Life is all about experiences and being the best person you can be. When you lose someone close to you, celebrating their life by remembering their remarkable journey is the best way for their memories to live on.
Some people prefer the upbeat, positive feeling that comes from celebrating the life of their loved ones, opposed to mourning their loss. A good way to remember someone in the most favorable way is with some life celebration quotes. Rather than focusing on how sad it is they’re gone, you can reminisce on the cherished memories you shared.
We have collated 51 of the best quotes to celebrate life.
1. “Every man’s life ends the same way. It is only the details of how he lived and how he died that distinguish one man from another.”
— Ernest Hemingway
2. “If death meant just leaving the stage long enough to change costumes and come back as a new character… Would you slow down? Or speed up?”
— Chuck Palahniuk
3.“Love as powerful as your mother’s for you leaves its own mark. To have been loved so deeply ... will give us some protection forever.”
— Albus Dumbledore, 'Harry Potter And The Sorcerer's Stone'.
4.“...we must find ways to celebrate people's lives and contributions while they are still alive. We need far more celebrations of life ... even before people know they are dying.”
— Tom Rath
5. “No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don’t want to die to get there. And yet, death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it, and that is how it should be, because death is very likely the single best invention of life. It’s life’s change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new.”
— Steve Jobs
6. "What we have done for ourselves alone dies with us; what we have done for others and the world remains and is immortal."
— Albert Pike
7. “The more you praise and celebrate your life, the more there is in life to celebrate.”
— Oprah Winfrey
8. “We think there is endless time to live but we never know which moment will last. So share, care, love, and celebrate every moment of life.”
— Anonymous
9. "Celebrate life in all its glory — challenge yourself to let the routine sing, and the new dance."
— Maximillian Degenerez
10. “Happiness requires that we celebrate the positive sides of life. Peace requires that we accept both the positive and the negative outcomes of life and move on.”
— Terry Mark
11. “If we celebrate life with all its contradictions, embrace, experience, and ultimately live with it, a chance exists for a spiritual life filled not only with pain and untidiness, but also with joy, community, and creativity.”
— Derrick Jensen
12. “There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle.”
— Albert Einstein
13. “Life should not be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid broadside in a cloud of smoke, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming 'Wow! What a Ride!'”
— Hunter S. Thompson
14.“While we are living in the present, we must celebrate life every day, knowing that we are becoming history with every work, every action, every deed.”
— Mattie Stepanek
15. “They that love beyond the world cannot be separated by it. For death is no more than a turning of us over from time to eternity. Death cannot kill what never dies.”
— William Penn
16. “Keep creating: the world yearns to celebrate your next masterpiece.”
— Ken Poirot
17. “Once you start celebrating the little victories in life, you will realize just how infinite they truly are.”
— Alicia Emamdee
18“Hope is the thing with feathers that perches in the soul. And sings the tune without the words, and never stops at all.”
— Emily Dickinson
19. “At the end of the day, the fact we have the courage to still be standing is reason enough to celebrate.”
— Meredith Grey
20. “Perhaps they are not stars but rather openings in heaven where the love of our lost ones shines down to let us know they are happy.”
— Anonymous
21. "Dying is nothing to fear. It can be the most wonderful experience of your life. It all depends on how you've lived."
— Dr. Elisabeth Kubler-Ross
22. “What we once enjoyed and deeply loved we can never lose, for all that we love deeply becomes part of us.”
— Helen Keller
23. "Life is so beautiful that death has fallen in love with it, a jealous, possessive love that grabs at what it can. But life leaps over oblivion lightly, losing only a thing or two of no importance, and gloom is just a passing shadow of a cloud."
— Yann Martel
24. “A simple celebration, a gathering of friends; here is wishing you great happiness, a joy that never ends.”
— Zahid Abas
25. “The meaning of life is not celebrating your birth, it is celebrating your work.”
— Amit Kalantri
26. “Some see weeds, others see wishes.”
— Anonymous
27. “What would life be worth if there were no death? Who would enjoy the sun if it never rained? Who would yearn for the day if there were no night?”
— Glenn Ringtved
28. “Keep your face to the sunshine and you cannot see the shadows. It’s what the sunflowers do.”
— Helen Keller
29. “Life is short, and it is up to you to make it sweet.”
— Sarah Louise Delany
30. “Life is worth celebrating and worth living even though we're all headed to the same hole at the end of the day.”
— Wayne Coyne
31. “You may never get back this life, so do something in this lifetime worthy of celebration.”
— Debasish Mridha
32. "Let no one weep for me, or celebrate my funeral with mourning; for I still live, as I pass to and fro through the mouths of men."
— Quintus Ennius
33. “Just celebrate the life you had, not the life you could've had.”
— Magic Johnson
34. “Achievements are precious and timeless, just like the precious metal platinum. And what better way to celebrate milestones in your life than with precious platinum.”
— Vijender Singh
35. “Live life when you have it. Life is a splendid gift — there is nothing small about it.”
— Florence Nightingale
36. “Don’t cry because it’s over, smile because it happened.”
— Dr. Suess
37. “What you leave behind is not what is engraved in stone monuments but what is woven into the lives of others.”
— Thucydides
38. “Count your age by friends, not years, your life by smiles, not tears.”
— John Lennon
39. "Life is meant to be a celebration! It shouldn't be necessary to set aside special times to remind us of this fact. Wise is the person who finds a reason to make every day a special one."
— Leo F. Buscaglia
40. “Those who love deeply never grow old; they may die of old age, but they die young.”
— Sir Arthur Wing Pinero
41. “Goodbyes are only for those who love with their eyes. Because for those who love with heart and soul there is no such thing as separation.”
— Rumi
42. “As a well-spent day brings happy sleep, so a life well used brings happy death.”
— Leonardo da Vinci
43. “Celebrate life. Care for others and share whatever you have with those less fortunate than you. Broaden your vision, for the whole world belongs to you.”
— Sri Ravi Shankar
44. “Life has meaning only in the struggle. Triumph or defeat is in the hands of the Gods. So let us celebrate the struggle!”
— Stevie Wonder
45. “Every time someone in your life dies, you realize you're not invincible and you have to wonder if we're celebrating life or if we're mourning a death.”
— Emily Bett Rickards
46. “Those we love never truly leave us. There are things that death cannot touch.”
— Jack Thorne
47. “In the end, it’s not the years in your life that count. It's life in your years.”
— Abraham Lincoln
48. “Explore all of life's options and never leave a stone unturned.”
— Anonymous
49. “It is no bad thing celebrating a simple life.”
— J. R. R. Tolkien
50. “Like fireworks, this universe is a celebration and you are the spectator contemplating the eternal Fourth of July of your absolute splendor.”
— Francis Lucille
51. “Why should we celebrate certain things at certain times? We don't need extra celebrations on anything, as every moment is already a great moment to celebrate that we're just alive!”
— Mehmet Murat ildan
Whatever way you use them, these quotes are perfect for a funeral, memorial service or forever remembering that someone special.