Mae Jemison Quotes

Mae Carol Jemison

Mae Jemison is an American engineer, physician, and former NASA astronaut. She became the first African-American woman to travel into space when she served as a mission specialist aboard the Space Shuttle Endeavour in 1992. (Mae Jemison Quotes)

“As an astronaut, you have a very defined set of tasks to do. Those tasks may require you to work 60, 70, or 80 hours a week.”
Mae Jemison

“Don’t let anyone rob you of your imagination, your creativity, or your curiosity. It’s your place in the world; it’s your life. Go on and do all you can with it, and make it the life you want to live.”
Mae Jemison

“Greatness can be captured in one word: lifestyle. Life is God’s gift to you, style is what you make of it.”
Mae Jemison

“I always knew I’d go to space.”
Mae Jemison

“I am as much a part of this universe as any speck of stardust.”
Mae Jemison

“I don’t know that having been in space gives me a better idea of whether life might exist on other planets. The reality is that we know that this universe, that our galaxy, has billions of stars. We know that stars have planets. So the likelihood that there is life somewhere else to me is just absolutely there.”
Mae Jemison

“I knew full well that people expected me to behave in a certain way. I bucked the system.”
Mae Jemison

“I like to think of ideas as potential energy. They’re really wonderful, but nothing will happen until we risk putting them into action.” (Mae Jemison Quotes)
Mae Jemison

“I think one of the things that we have to think about it is, we are all a part of this universe.”
Mae Jemison

“I want to make sure that that future that we’re creating is one that is the best it can be for people around the world, and also one that includes the full range of our talent and our skills – and, you know, gender and ethnicity, geography – to solving the world’s problems.”
Mae Jemison

“I want to make sure we use all our talent, not just 25 percent.”
Mae Jemison

“I wanted to be a professional dancer for a period of time, and I did a lot of dancing and choreography and got paid for it.”
Mae Jemison

“If you think about it, HG Wells wrote ‘First Men in the Moon’ in 1901. Imagine how incredulous, fantastical that idea was in 1901. We didn’t have rockets, we didn’t have the materials, and we weren’t really flying. It was incredible. Less than 100 years later, we were on the moon.”
Mae Jemison

“Images show us possibilities. A lot of times, fantasy is what gets us through to reality.”
Mae Jemison

“In some ways, I could have been seen as further ahead if I had taken an easier path, but every now and then I stop and think I probably wouldn’t have been happy.”
Mae Jemison

“In space, you need to exercise your heart since it’s not pumping blood around at the same rate.”
Mae Jemison

“It is important for scientists to be aware of what our discoveries mean, socially and politically. It’s a noble goal that science should be apolitical, acultural, and asocial, but it can’t be, because it’s done by people who are all those things.”
Mae Jemison

“It’s your place in the world; it’s your life. Go on and do all you can with it, and make it the life you want to live.”
Mae Jemison

“More women should demand to be involved. It’s our right. This is one area where women can get in on the ground floor and possibly help to direct where space exploration will go in the future.” (Mae Jemison Quotes)
Mae Jemison

“My parents were comfortable with me exploring areas that they were not proficient in.”
Mae Jemison

“Never be limited by other people’s limited imaginations. If you adopt their attitudes, then the possibility won’t exist because you’ll have already shut it out…You can hear other people’s wisdom, but you’ve got to re-evaluate the world for yourself.”
Mae Jemison

“Never limit yourself because of others’ limited imagination; never limit others because of your own limited imagination.”
Mae Jemison

“Pay attention to the world around you and then find the places where you think you’re skilled. Follow your bliss — and bliss doesn’t mean it’s easy!”
Mae Jemison

“People may see astronauts and because the majority are white males, they tend to think it has nothing to do with them. But it does.”
Mae Jemison

“Science is very important to me, but I also like to stress that you have to be well-rounded. One’s love for science doesn’t get rid of all the other areas. I truly feel someone interested in science is interested in understanding what’s going on in the world. That means you have to find out about social science, art, and politics.”
Mae Jemison

“Science provides an understanding of a universal experience. Arts provide a universal understanding of a personal experience.”
Mae Jemison

“Some of the most fun people I know are scientists.”
Mae Jemison

“Some people say they feel very small when they think about space. I felt more expansive, very connected to the universe.”
Mae Jemison

“Sometimes people have already decided who you are without your story shining through.”
Mae Jemison

“Space travel belongs to all of us. There is science in dance and art in science.”
Mae Jemison

“The arts and sciences are avatars of human creativity.”
Mae Jemison

“The best way to make dreams come true is to wake up.”
Mae Jemison

“The biggest challenge is to overcome the things in yourself that keep you from moving forward.”
Mae Jemison

“The biggest challenge we all face is to learn about ourselves and to understand our strengths and weaknesses. We need to utilize our strengths, but not so much that we don’t work on our weaknesses.”
Mae Jemison

“The difference between science and the arts is not that they are different sides of the same coin even, or even different parts of the same continuum, but rather, they are manifestations of the same thing.” (Mae Jemison Quotes)
Mae Jemison

“The future never just happened. It was created.”
Mae Jemison

“The level of confidence women are able to build in women-only groups is important.”
Mae Jemison

“The thing that I have done throughout my life is to do the best job that I can and to be me.”
Mae Jemison

“There have been lots of other women who had the talent and ability before me. I think this can be seen as an affirmation that we’re moving ahead. And I hope it means that I’m just the first in a long line.”
Mae Jemison

“There is a fascination with the idea that one has seen someone else do something before one can achieve it. I knew what I wanted to do.”
Mae Jemison

“Timidity does not inspire bold acts ”
Mae Jemison

“We look at science as something very elite, which only a few people can learn. That’s just not true.”
Mae Jemison

“What we find is that if you have a goal that is very, very far out, and you approach it in little steps, you start to get there faster. Your mind opens up to the possibilities.”
Mae Jemison

“When I’m asked about the relevance to Black people of what I do, I take that as an affront. It presupposes that Black people have never been involved in exploring the heavens, but this is not so. Ancient African empires — Mali, Songhai, Egypt — had scientists, astronomers. The fact is that space and its resources belong to all of us, not to any one group.”
Mae Jemison

“While we’re orbiting Earth in the shuttle, the sky looks exactly as it looks here on Earth, except that the stars are brighter. So, we see the same planets, and they look the same way as they look here.”
Mae Jemison