Quotes from Eleanor Roosevelt

We all create the person we become by our choices as we go through life. In a very real sense, by the time we are adult, we are the sum total of the choices we have made.

the thing we call French culture may be due to the fact that French children can play, surrounded by the things of the past, palaces of bygone kings, statues, remembrances of history.

It was the flexibility, the originality, and the independence of thought—combined, of course, with our vast resources—that made American business grow so rapidly. If the seeds of growth are made sterile, if men become passive followers instead of developing qualities of leadership—and courage—we may find someday that our way of life has been superseded.

Now and then, I am surprised to read of the death of someone I have known, because I thought he or she had died long ago. Actually, he had only stopped growing.

I learned something which has stood me in good stead many times—the most important thing in any relationship is not what you get but what you give.

If the child's curiosity is not fed, if his questions are not answered, he will stop asking questions. And then, by the time he is in his middle twenties, he will stop wondering about all the mysteries of his world. His curiosity will be dead.

The more the world speeds up the more it seems necessary that we should learn to pick out of the past the things that we feel were important and beautiful then. One of these things was a quality of tranquillity in people, which you rarely meet today.

There is no experience from which you can't learn something.

Whatever period of life we are in is good only to the extent that we make use of it, that we live it to the hilt, that we continue to develop and understand what it has to offer us and we have to offer it.

You must try to understand truthfully what makes you do things or feel things. Until you have been able to face the truth about yourself you cannot be really sympathetic or understanding in regard to what happens to other people. But it takes courage to face yourself and to acknowledge what motivates you in the things you do.

HAPPINESS is not a goal, it is a by-product.

Actually, an important part of self-knowledge is that it gives one a better realization of the inner strength that can be called upon, of which one may be quite unaware.

Consider the truly happy people you know. I think it is unlikely that you will find that circumstances have made them happy. They have made themselves happy in spite of circumstances.

We obtain our education at home, at school, and, most important, from life itself. The learning process must go on as long as we live.

Discipline of mind and body is one of the most difficult things one has to acquire, but in the long run it is a valuable ingredient of education and a tremendous bulwark in time of trouble. Certainly, it is essential in meeting defeats and recovering from disaster. No matter how hard hit you are, you can face what has to be faced if you have learned to master your own fears.

Maturity means, too, an ability to take criticism and evaluate it. When it is not of value, when it is not constructive, but destructive, one can forget it. But when it is constructive one must accept it and try to profit, even though hurt by it. Perhaps you were hurt because a certain person pointed out a fault and you did not want that person to think you had a fault. But, if you are mature enough, you will accept the criticism of those you love and who love you and learn from it.

No relationship in this world ever remains warm and close unless a real effort is made on both sides to keep it so.

But if you feel that the criticism is made out of sheer malice and that no amount of explanation will change a point of view which has nothing to do with the facts, then the best thing is to put it out of your mind entirely, as though it did not touch you or your loved ones in any way.

In a democratic society we must live cooperatively, and serve the community in which we live, to the best of our ability. For our own success to be real, it must contribute to the success of others.

Life teaches you that you cannot attain real maturity until you are ready to accept this harsh knowledge, this limitation in yourself, and make the difficult adjustment. Either you must learn to allow someone else to meet the need, without bitterness or envy, and accept it; or somehow you must make yourself learn to meet it. If you refuse to accept the limitation in yourself, you will be unable to grow beyond this point.

Occasionally he took us on a picnic or a camping trip and taught us many valuable lessons. The chief one was to remember that camping was a good way to find out people's characters. Those who were selfish showed it very soon, in that they wanted the best bed or the best food and did not want to do their share of the work.

One's philosophy is not best expressed in words; it is expressed in the choices one makes. In the long run, we shape our lives, and we shape ourselves.

There is another ingredient of the maturing process that is almost as painful as accepting your own limitations and the knowledge of what you are unable to give. That is learning to accept what other people are unable to give you. You must learn not to demand the impossible or to be upset when you do not get it.

The most unhappy people in the world are those who face the days without knowing what to do with their time.