50 Jigsaw Quotes For Finding Your Place In The Puzzle

By Clifton Sankofa

School Leader, Language Arts Expert & Master Quote Curator

Published March 1, 2023

These jigsaw quotes will help you discover your place in this puzzle we call life.

If you enjoy putting the pieces together in life, you will love our jigsaw quotes.

Tell us your favorite one in the comment section below.

What is a jigsaw?

Jigsaw is a word with many meanings.

A jigsaw can be a puzzle, a tool, or a murderous villain from a popular horror movie series.

When many people hear the word jigsaw, they think of jigsaw puzzles.

A jigsaw puzzle is a tiling puzzle that requires the assembly of irregularly shaped interlocking pieces.

When put together, the pieces create a complete picture.

A jigsaw is also the name of a tool.

Jigsaws are saws that use reciprocating blades to cut irregular curves and designs in wood, metal, or other materials.

Check out these exciting jigsaw facts:

John Spilsbury, a London cartographer and engraver is believed to have produced the first “jigsaw” puzzle around 1760.

The jigsaw tool was invented in 1855.
John Spilsbury is believed to have produced the first jigsaw puzzle in 1760.
1000-piece puzzles contain 1008 or 1026 pieces to make the correct shape.

Jigsaw history: the evolution of a modern tool

If you are an avid jigsaw lover, you may have noticed the above dates and asked the following question:

“What a minute, if the jigsaw tool was invented in 1855, how could the jigsaw puzzle come out before it?

What an astute observation!

The jigsaw tool first arrived in the mid-19th century, and Spilsbury created the first jigsaw puzzle almost two hundred years prior.

Spilsbury was a cartographer in London, England.

His jigsaw puzzle was a map of the countries and was used to teach geography.

His peers did not call this invention a jigsaw puzzle; instead, they called it a dissection.

Dissections were not toys for children and were mainly used by wealthy adults who could afford them.

John most likely used a marquetry saw, which allowed him to make curved cuts.

So how did the jigsaw get its name?

The jigsaw is one groovy tool

The jigsaw got its name from the popular dance, the jig.

The saw moves in an up-and-down motion, quickly reciprocating, similar to the up-and-down movement of the dance.

The word jigsaw puzzle did not appear until 1906, and the modern jigsaw puzzles we see were not around until 1947.

Check out our great jigsaw quotes below for more.

Short jigsaw quotes about the puzzles in life

Life is like a puzzle.

You may not always know where each piece goes, but you know you have the pieces to work with.

1. “Every horse I get on, I can adapt to. It’s like a jigsaw puzzle.” — Charlotte Dujardin

2. “We put our music together, piece by piece, like a jigsaw puzzle.” — Ronnie Van Zant

3. “You have no right to make jigsaws of people.” — Diana Wynne Jones, Howl’s Moving Castle

4. “Your hand fits mine like the last piece of a jigsaw puzzle” — Jodi Picoult, Between the Lines

5. “We do jigsaw puzzles. Here’s a pro tip: Listen to an audiobook while doing it.” — Megan Mullally

6. “When I was 10, I was hit by a car, which turned my right tibia into a jigsaw puzzle.” — John Scalzi

7. “I love when a song is conceived as a jigsaw puzzle in the studio, and then it’s a natural to play live.” — Jamie Hince

8. “I wanna make a jigsaw puzzle that’s 40,000 pieces. And when you finish it, it says ‘go outside.’” — Demetri Martin

9. “Writing a book is like doing a huge jigsaw puzzle, unendurably slow at first, almost self-propelled at the end.” — James Richardson

10. “We weren’t friends. We were more like jigsaw pieces, each of us part of the same big picture.” — Lemony Snicket, When Did You See Her Last?

Jigsaw quotes about how life is a game

Life is a game, and we should have fun.

