Eleanor Roosevelt was the previous first lady of the United States and served the UN Commission on Human Rights as its first chair. She was also an activist, diplomat, and an American political figure. May these Eleanor Roosevelt quotes about life give you insights from her ideals that will guide your quest called life.
1. “If someone betrays you once, it’s their fault; if they betray you twice, it’s your fault.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
2. “In the long run, we shape our lives, and we shape ourselves. The process never ends until we die. And the choices we make are ultimately our own responsibility.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
3. “The only things one can admire at length are those one admires without knowing why.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
4. “To handle yourself, use your head; to handle others, use your heart.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
5. “I believe that anyone can conquer fear by doing the things he fears to do.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
6. “Do not stop thinking of life as an adventure. You have no security unless you can live bravely, excitingly, imaginatively; unless you can choose a challenge instead of competence.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
7. “Life was meant to be lived, and curiosity must be kept alive. One must never, for whatever reason, turn his back on life.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
8. “It is not fair to ask of others what you are not willing to do yourself.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
9. “You have to accept whatever comes, and the only important thing is that you meet it with the best you have to give.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
-min.jpg "Famous quotes and sayings by Eleanor Roosevelt")
10. “Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
11. “You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, 'I have lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along.' You must do the thing you think you cannot do.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
12. “Friendship with oneself is all important, because without it one cannot be friends with anyone else in the world.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
13. “Never mistake knowledge for wisdom. One helps you make a living; the other helps you make a life.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
14. “Work is always an antidote to depression.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
-min.jpg "Famous quotes and sayings by Eleanor Roosevelt")
15. “One thing life has taught me: if you are interested, you never have to look for new interests. They come to you. When you are genuinely interested in one thing, it will always lead to something else.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
16. “Beautiful young people are accidents of nature, but beautiful old people are works of art.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
17. “Remember always that you have not only the right to be an individual; you have an obligation to be one. You cannot make any useful contribution in life unless you do this.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
18. “I think that somehow, we learn who we really are and then live with that decision.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
19. “No matter how plain a woman may be, if truth and honesty are written across her face, she will be beautiful.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
-min.jpg "Famous quotes and sayings by Eleanor Roosevelt")
20. “People grow through experience if they meet life honestly and courageously. This is how character is built.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
21. “A stumbling block to the pessimist is a stepping-stone to the optimist.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
22. “Every time you meet a situation you think at the time it is an impossibility and you go through the tortures of the damned, once you have met it and lived through it, you find that forever after you are freer than you were before.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
23. “There is not human being from whom we cannot learn something if we are interested enough to dig deep.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
24. “The only advantage of not being too good a housekeeper is that your guests are so pleased to feel how very much better they are.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
-min.jpg "Famous quotes and sayings by Eleanor Roosevelt")
25. “Today is the oldest you've ever been, and the youngest you'll ever be again.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
26. “We do not have to become heroes overnight. Just a step at a time, meeting each thing that comes up, seeing it as not as dreadful as it appears, discovering that we have the strength to stare it down.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
27. “As for accomplishments, I just did what I had to do as things came along.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
28. “I have never felt that anything really mattered but knowing that you stood for the things in which you believed and had done the very best you could.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
29. “Too often the great decisions are originated and given form in bodies made up wholly of men, or so completely dominated by them that whatever of special value women have to offer is shunted aside without expression.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
30. “It's your life, but only if you make it so.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
More Quotes from Eleanor Roosevelt
31. “You can never really live anyone else's life, not even your child's. The influence you exert is through your own life, and what you've become yourself.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
32. “A woman is like a tea bag; you never know how strong it is until it's in hot water.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
33. “Remember always that you not only have the right to be an individual you have an obligation to be one.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
34. “Character building begins in our infancy and continues until death.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
35. “There are no have-to's, just choices.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
36. “In all our contacts it is probably the sense of being really needed and wanted which gives us the greatest satisfaction and creates the most lasting bond.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
37. “You can't move so fast that you try to change the mores faster than people can accept it. That doesn't mean you do nothing, but it means that you do the things that need to be done according to priority.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
38. “He who learns but does not think is lost. He who thinks but does not learn is in great danger.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
39. “Love can often be misguided and do as much harm as good, but respect can do only good. It assumes that the other person's stature is as large as one's own, his rights as reasonable, his needs as important.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
40. “It isn't enough to talk about peace. One must believe in it. And it isn't enough to believe in it. One must work at it.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
41. “The giving of love is an education in itself.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
