Inspirational Quotes Therapy: A Powerful Collection to Heal and Motivate

"We would never tell someone with a broken leg that they should stop wallowing and get it together. We don’t consider taking medication for an ear infection something to be ashamed of. We shouldn’t treat mental health conditions any differently."

- Michelle Obama

"You have within you right now everything you need to deal with whatever the world can throw at you."

- Brian Tracy

"And still, I rise."

- Maya Angelou

"To know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived. This is to have succeeded."

- Ralph Waldo Emerson

"I am not a product of my circumstances. I am a product of my decisions."

- Stephen R. Covey

"In my early professional years I was asking the question, How can I treat, or cure, or change this person? Now I would phrase the question in this way: How can I provide a relationship which this person may use for his own personal growth?"

- Rogers

"One of the cardinal features of cognitive therapy is that it stubbornly refuses to buy into your sense of worthlessness."

- Burns

"Believe you can, and you’re halfway there."

- Theodore Roosevelt

"I have come to believe that caring for myself is not self-indulgent. Caring for myself is an act of survival."

- Audre Lorde

"The advice I’d give to somebody that’s silently struggling is, you don’t have to live that way. You don’t have to struggle in silence. You can be un-silent."

- Demi Lovato

"The curious paradox is that when I accept myself just as I am, then I can change."

- Carl R. Rogers

"One of the most important instruments you have to work with as a counselor is yourself as a person… To every therapy session, we bring our human qualities and the experiences that have influenced us. In my judgment, this human dimension is one of the most powerful influences on the therapeutic process."

- Gerald Corey

"Our greatest glory is not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall."

- Confucius

"What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us."

- Ralph Waldo Emerson

"The unexamined life is not worth living."

- Socrates

"When we tackle obstacles, we find hidden reserves of courage and resilience we did not know we had. And it is only when we are faced with failure do we realize that these resources were always there within us. We only need to find them and move on with our lives."

- A.P.J. Abdul Kalam

"It is taking everything within me to keep waiting, but this is the miracle that I am coming to know; this desert journey has made me weary but my heart is still slouched toward hope. And I will believe I can know peace without knowing what comes next. I will trust in the waiting everything connects. Today is not in vain. And I will grow and I will change in beautiful, meaningful ways."

- Morgan Harper Nichols

"There is hope, even when your brain tells you there isn’t."

- John Green

"Happiness can be found even in the darkest of times, if one only remembers to turn on the light."

- Albus Dumbledore

"Vulnerability sounds like truth and feels like courage. Truth and courage aren’t always comfortable, but they're never weakness."

- Brené Brown

"Promise me you’ll always remember: You’re braver than you believe, and stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think."

- A.A. Milne

"Just because no one else can heal or do your inner work for you doesn’t mean you can, should, or need to do it alone."

- Lisa Olivera

"Mental health…is not a destination, but a process. It’s about how you drive, not where you’re going."

- Noam Shpancer, PhD

"You are not your illness. You have an individual story to tell. You have a name, a history, a personality. Staying yourself is part of the battle."

- Julian Seifter

"Mental health problems don’t define who you are. They are something you experience. You walk in the rain and you feel the rain, but you are not the rain."

- Matt Haig

"What mental health needs is more sunlight, more candor, and more unashamed conversation."

- Glenn Close

"Being able to be your true self is one of the strongest components of good mental health."

- Dr. Lauren Fogel Mersy

"I am not afraid of storms for I am learning how to sail my ship."

- Louisa May Alcott

"Sometimes self care is exercise and eating right. Sometimes it’s spending time with loved ones or taking a nap. And sometimes it’s watching an entire season of TV in one weekend while you lounge around in your pajamas. Whatever soothes your soul."

- Nanea Hoffman

"The most beautiful people we have known are those who have known defeat, known suffering, known struggle, known loss, and have found their way out of the depths. These persons have an appreciation, a sensitivity, and an understanding of life that fills them with compassion, gentleness, and a deep loving concern. Beautiful people do not just happen."

- Elisabeth Kübler-Ross

"You have permission to rest. You are not responsible for fixing everything that is broken. You do not have to try and make everyone happy. For now, take time for you. It’s time to replenish."

- Alyse Ruriani

"Do not feel guilty for prioritizing your emotional well-being. You deserve to flourish in safe spaces."

- Alexandra Elle

"I cannot stand the words ‘Get over it’. All of us are under such pressure to put our problems in the past tense. Slow down. Don’t allow others to hurry your healing. It is a process, one that may take years, occasionally, even a lifetime – and that’s OK."

