40+ Motivational Quotes for Creatives

Sometimes we all need a little motivation. The road to creating something great can be tough. There are many twists and turns, failures, trials and tribulations. We all grow a little weary.

The goal of this article is to reinvigorate your creativity with empowering quotes from creators, inventors, and entrepreneurs of all backgrounds.

These quotes vary in nature. Some apply to work ethic, some for inspiration and determination, and others are just great phrases to live by. Get inspired with these quotes for creators below and then get creating!

Be Inspired to Create

“…If one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life which he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours…If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where they should be. Now put the foundations under them.” – Henry David Thoreau

“To know your life purpose is to connect with a higher power.” – Shannon L. Alder

“Inspiration exists, but it has to find you working.” – Pablo Picasso

“Success is not the key to happiness. Happiness is the key to success. If you love what you are doing, you will be successful.” – Albert Schweitzer

“It’s never too late to be who you might have been.” – George Eliot

“If you cannot do great things, do small things in a great way.” – Napoleon Hill

“With the advent of spring and beginning of the new harvest season the creators of abundance, our peasants, come out to the fields to sow with good aspirations and hopes.” – Islom Karimov

“To dare is to lose one’s footing momentarily. To not dare is to lose oneself.” – Soren Kierkegaard

“Success is going from failure to failure without losing enthusiasm.” – Winston Churchill

“The other side of every fear is a freedom.” – Marilyn Ferguson

“Opportunity is missed by most because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work.” – Thomas Edison

“Problems cannot be solved at the same level of awareness that created them.” – Albert Einstein

“A creative man is motivated by the desire to achieve, not by the desire to beat others.” – Ayn Rand

“What we see depends mainly on what we look for.” – John Lubbock

“Whether you think that you can, or that you can’t, you are usually right.” – Henry Ford

“I always prefer to believe the best of everybody; it saves so much trouble.”  – Rudyard Kipling

“You don’t need money to be creative. The ghetto builds champions every day.” – DJ Snake

“The most dangerous idea is silencing people.” – Naval Ravikant

“A busy calendar and a busy mind will destroy your ability to do great things in this world. If you want to be able to do great things, whether you’re a musician, or whether you’re an entrepreneur, or whether you’re an investor, you need free time and you need a free mind.” – Naval Ravikant

“The cure for boredom is curiosity. There is no cure for curiosity.” – Dorothy Parker

“Go into yourself. Find out the reason that commands you to write; see whether it has spread its roots into the very depths of your heart; confess to yourself whether you would have to die if you were forbidden to write.” – Rainer Maria Rilke

“So go on, get angry. But keep your mouth shut and go do your work.” – Austin Kleon

“Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known.” – Carl Sagan

“The world always seems brighter when you’ve just made something that wasn’t there before.” – Neil Gaiman

“We don’t make mistakes, just happy little accidents.” – Bob Ross

“Many prefer not to exercise their imaginations at all. They choose to remain comfortably within the bounds of their own experience, never troubling to wonder how it would feel to have been born other than they are.” – J.K. Rowling

“A new idea is delicate. It can be killed by a sneer or a yawn; it can be stabbed to death by a quip and worried to death by a frown on the right man’s brow.” – Charles Brower

“Remember the two benefits of failure. First, if you do fail, you learn what doesn’t work; and second, the failure gives you the opportunity to try a new approach.” – Roger Von Oech

“I’m convinced that about half of what separates successful entrepreneurs from the non-successful ones is pure perseverance.” – Steve Jobs

“Anxiety is the handmaiden of creativity.” – T. S. Eliot

“You can’t use up creativity the more you use the more you have.” – Maya Angelou

“There is only one of you in all time. This expression is unique and if you block it, it will never exist through any other medium and it will be lost.” – Martha Graham

“Creative people are curious, flexible, persistent, and independent, with a tremendous spirit of adventure and a love of play.” – Henri Matisse

“Curiosity about life in all of its aspects, I think, is still the secret of great creative people.” – Leo Burnett

“You can’t wait for inspiration, you have to go after it with a club.” – Jack London

“To raise new questions, new possibilities, to regard old problems from a new angle, requires creative imagination and marks real advance in science.” – Albert Einstein

“The essential part of creativity is not being afraid to fail.” – Edwin H. Land

“Creative activity could be described as a type of learning process where teacher and pupil are located in the same individual.” – Arthur Koestler

“Don’t think. Thinking is the enemy of creativity. It’s self-conscious, and anything self-conscious is lousy. You can’t try to do things. You simply must do things.” – Ray Bradbury

“Blessed are the curious, for they shall have adventures.” – L. Drachman

“In the beginner’s mind there are many possibilities, but in the expert’s mind there are few.” – Shunryu Suzuki

Quotes That Will Make You Think…

For this last section, we’re featuring just a few more quotes for creators that are less motivational and moreso thought-provoking.

“We call ourselves creators and we just copy.” – Lauryn Hill

“The most regretful people on earth are those who felt the call to creative work, who felt their own creative power restive and uprising, and gave to it neither power nor time.” – Mary Oliver

“If you’re creating anything at all, it’s really dangerous to care about what people think.” – Kristen Wiig

“Great is the human who has not lost his childlike heart.” – Mencius (Meng-Tse)

“When Alexander the Great visited Diogenes and asked whether he could do anything for the famed teacher, Diogenes replied: “Only stand out of my light.” Perhaps some day we shall know how to heighten creativity. Until then, one of the best things we can do for creative men and women is to stand out of their light.” – John W. Gardner

“Don’t worry about people stealing your ideas. If your ideas are any good, you’ll have to ram them down people’s throats.” – Howard Aiken

“Some men look at things the way they are and ask why? I dream of things that are not and ask why not?” – Robert Kennedy

Words of Wisdom

Which quote stood out the most to you? We hope you use these motivational and thought-provoking words to boost your creativity and make the world a more beautiful place. You can do it!