115 Perfect Motivation & Powerful Quotes About Self-Worth

Last Updated on February 14, 2024

I have always been drawn to quotes about self-worth.

There’s something about a few well-chosen words that can completely change your perspective and lift your spirits. 

When I’m feeling down, reading a powerful quote can remind me that I am worthy of love and respect, and that my value is not determined by external factors like my job or my appearance.

One of my favorite self-worth quotes is from author and motivational speaker, Marianne Williamson. She writes, “Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us.” 

This quote resonates with me because it reminds me that often, our own insecurities can hold us back from realizing our full potential. 

We fear that we are not good enough, smart enough, or talented enough to achieve our goals, when in reality, we have everything we need within us to succeed.

Another self-worth quote that I turn to often is from actress and activist, Lupita Nyong’o. She says, “You can’t eat beauty, it doesn’t sustain you. What is fundamentally beautiful is compassion, for yourself and for those around you.” 

This quote speaks to the idea that our worth is not tied to our physical appearance or our possessions. True beauty comes from within, from how we treat ourselves and others.

Self-worth is also closely tied to our ability to set boundaries and say no when necessary. As writer and researcher Brené Brown reminds us, “Daring to set boundaries is about having the courage to love ourselves even when we risk disappointing others.” 

This quote is a powerful reminder that putting our own needs first is not selfish, but rather an act of self-love and respect.

In a world that often values achievement and success above all else, it can be easy to lose sight of our own inherent worth. 

But as writer and motivational speaker, Louise Hay reminds us, “You have been criticizing yourself for years, and it hasn’t worked. Try approving of yourself and see what happens.” Ultimately, self-worth comes from within, and it is up to each of us to recognize and embrace our own unique value.

In this article, we’ll explore more inspiring self-worth quotes and the wisdom they hold. 

Whether you’re looking for a boost of confidence, a reminder to love yourself, or simply some words of encouragement, these quotes are sure to uplift and inspire. 

So take a deep breath, remember your worth, and let’s dive in.

