100 Quotes About Family To Remind You How Lucky You Are To Have Yours
For better or worse, family shapes you. And whatever shape or form they come in, they have a lot to do with the person you grow to become, and even how you raise your own children. What kind of parenting style you take on, the relationships you build, and your outlook on life and love are often formed by family dynamics early in life. So it’s only natural you want to express gratitude toward them.
With that in mind, we’ve gone ahead and collated over 100 quotes and sayings about family that speak to that distinctive dynamic.
1. “Being a part of a family means you are a part of something very wonderful. It means you will love and be loved for the rest of your life.” – Lisa Weed
2. “So much of what is best in us is bound up in our love of family, that it remains the measure of our stability because it measures our sense of loyalty.” – Haniel Long
3. “The family is the first essential cell of human society.” – Pope John XXIII
4. “Family and friends are hidden treasures, seek them out and enjoy their riches.” – Wanda Hope Carter
5. “‘Ohana’ means family and family means nobody gets left behind or forgotten.” – Lilo and Stitch
6. “I have a wonderful shelter, which is my family.” – José Carreras
7. “In time of test, family is best.” – Burmese proverb
8. “We may have our differences, but nothing’s more important than family.” – Coco
9. “I sustain myself with the love of family.” – Maya Angelou
10. “There is no doubt that it is around the family and the home that all the greatest virtues, the most dominating virtues of human, are created, strengthened, and maintained.” – Winston S. Churchill
11. “My mother always used to tell me that when push comes to shove, you always know who to turn to. That being a family isn’t a social construct but an instinct.” – Jodi Picoult
12. “What can you do to promote world peace? Go home and love your family.” – Mother Teresa
13. “In truth a family is what you make it. It is made strong, not by number of heads counted at the dinner table, but by the rituals you help family members create, by the memories you share, by the commitment of time, caring, and love you show to one another, and by the hopes for the future you have as individuals and as a unit.” – Marge Kennedy
14. “Whatever else is unsure in this stinking dunghill of a world, a mother’s love is not.” – James Joyce
15. “A family is a place where principles are hammered and honed on the anvil of everyday living.” – Charles R. Swindoll
16. “The family is the test of freedom; because the family is the only thing that the free man makes for himself and by himself.” – Gilbert K. Chesterton
17. “Families are like branches on a tree. We grow in different directions yet our roots remain as one.” – Unknown
18. “Our most basic instinct is not for survival but for family.” – Paul Pearsall
19. “Families are the compass that guides us. They are the inspiration to reach great heights, and our comfort when we occasionally falter.” – Brad Henry
20. “A man travels the world over in search of what he needs, and returns home to find it.” – George A. Moore
21. “I think togetherness is a very important ingredient to family lie.” – Barbara Bush
22. “Family is a life jacket in the stormy sea of life.” – J.K. Rowling
23. “The only rock I know that stays steady, the only institution I know that works, is the family.” – Lee Iacocca
24. “A happy family is but an earlier heaven.” – George Bernard Shaw
25. “The family is one of nature’s masterpieces.” – George Santayana
26. “Other things may change us, be we start and end with the family.” – Anthony Brandt
27. “Family and friendships are two of the greatest facilitators of happiness.” – John C. Maxwell
28. “A family is a risky venture, because the greater the love the greater the loss. That’s the trade-off — but I’ll take it all.” – Brad Pitt
29. “Family ties are cherished things, forged in childhood days, by love of parents, deep and true, and sweet familiar ways.” – Terri Burritt
30. “Bringing up a family should be an adventure, not an anxious discipline in which everybody is constantly graded for performance.” – Milton R. Saperstein
31. “At the end of the day, a loving family should find everything forgivable.” – Mark V. Olsen
32. “There’s nothing that makes you more insane than family. Or more happy. Or more exasperated. Or more… secure.” – Jim Butcher
33. “Govern a family as you would cook a small fish — very gently.” – Chinese Proverb
34. “Family is not an important thing; it’s everything.” – Michael J. Fox
35. “Call it a clan, call it a network, call it a tribe, call it a family: Whatever you call it, whoever you are, you need one.” – Jane Howard
36. “The memories we make with our family are everything.” – Candace Cameron Bure
37. “We must take care of our families, wherever we find them.” – Elizabeth Gilbert
38. “Family life is too intimate to be preserved by the spirit of justice. It can be sustained by a spirit of love which goes beyond justice.” – Reinhold Niebuhr
39. “Family: A social unit where the father is concerned with parking space, the children with outer space, and the mother with closet space.” – Evan Esar
40. “The family — that dear octopus from whose tentacles we never quite escape, nor, in our inmost hearts, ever quite wish to.” – Dodie Smith
41. “It didn’t matter how big our house was, it mattered that there was love in it.” – Peter Buffett
42. “Love your family. Spend time, be kind, and serve one another. Make no room for regrets. Tomorrow is not promised and today is short.” – Unknown
43. “Without a family, man, alone in the world, trembles with the cold.” – Andre Maurois
44. “He that raises a large family does, indeed, while he lives to observe them, stand a broader mark for sorrow; but then he stands a broader mark for pleasure, too.” – Benjamin Franklin
45. “Families are like fudge — mostly sweet with a few nuts.” – Unknown
46. “Sticking with your family is what makes you a family.” – Mitch Albom
47. “Home is people, not a place. If you go back there after the people are gone, then all you can see is what is not there anymore.” – Robin Hobb
48. “You need a strong family because, at the end, they will love you and support you unconditionally.” – Esha Gupta
49. “The strength of a family, like the strength of an army, is in its loyalty to each other.” – Mario Puzo
50. “Family is a unique gift that needs to be appreciated and treasured, even when they’re driving you crazy. As much as they make you mad, interrupt you, annoy you, curse at your, try to control you, these are the people who know you the best and who love you.” – Jenna Morasca