11. “Every day is sort of a jigsaw puzzle. You have to make sure that you’re putting the most important things first.” — Julia Hartz

12. “I don’t approach Jigsaw any differently than I approached The Nordic in The Firm or FBI Agent Stokes in Mississippi Burning. ” — Tobin Bell

13. “I witness the ones who are left behind, crumbling among the jigsaw puzzle of realization, despair, and surprises.” — Markus Zusak

14. “I am putting a mental jigsaw together of what a hobbit looks like, based on a composite of every customer I have ever sold a copy to.” — Shaun Bythell

15. “Being a playwright is like the equivalent of doing a jigsaw puzzle that has 1,500 pieces, and it’s a jigsaw of a blue sky. Not a cloud in sight.” — Lewis Black

More jigsaw quotes to live by

16. “There are no extra pieces in the universe. Everyone is here because he or she has a place to fill, and every piece must fit itself into the big jigsaw puzzle.” — Deepak Chopra

17. “In a chemistry class, there was a guy sitting in front of me doing what looked like a jigsaw puzzle or some really weird kind of thing. He told me he was writing a computer program.” — Jon Postel

18. “There is no problem with changing the course of history. The course of history does not change because it all fits together like a jigsaw.” — Douglas Adams

19. “So now it is time to disassemble the parts of the jigsaw puzzle or to piece another one together, for I find that, having come to the end of my story, my life is just beginning.” — Conrad Veidt

20. “The experience of life that you and I have is pretty much a jigsaw puzzle in the box: Day-to-day experiences of disconnected pieces that don’t seem to justify the efforts we make each day.” — Robert Adams

Jigsaw puzzle quotes about putting the pieces together

Every day allows us to create the mosaic of our lives.

21. “You are the odd-shaped jigsaw puzzle that I’m looking to fit. And you completed me” — Raditya Dika

22. “A jigsaw puzzle is my form of meditation. In New York, I glued all of the ones I did together and hung them up on the wall.” — Carly Chaikin

23. “Wouldn’t it have been wonderful, thought Woolly, if everybody’s life was like a piece in a jigsaw puzzle.” — Amor Towles

24. “When you put a jigsaw puzzle together, you put the bottom left corner together first, and then you find yourself working on the upper right corner.” — Tobin Bell

25. “Innovation is like looking for pieces in a jigsaw puzzle. You have to find a lot of pieces that don’t match to find the one or two pieces that match.” — Edward Conard

26. “To me, it’s really not about how I look – it’s about who I can be. It is my job to bring the character to life and my duty to fit into the jigsaw in that story.” — Imelda Staunton

27. “We can start an infernally hard jigsaw puzzle in June with the knowledge that, if there are enough rainy days, we may just finish it by Labor Day, but if not, there’s no harm, no penalty. ” — Nancy Gibbs

28. “One generation passes to the next a suitcase filled with jumbled jigsaw pieces from countless puzzles collected over time and says, ‘See what you can make out of these.” — Kate Morton

29. “He is across the world in another woman’s arms, and the years have spread us like dandelion seeds, sanding down the edges of our jigsaw parts that used to only fit each other” — Sarah Kay

30. “Writing a mystery is like drawing a picture and then cutting it into little pieces that you offer to your readers one piece at a time, thus allowing them the chance to put the jigsaw puzzle together by the end of the book.” — Ashwin Sanghi

Jigsaw quotes about using the tools we have

Each of us has different skill sets or tools we rely on. When we use all of our abilities, we enhance our toolbox.

