Are you about to graduate? Your graduation is a wonderful time of celebrating your achievements. You can count yourself lucky because you’re finally getting out of the almost never-ending loop between finishing your exams and starting the next semester. Reason enough to celebrate with a great list of inspirational graduation quotes! PS: Be sure not to miss our hilarious collection of epic and funny senior quotes.
No matter if you graduate from college, high school, or university, graduation marks the end of an important chapter in your life. All the hard work and effort is finally starting to pay off. Your graduation will compensate for all the difficulties and the struggles you had to go through during your time in school or university. And let’s face it, your teachers and professors made you go through some pretty tough stuff so there’s a lot to celebrate.
“You are educated. Your certification is in your degree. You may think of it as the ticket to the good life. Let me ask you to think of an alternative. Think of it as your ticket to change the world.”
Tom Brokaw
Graduating is like a ride on a roller coaster. It reminds you of the great time you’ve had at your school or university. But it also highlights how much time and effort you’ve had to invest to get where you are today. In short, your graduation ceremony is a reflection of your academic successes but also the trials you had to endure.
Let’s celebrate your accomplishments with the selection of inspirational graduation quotes
When graduation season arrives, students all across the country are listening to some great advice about pursuing their passions and having an impact on the world. And even though not every graduation speech is truly remarkable, there are quite a lot of profound insights in those inspirational graduation quotes. Luckily for you, you don’t need to jump from one graduation celebration to another to get all this valuable advice in a condensed form. Just read on, and have a look at our selection of the greatest thoughts about graduating.
125 Inspirational Graduation Quotes
No matter if you yourself are graduating or a close friend of yours, it’s not that easy to come up with some pretty inspirational words about graduating. That’s where our collection of truly remarkable graduation quotes comes in quite handy. Here you can find some of the most inspirational thoughts on graduating.
As a bonus, we’ve also added some funny graduation quotes for you. And if you’re graduating from high school or college, have a look at our high school graduation quotes and college graduation quotes. If you’re in a rush, these short graduation quotes will do to job as well.
Enjoy this collection of inspirational graduation quotes
1.
“Enjoy yourselves, keep your brain in your head and your head firmly attached to the body, the body active and alive, and I promise you this much; I promise you this one sweet victory over our enemies, over those desk-bound men and women with their hearts in a safe deposit box, and their eyes hypnotized by desk calculators. I promise you this; You will outlive the bastards.”
Edward Abbey
2.
“Your life is your story, and the adventure ahead of you is the journey to fulfill your own purpose and potential.”
Kerry Washington
3.
“Now go, and make interesting mistakes, make amazing mistakes, make glorious and fantastic mistakes. Break rules. Leave the world more interesting for you being here. Make good art.”
Neil Gaiman
4.
“You have to be burning with an idea, or a problem, or a wrong that you want to right. If you’re not passionate enough from the start, you’ll never stick it out.”
Steve Jobs
5.
“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
6.
“Graduation is only a concept. In real life every day you graduate. Graduation is a process that goes on until the last day of your life. If you can grasp that, you’ll make a difference.”
Arie Pencovici
7.
“Don’t buy society’s definition of success. Because it’s not working for anyone. It’s not working for women, it’s not working for men, it’s not working for polar bears, it’s not working for the cicadas that are apparently about to emerge and swarm us. It’s only truly working for those who make pharmaceuticals for stress, diabetes, heart disease, sleeplessness, and high blood pressure.”
Arianna Huffington
8.
“Graduation is not the end; it’s the beginning.”
Senator Orrin Hatch
9.
“When your journey seems too hard, and when you run into a chorus of cynics who tell you that you’re being foolish to keep believing or that you can’t do something, or that you should just give up, or you should just settle—you might say to yourself a little phrase that I’ve found handy these last eight years: Yes, we can.”
Barack Obama
10.
“The fireworks begin today. Each diploma is a lighted match. Each one of you is a fuse.”
Edward Koch
11.
“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
12.
“Do not complain beneath the stars about the lack of bright spots in your life.”
Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson
13.
“Take pride in how far you’ve come. Have faith in how far you can go. But don’t forget to enjoy the journey.”
Michael Josephson
14.
“I encourage you to live with life. Be courageous, adventurous. Give us a tomorrow, more than we deserve.”
