Some wise person once claimed that no matter what you do and how many books you read, nothing ever prepares you for motherhood. So, if you are a mother and need a gentle reminder that you are doing a great job and need to believe in yourself, here are fifty quotes that will inspire you to get up, brush the dust and tiredness off, and keep walking forward:
1. “When you’re in the thick of raising your kids by yourself, you tend to keep a running list of everything you think you’re doing wrong. I recommend taking a lot of family pictures as evidence to the contrary.” —Connie Schultz
2. “To describe my mother would be to write about a hurricane in its perfect power. Or the climbing, falling colors of a rainbow.” —Maya Angelou
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3. “My mother was the most beautiful woman I ever saw. All I am I owe to my mother. I attribute my success in life to the moral, intellectual and physical education I received from her.” —George Washington
4. “I remember my mother’s prayers and they have always followed me. They have clung to me all my life.” —Abraham Lincoln
5. “My mother was the one constant in my life. When I think about my mom raising me alone when she was 20, and working and paying the bills, and, you know, trying to pursue your own dreams, I think is a feat that is unmatched.” —Barack Obama
6. “I don’t know if I feel like a bad mom, but at the end of the day I’m always plagued with, did I do enough? Should I go in a different direction? But I also know that my entire life revolves around [my son] Louis.” —Sandra Bullock
7. “I finally understand / for a woman it ain’t easy tryin to raise a man / You always was committed / A poor single mother on welfare, tell me how ya did it / There’s no way I can pay you back / But the plan is to show you that I understand / You are appreciated” —Tupac Shakur
8. “It’s not easy being a mother. If it were easy, fathers would do it.” —Dorothy on The Golden Girls
9. “In 1971, Bossier City, Louisiana, there was a teenage girl who was pregnant with her second child. She was a high school dropout and a single mom, but somehow she managed to make a better life for herself and her children. She encouraged her kids to be creative, to work hard, and to do something special. That girl is my mother and she’s here tonight. And I just want to say, I love you, Mom. Thank you for teaching me to dream.” —Jared Leto
10. “A mother is the truest friend we have, when trials heavy and sudden fall upon us; when adversity takes the place of prosperity; when friends desert us; when trouble thickens around us, still will she cling to us, and endeavor by her kind precepts and counsels to dissipate the clouds of darkness, and cause peace to return to our hearts.” ―Washington Irving
11. “My mom had four kids, one with special needs. She had a full-time job, and she still came home and made dinner for us every night, from scratch. It was amazing.” —Eva Longoria
12. “Over the years, I learned so much from mom. She taught me about the importance of home and history and family and tradition. She also taught me that aging need not mean narrowing the scope of your activities and interests or a diminution of the great pleasures to be had in the everyday.” —Martha Stewart
13. “There’s something that just happens to you when you have a baby, and you look at their little eyes for the first time when you’re holding them. They’ve been safe inside your belly for almost 10 months, and now they’re in your arms. Intuition kicks in, where you will do anything for them and you have all the tools inside of you to take care of them.” —Hillary Duff
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14. “I think every working mom probably feels the same thing: You go through big chunks of time where you’re just thinking, ‘This is impossible — oh, this is impossible.’ And then you just keep going and keep going, and you sort of do the impossible.” —Tina Fey
15. “If I’ve learned anything as a mom with a daughter who’s three, I’ve learned that you cannot judge the way another person is raising their kid. Everybody is just doing the best they can. It’s hard to be a mom.” —Maggie Gyllenhaal
16. “When I had my first child I thought, ‘This is the best-kept secret.’ You know how parents rattle on to you about, ‘Oh, you won’t believe your life will never be the same,’ and da, da, da and you think, ‘Why can’t these people just get over it? All they’re doing is yakking on about their kids. It’s such a bore.’ And then you have kids and you just want to do all the same things.” —Uma Thurman
17. “You instantly become less selfish. You can’t be the biggest person in the world anymore—they are. [Motherhood] really grounds you.” —Keri Russell
18. “My mom is a hard worker. She puts her head down and she gets it done. And she finds a way to have fun. She always says, ‘Happiness is your own responsibility.’ That’s probably what I quote from her and live by the most.” —Jennifer Garner
19. “There’s no such thing as a supermom. We just do the best we can.” —Sarah Michelle Gellar
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20. “It’s not what you do for your children but what you have taught them to do for themselves that will make them successful human beings.” —Ann Landers
