Quotes & Sayings About Making Change For The Better

One out of 100 citizens of the U.S. is going to prison, and it's not that the system is making criminals, it's that it's making criminals better criminals. We're breeding them like rats and it has to change. — Val Kilmer

most importantly, this prediction is less of a prophecy and more a way of discussing our present choices. If the discussion makes us choose differently, so that the prediction is proven wrong, all the better. What's the point of making predictions if they cannot change anything? — Yuval Noah Harari

Don't just be making a living; make a life and leave an indelible footstep wherever you step. — Israelmore Ayivor

We do not make changes for the sake of making them, but we never fail to make a change when once it is demonstrated that the new way is better than the old way. — Henry Ford

They are the living dead and we have many of those among us, spending their days whining and complaining and never making any attempt to change their lives for the better. — Og Mandino

I used to wish I had an easier life," he mused. "Some families sail through years with nothing touching them. They have no tragedies. They go on about how lucky they are. Yet sometimes it seems to me they're half alive. When something goes wrong for them, and it does for everyone sooner or later, their trauma is much worse. They've had nothing bad happen to them before. In the meantime, they think little problems, like losing a wallet, are big deals. They think it's ruined their day. They have no idea what a hard day's like. It's going to be incredibly tough for them when they find out."
He'd also developed his own version of making the most of every minute. "Through Sam I found out how quickly things can change. Because of him I've learned to appreciate each moment and try not to hold on to things. Life's more exciting and intense that way. It's like the yogurt that goes off after three days. It tastes so much better than the stuff that lasts three weeks. — Helen Brown

Even the mistakes, even everything bad that happened, I wouldn't change because then I wouldn't be the person that I am today. The past is the past. I just want to focus on the future, and getting better, not making the same mistakes and just becoming a better person, a better artist. Just a better everything. — Jay Park

There's not anything I can fix, change, make better its out to the world. I'd like to say that I like my records but it's for reasons other than enjoyment, it's more like a notch on my revolver, one more down. I am proud of my work, yes but its accomplishment to me and another year of schooling,in making records it can always be better! — Shelby Lynne

The need for security and power riding on energies that should be making life better and easier for the masses remains a great error in leadership focus. Why should the discovery of uranium's potential become a curse instead of a blessing? I am sure any type of power (nuclear and leadership included) in the wrong hands has the unfortunate potential to become a curse. A lot more is involved, including greed that causes the wealthy to sponsor violence and chaos. All, in order to profit from conflict, yet disregarding the harm caused to the vulnerable majority. — Archibald Marwizi

The end game is you change that law to making that law better, whichever law you're talking about. — Mike Lowry

It's time to let go of the idea that you somehow deserve pain or punishment for your past choices. You don't have to keep reliving them and hurting yourself with it. Torturing yourself doesn't help you or anyone else. It doesn't change anything that happened before, and it doesn't teach you anything in the now. True growth is making better choices in the present because you learned from your past behavior. Redemption is not measured by how much you suffer; it's measured by how much you've grown from who you used to be. — Emily Maroutian

Some people say well we need a change. Hillary Clinton is been around a long, she sure has, and she's sure been worth every single year she's put into making people's lives better. — William J. Clinton

I never stop making sure that what I say is the best of what could be said about a particular thing. It's a constant evolution. If I planted a tree one way yesterday, and somebody tells me of a better way to plant a tree, I think, 'You know, they're right, that's better.' Then I change my way to accommodate the new way of planting trees. — Martha Stewart

We talk about wanting to change the world, and we often picture this as a lofty goal reached only by superstars, politicians and billionaires. The truth is, no matter where you are or what you're doing, you're making a difference just by existing. Every action you carry out will either make the universe a better place or a worse one. — Rosie Blythe

RVM Thoughts for Today
Don't just be who you are and what you are. Move, Evolve, Change, Grow and become Better each Day. — R.v.m.

