100 Inspiring Quotes about Helping Others in Need

Helping others should come naturally. It shouldn’t be a question of “why should I do it”, but “how can I do it”.

Some people are less fortunate; life is not kind to all of us. While you might be lucky enough to live a comfortable life, others don’t have a roof over their head or food to put on the table. You won’t be able to help everyone in need, but your gesture, no matter how small, will definitely make a difference.

Helping others is not always about giving them money or material things. Some people just need a shoulder to cry on or some good advice. And you don’t necessarily have to be friends with someone to be there for them. This is simply about being human and caring about other people’s well-being.

It really doesn’t matter who you are or how much you have to offer. Be kind just for the sake of it and expect nothing in return.

Here are 100 Quotes about helping others and expecting nothing in return

Quotes about helping others in time of need or through hard times

Always have a willing hand to help someone, you might be the only one that does.

ROY T. BENNETT

Great opportunities to help others seldom come, but small ones surround us every day.

SALLY KOCH

Selfless giving is the art of living.

FREDERIC LENZ

The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the service of others. 

MAHATMA GANDHI

Service to others is the rent you pay for your room here on earth.

MOHAMMAD ALI

You can have everything you want in life if you just help enough people get what they want in life. 

ZIG ZIGLAR

Those who are happiest are those who do the most for others. 

BOOKER T. WASHINGTON

There is no exercise better for the heart than reaching down and lifting people up. 

JOHN HOLMES

The test of a civilization is in the way that it cares for its helpless members.

PEARL S. BUCK

If we always helped one another, no one would need luck. 

SOPHOCLES

If you want happiness for an hour, take a nap. If you want happiness for a day, go fishing. If you want happiness for a year, inherit a fortune. If you want happiness for a lifetime, help somebody.

CHINESE PROVERB

While earning your daily bread, be sure you share a slice with those less fortunate.

JACKSON BROWN JR.

The small charity that comes from the heart is better than the great charity that comes from the head.

IVAN PANIN

No one is useless in this world who lightens the burdens of another. 

CHARLES DICKENS

In charity there is no excess.

FRANCIS BACON

Is the rich world aware of how four billion of the six billion live? If we were aware, we would want to help out, we’d want to get involved.

BILL GATES

A benefactor is a representative of God.

BENJAMIN WHICHCOTE

There is a natural law, a Divine law, that obliges you and me to relieve the suffering, the distressed and the destitute.

CONRAD HILTON

Charity is injurious unless it helps the recipient to become independent of it.

JOHN D. ROCKEFELLER

Our prime purpose in this life is to help others and if you can’t help them, at least don’t hurt them. 

DALAI LAMA

One of the most important things you can do on this earth is to let people know they are not alone. 

SHANNON L. ALDER

If you are truly concerned about helping people and creating value for them in your business and life. God will take care of you, and the universe will reward you. 

BERNARD KELVIN CLIVE

Let the echo of your footsteps spark a ray of hope in the heart of the hopeless and appear as help to the helpless. 

ABHIJIT NASKAR

You have not lived today until you have done something for someone who can never repay you.

JOHN BUNYAN

I feel that if you are blessed, or lucky enough, to be doing well, you should help others.

LAURELL K. HAMILTON

To me, there are saints every day. They stand up and help others and live for others and do things for others. 

THEODORE MELFI

Helping others is a good effort to instill human dignity.  

GIFT GUGU MONA

The first question which the priest and the Levite asked was: ‘If I stop to help this man, what will happen to me?’ But…the good Samaritan reversed the question: ‘If I do not stop to help this man, what will happen to him?'

MARTIN LUTHER KING JR.

Help others and give something back. I guarantee you will discover that while public service improves the lives and the world around you, its greatest reward is the enrichment and new meaning it will bring your own life.

ARNOLD SCHWARZENEGGER (more Arnold Schwarzenegger quotes)

Want to keep Christ in Christmas? Feed the hungry, clothe the naked, forgive the guilty, welcome the unwanted, care for the ill, love your enemies, and do unto others as you would have done unto you.

