These inspirational quotes for teens give your teenager a lot to think about.
Education, love, and your purpose in life can be heavy topics. These quotes from notable folks provide great insight and, in many cases, a nice way of looking at things.
So dive in and learn what you can. And don’t forget to share them with the teenagers in your life.
Best Inspirational Quotes for Teenagers
1.) Sooner or later, those who win are those who think they can.
Paul Tournier
2.) Life’s most persistent and urgent question is: “What are you doing for others?”
Martin Luther King, Jr.
3.) The pessimist sees difficulty in every opportunity. The optimist sees opportunity in every difficulty.
Winston Churchill
4.) You must be the change you wish to see in the world.
Mahatma Gandhi
5.) Be a first-rate version of yourself, not a second-rate version of someone else.
Judy Garland
6.) Your attitude, not your aptitude, will determine your altitude.
Zig Ziglar
7.) A successful man is one who can lay a firm foundation with the bricks others have thrown at him.
David Brinkley
You might also enjoy our inspirational quotes for kids.
8.) We all can dance when we find music we love.
Giles Andreae
9.) Success is not final; failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.
Winston Churchill
10.) Never let the fear of striking out keep you from playing the game.
Babe Ruth
Inspiring Sayings
11.) Do what you can, with what you have, where you are.
Theodore Roosevelt
12.) Never let the odds keep you from doing what you know in your heart you were meant to do.
H. Jackson Brown
13.) All our dreams can come true if we have the courage to pursue them.
Walt Disney
14.) The more that you read, the more things you will know. The more that you learn, the more places you’ll go.
Dr. Seuss
15.) Smile and let everyone know that today, you’re a lot stronger than you were yesterday.
Drake
16.) Don’t waste your energy trying to change opinions. Do your thing, and don’t care if they like it.
Tina Fey
17.) Life is either a great adventure or nothing.
Helen Keller
18.) No matter what you look like or think you look like, you’re special, loved, and perfect just the way you are.
Ariel Winter
19.) One must first have a burning desire, similar to an “I can’t wait to start work” attitude, to have or obtain only what now is currently only a dream.
Byron Pulsifer
20.) Winning doesn’t always mean being first. Winning means you’re doing better than you’ve done before.
Bonnie Blair
21.) Beauty begins the moment you decide to be yourself.
Coco Chanel
Empowering Quotes for Girls
22.) Women challenge the status quo because we are never it.
Cindy Gallop
23.) It took me quite a long time to develop a voice, and now that I have it, I am not going to be silent.
Madeleine Albright
24.) Some women choose to follow men, and some choose to follow their dreams. If you’re wondering which way to go, remember that your career will never wake up and tell you that it doesn’t love you anymore.
Lady Gaga
25.) A girl should be two things: who and what she wants.
Coco Chanel
26.) Live as if you were to die tomorrow. Learn as if you were to live forever.
Mahatma Gandhi
27.) The thing women have yet to learn is nobody gives you power. You just take it.
Roseanne Barr
28.) The world needs strong women. Women who will lift and build others, who will love and be loved. Women who live bravely, both tender and fierce. And women of indomitable will.
Amy Tenney
29.) We cannot all succeed when half of us are held back. We call upon our sisters around the world to be brave – to embrace the strength within themselves and realize their full potential.
Malala Yousafzai
30.) The woman who does not require validation from anyone is the most feared individual on the planet.
Mohadesa Najumi
31.) Whenever you see a successful woman, look out for three men who are going out of their way to try to block her.
Yulia Tymoshenko
32.) She is clothed in strength and dignity, and she laughs without fear of the future.
Proverbs 31:25
33.) You are more powerful than you know; you are beautiful just as you are.
Melissa Etheridge
Funny Quotes
34.) People often say that motivation doesn’t last. Well, neither does bathing – that’s why we recommend it daily.
Zig Ziglar
35.) A peacock that rests on his tail feathers is just another turkey.
Dolly Parton
36.) I always wanted to be somebody, but now I realize I should have been more specific.
