One of the hardest things in life is having words in your heart that you can't utter.

The line expresses the anguish of inexpressibility: the gap between inner experience and outward speech. “Words in your heart” suggests feelings or truths that are already formed internally—love, grief, regret, confession—but remain trapped by fear, shame, social constraint, or the inadequacy of language itself. The quote resonates with James Earl Jones’s public association with voice and eloquence, making the sentiment especially poignant: even someone celebrated for speaking can know the pain of silence. More broadly, it points to how emotional repression and unspoken communication can become a central hardship of human life, shaping relationships through what is withheld as much as what is said.