Top 350 Amy Poehler Quotes (2025 Update)
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301. “But I was eventually okay. And you will be okay too. Here’s why. I had already made a decision early on that I would be a plain girl with tons of personality, and accepting it made everything a lot easier.”

— Amy Poehler

302. “I wondered if I was just doing this as some kind of ego trip. Then I decided I didn’t care. Not enough is made of the fact that being of service makes you feel good. I think nonprofits should guarantee that giving your time and money makes your skin better and your ass smaller. Why not? There are so many people in the world with so little. Who cares why you decide to help?”

— Amy Poehler

303. “Style is obviously important in Haiti. A lot of people wore bright colors and neatly pressed shirts. The taxis and billboards were beautiful. Haiti is not afraid of color. And texture. And depth. The young people looked fierce and bored. They looked like pure energy. There was true aesthetic but also a palpable darkness. I mean, let’s get real. Kids are slaves here. Kids are bought and sold and put to work.”

— Amy Poehler

304. “You get better at understanding what people mean and how it can be different from what they say.”

— Amy Poehler

305. “When you have a comfortable and loving middle-class family, sometimes you yearn for a dance on the edge. This can lead to an overactive imagination, but it is also the reason why kids in Montana do meth.”

— Amy Poehler

306. “All of my lower-middle-class Boston issues rose to the surface. I don’t like it when bratty, privileged old white guys speak to me like I am their mouthy niece. I got that amazing feeling you get when you know you are going to lose it in the best, most self-righteous way. I just leaned back and yelled, “FUUUUUUUUUUUUCK YOU.” Then I chased him as he tried to get away from me.”

— Amy Poehler

307. “Patti Smith was amazing. She talked about politics and sang like a soldier. She was so cool and interesting. She stomped around and spit onstage. Spitting is disgusting, but when Patti spits it looks like ballet.”

— Amy Poehler

308. “Sometimes I worry that not enough people hate me.”

— Amy Poehler

309. “People treat writing like it’s some elegant act but it’s usually lonely and isolating.”

— Amy Poehler

310. “Annie taught me that orphanages were a blast and being rich is the only thing that matters. Grease taught me being in a gang is nonstop fun and you need to dress sexier to have any chance of keeping a guy interested.”

— Amy Poehler

311. “You are six or twelve or fifteen and you look in the mirror and you hear a voice so awful and mean that it takes your breath away. It tells you that you are fat and ugly and you don’t deserve love. And the scary part is the demon is your own voice.”

— Amy Poehler

312. “I loved school. I loved new shoes and lunch boxes and sharp pencils. I would hold dance contests in tiny finished basements with my friends. I roller-skated in my driveway and walked home from the bus stop on my own. We never locked our door. I had a younger brother whom I loved and also liked. I thought my mother was the most beautiful mother in the world and my father was a superhero who would always protect me. I wish this feeling for every child on earth.”

— Amy Poehler

313. “I am here to tell you that you don’t have to. You don’t have to tell it or tweet it or Instagram it. You don’t have to put it in a book or share it with anyone who doesn’t feel safe and protective of your heart.”

— Amy Poehler

314. “You guys missed my cue,” I said. “No one noticed.” “I did.” “Relax, it was great.” “Relax” is a real tough one for me. Another tough one is “smile.” “Smile” doesn’t really work either. Telling me to relax or smile when I’m angry is like bringing a birthday cake into an ape sanctuary. You’re just asking to get your nose and genitals bitten off.”

— Amy Poehler

315. “I can party like a twenty-four-year-old but it takes me almost a week to recover.”

— Amy Poehler

316. “Treat your career like a bad boyfriend.”

— Amy Poehler

317. “A war raged between my jokey and protective brain and my squishy and tender heart. I have realized that mystery is what keeps people away, and I’ve grown tired of smoke and mirrors. I yearn for the clean, well-lighted place. So let’s peek behind the curtain and hail the others like us. The open-faced sandwiches who take risks and live big and smile with all of their teeth. These are the people I want to be around. This is the honest way I want to live and love and write.”

— Amy Poehler

318. “While I was at Carlucci I learned how to dust a tiramisu and pair cordials. I learned having a pocket filled with cash is a dangerous thing. I learned that I was getting way too good at a job that was not my life’s passion.”

— Amy Poehler

319. “I haven’t lived a full enough life to look back on, but I am too old to get by on being pithy and cute. I know enough now to know I know nothing. I am slugging away every day, just like you.”

— Amy Poehler

320. “Also, even though I’m bossy, I like being told what to do by people who are smarter and more interesting than me.”

— Amy Poehler

321. “Wordsworth also said that the best part of a person’s life is “his little, nameless, unremembered, acts of kindness and of love.” I.”

— Amy Poehler

322. “Remember, your career is a bad boyfriend. It likes you when you don’t depend on it.”

— Amy Poehler

323. “The lessons? Women are mighty. George Clooney loves bits. Doing something is often more fun than doing it alone. And you don’t always have to win to get the pudding.”

— Amy Poehler

324. “I think middle age begins once you start looking forward to eating dinner before six thirty, or when you call the cops when your next-door neighbor has a party.”

— Amy Poehler

325. “Teenage bodies should be filled with Vonnegut and meatball subs, not opiates that create glassy-eyed party monsters.”

