190 Stevie Wonder Quotes on Life, Work, and Career

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1. “We all have ability. The difference is how we use it.”

2. “Fear can’t put dreams to sleep.”

3. “Music, at its essence, is what gives us memories. And the longer a song has existed in our lives, the more memories we have of it.”

4. “When you’re moving in the positive, your destination is the brightest star.”

5. “Music is a world within itself, with a language we all understand.”

6. “God gave me life to continue to do things that I would never have done.”

7. “I am what I am. I love me! And I don’t mean that egotistically. I love that God has allowed me to take whatever it was that I had and to make something out of it.”

8. “We all have hearts. If you have a heart, love somebody. If you have enough heart, love everybody.” 

9. “Of all the needs that we need right now, more than anything, we need a time for love.”

10. “Ability may get you to the top, but it takes character to keep you there.”

11. “What I’m not confused about is the world needing much more love—no hate, no prejudice, no bigotry, and more unity, peace, and understanding. Period.”

12. “Just because a man lacks the use of his eyes doesn’t mean he lacks vision.”

13. “Hate knows that love is the cure.”

14. “You can’t base your life on other people’s expectations.”

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15. “Time is long, but life is short.”

16. “Heaven help the roses if the bombs begin to fall.”

17. “Life has meaning only in the struggle. Triumph or defeat is in the hands of the Gods. So let us celebrate the struggle!”

18. “Shattered dreams, worthless years, here I am encased in a hollow shell. Life began, then was done, now I stare into a cold and empty well.” 

19. “The Lord that I serve says the impossible is unacceptable.”

20. “Mama was my greatest teacher—a teacher of compassion, love, and fearlessness. If love is sweet as a flower, then my mother is that sweet flower of love.”

21. “It feels better to love than to hate.”

22. “If you don’t ask, you don’t get.”

23. “I feel thankful to God, first and foremost, allowing me to enjoy this ‘smell the roses’ kind of thing.”

24. “Did you know that asks for nothing? Her acceptance is the way we pay.”

25. “I’ve had threats.”

26. “I just called to say, ‘I love you.’”

27. “There may be a brighter star. But through my eyes, the light of you is all I see.”

28. “All I ever wanted to do was music, and all I’ve ever asked, as I’ve gotten to know and discover the world more, is that God would use me in any way to encourage and inspire love and inspire people to bring and give love to each other.”

29. “There are a lot of things happening that show us that this, right now, is a time to love.”

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30. “It bothered me that my mother was crying all the time. She thought God might be punishing her for something. So I just told her I was happy to be blind and I think she felt better after that.”

31. “Hold onto your dreams ’cause they’re always worth having. Hold on to your dreams till the day your life is said and done.”

32. “I’ve always asked to be able to speak and write about injustice and to do it in a way that would encourage people to make things better for everyone.”

33. “Troubled heart, you’ll know problems have solutions. Trust and I will show.”

34. “Even though we sometimes would not get a thing, we were happy with the joy the day would bring.”

35. “We can’t live in a place of fear.”

36. “This is like one thing that I’ve tried to do, and I think successfully, that when you realize that nothing really belongs to you, you begin to appreciate having an understanding of just where your head is at, and you feel so much better.”

37. “There are people who have let the problems of today lead them to conclude that for them life is not the way.”

38. “Soul is being able to make a person so involved in a particular thing that they can cry about it or smile about it. It can be any kind of song, as long as you’re for real about it.”

39. “The truth is that we have to, as American citizens, stop thinking that this life that we’re living, the things that we’re dealing with, is some reality TV show. This is real life, real children, real situations.”

40. “When you believe in things that you don’t understand, then you suffer.”

41. “We’re stuck in fear and in not wanting to cross that most important bridge of understanding that we’re more alike or not. We all cry, we all laugh.”

42. “Ya gots to work with what you gots to work with.”

43. “Minds ripen at very different ages.”

44. “It’s up to you to perfect that gift that you’ve been given. Put your spirit into that song. Focus on the words that you are singing. Get into the experience that you are singing about and sing your heart out.”

45. “Many of us feel we walk alone without a friend, never communicating with the one who lives within.”

46. “I get a certain feeling in my head when a person says red, or blue, green, black, white, yellow, orange, purple. Purple is a crazy color to me.”

47. “I’m glad I’m blind and can’t see it.”

48. “Sometimes I wish I could drive a car, but I’m gonna drive a car one day, so I don’t worry about that.” 

49. “It could have been worse. I could have been born black.”

50. “One of many joyful moments with BB King was him letting me play ‘Lucille.’ The thrill will never be gone.”

51. “You took me riding in your rocket and gave me a star. But half a mile from heaven, you dropped me back down to this cold, cold world.”

