After so much efforts and sleepless nights just to make it successfully to graduation. When you finally arrive, you deserve some good advice. In this article from EveryDay Stunner, you’ll find the best graduation quotes from celebrities, athletes, politicians, writers and more.
These thoughtful bits of advice are perfect for everyone to include in graduation cards or a commencement speech. I encourage you to keep scrolling down to discover over 100 inspirational graduation quotes!
Best Graduation Posts
- “That clock you hear is the sound of your own heart. Sink your teeth into this life, and don’t get let go.”
—Lin-Manuel Miranda - “Don’t be afraid. Be focused. Be determined. Be hopeful. Be empowered.”
—Michelle Obama - “Understand that one day you will have the power to make a difference, so use it well.”
—Mindy Kaling - “You can’t do it alone. Be open to collaboration. Find a group of people who challenge and inspire you. Spend a lot of time with them and it will change your life.”
— Amy Poehler - “Change takes courage.” —Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez
- “I’m continually trying to make choices that put me out of my own comfort zone. As long as you’re uncomfortable it means you’re growing.”
—Ashton Kutcher - “Your imagination is your preview of life’s coming attractions.”
—Albert Einstein - “When we show up, act boldly, and practice the best ways to be wrong, we fail forward. No matter where we end up, we’ve grown from where we began.”
—Stacey Abrams - “Your education is a dress rehearsal for a life that is yours to lead.”
—Nora Ephron - “You must have some vision for your life. Even if you don’t know the plan, you have to have a direction in which you choose to go.”
—Oprah - “Ignore the naysayers. Really the only option is: head down and focus on the job.”
—Chris Pine - “Remember this: You are awesome. I’m not suggesting you be boastful. No one likes that in men or women. But I am suggesting that believing in yourself is the first necessary step to coming even close to achieving your potential.”
—Sheryl Sandberg - “No matter what happens in life, be good to people. Being good to people is a wonderful legacy to leave behind.”
—Taylor Swift - “It’s amazing what you can get if you quietly, clearly and authoritatively demand it.”
—Meryl Streep - “Fight for what makes you optimistic about the world. Find it, insist on it, dig into it, go after it.”
—Jennifer Garner - “It’s hard to beat a person who never gives up.”
—Babe Ruth - “There are no regrets in life — just lessons.”
—Jennifer Aniston - “There’s something so special about a woman who dominates in a man’s world. It takes a certain grace, strength, intelligence, fearlessness, and the nerve to never take no for an answer.”
—Rihanna - “You cannot dream of becoming something you do not know about. You have to learn to dream big. Education exposes you to what the world has to offer, to the possibilities open to you.”
—Sonia Sotomayor - “You can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backward. You have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future.”
—Steve Jobs - “If I must give any of you advice it would be say yes. Say yes, and create your own destiny.”
— Maya Rudolph - “I’ve learned it’s important not to limit yourself. You can do whatever you really love to do, no matter what it is.”
—Ryan Gosling - “It is better to be a failure at something you love than to be a success at something you hate.”
—George Burns - “When you respect the idea that you are sharing the Earth with other humans, and when you lead with your nice foot forward, you’ll win, every time. It might not be today, it might not be tomorrow, but it comes back to you when you need it.”
—Kristen Bell - “Success is only meaningful and enjoyable if it feels like your own.”
—Michelle Obama - “To give any less than your best is to sacrifice a gift.”
—Steve Prefontaine - “It takes courage to grow up and become who you really are.”
—E. E. Cummings - “A woman with a voice is, by definition, a strong woman.”
—Melinda Gates - “The best remedy for those who are frightened, lonely or unhappy is to go outside, somewhere where they can be alone with the sky, nature, and God. For only then can you feel that everything is as it should be and that God wants people to be happy amid nature’s beauty and simplicity.”
—Anne Frank - “Your inexperience is an asset in that it will make you think in original, unconventional ways. Accept your lack of knowledge and use it as your asset.”
—Natalie Portman - “Take your risks now. As you grow older, you become more fearful and less flexible … Try to keep your mind open to possibilities and your mouth closed on matters that you don’t know about. Limit your ‘always’ and your ‘nevers.’ Continue to share your heart with people even if it’s been broken.”