Boost Your Value With Self-Worth Quotes

1. “When you recover or discover something that nourishes your soul and brings joy, care enough about yourself to make room for it in your life.”— Jean Shinoda Bolen
2. “If you have no confidence in self, you are twice defeated in the race of life. With confidence, you have won even before you have started.” – Cicero
3. “Because one believes in oneself, one doesn’t try to convince. Because one is content with oneself, one doesn’t need others’ approval. Because one accepts oneself, the whole world accepts him or her.” – Laozi
4. “If nothing else in this long and short life, let me be true to my conscience, to the dignity of my own heart. Let me act in a way that says, I have honored my spirit as truly as I have honored others’. Let me stand tall and rooted as a mountain in the face of a quaking world.”— Jennifer DeLucy
5. “We gain strength, and courage, and confidence by each experience in which we really stop to look fear in the face … we must do that which we think we cannot.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
6. “When you understand that your self-worth is not determined by your net-worth, then you’ll have financial freedom.”— Suze Orman
7. “People are like stained-glass windows. They sparkle and shine when the sun is out, but when the darkness sets in their true beauty is revealed only if there is light from within.” – Elisabeth Kubler-Ross
8. “With realization of one’s own potential and self-confidence in one’s ability, one can build a better world.” – The Dalai Lama
9. “We cannot think of being acceptable to others until we have first proven acceptable to ourselves.”— Malcolm X
10. “No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
11. “They are called, ‘SELF-worth’ and ‘SELF-esteem’ for a reason… we can’t let others decide what we are worth, that is so dangerous! Empower yourself!”— Jaeda DeWalt
12. “If you had to choose only two qualities to get you through times of change, the first should be a sense of self-worth and the second a sense of humor.”— Jennifer James, Thinking In The Future Tense
13. “Do not let what you cannot do interfere with what you can do.” – John Wooden
14. “When you’ve spent your whole life not being good enough, it takes time to let yourself believe that you finally are. Self-worth isn’t a switch that flips inside you. It’s a daily struggle not to sabotage your own success. Not to cave into the voices inside your head that whisper you’re not good enough, or you’ll fuck things up, or that someone else could do things better than you.”— Julie Johnson, The Monday Girl
15. “Life is not easy for any of us. But what of that? We must have perseverance and above all confidence in ourselves. We must believe that we are gifted for something and that this thing must be attained.” ­- Marie Curie
16. “Love is the great miracle cure. Loving ourselves works miracles in our lives.”— Louise Hay
17. “You’re never as good as everyone tells you when you win, and you’re never as bad as they say when you lose.” – Lou Holtz
18. “Never be bullied into silence. Never allow yourself to be made a victim. Accept no one’s definition of your life, but define yourself.”— Harvey Fierstein
19. “Your value doesn’t decrease based on someone’s inability to see your worth.” – Anonymous
20. “I can be changed by what happens to me. But I refuse to be reduced by it.” ­­-­ Maya Angelou
21. “Never allow yourself to be defined by someone else’s opinion.” – Anonymous
22. “Never measure your self-worth by what other people think you should have become.” – Anonymous
23. “As long as you look for someone else to validate who you are by seeking their approval, you are setting yourself up for disaster. You have to be whole and complete in yourself. No one can give you that. You have to know who you are – what others say is irrelevant.”— Nic Sheff
24. “Self-worth comes from within.” – Anonymous
25. “If you find yourself constantly trying to prove your worth to someone, you have already forgotten your value.” – Anonymous
26. “Your crown has been bought and paid for. Put it on your head and wear it.” – Dr. Maya Angelou
27. “Sometimes all you have to do is forget what you feel and remember what you deserve.” – Anonymous
28. “Make sure you don’t start seeing yourself through the eyes of those who don’t value you. Know your worth even if they don’t.” – Anonymous
29. “People learn how to treat you based on what you accept from them.” – Anonymous
30. “Know your worth. Know the difference between what you’re getting and what you deserve.” – Anonymous
31. “Listen to the right people and ignore the wrong ones. People that doubt you, hate you and judge you are never worth your time or attention.” – Anonymous
32. “Know your worth. Don’t settle for anything less.” – Anonymous
33. “To fall in love with yourself is the first secret to happiness.” – Robert Morley
34. “Self-worth is so vital to your happiness if you don’t feel good about you, it’s hard to feel good about anything else.” – Sandy Hale
35. “Always be prepared, always be yourself, and always be honest. That is a good recipe for self-respect, self-love, and self-worth.” – Anonymous
36. “I know what I bring to the table, so trust me when I say I’m not afraid to eat alone.” – Anonymous
37. “Self-worth comes from one thing – thinking that you are worthy.” – Wayne Dyer
38. “If I could give you one gift, I would give you the ability to see yourself as I see you, so you could see how truly special you are.” – Anonymous