Lily Tomlin
37.) Happiness is having a large, loving, caring, close-knit family in another city.
George Burns
38.) Be a positive energy trampoline – absorb what you need and rebound more back.
Dave Carolan
39.) You can’t wait for inspiration. You have to go after it with a club.
Jack London
40.) If at first, you don’t succeed, then skydiving definitely isn’t for you.
Steven Wright
41.) If you’re going through hell, keep going.
Winston Churchill
42.) Work until your bank account looks like a phone number.
Unknown
43.) Bad decisions make good stories.
Ellis Vidler
Amusing Insights
44.) I am so clever that sometimes I don’t understand a single word of what I am saying.
Oscar Wilde
45.) If you think you are too small to make a difference, try sleeping with a mosquito.
Dalai Lama
46.) When life gives you lemons, squirt someone in the eye.
Cathy Guisewite
47.) People say nothing is impossible, but I do nothing every day.
Winnie the Pooh
48.) You can’t have everything. Where would you put it?
Steven Wright
49.) A clear conscience is a sure sign of a bad memory.
Mark Twain
Uplifting Quotes for Boys
50.) Try not to become a man of success, but rather try to become a man of value.
Albert Einstein
51.) A man who has committed a mistake and doesn’t correct it is committing another mistake.
Confucius Kongzi
52.) One secret of success in life is for a man to be ready for his opportunity when it comes.
Benjamin Disraeli
53.) Build bridges, not walls.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
54.) No man will make a great leader who wants to do it all himself or get all the credit for doing it.
Andrew Carnegie
55.) A creative man is motivated by the desire to achieve, not by the desire to beat others.
Ayn Rand
56.) You can’t see the water until you run into it. A little boy took off running through it. He got all muddy.
Shannon O’Brien
57.) A boy’s story is the best that is ever told.
Charles Dickens
58.) The real man smiles in trouble, gathers strength from distress, and grows brave by reflection.
Thomas Paine
59.) There comes a time in every rightly constructed boy’s life when he has a raging desire to go somewhere and dig for hidden treasure.
Mark Twain
60.) A man must be big enough to admit his mistakes, smart enough to profit from them, and strong enough to correct them.
John C. Maxwell
61.) One man with courage makes a majority.
Andrew Jackson
62.) The successful man will profit from his mistakes and try again in a different way.
Dale Carnegie
63.) It is not the situation that makes the man, but the man who makes the situation.
Frederick William Robertson
Short Inspiring Quotes
64.) If you want something said, ask a man; if you want something done, ask a woman.
Margaret Thatcher
65.) You can steer yourself in any direction you choose.
Dr. Seuss
66.) When you know better, you do better.
Maya Angelou
67.) Don’t let what you can’t do stop you from doing what you can do.
John Wooden
68.) A witty woman is a treasure; a witty beauty is a power.
George Meredith
69.) Do or do not. There is no try.
Yoda
70.) Believe you can, and you’re halfway there.
Theodore Roosevelt
71.) If you can dance and be free and embarrassed, you can rule the world.
Amy Poehler
72.) We rise by lifting others.
Robert Ingersol
73.) No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.
Eleanor Roosevelt
74.) Goal setting is the secret to a compelling future.
Tony Robbins
75.) And though she is but little, she is fierce.
William Shakespeare
76.) I am not what happened to me. I am what I choose to become.
C. G. Jung
77.) The kind of beauty I want most is the hard-to-get kind that comes from within— Strength, Courage, and Dignity.
Ruby Dee
78.) When someone tells you that you can’t, turn around and say, ‘watch me.’
Unknown
79.) Sometimes, being a brother is even better than being a superhero.
Marc Brown
Thought Provoking Insights
80.) Anything is possible. Anything can be.
Shel Silverstein
81.) He who conquers himself is the mightiest warrior.
Confucius
82.) Be who you are and say how you feel because those who mind don’t matter, and those that matter don’t mind.
Dr. Seuss
83.) Unique and different is the next generation of beautiful.