21. Parenting is the easiest thing in the world to have an opinion about, but the hardest thing in the world to do. —Matt Walsh
22. “A mother’s love for her child is like nothing else in the world. It knows no law, no pity, it dares all things and crushes down remorselessly all that stands in its path.” ─ Agatha Christie
23. “And so our mothers and grandmothers have, more often than not anonymously, handed on the creative spark, the seed of the flower they themselves never hoped to see — or like a sealed letter they could not plainly read.” ──Alice Walker
24. “Before becoming a mother I had a hundred theories on how to bring up children. Now I have seven children and only one theory: Love them, especially when they least deserve to be loved.” ──Kate Samperi
25. “Most of all the other beautiful things in life come by twos and threes, by dozens and hundreds. Plenty of roses, stars, sunsets, rainbows, brothers and sisters, aunts and cousins, comrades and friends – but only one mother in the whole world.” ──Kate Douglas Wiggin
26. “Motherhood is not for the faint-hearted. Frogs, skinned knees, and the insults of teenage girls are not meant for the wimpy.” ──Danielle Steel
27. “She was of the stuff of which great men’s mothers are made. She was indispensable to high generation, hated at tea parties, feared in shops, and loved at crises.” ──Thomas Hardy
28. “When you are a mother, you are never really alone in your thoughts. A mother always has to think twice, once for herself and once for her child.” ── Sophia Loren
29. “Women do not have to sacrifice personhood if they are mothers. They do not have to sacrifice motherhood in order to be persons. Liberation was meant to expand women’s opportunities, not to limit them. The self-esteem that has been found in new pursuits can also be found in mothering.” ──Elaine Heffner
30. “Somewhere between handling challenges, taking care of business, and juggling responsibilities, you may have lost pieces of yourself which you long to recover. Perhaps they were buried and forgotten long ago. Rediscovering is more than just being reminded of these golden treasures. It is being able to excavate your riches by pulling them out, polishing them off, and allowing them to shine again.” ― Susan C. Young
31. “You may encounter many defeats, but you must not be defeated. In fact, it may be necessary to encounter the defeats, so you can know who you are, what you can rise from, how you can still come out of it.” – Maya Angelou
32. “The strength of a woman is not measured by the impact that all her hardships in life have had on her; but the strength of a woman is measured by the extent of her refusal to allow those hardships to dictate her and who she becomes.” ― C. JoyBell C.
33. “If for a while, the harder you try, the harder it gets, take heart. So it has been for the best people who have ever lived.” ──Jeffrey R. Holland
34. “Successful mothers are not the ones who have never struggled. They are the ones who never give up despite the struggles.” ──Sharon Jaynes
35. “Never give up what you want most for what you want today.” ──Neal A. Maxwell
36. “A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.” ──Lao-Tzu
37. “The attitude you have as a parent is what your kids will learn from more than what you tell them. They don’t remember what you try to teach them. They remember what you are.” ──Jim Henson
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38. “We delight in the beauty of the butterfly, but rarely admit the changes it has gone through to achieve that beauty.” ──Maya Angelou
39. “I have never met a woman, or man, who stated emphatically, “Yes, I have it all.’” Because no matter what any of us has—and how grateful we are for what we have—no one has it all.” ──Sheryl Sandberg
40. “Life is about balance. The good and the bad. The highs and the lows. The pina and the colada.” ──Ellen DeGeneres
41. “Mistakes are a fact of life: It is the response to the error that counts.” ──Nikki Giovanni
42. “The key is not to prioritize what’s on your schedule but to schedule your priorities.” ──Stephen Covey
43. “Life is not easy for any of us. But what of that? We must have perseverance and above all confidence in ourselves. We must believe that we are gifted for something and that this thing must be attained.” ──Marie Curie
44. “Any mother could perform the jobs of several air traffic controllers with ease.” – Lisa Alther
45. “Being a full-time mother is one of the highest salaried jobs… since the payment is pure love.” – Mildred B. Vermont
46. “It is not until you become a mother that your judgment slowly turns to compassion and understanding.” – Erma Bombeck
47. “If you have never been hated by your child you have never been a parent.” -Bette Davis
48. “The phrase ‘working mother’ is redundant.” – Jane Sellman
49. “A mother is a person who seeing there are only four pieces of pie for five people, promptly announces she never did care for pie.” – Tenneva Jordan
50. “Before I got married, I had six theories about bringing up children; now, I have six children and no theories.” – J. Wilmot
