55 Lightning Quotes For Flashes Of Environmental Inspiration
Lightning is probably one of the most impressive aspects of nature. We watch it in awe when it strikes as the light fills the sky. We often see lightning before thunder strikes because light travels faster than sound. This powerful scenario can sometimes feel scary, but its appearance leaves us in awe. We’ll explore the connotations of lightning quotes that highlight their striking appearance and reflect on their use to inspire ideas.
Lightning is a natural event. It occurs when there’s an imbalance between storm clouds and the ground or where this imbalance occurs within clouds. As a result, an electrical discharge occurs, so we see giant sparks of electricity in the sky.
Lightning comes with bright flashes. When lightning strikes, it also often comes in different colors. We may see blue, purple, orange, white, and a host of other colors. Its electrifying nature is one to explore. This collection of famous quotes will leave you inspired and, possibly, ready to create.
Related read: For more about the weather, you might also like our rain quotes and storm quotes.
Best lightning quotes
Lightning is an exceptional occurrence. It appears quickly, occupying space in the sky and illuminating the night with a flash of light. It creates sudden illumination, giving us something to explore in wonder.
We often experience these light flashes during thunderstorms. Although thunderstorms may not be your favorite event, there’s no denying the powerful appearance of lightning.
There are many quotes and sayings about lightning. Some explore its beauty, while others talk about its effects and the wisdom from a flash of inspiration. There’s a strong contrast between lightning’s beautiful appearance and dangerous impact. Here, we feature some of our favorite lightning quotes.
"Electricity is really just organized lightning."
- George Carlin
"I don't think you can catch lightning in a bottle twice."
- Mark Frost
"I loved watching the base of those thunderstorms, the billowing tops of the cumulonimbus, the lightning that effortlessly lit up the lake and the sky. It was gorgeous, so energetic. I was in love."
- Ginger Zee
"The more brilliant the lightning, the quicker it disappears."
- Avicenna
"My name is Bolt, Lightning Bolt."
- Usain Bolt
Lightning quotes about its awe-inspiring strikes
We can often equate creative processes with the lightning bolt. Just as lightning strikes suddenly, ideas often come similarly. It’s important to keep going regardless of the situation when working towards our goals.
Sometimes, a big break can show up suddenly like a bolt. Such moments can take place when you least expect them. In this section, you get to explore more quotes about lightning bolts.
"Thunder is good, thunder is impressive; but it is lightning that does the work."
- Mark Twain
"The lofty pine is oftenest shaken by the winds; High towers fall with a heavier crash; And the lightning strikes the highest mountain."
- Horace
"Why is the sky blue? Why is the grass green? Why is metal a conductor of electricity, and wood is not, but you're more likely to be struck by lightning when standing under a tree? These are questions that require science to answer."
- Gza
"It is not the roaring thunder that smites, but the silent lightning."
- Ivan Panin
"Global warming is the foreboding thunder in the distance. Ocean acidification is the lightning strike in our front yard, right here, right now."
- David Horsey
"I hate it when storm clouds roll in, heralded by dazzling claps of thunder and lightning that boast an ocean of tears. This majestic performance of bad temper manages to overshadow my pathetic attempts at pouting."
- Richelle E. Goodrich
"With luck, you have other things to do than wait for lightning to strike."
- Paul Lauterbur
"Nothing is so beautiful as spring - when weeds, in wheels, shoot long and lovely and lush; Thrush's eggs look little low heavens, and thrush through the echoing timber does so rinse and wring the ear, it strikes like lightning to hear him sing."
- Gerard Manley Hopkins
"Unfortunately, if you've ever been in southern Georgia on the beaches in a lightning storm, if you're out there, you're in great, great danger, and you can be killed very, very quickly."
- Norman Schwarzkopf
"Might the peasant expect the Almighty to stay the thunder storm, which clears the air of a nation from pestilence, lest the lightning bold should in its flash kill his cow?"
- Benjamin Butler
Lightning quotes referencing its place in nature
As Mark Twain said, “Thunder is good, thunder is impressive; but it is lightning that does the work.” When lightning strikes, it displays impressive colors and causes thunder. As this heats its surroundings, the air expands very fast. This process leads to a shock wave that produces a sound wave we experience as thunder.
Lightning commands attention the moment it strikes and gives us something to examine. Although it hits silently, there’s no denying its commanding and powerful presence. The fascination with this commanding presence leads many people to take photographs of the sky, endeavoring to capture the fleeting moments when lightning strikes. Read on to discover lightning quotes that explore its presence and impact in nature.
"I done wrestled with an alligator, I done tussled with a whale; handcuffed lightning, thrown thunder in jail; only last week, I murdered a rock, injured a stone, hospitalised a brick; I'm so mean I make medicine sick."
- Muhammad Ali
"The difference between the almost right word and the right word is really a large matter - 'tis the difference between the lightning-bug and the lightning."
- Mark Twain
"I am a being of Heaven and Earth, of thunder and lightning, of rain and wind, of the galaxies."
- Eden Ahbez
"Nothing good bursts forth all at once. The lightning may dart out of a black cloud; but the day sends his bright heralds before him, to prepare the world for his coming."
- Augustus Hare
"Mirth is like a flash of lightning, that breaks through a gloom of clouds, and glitters for a moment; cheerfulness keeps up a kind of daylight in the mind, and fills it with a steady and perpetual serenity."
- Joseph Addison
Lightning quotes about danger and strikes
Lightning is spectacular as we examine it from afar. However, a single lightning flash can heat the surrounding air to five times hotter temperatures than the sun's surface. So, as appealing as a lightning strike may look, it’s also extremely dangerous. Its impact can lead to severe burns, memory loss, and cardiac arrest. It’s no surprise then that a lightning strike can also kill.
