Top 120 Matthew Kelly Quotes (2025 Update)

1. “Our lives change when our habits change.”

— Matthew Kelly

Featured in: Habit Quotes, New Year Motivational Quotes

2. “Freedom is not the ability to do whatever you want. Freedom is the strength of character to do what is good, true, noble, and right.”

— Matthew Kelly

Featured in: Conscience Quotes

3. “Reading is to the mind what exercise is to the body and prayer is to the soul.”

— Matthew Kelly

4. “Anything and anyone that does not help you to become the best version of yourself is too small for you.”

— Matthew Kelly

5. “Our essential purpose is to become the best version of ourselves.”

— Matthew Kelly

6. “If you don’t have time to pray and read the scriptures, you are busier than God ever intended you to be.”

— Matthew Kelly

7. “We become the books we read.”

— Matthew Kelly

8. “Who you become is infinitely more important than what you do, or what you have.”

— Matthew Kelly

9. “Whether you are sixteen or sixty, the rest of your life is ahead of you. You cannot change one moment of your past, but you can change your whole future. Now is your time.”

— Matthew Kelly

10. “You cannot be healthy and happy without discipline. If you want to measure the level of happiness in your life, just measure the level of discipline in your life. You will never have more happiness than you have discipline.”

— Matthew Kelly

11. “It takes more energy to maintain mediocrity than it takes to pursue excellence.”

— Matthew Kelly

12. “Discipline is the path to happiness.”

— Matthew Kelly

13. “Everybody is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid.” The question I have for you at this part of our journey together is, “What is your genius?”

— Matthew Kelly

14. “On the one hand, we all want to be happy. On the other hand, we all know the things that make us happy. But we don’t do those things. Why? Simple. We are too busy. Too busy doing what? Too busy trying to be happy. This is the paradox of happiness that has bewitched our age.”

— Matthew Kelly

15. “Love is a choice, love is an act of will, you can choose to love.”

— Matthew Kelly

16. “Most people overestimate what they can do in a day, and underestimate what they can do in a month. We overestimate what we can do in a year, and underestimate what we can accomplish in a decade.” by Matthew Kelly from the book The Long View.”

— Matthew Kelly

17. “Life is about saying yes to the things that help you become the-best-version-of-yourself and no to the things that don’t.”

— Matthew Kelly

18. “Hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things. Hope is one of those things that you can’t buy, but that will be freely given to you if you ask. Hope is the one thing people cannot live without. Hope is a thing of beauty.”

— Matthew Kelly

19. “Never pass up an opportunity to speak a kind word of appreciation. There are six billion people on the planet, and 5.9 billion of them go to bed every night starving for one honest word of appreciation.”

— Matthew Kelly

20. “Thought determines action. Do not let your whole life be a reaction to the things that happen around you each day. Let your life be an action.”

— Matthew Kelly

21. “Catholicism is not a lifeless set of rules and regulations. Catholicism is a lifestyle. Catholicism is a way of life designed by God to help you become all you can be.”

— Matthew Kelly

22. “The measure of your life will be the measure of your courage.”

— Matthew Kelly

23. “Truth be told, our modern education systems crush the very spirit they claim to instill.”

— Matthew Kelly

24. “Life is about love. It’s about whom you love and whom you hurt. Life’s about how you love yourself and how you hurt yourself. Life’s about how you love and hurt the people close to you. Life is about how you love and hurt the people who just cross your path for a moment. Life is about love.”

— Matthew Kelly

25. “God of hope, I look to you with an open heart and yearning spirit. During this Advent season, I will keep alert and awake, listening for your word and keeping to your precepts. My hope is in you.”

— Matthew Kelly

26. “Thoughts create actions. Actions create habits. Habits create character.”

— Matthew Kelly

27. “We are not here to solve the problems; the problems are here to solve us.”

— Matthew Kelly

28. “Wherever you find excellence, you find continuous learning. They go hand in hand. Wherever you find that continuous learning is missing, you find mediocrity.”

— Matthew Kelly

29. “Never believe a promise from a man or woman who has no discipline. They have broken a thousand promises to themselves, and they break their promise for you.”

— Matthew Kelly

30. “God of deep waters and infinite riches, challenge me to go where I fear, to do what is difficult and what I thought could never be done. Push me to go to the deep waters of life and cast my net wide, for I put all my hope, trust and faith in you.”

— Matthew Kelly

31. “Character is built little by little, over days, weeks, months, and years, with thousands of small and seemingly insignificant acts of discipline.”

— Matthew Kelly

32. “Superficiality is the curse of the modern world.”

— Matthew Kelly

33. “If we will walk humbly with our God, He will lead us by the hand to exactly who and what we need, to those people, things, and experiences He has designed and intended for us, and this alone will be the cause of our deep fulfillment and happiness.”

— Matthew Kelly

34. “What is a holy moment? A holy moment is a moment when you make yourself completely available to God. You set self-interest aside, you set aside what you want to do or feel like doing, and for that moment you do exactly what you sense God is calling you to do.”

— Matthew Kelly

35. “We become the stories we listen to. But perhaps the more important question is, what stories do you listen to? What stories are forming your life?”

— Matthew Kelly

36. “The challenge life presents to each of us is to become truly ourselves – not the self we have imagined or fantasized about, not the self that our friends want us to be, not the self our ego would have us be, but the self God has ordained us to be from before we were in our mother’s womb.”

— Matthew Kelly

37. “There will be times of fear and trembling. There will be times of discouragement and disillusionment. Have courage, smile, keep your chin up, laugh often, be kind to yourself, stay focused, be gracious and appreciative, think happy thoughts, and carry on regardless.”

— Matthew Kelly

38. “God always wants our future to be bigger than our past.”

— Matthew Kelly

39. “Catherine of Sienna wrote, “If you are what you should be you will set the whole world on fire.”

— Matthew Kelly

40. “Nothing in the world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful men with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education alone will not; the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent.”

— Matthew Kelly

41. “The way we see the world determines the way we live our lives.”

— Matthew Kelly

42. “For the day we accept that we have chosen to choose our choices is the day we cast off the shackles of victimhood and are set free to pursue the lives we were born to live. Learn to master the moment of decision and you will live a life uncommon.”

— Matthew Kelly

43. “The hardest war to win is one you don’t even realize you are fighting, and the hardest enemy to defeat is the one you don’t even know exists. Every day you are at war with resistance.”

— Matthew Kelly

44. “The notion of freedom proclaimed by the modern world is anti-discipline. But true freedom cannot be separated from discipline.”

— Matthew Kelly

45. “We are not here to solve the problems; the problems are here to solve us. This is one of the supernatural mysteries of our journeys here on earth.”

— Matthew Kelly

46. “The glory of God is the perfection of the creature.” There is no better way to honor life and God than to strive to become the – best – version – of – yourself.”

— Matthew Kelly

47. “Connecting with people in a powerful way is a skill that must be developed, nurtured, and practiced.”

— Matthew Kelly

48. “In fact, the more each person can remove his or her ego from the discussion and focus on the subject matter, the more fruitful the conversation will be for all involved.”

— Matthew Kelly

49. “It has been my experience that nothing changes a person’s life more than the discovery of one solitary truth: There is a meaning and purpose to life. More specifically: There is a meaning and purpose to your life.”

— Matthew Kelly

50. “The most devastating form of loneliness is not to be without friends; rather, it is to be surrounded by friends and never to be truly known.”

— Matthew Kelly