These survivor quotes will inspire you. Survivor, a person who survives, especially a person remaining alive after an event in which others have died.
Below you will find a collection of motivating, happy, and encouraging survivor quotes, survivor sayings, and survivor proverbs.
Inspirational Survivor Quotes
- “It is better to suffer wrong than to do it.” ~ Samuel Johnson
- “When you live in the shadow of insanity, the appearance of another mind that thinks and talks as yours does is something close to a blessed event.” ~ Robert M. Pirsig
- “You think maybe if you just work harder and faster, you can hold off the chaos, but then one day you’re changing a patio light bulb with a five-year life span and you realize how you’ll only be changing this light maybe ten more times before you’ll be dead.” ~ Chuck Palahniuk
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“I’m a survivor – a living example of what people can go through and survive.” ~ Elizabeth Taylor
- “Though I can’t change what happened, I can choose how to react. And I don’t want to spend the rest of my life being bitter and locked up.” ~ Tori Amos
- “Laughter is the evidence that we’re still here, the proof that our tragedies will not define us forever. Laughter is the language of the survivor.” ~ Josh James
- “Give me life, give me pain, give me myself again.” ~ Tori Amos
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“You can be a victim of cancer or a survivor of cancer. It’s a mindset.” ~ Dave Pelzer
- “I have seen war. I have seen war on land and sea. I have seen blood running from the wounded. I have seen men coughing out their gassed lungs. I have seen the dead in the mud. I have seen cities destroyed. I have seen 200 limping, exhausted men come out of line—the survivors of a regiment of 1,000 that went forward 48 hours before. I have seen children starving. I have seen the agony of mothers and wives. I hate war.” ~ Franklin D. Roosevelt
- “Being a survivor doesn’t mean being strong – it’s telling people when you need a meal or a ride, company, whatever. It’s paying attention to heart wisdom, feelings, not living a role, but having a unique, authentic life, having something to contribute, finding time to love and laugh. All these things are qualities of survivors.” ~ Bernie Siegel
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“A scar is a sign of strength. . .the sign of a survivor.” ~ Laurie Halse Anderson
- “I’m a survivor of life. I try to give the glory to God and appreciate what’s happening to me.” ~ Mike Epps
- “One thing you who had secure or happy childhoods should understand about those of us who did not. We who control our feelings, who avoid conflicts at all costs, or seem to seek them. Who are hypersensitive, self-critical, compulsive, workaholic, and above all survivors. We are not that way from perversity, and we cannot just relax and let it go. We’ve learned to cope in ways you never had to.” ~ Piers Anthony
- “Happiness can be found, even in the darkest of times, if one only remembers to turn on the light.” ~ J. K. Rowling
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“In modern warfare, there are no victors; there are only survivors.” ~ Lyndon B. Johnson
- “The feat of surviving is directly related to the capacity of the survivor.” ~ Claire Cameron
- “It’s about realizing, painfully, you’ve kept that voice inside yourself, locked away from even yourself. And you step back and see that your jailer has changed faces. You realize you’ve become your own jailer.” ~ Tori Amos
- “It is important for people to know that no matter what lies in their past, they can overcome the dark side and press on the a brighter world.” ~ Dave Pelzer
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“You can get used to anything – haven’t I already said that? Isn’t that what all survivors say?” ~ Yann Martel
- “The way of acquiescence leads to moral and spiritual suicide. The way of violence leads to bitterness in the survivors and brutality in the destroyers. But, the way of nonviolence leads to redemption and the creation of the beloved community.” ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.