Taylor Swift
84.) Why fit in when you were born to stand out?
Dr. Seuss
85.) The most difficult thing is the decision to act; the rest is merely tenacity.
Amelia Earhart
Inspirational Love Quotes
86.) Love takes off masks that we fear we cannot live without and know we cannot live within.
James Baldwin
87.) Just don’t give up trying to do what you really want to do. Where there’s love and inspiration, I don’t think you can go wrong.
Ella Fitzgerald
88.) Of all forms of caution, caution in love is perhaps the most fatal to true happiness.
Bertrand Russell
89.) Love yourself first, and everything else falls into line. You really have to love yourself to get anything done in this world.
Lucille Ball
90.) Just be kind.
Unknown
91.) You, yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe, deserve your love and affection.
Buddha
92.) It is better to be hated for what you are than to be loved for what you are not.
Andre Gide
93.) Love will find a way through paths where wolves fear to prey.
Lord Byron
94.) One word frees us of all the weight and pain of life: that word is love.
Sophocles
95.) Love isn’t something you find. Love is something that finds you.
Loretta Young
96.) Romance is the glamour that turns the dust of everyday life into a golden haze.
Elinor Glyn
97.) Spread love wherever you go.
Unknown
Empowering Quotes About Education
98.) You can beat 40 scholars with one fact, but you can’t beat one idiot with 40 facts.
Mevlana
99.) Intellectual growth should commence at birth and cease only at death.
Albert Einstein
100.) Education is the passport to the future, for tomorrow belongs to those who prepare for it today.
Malcolm X
101.) Education is what remains after one has forgotten what one has learned in school.
Albert Einstein
102.) Teachers open the door, but you must enter by yourself.
Chinese Proverb
103.) You’ll find that education is just about the only thing lying around loose in this world, and it’s about the only thing a fellow can have as much of as he’s willing to haul away.
John Graham
104.) Education is not preparation for life; education is life itself.
John Dewey
105.) The whole purpose of education is to turn mirrors into windows.
Sydney J. Harris
106.) The roots of education are bitter, but the fruit is sweet.
Aristotle
107.) Education is the most powerful weapon that you can use to change the world.
Nelson Mandela
108.) Develop a passion for learning. If you do, you will never cease to grow.
Anthony J. D’Angelo
109.) Give a man a fish, and you feed him for a day; teach a man to fish, and you feed him for a lifetime.
Maimonides
110.) Education is not the filling of a pail but the lighting of a fire.
W.B. Yeats
111.) If you want your children to be intelligent, read them fairy tales. If you want them to be more intelligent, read them more fairy tales.
Albert Einstein
112.) Education’s purpose is to replace an empty mind with an open one.
Malcolm Forbes
Inspirational Life Quotes
113.) The purpose of our lives is to be happy.
Dalai Lama
114.) It’s not what happens to you but how you react to it that matters.
Epictetus
115.) I believe in being strong when everything seems to be going wrong.
Audrey Hepburn
116.) You only live once, but if you do it right, once is enough.
Mae West
117.) You are the sum total of everything you’ve ever seen, heard, eaten, smelled, been told, forgot – it’s all there. Everything influences each of us, and because of that, I try to make sure that my experiences are positive.
Maya Angelou
118.) The greatest glory in living lies not in never falling but in rising every time we fall.
Nelson Mandela
119.) Many of life’s failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.
Thomas A. Edison
120.) All you need in this life is ignorance and confidence; then success is sure.
Mark Twain
121.) If you want to live a happy life, tie it to a goal, not to people or things.
Albert Einstein
122.) If life were predictable, it would cease to be life and be without flavor.
Eleanor Roosevelt
123.) The whole world is a series of miracles, but we’re so used to them we call them ordinary things.
Hans Christian Andersen
124.) Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma – which is living with the results of other people’s thinking.
Steve Jobs
Family Quotations
125.) Stick to the basics, and hold on to your family and friends — they will never go out of fashion.
