Top 51 Quotes & Sayings by Rosalynn Carter
Explore popular quotes and sayings by an American first lady Rosalynn Carter.
Last updated on April 14, 2025.
It's been taboo for so long to admit you had a mental health problem.
If you don't accept failure as a possibility, you don't set high goals, you don't branch out, you don't try - you don't take the risk.
Being a caregiver requires infinite patience, physical and emotional strength, health care navigation skills, and a sense of humor - which can be hard to come by after sleepless nights and demanding days.
For Jimmy and me, Iowa holds a special place in our hearts. During his presidential campaign I spent over 100 days in Iowa. I visited 105 communities and knocked on more doors and met more Iowans than anyone thought possible.
I have cared for loved ones nearly all my life, so when I look in the mirror, I see a caregiver looking back at me. It began when I was 12 years old and my father became ill. Taking care of him took a toll on our entire family, my mother most of all.
Many politicians, celebrities, businessmen and women, and community leaders now are open about their struggles with mental illnesses, something almost unheard of when I began. Together, we are spreading the word that mental health affects all of us and deserves our support and attention.
There is nothing more important than a good, safe, secure home.
Do what you can to show you care about other people, and you will make our world a better place.
I love San Francisco. I have a lot of memories there.
When I announced my focus on mental health as first lady of Georgia in 1971, none but five mental health advocates in the state wanted to be involved with the issue.
My philosophy is that you do what you have to do.
You can make the First Lady's job whatever you want it to be. To some women the job is more involved with the entertaining. They feel at home doing the things at home.
When I was first lady, I worked to call attention to the plight of refugees fleeing Cambodia for Thailand, I visited Thailand and witnessed firsthand the trauma of parents and children separated by circumstance beyond their control.
I've never had time for friends. I've always worked too hard.
It's just unbelievable to me that the National Rifle Association has so much power.
I've watched my family grow, I've traveled around the world and I've had a chance to contribute some, I think.
When you travel and when you campaign, people tell you their problems. You see the problems and you become aware of them and you talk about them every day. And so you feel the responsibility for doing something about them.
Don't worry about polls, but if you do, don't admit it.
There's a mental health problem in the sense that people are so afraid of the stigma that they don't get help. But there's absolutely a gun control problem in the country.
Aside from doing everything possible to provide programs for people who are seriously ill, I want to do everything humanly possible to help create a more caring society so that we can begin to counter the painful loneliness and sense of helplessness which has engulfed too many of our people.
I was very nervous about giving speeches for a long time.
You can have a full life after 50.
San Francisco is one of my favorite cities in the world.
If you look at suicides, most of them are connected to depression. And the mental health system just fails them. It's so sad. We know what to do. We just don't do it.
Early diagnosis is so important because the earlier a mental illness can be detected, diagnosed and treatment can begin, the better off that person can be for the rest of his or her life.
One day, I made a remark that I might work with people with mental illness, and somebody in the press heard it, and it was in the paper. And the more I thought about it and found out about it, the more I thought it was just a terrible situation with no attention. And I've been working on it ever since.
You must accept that you might fail; then, if you do your best and still don't win, at least you can be satisfied that you've tried. If you don't accept failure as a possibility, you don't set high goals, you don't branch out, you don't try - you don't take the risk.
Caregivers are the selfless people who provide unpaid care for loved ones who are ill or have serious medical conditions. This is among the most challenging work there is.
I have learned that you can do anything you want to. They used to ask me if I thought the first lady ought to be paid. If you get paid, then I have to do what first lady is supposed to do. But you can do anything you want to, and it's such a great soap box.
A leader takes people where they want to go. A great leader takes people where they don't necessarily want to go, but ought to be.
I've always worked - I can't stay at home and do Cokes and teas, although I think that for those people who want to do that, then that's surely important to them.
I hope I've contributed something to the mental health field. But I hope people will think - I've had so many wonderful opportunities, I tried to take advantage of them.
My mother made all of our clothes, my friends' mothers made all of their clothes. This was the Depression.
We know how to treat depression, we know how to treat mental illness, and we have not had the political will in our country to make it happen.
You have to have confidence in your ability, and then be tough enough to follow through.
I've had a great life.
If we have not achieved our early dreams, we must either find new ones or see what we can salvage from the old. If we have accomplished what we set out to do in our youth, we need not weep like Alexander the Great that we have no more worlds to conquer.
We have to get the word out that mental illnesses can be diagnosed and treated, and almost everyone suffering from mental illness can live meaningful lives in their communities.
Kindness is the connection that links us all together and strengthens the bonds within our communities, neighborhoods, and families.
There is clearly much left to be done, and whatever else we are going to do, we had better get on with it.
If you doubt you can accomplish something, then you can't accomplish it. You have to have confidence in your ability, and then be tough enough to follow through.
I think the city of Washington itself is insular to a certain extent. You have to get out in the country to realize what is going on and discover that the perceptions in Washington aren't necessarily accurate.
Once you accept the fact that you're not perfect, then you develop some confidence.
Times of upheaval require not just more leadership but more leaders. People at all organizational levels, whether anointed or self-appointed, must be empowered to share leadership responsibilities.
First ladies throughout our history have been expected to be adoring wives and perfect mothers.
There are only four kinds of people in the world - those who have been caregivers, those who are caregivers, those who will be caregivers and those who will need caregivers.
Without volunteers, we'd be a nation without a soul.
People with mental problems are our neighbors. They are members of our congregations, members of our families; they are everywhere in this country. If we ignore their cries for help, we will be continuing to participate in the anguish from which those cries for help come. A problem of this magnitude will not go away. Because it will not go away, and because of our spiritual commitments, we are compelled to take action.
I had already learned from more than a decade of political life that I was going to be criticized no matter what I did, so I might as well be criticized for something I wanted to do.
My greatest disappointment in all the projects I worked on during the White House years was the failure of the Equal Rights Amendment to be ratified. ... Why all the controversy and why such difficulty in giving women the protection of the Constitution that should have been theirs long ago?
I believe that one of the most important things to learn in life is that you can make a difference in your community no matter who you are or where you live.
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