This Beyoncé Quote Is Exactly What You Need To Move On
Whether you're moving on from a breakup, a setback, or a personal loss, everyone can use a bit of help when it comes to healing. And even though no one’s got this moving on thing totally figured out, it’s always comforting to know that you’re not alone—other people have suffered through pain and come out on the other side, too. That’s where quotes can make a big difference. Words of wisdom from people who can identify with your struggles serve to remind you that there will be light at the end of the tunnel, and that it's all part of the human experience, no matter how messy.
Chances are, no matter what you’re dealing with there’s a load of sayings out there that’ll resonate with you. To narrow them down a bit, look no further than this list for 100 of the best quotes about moving on, letting go, and living life beyond the pain. From words spoken by Beyoncé to advice doled out by Robert Frost, you’ll likely find a common thread that’ll kickstart the healing process.
Moving on is hard—a breakup you never expected, a friendship you thought would last forever, a failure in your professional life, a furry friend who you weren’t ready to let go, or loved ones taken too soon. But quotes, no matter who they come from, can offer you that reminder of connection and the promise of eventual healing.
These quotes can help you move on:
"The heart will break, but broken live on." –Lord Byron
"Expect trouble as an inevitable part of life and repeat to yourself, the most comforting words of all: This, too, shall pass." –Ann Landers
"In three words I can sum up everything I've learned about life: It goes on." –Robert Frost
"Cry. Forgive. Learn. Move on. Let your tears water the seeds of your future happiness." ―Steve Maraboli
"You don't have to let that one thing be the thing that defines you." ―Jojo Moyes
"Love is proved the moment you let go of someone because they need you to." ―Shannon L. Alder
"The only way to make sense out of change is to plunge into it, move with it, and join the dance." –Alan Watts
"The only thing a person can ever really do is keep moving forward. Take that big leap forward without hesitation, without once looking back. Simply forget the past and forge toward the future." –Alyson Noel
"When I let go of what I am, I become what I might be. When I let go of what I have, I receive what I need." –Tao Te Ching
"Finding beauty in a broken world is creating beauty in the world we find."―Terry Tempest Williams
"I always get to where I am going by walking away from where I have been." —Winnie the Pooh
"When you feel at peace with your troubles, they turn into lessons and ladders to help you climb to the next level of your evolution."― Dr. Jacinta Mpalyenkana, Ph.D, MBA
"Get past your past, be a presence in your present, and let no one refute your future."―Johnnie Dent Jr.
"It is not easy to let go, but when you do; not only do you realize the strength that lies within you, you also create an opportunity to see God perform the best of miracles in your life."―Gift Gugu Mona
"When you hold onto a script that doesn't serve you, you leave no space to write a new one that does."―Jennifer Ho-Dougatz
"Grief is in two parts. The first is loss. The second is the remaking of life." –Anne Roiphe
"Peace can only be achieved by letting go of the past and accepting what is." ―Abhishek Kumar
"Letting go means to come to the realization that some people are a part of your history, but not a part of your destiny." –Steve Maraboli
"Getting over a painful experience is much like crossing monkey bars. You have to let go at some point in order to move forward." –Author unknown
"In order to move on, you must understand why you felt what you did and why you no longer need to feel it." –Mitch Albom
Photo credit: J_art - Getty Images "People have a hard time letting go of their suffering. Out of a fear of the unknown, they prefer suffering that is familiar."–Thich Nhat Hanh
"1. You must let the pain visit. 2. You must allow it teach you. 3. You must not allow it overstay. (Three routes to healing)"―Ijeoma Umebinyuo
"As my Popo used to say, life is a tapestry we weave day by day with threads of different colors, some heavy and dark, others thin and bright, all the threads having their uses. The stupid things I did are already in the tapestry, indelible, but I’m not going to be weighed down by them till I die. What’s done is done; I have to look ahead."―Isabel Allende
"The choice isn’t to move on—life moves whether I want it to or not. No, the choice is to look forward, not backward, to take a step because refusing to move won’t draw the past nearer, only postpone better days."―Caroline George
"You can't start a new chapter in your life if you keep re-reading the last one."―Suzy Kassem
"But there's a whole world waiting, still, and there are good things in it."―Lois Lowry
"Dare to live by letting go."―Tom Althouse
"It doesn't take a lot of strength to hang on. It takes a lot of strength to let go." –J. C. Watts
"Even though you may want to move forward in your life, you may have one foot on the brakes. In order to be free, we must learn how to let go. Release the hurt. Release the fear. Refuse to entertain your old pain. The energy it takes to hang onto the past is holding you back from a new life. What is it you would let go of today?" –Mary Manin Morrissey
"If there are people you haven't forgiven, you're not going to really awaken. You have to let go." –Eckhart Tolle
"The most beautiful people we have known are those who have known defeat, known suffering, known struggle, known loss, and have found their way out of those depths." –Elisabeth Kubler-Ross
"Loss is part of life. If you don't have loss, you don't grow." –Dominick Cruz
"Every new beginning comes from some other beginning's end." –Lucius Annaeus Seneca
