99 Life-Changing Quotes to Inspire Your Days

Read these nuggets of wisdom and feel your spirits rise.

Whether we're suffering from end-of-summer blues or we're just having a rough go of it on a Monday, we're all guilty of finding ourselves in an emotional rut every now and then. But to help you get out of yours, we've put together a complete list of the very best words of wisdom necessary to inspire you and get you back on top. So read on—and feel your spirits rise! And if you want your newfound inspiration to seep into your wallet, too, be sure to read up on the 5 Ways Billionaires Think Differently Than Most People.

1
Eleanor Roosevelt

Eleanor Roosevelt, inspiring quotes

"Do one thing everyday that scares you."

And here are more 20 Timeless One-Liners from History’s Extraordinary Women.

2
Jane Goodall

Jane Goodall, inspiring quotes

"What you do makes a difference, and you have to decide what kind of difference you want to make."

3
Babe Ruth

Babe Ruth, inspiring quotes

"It's hard to beat a person who never gives up."

4
Simone Weil, Philosopher

Simone Weil philosopher
Wikimedia Commons

"Attention is the rarest and purest form of generosity."

5
Beyoncé

beyonce, inspiring quotes

"I don't like to gamble, but if there's one thing I'm willing to bet on, it's myself."

6
Bethany Hamilton, Surfer

Bethany Hamilton, inspiring quotes

"People can do whatever they want if they just set their heart to it, and just never give up, and just go out there and do it."

7
Maya Angelou

Maya Angelou, inspiring quotes
Courtesy, William J. Clinton Presidential Library

"A bird doesn't sing because it has an answer, it sings because it has a song."

8
Oprah Winfrey

Billionaire Oprah Winfrey, inspiring quotes
Shutterstock

"It doesn't matter who you are, where you come from.The ability to triumph begins with you. Always."

9
Emma Stone

Emma stone, inspiring quotes
Denis Makarenko/Shutterstock

"I can't think of any better representation of beauty than someone who is unafraid to be herself."

10
Michael Jordan

Michael Jordan, inspiring quotes
Shutterstock

"I have missed more than 9,000 shots in my career.I have lost almost 300 games. On 26 occasions I have been entrusted to take the game winning shot… and I missed. I have failed over and over and over again in my life. And that's precisely why I succeed."

11
Frank Sinatra

frank sinatra
Image via Wikimedia Commons

"If you don't know the guy on the other side of the world, love him anyway because he's just like you. He has the same dreams, the same hopes and fears. It's one world, pal. We're all neighbors."

12
C.S. Lewis

C.S. Lewis, inspiring quotes
Arthur Strong / Fair Use

"Hardships often prepare ordinary people for an extraordinary destiny."

13
Ralph Waldo Emerson

Ralph Waldo Emerson, inspiring quotes
Shutterstock

"The invariable mark of wisdom is to see the miraculous in the common."

14
Audrey Hepburn

Audrey Hepburn, inspiring quotes

"Nothing is impossible. The word itself says, 'I'm possible!'"

15
Victor Hugo, Poet and Novelist

Victor Hugo, inspiring quotes

"There is only one thing stronger than all the armies of the world: and that is an idea whose time has come."

16
Ryan Gosling

Ryan Gosling celebrities heroes, inspiring quotes

"I've learned it's important not to limit yourself. You can do whatever you really love to do, no matter what it is."

17
Alicia Keys

Alicia Keys, inspiring quotes

"No one will take care of you if you don't take care of yourself."

18
Steve Jobs

steve jobs wore the same thing every day, inspiring quotes
Getty Images

"Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life."

19
Bob Dylan

Bob Dylan, inspiring quotes
Wikimedia Commons/Jean-Luc Ourlin

"What's money? A man is a success if he gets up in the morning and goes to bed at night and in between does what he wants to do."

20
Leonardo da Vinci

Leonardo da Vinci, inspiring quotes
Hunter Bliss Images/Shutterstock

"I have been impressed with the urgency of doing. Knowing is not enough; we must apply. Being willing is not enough; we must do."

21
Andy Warhol

Andy Warhol, inspiring quotes
Wikimedia Commons/Jack Mitchell

"As soon as you stop wanting something, you get it."