- Beau Taplin

"Self-care is how you take your power back."

- Lalah Delia

"My dark days made me strong. Or maybe I already was strong, and they made me prove it."

- Emery Lord

"There is no normal life that is free of pain. It's the very wrestling with our problems that can be the impetus for our growth."

- Fred Rogers

"‘Positive vibes only’ isn’t a thing. Humans have a wide range of emotions and that’s OK."

- Molly Bahr, LMHC

"You don’t have to be positive all the time. It’s perfectly okay to feel sad, angry, annoyed, frustrated, scared and anxious. Having feelings doesn’t make you a negative person. It makes you human."

- Lori Deschene

"Nothing can dim the light that shines from within."

- Maya Angelou

"You, yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe, deserve your love and affection."

- Buddha

"This feeling will pass. The fear is real but the danger is not."

- Cammie McGovern

"Feelings come and go like clouds in a windy sky. Conscious breathing is my anchor."

- Thich Nhat Hanh

"Even if we don’t have the power to choose where we come from, we can still choose where we go from there."

- Stephen Chbosky

"You are valuable just because you exist. Not because of what you do or what you have done, but simply because you are."

- Max Lucado

"There is no standard normal. Normal is subjective. There are seven billion versions of normal on this planet."

- Matt Haig, Reasons to Stay Alive

"Women have to take the time to focus on our mental health — take time for self, for the spiritual, without feeling guilty or selfish. The world will see you the way you see you, and treat you the way you treat yourself."

- Beyoncé

"The best way out is always through."

- Robert Frost

"We are not our trauma. We are not our brain chemistry. That’s part of who we are, but we’re so much more than that."

- Sam J. Miller

"Your mental health is everything – prioritize it. Make the time like your life depends on it, because it does."

- Mel Robbins

"If we start being honest about our pain, our anger, and our shortcomings instead of pretending they don’t exist, then maybe we’ll leave the world a better place than we found it."

- Russell Wilson

"In general, the ability to make sense of tragedy and then find benefit in it is the key that unlocks posttraumatic growth."

- Haidt

"The need to be closely related to others is as basic as any biological need and is, in the light of the prolonged period of helpless infancy, equally necessary to survival."

- Yalom

"A sense of life meaning ensues but cannot be deliberately pursued: life meaning is always a derivative phenomenon that materializes when we have transcended ourselves, when we have forgotten ourselves and become absorbed in someone (or something) outside ourselves."

- Yalom

"Our relations with one another are like a stone arch, which would collapse if the stones did not mutually support each other, and which is upheld in this very way."

- Seneca

"We were born for cooperation, like feet, like hands, like eyelids, like the rows of upper and lower teeth. So to work in opposition to one another is against nature: and anger or rejection is opposition."

- Marcus Aurelius

"The greatest gift is a portion of thyself."

- Ralph Waldo Emerson

"The good life is one inspired by love and guided by knowledge."

- Bertrand Russell

"Your time is limited; don’t waste it living someone else’s life."

- Steve Jobs

"We rise by lifting others."

- Robert Ingersoll

"The greatest gift you can give someone is the space to be his or her authentic self."

- Ralph Waldo Emerson

"The darkest night is often the bridge to the brightest tomorrow."

- Norman Vincent Peale

"The simple act of caring is heroic."

- Edward Albert

"We need to give each other the space to grow, to be ourselves, to exercise our diversity. We need to give each other space so that we may both give and receive such beautiful things as ideas, openness, dignity, joy, healing, and inclusion."

- Max de Pree

"When we are listened to, it creates us, makes us unfold and expand."

- Karl A. Menniger

"Your present circumstances don’t determine where you can go; they merely determine where you start."

- Nibo Qubein

"You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take."

- Wayne Gretzky

"The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams."

- Eleanor Roosevelt

"Psychotherapy … [is] a profession whose mainspring is love. Nearly everyone who visits a therapist has a love disorder, and each has a story to tell—of love lost or denied, love twisted or betrayed, love perverted or shackled to violence."

- Ackerman

"I feel enriched when I can truly prize or care for or love another person and when I can let that feeling flow out to that person."

- Rogers

"'Psychotherapy is a cyclical process from isolation into relationship.' It is cyclical because the patient, in terror of existential isolation, relates deeply and meaningfully to the therapist and then, strengthened by this encounter, is led back again to a confrontation with existential isolation."

- Yalom

"Nothing ever goes away until it has taught us what we need to know."