The quickest way to change a child's behavior and attitude is to get him involved in fixing his mistake. The best way to inspire a child to do better in the future is to give him an opportunity to do better in the present. A punishment makes him feel bad about himself. Making amends helps him feel good about himself, and helps him to see himself as a person who can do good. — Joanna Faber

designers actually can change the world for the better by making the complicated simple and finding beauty in truth. — Michael Bierut

The people making you feel guilty for going your own way and choosing your own life are simply saying, 'Look at me. I'm better than you because my chains are bigger.' It takes courage to break those chains and define your own life." So dare to live your precious days on Earth to their fullest, true to yourself, with open heart and thoughtful mind, and with the courage to change what doesn't work and accept the consequences. You may find that you can fly farther than you ever imagined. — Vishen Lakhiani

If you assume that there is no hope, you guarantee that there will be no hope. If you assume that there is an instinct for freedom, that there are opportunities to change things, then there is a possibility that you can contribute to making a better world. — Noam Chomsky

But most critically, sweet, never try to change the narrative structure of someone else's story, though you will certainly be tempted to, as you watch those poor souls in school, in life, heading unwittingly down dangerous tangents, fatal digressions from which they will unlikely be able to emerge. Resist the temptation. Spend your energies on your story. Reworking it. Making it better. — Marisha Pessl

No matter what happens tonight, don't ever change, okay? You are fun and sweet and amazing just the way you are. You make the world a better place because you always find the bright side. You are the bright side. And if I'm ever going to make it through this, I need to know you're out there, still glowing and making the world bright. — Linda Kage

Never try to change the narrative structure of someone else's story, though you will certainly be tempted to, as you watch those poor souls in school, in life, heading unwittingly down dangerous tangents, fatal digressions from which they will unlikely be able to emerge. Resist the temptation. Spend your energies on your story. Reworking it. Making it better. Increasing the scale, the depth of content, the universal themes. And I don't care what those themes are- they're yours to uncover and stand behind-so long as, at the very least, there is courage. — Marisha Pessl

Making this a better world happens one person at a time. You cannot force your beliefs on anyone. Rather, be the example that others can emulate. Live your life so that others may be inspired by your words and deeds. That's how change happens. — Tom Giaquinto

But we're not born evil. His desire to reclaim what he lost blinded him from making the right choices. Sometimes what we desire the most can change who we are, and it's up to us to decide if that's for better or worse. You must learn to control those desires so that you're always on the right path, even if that means never attaining or holding on to the thing you want most. — Dannika Dark

You become what you do. How and what you become depends on environmental influence so you become who you hang around. Raise the standard your peers must meet and you'll raise your expectations of yourself. If your environment is not making you better, change it. — Mark Twight

What I would say is that vows and rings don't change anything: the challenges are the same. Every day is just a conscious commitment to making the next day better. — America Ferrera

I am telling you that I am very grateful and am so proud of you for being a symbolic generation that is calling for change to the better, that is dreaming for a better future, and is making the future. — Hosni Mubarak

Gardening and making your own soap and home-birthing your babies are fine, but these are inherently limited actions. If we want to see genuine food safety, if we want to see sustainable products, if we want to see a better women's health system, and if we want these things for everyone, not just the privileged few with the time and education to DIY it, then we need large social changes. — Emily Matchar

Making people change because you can't deal with who they are isn't how it's supposed to be done. What needs to be done is for people to pull their heads out of their asses. You say 'cure.' I hear 'you're not human enough. — John Scalzi

It is time for corporate America to become 'the third pillar' of social change in our society, complementing the first two pillars of government and philanthropy. We need the entire private sector to begin committing itself not just to making profits, but to fulfilling higher and larger purposes by contributing to building a better world. — Simon Mainwaring

I've learned that in order to effectively and genuinely "Change" for the better.

#1. Must want to change. (Grow)

#2. Know who we are now relative to who we want to be.