22
Bob Marley

Bob marley celebrity deaths, inspiring quotes
monosnaps / CC BY 2.0

"Some people feel the rain, others just get wet."

23
Will Smith

Will Smith, inspiring quotes
Shutterstock

"Greatness is not this wonderful, esoteric, elusive, God-like, feature that only the special among us will ever taste. It's something that truly exists in all of us. It's very simple. This is what I believe, and I'm willing to die for it."

24
Nelson Mandela

nelson Mandela, inspiring quotes
Shutterstock

"There is no passion to be found playing small–in settling for a life that is less than the one you are capable of living."

25
Dame Julie Andrews

Julie Andrews, inspiring quotes

"Perseverance is failing 19 times and succeeding the 20th."

26
Stevie Wonder

Stevie Wonder, inspiring quotes
Shutterstock

"If you don't ask, you don't get."

27
Tyler Knott Gregson, Author

Tyler Knott Gregson, inspiring quotes
Tyler Knott / CC BY-SA 4.0

"Promise me you will not spend so much time treading water and trying to keep your head above the waves that you forget, truly forget, how much you have always loved to swim."

28
Michael Phelps

Michael Phelps, dream job, inspiring quotes

"You can't put a limit on anything. The more you dream, the farther you get."

29
Morgan Freeman

Morgan Freeman, inspiring quotes
Everett Collection/Shutterstock

"Learning how to be still, to really be still and let life happen–that stillness becomes a radiance."

30
Mindy Kaling

Mindy Kaling, inspiring quotes
Shutterstock

"I think as humans, no one remembers their successes, everyone just remembers their failures."

31
Arnold Schwarzenegger

Arnold Schwarzenegger, inspiring quotes
Shutterstock

"Strength does not come from winning. Your struggles develop your strengths. When you go through hardships and decide not to surrender, that is strength."

32
Ernest Hemingway

Ernest Hemingway, inspiring quotes
Wikimedia Commons/Lloyd Arnold

"The world breaks everyone, and afterward, some are strong at the broken places."

33
Usain Bolt

Usain Bolt, inspiring quotes
Shutterstock

"There are better starters than me but I'm a strong finisher."

34
Thomas Jefferson

thomas jefferson success quotes

"I'm a great believer in luck. The harder I work, the more I have of it."

35
Shawn Johnson, Olympian

Shawn Johnson, inspiring quotes

"Stay strong. Stand up. Have a voice."

36
Oscar Wilde

oscar wilde success quotes

"We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars."

37
The Dalai Lama

Dalai Lama, inspiring quotes

"Happiness is not something ready made. It comes from your own action."

38
Abraham Lincoln

Abraham Lincoln, inspiring quotes
Shutterstock

"The best way to predict the future is to create it."

39
Bono

Bono, inspiring quotes
Shutterstock

"The world is more malleable than you think and it's waiting for you to hammer it into shape."

40
Samuel Beckett

samuel beckett success quotes
Public Domain

"Try again. Fail again. Fail better."

41
Winston Churchill

winston-churchill, inspiring quotes
PA Images via Getty Images

"Attitude is a little thing that makes a big difference."

42
Katie Couric

Katie Couric, inspiring quotes
Kathy Hutchins / Shutterstock

"You can learn something new everyday if you have a really positive attitude."

43
Deepak Chopra

Deepak Chopra, inspiring quotes

"As human beings we have unlimited potential and imagination. The worst thing you can do is be a conformist and buy into conformity. It's the worst possible thing. It's better to be outrageous. It's better to hang out with the sages, the people open to possibilities, even the psychotics.You never know where you'll find the geniuses of our society."

44
Joseph Gordon-Levitt

Joseph Gordon Levitt, inspiring quotes

"Questions are often looked upon as questions of doubt but I don't see it that way at all. I question things to stay present, to make sure I'm doing what I'm supposed to be doing."

45
Robert DeNiro

Robert DeNiro, inspiring quotes
Shutterstock

"The most important thing for actors – and not just actors, but everybody – is to feel loose enough to create what you want to create, and be free to try anything. To have choices."

46
Caitlyn Jenner

Caitlyn Jenner
Featureflash Photo Agency/Shutterstock

"We are all different. That's not a bad thing. That's a good thing, and while it may not be easy to get past the things you don't always understand, I want to prove that it is absolutely possible if we only do it together."

