Top 450 Michelle Obama Quotes (2024 Update)
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151. “What I’ve learned is this: All of them have had doubters. Some continue to have roaring, stadium-sized collections of critics and naysayers who will shout I told you so at every little misstep or mistake. The noise doesn’t go away, but the most successful people I know have figured out how to live with it, to lean on the people who believe in them, and to push onward with their goals.”

— Michelle Obama

152. “And I come here as a daughter, raised on the South Side of Chicago – by a father who was a blue-collar city worker and a mother who stayed at home with my brother and me.”

— Michelle Obama

153. “It hurts to live after someone has died. It just does.”

— Michelle Obama

154. “I try to have no absolute nos. I love french fries, I like a good burger, and I like pie. And that’s okay.”

— Michelle Obama

155. “There’s no expert on this planet who says that the government telling people what to do actually does any good with this issue, this is going to require an effort on everyone’s part.”

— Michelle Obama

156. “Optics would always rule our lives.”

— Michelle Obama

157. “And the first thing we have to do is vote. Hey, no, not just once in a while. Not just when my husband or somebody you like is on the ballot. But in every election at every level, all of the time.”

— Michelle Obama

158. “Don’t worry about what candidates have done or said, just vote for the Democrats. Then, afterwards, you can go eat fried chicken.”

— Michelle Obama

159. “I like to talk about my obsession with french fries because I don’t want people to think that ‘Let’s Move’ is about complete, utter deprivation. It’s about moderation and real-life changes and ideas that really work for families.”

— Michelle Obama

160. “Her goal was to push us out into the world. “I’m not raising babies,” she’d tell us. “I’m raising adults.”

— Michelle Obama

161. “It’s always positive to hear how many people are willing to step up – whether it is the employment community, mental health community, or medical community.”

— Michelle Obama

162. “I try to be thoughtful about spreading the wealth: young designers. Mixing things up is important to me.”

— Michelle Obama

163. “For the first time in my adult lifetime, I am really proud of my country. And not just because Barack has done well, but because I think people are hungry for change. And I have been desperate to see our country moving in that direction.”

— Michelle Obama

164. “I tell my kids, ‘I am thinking about you every other minute of my day.’”

— Michelle Obama

165. “My mother maintained the sort of parental mind-set that I now recognize as brilliant and nearly impossible to emulate – kind of unflappable Zen neutrality... She wasn’t quick to judge and she wasn’t quick to meddle. Instead, she monitored our moods and bore benevolent witness to whatever travails or triumphs a day might bring... When we’d done something great, we received just enough praise to know she was happy with us, but never so much that it became the reason we did what we did.”

— Michelle Obama

166. “I joke that I stick with the job because it covers my insurance, but the reality is that my career has always been very important to me.”

— Michelle Obama

167. “I’ve always been a closet jock. With exercising, the more you do it, the more you get into it. And the more you see results, the more you’re pushing for the next level.”

— Michelle Obama

168. “We can aim to create a culture, where kids ask for healthy options instead of resisting them.”

— Michelle Obama

169. “I was not raised with wealth or resources or any social standing to speak of.”

— Michelle Obama

170. “My sense is that being a First Lady is a full-time job, but I’ll know more when the time comes.”

— Michelle Obama

171. “We have to make sure that our kids still feel good about themselves no matter what their weight, no matter how they feel. We need to make sure that our kids know that we love them no matter who they are, what they look like, what they’re eating.”

— Michelle Obama

172. “Everything was not lost. This was the message we needed to carry forward. It’s what I truly believed. It wasn’t ideal, but it was our reality – the world as it is. We needed now to be resolute, to keep our feet pointed in the direction of progress.”

— Michelle Obama

173. “I’ve always tried to make sure that what I do really connects with the broader agenda of what my husband is trying to do.”

— Michelle Obama

174. “Ultimately this issue is on us. We’re the ones who make the decisions about what our kids eat.”

— Michelle Obama

175. “At the end of the day, when it comes time to make that decision, as president, all you have to guide you are your values, and your vision, and the life experiences that make you who you are.”