Maya Angelou
15.
“Instruction ends in the schoolroom, but education ends only with life.”
Frederick W. Robertson
16.
“Do all the other things, the ambitious things—travel, get rich, get famous, innovate, lead, fall in love, make and lose fortunes…but as you do, to the extent that you can, err in the direction of kindness.”
George Saunders
17.
“In the business world, everyone is paid in two coins: cash and experience. Take experience first; the cash will come later.”
Harold Geneen
18.
“Your education is a dress rehearsal for a life that is yours to lead.”
Nora Ephron
19.
“And how do you know when you’re doing something right? How do you know that? It feels so. What I know now is that feelings are really your GPS system for life. When you’re supposed to do something or not supposed to do something, your emotional guidance system lets you know. The trick is to learn to check your ego at the door and start checking your gut instead.”
Oprah Winfrey
20.
“Keep in mind that neither success nor failure is ever final.”
Roger Babson
21.
“An investment in knowledge always pays the best interest.”
Benjamin Franklin
22.
“Knowledge is not power. The implementation of knowledge is power.”
Larry Winget
23.
“Intelligence plus character—that is the goal of true education.”
Martin Luther King Jr.
24.
“Life is an improvisation. You have no idea what’s going to happen next and you are mostly just making things up as you go along.”
Stephen Colbert
25.
“Your need for acceptance can make you invisible in this world. Don’t let anything stand in the way of the light that shines through this form. Risk being seen in all of your glory.”
Jim Carrey
26.
“Every person you meet knows something you don’t; learn from them.”
H Jackson Brown Jr
27.
“The beautiful thing about learning is that no one can take it away from you.”
B.B. King
28.
“Now that you’ve graduated, just remember: Bosses don’t usually accept notes from your mother.”
Melanie White
29.
“Don’t be afraid of fear. Because it sharpens you, it challenges you, it makes you stronger; and when you run away from fear, you also run away from the opportunity to be your best possible self.”
Ed Helms
30.
“Don’t say you don’t have enough time. You have exactly the same number of hours per day that were given to Helen Keller, Pasteur, Michaelangelo, Mother Teresa, Leonardo da Vinci, Thomas Jefferson, and Albert Einstein.”
H. Jackson Brown Jr
31.
“Life is my college. May I graduate well, and earn some honors!”
Louisa May Alcott
32.
“Set out each day believing in your dreams. Know without a doubt that you were made for great things.”
Josh Hinds
33.
“What sculpture is to a block of marble, education is to the human soul.”
Joseph Addison
34.
“Always be a first-rate version of yourself, instead of a second-rate version of somebody else.”
Judy Garland
35.
“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
36.
“Education is our passport to the future, for tomorrow belongs to the people who prepare for it today.”
Malcolm X
37.
“Be compassionate to everyone. Don’t just search for whatever it is that annoys and frightens you, see beyond those things to the basic human being. Especially see the child in the man or woman. Even if they are destroying you, allow a moment to see how lost in their own delusion and suffering they are.”
Alice Walker
38.
“Accept responsibility for your life. Know that it is you who will get you where you want to go, no one else.”
Les Brown
39.
“Thankfully dreams can change. 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. But just as importantly—and this is the part I may not get right and you may not listen to—if you do get your dream, you are not a winner.”
Stephen Colbert
40.
“All our dreams can come true… if we have the courage to pursue them.”
Walt Disney
41.
“The best way to predict the future is to create it.”
Abraham Lincoln
42.
“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
43.
“Your path is your character defining itself more and more everyday like a photograph coming into focus.”
Jodie Foster
44.
“Adapt what is useful, reject what is useless, and add what is specifically your own.”
Bruce Lee
45.
“To accomplish great things, we must not only act, but also dream, not only plan, but also believe.”
Anatole France
46.
“Some men see things as they are and ask why. Others dream things that never were and ask why not.”
George Bernard Shaw
47.
“Anyone who stops learning is old, whether at twenty or eighty. Anyone who keeps learning stays young.”
Henry Ford
48.
“From my point of view, which is that of a storyteller, I see your life as already artful, waiting, just waiting and ready for you to make it art.”
Toni Morrison
49.
“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
50.
“Nobody likes to fail, but failure is an essential part of life and of learning. If your uniform isn’t dirty, you haven’t been in the game.”