47
Reese Witherspoon

Reese Witherspoon, inspiring quotes
Shutterstock/Denis Makarenko

"Like Elle Woods, I do not like to be underestimated."

48
Taraji P. Henson, Actress and Author

Photo by Kevork Djansezian/Getty Images taraji p henson cleavage
Getty Images

"I'm not twentysomething. I'm not trying to find myself—I know exactly who I am and exactly what I want."

49
Rihanna

rihanna underboob, inspiring quotes

"I just have a way of breaking the rules even when I don't intend to. You have to let people be who they are. You have to believe that that's going to be the best version of them."

50
Drew Barrymore

Drew Barrymore, inspiring quotes

"Making bad decisions doesn't make you a bad person. It is how you learn to make better choices."

51
Jane Fonda

Jane Fonda, inspiring quotes

"It's never too late—never too late to start over, never too late to be happy."

52
Johnny Depp

Johnny Depp, inspiring quotes

"If there's any message to my work, it is ultimately that it's OK to be different, that it's good to be different, that we should question ourselves before we pass judgment on someone who looks different, behaves different, talks different, is a different color."

53
Denzel Washington

Denzel Washington, inspiring quotes
Shutterstock

"You pray for rain, you gotta deal with the mud, too. That's a part of it. I'd be more frightened by not using whatever abilities I'd been given. I'd be more frightened by procrastination and laziness."

54
John Wayne

John Wayne, inspring quotes
Public Domain

"Life's tough, but it's tougher when you're stupid."

55
Billie Jean King

billie jean king success quotes

"Champions keep playing until they get it right."

56
Henry Ford

Henry Ford, inspiring quotes
Wikimedia Commons/Hartsook

"The whole secret of a successful life is to find out what is one's destiny to do, and then do it."

57
John D. Rockerfeller

John_D._Rockefeller, inspiring quotes
Public Domain

"Don't be afraid to give up the good to go for the great."

58
Bill Gates

success quotes bill gates
Paolo Bona/Shutterstock

"As we look ahead into the next century, leaders will be those who empower others."

59
Bruce Lee

bruce lee celebrity deaths
Wikimedia Commons

"The successful warrior is the average man, with laser-like focus."

60
Booker T. Washington

booker t washington success quotes

"You measure the size of the accomplishment by the obstacles you had to overcome to reach your goals."

61
Steve Carell

Steve Carell, life lessons, wisdom
Denis Makarenko/Shutterstock

"Nothing to me feels as good as laughing incredibly hard."

62
Confucius

Confucius, inspiring quotes

"It does not matter how slowly you go, so long as you do not stop."

63
Mark Twain

mark twain success quotes

"Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn't do than by the ones you did do, so throw off the bowlines, sail away from safe harbor, catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore, Dream, Discover."

64
John Lennon

John Lennon
Getty Images

"When I was 5 years old, my mother always told me that happiness was the key to life. When I went to school, they asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up. I wrote down "happy". They told me I didn't understand the assignment, and I told them they didn't understand life."

65
Christopher Columbus

Christopher Columbus, inspiring quotes
Shutterstock

"You can never cross the ocean unless you have the courage to lose sight of the shore."

66
Amelia Earhart

Amelia Earhart
Shutterstock

"The most difficult thing is the decision to act, the rest is merely tenacity."

67
Woody Allen

Woody Allen, inspiring quotes
Shutterstock

"Eighty percent of success is showing up."

68
Marie Curie

Marie Curie, inspiring quotes
Shutterstock

"We must believe that we are gifted for something, and that this thing, at whatever cost, must be attained."

69
Jesse Owens

jesse owens, inspiring quotes
Bundesarchiv, Bild 183-R96374 / CC-BY-SA 3.0

"The battles that count aren't the ones for gold medals. The struggles within yourself–the invisible battles inside all of us–that's where it's at."

70
Estee Lauder

Estee_Lauder, inspiring quotes
Library of Congress

"I never dreamed about success. I worked for it."

71
Bill Murray

Bill Murray, inspiring quotes

"Don't think about your errors or failures; otherwise, you'll never do a thing."

