100+ Iconic Shonda Rhimes Quotes & Sayings (2024)

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August 10th, 2022

100+ Iconic Shonda Rhimes Quotes & Sayings (2024)

Shonda Lynn Rhimes is an American screenwriter, director, and producer.

Rhimes is best known as the creator, head writer, executive producer, and showrunner of the popular American medical drama series, Grey's Anatomy.

Shonda has written back-to-back pioneering tv shows for the ABC Network and was called the queen of ABC's Thursday night prime-time squad. She revolutionized the art of writing & directing television series and has proved herself to be one of the most successful screenwriters, producers, and best showrunner of her time.

We've put together an incredible collection of the best Shonda Rhimes quotes to read.

Here they are:

Inspiring Shonda Rhimes Quotes

People really do not like it when you decide to step off the road and climb the mountain instead. It seems to make even the people who mean well nervous. - Shonda Rhimes

There is victory in surrender. - Shonda Rhimes

Volunteer for some hours. Focus on something outside yourself. Devote a slice of your energies toward making the world suck less every week. - Shonda Rhimes

The air you are breathing right now is rare air. Appreciate it. And don’t be an asshole. - Shonda Rhimes

The only obstacle to your success is your own imagination. - Shonda Rhimes

Standing around like Wonder Woman in the morning can make people think you are more amazing at lunchtime. Crazy. But true. How awesome is that? - Shonda Rhimes

You know what I am? I am smart, I am talented, I take advantage of the opportunities that come my way and I work really, really hard. Don’t call me lucky. Call me a badass. - Shonda Rhimes

Happiness comes from living as you need to, as you want to. As your inner voice tells you to. Happiness comes from being who you actually are instead of who you think you are supposed to be. - Shonda Rhimes

If you want crappy things to stop happening to you, then stop accepting crap and demand something more. - Shonda Rhimes

If I don't poke my head out of my shell and show people who I am, all anyone will ever think I am is my shell. - Shonda Rhimes

Not a single woman in the room could handle being told, You’re awesome. I couldn’t handle being told I am awesome. What in the hell is wrong with us? - Shonda Rhimes

It’s not bragging if you can back it up, I whisper to myself in the shower every morning. That is my favorite Muhammad Ali quote. If you ask me, Ali invented a modern-day swagger. - Shonda Rhimes

Sometimes the toilet paper does not win. Sometimes a broke woman needs red wine more. - Shonda Rhimes

Badassery, I’m discovering, is a new level of confidence—in both yourself and those around you. - Shonda Rhimes

Everything sounds like crap until you are in the right mindset. - Shonda Rhimes

Marriage is a financial partnership. Marriage has nothing to do with love. Love is a choice we can make every day. - Shonda Rhimes

Wonder Woman is not faking it. Wonder Woman means it. Wonder Woman is all swagger and badassery. Compliment. - Shonda Rhimes

I am never more sure of myself about a topic than when I have absolutely no experience with it. - Shonda Rhimes

Losing yourself does not happen all at once. Losing yourself happens one no at a time. - Shonda Rhimes

When you sit down to write every day, it becomes easier and easier to tap into that creative space inside your mind. - Shonda Rhimes

Your body is yours. My body is mine. No one's body is up for comment. No matter how small, how large, how curvy, how flat. If you love you, then I love you. - Shonda Rhimes

I don’t have Alzheimer’s. I’m just old. Pour one out for my youth. - Shonda Rhimes

I was born with an awesome vagina and really gorgeous brown skin. I didn't do anything to make either of those things happen. To get all Beyonce about it, people I woke up like this. - Shonda Rhimes

The need for change bulldozed a road down the center of my mind. - Shonda Rhimes

So when you negate someone’s compliment, you are telling them they are wrong. You’re telling them they wasted their time. You are questioning their taste and judgment. - Shonda Rhimes

I am different. I am an original. And like everyone else, I am here to take up space in the universe. - I am different. I am an original. And like everyone else, I am here to take up space in the universe. - Shonda Rhimes

I've started to think we are like mirrors. What you are gets reflected back to you. What you see in yourself, you may see in others, and what others see in you, they may see in themselves. - Shonda Rhimes

I have spent years having a totally fulfilling, completely awesome friendship with a person who is only a stand-in for a figment of my imagination. - Shonda Rhimes

