The claim, as it circulates · Checked 2026-10-20
Did Gandhi say “Be the change you wish to see in the world”?
Be the change you wish to see in the world.”
Usually credited to Mahatma Gandhi
MISATTRIBUTEDShort answer · MisattributedNo, not in those words. Nobody has found the line in Gandhi’s writings. The short version goes back to educator Arleen Lorrance’s “The Love Project” (1974): “be the change you want to see happen.” Gandhi did write something with a similar idea in 1913.
The receipt: earliest evidenceNo. 008
We but mirror the world. All the tendencies present in the outer world are to be found in the world of our body. If we could change ourselves, the tendencies in the world would also change. As a man changes his own nature, so does the attitude of the world change towards him. … We need not wait to see what others do.
- Work
- Closest real Gandhi: Indian Opinion, 9 Aug 1913 (Collected Works, vol. XII, p. 158)
- Date
- 1913
- Transl.
- Translated from Gujarati (Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi)
- Origin
- Arleen Lorrance, “The Love Project” (1974): “be the change you want to see happen.”
- Source
- Quote Investigator: Be the Change You Wish To See in the World ↗
- Checked
- 2026-10-20
Excerpt as quoted with full citation by Quote Investigator; primary text in the Collected Works (Gandhi Heritage Portal).
- The earliest known case of crediting the line to Gandhi is in a 1987 Santa Fe newspaper.
- The Gandhi family has said he spoke the idea often. Nobody has found it in his writings.
Cite-safe version
“Be the change you want to see happen.” — Arleen Lorrance, The Love Project (1974)