"Let go. Why do you cling to pain? There is nothing you can do about the wrongs of yesterday. It is not yours to judge. Why hold on to the very thing which keeps you from hope and love?" –Leo Buscaglia
"A very wise man once told me that you can't look back—you just have to put the past behind you, and find something better in your future."―Jodi Picoult
"Life is like riding a bicycle. To keep your balance you must keep moving."–Albert Einstein
"You gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself 'I have lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along.' You must do the thing you think you cannot do." –Eleanor Roosevelt
"Hearts live by being wounded." –Oscar Wilde
"I’ve always believed that if you don’t stay moving, they will throw dirt on you." –Paul Anka
"For a long time, the fact that I was divorced was the most important thing about me. And now, it’s not. Now the most important thing about me is that I’m old." –Nora Ephron
"Moving on is easy. It’s staying moved on that’s trickier." ―Katerina Stoykova Klemer
"I realize there’s something incredibly honest about trees in winter, how they’re experts at letting things go." –Jeffrey McDaniel
"The secret of change is to focus all of your energy, not on fighting the old, but on building the new." —Socrates
"Life is short. You have to be able to laugh at our pain or we never move on." –Jeff Ross
"The broken heart. You think you will die, but you keep living, day after day after terrible day."―Charles Dickens
"You’ve got to make a conscious choice every day to shed the old—whatever 'the old' means for you."–Sarah Ban Breathnach
"I’m choosing happiness over suffering, I know I am. I’m making space for the unknown future to fill up my life with yet-to-come surprises."—Elizabeth Gilbert
"Every time you thought you couldn’t keep moving forward, you did. Take a moment to appreciate your strength." —Karen Salmansohn
"Some of us think holding on makes us strong, but sometimes it is letting go." –Hermann Hesse
"Sadness flies away on the wings of time."–Jean de La Fontaine
"A wounded deer leaps highest." —Emily Dickinson
"Change has to come for life to struggle forward."–Helen Hollick
Of course, Oprah always has the best advice:
"Breathe. Let go. And remind yourself that this very moment is the only one you know you have for sure." –Oprah Winfrey
"Every day brings a chance for you to draw in a breath, kick off your shoes, and dance."―Oprah Winfrey
"Think like a queen. A queen if not afraid to fail. Failure is another stepping stone to greatness."―Oprah Winfrey
"In the midst of difficulty lies opportunity."―Oprah Winfrey
"Life is full of many unpredictable changes... Let go of chaos yesterday; cheerfully live for today, and look forward to tomorrow with greater possibilities... It's our imperfections that make us perfect in our own unique ways."―Oprah Winfrey
When in doubt, consult Brené Brown:
"The universe is not short on wake-up calls. We’re just quick to hit the snooze button." ―Brené Brown
"But what we know now is that when we deny our emotion, it owns us. When we own our emotion, we can rebuild and find our way through the pain." ―Brené Brown
"Yes, I agree with Tennyson, who wrote, ' 'Tis better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all.' But heartbreak knocks the wind out of you, and the feelings of loss and longing can make getting out of bed a monumental task. Learning to trust and lean in to love again can feel impossible."―Brené Brown,
"When we deny our stories and disengage from tough emotions, they don’t go away; instead, they own us, they define us."―Brené Brown
"Pain will subside only when we acknowledge it and care for it. Addressing it with love and compassion would take only a minuscule percentage of the energy it takes to fight it, but approaching pain head-on is terrifying." ―Brené Brown
"Rising strong after a fall is how we cultivate wholeheartedness in our lives; it’s the process that teaches us the most about who we are."―Brené Brown,
Even your fave celebs have good advice (especially Kate Winslet):
"Every day is a new day, and you'll never be able to find happiness if you don't move on." –Carrie Underwood
"You build on failure. You use it as a stepping stone. Close the door on the past. You don't try to forget the mistakes, but you don't dwell on it. You don't let it have any of your energy, or any of your time, or any of your space." –Johnny Cash
"I really believe in, 'Move on, live and let live, forgive and forget.'" –Kate Winslet
"Loving someone is setting them free, letting them go." –Kate Winslet
"I think heartbreak is something that you learn to live with as opposed to learn to forget."–Kate Winslet
"[Once,] I was asked, 'If there was one part of your life that you could erase, what would it be?' And I was so stunned by that. I thought: 'Nothing.' I would keep all the good bits and the bad bits, because those things made me who I am." –Kate Winslet
"Be honest about how you approach failure. Don't just be critical of yourself, because that can be self-serving. Approach it honestly, assess your performance, and assess the areas where you have fallen short. Correct them and move on. Don't dwell on it. Don't hold on to it." –Megan Rapinoe
"Letting go of someone we love is the hardest thing we will ever do. Some people never surrender to love for the fear of being hurt. But to not have loved, to not have felt the immense joy it brings, would have been a far worse kind of death." –Goldie Hawn
"I think it's important to have closure in any relationship that ends—from a romantic relationship to a friendship. You should always have a sense of clarity at the end and know why it began and why it ended. You need that in your life to move cleanly into your next phase." –Jennifer Aniston
"Only time can heal his heart, just as only time can heal his broken arms and legs." –Miss Piggy
"Thank God I found the GOOD in goodbye." –Beyoncé
If you need extra help with your breakup...
