Robert Fulghum Quotes & Sayings

Clean up your own mess. — Robert Fulghum

The Indian danced on alone. The crowd clapped up the beat. The Indian danced with a chair. The crowd went crazy. The band faded. The crowd cheered. The Indian held up his hands for silence as if to make a speech. Looking at the band and then the crowd, the Indian said, Well, what're you waiting for? Let's DANCE. — Robert Fulghum

Hide-and-seek, grown-up style. Wanting to hide. Needing to be sought. Confused about being found. — Robert Fulghum

The winding down of summer puts me in a heavy philosophical mood. — Robert Fulghum

The pig was so earnest. So sincere. So very "there." The pig brought gravity and mythic import to this well-worn fairy tale. — Robert Fulghum

To be human is to keep rattling the bars of the cage of existence, hollering, 'What's it for?' — Robert Fulghum

We even make ourselves up, fusing what we are with what we wish into what we must become. I'm not sure why it must be so, but it is. — Robert Fulghum

Nobody goes "AAAAAAAGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!" when they sing it. Maybe because it puts the life adventure in such clear and simple terms. The small creature is alive and looks for adventure. Here's the drainpipe
a long tunnel going up toward some light. The spider doesn't even think about it
just goes. Disaster befalls it
rain, flood, powerful foces. And the spider is knocked down and out beyond where it started. Does the spider say, "To hell with that"? No. Sun comes out
clears things up
dries off the spider. And the small creature goes over to the drainpipe and looks up and thinks it really wants to know what is up there. — Robert Fulghum

The world does not need tourists who ride by in a bus clucking their tongues. The world as it is needs those who will love it enough to change it, with what they have, where they are. — Robert Fulghum

The best feelings in your life come when you start feeling good after you've been feeling just awful — Robert Fulghum

We could learn a lot from crayons; some are sharp, some are pretty, some are dull, while others bright, some have weird names, but they all have learned to live together in the same box. — Robert Fulghum

To insist on one's place in the scheme of things and to live up to that place.To empower others in their reaching for some place in the scheme of things.To do these things is to make fairy tales come true. — Robert Fulghum

You will continue to read stories of crookedness and corruption - of policemen who lie and steal, doctors who reap where they do not sew, politicians on the take. Don't be misled. They are news because they are the exceptions. — Robert Fulghum

There is nothing in your budget for joy. No books, no flowers, no music, not even a cold beer. And there is nothing in your budget to give away to someone else. We don't help people who don't have better values than you do. — Robert Fulghum

To ponder is not to brood or grieve or even meditate. It is to wonder at a deep level. — Robert Fulghum

My mother was pulling my leg on that one. I have collected so much gift-wrapped trash over the years from people who copped out and hurriedly bought a little plastic cheapie to give under the protective flag of good thoughts. I tell you, it is the gift that counts. Or rather, people who think good thoughts give good gifts. It ought to be a rule - the Brass Rule of Gift Exchange. — Robert Fulghum

It is the chair in honor of all those who, however competently, embrace the impossible. Sit in that chair someday. — Robert Fulghum

I think my writing is part of my ministry. — Robert Fulghum

Any fool can make enough money to survive. It's another thing to keep yourself consistently entertained. It's a lot of work, and a lot of fun, to make a life. — Robert Fulghum

To understand our love they'd have to turn the world upside down — Robert Fulghum

The point is that getting married for lust or money or social status or even love is usually trouble. The point is that marriage is a maze into which we wander - a maze that is best got through with a great companion. — Robert Fulghum

We're all a little weird. And life is a little weird. And when we find someone whose weirdness is compatible with ours, we join up with them and fall into mutually satisfying weirdness - and call it love - true love. — Robert Fulghum

I've always thought anyone can make money. Making a life worth living, that's the real test. — Robert Fulghum

Almost anything can be dealt with if people are of good will and light hearts and strong values. — Robert Fulghum

To look this way is to see. To see is to have vision. To have vision is to understand. To understand is to know. To know is to become. To become is to live fully. To live fully is to matter. And to matter is to become light. And to become light is to be loved. And to be loved is to burn. And to burn is to exist. Off and on. — Robert Fulghum

