Badass Women Give the Best Advice. Becca Anderson

but to the grave,” and “The futility of the search to be someone. Do you hear the drum?”

       On Veep Henry Wallace, “His global thinking is, no matter how you slice it, globaloney!”

       On Franklin Delano Roosevelt, “Now, I do not for a moment believe that Mr. Roosevelt is a real dictator. Rather, he is a sort of super-duper, highly cultured political boss.”

       On Harry Truman, “A gone goose.”

       On Eleanor Roosevelt, “No woman in American history has ever so comforted the distressed or so distressed the comfortable.”

       On Mississippi senator Theodore Bilbo, “the high muckamuck in America of that muckiest and most vulgar of all modern pagan cults: racism!”

       On the environment, “I am bewildered by the paradox presented by a nation that can land on the moon, orbit satellites 190 million miles from earth, but can’t find a way to rid its own landscape of broken-down automobiles.”

      Love doesn’t just sit there, like a stone; it has to be made, like bread, remade all the time, made new.

      —Ursula K. LeGuin, prize-winning speculative fiction author and poet

      I have never met a person whose greatest need was anything other than real, unconditional love…. There is no mistaking love. You feel it in your heart. It is the common fiber of life, the flame that heats our soul, energizes our spirit, and supplies passion to our lives.

      —Elizabeth Kubler-Ross, pioneering Swiss-American psychiatrist and writer

      As you continue to send out love, the energy returns to you in a regenerating spiral…. As love accumulates, it keeps your system in balance and harmony. Love is the tool, and more love is the end product.

      —Sara Paddison, writer on human potential

      Where there is great love, there are always miracles.

      —Willa Cather, award-winning author known for novels about frontier life

      Loves conquers all things except poverty and toothache.

      —Mae West, memorable actress, comedian, screenwriter, and sex symbol

      Love is like pi—natural, irrational, and VERY important.

      —Lisa Hoffman, entrepreneur and nerdy wit

      Esteem Yourself!

      You yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe, deserve your love and affection.

      —Sharon Salzberg, best-selling author and Buddhist teacher

      Wanting to be someone else is a waste of the person you are.

      —Marilyn Monroe, iconic actress and singer

      The man who does not value himself cannot value anything or anyone.

      —Ayn Rand, in The Virtue of Selfishness: A New Concept of Egoism

      For once, you believed in yourself. You believed you were beautiful and so did the rest of the world.

      —Sarah Dessen, author of Saint Anything

      One of the greatest regrets in life is being what others would want you to be, rather than being yourself.

      —Shannon L. Alder, Mormon self-help author

      Don’t waste your energy trying to change opinions…. Do your thing, and don’t care if they like it.

      —Tina Fey, actress, SNL comedian, writer, and producer

      You’re always with yourself, so you might as well enjoy the company.

      —Diane Von Furstenberg, Belgian-American fashion designer

      To lose confidence in one’s body is to lose confidence in oneself.

      —Simone de Beauvoir, intellectual, writer, philosopher, and social theorist

      I never loved another person the way I loved myself.

      —Mae West, memorable actress, comedian, screenwriter, and sex symbol

      I am my own experiment. I am my own work of art.

      —Madonna, iconic performer

      I don’t entirely approve of some of the things I have done, or am, or have been. But I’m me. God knows, I’m me.

      —Elizabeth Taylor, British-American actress and humanitarian

      Self-esteem isn’t everything; it’s just that there’s nothing without it.

      —Gloria Steinem, journalist, activist, and feminist founder of Ms. Magazine