52. “Why has there never been a holiday where peace is celebrated all throughout the world?”

53. “A frowning face can’t bring out the beauty that you are.”

54. “We know the things that are not good and are right. Those things that we know are wrong, we’ve got to fix them.”

55. “There’s a place in the Sun where there’s hope for everyone.”

56. “I want to take all the pain that I feel and celebrate and turn it around.”

57. “Many years ago, but not so long ago, there were those who said, ‘Well, you have three strikes against you—you’re black, you’re blind, and you’re poor,’ But God said to me, ‘I will make you rich in the spirit of inspiration, to inspire others as well as create music to encourage the world to a place of oneness and hope, and positivity.’ I believed Him and not them.”

58. “Law and order comes from having respect for one another.”

59. “Eyes lie if you ever look into them for the character of the person.”

60. “Here is my music. That is all I have to tell you how I feel. Know that your love keeps my love strong.”

61. “People love to hear music on their personal devices, but the issue really becomes, if you’re able to download music, you should know this download and the quality of it is going to be of the highest, and that it has a value to it and on it.”

62. “The most important thing is, when I do give the music, I’m satisfied with it, that it speaks for what I want to do.” 

63. “Music can measure how broad our horizons are. My mind wants to see to infinity.”

64. “Kenny Burrell is a great musician and his music has helped to make me what I am today.”

65. “There’re songs to make you smile, there’re songs to make you sad. But with a happy song to sing, it never seems as bad.”

66. “Rap, to me, is modern blues. But until we really confront the truth, we are going to have a Tupac or or Biggie Smalls to remind us about it—and thank God.”

67. “I can’t say that I’m always writing in my head, but I do spend a lot of time in my head writing or coming up with ideas. And what I do usually is write the music and melody and then, you know, maybe the basic idea. But when I feel that I don’t have a song or just say, God, please give me another song. And I just am quiet and it happens.”

68. “I might sing a gospel song in Arabic or do something in Hebrew. I want to mix it up and do it differently than one might imagine.”

69. “You know, I always when people ask me, like, what is my most favorite song, I quote Duke Ellington, when they would ask him, what’s his favorite composition? And I say, I haven’t written it yet. Because, you know, there are different songs for different occasions.”

70. “You are the sunshine of my life. That’s why I’ll always be around. You are the apple of my eye, forever you’ll stay in my heart.”

71. “Isn’t she lovely made from love?”

72. “We’re going to miss his love because it was real, it’s pure. We got you, Lou. We got you forever and always.”

73. “We all know that love is truly the key.”

74. “I’m a work in progress, but if I know in my heart that I’m doing my best, that my heart’s in the right place, that I have unconditional love, I feel okay.”

75. “Love’s in need of love today don’t delay—send yours in right away.”

76. “Use your heart to love somebody. And If your heart is big enough, use your heart to love everybody.”

77. “When the truths of love are planted firm, they won’t be hard to find. And words of love I speak to you will echo in your mind.”

78. “The way the world is right now, we need more love.” 

79. “Change your words into truths and then change that truth into love.”

80. “People can misconstrue closeness for love.”

81. “No one has been a greater advocate for the power of love in this world than I—both in my life and in my music.”

82. “Clearly, love is love, between a man and a woman, a woman and a man, a woman and a woman and a man and a man.”

83. “Among all the wonderful things we have, we don’t seem to have a time to love.”

84. “As long as I know I have love, I can make it.”

85. “Anyone who tries to make anyone think that things of destruction have anything to do with God or Allah, they’re a liar.”

86. “Different artists are talking about the laws that exist and how they need to be fixed so that compensation does happen to a far fairer level. And I agree with that.”

87. “Don’t need cars cause we’ve learned to fly on Saturn.”

88. “I used to say that if something happened to my mother, I wanted to die with her. That’s because I loved her so much. I want to live so I can carry out the essence of what she has shown me—kindness and goodness.”

89. “The power has to be in your desire to see everyone thrive.”

90. “Some people have a desire to be with the same sex. But that’s them.”

91. “I’m believing that miracles and blessings still exist.”

92. “When I grow up, I wanna be like Omar.”

93. “My thing was always trying to do as much as I possibly could do. I wanted to do all the things the other kids did in the neighborhood.”

94. “The right to bear arms? What about the right to live?”

95. “I see the light in your smile.”

96. “There are very few people on this Earth who are totally free. I’m not free, but I’m working on it.”

97. “Evil—why do you infest the purest thoughts with hatred?”

98. “If we begin to stop spewing the negative and really move into using our voices, and our pens, and our abilities that we have to reach millions of people to the positive, we can make a difference in the world.”

99. “Through the ages all great men have taught truth and happiness can’t be bought.”

