Top 10 Best Yoda Quotes

Nine hundred years old, and he still talks backwards. That’s Yoda for you — small, green, and somehow the wisest voice in the entire galaxy.

Here are the ten lines that prove size really has nothing to do with wisdom.

10. On aging “When nine hundred years old you reach, look as good, you will not, hmmm?” Said with a straight face to Luke on Dagobah, right after being mistaken for a random swamp creature. Even Yoda gets to be petty sometimes.

9. On loss “On many long journeys have I gone. And waited, too, for others to return from journeys of their own. Some return; some are broken; some come back so different only their names remain.” From Dark Rendezvous. Not a movie line, but it’s the kind of quiet, sad wisdom that only comes from watching a lot of people you love disappear.

8. On fighting back “To answer power with power, the Jedi way this is not. In this war, a danger there is, of losing who we are.” This one’s from The Clone Wars, and it lands harder the more war Yoda actually sees. He’s not just quoting a rulebook — he’s warning himself too.

7. On choosing a side “To be Jedi is to face the truth, and choose. Give off light, or darkness, Padawan. Be a candle, or the night.” Also from Dark Rendezvous. Strip away the sentence structure and this is basically the entire Jedi philosophy in two lines.

6. On losing without failing “If no mistake have you made, yet losing you are… a different game you should play.” From Shatterpoint. This is Yoda telling you that sometimes the problem isn’t you — it’s the fight you picked.

5. On death and attachment “Death is a natural part of life. Rejoice for those who transform into the Force. Mourn them do not. Miss them do not. Attachment leads to jealousy. The shadow of greed, that is.” Said to Anakin right before everything falls apart. In hindsight, it’s less a comfort and more a warning nobody listened to.

4. On Obi-Wan’s bad day “Lost a planet, Master Obi-Wan has. How embarrassing. How embarrassing.” Pure comic relief in the middle of a war movie. Yoda gets to be funny about once a trilogy, and this is the moment he cashes it in.

3. On effort “No! Try not. Do, or do not. There is no try.” The most quoted line in the entire franchise, and probably the most quoted line from any movie ever made about lifting a swamp-buried X-wing.

2. On fear “Fear is the path to the dark side. Fear leads to anger, anger leads to hate, hate leads to suffering.” Said to a nine-year-old Anakin Skywalker. Knowing how the story ends, this line is basically a prophecy Yoda didn’t realize he was writing.

1. On temptation “When you look at the dark side, careful you must be… for the dark side looks back.” From Dark Rendezvous. It’s the quiet version of “fear leads to suffering” — less warning, more confession. Yoda sounds like someone who’s looked too long himself.

Backwards sentences aside, Yoda never wasted a word. Maybe that’s the real secret — when you’ve got nine hundred years of practice, you learn to say only what matters.