RELATED: 100+ Funny Mom Jokes Because She’s Way Funnier Than Dad
51. “Many men can make a fortune but very few can build a family.” – S. Bryan
52. “My family is my strength and my weakness.” – Aishwarya Rai Bachchan
53. “When everything goes to hell, the people who stand by you without flinching — they are your family.” – Jim Butcher
54. “Family contributes immensely to an individual’s happiness. Only in a happy home life can complete contentment be found.” – Dorothea S. Koppliln
55. “Rejoice with your family in the beautiful land of life.” – Albert Einstein
56. “The happiest moments of my life have been the few which I have passed at home in the bosom of my family.” – Thomas Jefferson
57. “Your greatest contribution may not be something you do but someone you raise.” – Unknown
58. “To put the world right in order, we must first put the nation in order. To put the nation in order, we must first put the family in order. To put the family in order, we must first cultivate our personal life. We must first set our hearts right.” – Confucius
59. “Your parents miss you and wish you’d call. Later you’ll miss them and wish you could.” – Paul Graham
60. “A family can develop only with a loving woman as its center.” – Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel
61. “If you cannot get rid of the family skeleton, you may as well make it dance.” – George Bernard Shaw
62. “No family is perfect. We argue, we fight. We even stop talking to each other at times. But in the end, family is family. The love will always be there.” – Anonymous
63. “Family is the most important thing in the world.” – Princess Diana
64. “Family: A little bit of crazy, a little bit of loud, and a whole lot of love.” – Unknown
65. “In family life, love is the oil that eases friction, the cement that binds closer together, and the music that brings harmony.” – Eva Burrows
66. “Family is the heart of a home.” – Unknown
67. “The love of family and the admiration of friends is much more important than wealth and privilege.” – Charles Kuralt
68. “I don’t think quantity time is as special as quality time with your family.” – Reba McEntire
69. “Family is always gonna be there. The material things, they come and go.” – Romeo Miller
70. “Life is precious and relationships are precious. I’m a great believer in family.” – Len Goodman
71. “A family is a place where minds come in contact with one another.” – Buddha
72. “Family isn’t always blood. It’s the people in your life who want you in theirs. The ones who accept you for who you are. The ones who would do anything to see you smile, and who love you no matter what.” – Anonymous
73. “Family is this very deep, complex thig that for most people becomes everything. It informs your entire life.” – Ezra Miller
74. “You can kiss your family and friends goodbye and put miles between you, but at the same time you carry them with you in your heart, your mind, your stomach, because you do not just live in a world but a world lives in you.” – Frederick Buechner
75. “I think people that have a brother or sister don’t realize how lucky they are. Sure, they fight a lot, but to know that there’s always somebody there, somebody that’s family.” – Trey Parker
76. “Family faces are magic mirrors — looking at people who belong to us, we see the past, present, and future.” – Gail Lumet Buckley
77. “I think family is the most important thin in the world. I think your own family is the most complicated thing in the world, and I think it’s the most beautiful thing in the world.” – Jake Gyllenhaal
78. “It’s nice to have some distance with your family. As long as you’re closer to them by love.” – Olivier Martinez
79. “Sometimes you struggle so hard to feed your family one way, you forget to feed them the other way, with spiritual nourishment. Everybody needs that.” – James Brown
80. “If you don’t have your friends and your family, what do you really have? You can have all the money in the world, but with no friends and no family, it’s no good.” – Meek Mill
81. “Show me a family of readers, and I will show you the people who move the world.” – Napoléon Bonaparte
82. “There is no one right way to raise children, and there is no one best kind of family.” – Benjamin Spock
83. “Home is where you are loved the most and act the worst.” – Marjorie Pay Hinckley
84. “You need to make time for your family no matter what happens in your life.” – Matthew Quick
85. “The family unit is the first group of people that you are a part of. While there are obvious exceptions, there’s usually an intrinsic trust that is built into your family.” – Tom Meitner
86. “There is a great work/home life balance that you need to achieve. If you let your home life eat into your work life, you lose motivation quickly and if work life imposes too much on your family time, then your family time becomes less satisfactory.” – Dane Taylor
87. “Families are meant to stick to each other and help each other through their problems.” – T.K. Oliver
88. “Think of your family today and every day thereafter. Don’t let the busy world of today keep you from showing how much you love and appreciate your family.” – Anonymous
89. “Family consists of people that love and care about each other mutually.” – John Shea
90. “If the family were a boat, it would be a canoe that makes no progress unless everyone paddles.” – Letty Cottin Pogrebin
91. “Siblings have a unique relationship… They are family, tied together by kinship throughout life.” – Kenneth J. Doka
92. “When it comes to acting like a family, simply show them the love they need along the way.” – Martha Roberts
93. “The older you get, the more important family is.” – Catherine Pulsifer
94. “Families, like individuals, are unique.” – Norman Vincent Peale
95. “The informality of family life is a blessed condition that allows us to become our best while looking our worst.” – Marge Kennedy
96. “We cannot destroy kindred: our chains stretch a little sometimes, but they never break.” – Marquise de Sévigné
97. “Treasure and cherish every moment with your family. If you do that, not a single second will be wasted.” – Melony Buenger
98. “The strongest relationship that you can form in your lifetime is with your family.” – Stephens Hyang
99. “We all play our own part in how our family functions.” – Darrin Wiggins
100. “Just as a house needs a foundation in order to stand firm, so does a person.” – Jacquie McTaggart
Related: 80+ Sidesplitting Family Jokes To Whip Out At The Next Reunion
This article was originally published on