Jane Fonda Quotes

As I started getting older, I realized, ‘I’m so happy!’ I didn’t expect this! I wasn’t happy when I was young.

I love mistakes because it’s the only way you learn.

I knew that I had to write my memoirs.

I have a confidence about my life that comes from standing tall on my own two feet.

Some people are surprised that the Republicans are waging a war on women, or that they voted against equal pay for women. I’m not surprised at all. In some ways, it may be a good thing. They’re defending the patriarchy, which is a wounded beast! And wounded beasts are always dangerous.

I am able to talk about my life in a way that helps other women – and men, but mostly women – understand their own life. I feel real proud of that. And then the fact that my children are okay. You know, you’re only as happy as your least happy child. So if your kids aren’t okay, you’re not good.

The ’60s may be idealized in the movie from a cultural point of view, but the decade was all about discord and a big generational split that was very painful.

The capacity of young people to persevere, even under the most adverse conditions, never ceases to amaze me.

It’s hard for women at my age in Hollywood, but I’m not discouraged.

I’m not sure that I would have become a Christian if I had continued to live in Hollywood because the notion wouldn’t have occurred to me.

The only thing I have never known is true intimacy with a man. I absolutely wanted to discover that before dying.

Through therapy and a lot of thinking and writing my memoirs, I’ve been able to use my life as a lesson.

We are living on average today 34 years longer than our great-grandparents did.

I never was a hippie! I went to India because so many friends like Mia Farrow and the Beatles were going there to discover truth. And so I went and trekked through India by myself, but instead of discovering truth, I wanted to join the Peace Corps.

I spent a good deal of time going back over my childhood, my midlife, to try to understand who I was. We’re supposed to be complete and whole, and you can’t be whole if you’re trying to be perfect. Doing a life review helped me get over the disease to please.

A mother who is obsessing about being thin and dieting and exercising is not going to be a very good mother.

My mother killed herself when I was 12. I won’t complete that relationship. But I can try to understand her.

If the career you have chosen has some unexpected inconvenience, console yourself by reflecting that no career is without them.

All my life I had believed that unless I was perfect I would not be loved.

I would have given up acting in a minute. I didn’t like how it set me apart from other people.

I’ve been accused of being too flexible, too willing to mold myself to men, and that’s something I’m constantly working on.

I feel like my honesty gives people the freedom to talk about things they wouldn’t otherwise.

I know how gratifying it is not only to work in film but to be acknowledged by peers; producing ‘9 to 5’ was an opportunity that I valued precisely because it’s so rarely in the hands of women.

When I was at the age when you were supposed to be glamorous if you were a movie star, I wasn’t.

I always had a penchant for falling in love. Every time I found myself without a mate, I fell into a state of low-sizzling panic.

I grew up with a deep belief that wherever our troops fought, they were on the side of the angels.

Ted needs someone to be there 100% of the time. He thinks that’s love. It’s not love – it’s babysitting.

If adolescent pregnancy prevention is to become a priority, then our strategy, as advocates, must contain two key elements: civic engagement and education.

I see many more men who are feminist, or at least who have learned about life in the context of feminism.

My love life is wonderful.

To be a revolutionary you have to be a human being. You have to care about people who have no power.

When you can’t remember why you’re hurt, that’s when you’re healed.

I think feminism is about the spirit.

I lived in France during the ’60s. I was there from the early ’60s until 1970, so my view of the ’60s is more global. It was a time of tremendous transition, not only for America but for the whole world.

The reality is sobering: in the United States one in three girls will become pregnant before age 20, totaling more than 750,000 girls per year.

I think the Internet and technology in general has changed everything. We can see it overseas even more with the Arab Spring and so forth.

It’s about time we make the well-being of our young people more important than ideology and politics. As a country, we benefit from investing in their future by investing in teen pregnancy prevention.

We’re still living with the old paradigm of age as an arch. That’s the old metaphor: You’re born, you peak at midlife and decline into decrepitude.

I am blessed beyond reason with women friends.

I was in my mid-40s. I was a bulimic, and I realized if I continue with this addiction of mine, I will not be able to continue doing my life. The older you get the more damage it does; it takes longer to recover from a binge. And it was very hard.

People think actresses find public speaking easy, and it’s not easy at all; we’re used to hiding behind masks.

I’m now the elder in the position of doling out wisdom and trying to mend fences.

Parents are supposed to give the child back to herself with love. If they’ve got duct tape over their eyes because of narcissism, it doesn’t happen.

My childhood was influenced by the roles my father played in his movies. Whether Abraham Lincoln or Tom Joad in the ‘Grapes of Wrath,’ his characters communicated certain values which I try to carry with me to this day.

We’re not meant to be perfect. It took me a long time to learn that.

While not impossible, it is especially challenging for teenage parents to develop bonds with their children. A high percent of them were themselves children of teenage parents and have never experienced appropriate parenting.

A good many dramatic situations begin with screaming.

We can no longer waste time and money. Every day, more than 2,000 girls in America, age 15-19, give birth – in the wealthiest, most educated nation in the world! Neither you nor I should accept this statistic.

I’m a very brave person. I can go to North Vietnam, I can challenge my government, but I can’t challenge the man I’m with if means I’m going to end up alone.

One part of wisdom is knowing what you don’t need anymore and letting it go.

We cannot always control our thoughts, but we can control our words, and repetition impresses the subconscious, and we are then master of the situation.

A man has every season while a woman only has the right to spring.

In my marriages, I’d lost parts of who I was because I was trying to mold myself into what I thought a man wanted me to be.

It’s never too late – never too late to start over, never too late to be happy.

If you’re ever in a situation where you’re not getting served or you can’t get what you need, just cry.