42. “What you don't do can be a destructive force.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
43. “It is a brave thing to have courage to be an individual; it is also, perhaps, a lonely thing. But it is better than not being an individual, which is to be nobody at all.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
44. “If man is to be liberated to enjoy more leisure, he must also be prepared to enjoy this leisure fully and creatively.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
45. “When you adopt the standards and the values of someone else, you surrender your own integrity. You become, to the extent of your surrender, less of a human being.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
46. “Have convictions. Be friendly. Stick to your beliefs as they stick to theirs. Work as hard as they do.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
47. “I am who I am today because of the choices I made yesterday.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
48. “It is better to light a candle than curse the darkness.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
49. “The purpose of life is to live it, to taste experience to the utmost, to reach out eagerly and without fear for newer and richer experience.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
50. “The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
51. “Justice cannot be for one side alone, but must be for both.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
52. “I could not at any age be content to take my place in a corner by the fireside and simply look on.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
53. “It takes as much energy to wish as it does to plan.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
54. “I think, at a child's birth, if a mother could ask a fairy godmother to endow it with the most useful gift, that gift should be curiosity.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
55. “Since you get more joy out of giving joy to others, you should put a good deal of thought into the happiness you are able to give.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
56. “Ambition is pitiless. Any merit that it cannot use it finds despicable.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
57. “Freedom makes a huge requirement of every human being. With freedom comes responsibility. For the person who is unwilling to grow up, the person who does not want to carry his own weight, this is a frightening prospect.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
58. “I’m so glad I never feel important, it does complicate life.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
59. “When life is too easy for us, we must beware or we may not be ready to meet the blows which sooner or later come to everyone, rich or poor.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
60. “Hate and force cannot be in just a part of the world without having an effect on the rest of it.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
61. “If life were predictable it would cease to be life, and be without flavor.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
62. “It is not more vacation we need – it is more vocation.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
63. “When you cease to make a contribution, you begin to die.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
64. “My experience has been that work is almost the best way to pull oneself out of the depths.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
65. “There are practical little things in housekeeping which no man really understands.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
66. “We are afraid to care too much, for fear that the other person does not care at all.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
67. “A little simplification would be the first step toward rational living, I think.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
68. “With the new day comes new strength and new thoughts.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
69. “Understanding is a two-way street.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
70. “Life must be lived and curiosity kept alive. One must never, for whatever reason, turn his back on life.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
Share these Quotes by Eleanor Roosevelt with your friends, family, and loved ones to inspire them as well.
2. “In the long run, we shape our lives, and we shape ourselves. The process never ends until we die. And the choices we make are ultimately our own responsibility.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
3. “The only things one can admire at length are those one admires without knowing why.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
4. “To handle yourself, use your head; to handle others, use your heart.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
5. “I believe that anyone can conquer fear by doing the things he fears to do.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
6. “Do not stop thinking of life as an adventure. You have no security unless you can live bravely, excitingly, imaginatively; unless you can choose a challenge instead of competence.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
7. “Life was meant to be lived, and curiosity must be kept alive. One must never, for whatever reason, turn his back on life.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
8. “It is not fair to ask of others what you are not willing to do yourself.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
9. “You have to accept whatever comes, and the only important thing is that you meet it with the best you have to give.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
11. “You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, 'I have lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along.' You must do the thing you think you cannot do.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
12. “Friendship with oneself is all important, because without it one cannot be friends with anyone else in the world.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
13. “Never mistake knowledge for wisdom. One helps you make a living; the other helps you make a life.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
14. “Work is always an antidote to depression.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
16. “Beautiful young people are accidents of nature, but beautiful old people are works of art.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
17. “Remember always that you have not only the right to be an individual; you have an obligation to be one. You cannot make any useful contribution in life unless you do this.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
18. “I think that somehow, we learn who we really are and then live with that decision.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
19. “No matter how plain a woman may be, if truth and honesty are written across her face, she will be beautiful.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
21. “A stumbling block to the pessimist is a stepping-stone to the optimist.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
22. “Every time you meet a situation you think at the time it is an impossibility and you go through the tortures of the damned, once you have met it and lived through it, you find that forever after you are freer than you were before.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