- Chödrön

"When we are no longer able to change a situation—just think of an incurable disease such as inoperable cancer—we are challenged to change ourselves."

- Frankl

"Who looks outside dreams; who looks inside awakes."

- Jung

"It seems to me that the good life is not any fixed state. [...] The good life is a process, not a state of being. It is a direction, not a destination."

- Rogers

"Meanings are not determined by situations, but we determine ourselves by the meanings we give to situations."

- Adler

"God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; the courage to change the things I can; and the wisdom to know the difference."

- Niebuhr

"There is nothing either good or bad but thinking makes it so."

- Seneca

"Person-centered therapy is an optimistic, humanistic, and phenomenological approach to therapy. Person-centered theory posits that individuals have within themselves a capacity for dramatic and positive growth."

- Sommers-Flanagan and Sommers-Flanagan

"Positive psychology looks at what is right with people, focuses on when people are at their best, and attends to individual and group flourishing."

- Biswas-Diener

"We know from experience and the growing body of supportive literature [...] that the therapeutic relationship a counselor forms with each client can be the most powerful tool for helping clients change."

- Cochran and Cochran

"Rather than particular techniques, the far greater predictors of positive outcomes are therapeutic relationships, or counselor qualities in therapeutic relationships that capitalize on clients’ internal strengths."

- Cochran and Cochran

"As human beings we belong to an extremely resilient species. [...] But traumatic experiences do leave traces, whether on a large scale [...] or close to home. [...] They also leave traces on our minds and emotions, on our capacity for joy and intimacy, and even on our biology and immune systems."

- van der Kolk

"Beneath the surface of the protective parts of trauma survivors there exists an undamaged essence, a Self that is confident, curious, and calm, a Self that has been sheltered from destruction by the various protectors that have emerged in their efforts to ensure survival."

- van der Kolk

"Trauma often shatters belief systems and robs people of their sense of meaning. In so doing, it forces people to put the pieces back together, [...] rebuilding beautifully those parts of their lives and life stories that they could never have torn down voluntarily."

- Haidt

"The only limit to our realization of tomorrow will be our doubts of today."

- Franklin D. Roosevelt

"First, out of clutter, find simplicity. Second, from discord, make harmony. Third, in the middle of difficulty lies opportunity."

- John Archibald Wheeler (about Albert Einstein)

"Knowing yourself is the beginning of all wisdom."

- Aristotle

"The more you know yourself, the more patience you have for what you see in others."

- Erik Erikson

"Every adversity, every failure, every heartache carries with it the seed of an equal or greater benefit."

- Napoleon Hill

"Great works are performed not by strength but by perseverance."

- Samuel Johnson

"Nourishing yourself in a way that helps you blossom in the direction you want to go is attainable, and you are worth the effort."

- Deborah Day

"Self-care is giving the world the best of you instead of what’s left of you."

- Katie Reed

"You owe yourself the love that you so freely give to other people."

- Alexandra Elle

"Far and away, the best prize life has to offer is the chance to work hard at work worth doing."

- Theodore Roosevelt

"It is not the mountain we conquer, but ourselves."

- Sir Edmund Hillary

"Boundaries are the distance at which I can love you and me simultaneously."

- Prentis Hemphil

"Life is a balance of holding on and letting go - Rumi No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it's not the same river and he's not the same man. Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom."

- Rumi, Heraclitus, Viktor E. Frankl

"Our wounds are often the openings into the best and most beautiful part of us."

- David Richo

"I'm fine. Well, I'm not fine - I'm here." "Is there something wrong with that?" "Absolutely."

- Ned Vizzini

"Writing is a form of therapy; sometimes I wonder how all those who do not write, compose, or paint can manage to escape the madness, melancholia, the panic and fear which is inherent in a human situation."

- Graham Greene

"Courage doesn’t happen when you have all the answers. It happens when you are ready to face the questions you have been avoiding your whole life."

- Shannon L. Alder

"The attempt to escape from pain, is what creates more pain."

- Gabor Maté

"In my early professional years I was asking the question: How can I treat, or cure, or change this person? Now I would phrase the question in this way: How can I provide a relationship which this person may use for his own personal growth?"

- Carl R. Rogers

"Think of your head as an unsafe neighborhood; don't go there alone."

- Augusten Burroughs

"First, the physiological symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder have been brought within manageable limits. Second, the person is able to bear the feelings associated with traumatic memories. Third, the person has authority over her memories; she can elect both to remember the trauma and to put memory aside. Fourth, the memory of the traumatic event is a coherent narrative, linked with feeling. Fifth, the person's damaged self-esteem has been restored. Sixth, the person's important relationships have been reestablished. Seventh and finally, the person has reconstructed a coherent system of meaning and belief that encompasses the story of trauma."

