Top 35 Ashlee Gadd Quotes (2025 Update)

1. “Both motherhood and creativity involve risk and require courage. We might never feel ready or prepared, but that’s where the leap of faith comes in.”

— Ashlee Gadd

2. “Because every minute spent pining for that cabin in the woods is a minute lost on creating something beautiful in the actual life you are living.”

— Ashlee Gadd

3. “Each precious child has challenged me to let go of the vision of the mom I wanted to be so I could be the mom my kids need.”

— Ashlee Gadd

4. “You are not weak if you need backup. You aren’t needy if you ask your husband to take a late-night diaper change. You are not lazy if you ask grandparents to watch the kids sometimes, or if you hire a housecleaner because you barely have time to bathe yourself, let alone scrub the tile.”

— Ashlee Gadd

5. “Breadcrumbs are made of peace and lined with grace. When you stumble across one, there is no mistaking where it came from. These divine hints lead us forward, as if God himself is holding out His hand, pulling us along to the next chapter He is writing in our lives.”

— Ashlee Gadd

6. “You are a beloved daughter of the Highest King, who gave His life so you could live. So you could rest. So you could be free from the desperate pursuit of trying to earn your keep in this world.”

— Ashlee Gadd

7. “You have permission to pursue your creative gifts as a testament to who God created you to be. You have permission to make beautiful things in a broken world as a testament to God’s grace mightily at work in you.”

— Ashlee Gadd

8. “Both motherhood and creativity require us to pay attention, to listen, to remain expectant.”

— Ashlee Gadd

9. “Listen to me carefully, Momma: score-keeping has no place in your marriage. The best thing you can do for yourself and for each other is to say “thank you” and “I love you” as much as possible. Be grateful. Be appreciative. Offer each other grace upon grace upon grace. You’ve never needed it this much.”

— Ashlee Gadd

10. “Creativity begets creativity.”

— Ashlee Gadd

11. “In the end, Noah’s labor resulted in far more than a simple ark that stayed afloat. All those hours co-laboring with God led to something far greater: a rainbow, a promise, a covenant between God and every living creature on earth.”

— Ashlee Gadd

12. “At the root, my desire to feel ready is actually a desire to control the outcome.”

— Ashlee Gadd

13. “We get to choose whether we dole out praise or intentionally withhold it. We get to choose whether we build one another up or break each other down, whether we root for or against our fellow moms, our fellow artists, our fellow Kingdom builders.”

— Ashlee Gadd

14. “Both motherhood and creativity have taught me to be brave, to relentlessly seek beauty and joy among the mundane, to notice the remarkable grace flooding my unremarkable life.”

— Ashlee Gadd

15. “At the core, making space for creativity traces back to permission, to the idea that feeding our souls is not a waste. Creativity is not a waste of time, or money, or resources. It’s not a waste of space in our schedules, our minds, our homes. If you view creativity as a selfish act, you will always struggle to justify making time for it. If you believe pursuing creativity is self-serving, it’s going to be the first thing you cut from your life in busy seasons.”

— Ashlee Gadd

16. “If I measure each day by my list, the days are not always very good, but when I look at each day like it is their day too, because it is their day, well, then most days are better. A lot better.”

— Ashlee Gadd

17. “God doesn’t waste mediocre moments. God doesn’t waste pain or joy, failure or delight. He doesn’t waste time, or chances, or opportunities to refine our hearts.”

— Ashlee Gadd

18. “The enemy hisses imposter and fraud, but I beg you to listen to the louder voice who calls you by a different name.”

— Ashlee Gadd

19. “Film, like all of creativity, requires surrender, releasing our work into the world knowing it is not perfect, and perhaps even, the extra grain is what makes it special.”

— Ashlee Gadd

20. “You desperately want all the right tools because you want to mother ‘the right way’. But motherhood is messy, and raw, and nuanced, and requires things a baby registry could never provide: surrender, and trust, and dependence on the Lord Almighty to fuel you with grace, with perseverance, with steadfast love, with sacrificial willingness to get up the next morning with your eyes half shut and do it all over again. That is what you need to mother.”

— Ashlee Gadd

21. “Could radical obedience be the middle place between perfection and good enough? Or perhaps not even a middle place, but a better way altogether?”

— Ashlee Gadd

22. “When we create lovely things that point back to the goodness of our Maker, we are giving an account of the hope that is in us.”

— Ashlee Gadd

23. “I hope they are unapologetic with their confidence. I hope they are a force to be reckoned with.”

— Ashlee Gadd

24. “To color and bake and arrange flowers in a jar, to do whatever it takes to keep making beautiful things in a broken world.”

— Ashlee Gadd

25. “Perfectionism is rooted in anxiety, frustration, and endless striving. Radical obedience is rooted in peace, joy, and endless surrender. Perfectionism chokes, paralyzes, and prevents us from even starting. Radical obedience launches, spurs, and propels us forward.”

— Ashlee Gadd

26. “We live in a culture obsessed with final products, but the middle matters greatly. The show up, the discipline, the putting your butt in the chair – this is where the magic happens. The more we show up to our creativity, even when we don’t feel like it, the more we start to view all of life as a creative act.”

— Ashlee Gadd

27. “This is about paying attention to beauty and mercy and grace, and then sharing those gifts with the world through our words, our paintings, our music, our photographs.”

— Ashlee Gadd

28. “The longer we parent, the better we get at this role change. It’s not just about learning to discipline well; it’s about learning that love is made real when it is tested, in the times we have to be someone we never thought we would be.”

— Ashlee Gadd

29. “That’s all we can do, isn’t it? As mothers. As artists. We do the work. We ask for help. We show up and give God our best effort, our richest offering, hoping someday we meet our Maker and hear “She has done a beautiful thing. She has done what she could.”

— Ashlee Gadd

30. “If we want to create inspiring art, we have to consume inspiring art. We have to go where the light is, toward what is lovely, toward what makes us feel alive.”

— Ashlee Gadd

31. “If you view creativity as a selfish act, you will always struggle to justify making time for it.”

— Ashlee Gadd

32. “You have been appointed to steward all of it-these precious children under your care and this art burning a hole in your heart. There is no one better suited for this job, for this holy work, for this calling, than you.”

— Ashlee Gadd

33. “God filled the world with good things and calls us to do the same-to showcase hope, light, beauty, and restoration as part of the ongoing process of God’s glory infusing the earth.”

— Ashlee Gadd

34. “The more we show up to our creativity, even when we don’t feel like it, the more we start to view all of life as a creative act.”

— Ashlee Gadd

35. “If God is the first artist-and we are a walking, breathing reflection of Him-this means our desire to create is hereditary, a fundamental imprint of His Spirit in us.”

— Ashlee Gadd