58 Inspirational Empowerment Quotes

In our journey through life, we often seek inspiration and empowerment to navigate challenges and seize opportunities. Words have the incredible ability to uplift and inspire, offering renewed perspective and motivation. Whether you're looking to spark a change, embrace positivity, or simply find a moment of peace, our curated collection of the top 58 inspirational empowerment quotes is here to guide you. These nuggets of wisdom, drawn from diverse voices and experiences, aim to challenge, encourage, and support you on your path to personal and professional growth. Join us as we explore the transformative power of words that can illuminate your way forward.

1. “Marriage is a fine institution, but I'm not ready for an institution.” - Mae West

2. “Women are never so strong as after their defeat.” - Alexandre Dumas

3. “I care for myself. The more solitary, the more friendless, the more unsustained I am, the more I will respect myself.” - Charlotte Brontë

4. “No matter what happened yesterday it is insignificant when compared to what lies within the core of your being today.” - Sandy Brewer

5. “I do not think, sir, you have any right to command me, merely because you are older than I, or because you have seen more of the world than I have; your claim to superiority depends on the use you have made of your time and experience.” - Charlotte Brontë

6. “I hate to hear you talk about all women as if they were fine ladies instead of rational creatures. None of us want to be in calm waters all our lives.” - Jane Austen

7. “Looking at it, I started crying. Maybe it was knowing that I had to give up the fantasy, the enormous life consuming fantasy , that someone or something was going to do this for me – the fantasy that someone was coming to lead my life, to choose direction, to give me orgasms.” - Eve Ensler

8. “Stop in somebody's shadow to rest and cool down, and you are lost. No one can make anyone else happy.” - Peter Deunov

9. “In the law, rights are islands of empowerment. . . . Rights contain images of power, and manipulating those images, either visually or linguistically, is central in the making and maintenance of rights. In principle, therefore, the more dizzyingly diverse the images that are propagated, the more empowered we will be as a society.” - Patricia J. Williams

10. “Happiness is part of who we are. Joy is the feeling” - Tony DeLiso

11. “Keep your best wishes, close to your heart and watch what happens” - Tony DeLiso

12. “When, however, one reads of a witch being ducked, of a woman possessed by devils, of a wise woman selling herbs, or even of a very remarkable man who had a mother, then I think we are on the track of a lost novelist, a suppressed poet, of some mute and inglorious Jane Austen, some Emily Bronte who dashed her brains out on the moor or mopped and mowed about the highways crazed with the torture that her gift had put her to. Indeed, I would venture to guess that Anon, who wrote so many poems without signing them, was often a woman.” - Virginia Woolf

13. “Freedom begins the moment you realize someone else has been writing your story and it's time you took the pen from his hand and started writing it yourself.” - Bill Moyers

14. “Incredible change happens in your life when you decide to take control of what you do have power over instead of craving control over what you don't.” - Steve Maraboli

15. “I have not yet spoken my last word about women. I believe that if a woman succeeds in withdrawing from the mass, or rather raising herself from above the mass, she grows ceaselessly and more than a man.” - Arthur Schopenhauer

16. “Maybe your country is only a place you make up in your own mind. Something you dream about and sing about. Maybe it's not a place on the map at all, but just a story full of people you meet and places you visit, full of books and films you've been to. I'm not afraid of being homesick and having no language to live in. I don't have to be like anyone else. I'm walking on the wall and nobody can stop me.” - Hugo Hamilton

17. “..by honouring the demands of our bleeding, our blood gives us something in return. The crazed bitch from irritation hell recedes. In her place arises a side of ourselves with whom we may not-at first- be comfortable. She is a vulnerable, highly perceptive genius who can ponder a given issue and take her world by storm. When we're quiet and bleeding, we stumble upon solutions to dilemmas that've been bugging us all month. Inspiration hits and moments of epiphany rumba 'cross de tundra of our senses. In this mode of existence one does not feel antipathy towards a bodily ritual that so profoundly and reinforces our cuntpower. ” - Inga Muscio

18. “The purpose of empowerment is to urge you towards freedom, to help each of you to break free of all limitations. It is that freedom that will give you eternal happiness and finally connect you with the unconditional realization of TRUTH.” - Steve Maraboli

19. “If you can transcend from the dark rut of disempowered thinking to the bright light of an empowered agreement with reality, you will see opportunities not barriers. You will see the finish line, not the hurdles.” - Steve Maraboli

20. “Fear has the role we give it. We are able to empower or poison ourselves to whatever degree we want. This is the beauty of our design.” - Steve Maraboli

21. “If I follow the inclination of my nature, it is this: beggar-woman and single, far rather than queen and married.” - Elizabeth I

