I think everybody has tragedy in their life. Everybody has hurdles in their life. Everybody has tough things to overcome. My kids say to me, 'This isn't fair.' I said, 'Life isn't fair.' Everybody has their issues. It's how you handle your issues that distinguishes you.

Maria Shriver

Categorized in : Thinking Kids Said Life

Perfectionism doesn't make you feel perfect. It makes you feel inadequate.

Maria Shriver

perfectionism perfect feels

Never think that someone else knows what's best for you. Trust your way and don't ask for so much advice. Learn how to be quiet and still enough to hear your own voice. It's up to you: Your voice will either be silenced or will get to roar.

Maria Shriver

voice advice thinking

Make time in your life to listen to your own voice. Do not let it get drowned out by others. Your voice is yours and yours alone. Stay in touch with it and use it.

Maria Shriver

voice use relationship

Pausing allows you to take a beat to take a breath in your life. As everybody else is rushing around like a lunatic out there, I dare you to do the opposite.

Maria Shriver

opposites graduation inspirational

Our mothers give us so many gifts. They give us the precious gift of life, of course, but they also leave treasured lessons that can guide us along our journeys even when they are no longer with us.

Maria Shriver

journey mother giving

My definition of success? Being the kind of woman that I would want to have as a friend.

Maria Shriver

definitions kind want

We all obsess about what we are doing and accomplishing. What if we let it go and simply made the way we live our lives our accomplishment?

Maria Shriver

empowering accomplishment inspirational

When the world is so complicated, the simple gift of friendship is within all of our hands.

Maria Shriver

simple hands world

Someone once told me not to be afraid of being afraid, because, as she said, 'Anxiety is a glimpse of your own daring.' Isn't that great? It means that part of your agitation is just excitement about what you're getting ready to accomplish. Don't sell yourself short by being so afraid of failure that you don't dare to make any mistakes. Make your mistakes and learn from them. And remember: No matter how many mistakes you make, your mother always loves you!

Maria Shriver

mother mistake love-you

People think, 'Oh my goodness! I have to do something really big.' You don't. Do what you love. There's a great quote from a poet I use all the time: 'Instead of asking what the world needs, ask yourself what you love,' because what the world needs is more people doing what they love.

Maria Shriver

use people thinking

you are the leader you've been looking for

Maria Shriver

leader

Don't wait until you are perfect to change the world.

Maria Shriver

waiting perfect world

It takes time to get to the top, and that's good - because by the time you get there, you'll have learned what you need to know in order to stay there.

Maria Shriver

success order needs

Art is fundamental, unique to each of us...Even in difficult economic times - especially in difficult economic times, the arts are essential.

Maria Shriver

carpe-diem unique art

The love and laughter are what you need most in your life. They'll fill out all the potholes in the road.

Maria Shriver

laughter life needs

The most important thing we can tell young people is not to be an imitation of somebody else. That their life is special. They are the creator of their life and their way and find something that they enjoy doing that doesn't even feel like work. It feels like a passion. And then just by doing that and bringing that to the world, they become architects of change.

Maria Shriver

passion special people

I myself am still learning how to be me and that's OK. It can take a really long time to become the person you really want to be. Be who you are. It's the greatest gift we can give to ourselves, our community and our world.

Maria Shriver

our-world giving long

You know those goals you've set for yourself, those dreams you've been waiting for the perfect time to live out? It's time!

Maria Shriver

goal perfect dream

I've learned that asking ourselves not just what we want to be, but who we want to be is important at every stage of our lives, not just when we're starting out in the world. That's because in a way, we're starting out fresh in the world every single day.

Maria Shriver

important asking world

I was raised by a formidable woman. She always pushed me to be competitive in a man's world. That's maybe one of the attractions to journalism in the beginning. It was a male profession, and I was comfortable in that.

Maria Shriver

males men world