Ben Bernanke
51.
“If you don’t go after what you want, you’ll never have it. If you don’t ask, the answer is always no. If you don’t step forward, you’re always in the same place.”
Nora Roberts
52.
“Not only can you not plan the impact you’re going to have, you often won’t recognize it when you’re having it.”
Dick Costolo
53.
“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
54.
“Try to learn something about everything and everything about something.”
T. H. Huxley
55.
“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
56.
“I have been impressed with the urgency of doing. Knowing is not enough; we must apply. Being willing is not enough; we must do.”
Leonardo da Vinci
57.
“There is no script. Live your life. Soak it all in.”
Dick Costolo
58.
“Success doesn’t rush. The greatest reward is the journey!”
Jeff Moore
59.
“Education’s purpose is to replace an empty mind with an open one.”
Malcolm S. Forbes
60.
“Be bold, be courageous, be your best.”
Gabrielle Giffords
Funny graduation quotes
61.
“A graduation ceremony is an event where the commencement speaker tells thousands of students dressed in identical caps and gowns that “individuality” is the key to success.”
Robert Orben
62.
“To those of you who received honors, awards, and distinctions, I say well done. And to the C students, I say you too may one day be president of the United States.”
George W. Bush
63.
“Your families are extremely proud of you. You can’t imagine the sense of relief they are experiencing. This would be a most opportune time to ask for money.”
Gary Bolding
64.
“Even if you are on the right track, you will get run over if you just sit there.”
Will Rogers
65.
“The elevator to success is out of order. You’ll have to use the stairs . . . one step at a time.”
Joe Girard
66.
“Never follow someone else’s path, unless you’re in the woods and you’re lost and you see a path. By all means, you should follow that.”
Ellen DeGeneres
67.
“There may be days when you’ll say to yourself, ‘I can’t. I literally can’t even.’ But you can! You can even!”
Katie Couric
68.
“You can’t climb the ladder of success with your hands in your pockets.”
Arnold Schwarzenegger
69.
“Graduation day is tough for adults. They go to the ceremony as parents. They come home as contemporaries. After 22 years of child-raising, they are unemployed.”
Erma Bombeck
70.
“Do not worry too much about your lawn. You will soon find if you haven’t already that almost every adult American devotes tremendous time and money to the maintenance of an invasive plant species called turf grass that we can’t eat. I encourage you to choose better obsessions.”
John Green
71.
“You did it, even when you didn’t feel like studying – you did it. Congratulations!”
Kate Summers
High school graduation quotes
72.
“I learned many great lessons from my father, not the least of which was that you can fail at what you don’t want, so you might as well take a chance on doing what you love.”
Jim Carrey
73.
“Live your life each day as you would climb a mountain. An occasional glance towards the summit keeps the goal in mind, but many beautiful scenes are to be observed from each new vantage point.”
Harold B. Melchart
74.
“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
75.
“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
76.
“So, I say to you, forget about the fast lane. If you really want to fly, just harness your power to your passion. Honor your calling. Everybody has one. Trust your heart and success will come to you.”
Oprah Winfrey
77.
“How far you go in life depends on your being tender with the young, compassionate with the aged, sympathetic with the striving and tolerant of the weak and the strong. Because someday in life you will have been all of these.”
George Washington Carver
78.
“The most rewarding things in life are often the ones that look like they cannot be done.”
Arnold Palmer
79.
“You can never be overdressed or overeducated.”
Oscar Wilde
80.
“Let us never be betrayed into saying we have finished our education; because that would mean we had stopped growing.”
Julia H. Gulliver
81.
“Successful and unsuccessful people do not vary greatly in their abilities. They vary in their desires to reach their potential.”
John Maxwell
82.
“If you’re willing to stand for what you believe in… you won’t need advice from me, because you will be able to handle whatever comes.”
Whoopi Goldberg
83.
“Don’t judge each day by the harvest you reap but by the seeds that you plant.”
Robert Louis Stevenson
84.
“Don’t be trapped by dogma – which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition.”
Steve Jobs
85.
“Love your Enemies, for they tell you your faults.”
Benjamin Franklin
86.
“Don’t get impatient. Even if things are so tangled up you can’t do anything, don’t get desperate or blow a fuse and start yanking on one particular thread before it’s ready to come undone. You have to realize it’s going to be a long process and that you’ll work on things slowly, one at a time.”