Self-Worth Quotes

Inspirational Self-Worth Quotes

39. “Your most important sale is to sell yourself to yourself.” – Maxwell Maltz
40. “To double your net worth, double your self-worth. Because you will never exceed the height of your self-image.” – Robin Sharma
41. “When your self-worth goes up, your net worth goes up with it.” – Mark Victor Hansen
42. “Once you learn how to be happy, you won’t tolerate being around people who make you feel anything less.” – Anonymous
43. “Make the most of yourself, for that is all there is of you.”— Ralph Waldo Emerson
44. “You will never gain anyone’s approval by begging for it. When you stand confident in your own worth, respect follows.”— Mandy Hale
45. “To be beautiful means to be yourself. You don’t need to be accepted by others. You need to accept yourself.” – Tich Nhat Hanh
46. “You alone have the power to determine your value. Don’t let somebody else paste a discount sticker on you. You’re priceless.”— Toni Sorenson
47. “You have been criticizing yourself for years, and it hasn’t worked. Try approving of yourself and see what happens.” – Louise L. Hay
48. “Love yourself enough to set boundaries. Your time and energy are precious. You get to choose how you use it. You teach people how to treat you by deciding what you will and won’t accept.” – Anna Taylor
49. “No one else can take risks for us, or face our losses on our behalf, or give us self-esteem. No one can spare us from life’s slings and arrows, and when death comes, we meet it alone.” – Martha Beck
50. “If you don’t love yourself, nobody will. Not only that, you won’t be good at loving anyone else. Loving starts with the self.” – Wayne Dyer
51. “Our self-respect tracks our choices. Every time we act in harmony with our authentic self and our heart, we earn our respect. It is that simple. Every choice matters.”— Dan Coppersmith
52. “Find the love you seek, by first finding the love within yourself. Learn to rest in that place within you that is your true home.” – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
53. “Until you value yourself, you won’t value your time. Until you value your time, you will not do anything with it.” – M. Scott Peck
54. “Loving yourself isn’t vanity. It’s sanity.” – Katrina Mayer
55. “True abundance isn’t based on our net worth, it’s based on our self-worth.”— Gabrielle Bernstein
56. “It took many years of vomiting up all the filth I’d been taught about myself, and half-believed before I was able to walk on the earth as though I had a right to be here.” – James Baldwin
57. “Self-esteem and self-contempt have specific odors; they can be smelled.” – Eric Hoffer
58. “No other love no matter how genuine it is, can fulfill one’s heart better than unconditional self-love.” – Edmond Mbiaka
59. “Nothing profits more than self-esteem, grounded on what is just and right.” – John Milton
60. “To love oneself is the beginning of a life-long romance” – Oscar Wilde
61. “Your worth is not a product of your appearance, your intelligence, your talent or how successful are you.” – Invajy
62. “You’re always with yourself, so you might as well enjoy the company.” – Diane Von Furstenberg
63. “When you stop living your life based on what others think of you, your real life begins. At that moment, you will finally see the door of self-acceptance opened.” – Shannon L. Alder
64. “Being worthy is not something you earn. It is something you recognize and believe in.” – Invajy
65. “Make a pledge to yourself right now, to declare that you are worth your time and energy.”— Deborah Day
66. “Did your mom ever tell you, ‘If you can’t say something nice, don’t say anything’? She was right–and talking nicely also applies when you’re talking to yourself, even inside your head.” – Victoria Moran
67. “The concept of the best possible version of me is not merely an intention, it is an action. It is the daily practice of taking full responsibility for my thoughts, emotions, behaviours, and actions.”— Tanya Valentin
68. Respect yourself and others will respect you.” – Confucius
69. “Lighten up on yourself. No one is perfect. Gently accept your humanness.” – Deborah Day
70. “If you are insecure, guess what? The rest of the world is too. Do not overestimate the competition and underestimate yourself. You are better than you think.”— T. Harv Eker
71. “It is never too late to be what you might have been.” – George Eliot
72. “It’s hard to give up the self-esteem connected to being codependent and appearing ‘right,’ which is probably a survival behavior learned from growing up in a crazy family. It feels like you will actually disappear.” – Melody Beattie
73. “Self-love is an ocean and your heart is a vessel. Make it full, and any excess will spill over into the lives of the people you hold dear. But you must come first.” – Beau Taplin
74. “To be creative, first we must be generous. Then we must have a quiet, indomitable belief in our own worth.”— Donna Goddard
75. “Successful people have fear, successful people have doubts, and successful people have worries. They just don’t let these feelings stop them.” – T. Harv Eker
76. “If you wish to achieve worthwhile things in your personal and career life, you must become a worthwhile person in your own self-development.”— Brian Tracy

