tremble to take us.” – Charles Bukowski

6) “Some people never go crazy. What truly horrible lives they must live.” – Charles Bukowski

7) “If you want to know who your friends are, get yourself a jail sentence.” – Charles Bukowski

You may not see it in front of you, but a lot of your so-called friends aren’t true friends. The ones who stick around when you’re at your lowest are the best. The ones who flee when they see they can’t use you anymore aren’t friends at all.

8) “The problem with the world is that the intelligent people are full of doubts. While the stupid ones are full of confidence.” – Charles Bukowski

Please fuel your knowledge with courage!

9) “I wasn’t much for a petty thief. I wanted the whole world or nothing.” – Charles Bukowski

10) “If you’re losing your soul and you know it, then you’ve still got a soul left to lose.” – Charles Bukowski

11) “Genius might be the ability to say a profound thing in a simple way.” – Charles Bukowski

12) “To do a dull thing with style, now that’s what I call art.” – Charles Bukowski

13) “You’ve to die a few times before you actually live.” – Charles Bukowski

14) “People are strange. They are constantly angered by trivial things, but on a major matter like totally wasting their lives, they hardly seem to notice.” – Charles Bukowski