60 Famous Quotes by Johnny Cash on Love and Life

Known for his calming bass-baritone voice, Johnny Cash (February 26, 1932 – September 12, 2003), is considered one of the best country music singers and best-selling music artists of all times.

Cash grew up in a poor farming community and spent more than 15 years working in cotton fields alongside his family to pay off their debts. The future artist didn’t have an easy life, but music was one of the ways that helped him deal with all the hardships.

He began writing songs at the age of 12 and later formed a group with a couple of friends. Cash used to play on an old $5 guitar before reaching true fame. In 1956, he wrote and released I Walk the Line -- a song that became number one on the country music charts.

In the 1960s, Cash’s career was almost destroyed by a serious substance-abuse problem. Luckily, his second wife, June Carter helped him refocus and get back on track.

In 2005, the story of Johnny Cash’s life and career was made into a feature film -- Walk the Line -- starring Joaquin Phoenix and Reese Witherspoon.

Here Are 60 Famous Quotes by Johnny Cash Songs on Love, Life and... Coffee

Johnny Cash quotes about love

All your life, you will be faced with a choice. You can choose love or hate… I choose love.

Follow your heart. That's what I do. Compassion is something I have a lot of, because I've been through a lot of pain in my life. Anybody who has suffered a lot of pain has a lot of compassion.

Happiness is being at peace, being with loved ones, being comfortable... but most of all, it's having those loved ones.

Six foot six he stood on the ground He weighed two hundred and thirty-five pounds But I saw that giant of a man brought down to his knees by love.

Somehow there’s been an immediate bonding between total strangers. We share each other’s triumphs, and when one of us gets hurt, we all bleed -- it’s corny, I know, but it’s true.

Loneliness is emptiness, but happiness is you.

Life and love go on, let the music play.

Johnny Cash quotes about life

Life is the question and life is the answer, and God is the reason and love is the way.

There’s no more simple life with simple choices for the young.

Life is rough so you gotta be tough.

You build on failure. You use it as a stepping stone. Close the door on the past. You don't try to forget the mistakes, but you don't dwell on it. You don't let it have any of your energy, or any of your time, or any of your space.

The things that have always been important: to be a good man, to try to live my life the way God would have me, to turn it over to Him that His will might be worked in my life, to do my work without looking back, to give it all I've got, and to take pride in my work as an honest performer.

I’m not bitter. Why should I be bitter? I’m thrilled to death with life.

God gives us life and takes us away as He sees fit.

There’s no way around grief and loss: you can dodge all you want, but sooner or later you just have to go into it, through it, and, hopefully, come out the other side.

I took the easy way, and to an extent I regret that. Still, though, the way we did it was honest. We played it and sang it the way we felt it, and there’s a lot to be said for that.

If this were a movie, I’d be the bad guy.

I learn from my mistakes. It’s a very painful way to learn, but without pain, the old saying is, there’s no gain.

How well I have learned that there is no fence to sit on between heaven and hell. There is a deep, wide gulf, a chasm, and in that chasm is no place for any man.

If you don’t get outside every day, even for a minute, you have not appreciated what God has done. It makes you grateful for our surroundings, and it starts your day differently.

You miss a lot of opportunities by making mistakes, but that’s part of it: knowing that you’re not shut out forever, and that there’s a goal you still can reach.

The world you find there will never be the same as the world you left.

The only really frightening thing about Cinnamon Hill belongs in the realm of the living and serves to remind me that some of them – just a few of them, a tiny minority-are much more dangerous than all the dead put together.

It’s good to know who hates you and it is good to be hated by the right people.

Famous Johnny Cash quotes

Success is having to worry about every damn thing in the world, except money.

People call me wild. Not really though, I’m not. I guess I’ve never been normal, not what you call Establishment. I’m country.

If you aren’t gonna say exactly how and what you feel, you might as well not say anything at all.

You’ve got to know your limitations. I don’t know what your limitations are. I found out what mine were when I was twelve. I found out that there weren’t too many limitations, if I did it my way.

You have to be what you are. Whatever you are, you gotta be it.