23. “There is not human being from whom we cannot learn something if we are interested enough to dig deep.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
24. “The only advantage of not being too good a housekeeper is that your guests are so pleased to feel how very much better they are.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
26. “We do not have to become heroes overnight. Just a step at a time, meeting each thing that comes up, seeing it as not as dreadful as it appears, discovering that we have the strength to stare it down.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
27. “As for accomplishments, I just did what I had to do as things came along.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
28. “I have never felt that anything really mattered but knowing that you stood for the things in which you believed and had done the very best you could.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
29. “Too often the great decisions are originated and given form in bodies made up wholly of men, or so completely dominated by them that whatever of special value women have to offer is shunted aside without expression.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
30. “It's your life, but only if you make it so.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
More Quotes from Eleanor Roosevelt
31. “You can never really live anyone else's life, not even your child's. The influence you exert is through your own life, and what you've become yourself.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
32. “A woman is like a tea bag; you never know how strong it is until it's in hot water.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
33. “Remember always that you not only have the right to be an individual you have an obligation to be one.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
34. “Character building begins in our infancy and continues until death.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
35. “There are no have-to's, just choices.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
36. “In all our contacts it is probably the sense of being really needed and wanted which gives us the greatest satisfaction and creates the most lasting bond.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
37. “You can't move so fast that you try to change the mores faster than people can accept it. That doesn't mean you do nothing, but it means that you do the things that need to be done according to priority.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
38. “He who learns but does not think is lost. He who thinks but does not learn is in great danger.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
39. “Love can often be misguided and do as much harm as good, but respect can do only good. It assumes that the other person's stature is as large as one's own, his rights as reasonable, his needs as important.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
40. “It isn't enough to talk about peace. One must believe in it. And it isn't enough to believe in it. One must work at it.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
41. “The giving of love is an education in itself.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
42. “What you don't do can be a destructive force.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
43. “It is a brave thing to have courage to be an individual; it is also, perhaps, a lonely thing. But it is better than not being an individual, which is to be nobody at all.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
44. “If man is to be liberated to enjoy more leisure, he must also be prepared to enjoy this leisure fully and creatively.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
45. “When you adopt the standards and the values of someone else, you surrender your own integrity. You become, to the extent of your surrender, less of a human being.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
46. “Have convictions. Be friendly. Stick to your beliefs as they stick to theirs. Work as hard as they do.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
47. “I am who I am today because of the choices I made yesterday.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
48. “It is better to light a candle than curse the darkness.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
49. “The purpose of life is to live it, to taste experience to the utmost, to reach out eagerly and without fear for newer and richer experience.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
50. “The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
51. “Justice cannot be for one side alone, but must be for both.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
52. “I could not at any age be content to take my place in a corner by the fireside and simply look on.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
53. “It takes as much energy to wish as it does to plan.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
54. “I think, at a child's birth, if a mother could ask a fairy godmother to endow it with the most useful gift, that gift should be curiosity.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
55. “Since you get more joy out of giving joy to others, you should put a good deal of thought into the happiness you are able to give.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
56. “Ambition is pitiless. Any merit that it cannot use it finds despicable.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
57. “Freedom makes a huge requirement of every human being. With freedom comes responsibility. For the person who is unwilling to grow up, the person who does not want to carry his own weight, this is a frightening prospect.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
58. “I’m so glad I never feel important, it does complicate life.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
59. “When life is too easy for us, we must beware or we may not be ready to meet the blows which sooner or later come to everyone, rich or poor.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
60. “Hate and force cannot be in just a part of the world without having an effect on the rest of it.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
61. “If life were predictable it would cease to be life, and be without flavor.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
62. “It is not more vacation we need – it is more vocation.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
63. “When you cease to make a contribution, you begin to die.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
64. “My experience has been that work is almost the best way to pull oneself out of the depths.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
65. “There are practical little things in housekeeping which no man really understands.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
66. “We are afraid to care too much, for fear that the other person does not care at all.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
67. “A little simplification would be the first step toward rational living, I think.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
68. “With the new day comes new strength and new thoughts.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
69. “Understanding is a two-way street.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
70. “Life must be lived and curiosity kept alive. One must never, for whatever reason, turn his back on life.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
Share these Quotes by Eleanor Roosevelt with your friends, family, and loved ones to inspire them as well.