"There are only three things that can kill a farmer: lightning, rolling over in a tractor, and old age."
- Bill Bryson
"You might get run over; you might get hit by lightning. I mean, who knows? Each day, there is a chance you might die. And there's nothing wrong with that. Every living being on Earth is facing that same existential rift."
- Alex Honnold
"You're more likely to see someone fatally struck by lightning than witness a case of in-person voter fraud."
- Tom Perez
"We want to be able to fly. We want to be able to sear somebody with lightning from across the room. Those are primal desires, to shoot somebody with energy."
- Bill Irwin
"In fact, if you are faced with the prospect of running across an open field in which lightning bolts are going to be a problem, you are much better off if their timing and location are determined by something, since then they may be predictable by you, and hence avoidable."
- Daniel Dennett
"Lightning is something which, again, we would rather avoid."
- Richard Branson
"And when I breathed, my breath was lightning."
- Black Elk
Lightning quotes about life and living
We can reference lightning in many aspects of our lives. One of lightning's most striking lessons is that the silent ones can also be powerful. Lightning appears silently, yet it strikes with such a commanding presence. It’s not always the loudest person in the room that can impact.
Similarly, when courage strikes within us, we can take steps to fulfill our goals and desires. Lightning has inspired many people to build courage, carry out tasks and pursue their goals. Here are some quotes about lightning quotes and nature.
"The cloud of mind is discharging its collected lightning."
- Percy Bysshe Shelley
"When his flame falls, my lightning rises, and so on."
- Victoria Aveyard
"They say marriages are made in Heaven. But so is thunder and lightning."
- Clint Eastwood
"I do believe there are leaders who are like lightning and they come along and they lead. The Lincolns of the world, the Alexander the Greats, they do exist. They have existed."
- Oliver Stone
"I'd rather be a lightning rod than a seismograph."
- Ken Kesey
"The best lightning rod for your protection is your own spine."
- Ralph Waldo Emerson
"Genius unrefined resembles a flash of lightning, but wisdom is like the sun."
- Franz Grillparzer
"Fame and fortune are as hard to find as a lightning strike."
- P. N. Elrod
"Human life is as evanescent as the morning dew or a flash of lightning."
- Samuel Butler
"If you ever want your soul to dance in the clouds, you will at some point have to juggle lightning and taste the thunder."
- Christopher Poindexter
"Even in a less exaggerated description, any verbal account of a person is bound to find itself employing an assortment of waterfalls, lightning rods, landscapes, birds, etc."
- Sergei Eisenstein
Lightening bolt quotes
"The creative process is not like a situation where you get struck by a single lightning bolt. You have ongoing discoveries, and there's ongoing creative revelations. Yes, it's really helpful to be marching toward a specific destination, but, along the way, you must allow yourself room for your ideas to blossom, take root, and grow."
- Carlton Cuse
"A song is an emotional lightning bolt - a good one, anyway."
- Mary Gauthier
"The uniformity of the earth's life, more astonishing than its diversity, is accountable by the high probability that we derived, originally, from some single cell, fertilized in a bolt of lightning as the earth cooled."
- Lewis Thomas
"A poet is someone who stands outside in the rain hoping to be struck by lightning."
- James Dickey
"Some calamities - the 1929 stock market crash, Pearl Harbor, 9/11 - have come like summer lightning, as bolts from the blue. The looming crisis of America's Ponzi entitlement structure is different. Driven by the demographics of an aging population, its causes, timing and scope are known."
- George Will
"Success is like a lightning bolt. It'll strike you when you least expect it, and you just have to keep the momentum going. You have to strike when the iron is hot. So for me, I just kept striking and striking to polish out the sword that I was making."
- Michelle Phan
Lightning quotes from the arts and literature
Poets, writers, singers, and many people in the arts and literature field have words to say about lightning. Here are some quotes from names in this field.
"The trouble ain't that there is too many fools, but that the lightning ain't distributed right."
- Mark Twain
"The affections are like lightning: you cannot tell where they will strike till they have fallen."
- Lee Iacocca
"It is like writing history with lightning and my only regret is that it is all so terribly true."
- Woodrow Wilson
"Nobody sells books like J.K. Rowling. We have a rule in publishing: Never compare anything to 'Harry Potter' because it's like lightning in a bottle."
- Cassandra Clare
"I've managed to catch lightning in a bottle a couple times. I'm very lucky. But I want to do this forever. I enjoy it so much. One of the challenges as an actor is to stay relevant."
- Ian Ziering
"A poet is a man who manages, in a lifetime of standing out in thunderstorms, to be struck by lightning five or six times."
- Randall Jarrell
"Early impressions are like glimpses seen through the window by night when lightning is about."
- E. F. Benson
"Poetry for me is very easy. It's like a lightning bolt. I feel this calling, and the first line of the poem comes into my head, and I just have to go to the page, to the typewriter, to the computer or whatever and write it."
- Gioconda Belli
"Mozart makes us care about people in flashes of lightning."
- Simon McBurney
"I think good artists know when they're on a roll, and they recognize when lightning is striking. It's a very fortunate thing to have that inspiration and not to overanalyze it or mess with it; you just follow it if you love what you do."
- Johnny Marr
"Poetry is a sword of lightning, ever unsheathed, which consumes the scabbard that would contain it."
- Percy Bysshe Shelley
Jen’s a passionate environmentalist and sustainability expert. With a science degree from Babcock University Jen loves applying her research skills to craft editorial that connects with our global changemaker and readership audiences centered around topics including zero waste, sustainability, climate change, and biodiversity.
Elsewhere Jen’s interests include the role that future technology and data have in helping us solve some of the planet’s biggest challenges.