Powerful Self-Worth Quotes

More Positive Quotes To Boost Self-Esteem

77. “The reward for conformity is that everyone likes you but yourself.” – Rita Mae Brown
78. “Remember always that you not only have the right to be an individual, you have an obligation to be one.”— Eleanor Roosevelt
79. “Sometimes the hardest part of the journey is believing you’re worth the trip.” – Glenn Beck
80. “There are so many more important things to worry about than how you’re perceived by strangers.” – Dennis Lehane
81. “Once you embrace your value, talents and strengths, it neutralizes when others think less of you.” – Rob Liano
82. “Nothing can stop the man with the right mental attitude from achieving his goal; nothing on earth can help the man with the wrong mental attitude.” – Thomas Jefferson
83. “One of the greatest regrets in life is being what others would want you to be, rather than being yourself.” – Shannon L. Alder
84. “A healthy self-love means we have no compulsion to justify to ourselves or others why we take vacations, why we sleep late, why we buy new shoes, why we spoil ourselves from time to time. We feel comfortable doing things which add quality and beauty to life.” – Andrew Matthews
85. “If you want to improve your self-worth, stop giving other people the calculator.”— Tim Fargo
86. “What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson
87. “Be courteous to all, but intimate with few, and let those few be well tried before you give them your confidence.” ­- George Washington
88. “There came a time when the risk to remain tight in the bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom.” – Anaïs Nin
89. “Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear, not absence of fear.” – Mark Twain
90. “Why should we worry about what others think of us, do we have more confidence in their opinions than we do our own?” – Brigham Young
91. “Sooner or later, those who win are those who think they can.” ­- Paul Tournier
92. “You yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe, deserve your love and affection.” – Buddha
93. “Remember that wherever your heart is, there you will find your treasure.” – Paulo Coelho
94. “Trust yourself–you know more than you think you do.” – Benjamin Spock
95. “Too many people overvalue what they are not and undervalue what they are.” – Malcolm S. Forbes
96. “People may flatter themselves just as much by thinking that their faults are always present to other people’s minds, as if they believe that the world is always contemplating their individual charms and virtues.” – Elizabeth Gaskell
97. “Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don’t matter and those who matter don’t mind.” ­­- Bernard Baruch
98. “The better you feel about yourself, the less you feel the need to show off.” – Robert Hand
99. “If you hear a voice within you say ‘you cannot paint,’ then by all means paint, and that voice will be silenced.” – Vincent Van Gogh
100. “Optimism is the faith that leads to achievement. Nothing can be done without hope and confidence.” – Helen Keller
101. “Act as if what you do makes a difference. It does.” – William James
102. “One’s dignity may be assaulted, vandalized and cruelly mocked, but it can never be taken away unless it is surrendered.” – Michael J. Fox
103. “It is best to act with confidence, no matter how little right you have to it.” ­­- Lillian Hellman
104. “You’re always with yourself, so you might as well enjoy the company.” – Diane Von Furstenberg
105. “Believe in yourself! Have faith in your abilities! Without a humble but reasonable confidence in your own powers you cannot be successful or happy.” – Norman Vincent Peale
106. “Accept who you are; and revel in it.” – Mitch Albom
107. “Don’t be distracted by criticism. Remember–the only taste of success some people have is when they take a bite out of you.” – Zig Ziglar
108. “Never bend your head. Always hold it high. Look the world straight in the eye.” – Helen Keller
109. “Success is most often achieved by those who don’t know that failure is inevitable.” -Coco Chanel
110. “Inaction breeds doubt and fear. Action breeds confidence and courage. If you want to conquer fear, do not sit home and think about it. Go out and get busy.” – Dale Carnegie
111. “I am not afraid of storms for I am learning how to sail my ship.” – Louise May Alcott
112. “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
113. “One of the best guides to how to be self-loving is to give ourselves the love we are often dreaming about receiving from others.” – Bell Hooks
114. “If a man, who says he loves you, won’t tell you the details of a private conversation between him and another woman you can be sure he is not protecting your heart. He is protecting himself and the women he has feelings for. Wise women simply see things as they are, not as their low self-esteem allows.”― Shannon L. Alder
115. “Beauty begins the moment you decide to be yourself.” – Coco Chanel

Inspirational Self-Worth Quotes

How Can Reading Self-Worth Quotes Help You?