100. “Handicaps are really to be used another way to benefit yourself and others.”

101. “Sometimes, I’m very disappointed at some of the people in our family of communicators, whether it be a songwriter or a rapper that’s always talking about negativity or a singer or a columnist or a network that basically gets off on just trying to create the negative.”

102. “I think, honestly, some people who think they’re gay, they’re confused.”

103. “I’ve had some incredibly triumphal things happen in my life.”

104. “We have to have pride in not just one person but all people.”

105. “We’re not living in a one-dimensional society. You can’t just talk about, you know, the horrible things in life and the destruction.”

106. “When you feel your life’s too hard, just go have a talk with God. Well, he’s the only free psychiatrist that’s known throughout the world.”

107. “We have to be respectful to one another.”

108. “We must reassure the future of our youth, so they will never again have to experience the ugliness of racism, bigotry, or prejudice of any kind.”

109. “Let us come together before we’re annihilated.”

110. “I’m too high, but I ain’t left the ground.”

111. “Now some folks say that we should be glad for what we have.”

112. “Just because a record has a groove don’t make it in the groove.”

113. “The reality is when people don’t have someone to give them a sense of guidance, and say, ‘Hey, man, that’s not happening,’ it’s really hard.”

114. “For as long as there’s life, for as long as we have things happening in the world, for as long as people haven’t been able to work it, for as long as people are not trying to work it out, for as long as there’s crime, destruction, hate, bigotry, for as long as there is a spirit that does not have love in it, I will always have something to say.”

115. “I know that there’ll be a continuation of making the world more accessible for people with disabilities.”

116. “I like all the various technologies that are becoming available to make the world more accessible to people who are blind and with low vision.”

117. “Blind don’t mean you can’t, you know, listen.”

118. “You can’t hear me? Read my lips!”

119. “Sometimes, I feel I am really blessed to be blind because I probably would not last a minute if I were able to see things.”

120. “When I was a child, kids used to make fun of me because I was blind. But I just became more curious, ‘How can I climb this tree and get an apple for this girl?’ That’s what mattered to me.”

121. “Do you know, it’s funny, but I never thought of being blind as a disadvantage, and I never thought of being black as a disadvantage.”

122. “As much as I’ve been blessed to do, this is for me when I want to do what I really want to do as far as helping people. Obviously helping people with disabilities, I want my desire is to in my lifetime be a very integral part of getting this country and the world completely accessible to everyone with any disability. There should be nowhere that we can’t go, and there should be nothing that we can’t do. Considering that we have the disability, whichever one it might be, we will be so on point with being able to do that we need little to no assistance.”

123. “I guess people expect or figure me to be a lot of different things.”

124. “Disrespecting one’s ethnicity or their religious preference, on and on and on, if they have a disability, is not anything that has to do with when we talk about democracy. Equality.”

125. “I’m still experimenting.”

126. “I am all for stem cell research.”

127. “I might do something in Arabic. I might do something in Hebrew.”

128. “You know, I have seven children, so I guess I know some things about life.”

129. “I know there are thousands of images of me.”

130. “I love gettin’ into just as much weird shit as possible.”

131. “I do believe in women. I really do.”

132. “I love Aretha Franklin and I’ve loved her all my life. I think she’s an incredible songstress, obviously. She consistently has had this incredible voice. I remember when she was singing gospel in her father’s church.”

133. “I have enough money to satisfy myself for a lifetime.”

134. “I am not a normal man.”

135. “First of all, I’m no better than the next person.”

136. “I am all for anything that is going to better equip a person who is physically challenged in any way, to have an opportunity to be able to do what they are able to do.”

137. “For the most part, I feel really comfortable with what I’ve given to the people. I want to give it to them again.”

138. “I listen a lot to rap, and I’m inspired to take it, to use it in another way, to get the message across.”

139. “I think that to a great degree, reggae companies have become very corporate and so maybe some don’t have that freedom to say whatever they want to say.”

140. “For did my dreams come true when I looked at you. And maybe too, if you would believe, you too might be overjoyed, over loved, over me.”

141. “Those yesterdreams were just a cruel and foolish game we used to play, yester-me, yester-you, yesterday.”

142. “Every day I searched for the star that never was in the sky. Now I see that star is on the earth.”

143. “I never imagined I’d meet Berry Gordy who told me when he first heard me sing, ‘You know, your singing’s okay, but I like your harmonica playing better.’”

144. “Until the rainbow burns the stars out in the sky. Until the ocean covers every mountain high. Until the dolphin flies and parrots live at sea. Until we dream of life and life becomes a dream. Always.”

145. “The exciting thing about a songwriter is that, you know, particularly if you’re a songwriter and an artist and you play the parts and you’re producing it and all that, you have various times you have to critique what you do.”