Then he read the words of the scroll slowly, first in Japanese and then carefully translated into English:
'There is really nothing you must be.
And there is nothing you must do.
There is really nothing you must have.
And there is nothing you must know.
There is really nothing you must become.
However. It helps to understand
that fire burns, and when it rains,
the earth gets wet ... '
'Whatever, there are consequences. Nobody is exempt,' said the master. — Robert Fulghum

You can't always explain everything you do to everybody, you know. — Robert Fulghum

If you do not join the dancing you will feel foolish. So why not dance? And i will tell you a secret: If you do not join the dance, we will know you are a fool. But if you dance, we will think well of you for trying. if you dance badly to begin and we laugh, what is the sin in that? We will begin there. — Robert Fulghum

Liberation, I guess, is everybody getting what they think they want, without knowing the whole truth. Or in other words, liberation finally amounts to being free from things we don't like in order to be enslaved by things we approve of. Here's to the eternal tandem. — Robert Fulghum

And snow - snow is not my enemy, I tell him. Snow is God's way of telling people to slow down and rest and stay in bed for a day. And besides, snow always solves itself. Mixes with the leaves to form more earth, I tell him. Think compost, says I. — Robert Fulghum

Even the finest workman needs to inspect his work critically. — Robert Fulghum

Sometimes history knocks at the most ordinary door to see if anyone is home. Sometimes someone is. — Robert Fulghum

Above all, if what you've done is stupid, but it works, it ain't stupid. — Robert Fulghum

Life will examine us continually to see if we have understood and have practiced what we were taught that first year of school. — Robert Fulghum

The gift was not large as money goes, and my need was not great, but the spirit of the gift is beyond price and leaves me blessed and in debt. — Robert Fulghum

I am sometimes amazed at what we did not fully grasp in kindergarten. In the years I was a parish minister I was always taken aback when someone came to me and said. 'I've just come from the doctor and he told me I have only a limited time to live'. I was always tempted to shout 'WHAT? You didn't know? You had to pay a doctor to tell you - at your age? Where were you the week in kingergarten when you got the little cup with the cotton and water and seed? Life happened - remember? A plant grew up and the roots grew down. A miracle. And then a few days later the plant was dead. DEAD. Life is short. Were you asleep that week or home sick or what? — Robert Fulghum

What I notice is that every adult or child I give a new set of Crayolas to goes a little funny. The kids smile, get a glazed look on their faces, pour the crayons out, and just look at them for a while ... The adults always get the most wonderful kind of sheepish smile on their faces
a mixture of delight and nostalgia and silliness. And they immediately start telling you about all their experiences with Crayolas. — Robert Fulghum

It will be a great day when our schools have all the money they need, and our air force has to have a bake-sale to buy a bomber. — Robert Fulghum

For all my good intentions, there are days when things go wrong or I fall into old habits. When things are not going well, when I'm grumpy or mad, I'll realize that I've not been paying attention to my soul and I've not been following my best routine. — Robert Fulghum

Ignorance and power and pride are a deadly mixture, you know. — Robert Fulghum

I believe in dancing. — Robert Fulghum

Imagination is better than knowledge. — Robert Fulghum

It's harder to talk about, but what I really, really, really want for Christmas is just this: I want to be 5 years old again for an hour. I want to laugh a lot and cry a lot. I want to be picked or rocked to sleep in someone's arms, and carried up to be just one more time. I know what I really want for Christmas: I want my childhood back. People who think good thoughts give good gifts. — Robert Fulghum

I am a fragment of a mirror whose whole design and shape I do not know. Nevertheless, with what I have - I can reflect light into the dark places of this world - into the black places in the hearts of men - and change somethings in some people. Perhaps others may see and do likewise. This is what I am about. This is the meaning of my life. — Robert Fulghum

If you notice phrases, ideas, and anecdotes that closely resemble those that appear elsewhere in my writing, it's not a matter of sloppy editing. I'm repeating myself. I'm reshuffling words in the hope that just once I might say something exactly right. And I'm still wrestling with dilemmas that are not easily resolved or easily dismissed. I run at them again and again because I am not finished with them. Any may never be. Work-in- progress on a life-in-progress is what my writing is about. And some progress in the work is enough to keep it going on. — Robert Fulghum

It's the spirit here that counts. The time may be long, the vehicle may be strange or unexpected. But if the dream is held close to the heart, and imagination is applied to what there is close at hand, everything is still possible. — Robert Fulghum