— Michelle Obama

176. “It was painful, but time pushed us all forward.”

— Michelle Obama

177. “People want to feel hopeful.”

— Michelle Obama

178. “They were me, as I’d once been. And I was them, as they could be.”

— Michelle Obama

179. “We need to support Mary Burke for Governor!”

— Michelle Obama

180. “One light feeds another. One strong family lends strength to more. One engaged community can ignite those around it. This is the power of the light we carry.”

— Michelle Obama

181. “I believe that each of us carries a bit of inner brightness, something entirely unique and individual. A flame that’s worth protecting. When we are able to recognize our own light, we become empowered to use it. When we learn to foster what’s unique in the people around us, we become better able to build compassionate communities and make meaningful change.”

— Michelle Obama

182. “I continue, too, to keep myself connected to a force that’s larger and more potent than any one election, or leader, or news story––and that’s OPTIMISM. For me, this is a form of faith, an antidote to fear.”

— Michelle Obama

183. “Child hunger and child obesity are really just two sides of the same coin. Both rob our children of the energy, the strength and the stamina they need to succeed in school and in life. And that, in turn, robs our country of so much of their promise.”

— Michelle Obama

184. “I’ve learned that it’s harder to hate up close.”

— Michelle Obama

185. “We’re going to have to change our traditions, our history.”

— Michelle Obama

186. “You can be a good mom and still work out, get your rest, have a career – or not. My mother encouraged me to find that balance.”

— Michelle Obama

187. “My mother’s love has always been a sustaining force for our family, and one of my greatest joys is seeing her integrity, her compassion, her intelligence reflected in my daughters.”

— Michelle Obama

188. “It is my hope that our garden’s story-and the stories of gardens across America-will inspire families, schools, and communities to try their own hand at gardening and enjoy all the gifts of health, discovery, and connection a garden can bring.”

— Michelle Obama

189. “Time, as far as my father was concerned, was a gift you gave to other people.”

— Michelle Obama

190. “Grief and resilience live together. I learned this not just once as First Lady but many times over.”

— Michelle Obama

191. “If you don’t get out there and define yourself, you’ll be quickly and inaccurately defined by others. I wasn’t interested in slotting myself into a passive role, waiting for Barack’s team to give me direction.”

— Michelle Obama

192. “At fifty-four, I am still in progress, and I hope that I always will be.”

— Michelle Obama

193. “I had nothing or I had everything. It depends on which way you want to tell it.”

— Michelle Obama

194. “You don’t really know how attached you are until you move away, until you’ve experienced what it means to be dislodged, a cork floating on the ocean of another place.”

— Michelle Obama

195. “A word now about the bar exam: It’s a necessary chore, a rite of passage for any just-hatched lawyer wishing to practice, and though the content and structure of the test itself vary somewhat from state to state, the experience of taking it – a two-day, twelve-hour exam meant to prove your knowledge of everything from contract law to arcane rules about secured transactions – is pretty much universally recognized as hellish.”

— Michelle Obama

196. “It was like stepping onstage at your first piano recital and realizing that you’d never played anything but an instrument with broken keys. Your world shifts, but you’re asked to adjust and overcome, to play your music the same as everyone else.”

— Michelle Obama

197. “A lot of young people think they’re invincible, but the truth is young people are knuckleheads. Now young people can get insurance for as little as $50 a month, less than the cost of gym shoes.”

— Michelle Obama

198. “It’s remarkable how a stereotype functions as an actual trap. How many “angry black women” have been caught in the circular logic of that phrase? When you aren’t being listened to, why wouldn’t you get louder? If you’re written off as angry or emotional, doesn’t that just cause more of the same?”

— Michelle Obama

199. “I am so tired of fear. And I don’t want my girls to live in a country, in a world, based on fear.”

— Michelle Obama

200. “I’m an ordinary person who found herself on an extraordinary journey. In sharing my story, I hope to help create space for other stories and other voices, to widen the pathway for who belongs and why.”

— Michelle Obama