Mae Jemison Quotes

“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

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

— Mae Jemison

“I stayed in the astronaut program until 1993. People ask me why I left. I thought I had a lot of things to contribute that would be difficult to do if I stayed. I thought I could have a stronger voice as an advocate for space exploration. So I ended up starting my own technology consulting company.”

— Mae Jemison

Sometimes people ask me how difficult the astronaut program was, but being in Sierra Leone, being responsible for the health of more than 200 people, seven days a week, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, at age 26 - that prepared me to take on a lot of different challenges.

— 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

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

“I always knew I'd go to space.”

— Mae Jemison

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

— Mae Jemison

“I went to school at night in L.A. to brush up on my engineering while I applied to the astronaut program. I really did not know if I would get in. It was the year after the Challenger accident in 1987.”

— Mae Jemison

“We look at science as something very elite, which only a few people can learn. That's just not true. You just have to start early and give kids a foundation. Kids live up, or down, to expectations.”

— 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

“I think science fiction helps us think about possibilities, to speculate - it helps us look at our society from a different perspective. It lets us look at our mores, using science as the backdrop, as the game changer.”

— 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

Never limit yourself because of others' limited imagination; never limit others because of your own limited imagination.

— Mae Jemison

“You have the right to be involved. You have something important to contribute, and you have to take the risk to contribute it.”

— 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

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

— 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

“Once I got into space, I was feeling very comfortable in the universe. I felt like I had a right to be anywhere in this universe, that I belonged here as much as any speck of stardust, any comet, any planet”

— Mae Jemison

“Sciences provide an understanding of a universal experience, Arts are a universal understanding of a personal experience ... they are both a part of us and a manifestation of the same thing ... the arts and sciences are avatars of human creativity”

— 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

“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

People always think of technology as something having silicon in it. But a pencil is technology. Any language is technology. Technology is a tool we use to accomplish a particular task and when one talks about appropriate technology in developing countries, appropriate may mean anything from fire to solar electricity.

— Mae Jemison

“When God made the color purple, God was just showing off.”

— Mae Jemison

My parents were comfortable with me exploring areas that they were not proficient in. Some parents just aren't comfortable with that.

— Mae Jemison