—Amy Poehler - “Now go, and make interesting mistakes, make amazing mistakes, make glorious and fantastic mistakes. Break rules. Leave the world more interesting for your being here.”
—Neil Gaiman - “I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed.”
—Michael Jordan - “You get in life what you have the courage to ask for.”
—Oprah Winfrey - “Being realistic is the most commonly traveled road to mediocrity.”
—Will Smith - “The meaning of life is to find your gift, the purpose of life is to give it away.”
—Joy J. Golliver - “You don’t have to be famous. You just have to make your mother and father proud of you, and you already have.”
—Meryl Streep - “You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take.”
—Wayne Gretzky - “I can’t think of any better representation of beauty than someone who is unafraid to be herself.”
—Emma Stone - “It’s the choice. You have to wake up every day and say ‘There’s no reason today can’t be the best day of my life.’”
—Blake Lively - “I celebrate you as you remember the power of grace and pride, and I challenge you to choose freedom over fear.”
— Janelle Monáe - “Be thankful for what you have; you’ll end up having more. If you concentrate on what you don’t have you, you will never, ever have enough.”
—Oprah - “Go make your big beautiful dent, and as you do so come down on the side of boldness. If you err, may it be for too much audacity, and not too little. For you really are enough. You have untold strengths and resources inside. You have your glorious self.”
—Sue Monk Kidd - “Persistence can change failure into extraordinary achievement.”
—Matt Bondi - “Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don’t matter and those who matter don’t mind.”
—Dr. Seuss - “You will stumble and fall, you will experience both disaster and triumph, sometimes in the same day. But it’s really important to remember that like a hangover, neither triumphs nor disasters last forever.”
—Helen Mirren - “You could travel with the sheep, follow everybody else’s stuff, but then you’re not you. I guess if I want to say anything it’s ‘Be you.’ Be true to you, and that should make the ride a little more interesting.”
— Whoopi Goldberg - “The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams.”
—Eleanor Roosevelt - “A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.”
—Sun Tzu - “It is impossible to live without failing at something, unless you live so cautiously that you might as well not have lived at all – in which case, you fail by default.”
—J.K. Rowling - “There will be times when your best isn’t your good enough. There can be many reasons for this, but as long as you give your best you’ll be OK.”
—Robert De Niro - “All of our dreams can come true if we have the courage to pursue them.”
—Walt Disney - “Start where you are. Use what you have. Do what you can.”
—Arthur Ashe - “She turned her can’ts into cans and her dreams into plans.”
—Kobi Yamada - “There is no passion to be found in playing small — in settling for a life that is less than the one you are capable of living.”
—Nelson Mandela - “It is often easier to make progress on mega-ambitious dreams. I know that sounds completely nuts. But, since no one else is crazy enough to do it, you have little competition. There are so few people this crazy that I feel like I know them all by first name. They all travel as if they are pack dogs and stick to each other like glue. The best people want to work the big challenges.”
—Larry Page - “Learn from every mistake because every experience, encounter, and particularly your mistakes are there to teach you and force you into being more who you are. And then figure out what is the next right move. And the key to life is to develop an internal moral, emotional G.P.S. that can tell you which way to go.”
—Oprah - “There may be people that have more talent than you, but there’s no excuse for anyone to work harder than you do.”
—Derek Jeter - “Some life lessons don’t ever change. They need to be highlighted and they need to be remembered throughout our entire lives. But how you embrace them will distinguish you from the pack.”
—Brooke Shields - “You can’t climb the ladder of success with your hands in your pockets.”
—Arnold Schwarzenegger - “Education is not preparation for life; education is life itself.”
—John Dewey - “He who is not courageous enough to take risks will accomplish nothing in life.”
—Muhammad Ali - “My favorite animal is the turtle. The reason is that in order for the turtle to move, it has to stick its neck out. There are going to be times in your life when you’re going to have to stick your neck out. There will be challenges, and instead of hiding in a shell, you have to go out and meet them.”
—Ruth Westheimer - “Be the hardest working person you know. Because if you’re not, someone else will be.”
—Ian Brennan - “In response to those who say to stop dreaming and face reality, I say keep dreaming and make reality.”
—Kristian Kan - “This above all: To thine own self be true.”
—William Shakespeare - “Frustration, although quite painful at times, is a very positive and essential part of success. —Bo Bennett
- “If you can’t outplay them, outwork them.”
