Elif Safak Quotes

Don't ever go with the flow. Be the flow.

You can be like a thermometer, just reflecting the world around you. Or you can be a thermostat, one of those people who sets the temperature.

If I can be a leader, I will.

We're too complacent. We let things happen to us. And you don't have to let things happen to you. You can affect change.

I've got to literally write my own ticket.

I think I've always been a follow-the-leader with my career, or maybe waiting for things to happen. Now I'm like, I'm OK-I know the direction, whoever's on board can go with me.

I am not a passenger in anything I do. I am and always will be a leader.

Don't wait for the stars to align, reach up and rearrange them the way you want...create your own constellation

What I wanted to hear didn't exist, so it was necessary for me to go out and create it.

Everyone has power. But it doesn't help if you don't use it.

The world is in your hands, now use it.

Don't follow trends, start trends.

I am not a passenger in anything I do.

You may feel powerless as a child, but the world will one day be yours. And you're responsible for it. So, seize the day and take charge of it.

Change is debilitating when it is done to us. Change is exhilarating when it is done by us.

I don't want to follow in anyone's footsteps. I want to follow my own path and do something unique.

I followed my own self and individuality so much that it automatically made me a game changer or set me apart from others. I did not think it was necessary to do things the way others are doing it.

You have more of an opportunity than people think to impact a game through the tone that you can set. You can't control everything, setting that tone is important.

One of the things my parents taught me, and I'll always be grateful as a gift, is to not ever let anybody else define me; that for me to define myself. and I think that helped me a lot in assuming a leadership position.

Be the leader you wish you had.

Take action. Every story you've ever connected with, every leader you've ever admired, every puny little thing that you've ever accomplished is the result of taking action. You have a choice. You can either be a passive victim of circumstance or you can be the active hero of your own life.

Doesn't matter if the glass is half-empty or half-full. All that matters is that you are the one pouring the water.

Be neither a conformist or a rebel, for they are really the same thing. Find your own path, and stay on it.

It's time to stop complying with the system and draw your own map. Stop settling for what's good enough and start creating art that matters.

When you leave here today and commence the next stage of your life, you can follow someone else's script, try to make choices that will make other people happy, avoid discomfort, do what is expected, and copy the status quo. Or you can look at all that you have accomplished today and use it as fuel to venture forth and write your own story. If you do, amazing things will take shape.