Niki Taylor
126.) When all the dust is settled, and all the crowds are gone, the things that matter are faith, family, and friends.
Barbara Bush
127.) In family life, love is the oil that eases friction, the cement that binds closer together, and the music that brings harmony.
Friedrich Nietzsche
128.) It didn’t matter how big our house was; it mattered that there was love in it.
Peter Buffett
129.) Families are the compass that guides us. They are the inspiration to reach great heights and our comfort when we occasionally falter.
Brad Henry
130.) I sustain myself with the love of family.
Maya Angelou – See more Maya Agnelou quotes.
131.) Other things may change us, but we start and end with the family.
Anthony Brandt
132.) We may have our differences, but nothing’s more important than family.
Coco Chanel
133.) Family means nobody gets left behind or forgotten.
David Ogden Stiers
134.) When everything goes to hell, the people who stand by you without flinching—they are your family.
Jim Butcher
135.) A family is a risky venture because the greater the love, the greater the loss – that’s the trade-off. But I’ll take it all.
Brad Pitt
Self-Belief Quotes
136.) Because one believes in oneself, one doesn’t try to convince. Because one is content with oneself, one doesn’t need others’ approval. And because one accepts oneself, the whole world accepts him or her.
Laozi
137.) Never give up on what you really want to do. A person with big dreams is more powerful than one with all the facts.
Albert Einstein
138.) As soon as you trust yourself, you will know how to live.
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
139.) Hold fast to dreams, for if dreams die, life is a broken-winged bird that cannot fly.
Langston Hughes
140.) Even if you’re on the right track, you’ll get run over if you just sit there.
Will Rogers
141.) The greatest danger for most of us is not that our aim is too high and we miss it, but that it is too low and we reach it.
Michelangelo
142.) I can be changed by what happens to me. But I refuse to be reduced by it.
Maya Angelou
143.) Look at life with the eyes of a child.
Henri Matisse
144.) To succeed in life, you need three things: a wishbone, a backbone, and a funny bone.
Reba McEntire
145.) Those who don’t believe in magic will never find it.
Roald Dahl
146.) Once we believe in ourselves, we can risk curiosity, wonder, spontaneous delight, or any experience that reveals the human spirit.
e e cummings
147.) With the realization of one’s own potential and self-confidence in one’s ability, one can build a better world.
Dalai Lama
Famous Quotes for Teenagers
You might recognize some of these famous inspirational quotes for teens.
148.) We cannot solve problems with the kind of thinking we employed when we came up with them.
Albert Einstein
149.) If you are working on something that you really care about, you don’t have to be pushed. The vision pulls you.
Steve Jobs
150.) Nothing is particularly hard if you break it down into small jobs.
Henry Ford
151.) The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched – they must be felt with the heart.
Helen Keller
152.) If I ever let my head down, it will be just to admire my shoes.
Marilyn Monroe
153.) Beautiful people are not always good, but good people are always beautiful.
Imam Ali
154.) An investment in knowledge pays the best interest.
Benjamin Franklin
155.) Notice that the stiffest tree is most easily cracked, while the bamboo or willow survives by bending with the wind.
Bruce Lee
156.) I say, if your knees aren’t green by the end of the day, you ought to seriously re-examine your life.
Bill Watterson, Calvin and Hobbes
Notable Quotations
157.) Fear? What has a man to do with fear? Chance rules our lives, and the future is all unknown. Best live as we may, from day to day.
Sophocles
158.) Take the attitude of a student; never be too big to ask questions, and never know too much to learn something new.
Augustine Og Mandino
159.) Pursue some path, however narrow and crooked, in which you can walk with love and reverence.
Henry David Thoreau
160.) Let the beauty of what you love be what you do.
Rumi
I hope you enjoyed the quotes above. I’m going to leave you with my favorite quote by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, “Whatever you can do or dream, you can begin it. Boldness has genius, power, and magic in it.”
By Mike O’Halloran
Mike is the founder and editor of Greeting Card Poet.
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