- “Many of life’s failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.” ~ Thomas A. Edison , Survivor quotes failure
- “Time is shortening. But every day that I challenge this cancer and survive is a victory for me.” ~ Ingrid Bergman
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“Anything in life worth doing is worth overdoing. Moderation is for cowards.” ~ Seal
- “During chemo, you’re more tired than you’ve ever been. It’s like a cloud passing over the sun, and suddenly you’re out. But you also find that you’re stronger than you’ve ever been. You’re clear. Your mortality is at optimal distance, not up so close that it obscures everything else, but close enough to give you depth perception. Previously, it has taken you weeks, months, or years to discover the meaning of an experience. Now it’s instantaneous.” ~ Melissa Bank
- “Hi, I’m Bill. I’m a birth survivor.” ~ Bill Maher
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“A man’s dying is more the survivors’ affair than his own.” ~ Thomas Mann
- “Lance Armstrong, the famous cyclist and more importantly, cancer survivor, has said ‘if you ever get a second chance for something, you’ve got to go all the way.'” ~ Michael N. Castle
- “We have to stop arresting prostitutes and not arresting traffickers and pimps. It’s absurd. We’re arresting the victim or the survivor and not the oppressor.” ~ Gloria Steinem
- “Survivors are cooperators. In order to survive in anything we need others to cooperate with or partner with.” ~ Mike Vance
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“How can you be a survivor, when you can’t even remember the war?” ~ Jodi Picoult
- “Many of my favorite survivors in fiction show that it may not be the most muscled, macho or mighty people who pull through. A strong mind and body arent always enough. You might also need a resilient heart.” ~ Claire Cameron
- “For eight years I was an inmate in a state asylum for the insane. During those years I passed through such unbearable terror that I deteriorated into a wild, frightened creature intent only on survival. And I survived. I was raped by orderlies, gnawed on by rats, and poisoned by tainted food. I was chained in padded cells, strapped into strait-jackets and half-drowned in ice baths. And I survived. The asylum itself was a steel trap, and I was not released from its jaws alive and victorious. I crawled out mutilated, whimpering and terribly alone. But I did survive.” ~ Frances Farmer
- “War is not a computer-generated missile striking a digital map. War is the color of earth as it explodes in our faces, the sound of child pleading, the smell of smoke and fear. Women survivors of war are not the single image portrayed on the television screen, but the glue that holds families and countries together. Perhaps by understanding women, and the other side of war … we will have more humility in our discussions of wars… perhaps it is time to listen to womens side of history.” ~ Zainab Salbi , Survivor quotes war
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“I am a survivor of domestic violence.” ~ Brooke Axtell
- “One … aspect of the case for World War II is that while it was still a shooting affair it taught us survivors a great deal about daily living which is valuable to us now that it is, ethically at least, a question of cold weapons and hot words.” ~ M. F. K. Fisher
- “I am a survivor and not a victim. Life isn’t perfect. When you get a knock, you have to get up, dust yourself down and get on with it.” ~ Patsy Kensit , I am a survivor quotes
- “There will always be survivors.” ~ Robert A. Heinlein
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“We are survivors from the moment of diagnosis.” ~ Peter Jennings
- “I once heard the survivors of a colony of ants that had been partially obliterated by a cow’s foot seriously debating the intention of the gods towards their civilization.” ~ Don Marquis
- “I feel like I have a Ph.D. in life, I’m a survivor. I’ve not only survived, I’ve thrived.” ~ Gennifer Flowers
- “So often survivors have had their experiences denied, trivialized, or distorted. Writing is an important avenue for healing because it gives you the opportunity to define your own reality. You can say: This did happen to me. It was that bad. It was the fault & responsibility of the adult. I was—and am—innocent.” The Courage to Heal by Ellen Bass & Laura Davis” ~ Ellen Bass
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“Only fools pity survivors their scars and you should never kowtow to fools” ~ Jeaniene Frost
- “But perhaps, after so much talk and fighting, unspoken words do create a silence in whose gentleness the survivors of good and bad can sleep easy.” ~ Miljenko Jergovic
- “You know the bad thing about being a survivor… You keep having to get into difficult situations in order to show off your gift.” ~ Carrie Fisher
- “So many bright futures consigned to the ashes of the past.So many dreams lost in the madness that had engulfed us.Except for a few widely scattered shouts of joy,the survivors of the abyss sat hollow-eyed and silent, trying to comprehend a world without war.” ~ Paul Fussell