"This is a good sign, having a broken heart. It means we have tried for something." –Elizabeth Gilbert
"One of the best times for figuring out who you are and what you really want out of life? Right after a breakup." —Mandy Hale
"When you're going through a breakup, you should just let yourself feel everything so you can get over it as opposed to pretending everything's okay and dragging it out." –Hannah Simone
"After a breakup, it takes a couple weeks for the fog to settle, but it's always a period of self-priority and growth. Life presents you with so many decisions. A lot of times, they're right in front of your face and they're really difficult, but we must make them." Brittany Murphy
"The cure for a broken heart is simple, my lady. A hot bath and a good night’s sleep." – Margaret George
"Only the broken-hearted know the truth about love." –Mason Cooley
"Friendship is certainly the finest balm for the pangs of disappointed love." –Jane Austen
"Sometimes, good things fall apart so better things can fall together." –Marilyn Monroe
"Don’t dwell on what went wrong. Instead, focus on what to do next. Spend your energies on moving forward toward finding the answer." –Denis Waitley
"When we are in love, we are convinced nobody else will do. But as time goes, others do do, and often do much much better."―Coco J. Ginger
"If you really want closure… at some point, you have to shut the door." —Jacki Wells Wunderlin
"When someone leaves, it’s because someone else is about to arrive." –Paulo Coelho
"Heartbroken? Channel your sorrow to become worthy of love. The world will be yours." –Tapan Ghosh
"My feet will want to walk to where you are sleeping, but I shall go on living." –Pablo Neruda
"We looked into one another’s eyes, and I think we both knew in that instant that the past was behind us. We could never be to each other what we had been once."―Ashley Weave
"You loved him enough to let him leave… Now you need to love yourself enough to let him go."―Ranata Suzuki
"What we wait around a lifetime for with one person, we can find in a moment with someone else."–Stephanie Klein
"Everyone’s allowed to be in love with the wrong person at some point. In fact, it’s a mistake not to be."–Harriet Evans
"How do you know when it’s over? Maybe when you feel more in love with your memories than with the person standing in front of you." –Gunnar Ardelius
And there's nothing like advice from Lorelai Gilmore and other fictional faves.
"No matter who broke your heart, or how long it takes to heal, you’ll never get through it without your friends."—Carrie Bradshaw, Sex and the City
"I am beginning to feel like the only way to truly get over someone that you cared a lot about is to start a new chapter."—Mindy Lahiri, The Mindy Project
"So I am hanging on to the bumper and life goes on and the car goes on, and I get really badly bruised and I’m hitting potholes. And it hurts. It really hurts. So yesterday I had to let go of the bumper. Because it hurts too much."—Lorelai Gilmore, Gilmore Girls
"You may think your only choices are to swallow your anger or throw it in someone’s face, but there’s a third option: You can just let it go, and only when you do that is it really gone and you can move forward."—Ted Mosby, How I Met Your Mother
"You cry, m’lady. You have a good cry. That’s what’s needed now. And when you’re ready you can get to work. Because you are strong enough. You’re strong enough for the task."—Mr. Carson, Downton Abbey
"The course of true love did never run smooth." —William Shakespeare, A Midsummer Night's Dream
And of course, some advice from Twilight:
"When he left, you spent all your energy holding on to him. You could be happy if you let go."― Stephenie Meyer, Eclipse
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