31. “The way Beyonce works, the song is a jigsaw piece, and then she will piece various elements.” — Rita Tushingham

32. “No, absolutely not; writing doesn’t have to be like a jigsaw puzzle. It can be a very linear undertaking.” — Guillermo Cabrera Infante

33. “To me, acting is like a jigsaw puzzle. The jigsaw puzzle is of the sky, and all the pieces are blue. Out of this, you have to create a human being and put it together.” — Henry Winkler

34. “For me, it started as a child with one of those little wooden jigsaw maps of the U.S., where there’s crocodiles on Florida and apples on Washington state. That was my very first map.” — Ken Jennings

35. “Jigsaw Lady is the working title of a science fiction novel I’ve had in my head for darn near 15 years. I think I’ll start work on it next year (in all my spare time), but I’d like to get it finished someday.” — Raymond E

Jigsaw quotes that make you ponder life

36. “When you write non-fiction, you sit down at your desk with a pile of notebooks, newspaper clippings, and books, and you research and put a book together the way you would a jigsaw puzzle?” — Janine di Giovanni

37. “Feist It’s like a jigsaw, there’s a piece of the puzzle at the beginning, and it’s the only one, and of course, it had a lot to do with the way you look. And then, you have to have the time to add pieces of the jigsaw.” — Carole Bouquet

38. “When scientists are asked what they are working on, their response is seldom ‘Finding the origin of the universe’ or ‘Seeking to cure cancer.’ Usually, they will claim to be tackling a very specific problem – a small piece of the jigsaw that builds up the big picture.” — Martin Rees

39. “David Beckham is always seen as the thickest man on the planet, too daft to complete a jigsaw puzzle. But then you watch old footage of him playing, and every time he plays a ball across the field, he’s intuitively working out the trajectory of the ball.” — Romesh Ranganathan

40. “Once I began doing stand-up, I didn’t get a kick out of the applause or being the center of attention – but I did get a kick out of the jigsaw puzzle aspect of it, searching for the right bit, adding another few pieces each night until the bigger picture appears. 40. That’s the appeal: the challenge of it.” — Stephen Merchant

Jigsaw quotes about living your dream to find success in life

We all have goals, and when we string together our excitement with our passion, we create a beautiful picture.

41. “I’ve been in an Agatha Christie called ‘The Sittaford Mystery,’ which I enjoyed, but ‘The Pale Horse’ has a real sense of intrigue and the jigsaw pieces fitting together.” — Rita Tushingham

42. “Freddie Kruger, Jason, Michael Myers – they’re all our generation. I think the kids wanted some new guys that they could take ownership of, and Jigsaw was that guy.” — Leigh Whannell

43. “They’ve put skin from my arm on my ankle and from my thigh on my arm. So whenever I get asked what’s happened to me, I end up saying it’s like a little jigsaw, parts of my body all over the place.” — Santi Cazorla

44. “Having done film, TV, and theatre, the nicest final bit of the jigsaw is to do live comedy because you can talk to the audience. It feels really natural to be able to laugh with them, but at the same time still, be within the framework of a play.” — Jessie Cave

Motivating quotes about jigsaw puzzles

45. “My ideal beach house has bookshelves full of paperbacks that can tolerate a little sand, a DVD library that includes some Disney classics for the little ones, board games, and jigsaw puzzles.” — Mary Kay Andrews

46. “The dream of empire died when Shanghai surrendered without a fight. Even at the age of 11 or 12, I knew that no amount of patriotic newsreels would put the Union Jack jigsaw together again. From then on, I was slightly suspicious of all British adults.” — J. G. Ballard

47. “Whenever you start working on something, you have to go about it with the underlying assumption that this puzzle has a solution, right? If you started a jigsaw puzzle not knowing whether all the pieces were in the box, it would not be a fun exercise.” — Boyan Slat

48. “The Queen is frequently on her own, walking the dogs, riding her horses, playing patience, completing a jigsaw, sorting her photograph albums, watching television, phoning friends, doing the Telegraph crossword. Is she neglected? Is she suffering?” — Gyles Brandreth

50. “The modern Westerner, persuaded that he has a right to “think for himself” and imagining that he exercises this right, is unwilling to acknowledge that his every thought has been shaped by cultural and historical influences and that his opinions fit, like pieces of jigsaw puzzle, into a pattern which has nothing random about it.” — Charles Le Gai Eaton, Islam and the Destiny of Man