You can ask the people around me. I don’t give up. I don’t give up… and it’s not out of frustration and desperation that I say I don’t give up. I don’t give up because I don’t give up. I don’t believe in it.

There’s a lot of things blamed on me that never happened. But then, there’s a lot of things that I did that I never got caught at.

We’re all in this together if we’re in it at all.

It makes me so mad that some people underestimate the wisdom and energy of young people. All because they don’t look the way older folks think they should look. 

Sometimes I can sow a seed. And post-hole diggers and seed sowers are mighty important in the building of the Kingdom.

I don’t believe there are any people on earth who, properly sheltered, don’t feel the peace inside a summer rain and the cleansing it brings, the renewal of the earth in its aftermath.

Johnny Cash quotes from songs

The day you went away, I made myself a promise/ That I’d soon forget the day we met/ But something sure went wrong, for I’m so blue and lonely/ I forgot, to remember, to forget.

I FORGOT TO REMEMBER TO FORGET

Yeah, the ones that you're calling wild/ Are going to be the leaders in a little while.

WHAT IS TRUTH

When I was just a baby/ My Mama told me, ‘Son, always be a good boy. Don't ever play with guns’/ But I shot a man in Reno/ Just to watch him die/ When I hear that whistle blowin'/ I hang my head and cry.

FOLSOM PRISON BLUES

Let me tell you, Mr. teacher when you say you’ll make me right, in five hundred years of fighting not one Indian turned white.

DRUMS

I keep a close watch on this heart of mine. I keep my eyes wide open all the time. I keep the ends out for the tie that binds because you’re mine, I walk the line.

I WALK THE LINE

I wear the black for the poor and the beaten down, Livin’ in the hopeless, hungry side of town. I wear it for the prisoner who has long paid for his crime, but is there because he’s a victim of the times.

MAN IN BLACK

Money can't buy back your youth when you're old/ A friend, when you're lonely, or peace to your soul./ The wealthiest person is a pauper at times/ Compared to the man with a satisfied mind.

SATISFIED MIND

A rose looks grey at midnight but the flame is just asleep/ And steel is strong because it knew the hammer and white heat.

THESE THINGS SHALL PASS

You’re so heavenly minded, you’re no earthly good.

NO EARTHLY GOOD

Well you may throw your rock and hide your hand. Workin’ in the dark against your fellow man. But as sure as God made black and white, what’s down in the dark will be brought to the light.

GOD’S GONNA CUT YOU DOWN

The beast in me is caged by frail and fragile bars.

THE BEAST IN ME

Well, I’d love to wear a rainbow every day, and tell the world that everything’s okay. But I’ll try to carry off a little darkness on my back. ‘Til things are brighter, I’m the man in black.

MAN IN BLACK

Beneath the stains of time the feeling disappears, you are someone else, I am still right here.

HURT

For you I know I’d even try to turn the tide.  

I WALK THE LINE

Flesh and blood needs flesh and blood, and you’re the one I need  

FLESH AND BLOOD

Johnny Cash quotes about June

This morning, with her, having coffee.

(WHEN ASKED FOR HIS DEFINITION ABOUT PARADISE)

The fire and excitement may be gone now that we don’t go out there and sing anymore, but the ring of fire still burns around you and I, keeping our love hotter than a pepper sprout.

There’s unconditional love there. You hear that phrase a lot, but it’s real with me and her.

She loves me in spite of everything, in spite of myself. She has saved my life more than once. She’s always been there with her love, and it has certainly made me forget the pain for a long time, many times.

You still fascinate and inspire me… You’re the object of my desire, the number one Earthly reason for my existence. I love you very much.

We fell madly in love and we worked together all the time, and when the tour was over we both had to go home to other people. It hurt.

Because you are mine, I walk the line.

The taste of love is sweet when heart like ours meet.

We’re soulmates, friends and lovers, and everything else that makes a happy marriage. Our hearts are attuned to each other, and we’re very close.

When it gets dark and everybody’s gone home and the lights are turned off, it’s just me and her.

She’s the greatest woman I have ever known. Nobody else, except my mother, comes close.