22. “Once lay down the rule that the job comes first and you throw that job open to every individual, man or woman, fat or thin, tall or short, ugly or beautiful, who is able to do that job better than the rest of the world.” - Dorothy L. Sayers

23. “Chastity ... has, even now, a religious importance in a woman's life, and has so wrapped itself round with nerves and instincts that to cut it free and bring it to the light of day demands courage of the rarest.” - Virginia Woolf

24. “The rule seemed to be that a great woman must either die unwed ... or find a still greater man to marry her. ... The great man, on the other hand, could marry where he liked, not being restricted to great women; indeed, it was often found sweet and commendable in him to choose a woman of no sort of greatness at all.” - Dorothy L. Sayers

25. “GIVING - Applied tithing is so rewarding. When you give away your time, talent, and treasures you create a huge shift in your prosperity consciousness. So start where you are as you reach for where it is you want to be.” - Lisa Washington

26. “We tend to disempower ourselves. We tend to believe that we don’t matter. And in the act of taking that idea to ourselves we give everything away to somebody else, to something else.” - Terence McKenna

27. “In honor of Oprah Winfrey: Even greater than the ability to inspire others with hope is the power to motivate them to give as much to the lives of others as they would give to their own; and to empower them to confront the worst in themselves in order to discover and claim the best in themselves.” - Aberjhani

28. “If [God] send me no husband, for the which blessing I am at him upon my knees every morning and evening ...” - William Shakespeare

29. “Your self-confidence is simply the part of your brain that tells you whether or not you should try something different or new or believe in yourself, and just as a Jedi truly believes that it is within their power to control their thoughts and stay in the Light, so can you.” - Stephen Richards

30. “Humans, unlike Jedi, are powerfully afraid of rejection. We do not survive well alone, so humans as a species are especially vulnerable to thoughts that make us afraid the rest of the “tribe” will desert us to die a sad, lonely death.” - Stephen Richards

31. “Certain situations need a Jedi-like approach. One of these is when you are in a strange environment, usually where you feel unsure of yourself. You would be surprised how, if you walk with confidence and meaning, people will see this as a mark of confidence, yet you are perhaps shaking inside but outwardly you have the gait of a confident Jedi Knight.” - Stephen Richards

32. “Stop comparing yourself with others. If they are good at something, you too are good at something else. Self-confidence is not measured by your own capabilities versus that of others, but by your own needs.” - Stephen Richards

33. “Jedi are conversationalists and negotiators, bringing people together and solving problems. Jedi listen and feel to what others are saying.” - Stephen Richards

34. “The moment you become friends with your inner Self, you realize that the failures or hindrances that you met earlier were caused more by your disconnected status with your inner Being.” - Stephen Richards

35. “There are two things essential if you want to enhance your Jedi self-confidence: 1/ belief that it is possible 2/ that self-help is the best help” - Stephen Richards

36. “It's not that difficult you see, To be all that you can be;For the true secret to success, Is simply this...ALWAYS do your best.” - Danielle Pierre

37. “In the game of life, we all receive a set of variables and limitations in the field of play. We can either focus on the lack thereof or empower ourselves to create better realities with the pieces we play the game with.” - T.F. Hodge

38. “When you stop living your life based on what others think of you real life begins. At that moment, you will finally see the door of self acceptance opened.” - Shannon L. Alder

39. “There are some who want to get married and others who don't. I have never had an impulse to go to the altar. I am a difficult person to lead.” - Greta Garbo

40. “(Response to King Erik XIV of Sweden's proposal of marriage:)"[W]hile we perceive ... the zeal and love of your mind towards us is not diminished, yet in part we are grieved that we cannot gratify your Serene Highness with the same kind of affection. And that indeed does not happen because we doubt in any way of your love and honour, but, as often we have testified both in words and writing, that we have never yet conceived a feeling of that kind of affection towards anyone.We therefore beg your Serene Highness again and again that you be pleased to set a limit to your love, that it advance not beyond the laws of friendship for the present nor disregard them in the future. ... We certainly think that if God ever direct our hearts to consideration of marriage we shall never accept or choose any absent husband how powerful and wealthy a Prince soever. But that we are not to give you an answer until we have seen your person is so far from the thing itself that we never even considered such a thing. I have always given both to your brother ... and also to your ambassador likewise the same answer with scarcely any variation of the words, that we do not conceive in our heart to take a husband but highly commend this single life, and hope that your Serene Highness will no longer spend time in waiting for us.” - Elizabeth I

41. “There are certain phrases potent to make my blood boil -- improper influence! What old woman's cackle is that?""Are you a young lady?""I am a thousand times better: I am an honest woman, and as such I will be treated.” - Charlotte Brontë