STEVE MARABOLI

When you learn, teach. When you get, give.

MAYA ANGELOU

When you reach out to those in need, do not be surprised if the essential meaning of something occurs. 

STEPHEN RICHARDS

Only by giving are you able to receive more than you already have.

JIM ROHN

Never look down on anybody unless you’re helping him up.

REV. JESSE JACKSON

The degree of loving is measured by the degree of giving.

EDWIN LOUIS COLE

If you have much, give of your wealth; if you have little, give of your heart.

PROVERB

Remember that the happiest people are not those getting more, but those giving more.

ROBIN SHARMA

Find out how much God has given you and from it take what you need; the remainder is needed by others. 

SAINT AUGUSTINE

Every shine which destroys the darkness of others is a holy shine!  

MEHMET MURAT ILDAN

To ease another’s heartache is to forget one’s own.

ABRAHAM LINCOLN

Everyone can be great, because everyone can serve.

MARTIN LUTHER KING JR.

Quotes about helping others who don't appreciate it

Some won't appreciate you no matter how much you do for them. Release yourself. Go where you're appreciated and understood.

ROBERT TEW

There is no use whatever trying to help people who do not help themselves. You cannot push anyone up a ladder unless he is willing to climb himself.

 ANDREW CARNEGIE

A lack of appreciation and respect can be a sad end to many wonderful relationships. 

BERNAJOY VAAL

Sometimes, we may discover we helped the wrong person, but that should not be a reason to stop helping other people in need, even though we were fooled previously.

NICO J. GENES

A kind gesture can reach a wound that only compassion can heal. 

STEVE MARABOLI

You can be the nicest person, try your best to please everyone, but at the end of the day all your efforts still go unappreciated! 

RASHIDA ROWE

Sometimes you'll give your all to someone, and they won't appreciate you. That's life. Just don't become bitter because of it. 

SONYA PARKER

Anything acquired without effort, and without cost is generally unappreciated. 

NAPOLEON HILL

We can't be afraid to dismiss the unappreciative. 

DOMINIC RICCITELLO

People don’t remember the million times you’ve helped them, only the one time you don’t.

UNKNOWN

Life is too short to waste your time on people who don’t respect, appreciate, and value you.

ROY T. BENNETT

Hell is full of the ungrateful.

SPANISH PROVERB

The wicked are always ungrateful.

MIGUEL DE CERVANTES

If you help the same person too many times. They’ll start believing that you are obliged to help them and become ungrateful.

UNKNOWN

Be nice to people… maybe it’ll be unappreciated, unreciprocated, or ignored, but spread the love anyway. We rise by lifting others. 

GERMANY KENT

Quotes about helping others before yourself

When you become detached mentally from yourself and concentrate on helping other people with their difficulties, you will be able to cope with your own more effectively. Somehow, the act of self-giving is a personal power-releasing factor.

NORMAN VINCENT PEALE

Set your heart on doing good. Do it over and over again, and you will be filled with joy.

BUDDHA

There is nothing more beautiful than someone who goes out of their way to make life beautiful for others.

MANDY HALE

Real living is living for others.

BRUCE LEE (more Bruce Lee quotes)

When we help ourselves, we find moments of happiness. When we help others, we find lasting fulfillment.

SIMON SINEK (more Simon Sinek quotes)

Not he who has much is rich but he who gives much.

ERICH FROMM

There are those who give with joy, and that joy is their reward.

KHALIL GIBRAN

Since you get more joy out of giving joy to others, you should put a good deal of thought into the happiness that you are able to give.

ELEANOR ROOSEVELT

To do more for the world than the world does for you, that is success.

HENRY FORD

I slept and dreamt that life was joy. I awoke and saw that life was service. I acted and behold, service was joy.

RABINDRANATH TAGORE

Ask not what I can get more from others, but instead what gift I have that can better help serve others more. 

DAVID VOSBURG

And if you must measure your success do it not by what you have gained personally but what you have contributed to a wider benefit. 