—Ben Hogan - “You can never be the best. The only thing you can be the best at is developing yourself.”
— Natalie Portman - “Cynicism has never won a war, or cured a disease, or started a business, or fed a young mind, or sent men into space. Cynicism is a choice. Hope is a better choice.”
—Barack Obama - “What lies behind us and what lies before us are small matters compared to what lies within us.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson - “When someone who loves you hugs you, hug them back with two arms—don’t do the one-arm hug, because when you hug someone with two arms, it allows you to lean on somebody, and we all need someone to lean on.”
— Sandra Bullock - “When people tell you not to believe in your dreams, and they say ‘Why?’ say ‘Why not?’”
—Billie Jean King - “Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work.”
—Thomas Edison - “Do. Or do not. There is no try.”
—Yoda - “Intelligence plus character—that is the goal of true education.”
—Martin Luther King Jr. - “As you graduate, as you deal with your excitement and your doubts today, I urge you to try and create the world you want to live in. Minister to the world in a way that can change it. Minister radically in a real, active, practical, get your hands dirty way.”
—Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie - “If you aren’t going all the way, why go at all?”
—Joe Namath - “Go confidently in the direction of your dreams. Live the life you have imagined.”
—Henry David Thoreau - “It is absolutely still possible to make a difference.”
—Michelle Obama - “The horizon leans forward, offering you space to place new steps of change.”
—Maya Angelou - “There is nothing more beautiful than finding your course as you believe you bob aimlessly in the current. Wouldn’t you know that your path was there all along, waiting for you to knock, waiting for you to become. This path does not belong to your parents, your teachers, your leaders, or your lovers. Your path is your character defining itself more and more everyday like a photograph coming into focus.”
—Jodie Foster - “No job or task is too small or beneath you. If you want to get ahead, volunteer to do the things no one else wants to do, and do it better.”
—Bobbi Brown - “We do not need magic to change the world, we carry all the power we need inside ourselves already: we have the power to imagine better.”
—J. K. Rowling - “Education is our passport to the future, for tomorrow belongs to the people who prepare for it today.”
—Malcolm X - “You have to dance a little bit before you step out into the world each day, because it changes the way you walk.”
—Sandra Bullock - “Now the first suggestion is to aim high, but be aware that even before you have reached your ultimate professional destination, if you always strive for excellence, you can and should have a substantial impact on the world in which you live.”
—Sandra Day O’Connor - “Real leadership comes from the quiet nudging of an inner voice. It comes from realizing that the time has come to move beyond waiting to doing.”
—Madeleine Albright - “You and you alone are the only person who can live the life that writes the story that you were meant to tell.”
— Kerry Washington - “Dreams are lovely. But they are just dreams. Fleeting, ephemeral, pretty. But dreams do not come true just because you dream them. It’s hard work that makes things happen. It’s hard work that creates change.”
—Shonda Rhimes - “I’m a greater believer in luck, and I find the harder I work the more I have of it.”
—Thomas Jefferson - “There are far, far better things ahead than any we leave behind.”
—C.S. Lewis - “We may live in an age of instant messaging, instant gratification and Instagram, but there is no way to short circuit the path to success.”
—Tory Burch - “You don’t go to university so you can punch a clock. You go to university so you can be in a position to make a difference.”
—Janet Napolitano - “A champion is someone who gets up when he can’t.”
—Jack Dempsey - “Education is the most powerful weapon we can use to change the world.”
—Nelson Mandela - “Don’t just get involved. Fight for your seat at the table. Better yet, fight for a seat at the head of the table.”
—Barack Obama - “Even if you are on the right track, you will get run over if you just sit there.”
—Will Rogers - “Real courage is holding on to a still voice in your head that says, ‘I must keep going.’ It’s that voice that says nothing is a failure if it is not final. That voice that says to you, ‘Get out of bed. Keep going. I will not quit.’”
—Cory Booker - “If we’d all stuck with our first dream, the world would be overrun with cowboys and princesses. So whatever your dream is right now, if you don’t achieve it you haven’t failed and you’re not some loser.”
—Stephen Colber
If you are just getting started you should have already found immense inspiration from these graduation posts above randomly pulled from world renowned individuals who have shown huge success in their career and life path.