I can't wait to find out who I will be when next Thanksgiving rolls around. - Shonda Rhimes

Being aware of your crap and actually overcoming your crap are two very different things. - Shonda Rhimes

That never would have happened if I hadn’t stopped dreaming of becoming her and gotten busy becoming myself. - Shonda Rhimes

I am smart, I am talented, I take advantage of the opportunities that come my way and I work really, really hard. Don’t call me lucky. Call me a badass. - Shonda Rhimes

I am on my own mountain standing in my own sun. - Shonda Rhimes

See, I am an introvert. Deep. To the bone. My marrow is introvert marrow. My snot is introvert snot. - Shonda Rhimes

Powerful Shonda Rhimes Quotes

We all spend our lives kicking the crap out of ourselves for not being this way or that way, not having this thing or that thing, not being like this person or that person. - Shonda Rhimes

The feminist in me didn’t want to have the discussion with myself. I resented the need to talk about weight. It felt as though I was judging myself on how I looked. It felt shallow. - Shonda Rhimes

It is time to stop standing at the edges of rooms. Hugging the walls. Living in my head. Wishing I had something to say. - Shonda Rhimes

I’m the one who spills. Who trips? Who drops? I once accidentally flung a chicken bone across the room at a very elegant cocktail party while trying to make a point. - Shonda Rhimes

Happy, whole people are drawn to happy, whole people, but nothing makes a toxic person more miserable and destructive than a happy, whole person. - Shonda Rhimes

I am on the list but I am not on the list. - Shonda Rhimes

Remind me to start a revolution about that later. - Shonda Rhimes

This is who I am. Silent. Quiet. Interior. More comfortable with books than new situations. - Shonda Rhimes

You just have to keep moving forward. - Shonda Rhimes

Every single writer I met likened writing for television to one thing laying track for an oncoming speeding train. - Shonda Rhimes

Let me describe myself as a kid: highly intelligent, way too chubby, incredibly sensitive, nerdy, and painfully shy. - Shonda Rhimes

You're alive. You're living. Some people never do that. - Shonda Rhimes

We can choose to be afraid of it, to stand there trembling not moving, assuming the worst that can happen or we can step forward into the unknown and assume it will be brilliant. - Shonda Rhimes

I can experience life or I can give up on it. - Shonda Rhimes

Now, I'm no longer looking for the enemy. So I no longer see the enemy. - Shonda Rhimes

You can wake up one day and find that you are interesting and powerful and engaged. - Shonda Rhimes

We are only on the edge of change. There is still so much more work to be done. I'm going to accept this award as encouragement and not as an accomplishment. I don't think the job is finished yet. - Shonda Rhimes

My own special formula involved red wine. And buttered popcorn. - Shonda Rhimes

Being a mother brings us face-to-face with ourselves as children, with our mothers as human beings, with our darkest fears of who we really are. - Shonda Rhimes

Any actual parts of me, anything real, anything human, anything honest, I kept to myself. I was a very good girl. I did what everyone needed me to do. - Shonda Rhimes

A lady never shows her soul outside the boudoir. - Shonda Rhimes

I mean that I am going to miss Cristina Yang so much that my heart hurts. - Shonda Rhimes

It’s like surgery. You can’t close the patient’s chest until you’ve found the wound and operated on it. The problem is the open chest, the wound is the challenge and the YES is the operation. - Shonda Rhimes

I was baptized Catholic but I was Church of Oprah. If you are a person on. - Shonda Rhimes

Being a mother is incredibly important. To the naysayers, I growl, do not diminish it by calling it a job. - Shonda Rhimes

Hate diminishes, love expands. - Shonda Rhimes

To them, it is a journey that has twists, turns, bumps, and possibly detours, but no end. There are no exit ramps. And they don’t care. They are too busy having fun. - Shonda Rhimes

Every yes changes something in me. Every yes is a bit more transformative. Every yes sparks some new phase of the revolution. - Shonda Rhimes

It irritated me to my core that we live in an era of ignorance great enough that it was still necessary for me to be a role model, but that didn't change the fact that I was one. - Shonda Rhimes

I grew up with a front-row seat to what a happy, healthy marriage looks like. Never perfect, constantly evolving, always united. - Shonda Rhimes

A hashtag is not a movement. - Shonda Rhimes

The insides of my brain are fading photographs, stories, and images drifting away to places unknown. Leaving patches of nothingness where a name or an event or a location should be. - Shonda Rhimes