RASHEED OGUNLARU

If you knew what I know about the power of giving, you would not let a single meal pass without sharing it in some way.

BUDDHA

We are not put on this earth for ourselves, but are placed here for each other. If you are there always for others, then in time of need, someone will be there for you.

JEFF WARNER

The good we secure for ourselves is precarious and uncertain until it is secured for all of us and incorporated into our common life.

JANE ADDAMS

Life engenders life. Energy creates energy. It is by spending oneself that one becomes rich.

SARAH BERNHARDT

It’s good to be blessed. It’s better to be a blessing.

JERRY SMITH

An effort made for the happiness of others lifts us above ourselves.

LYDIA M. CHILD

Quotes about helping others from Mother Teresa

Spread love everywhere you go. Let no one ever come to you without leaving happier.

MOTHER TERESA

We ourselves feel that what we are doing is just a drop in the ocean. But the ocean would be less because of that missing drop.

MOTHER TERESA

Not all of us can do great things. But we can do small things with great love.

MOTHER TERESA

If you can’t feed a hundred people, then feed just one.

MOTHER TERESA

Kind words can be short and easy to speak, but their echoes are truly endless.

MOTHER TERESA

We shall never know all the good that a simple smile can do.

MOTHER TERESA

I want you to be concerned about your next-door neighbor. Do you know your next-door neighbor?

MOTHER TERESA

It’s not how much we give but how much love we put into giving.

MOTHER TERESA

Love is not patronizing and charity isn’t about pity, it is about love. Charity and love are the same — with charity you give love, so don’t just give money but reach out your hand instead.

MOTHER TERESA

At the end of life we will not be judged by how many diplomas we have received, how much money we have made, how many great things we have done. We will be judged by I was hungry, and you gave me something to eat, I was naked and you clothed me. I was homeless, and you took me in.

MOTHER TERESA

Quotes about helping others and making a difference

The purpose of life is not to be happy. It is to be useful, to be honorable, to be compassionate, to have it make some difference that you have lived and lived well.

RALPH WALDO EMERSON

It’s the action, not the fruit of the action, that’s important. You have to do the right thing. It may not be in your power, may not be in your time, that there’ll be any fruit. But that doesn’t mean you stop doing the right thing. You may never know what results come from your action. But if you do nothing, there will be no result.

MAHATMA GANDHI

The purpose of life is to contribute in some way to making things better.

ROBERT F. KENNEDY

The work an unknown good man has done is like a vein of water flowing hidden underground, secretly making the ground green. 

THOMAS CARLYLE

I am only one, but I am one. I cannot do everything, but I can do something. And I will not let what I cannot do interfere with what I can do.

EDWARD EVERETT HALE

Kindness can transform someone’s dark moment with a blaze of light. You’ll never know how much your caring matters. Make a difference for another today.

AMY LEIGH MERCREE

This is the only perfection there is, the perfection of helping others. This is the only thing we can do that has any lasting meaning. This is why we’re here. To make each other feel safe. 

ANDRE AGASSI

Only a life lived for others is a life worthwhile. 

ALBERT EINSTEIN

In a gentle way, you can shake the world.

MAHATMA GANDHI

We rise by lifting others. 

ROBERT INGERSOLL

Giving is not just about making a donation. It is about making a difference.

KATHY CALVIN

At the end it’s not about what you have or even what you’ve accomplished. It’s about who you’ve lifted up, who you’ve made better. It’s about what you’ve given back.

DENZEL WASHINGTON

I cannot do all the good that the world needs. But the world needs all the good that I can do.

JANA STANFIELD

I don’t want to live in the kind of world where we don’t look out for each other. Not just the people that are close to us, but anybody who needs a helping hand. I cant change the way anybody else thinks, or what they choose to do, but I can do my bit. 

CHARLES DE LINT

When you do nothing, you feel overwhelmed and powerless. But when you get involved, you feel the sense of hope and accomplishment that comes from knowing you are working to make things better. 

PAULINE R. KEZER

What we have done for ourselves alone dies with us; what we have done for others and the world remains and is immortal.

ALBERT PIKE