Top 40 Growing Up Quotes (2025 Update)

1. “Every child needs at least one adult who is irrationally crazy about him or her.”

— Urie Bronfenbrenner

Also featured in: Caring Quotes, Crazy Quotes, Quotes About Children, Quotes About Kids

2. “It matters not what someone is born, but what they grow to be.”

— J.K. Rowling

Also featured in: Positive Inspirational Quotes, Identity Quotes, Perspective Quotes, Choices Quotes, Growth Quotes

3. “In youth we learn; in age we understand.”

— Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach

Also featured in: Experience Quotes, Short Quotes About Life, Wisdom Quotes, Knowledge Quotes

4. “The education of even a small child, therefore, does not aim at preparing him for school, but for life.”

— Maria Montessori

Also featured in: Education Quotes, Lifelong Learning Quotes, School Quotes, Quotes About Childhood

5. “You can’t be old and wise, if you were never young and crazy.”

— Chris Brown

Also featured in: Silly Quotes, Wise Quotes, Artist Quotes, Crazy Quotes

6. “What a child can do today with assistance, she will be able to do by herself tomorrow.”

— Lev S. Vygotsky

Also featured in: Education Quotes, Inspirational Quotes for Students, Teaching Quotes, Quotes About Childhood

7. “Pain is a part of growing-up. It is how we learn...”

— Dan Brown

Also featured in: Quotes About Growing Up

8. “Don’t limit a child to your own learning, for he was born in another time.”

— Rabindranath Tagore

Also featured in: Encouraging Quotes for Students, Teaching Quotes, Quotes About Children

9. “Our children are the rock on which our future will be built, our greatest asset as a nation.”

— Nelson Mandela

Also featured in: Quotes About Children

10. “Young people need models, not critics.”

— John Wooden

Also featured in: Encouraging Quotes for Students, Quotes About Children

11. “Our children are the rock on which our future will be built, our greatest asset as a nation. They will be the leaders of our country, the creators of our national wealth, those who care for and protect our people.”

— Nelson Mandela

Also featured in: Impact Quotes, Legacy Quotes, Quotes About Children

12. “A youth is to be regarded with respect. How do we know that his future will not be equal to our present?”

— Confucius

Also featured in: Encouraging Quotes for Students, Respect To Be Respected Quotes

13. “The question isn’t so much, Are you parenting the right way? as it is: Are you the adult you want your child to grow up to be?”

— Brené Brown

Also featured in: Family Quotes, Parenting Quotes, Quotes About Growing Up

14. “It may be hard for an egg to turn into a bird: it would be a jolly sight harder for a bird to learn to fly while remaining an egg. We are like eggs at present. And you cannot go on indefinitely being just an ordinary, decent egg. We must be hatched or go bad.”

— C. S. Lewis

Also featured in: Awakening Quotes, New Beginnings Quotes

15. “In order to develop normally, a child requires progressively more complex joint activity with one or more adults who have an irrational emotional relationship with the child. Somebody’s got to be crazy about that kid. That’s number one. First, last and always.”

— Urie Bronfenbrenner

Also featured in: Crazy Quotes, Quotes About Kids, Quotes About Childhood, Parenting Quotes

16. “When I was ten, I read fairy tales in secret and would have been ashamed if I had been found doing so. Now that I am fifty, I read them openly. When I became a man I put away childish things, including the fear of childishness and the desire to be very grown up.”

— C. S. Lewis

17. “Children require long, uninterrupted periods of play and exploration.”

— Jean Piaget

Also featured in: Quotes About Kids, Quotes About Childhood

18. “Maturity comes not with age but with the acceptance of responsibility. You are only young once but immaturity can last a lifetime!”

— Edwin Louis Cole

Also featured in: Accountability Quotes

19. “The right way to begin is to pay attention to the young, and make them just as good as possible.”

— Socrates

Also featured in: Teacher Quotes, Quotes About Kids

20. “Do you know that the harder thing to do and the right thing to do are usually the same thing? Nothing that has meaning is easy. “Easy” doesn’t enter into grown-up life.”

— Michael Caine

Also featured in: Life is Hard Quotes

21. “There are no perfect parents, and there are no perfect children, but there are plenty of perfect moments along the way.”