42. “I am anchored on a resolve you cannot shake. My heart, my conscience shall dispose of my hand -- they only. Know this at last.” - Charlotte Brontë

43. “[J]ust the sight of this book, even though it was of no authority, made me wonder how it happened that so many different men – and learned men among them – have been and are so inclined to express both in speaking and in their treatises and writings so many wicked insults about women and their behaviour. Not only one or two ... but, more generally, from the treatises of all philosophers and poets and from all the orators – it would take too long to mention their names – it seems that they all speak from one and the same mouth. Thinking deeply about these matters, I began to examine my character and conduct as a natural woman and, similarly, I considered other women whose company I frequently kept, princesses, great ladies, women of the middle and lower classes, who had graciously told me of their most private and intimate thoughts, hoping that I could judge impartially and in good conscience whether the testimony of so many notable men could be true. To the best of my knowledge, no matter how long I confronted or dissected the problem, I could not see or realise how their claims could be true when compared to the natural behaviour and character of women.” - Christine de Pizan

44. “The most important thing is this: to sacrifice what you are now for what you can become tomorrow.” - Shannon Alder

45. “Never do a single thing in the anticipation to prove something to someone who has hurt you. If someone has hurt or offended you (whoever that person may be), never perform anything or strive for anything in your life with the mind of proving something to that someone/ to those people. May nothing that you do be done with any thought of them in mind. There is nothing that needs to be proven.” - C. JoyBell C.

46. “I don't know what to do, and if I did know what to do I wouldn't tell you, because if I had to tell you today then I'd have to tell you tomorrow, and when I'm gone you'd have to get somebody else to tell you.” - Myles Horton

47. “If you always attach positive emotions to the things you want, and never attach negative emotions to the things you don't, then that which you desire most will invariably come your way.” - Matt D. Miller

48. “Whatever you choose, however many roads you travel, I hope that you choose not to be a lady. I hope you will find some way to break the rules and make a little trouble out there. And I also hope that you will choose to make some of that trouble on behalf of women."[Commencement Address, Wellesley College, 1996]” - Nora Ephron

49. “Senses empower limitations, senses expand vision within borders, senses promote understanding through pleasure.” - Dejan Stojanovic

50. “[T]he more clamour we make about 'the women's point of view', the more we rub it into people that the women's point of view is different, and frankly I do not think it is -- at least in my job. The line I always want to take is, that there is the 'point of view' of the reasonably enlightened human brain, and that this is the aspect of the matter which I am best fitted to uphold.” - Dorothy L. Sayers

51. “You are the most influential person you will talk to all day.” - Zig Ziglar INC.

52. “The problem isn’t that I think so highly of myself. It is just that you think so little of yourself. Live life BIG, BOLD and OUT LOUD!” - Shannon L. Alder

53. “Critical pessimists, such as media critics Mark Crispin Miller, Noam Chomsky, and Robert McChesney, focus primarily on the obstacles to achieving a more democratic society. In the process, they often exaggerate the power of big media in order to frighten readers into taking action. I don't disagree with their concern about media concentration, but the way they frame the debate is self-defeating insofar as it disempowers consumers even as it seeks to mobilize them. Far too much media reform rhetoric rests on melodramatic discourse about victimization and vulnerability, seduction and manipulation, "propaganda machines" and "weapons of mass deception". Again and again, this version of the media reform movement has ignored the complexity of the public's relationship to popular culture and sided with those opposed to a more diverse and participatory culture. The politics of critical utopianism is founded on a notion of empowerment; the politics of critical pessimism on a politics of victimization. One focuses on what we are doing with media, and the other on what media is doing to us. As with previous revolutions, the media reform movement is gaining momentum at a time when people are starting to feel more empowered, not when they are at their weakest.” - Henry Jenkins

54. “Every woman that finally figured out her worth, has picked up her suitcases of pride and boarded a flight to freedom, which landed in the valley of change.” - Shannon L. Alder

55. “Cut away the nonsense, the drama, the regret, the scars of the past, and make a decision to no longer let them govern your happiness and freedom.” - Steve Maraboli

56. “Now say, have women worth, or have they none? Or had they some, but with our Queen is’t gone? Nay Masculines, you have thus tax’d us long, But she, though dead, will vindicate our wrong. Let such as say our sex is void of reason Know ‘tis a slander now, but once was treason."(In Honour of that High and Mighty Princess, Queen Elizabeth)” - Anne Bradstreet

57. “Never limit yourself to what you can't do, but to what you have the power to do with what you have.” - Nadège Richards

58. “Freedom is something that you give yourself and no one else can ever take away.” - Angela Bushman