Arguing whether or not a God exists is like fleas arguing whether or not the dog exists. Arguing over the correct name for God is like fleas arguing over the name of the dog. And arguing over whose notion of God is correct is like fleas arguing over who owns the dog. — Robert Fulghum

A giraffe has a black tongue twenty-seven inches long and no vocal cords. A giraffe has nothing to say. He just goes on giraffing. — Robert Fulghum

If you break your neck, if you have nothing to eat, if your house is on fire, then you got a problem. Everything else is inconvenience. — Robert Fulghum

If you want an interesting party sometime, combine cocktails and a fresh box of crayons for everyone. — Robert Fulghum

The kindergarten children are confident in spirit, infinite in resources, and eager to learn. Everything is still possible. — Robert Fulghum

The grass is not always greener on the other side of the fence. The grass is greenest where it is watered. — Robert Fulghum

As one old gentleman put it, Son, I don't care if you're stark nekkid and wear a bone in your nose. If you kin fiddle, you're all right with me. It's the music we make that counts. — Robert Fulghum

Water is everywhere and in all living things; we cannot be seperated from water. No water, no life. Period. Water comes in many forms - liquid, vapor, ice, snow, fog, rain, hail. But no matter the form, it's still water. — Robert Fulghum

All I ever needed to know I learned in kindergarten. Share everything ... Don't hit people ... Clean up your own mess ... — Robert Fulghum

But it does no good
solves nothing
to distance myself from the front lines of human need by using the mail as a safe shelter. I believe that serving the best ends of humanity means getting out in the middle of it just as it is, not staying home writing checks and thinking hopeful thoughts. The world does not need tourists who ride by in a bus clucking their tongues. The world as it is needs those who will love it enough to change it, with what they have, where they are. And you're damned right that's idealistic. No apology. When idealism goes into the trash as junk mail, we're finished. — Robert Fulghum

Play fair. Don't hit people. Say you're sorry when you hurt somebody. — Robert Fulghum

I love this child. Red-haired - patient and gentle like her mother - fey and funny like her father. When she giggles I can hear him when he and I were young. I am part of this child. It may be only because we share genes and that therefore smell familiar to each other ... It may be that a part of me lives in her in some important way ... But for now, it's jelly beans and 'Old MacDonald' that unite us. — Robert Fulghum

The grass is not, in fact, always greener on the other side of the fence. No, not at all. Fences have nothing to do with it. The grass is greenest where it is watered. When crossing over fences, carry water with you and tend the grass wherever you may be. — Robert Fulghum

If dandelions were rare and fragile, people would knock themselves out to pay $14.95 a plant, raise them by hand in greenhouses, and form dandelion societies and all that. But, they are everywhere and don't need us and kind of do what they please. So we call them weeds and murder them at every opportunity — Robert Fulghum

Every person passing through this life will unknowingly leave something and take something away. Most of this "something" cannot be seen or heard or numbered or scientifically detected or counted. It's what we leave in the minds of other people and what they leave in ours. Memory. The census doesn't count it. Nothing counts without it. — Robert Fulghum

Whenever life becomes Tinkertoys, the queen may be sacrificed. — Robert Fulghum

I talk about very serious human affairs but with a lightness of heart. — Robert Fulghum

I do not want to know what you will hope for. I want to know what you will work for. I do not want your sympathy for the needs of humanity. I want your muscle. As the wagon driver said when they came to a long, hard hill: 'Them that's going on with us, get out and push. Them that ain't, get out of the way'. — Robert Fulghum

We are the only creatures that both laugh and weep. I think it's because we are the only creatures that see the difference between the way things are and the way they might be. — Robert Fulghum

Speed and efficiency do not always increase the quality of life. — Robert Fulghum

Pardon me, but my father says that it is a lie that Americans have everything. You have no sheep, no goats, no trees, no oil, no vines, no wine, not even chickens. He asks, 'What kind of life is that?' He says, 'No wonder you don't sing or dance or recite poetry very often. — Robert Fulghum

Anything can happen. The great banana peel of existence is always on the floor somewhere. — Robert Fulghum

An artists job is to see. And to go out in the world and see it firsthand, just as it is; to report with line and words what is seen. To be in the world, not just study about the world, that is the artists task — Robert Fulghum