Saying yes . . . saying yes is courage. Saying yes is the sun. Saying yes is life. - Shonda Rhimes

Favorite Shonda Rhimes Quotes

My destiny rides squarely on the back of my imagination. - Shonda Rhimes

I don’t think it ever occurred to me before how much and how often women are praised for displaying traits that basically render them invisible. - Shonda Rhimes

Fatherhood is being redefined at a lightning-fast rate. You don’t want to be a dinosaur. - Shonda Rhimes

keeps his tone soothingly soft, the mellow tones of a psychiatric nurse, as he informs me that I will have to give a speech. Then he waits for me to freak out. This speech is not yours. - Shonda Rhimes

A lot of people dream, and while they are busy dreaming, the powerful, engaged people? Are busy doing? - Shonda Rhimes

before kids, my confidence could not be dented. Now it’s shattered on a daily basis. I don’t know what I am doing. - Shonda Rhimes

They met on a blind date. It must have been an incredible blind date. It seems to have never ended. - Shonda Rhimes

Standing around like Wonder Woman in the morning can make people think you are more amazing at lunchtime. - Shonda Rhimes

I make a rule that I will not work on Saturday or Sunday unless it’s an emergency or unless the show is filming. - Shonda Rhimes

The one thing I have learned is that I don't know ANYTHING. - Shonda Rhimes

Whenever you see me somewhere succeeding in one area of my life, that almost certainly means that I am failing in another area of my life. - Shonda Rhimes

In their world, mothers work. And I am a better mother for it. - Shonda Rhimes

So when you negate someone’s compliment, you are telling them they are wrong. You’re telling them they wasted their time. You are questioning their taste and judgment. You are insulting them. - Shonda Rhimes

My kids are not my friends. They are my children. My goal is not to get them to like me. My goal is to raise citizens. - Shonda Rhimes

The only limit to your success is your own imagination. - Shonda Rhimes

Ditch the dream and be a doer. - Shonda Rhimes

You can waste your lives drawing lines. Or you can live your life crossing them. - Shonda Rhimes

Dreams are lovely. But they are just dreams. Fleeting, ephemeral, pretty. But dreams do not come true just because you dream them. It’s hard work that makes things happen. It’s hard work that creates change. - Shonda Rhimes

You are not alone. You are seen. I am with you. You are not alone. - Shonda Rhimes

The expected is what keeps us steady. It’s the unexpected that changes our lives forever. - Shonda Rhimes

I think a lot of people dream. And while they are busy dreaming, the really happy people, the really successful people, the really interesting, engaged, powerful people, are busy doing. - Shonda Rhimes

At some point, you have to make a decision. Boundaries don’t keep other people out. They fence you in. Life is messy. That’s how we’re made. So, you can waste your lives drawing lines. Or you can live your life crossing them. - Shonda Rhimes

Nobody got anything great by playing it safe. - Shonda Rhimes

Mother is a verb, not a noun. - Shonda Rhimes

I happen to like debating, and I like to debate like a lawyer, and I can argue any points to death, and I will. - Shonda Rhimes

Boundaries don’t keep other people out, they fence you in. - Shonda Rhimes

I am not lucky. Do you know what I am? I am smart, I am talented, I take advantage of the opportunities that come my way and I work really, really hard. Don’t call me lucky. Call me a badass. - Shonda Rhimes

Whenever you see me somewhere succeeding in one area of my life, that almost certainly means I am failing in another area of my life. - Shonda Rhimes

Perfect is boring and dreams are not real. Just do. So you think, “I wish I could travel.” Great. Sell your crappy car, buy a ticket to Bangkok, and go. Right now. I’m serious. - Shonda Rhimes

When people show you who they are, believe them. I carry that with me a lot. It has served me well. - Shonda Rhimes

Famous Shonda Rhimes Quotes

Mother is not a title. Mother is a verb. It is not who you are. It’s what you do. - Shonda Rhimes

Cynicism is a choice. Optimism is a better choice. - Shonda Rhimes

Do you know who you are? Do you understand what has happened to you? Do you want to live this way? - Shonda Rhimes

Nobody ever asks a man how he gets stuff done. Nobody asks a man how he finds balance. - Shonda Rhimes