72
Aziz Ansari

Aziz Ansari, inspiring quotes

"Why do we all say we prefer honesty but rarely give that courtesy to others?"

73
Tina Fey

Tina Fey, inspiring quotes
Shutterstock

"Whatever the problem, be part of the solution. Don't just sit around raising questions and pointing out obstacles."

74
J.K. Rowling

J.K. Rowling, inspiring quotes

"Every human life is worth the same, and worth saving."

75
Stephen King

stephen king success quotes
Shutterstock

"Get busy living, or get busy dying."

76
Harper Lee

Harper Lee, inspiring quotes
Eric Draper/White House, via Wikimedia Commons

"Most people are nice when you finally see them."

77
Kanye West

Kanye West, inspiring quotes
Shutterstock

"I refuse to accept other people's ideas of happiness for me. As if there's a one size fits all standard for happiness."

78
T.S. Eliot

T.S._Eliot, inspiring quotes
Public Domain

"Only those who will risk going too far can possibly find out how far one can go."

79
Ellen DeGeneres

Ellen DeGeneres, inspiring quotes

"When you take risks you learn that there will be times when you succeed and there will be times when you fail, and both are equally important."

80
Adele

Adele, inspiring quotes
Shutterstock

"The main thing in life is that you get what you put in."

81
Mark Zuckerberg

mark zuckerberg for president, inspiring quotes

"If you just work on stuff that you like and you're passionate about, you don't have to have a master plan with how things will play out."

82
Larry Page

larry page
Shutterstock

"Always deliver more than expected"

83
Mark Cuban

Mark Cuban, inspiring quotes

"It doesn't matter how many times you fail. It doesn't matter how many times you almost get it right. No one is going to know or care about your failures, and neither should you. All you have to do is learn from them and those around you because all that matters in business is that you get it right once. Then everyone can tell you how lucky you are."

84
Jay-Z

Jay-Z sits for cover interview with Best Life, inspiring quotes

"I'm not afraid of dying, I'm afraid of not trying."

85
Coco Chanel

Coco Chanel, inspring quotes

"Success is most often achieved by those who don't know that failure is inevitable."

86
Warren Buffet

Warren Buffet, public speaking, inspiring quotes
Kent Sievers / Shutterstock

"Someone is sitting in the shade today because someone planted a tree a long time ago."

87
Christopher Reeve

Christoper reeve, inspiring quotes
Public Domain

"Once you choose hope, anything's possible."

88
Mother Teresa

Mother Teresa

"One of the greatest diseases is to be nobody to anybody."

89
Kate Winslet

Celebrities heroes kate winslet, inspiring quotes
Shutterstock

"Life is short, and it is here to be lived."

90
Barack Obama

president barack obama success quotes

"Change will not come if we wait for some other person or some other time. We are the ones we've been waiting for. We are the change that we seek."

91
Francis Chan, Pastor

francis chan former teacheing pastor of Cornerstone Community church
Wikimedia Commons/NateBailey

"Our greatest fear should not be of failure… but of succeeding at things in life that don't really matter."

92
Neil Armstrong

Neil_Armstrong inspiring quotes
Wikimedia Commons

"I believe every human has a finite number of heartbeats. I don't intend to waste any of mine."

93
Leonardo DiCaprio

Leonardo DiCaprio

"If you can do what you do best and be happy, you're further along in life than most people."

94
Malcolm X

Malcolm X inspiring quotes
Public Domain

"If you don't stand for something, you'll fall for anything."

95
Harriet Tubman

Harriet_Tubman, inspiring quotes
Library of Congress

"Always remember, you have within you the strength, the patience, and the passion to reach for the stars to change the world."

96
Michelle Obama

Michelle Obama, inspiring quotes
Michelle Obama

"Success isn't about how much money you make. It's about the difference you make in people's lives."

97
Charles Darwin

Charles Darwin, inspiring quotes
Shutterstock

"It is not the strongest of the species that survive, nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change."

98
Amy Poehler

Amy Poehler, inspring quotes

"Try to keep your mind open to possibilities and your mouth closed on matters that you don't know about. Limit your 'always' and 'nevers.'"

99
Princess Diana

Princess Diana Archive/Getty Images

"Family is the most important thing in the world."

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