Quotes by Fred Rogers

“Play is often talked about as if it were a relief from serious learning. But for children play is serious learning. Play is really the work of childhood.”

“What makes the difference between wishing and realizing our wishes? Lots of things, and it may take months or years for wish to come true, but its far more likely to happen when you care so much about a wish that youll do all you can to make it happen.”

“You know, you dont have to look like everybody else to be acceptable and to feel acceptable.”

“Propel, propel, propel your craft softly down liquid solution. Ecstatically, ecstatically, ecstatically, ecstatically, existence is simply illusion.”

“Songs from the Neighborhood”

“He was an enormous talent, and for him to have been able to offer that to children through the neighborhood all through these years was a great gift,”

“I thought there was some way of using this fabulous instrument to be of nurture to those who would watch and listen,”

“When I saw the toy piano on one of the pages, that was it!”

“Knowing that we can be loved exactly as we are gives us all the best opportunity for growing into the healthiest of people.”

“How sad it is that we give up on people who are just like us.”

“Drink to the point of hilarity.”

When I say its you I like, Im 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.

Part of the problem with the word disabilities is that it immediately suggests an inability to see or hear or walk or do other things that many of us take for granted. But what of people who cant feel? Or talk about their feelings? Or manage their feelings in constructive ways? What of people who arent able to form close and strong relationships? And people who cannot find fulfillment in their lives, or those who have lost hope, who live in disappointment and bitterness and find in life no joy, no love? These, it seems to me, are the real disabilities.

We need to help people to discover the true meaning of love. Love is generally confused with dependence. Those of us who have grown in true love know that we can love only in proportion to our capacity for independence.

The connections we make in the course of a life--maybe thats what heaven is.

Anything that’s human is mentionable, and anything that is mentionable can be more manageable. When we can talk about our feelings, they become less overwhelming, less upsetting, and less scary. The people we trust with that important talk can help us know that we are not alone.

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.

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, Im proud of you, I forgive you, Im grateful for you. Thats what eternity is made of: invisible imperishable good stuff.

Its very dramatic when two people come together to work something out. Its 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.

Its a beautiful day in this neighborhood,A beautiful day for a neighbor.Would you be mine?Could you be mine?...Its a neighborly day in this beauty wood,A neighborly day for a beauty.Would you be mine?Could you be mine?...Ive always wanted to have a neighbor just like you.Ive always wanted to live in a neighborhood with you.So, lets make the most of this beautiful day.Since were together we might as well say:Would you be mine?Could you be mine?Wont you be my neighbor?Wont you please,Wont you please?Please wont you be my neighbor?