- Judith Lewis Herman

"I have an obligation to help eliminate the stigma attached to mental illness. When I’m feeling despondent and someone asks in a sincere way how I am, I have a duty to tell the truth. It’s no different from saying I have a bad cold. By speaking candidly, I give others permission to acknowledge their own mental illness, talk about it, and seek help. I must break the silence instead of treating my depression like a shameful character flaw."

- Larry Godwin

"Emotional pain is not something that should be hidden away and never spoken about. There is truth in your pain, there is growth in your pain, but only if it’s first brought out into the open."

- Steven Aitchison

"You are not alone. You are seen. I am with you. You are not alone."

- Shonda Rhimes

"In the depths of winter, I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer. And that makes me happy. For it says that no matter how hard the world pushes against me, within me, there’s something stronger — something better, pushing right back."

- Albert Camus

"If you’re going through hell, keep going."

- Winston Churchill

"If there is no struggle, there is no progress."

- Frederick Douglass

"Talk to yourself like you would to someone you love."

- Brené Brown

"I learned that my sadness never destroyed what was great about me. You just have to go back to that greatness, find that one little light that’s left. I’m lucky I found one little glimmer stored away."

- Lady Gaga

"One small crack does not mean that you are broken, it means that you were put to the test and you didn’t fall apart."

- Linda Poindexter

"You say you’re depressed — all I see is resilience. You are allowed to feel messed up and inside out. It doesn’t mean you’re defective–it just means you’re human."

- David Mitchell

"Slow breathing is like an anchor in the midst of an emotional storm: the anchor won't make the storm go away, but it will hold you steady until it passes."

- Russ Harris

"Be dedicated to change the way in which people see mental illness at all levels of society. If not for yourself, advocate for those who are struggling in silence."

- Germany Kent

"Anyone can be affected, despite their level of success or their place on the food chain. In fact, there is a good chance you know someone who is struggling with it since nearly 20% of American adults face some form of mental illness in their lifetime. So why aren’t we talking about it?"

- Kristen Bell

"You don’t have to control your thoughts. You just have to stop letting them control you."

- Dan Millman

"There is a crack in everything, that’s how the light gets in."

- Leonard Cohen

"I think it’s really important to take the stigma away from mental health… My brain and my heart are really important to me. I don’t know why I wouldn’t seek help to have those things be as healthy as my teeth."

- Kerry Washington

"Play is the child’s symbolic language of self-expression and can reveal (a) what the child has experienced; (b) reactions to what was experienced; (c) feelings about what was experienced; (d) what the child wishes, wants, or needs; and (e) the child’s perception of self."

- Landreth

"[Children should] be allowed to remain in the Garden of Eden until they are strong enough to stand the cultural process without being broken by it."

- Johnson

"The human capacity for burden is like bamboo — far more flexible than you’d ever believe at first glance."

- Jodi Picoult

"Adopting the right attitude can convert a negative stress into a positive one."

- Hans Selye

"It is during our darkest moments that we must focus to see the light."

- Aristotle

"Change what you can, manage what you can’t."

- Raymond McCauley

"It is not the bruises on the body that hurt. It is the wounds of the heart and the scars on the mind."

- Aisha Mirza

"All children should be taught to unconditionally accept, approve, admire, appreciate, forgive, trust, and ultimately, love their own person."

- Asa Don Brown

"Although both love and knowledge are necessary, love is in a sense more fundamental since it will lead intelligent people to seek knowledge in order to find out how to benefit those whom they love. But if people are not intelligent, they will be content to believe what they have been told and may do harm in spite of the most genuine benevolence."

- Bertrand Russell

"Do not wait for leaders; do it alone, person to person."

- Mother Teresa

"The influence of a beautiful, helpful character is contagious and may revolutionize a whole town."

- Eleanor H. Porter

"Understanding why people suffer, how they change, and how to help them live satisfying lives is a fascinating and important undertaking."

- Sommers-Flanagan and Sommers-Flanagan

"One who conquers the sea today is ready to conquer the ocean tomorrow."

- Matshona Dhliwayo

"The children must be taught how to think, not what to think."

- Mead

"Burnout occurs when the distance between the ideal and the possible lived reality becomes too much to bear. That’s true of the workplace, and that’s true of parenting."