Reading self-worth quotes can be incredibly beneficial for anyone looking to improve their self-esteem and boost their confidence. 

Here are a few ways that reading self-worth quotes can help:

  1. Shifts perspective: Often, when we’re feeling down or insecure, we can get stuck in negative thought patterns. Self-worth quotes can help to shift our perspective and remind us of the positive qualities we possess.
  2. Provides motivation: Reading self-worth quotes can be a great source of motivation when we’re feeling discouraged. They can help to inspire us to keep going, even when things get tough.
  3. Encourages self-acceptance: Many self-worth quotes encourage us to accept ourselves as we are, flaws and all. This can be a powerful reminder that we don’t need to be perfect in order to be valuable and deserving of love.
  4. Promotes self-love: Quotes about self-worth often focus on the importance of loving ourselves. When we love and accept ourselves, we are better able to take care of ourselves and pursue our goals with confidence.
  5. Builds resilience: Reading self-worth quotes can help us to develop resilience and bounce back from setbacks. They can remind us that our worth is not determined by external factors like our successes or failures.

Next Steps

Implementing self-worth quotes into your daily life can be a great way to boost your confidence and improve your self-esteem. 

Here are a few ways that you can incorporate self-worth quotes into your daily routine:

  1. Create a daily affirmation: Choose a self-worth quote that resonates with you and turn it into a daily affirmation. Repeat the affirmation to yourself each morning as you start your day, or whenever you need a boost of confidence.
  2. Display the quote: Print out your favorite self-worth quote and display it somewhere you’ll see it often, such as on your desk, bathroom mirror, or phone lock screen. This can serve as a reminder to practice self-love and acceptance throughout the day.
  3. Journal about the quote: Take some time to reflect on how the self-worth quote applies to your life. Write down your thoughts and feelings in a journal, and consider how you can use the quote to inspire positive changes in your life.
  4. Share the quote with others: Share your favorite self-worth quote with friends, family, or coworkers who might also benefit from the message. Encourage them to practice self-love and acceptance, and remind them that they are deserving of love and respect.
  5. Create a self-worth quote collection: Collect self-worth quotes that resonate with you and compile them in a journal or notebook. Refer to the collection whenever you need a pick-me-up or a reminder of your worth.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can Reading Self-Worth Quotes Really Improve My Self-Esteem?

Yes, reading self-worth quotes can be a helpful tool for improving self-esteem. 

These quotes often focus on the importance of self-love and acceptance, and can help to shift our perspective from negative self-talk to positive self-talk. 

By reminding us of our inherent worth and encouraging self-love and self-acceptance, these quotes can help us to develop a more positive mindset and improve our overall well-being.

Where Can I Find Self-Worth Quotes?

Self-worth quotes can be found in many different places, including books, websites, social media, and even on merchandise like mugs and t-shirts. 

A simple internet search for “self-worth quotes” can yield many results, and there are also many social media accounts and websites dedicated to sharing inspirational quotes. 

Additionally, many self-help books and resources include quotes and affirmations focused on improving self-esteem and promoting self-love.

How Do I Know Which Self-Worth Quotes Will Resonate With Me?

Choosing self-worth quotes that resonate with you is a personal process, and can depend on many factors, including your individual experiences and values. 

To find quotes that resonate with you, take some time to reflect on what is important to you and what you need to hear in order to improve your self-esteem. 

You may also want to experiment with different types of quotes, such as those focused on self-love, acceptance, or resilience, to see which ones feel most helpful and inspiring to you. 

Ultimately, the most effective self-worth quotes are those that speak to your heart and help you to feel more confident and self-assured.

Diane
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