Bette Midler Quotes

If you're passionate about something, then you should pick up your flag and run with it.

Rap is poetry set to music. But to me it's like a jackhammer.

I celebrate everyone's religious holidays. if it's good enough for the righteous, it's good enough for the self-righteous, I always say.

The outside world doesn't have a lot to offer. You have to make your own heaven in your own home.

Writing a book is not as tough as it is to haul thirty-five people around the country and sweat like a horse five nights a week.

I bear no grudges. I have a mind that retains nothing.

There comes a time whenyou haveto let yourclothesgo out in the world and try to make it on their own.

When I started in this [music] business, I had a dream, but it was amorphous, and I had no experience. I just had a fuzzy notion of what life would be like if I became what I pictured.

Most people don't deserve to be spoken of in the same breath as Chaplin or Lucille Ball.

For days on end, I would hardly speak, and when I did only the vilest sort of gibberish would spout forth. I became morose and fat. Unapproachable, except when eating - and then only by waiters.

Do I understand this right? I'm being marked down?

I've always said we got married because there was nothing on TV.

When it's time to shuffle off this mortal coil, you leave your ashes to be composted.

Without passion, the powers-that-be can run roughshod over you.

In a marriage, you struggle and struggle and struggle, and then you realize that you have to ride the horse in the direction it's going. You stop trying to pull the reins in another direction.

My parents taught me: Do not rely on a man. Not rely on it that you get married and it pays for you. That's what I figured. I have always paid my own bills.

When I finally did stop and look at my life, I realized that I had done what I'd set out to do. In my pitiful little way, I had climbed the mountain I had chosen. And there I was, on top.

I wish America would spend even half as much time complaining about plastics in our oceans as we do about actresses' plastic surgery.

I can get plenty of men, keeping them is the hard part.

I would much rather watch myself than listen to myself. The moving is second nature, but the listening... that's the art.

GOD is watching us, from a Distance.

[On Helen Reddy:] She ought to be arrested for loitering in front of an orchestra.

You can't just have a clean public space - you also have to have people willing to use it, and something that will draw them in.

The [film] industry is an ecosystem that's sick.

Me, I'm just a hack. I'm just a schlep-per. I just do what I can do.

Life is like cooking your masterpiece recipe. You have to get the right ingredients,have the right mixture and the right cooking time to reveal the PERFECT and DELICIOUS TASTE of your craft.

When my daughter was younger we showed her all the great musicals. And the great dramas and great comedies, and the one that she took to the most was Some Like It Hot.

That's our mission: to clean and green New York City - one block at a time.

I'm so glad to be back in New York. Los Angeles can be so cold, so cruel after you've been-what's the word?-oh yes: 'fired.'

If you're frightened, you're out of luck.

Music is probably the only place I get energy from. Music and maybe watching a really tremendous performer, watching a terrific performer like Jagger or watching a great movie.

Sold my soul. Bought these devil chains.

I fear for the future of the planet. But in a funny way, I'm even sanguine about that.

I hope to keep entertaining in some way until I can't physically entertain any longer. It's what I was born to do, and I love this profession.

It's important that you all agree on what the parameters are and what you can accomplish - and not get pissed off or beat yourself up for what you can't accomplish.

While I was growing up, I believed I could do anything I could think of. So the challenge was always to keep thinking - to get to where I wanted to be and then to think of somewhere else to go.

You have to be alert. When my daughter, Sophie, came out of the womb, she was instantly alert, as if she had been here before. And she was a little disappointed that she was here again.

Humor disarms people. They don't feel threatened.

I don't need anyone to write me a show in my style, I would like to do a show in a style that wasn't my style, because that's the only way I can grow up and grow out.

America is so caught up in this celebrity mania!

I don't like violence. I get sick from violence. Do you think people are excited by violence?

You can feel compassion for others without feeling victimized yourself.

I want to have fun, and I want to give people a good laugh.

We're all divine, but I was the only one who had the nerve to call myself that.

I've forbidden my daughter to have grandchildren, I'm too young.

I've always been lucky enough to have great audiences. It has been quite a life.

Everyone goes through their winters and springs, and their summers and autumns.

As you age, feelings do diminish.

I have a ball - and it keeps my heart rate up. I get to wear fabulous clothes. I get to make people laugh. That's my core business, and that's where I'll always return.

The Internet has changed everything. People will be discovered online. People buy music online. It's a completely different way to get entertainment.