Quotes About Optimism to Brighten Your Day

There is goodness everywhere you look

Girl drawing flowers on a concrete wall, representing the concept of optimism.

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Having an optimistic outlook can have a positive impact on one's health, happiness, and performance. The power of optimism should not be ignored as a factor in success and personal growth. Some research even shows that optimism results in higher achievement. Even in the darkest times, people who have found themselves negative, depressed, or in despair chose instead to focus on the positive things in their lives that made them feel happy and inspired.

Colin Powell

"Perpetual optimism is a force multiplier." 

Margaret Thatcher

"I have a habit of comparing the phraseology of communiques...noting a certain similarity of words, a certain similarity of optimism...and a certain similarity in the lack of practical results during the ensuing years." 

Nicholas Murray Butler

”Optimism is the foundation of courage.”

Dr. James S. Vuocolo

"Some folks go through life pleased that the glass is half full. Others spend a lifetime lamenting that it's half-empty. The truth is: There is a glass with a certain volume of liquid in it. From there, it's up to you!"

Harvey Mackay

"Optimists are right. So are pessimists. It's up to you to choose which you will be." 

Lucille Ball

"One of the things I learned the hard way was that it doesn't pay to get discouraged. Keeping busy and making optimism a way of life can restore your faith in yourself.” 

Bill Frist

"We are a strong, robust, and prosperous nation. Optimism is the essence of our success. It drives our creativity and emboldens our entrepreneurial spirit. It is what makes us invest in the future and accomplish our highest aims."

Winston Churchill

"For myself, I am an optimist—it does not seem to be much use being anything else."

"An optimist sees an opportunity in every calamity; a pessimist sees a calamity in every opportunity." 

Benjamin Franklin

"While we may not be able to control all that happens to us, we can control what happens inside us."

Robert Conroy

"Cultivate optimism by committing yourself to a cause, a plan or a value system. You'll feel that you are growing in a meaningful direction which will help you rise above day-to-day setbacks.”

Linda Lingle

"But before looking to the future, let's glance back at the road we've traveled these past two years because that is the source of much of the optimism we are all feeling about the future." 

Henry Ford

"If you think you can do a thing or think you can't do a thing, you're right."

Richard M. DeVos

”Few things in the world are more powerful than a positive push. A smile. A world of optimism and hope. A 'you can do it' when things are tough.” 

Hilary Mantel

"The things you think are the disasters in your life are not the disasters really. Almost anything can be turned around: out of every ditch, a path, if you can only see it."

Norman Vincent Peale

"Believe it is possible to solve your problem. Tremendous things happen to the believer. So believe the answer will come. It will."

A.A. Milne (Alan Alexander Milne)

"What day is it?" asked Pooh.
"It's today," squeaked Piglet.
"My favorite day," said Pooh.

Helen Keller

"Optimism is the faith that leads to achievement. Nothing can be done without hope and confidence."

"No pessimist ever discovered the secrets of the stars, or sailed to an uncharted land, or opened a new heaven to the human spirit." 

Zig Ziglar

"An optimist is someone who goes after Moby Dick in a rowboat and takes the tartar sauce with him." 

Nicholas M. Butler

"Optimism is essential to achievement and it is also the foundation of courage and true progress." 

Henry David Thoreau

"If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. Let him step to the music which he hears, however measured or far away."