I remember saying, very almost jokingly, I’m going to take over the world through television, that’s my plan. And I said it to my agent, and I said it to my friends, and I said it to myself. u do. - Shonda Rhimes

Don’t let what he wants to eclipse what you need. He is very dreamy, she says But he is not the sun. You are. - Shonda Rhimes

If I don’t poke my head out of my shell and show people who I am, all anyone will ever think I am is my shell. - Shonda Rhimes

Making it through the ceiling to the other side was simply a matter of running on a path created by every other woman’s footprints. - Shonda Rhimes

Happiness comes from being who you actually are instead of who you think you are supposed to be. - Shonda Rhimes

I am terrible with examples. I can never think of them when anybody asks for an example. - Shonda Rhimes

Most of the women I saw on TV didn’t seem like people I actually knew. They felt like ideas of what women are. - Shonda Rhimes

A hashtag is not helping. A hashtag is not a movement. A hashtag does not make you Dr. King. A hashtag does not change anything. It’s a hashtag. - Shonda Rhimes

Shonda, how do you do it all? The answer is this: I don’t. Whenever you see me somewhere succeeding in one area of my life, that almost certainly means that I am failing in another area of my life. - Shonda Rhimes

I don’t understand why people don’t understand that the world of TV should look like the world outside of TV. - Shonda Rhimes

I have learned this is a very long marriage doing a television show. I like the people that I work with to be people I enjoy, so you want to cast people who are as excited and enthusiastic as you are. - Shonda Rhimes

I’m a black woman every day, and I’m not confused about that. I’m not worried about that. I don’t need to have a discussion with you about how I feel as a black woman, because I don’t feel disempowered as a black woman. - Shonda Rhimes

I really don’t think there’s a world in which you can do anything with anybody. Because we’re in the world of the White House, I think there are certain things you can do, and larger things that can happen, but I don’t think you can do anything. - Shonda Rhimes

You can’t tell stories and really walk in someone’s shoes and not have a love for them, even if they’re doing horrible things. - Shonda Rhimes

I never, ever pay attention to the ratings. I stopped paying attention to the ratings somewhere around season two or three of Grey's. It’s something I have no control over, so I don’t even pay attention. - Shonda Rhimes

I was 4 and dictating stories into a tape recorder, and my mom typed them up. - Shonda Rhimes

I can’t wait to find out who I will be when next Thanksgiving rolls around. - Shonda Rhimes

Calling a show a guilty pleasure is like saying I’m embarrassed to say I watch it but I can’t stop. That’s not a compliment. - Shonda Rhimes

I actually like being alone. I spend most evenings reading and taking long baths. - Shonda Rhimes

Don’t call me lucky. Call me a badass. - Shonda Rhimes

This Yes is about giving yourself the permission to shift the focus of what is a priority from what’s good for you over to what makes you feel good. - Shonda Rhimes

I have been saying yes to being fat. Which is WHY I’m now so fat. I’m not a failure; I’m successfully fat. I didn’t let go of the wheel; I just turned the car down the fat road. - Shonda Rhimes

You know what happens when all of your dreams come true? Nothing. I realized a very simple truth: that success, fame, and having all my dreams come true would not fix or improve me, it wasn’t an instant potion for personal growth. - Shonda Rhimes

You have to be okay with being better than everyone else. - Shonda Rhimes

I felt bolstered by their friendship. By their loyalty. By the idea that I had these amazing friends, these members of my tribe, these gladiators at my back. - Shonda Rhimes

Don’t apologize. Don’t explain. Don’t ever feel less than. When you feel the need to apologize or explain who you are, it means the voice in your head is telling you the wrong story. Wipe the slate clean. And rewrite it. - Shonda Rhimes

Now, I’m no longer looking for the enemy. So I no longer see the enemy. - Shonda Rhimes

I’ve started to think we are like mirrors. What you are gets reflected back to you. What you see in yourself, you may see in others, and what others see in you, they may see in themselves. - Shonda Rhimes

Motherhood means I’m always a little bit awake, a little bit alert at all times. - Shonda Rhimes

Cristina Yang was the walking validation of my dreams. - Shonda Rhimes

I don’t even know who someone is until I’ve seen how they handle adversity. - Shonda Rhimes

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Pat Walls

I'm Pat Walls and I created Starter Story - a website dedicated to helping people start businesses. We interview entrepreneurs from around the world about how they started and grew their businesses.

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