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“The dead have a way of becoming saints in the eyes of their survivors.” ~ Rachel Vincent
- “There are remains of great and good men, which, like this mantle, ought to be gathered up and preserved by the survivors, their sayings, their writings, their examples, that, as their works follow them in the reward of them, they may stay behind in the benefit of them.” ~ Matthew Henry
- “In each age there is a series of pressing questions which must be asked and answered. On the correctness of the questions depends the survival of those who ask; on the quality of the answers depends the quality of the life those survivors will lead.” ~ Margaret Mead
- “Whenever I talk to survivors [of a domestic abuse relationship] who have lived through that and are on the other side and their whole perspective on life is a complete 180, I’m just so inspired.” ~ Kerry Washington
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“All the survivors of the war had reached their homes and so put the perils of battle and the sea behind them.” ~ Homer
- “What we share may be a lot like a traffic accident but we get one another. We are survivors of each other. We have been shark to one another, but also lifeboat. That counts for something.” ~ Margaret Atwood
- “As the son of Holocaust survivors, this is life – you’re put in a corner, and you have to get out. I believe that you can always get out.” ~ Etgar Keret
- “With the children of Holocaust survivors, there is always a very close relationship. You grow with the sense that you are parenting your parents and – with this kind of responsibility to protect them. That’s what makes the children of Holocaust survivors strange.” ~ Amira Hass
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“I was the last, the sole survivor. The most honorable thing a survivor could do was survive. If you stayed on your feet, stayed alive, you were the winner.” ~ Jean-Claude Izzo
- “The journey through another world, beyond bad dreams beyond the memories of a murdered generation, cartographed in captivity by bare survivors makes sacristans of us all.” ~ Elizabeth Cook-Lynn
- “My niece was a sexual-assault victim. My sister is a survivor of domestic violence. We have more shelters for animals than for battered women. That’s not the message we should be sending.” ~ Hilda Solis , Survivor quotes domestic violence
- “Many survivors insist they’re not courageous: ‘If I were courageous I would have stopped the abuse.’ ‘If I were courageous, I wouldn’t be scared’…Most of us have it mixed up. You don’t start with courage and then face fear. You become courageous because you face your fear.” ~ Laura Davies
- “An important documentary that sheds light on one of the most terrifying realities in the U.S. today—the commercial sexual exploitation of young girls. TRICKED is a comprehensive portrait of all the players in this human rights abuse: survivors, traffickers, johns and cops. Everyone should see this film.” ~ Rachel Lloyd
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“Sometimes I feel like I’m a contestant in a reality show that probably would be called The Apprentice Survivor Millionaire.” ~ Bob Iger
- “Sixty years after the end of the war, the time has come to make this information available. With the number of survivors and witnesses diminishing by the day, and the reality that the Holocaust is fading into the pages of history and memory, we should not have to wait any longer.” ~ Abraham Foxman
- “Even though . . . 9/11 happened because . . . Bush’s FBI and CIA did not detect the Al Qaeda conspiracy . . . , Bush not only failed to apologize to the nation or the victims’ survivors, he demonstrated his total lack of leadership by refusing to fire or even criticize those in these agencies who, like Bush, let this nation down. As in private life, to stimulate excellence, good performances have to be rewarded and gross negligence and incompetence punished.” ~ Vincent Bugliosi
- “I throw raps that attack like the Japs on Pearl Harbor.
MC’s be out like bank robbers,
Fleeing the scene, to be a sole survivor;
DJ…the getaway driver.” ~ GZA -
“There’s a storm inside of us. I’ve heard many team guys speak of this. A burning. A river. A drive.” ~ Marcus Luttrell
- “Dictators are allergic to reform, and they are cunning survivors. They will do whatever it takes to preserve their power and wealth, no matter how much blood ends up on their hands. They are master deceivers and talented manipulators who cannot be trusted to change.” ~ George Ayittey
- “I believe that at the beginning of the life of every artist there is some kind of trauma. We have a problem and all of our life we try to speak about this problem. My trauma was historical. When I was three or four, all the friends of my parents were survivors of the Holocaust; they spoke a lot about that. My father was hiding during the war, it was something totally present when I was a boy. It is sure that it has made me.” ~ Christian Boltanski