— Dave Willis

Also featured in: Cute Quotes, Quotes About Kids, Parenting Quotes

22. “Childhood memories are sometimes covered and obscured beneath the things that come later, like childhood toys forgotten at the bottom of a crammed adult closet, but they are never lost for good.”

— Neil Gaiman

Also featured in: Past Quotes, Quotes About Childhood, Making Memories Quotes

23. “Things change. And friends leave. Life doesn’t stop for anybody.”

— Stephen Chbosky

Also featured in: Life is Hard Quotes, Sad Quotes About Life, Loss Quotes

24. “The future is now. It’s time to grow up and be strong. Tomorrow may well be too late.”

— Neil LaBute

25. “A child’s mental health is just as important as their physical health.”

— Kate Middleton

Also featured in: Wellness Wednesday Quotes, Quotes About Childhood, Motherhood Quotes

26. “I think the best thing a parent can do, when raising a child, is simply get out of their way.”

— Neil deGrasse Tyson

Also featured in: Quotes About Children

27. “The only way to know is to Live, Learn, and Grow.”

— Lauryn Hill

Also featured in: Growth Mindset Quotes, Lifelong Learning Quotes

28. “To exist is to change, to change is to mature, to mature is to go on creating oneself endlessly.”

— Henri Bergson

29. “Help young people. Help small guys. Because small guys will be big. Young people will have the seeds you bury in their minds, and when they grow up, they will change the world.”

— Jack Ma

Also featured in: Encouraging Quotes for Students, Inspirational Quotes for Students, Small Business Quotes, Quotes About Kids

30. “Children are not vessels to be filled but lamps to be lit.”

— Chinmayananda Saraswati

Also featured in: Quotes About Childhood

31. “Growing up happens when you start having things you look back on and wish you could change.”

— Cassandra Clare

32. “When I get older, I will be stronger.”

— K'naan

33. “Childhood is not a race to see how quickly a child can read, write and count. It is a small window of time to learn and develop at the pace that is right for each individual child. Earlier is not better.”

— Magda Gerber

Also featured in: Quotes About Children, Quotes About Childhood, Parenting Quotes, Inspirational Quotes for Teachers

34. “The mark of the immature man is that he wants to die nobly for a cause, while the mark of the mature man is that he wants to live humbly for one.”

— J.D. Salinger

Also featured in: Quotes About Growing Up

35. “Children are like buds in a garden and should be carefully and lovingly nurtured, as they are the future of the nation and the citizens of tomorrow.”

— Jawaharlal Nehru

Also featured in: Quotes About Children, School Quotes, Quotes About Kids, Inspirational Quotes for Teachers

36. “You grow up the day you have the first real laugh at yourself.”

— Ethel Barrymore

Also featured in: Humor Quotes, Funny Motivational Quotes, Quotes About Growing Up

37. “My parents are my backbone. Still are. They’re the only group that will support you if you score zero or you score 40.”

— Kobe Bryant

Also featured in: Family Quotes, Thankful Quotes

38. “Even if we don’t have the power to choose where we come from, we can still choose where we go from there.”

— Stephen Chbosky

Also featured in: New Beginnings Quotes, Encouraging Quotes for Students, Inspirational Quotes for Students

39. “Make your own decisions. Make your own choices.”

— Lisa Mangum

Also featured in: Positive Quotes for Women, Encouraging Quotes for Students

40. “Childhood is the one story that stands by itself in every soul.”

— Ivan Doig

Also featured in: Quotes About Childhood

41. “Blaze your own trail in life. Make your own choices and make your own mistakes. It’s the only way you’ll find your own happiness, not someone else’s.”

— M. Leighton

Also featured in: Motivational Quotes for Women

42. “There is an expiry date on blaming your parents for steering you in the wrong direction; the moment you are old enough to take the wheel, responsibility lies with you.”

— J.K. Rowling

Also featured in: Accountability Quotes, Excuses Quotes

43. “The greatest gifts you can give your children are the roots of responsibility and the wings of independence.”

— Denis Waitley

Also featured in: Quotes About Kids

44. “Growth hurts because change isn’t easy, that’s why they call it growing pains.”

— Tony Gaskins

Also featured in: Life is Hard Quotes