Top 92 Quotes & Sayings by Diane Keaton

My mother always said that everyone should be required to write an autobiography of their lives.

As an actress, I'm drawn to emotion and expressing the human condition in all its forms, and I'm fortunate to have thoughts and feelings at my fingertips.

My old boyfriend, Warren Beatty, used to say I was a late developer,' she reflects. 'He was right. It took me 50 years to find motherhood and unconditional love.'

I build a wall around myself. I'm hard to get to know. Any trait you have, it gets worse as you go along.

The best relationships develop out of friendships.

I am absolutely intrigued by life, and I really want to hold onto it.

I don't think that because I'm not married it's made my life any less. That old maid myth is garbage.

I wish I had put myself out there a little bit more and experienced people more instead of protecting myself.

The best part is that I'm still here and, because the end is in sight, I treasure it all more.

Without a great man writing and directing for me, I realised I was a mediocre movie star at best.

I'm a lot of fun on a date.

Relationships are hard. You're lucky if you find someone.

I've done all kinds of things I said I wouldn't do and, of course, now I'm glad. Thrilled.

I used to listen to Judy Garland all the time - I love Judy Garland and her music. But I started to realize that if you keep singing like that, singing songs of being victimized by love over and over and over again, it can't help but have a profound effect on your life.

My mother wasn't a stickler for the more practical approaches to life.

I'm not a wine connoisseur, but I do like a glass or two at night.

I drink red wine on ice to water it down.

I said I would never go to a psychiatrist, and I spent much of my life in psychoanalysis.

I'm a hoarder. For me, documentation has always been key, and I've kept everything from my past.

I never understood the idea that you're supposed to mellow as you get older. Slowing down isn't something I relate to at all. The goal is to continue in good and bad, all of it.

I spent a lot of time protecting myself. I mean, I've met a lot of extraordinary people over the years - and I just wish I had been able to open myself up to them more.

A sense of freedom is something that, happily, comes with age and life experience.

It's not fun to see myself in the mirror.

What celebrities are useful for is bringing attention to the public and making them more aware. They can be unbelievably effective.

My thinking about plastic surgery is this. I haven't had it, but never say never. Because when you do, you are definitely going to go there.

My mother was really my partner in every project that I had. She was just the great enabler of my dreams.

It's kind of true, you do disappear off the planet if you are a middle-aged woman, but that has some advantages as well.

Because too much of my life was spent waiting to be seen. Hoping to be seen, hoping to be picked. Once you realize that you aren't looked at that way any more, other things start to happen and you have to depend on other things to get by.

Motherhood has completely changed me. It's just about like the most completely humbling experience that I've ever had. I think that it puts you in your place because it really forces you to address the issues that you claim to believe in and if you can't stand up to those principles when you're raising a child, forget it.

I had a career and I came to motherhood late and am not married and have never had such a trusting relationship with a man - and trust is where the real power of love comes from.

I don't carry little purses. I carry big duffels, always.

My mother was a listener. I'm a talker. I'm very comfortable talking.

I think that people who are famous tend to be underdeveloped in their humanity skills.

As a parent I provide all I can, but I think in the best possible scenario you need to have a man.

Even though all these obstacles keep coming at you, you just have to keep going through them. Because it's worth it to do something in your life, as opposed to fantasizing about doing something.

Somehow weddings bring out the most insane moments in people's lives.

With Robert De Niro, you're thinking, suddenly he'll do something you don't expect, or he appears and he's kind of slow to get there but then he gets there in a way that nobody does. Everybody is just really, extremely different.

Life is short and experiences with remarkable people are rare.

I don't think so much anymore. When you're younger, and at your height, then people want you to do that great one again. But seriously, things are forgotten, and that's the truth.

Choosing the freedom to be uninteresting never quite worked for me.

I've always loved independent women, outspoken women, eccentric women, funny women, flawed women. When someone says about a woman, 'I'm sorry, that's just wrong,' I tend to think she must be doing something right.

We can't save the past or solve the riddle of love. But to me, it's worth trying.

I don’t think that because I’m not married it’s made my life any less. That old-maid myth is garbage.

Just have fun. Smile. And keep putting on lipstick.

What is perfection, anyway? It's the death of creativity.

I have a policy about fear: It cripples the soul, so you just have to fight it.

I don't want to watch [films I was acting in]. I've had enough of me.

This living stuff is a lot. Too much, and not enough. Half empty, and half full.

We can grow gracefully, or gorgeously. I pick both.

Permanence can only be found in the immortality offered by the click of a camera. Like it or not, life moves on as fleetingly as the photograph is enduring.

Pretty is a self-serving situation in which it's all about you. People who are pretty are superficial, but they are not beautiful. Beauty requires more depth.

It's very odd, being older, because in a way it's hard to own the past, even.

There are a lot of movies I feel good about. It was a great experience that I was lucky enough to be there in it. That's the way I feel.

Memories are simply moments that refuse to be ordinary.

When I was young, I wanted my appearance to be more interesting than what surrounded me. Now the body part I like best is my eyes, because they bring beauty to me.

Humor helps us get through life with a modicum of grace. It offers one of the few benign ways of coping with the absurdity of it all.

...I also have an extended family. The people who stayed. The people who became more than friends; the people who open the door when I knock. That's what it all boils down to. The people who have to open the door, not because they always want to but because they do.

Here is my biggest takeaway after 60 years on the planet: There is great value in being fearless. For too much of my life, I was too afraid, too frightened by it all. That fear is one of my biggest regrets.

I've never really looked back.

What makes a heroine? I think I can answer that. A heroine is a woman who risks going too far in order to find out how far one can go for a cause greater than herself.