Do you ever go off with a long grocery list and come home from the store with a bunch of different stuff? And somebody in the family unsacks the groceries and wants to know why you got this and didn't get that and just where is the whatever? And you want to say, 'Well, just be glad I came back, okay?' And the unpacker says, 'Well, next time bring what's on the list.' — Robert Fulghum

Now Everybody has some secret goals in life ... Sometimes you can get what you want and what you need at the sames time. — Robert Fulghum

Love is the grand prize and the garbage heap. Love is a spiritual root canal and the only thing that makes life worth living. Love is a little taste of always and a big bite of nothing. And love is everything in between these extremes. — Robert Fulghum

I don't think there is a hidden purpose to the universe that you have to puzzle out. — Robert Fulghum

When my father finally got around to teaching me to drive, he was impressed at my "natural" talent for driving, not knowing that I had already been secretly driving my mother's car around the neighborhood. When I took the test and got my license and my father gave me my own set of keys to the car one night at dinner, it was a major rite of passage for him and my mother. Their perception of me had changed and was formally acknowledged. For me the occasion meant a private sanction to do in public what I had already been doing in secret. — Robert Fulghum

The leaves let go, the seeds let go, and I must let go sometimes, too, and cast my lot with another of nature's imperfect but tenacious survivors. — Robert Fulghum

Life is lumpy. And a lump in the oatmeal, a lump in the throat, and a lump in a breast are not the same lump. One should learn the difference. — Robert Fulghum

The examined life is no picnic. — Robert Fulghum

But love may have to be left off the exam. Most of us will never learn. — Robert Fulghum

The myth of the impossible dream is more powerful than all the facts of history. — Robert Fulghum

Yelling at living things does tend to kill the spirit in them. Sticks and stones may break our bones, but words will break our hearts ... — Robert Fulghum

Making a living and having a life are not the same thing. Making a living and making a life that's worthwhile are not the same thing. Living the good life and living a good life are not the same thing. A job title doesn't even come close to answering the question. "What do you do?". — Robert Fulghum

I've always made a clear distinction between making a life and making a living. — Robert Fulghum

I believe that imagination is stronger than knowledge. That myth is more potent than history. That dreams are more powerful than facts. That hope always triumphs over experience. That laughter is the only cure for grief. And I believe that love is stronger than death. — Robert Fulghum

Life is. I am. Anything might happen. — Robert Fulghum

Infinite possibility in all things is a certainty. That pretty much covers theology and philosophy for me. — Robert Fulghum

I wanted to be a citizen of the world but not in a superficial way. — Robert Fulghum

If I don't have time to live my life well the first time, when am I going to find the time to go back and live it over? — Robert Fulghum

Maybe we should develop a Crayola bomb as our next secret weapon. A happiness weapon. A beauty bomb. And every time a crisis developed, we would launch one. It would explode high in the air - explode softly - and send thousands, millions, of little parachutes into the air. Floating down to earth - boxes of Crayolas. And we wouldn't go cheap, either - not little boxes of eight. Boxes of sixty-four, with the sharpener built right in. With silver and gold and copper, magenta and peach and lime, amber and umber and all the rest. And people would smile and get a little funny look on their faces and cover the world with imagination. — Robert Fulghum

Until you have experienced raccoons mating underneath your bedroom at three in the morning, you have missed one of life's sensational moments. — Robert Fulghum

Living things have been doing just that for a long, long time. Through every kind of disaster and setback and catastrophe. We are survivors. — Robert Fulghum

You feel like an ant contemplating Chicago. — Robert Fulghum

It's not that I'm not grateful for all this attention. It's just that fame and fortune ought to add up to more than fame and fortune. — Robert Fulghum

Everything we can imagine becomes real. — Robert Fulghum

Don't sell yourself short. You may never have proof of your importance, but you are more important than you think. — Robert Fulghum

If you can't find the exact quote you want, make it up. — Robert Fulghum

Remember the little seed in the Styrofoam cup. The roots go down and the plant goes up and nobody really knows how or why, but we are all like that. — Robert Fulghum

I and you-We are infinate, rich, large, contradictory, living, breathing miracles-free human beings, children of God and the everlasting universe. That's what we do. — Robert Fulghum

It doesn't matter what you say you believe - it only matters what you do. — Robert Fulghum

You are free to give life meaning, whatever meaning you want to give it. — Robert Fulghum

Is it always to be a winners-losers world, or can we keep everyone in the game? Do we still have what it takes to find a better way? — Robert Fulghum