Quotes about worry
A collection of quotes on the topic of worry, doing, people, going.
Quotes about worry
“I'm having too much fun today to worry about tomorrow.”
Johnny Depp (1963) American actor, film producer, and musician
“Don't worry about a thing,
'Cos every little thing is gonna be alright.”
Bob Marley (1945–1981) Jamaican singer, songwriter, musician
Three Little Birds, from the album Exodus (1977)
Song lyrics
“Worry does not empty tomorrow of its sorrow, it empties today of its strength.”
Corrie ten Boom (1892–1983) Dutch resistance hero and writer
Source: Clippings from My Notebook
“Remember, today is the tomorrow you worried about yesterday.”
Dale Carnegie book How to Stop Worrying and Start Living
Source: How to Stop Worrying and Start Living (1948), p. 237. Part 8 : How I Conquered Worry,
John Wooden (1910–2010) American basketball coach
Variant: Be more concerned with your character than your reputation, because your character is what you really are, while your reputation is merely what others think you are.
“Worrying is like praying for something you don't want.”
Robert Downey Jr. (1965) American actor
Source: Biography
Ben Carson (1951) 17th and current United States Secretary of Housing and Urban Development; American neurosurgeon
Source: Think Big: Unleashing Your Potential for Excellence
“Worry is a cycle of inefficient thoughts whirling around a center of fear.”
Corrie ten Boom (1892–1983) Dutch resistance hero and writer
“I have learned not to worry about love; but to honor its coming with all my heart.”
Alice Walker (1944) American author and activist
Source: Revolutionary Petunias
Michael Jackson (1958–2009) American singer, songwriter and dancer
Handwritten note published in People (12 October 1987)
“It's not radical Islam that worries the US -- it's independence”
Noam Chomsky (1928) american linguist, philosopher and activist
Alexander Rybak (1986) Norwegian singer, actor, violinist, composer, pianist
"Funny Little World" (2009).
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie (1977) Nigerian writer
Source: https://www.globalcitizen.org/en/content/15-quotes-from-chimamanda-adichie-that-have-change/
“Pray, hope, and don't worry. Worry is useless. God is merciful and will hear your prayer.”
Padre Pio (1887–1968) Italian saint, priest, stigmatist and mystic
“Worry is the stomach's worst poison.”
Alfred Nobel (1833–1896) Swedish chemist, innovator, and armaments manufacturer
Heinrich Himmler (1900–1945) Nazi officer, Commander of the SS
Our concern, our duty, is our people and our blood. We can be indifferent to everything else. I wish the S.S. to adopt this attitude towards the problem of all foreign, non-Germanic peoples, especially Russians....
The Posen speech to SS officers (6 October 1943)
1940s
“A day of worry is more exhausting than a day of work.”
John Lubbock, 1st Baron Avebury (1834–1913) British banker, Liberal politician, philanthropist, scientist and polymath
“Don't worry that children never listen to you; worry that they are always watching you.”
Robert Fulghum (1937) American writer
As quoted in Reflections for Tending the Sacred Garden (2003) by Bonita Jean Zimmer, p. 182
George Soros (1930) Hungarian-American business magnate, investor, and philanthropist
Source: The Alchemy of Finance
“Stop worrying about growing old. And think about growing up.”
Philip Roth book The Dying Animal
Source: The Dying Animal
“Within certain limits, it is actually true that the less money you have, the less you worry.”
George Orwell book Down and Out in Paris and London
Source: Down and out in Paris and London (1933), Ch. 4
Source: Down and Out in Paris and London
Context: For, when you are approaching poverty, you make one discovery which outweighs some of the others. You discover boredom and mean complications and the beginnings of hunger, but you also discover the great redeeming feature of poverty: the fact that it annihilates the future. Within certain limits, it is actually true that the less money you have, the less you worry.
Golda Meir (1898–1978) former prime minister of Israel
On 30th anniversary of the founding of Israel, in International Herald Tribune (11 May 1978)
Shahrukh Khan (1965) Indian actor, producer and television personality
From interview with Komal Nahta
Andrea Dworkin (1946–2005) Feminist writer
Nervous Interview http://www.nostatusquo.com/ACLU/dworkin/WarZoneChaptIIA.html (1979). Dworkin wrote both the questions and the answers
Claire Holt (1988) Australian actress and model
Exclusive: The Australian Actress Hollywood Can't Get Enough Of (June 10, 2016)
Kanō Jigorō (1860–1938) Japanese educator and judoka
Source: Kodokan Judo (1882), p. 23
Context: Judo teaches us to look for the best possible course of action, whatever the individual circumstances, and helps us to understand that worry is a waste of energy. Paradoxically, the man who has failed and one who is at the peak of success are in exactly the same position. Each must decide what he will do next, choose the course that will lead him to the future. The teachings of judo give each the same potential for success, in the former instance guiding a man out of lethargy and disappointment to a state of vigorous activity.