- Petersen

"[Burnout is] the flattening of life into one never-ending to-do list, and the feeling that you’ve optimized yourself into a work robot that happens to have bodily functions, which you do your very best to ignore."

- Petersen

"Exhaustion means going to the point where you can’t go any further; burnout means reaching that point and pushing yourself to keep going, whether for days or weeks or years."

- Petersen

"Pain travels through families until someone is willing to feel it."

- Stephi Wagner

"Burnout is an ailment of the soul. We burn out in large part because we believe work is the sure path to social, moral, and spiritual flourishing."

- Malesic

"Deep breathing is our nervous system’s love language."

- Dr. Lauren Fogel Mersy

"Today I hit rock bottom but didn’t busy myself with activity to take my mind off it, like I usually do. I allowed myself to sink as deep as possible. It’s like an infection: let it run its course and be done with it. Rising, I felt cleansed."

- Larry Godwin

"Our bodies and minds are overworked by more than work. They are subject to a culture that relates to every moment as an opportunity to produce or consume."

- Cohen

"Your present circumstances don’t determine where you go; they merely determine where you start."

- Nido Qubein

"You are an amazing clinician. You’re helping so much, even when it doesn’t feel like it."

- @thecollaborativemiami

"Don't judge each day by the harvest you reap but by the seeds that you plant."

- Robert Louis Stevenson

"Sometimes the people around you won’t understand your journey. They don’t need to, it’s not for them."

- Joubert Botha

"Not until we are lost do we begin to understand ourselves."

- Henry David Thoreau

"Imposter syndrome loves to show up when you’re about to make major moves."

- Josie Rosario

"The opposite of illness is not wellness. The opposite of illness is justice."

- @inclusivetherapists

"Just because you don’t understand it doesn’t mean it isn’t so."

- Lemony Snicket

"Not all battles are visible and neither are the victories."

- Brittany Burgunder

"It's difficult. I take a low dose of lithium nightly. I take an antidepressant for my darkness because prayer isn't enough. My therapist hears confession twice a month, my shrink delivers the host, and I can stand in the woods and see the world spark."

- David Lovelace

"Everyone may agree upon the diagnosis, but not everyone may consent to the therapy. Indeed, for healing, things have to be sacrificed at times and separation or loss might always be heartbreak and leave scars of remorse or regret. ("Sorrow")"

- Erik Pevernagie

"The moment you have to recruit people to put another person down, in order to convince someone of your value is the day you dishonor your children, your parents and your God. If someone doesn't see your worth the problem is them, not people outside your relationship."

- Shannon L. Alder

"We take care of ourselves financially so we can be generous with others."

- Lindsay Bryan-Podvin

"Talking to a therapist, I thought, was like taking your clothes off and then taking your skin off, and then having the other person say, "Would you mind opening up your rib cage so that we can start?""

- Julie Schumacher

"If the sound of happy children is grating on your ears, I don't think it's the children who need to be adjusted."

- Stefan Molyneux

"Of course, a culture as manically and massively materialistic as ours creates materialistic behavior in its people, especially in those people who've been subjected to nothing but the destruction of imagination that this culture calls education, the destruction of autonomy it calls work, and the destruction of activity it calls entertainment."

- James Hillman

"In Hollywood if you don't have a shrink, people think you're crazy."

- Johnny Carson

"You yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe, deserve your love and affection."

"Your empathy and guidance plant the seeds of change in the hearts of those you touch."

"Feel it to heal it"

"If all you can do is crawl, start crawling"

"By the yard it’s hard but inch by inch, anything is a cinch!"

"You either pass it back or you pass it on."

"A comforting lie protects a painful truth."

"Whether you believe you can or you cannot, you’re right."

"Avoidance is a symptom of anxiety, not a treatment for it."

"A healthy relationship is one in which everyone can grow."

"Perfection is the enemy of the very good."

"Curiosity is the death of shame and criticism"

"Don’t make permanent decisions based on temporary emotions."

"Nourish to flourish"

"Stop ‘should-ing’ all over yourself!"

"Truth without tact is cruelty."

"We set boundaries to keep people in our lives, not to cut them out."

"If being hard on yourself worked, it would’ve already worked."

"Noone ever hated themselves into loving themselves"

"Worry pretends to be necessary."

"The only way to win against a toxic person is to choose not to play"

"anger is the bodyguard of sadness"

"Love is given and not earned There is a difference between being loved and feeling loved"

"No is a complete sentence. It's not what's wrong with you, it's what happened to you."

"Compassion and empathy sound like excuses to a perfectionist."

"Name is to tame it."

"Put the rage on the page"