— Amy Poehler

326. “When I left SNL, I gave Seth a badge of courage, like Dorothy give to the Cowardly Lion... He kept it in his pocket during “Update” until he didn’t need it anymore. Now it sits in a box on his desk at Late Night.”

— Amy Poehler

327. “Your career and your passion don’t always match up.”

— Amy Poehler

328. “I am introducing a new idea. Try to care less. Practice ambivalence. Learn to let go of wanting it.”

— Amy Poehler

329. “Gerthe also talked about travel. She talked about living in Jamaica. She joked about her husband and her haircut, because she is more than the earthquake. A person’s tragedy does not make up their entire life. A story carves deep grooves into our brains each time we tell it. But we aren’t one story.”

— Amy Poehler

330. “There should be some kind of pregnancy superhero movie. Calling Hollywood now. What’s that, Hollywood? It’s a weird idea and also you don’t do movies with female superheroes? Copy that.”

— Amy Poehler

331. “A word about apologizing: It’s hard to do it without digging yourself in deeper.”

— Amy Poehler

332. “I don’t remember; I was in a rage haze. Also I was showing off, which can be at the very least embarrassingly transparent and at the very worst.”

— Amy Poehler

333. “Annie taught me that orphanages were a blast and being rich is the only thing that matters. Grease taught me being in a gang is nonstop fun and you need to dress sexier to have any chance of keeping a guy interested. But The Wizard of Oz was the ultimate. It dealt with friendship and fear and death and rainbows and sparkly red shoes.”

— Amy Poehler

334. “The “yes” comes from my improvisational days and the opportunity that comes with youth, and the “please” comes from the wisdom of knowing that agreeing to do something usually means you aren’t doing it alone.”

— Amy Poehler

335. “He was the first important person in my life to die, and when he did, it was the first time I realized that life is not fair or safe or even ours to own. I miss him.”

— Amy Poehler

336. “Speaking of music, we will arrive with our own. We plan on delivering our baby to the soundtrack of Pink Floyd’s The Wall while simultaneously watching The Wizard of Oz. If this kid works with us, we guarantee your minds will be blown!”

— Amy Poehler

337. “He handed me a rope and it was up to me whether I would climb it or use it to hang myself.”

— Amy Poehler

338. “Our parents surround us with origin stories that create deep grooves in the vinyl records of our lives.”

— Amy Poehler

339. “It was hard to feel like somebody didn’t like me. It felt like such a failure. I don’t care as much now. It’s really great. It’s like I can finally eat spicy food without the gut ache later, or something similar. I have a stomach for other people not stomaching me. Or at least I am working on it.”

— Amy Poehler

340. “I didn’t really know what kind of actor I wanted to be back then. I didn’t have a real plan or even a mentor to follow. I just knew the things I didn’t want. I didn’t want to be tied down and stuck. I didn’t want to decide who I was going to marry or where I was going to live.”

— Amy Poehler

341. “Let me offer this apology. Please excuse this self-indulgent preface. I know what I am doing. I am presenting a series of reasons as to why you should lower your expectations, so that you can be blown away by my sneaky insights about life and work. I am a grown woman. I know my own tricks!”

— Amy Poehler

342. “I know how good I am at bemoaning my process and pretending I don’t care so that my final product will seem totally natural and part of my essence and not something I sweated for months and years.”

— Amy Poehler

343. “The only way we will survive is by being kind.”

— Amy Poehler

344. “I think it’s glorious to be nervous. Being nervous is great! How often do we get nervous on a daily basis? Being slightly nervous means you care, and you’re alive, and you’re taking some kind of risk. Hooray for being nervous! A friend told me to substitute the word ‘excitement’ for ‘nervous’. That way you acknowledge the physical feelings without putting a negative spin on things. So to answer your question, sometimes I still get so excited about ‘Update’ that I want to throw up.”

— Amy Poehler

345. “There are so many people in the world with so little. Who cares why you decide to help?”

— Amy Poehler

346. “At first we only knew a few things: we wanted to make content we would have watched when we were younger, and we wanted to end our episodes with a dance party. Spontaneous dance parties are important in my life. I have one in the makeup trailer almost every afternoon on Parks and Recreation. Dancing is the great equalizer. It gets people out of their heads and into their bodies. I think if you can dance and be free and not embarrassed you can rule the world.”

— Amy Poehler

347. “Career is different. Career is the stringing together of opportunities and jobs. Mix in public opinion and past regrets. Add a dash of future panic and a whole lot of financial uncertainty.”

— Amy Poehler

348. “Sometimes this book stays in the present, other times I try to cut myself in half and count the rings. Occasionally I think about the future, but I try to do that sparingly because it usually makes me anxious.”

— Amy Poehler

349. “I was told I resembled a cartoon chicken, which is still true, especially after a rough weekend. My parents tell stories about my staring at them from the crib at all hours of the night. Sounds pretty creepy, right? A pale, bald and tiny baby bird peering out through the slats of its cage, challenging the adults to an all-night staring contest?”

— Amy Poehler

350. “Kiss every baby, and pet every dog. Walk slowly, and lie down when you’re tired. What’s next?”

— Amy Poehler