Eleanor Roosevelt Quotes

“It's your life - but only if you make it so. The standards by which you live must be your own standards, your own values, your own convictions in regard to what is right and wrong, what is true and false, what is important and what is trivial. 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.”

“Life's not about expecting, hoping and wishing. It's about doing, being and becoming. It's about t Learn from the mistakes of others. You can't live long enough to make them all yourself.”

“The giving of love and understanding is an education in itself.”

“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.”

“The family is the natural and fundamental group unit of society and is entitled to protection by society and the State.”

“The motivating force of the theory of a Democratic way of life is still a belief that as individuals we live cooperatively, and, to the best of our ability, serve the community in which we live.”

“...no matter how avid they themselves may be for praise and appreciation, people are often niggardly in giving it to others, however merited it is.”

“Life has got to be lived - that's all there is to it.”

“...so much attention is paid to the aggressive sins, such as violence and cruelty, and greed with all their tragic effects, that too little attention is paid to the passive sins, such as apathy and laziness, which in the long run can have a more devastating and destructive effect upon society than the others.”

“A little simplification would be the first step toward rational living, I think.”

“You have to accept whatever comes and the only important thing is that you meet it with courage and with the best that you have to give.”

“You must do the things you think you cannot do.”

“I am convinced that every effort must be made in childhood to teach the young to use their own minds. For one thing is sure: If they don't make up their minds, someone will do it for them.”

“Make the most of What you have, When you have it, Where you are.”

“An economic policy which does not consider the well-being of all will not serve the purposes of peace and the growth of well-being among the people of all nations.”

“Every day do something that frightens you.”

“A great deal of fear is a result of just “not knowing.” We do not know what is involved in a new situation. We do not know whether we can deal with it. The sooner we learn what it entails, the sooner we can dissolve our fear.”

“those who attack always do so with greater fervor than those who defend.”

“Usefulness, whatever form it may take, is the price we should pay for the air we breathe and the food we eat and the privilege of being alive.”

“Sailors have the cleanest bodies and the filthiest minds.”

“The kind of man who thinks that helping with the dishes is beneath him will also think that helping with the baby is beneath him, and then he certainly is not going to be a very successful father.”

“To a certain extent I don't see any real need for socialism in the United States immediately, but things change and it may be that there will come a need for partial changes in our economy.”

“The destiny of human rights is in the hands of all our citizens in all our communities.”

“No human being can ever 'own' another, whether in friendship, love, marriage, or parenthood.”

“Long ago, there was a noble word, liberal, which derives from the word free. Now a strange thing happened to that word. A man named Hitler made it a term of abuse, a matter of suspicion, because those who were not with him were against him, and liberals had no use for Hitler. And then another man named McCarthy cast the same opprobrium on the word. ... We must cherish and honor the word free or it will cease to apply to us.”

“The freedom of man, I contend, is the freedom to eat.”

“What counts, in the long run, is not what you read; it is what you sift through your own mind; it is the ideas and impressions that are aroused in you by your reading. It is the ideas stirred in your own mind, the ideas which are a reflection of your own thinking, which make you an interesting person”

“Do whatever comes your way to do as well as you can. Think as little as possible about yourself. Think as much as possible about other people. Dwell on things that are interesting. Since you get more joy out of giving joy to others, you should put a good deal of thought into the happiness that you are able to give.”

“Women are like tea bags.They do not know how strong they are until they get into hot water.”

“the greatest luxury I know is sitting up reading in bed.”

“We must do what we think we can't do.”

“The only joy in this hard life is serving others.”

“Government exists for one purpose: to make things better for all people.”

“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.”

“Someone once asked me what I regarded as the three most important requirements for happiness. My answer was: A feeling that you have been honest with yourself and those around you; a feeling that you have done the best you could both in your personal life and in your work; and the ability to love others.”

“Perhaps nature is our best assurance of immortality.”

“It is a curious thing in human experience, but to live through a period of stress and sorrow with another person, creates a bond which nothing seems able to break.”

“Understanding is a two-way street.”

“To appear to be on the inside and know more than others about what is going on is a great temptation for most people. It is a rare person who is willing to seem to know less than he does ... Somehow, people seem to feel that it is belittling to their importance not to know more than other people.”

“Do the things that interest you and do them with all your heart.”

“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.”

“All the water in the world cannot drown you unless it gets inside of you.”

“There is a desire for progress in the hearts of all men, and it is the sense of frustration and inability to move forward that brings violent revolution.”

“People can only make you inferior with your consent.”

“It's your life-but only if you make it so.”

“One's philosophy is not best expressed in words; it is expressed in the choices one makes... and the choices we make are ultimately our responsibility.”

“Choose a challenge instead of competence”

“It seems to me of great importance to teach children respect for life. Towards this end, experiments on living animals in classrooms should be stopped. To encourage cruelty in the name of science can only destroy the finer emotions of affection and sympathy, and breed an unfeeling callousness in the young towards suffering in all living creatures.”

“A stumbling block to the pessimist is a stepping-stone to the optimist.”

“My experience has been that work is almost the best way to pull oneself out of the depths.”