“If I worried about everything that everyone said, I would not be a good artist.”
Lady Gaga (1986) American singer, songwriter, and actress
Context: Grace Jones said this to me when I met her. I washed her feet, and I looked up at her and she said, "No matter what you do in your life, don’t you ever let anybody take your creative people away from you." And what my creative friends always remind me of is they say, "Only value the opinion of those that you respect. And anyone that you don’t respect, pay no mind to their opinion about you or anything else." And that’s how I live my life. If I worried about everything that everyone said, I would not be a good artist.
Jawaharlal Nehru (1889–1964) Indian lawyer, statesman, and writer, first Prime Minister of India
Statement of 1951, in Selected Works of Jawaharlal Nehru Vol. 5 (1987), p. 321
Context: I want to go rapidly towards my objective. But fundamentally even the results of action do not worry me so much. Action itself, so long as I am convinced that it is right action, gives me satisfaction. In my general outlook on life I am a socialist and it is a socialist order that I should like to see established in India and the world.
Jane Goodall (1934) British primatologist, ethologist, and anthropologist
"The Power of One", TIME Magazine (26 August 2002) http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1003125,00.html
Pope Francis (1936) 266th Pope of the Catholic Church
Source: Movie The Two Popes, Jonathan Pryce as Pope Francis
Mark Wahlberg (1971) American actor, television producer and rap musician
Source: Mark on the September 11 attacks in a 2012 interview
“You can't change the past, but you can ruin the present by worrying about the future.”
Karen Blixen (1885–1962) Danish writer
Richard Dawkins book The God Delusion
Heart Of The Matter: God Under The Microscope | BBC (1996)
Variant: [... ] one of the truly bad effects of religion is that it teaches us that it is a virtue to be satisfied with not understanding.
Source: The God Delusion
“Worry is like a rocking chair: it gives you something to do but never gets you anywhere”
Erma Bombeck (1927–1996) When I stand before God at the end of my life, I would hope that I would not have a single bit of talent le…
“animals never worry about Heaven or Hell. neither do I. maybe that's why we get along”
Charles Bukowski (1920–1994) American writer
Source: The Last Night of the Earth Poems
Terry Pratchett (1948–2015) English author
Source: Good Omens: The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch
“Once they have you asking the wrong questions. They don't have to worry about the answers.”
Thomas Pynchon book Gravity's Rainbow
Variant: If they can get you asking the wrong questions, they don't have to worry about answers.
Source: Gravity's Rainbow
Max Lucado (1955) American clergyman and writer
Source: Cast of Characters: Common People in the Hands of an Uncommon God
“I've had a lot of worries in my life, most of which never happened.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) American author and humorist
Variant: I've lived through some terrible things in my life, some of which actually happened.
“Don't worry about being effective. Just concentrate on being faithful to the truth.”
Dorothy Day (1897–1980) Social activist
“Whenever you are too worried about someone else's approval, that person loses respect for you.”
Sherry Argov (1977) American writer
Source: Why Men Marry Bitches: A Woman's Guide to Winning Her Man's Heart
“You wouldn't worry so much about what others think of you if you realized how seldom they do.”
Eleanor Roosevelt (1884–1962) American politician, diplomat, and activist, and First Lady of the United States
Chinua Achebe (1930–2013) Nigerian novelist, poet, professor, and critic
Variant: When Suffering knocks at your door and you say there is no seat left for him, he tells you not to worry because he has brought his own stool.
“Don't worry when you are not recognized but strive to be worthy of recognition”
Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865) 16th President of the United States
Ronald Reagan (1911–2004) American politician, 40th president of the United States (in office from 1981 to 1989)
Remarks at the Annual Salute to Congress Dinner http://www.reagan.utexas.edu/archives/speeches/1981/20481b.htm (4 February 1981) <br class="br">1980s, First term of office (1981–1985) <br class="br">Variant: Thomas Jefferson once said, "We should never judge a president by his age, only by his works." And ever since he told me that I stopped worrying. <br class="br">Context: Thomas Jefferson made a comment about the Presidency and age. He said that one should not worry about one's exact chronological age in reference to his ability to perform one's task. And ever since he told me that, I stopped worrying.
“If I have to worry about the ants I crush beneath my feet, I couldn't even walk around”
Kentaro Miura (1966) Japanese manga artist
Source: Berserk, Vol. 1