#3. Paradoxically we must except who we are in the present moment. (You are worthy right now, you are just searching for a higher a 'self')

#4. Know that "True" change comes from within the mind. To the much deeper 'self' feelings and emotions.

#5. Make no drastic changes, but focus simply on making small ones within the present moment.

Sincerely,

My present self. — Matthew Donnelly

Looking back, if I had to live my life over, there are things I would do differently, but the one thing I would not change is my charitable giving. I'm particularly thankful for my father's advice to set goals so high that they can't possibly be achieved during a lifetime and to give help where help is needed most. That inspiration keeps me energized and eager to keep working hard every day on giving back and making the world a better place for generations to come. — Ted Turner

Each one of us has the power to be the change we want to see in the world, making the world a better place. — Naveen Jain

Danny had no idea what the thing was. All he knew was that he lived more or less in a constant state of expecting something any day, any hour, that would change everything, knock the world upside down and put Danny's whole life into perspective as a story of complete success, because every twist and turn and snag and fuckup would always have been leading up to this. Unexpected stuff could hit him like the thing at first: a girl he'd forgotten giving his number to suddenly calling up out of the blue, a friend with some genius plan for making money, better yet a person he'd never heard of who wanted to talk. Danny got an actual physical head rush from messages like these, but as soon as he called back and found out the details, the calls would turn out to just be about more projects, possibilities, schemes that boiled down to everything staying exactly like it was. — Jennifer Egan

If the entire world decided to become vegan tomorrow, a whole host of the world's problems would disappear overnight. Climate change would decrease by 25 percent, deforestation would cease, rainforests would be preserved, our water- and air-quality would increase, life-expectancy rates would increase, and our rates of cancer would plummet, so certainly, with that one action of becoming vegan you are quite effectively making the world a better place. — Moby

If you believe in making change from the bottom up, if you believe the measure of change is how many people's lives are better, you know it's hard, and some people think it's boring. — William J. Clinton

There are two main strategies we can try to improve the quality of life. The first is to try making external conditions match our goals. The second is to change how we experience external conditions to make them fit our goals better. — Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

Whenever I come across someone speaking negatively about escapism or looking down on those who seek a temporary escape from this world, I can't help but look at them as absolute fools. To deny someone the right to find temporary peace in escapism is to deny human nature itself as well as all the benefits of such a beautiful concept. Often times, these instances show them saying that "it'll only make things worse" or "it's not gonna change anything", except, a lot of times, that's not the case at all. How many times has someone shut themselves away from the world by listening to a song they hold dear only to return more ready to face the world than before, how many times has someone learned something about themselves through the fictional events of a novel that they wouldn't have other wise, how many times has society experienced great change through people who dreamed of making the world a better place, only to eventually make those dreams into a reality. — Justin Allen

...one good decision can totally change the trajectory of our lives. And that one good decision will lead to better decisions. But it starts by making the right decision when no one is looking.

There is a past cause and future effect to every decision that goes way beyond what is discernible in the here and now. Decisions have long and often complex genealogies. And every decision is a genesis moment that has the potential to radically alter not just our destiny but the course of human history as well. — Mark Batterson

Making a lifestyle change is challenging, especially when you want to transform many things at once, you better start with one, when you see the change you'll have an automatic motivation entering into your life. — Auliq Ice

I still hate making pictures! And I don't like Hollywood any better. I detest the limelight and love simplicity, and in Hollywood the only thing that matters is the hullabaloo of fame. If Hollywood will let me alone to find my way without forcing me and rushing me into things, I probably will change my feelings about it. But at present Hollywood seems utterly horrible and interfering and consuming. Which is why I want to leave it as soon as I am able. — Margaret Sullavan

My great panacea for making society at once better and more enjoyable would be to cultivate greater sincerity. — Frances Power Cobbe

The cause of making the world a better place for children unites us all - today HIV/AIDS is the biggest threat to this one universal objective. UNICEF needs us all to help them change the world for children — Liam Neeson

When we look at the matter from another point of view, great caution would seem to be required. For the habit of lightly changing the laws is an evil, and, when the advantage is small, some errors both of lawgivers and rulers had better be left; the citizen will not gain so much by making the change as he will lose by the habit of disobedience. — Aristotle.

