Trevor Noah is a South African comedian, a television host and a political commentator. He currently the host of an American satirical news program called The Daily Show. In 2002 he started his career as a comedian and presenter in South Africa. Subsequently he became the host of many other shows in South Africa.
After Noah attained international success in standup comedy, he started appearing on English panel shows and American late night talk shows.
Here are some of his inspiring quotes.
Inspiring Trevor Noah Quotes
“America was a thing I saw on TV – that wasn’t a real world. That wasn’t within my realm of dreaming.” – Trevor Noah
“As an outsider myself, I always mixed myself with different groups…I’ve never been afraid to go into a different space and relate to those people, because I don’t have a place where I belong and that means I belong everywhere.” – Trevor Noah
“Being chosen is the greatest gift you can give to another human being.” – Trevor Noah
“But the real world doesn’t go away. Racism exists. People are getting hurt. And just because it’s not happening to you, doesn’t mean it’s not happening.” – Trevor Noah
“Comedy is a great tool. We are trying to find ways to use humor to enlighten people without preaching to them.”
– Trevor Noah
“Don’t cry about your past. Life is full of pain. Let the pain sharpen you, but don’t hold on to it. Don’t be bitter.” – Trevor Noah
“Growing up in a home of abuse, you struggle with the notion that you can love a person you hate or hate a person you love. It’s a strange feeling.” – Trevor Noah
“I don’t think I have thick skin, but I heal fast. It’s easy to break through, but I heal fast.” – Trevor Noah
“Often, people who can do, don’t because they’re afraid of what people that can’t do will say about them doing.” – Trevor Noah
“I like the anonymity, the fact that you’re a stranger making strangers laugh. You aren’t forcing them to laugh – it’s involuntary, and that’s when they give the most honest response.” – Trevor Noah
“I was born in South Africa during apartheid, a system of laws that made it illegal for people to mix in South Africa. And this was obviously awkward because I grew up in a mixed family. My mother’s a black woman, South African Xhosa woman… and my father’s Swiss, from Switzerland.” – Trevor Noah
“I’m not an abrasive person. I do speak my mind, but my goal is never to offend. I don’t intentionally want to strike a chord.”
– Trevor Noah
“I’ve always been a fan of issues around race and racialism, and I’ve loved playing with it. People act as though it isn’t an issue, but it’s a recurring theme in our lives globally.” – Trevor Noah
“If you laugh with somebody, then you share something.” – Trevor Noah
“If this comedy thing doesn’t work out, I’ve always got poverty to fall back on.” – Trevor Noah
“Progression, in my opinion, is often identifying shortcomings – whether it’s views or the things you’re doing in your life, your relationships – and trying to find the places where you improve on those.” – Trevor Noah
“The first purpose of comedy is to make people laugh. Anything deeper is a bonus. Some comedians want to make people laugh and make them think about socially relevant issues, but comedy, by the very nature of the word, is to make people laugh. If people aren’t laughing, it’s not a comedy. It’s as simple as that.” – Trevor Noah
“Love, unfortunately, sometimes gives you the ability to forgive somebody and blind yourself to the truth.”
– Trevor Noah
“The first thing I learned about having money was that it gives you choices. People don’t want to be rich. They want to be able to choose. The richer you are, the more choices you have. That is the freedom of money.” – Trevor Noah
“The truth is, people, don’t know me. When people don’t know you, they’re going to try to get to know you as quickly as possible, because you’re now taking the place of somebody that they love dearly, or somebody that they hate sincerely, and so they need to know who you are.” – Trevor Noah
“Language, even more than color, defines who you are to people.” – Trevor Noah
“We get angry about the small things sometimes, I feel so that we feel like we’re doing something so that we don’t have to tackle the big things. And it’s fine; let people do that. But I’m not gonna now change because of that. Do you know? Like, the worst thing that happens to me is you don’t like me. And then what?” – Trevor Noah
“We live in a world where we don’t see the ramifications of what we do to others because we don’t live with them.” – Trevor Noah
“We spend so much time being afraid of failure, afraid of rejection. But regret is the thing we should fear most.”
– Trevor Noah
“When you are honest in your comedy, you have to acknowledge the world that you’re in. Through a comedic voice, you’re talking about what needs to be talked about, whether it’s race relations or politics or anything that’s happening on a global or an American scale.” – Trevor Noah
“You want to live in a world where someone is good or bad. Where you either hate them or love them. But that’s not how people are.” – Trevor Noah
“You have to work a bit harder to offend me because I’m from the home of some of the best racism in the world. I’m a snob when it comes to racism.” – Trevor Noah
“You’ll have a few bruises and they’ll remind you of what happened and that’s okay. But after a while, the bruises fade and they fade for a reason. Because now, it’s time to get up to some s**t again.” – Trevor Noah
“Love, unfortunately, sometimes gives you the ability to forgive somebody and blind yourself to the truth.”
– Trevor Noah
“As an outsider myself, I always mixed myself with different groups…I’ve never been afraid to go into a different space and relate to those people, because I don’t have a place where I belong and that means I belong everywhere.” – Trevor Noah