146. “When I wrote the words and I have the music, I felt, wow, you know, this has got to be right. I got to sing it right.”

147. “I really do seek to create music that is timeless. Each project takes on its own life, and the songs from ‘A Time To Love’ are the most appropriate for the statement I wanted to make.”

148. “It’s my new single. Please buy it so we can get Christmas gifts for the kids this year.”

149. “In my career, I learned that giving your services for free gives you a good return on your investment, not just financially but morally. It supplements your personal integrity.”

150. “My mother had a rule, obviously, that I couldn’t go across the street by myself, but I had to find a way of doing it.”

151. “My father really was not the dominant person who raised the family, it was my mother who raised the family.”

152. “My mother told me, if you call yourself ‘Little’ Stevie Wonder, you’d better be as good as Little Willie John.’”

153. “Mama gives you money for Sunday school, you trade yours for candy after church is through.”

154. “Families buying dog food now, starvation roams the streets. Babies die before they are born, infected by the grief.”

155. “Brother says he’s telling about you playing Doctor with that girl.”

156. “Sneaking out the back door to hand out with those hoodlum friends of mine.”

157. “My mother gave me an understanding that as good as you think you are, you’re not so great. There’s always room for improvement.”

158. “Everyone that was over 13 was my parent. Diana Ross was my momma. The Marvelettes were all my parents. The Contours, ‘You can’t have a candy bar now, you gotta study now, do this now.’”

159. “I always wanted my mother to for a day. I always used to watch that show that came on television.”

160. “Trying your best to bring the water to your eyes, thinking it might stop her from woopin’ your behind.”

161. “I wish the women of the world would say, ʻListen, until you get out of your spirit of war and destruction, you can’t get no love.’”

162. “You know, people are gonna have to wake up!”

163. “We have a marriage of people of various cultures coming together. It’s not a joke. It’s real.?”

164. “Dr. Jr’s teaching and works have led me and the world to give peace a chance.”

165. “Sometimes, we listen to too many commentators about things that don’t affect their lives because they’re in a different tax bracket. Or to the so-called clergymen giving their interpretation of God’s word, and yet they’re not rolling the same way in their own lives.”

166. “My mind must be polygamous and my spirit married to many and my love belongs to all.”

167. “I’m concerned about how accessible guns are.”

168. “Are you happy when you stick a needle in your vein?”

169. “A lack of communication between citizens and policemen is real stuff.”

170. “As a matter of fact, wherever I find that law exists, I will not perform in that state or in that part of the world.”

171. “Voting for Trump is like asking me to drive a car.”

172. “Unfortunately, we have warring in the world, so the youngest minds, the brilliant minds, are sent off to war. I think that, you know, you have brilliant people with great possibilities and that’s why I really am not really for war. I really am not.”

173. “We have to truly become a united people of the United States of America, and divisiveness cannot make that happen.”

174. “I was so bad. Out of control. So glad I turned out to be a nice guy.”

175. “Contrary to what people are saying, you can’t go by what people say, but by their spirit.”

176. “Exploitation, mutilation, mutations, confirmation to the evils of the world.”

177. “Disrespect is real stuff.”

178. “My love lives outside my window. Clouds burst to give water. So her love can grow. My love smiles to me each morning. Says she’ll never leave me and I know it’s so.”

179. “God’s induction, life’s construction—these instructions will save every living thing. Can’t you see that life’s connected?”

180. “Smoking cigarettes and writing something nasty on the wall, teacher sends you to the Principal’s office down the hall.”

181. “If you think of every single continent there is, on every continent, there is something, a natural resource that every continent has, or sources, that they can really survive with that, or they can trade with that. But a lot of the developed nations have taken those things from those places and have claimed it and, therefore, they’re dependent on those other nations.”

182. “Baby, everything is alright, uptight, out of sight.”

183. “And to me, that’s the fuel—that’s the fuel we need to make the engine go.”

184. “There’s only one true king of rock ‘n’ roll. His name is Chuck Berry.”

185. “I remember the beginnings of the Kurzweil reading machine. I was one of the first to meet Ray Kurzweil and purchase the reading machine in Boston. To think that the machine was at least two and a half large suitcases at the time, and now you have a camera and it takes a picture and you have sound.”

186. “All my children are my babies. They’re our babies.”

187. “Call up, ring once, hang up the phone to let me know you made it home. Don’t want anything to be wrong with my part time lover.”

188. “With a voice like Ella ringing out, there’s no way a band can lose.”

189. “At 13 years old, you know you’re a big star.”

190. “I’ve flown a plane before. A Cessna or something, from Chicago to New York. Scared the hell out of everybody.”