Here are some of my favourite quotes by Mr Rogers.
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”All of us, at some time or other, need help. Whether we’re giving or receiving help, each one of us has something valuable to bring to this world. That’s one of the things that connects us as neighbors—in our own way, each one of us is a giver and a receiver."
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"Anyone who does anything to help a child in his life is a hero. "
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"I don’t think anyone can grow unless he’s loved exactly as he is now, appreciated for what he is rather than what he will be."
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"I hope you’re proud of yourself for the times you’ve said “yes,” when all it meant was extra work for you and was seemingly helpful only to someone else."
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"In times of stress, the best thing we can do for each other is to listen with our ears and our hearts and to be assured that our questions are just as important as our answers."
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"There are three ways to ultimate success: The first way is to be kind. The second way is to be kind. The third way is to be kind.”
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“When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, “Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.”
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“Everyone longs to be loved. And the greatest thing we can do is to let people know that they are loved and capable of loving.”
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”Imagine what our real neighborhoods would be like if each of us offered, as a matter of course, just one kind word to another person.”
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“When I say it’s you I like, I’m talking about that part of you that knows that life is far more than anything you can ever see or hear or touch. That deep part of you that allows you to stand for those things without which humankind cannot survive. Love that conquers hate, peace that rises triumphant over war, and justice that proves more powerful than greed.”
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“Love isn’t a state of perfect caring. It is an active noun like struggle. To love someone is to strive to accept that person exactly the way he or she is, right here and now.”
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“We live in a world in which we need to share responsibility. It’s easy to say “It’s not my child, not my community, not my world, not my problem.” Then there are those who see the need and respond. I consider those people my heroes.”
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“The connections we make in the course of a life—maybe that’s what heaven is.”
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“The child is in me still and sometimes not so still.”
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“It’s very dramatic when two people come together to work something out. It’s easy to take a gun and annihilate your opposition, but what is really exciting to me is to see people with differing views come together and finally respect each other.”
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“In the external scheme of things, shining moments are as brief as the twinkling of an eye, yet such twinklings are what eternity is made of — moments when we human beings can say “I love you,” “I’m proud of you,” “I forgive you,” “I’m grateful for you.” That’s what eternity is made of: invisible imperishable good stuff.”
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“Knowing that we can be loved exactly as we are gives us all the best opportunity for growing into the healthiest of people.”
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“Love is like infinity: You can’t have more or less infinity, and you can’t compare two things to see if they’re “equally infinite.” Infinity just is, and that’s the way I think love is, too.”
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“It’s a mistake to think that we have to be lovely to be loved by human beings or by God”
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“You are a very special person. There is only one like you in the whole world. There’s never been anyone exactly like you before, and there will never be again. Only you. And people can like you exactly as you are.”
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“One of the universal fears of childhood is the fear of not having value in the eyes of the people whom we admire so much.”
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“I must be an emotional archaeologist because I keep looking for the roots of things, particularly the roots of behavior and why I feel certain ways about certain things.”
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“You know, I think everybody longs to be loved, and longs to know that he or she is lovable. And consequently, the greatest thing we can do is to help somebody know that they are loved and capable of loving.”
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“I’ve often hesitated in beginning a project because I’ve thought, “It’ll never turn out to be even remotely like the good idea I have as I start.” I could just “feel” how good it could be. But I decided that, for the present, I would create the best way I know how and accept the ambiguities.”
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“It’s very important, no matter what you may do professionally, to keep alive some of the healthy interests of your youth. Children’s play is not just kids’ stuff. Children’s play is rather the stuff of most future inventions.”
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“One of the strongest things I have had to wrestle with in my life is the significance of the longing for perfection in oneself and in the people bound to the self by friendship or parenthood or childhood.”
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“Imagine what our real neighbors would be like if each of us offered, as a matter of course, just one kind word to another person. There have been so many stories about the lack of courtesy, the impatience of today’s world, road rage and even restaurant rage. Sometimes, all it takes is one kind word to nourish another person. Think of the ripple effect that can be created when we nourish someone. One kind empathetic word has a wonderful way of turning into many.”
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“Listening is where love begins: listening to ourselves and then to our neighbors.”
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“You’ve made this day a special day, by just your being you. There’s no person in the whole world like you, and I like you just the way you are.”
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“A high school student wrote to ask, “What was the greatest event in American history?” I can’t say. However, I suspect that like so many “great” events, it was something very simple and very quiet with little or no fanfare (such as someone forgiving someone else for a deep hurt that eventually changed the course of history). The really important “great” things are never center stage of life’s dramas; they’re always “in the wings”. That’s why it’s so essential for us to be mindful of the humble and the deep rather than the flashy and the superficial.”
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“All our lives, we rework the things from our childhood, like feeling good about ourselves, managing our angry feelings, being able to say good-bye to people we love.”
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“Things Are Different: You never know the story By the cover of the book. You can’t tell what a dinner’s like By simply looking at the cook. It’s something everybody needs to know Way down deep inside That things are often different Than the way they look. When I put on a costume To play a fancy part That costume changes just my looks. It doesn’t change my heart. You cannot know what someone’s thinking By the picture you just took ‘Cause things are often different From the way they look.”
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“When I think of Robert Frost’s poems, like “The Road Not Taken”, I feel the support of someone who is on my side, who understands what life’s choices are like, someone who says, “I’ve been there, and it’s okay to go on”.”
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”Because I see that people who are not the fancy people of this world are the ones who seem to nourish my soul. And I want to learn how to be the best receiver that I can ever be. Because I think graceful receiving is one of the most wonderful gifts we can give anybody.”
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“People have said “Don’t cry” to other people for years and years, and all it has ever meant is “I’m too uncomfortable when you show your feelings: don’t cry.” I’d rather have them say, “Go ahead and cry. I’m here to be with you.”
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“For Rogers, the very act of asking questions, and trying to answer them honestly, was the key to growing and learning: “We can’t always know what’s behind a child’s question. But if we let a child know we respect the question, we’re letting that child know that we respect him or her. What a powerful way to say, “I care about you!”
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“Mary Lou Kownacki: “There isn’t anyone you couldn’t love once you’ve heard their story.”
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“To see people who will notice a need in the world and do something about it […] Those are my heroes.”
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“Dr. McFarland once invited a well-known sculptor from the faculty of Carnegie Institute of Technology (now Carnegie Mellon University) to come to our nursery school. Dr. McFarland said to him, ‘I don’t want you to teach sculpting. All I want you to do is to love clay in front of the children.’ And that’s what he did. He came once a week for the whole term, sat with the four- and five-year-olds as they played, and he ‘loved’ his clay in front of them. The adults who have worked at the center for many years have said that not before or since have the children in that school used clay so imaginatively as when they had those visits from the sculptor who obviously delighted in his medium.”
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Knowing that we can be loved exactly as we are gives us all the best opportunity for growing into the healthiest of people.