Haruki Murakami
87.
“Just don’t give up trying to do what you really want to do.”
Ella Fitzgerald
88.
“Don’t be afraid of fear. Because it sharpens you, it challenges you, it makes you stronger; and when you run away from fear, you also run away from the opportunity to be your best possible self.”
Ed Helms
89.
“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.”
JK Rowling
College graduation quotes
90.
“When you take risks, you learn that there will be times when you succeed and there will be times when you fail, and both are equally important.”
Ellen DeGeneres
91.
“When you leave here, don’t forget why you came.”
Adlai E. Stevenson
92.
“As you start your journey, the first thing you should do is throw away that store-bought map and begin to draw your own.”
Michael Dell
93.
“Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life.”
Steve Jobs
94.
“In response to those who say to stop dreaming and face reality, I say keep dreaming and make reality.”
Kristian Kan
95.
“We cannot change the cards we are dealt, just how we play the hand.”
Randy Pausch
96.
“Don’t ever take a fence down until you know why it was put up.”
Robert Frost
97.
“If you can imagine it, you can achieve it; if you can dream it, you can become it.”
William Arthur Ward
98.
“Don’t make excuses, don’t blame the past. The rest of your life can be the best of your life!”
Joel Osteen
99.
“Don’t settle. As with all matters of the heart, you’ll know it when you find it.”
Steve Jobs
100.
“Accept what life offers you and try to drink from every cup. All wines should be tasted; some should only be sipped, but with others, drink the whole bottle.”
Paulo Coelho
101.
“You may not always have a comfortable life and you will not always be able to solve all of the world’s problems at once, but don’t ever underestimate the importance you can have because history has shown us that courage can be contagious, and hope can take on a life of its own.”
Michelle Obama
102.
“You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself in any direction you choose.”
Dr. Seuss
103.
“The world rewards those who take responsibility for their own success.”
Curt Gerrish
104.
“By three methods we may learn wisdom: First, by reflection, which is noblest; Second, by imitation, which is easiest; and third by experience, which is the bitterest.”
Confucius
105.
“Sometimes you find out what you are supposed to be doing by doing the things you are not supposed to do.”
Oprah Winfrey
106.
“What you’re supposed to do when you don’t like a thing is change it. If you can’t change it, change the way you think about it. Don’t complain.”
Maya Angelou
107.
“There were two ways to be happy: improve your reality or lower your expectations.”
Jodi Picoult
108.
“Your life is your story, and the adventure ahead of you is the journey to fulfill your own purpose and potential.”
– Kerry Washington
109.
“Go confidently in the direction of your dreams. Live the life you have imagined.”
Henry David Thoreau
110.
“You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself in any direction you choose.”
Dr. Seuss
111.
“Don’t ever confuse the two, your life and your work. The second is only part of the first.”
Anna Quindlen
112.
“Sometimes you need a little crisis to get your adrenaline flowing and help you realize your potential.”
Jeannette Walls
Short graduation quotes
113.
“Start where you are. Use what you have. Do what you can.”
Arthur Ashe
114.
“Learning is the only thing the mind never exhausts, never fears, and never regrets.”
Leonardo da Vinci
115.
“Dream big and dare to fail.”
Norman Vaughan
116.
“Go confidently in the direction of your dreams. Live the life you have imagined.”
Henry David Thoreau
117.
“If opportunity doesn’t knock, build a door.”
Milton Berle
118.
“It takes courage to grow up and become who you really are.”
E.E. Cummings
119.
“Never give advice unless you have walked the walk, because anybody can talk the talk.”
Valencia Mackie
120.
“There are no regrets in life. Just lessons.”
Jennifer Aniston
121.
“Education is the key to unlocking the world, a passport to freedom.”
Oprah Winfrey
122.
“Discipline is the bridge between goals and accomplishment.”
Jim Rohn
123.
“Follow your arrow, wherever it points.”
Kacey Musgraves
124.
“The important thing is not to stop questioning.”
Albert Einstein
125.
“The most important thing is this: to sacrifice what you are now for what you can become tomorrow.”
Shannon Alder
I hope you enjoyed this collection of graduation quotes. What is your favorite quote that reminds you about your own graduation?
Stay victorious!