The people who dismiss concerns about global warming seem to be the pessimists who would rather give up than own up to the problems we have all created. The people who worry most about what we are doing to the planet are the optimists who believe we also have the intelligence - we, as a species, working together - to come up with powerful solutions to the problems we're working on that will change the world for the better. Which way of looking at the world is going to produce a Next Greatest Generation? Will it be the ones who give up, or the ones who get going? Making — Bill Nye

So, look at the world around you, and if you notice things that don't seem right - injustices, inefficiencies, or just oddities - investigate them further. Think about why and how those things might happen and what you could do to change them for the better. Test your ideas by trying new things, making more observations, refining your models, and repeating the process. And when you find something that works to explain or improve your situation, tell everyone about it, so we can all benefit. — Chad Orzel

A final caution to students: in making judgments on literature, always be honest. Do not pretend to like what you really do not like. Do not be afraid to admit a liking for what you do like. A genuine enthusiasm for the second-rate is much better than false enthusiasm or no enthusiasm at all. Be neither hasty nor timorous in making your judgments. When you have attentively read a poem and thoroughly considered it, decide what you think. Do not hedge, equivocate, or try to find out others' opinions before forming your own. But having formed an opinion and expressed it, do not allow it to petrify. Compare your opinion then with the opinions of others; allow yourself to change it when convinced of its error: in this way you learn. Honestly, courage, and humility are the necessary moral foundations for all genuine literary judgment. — Laurence Perrine

Sadly, we do a much better job of making people feel guilty than we do of delivering them from the guilt we create. We need to confess this and change our ways. — Tony Campolo

We can change the world and make it a better place. It is in your hands to make a difference. — Nelson Mandela

Being thankful for life itself is a way of making life better. When we look away from our problems, even for a short time, and generate joy in our hearts, we find that the world seems to change a bit. — John Harricharan

Under Barack Obama, the only 'Change' is that 'Hope' has been hard to find. Now millions of Americans are insecure about their future. But instead of inspiring us by reminding us of what makes us special, he divides us against each other. He tells Americans they're worse off because others are better off. That people got rich by making others poor. — Marco Rubio

It's good to be aware that a certain amount of fear is going to accompany every change in your life - a change for the worse or a change for the better. Knowing this can stop you from moving into fear about Change Itself. If you start fearing change generically you could wind up shrinking from ever making any kind of change at all for the rest of your day - even a change that obviously should be made for your own good. — Neale Donald Walsch

Chess teaches foresight, by having to plan ahead; vigilance, by having to keep watch over the whole chess board; caution, by having to restrain ourselves from making hasty moves; and finally, we learn from chess the greatest maxim in life - that even when everything seems to be going badly for us we should not lose heart, but always hoping for a change for the better, steadfastly continue searching for the solutions to our problems. — Benjamin Franklin

Each of us has a role to play, and we all need to contribute to making the world a better place. You cannot sit back and do nothing and hope for change; one person can make the biggest difference. Throughout history people have tried to say that we need love and we need to work together, which we do, but you cannot truly love anything unless you learn to love yourself. It all boils down to you, the individual.
When individuals accept themselves, they are liberated from their suffering, and are capable of fully embracing the world around them. You are the only one who can change your life. When the people recognize this, real change will come. Do not wait around for someone else to save the world. You are unique and you have knowledge from your own experience that no one else has. You have ideas and passions that nobody else can claim. You could be the one to help us out of the dreadful situation that we are in, but if you do not act on your ambition the world will never know. — Joseph P. Kauffman