Inspirational Quotations

Poetry is life distilled.
—Gwendolyn Brooks (American Poet, Educator)

When your work speaks for itself, don’t interrupt.
—Henry J. Kaiser (American Industrialist)

Don’t abuse your friends and expect them to consider it criticism.
—Elizabeth Taylor (American Actress)

You must take life the way it comes at you and make the best of it.
—Yann Martel (Canadian Novelist)

He travels best that knows when to return.
—Thomas Middleton (English Dramatist)

It’s essential to distinguish between events that are really beyond your control and events you caused yourself.
—Barbara Sher (American Career Coach)

Problems are only opportunities with thorns on them.
—Hugh Miller (Scottish Geologist, Writer)

The person who talks most of his own virtue is often the least virtuous.
—Jawaharlal Nehru (Indian Head of State)

Water is the one substance from which the earth can conceal nothing; it sucks out its innermost secrets and brings them to our very lips.
—Jean Giraudoux (French Novelist, Playwright)

Living in an age of extraordinary events and revolutions, I have learned, from thence this truth, which I desire might be communicated to posterity: that all is vanity which is not honest, and that there is no solid wisdom but in real piety.
—John Evelyn (English Restoration Diarist)

In a way, this diversity is very exciting, but one has at some point to ask: are these real beginnings, or so many false starts?
—Juliet Mitchell (British Feminist, Writer)

Open-mindedness should not be fostered because, as Scripture teaches, Truth is great and will prevail, nor because, as Milton suggests, Truth will always win in a free and open encounter. It should be fostered for its own sake.
—Richard Rorty (American Philosopher)

There is no Truth. There is only the truth within each moment.
—Ramana Maharshi (Indian Hindu Mystic)

The great advantage of living in a large family is that early lesson of life’s essential unfairness.
—Nancy Mitford (English Novelist, Biographer)

Nothing that is really good and God-like dies.
—Ernst Moritz Arndt (German Writer)

The past is a foreign country; they do things differently there.
—L. P. Hartley (British Writer, Critic)

One thing I never want to be accused of is not working.
—Don Shula (American Football Coach)

You don’t concentrate on risks. You concentrate on results. No risk is too great to prevent the necessary job from getting done.
—Chuck Yeager (American Aviator)

No trumpets sound when the important decisions of our life are made. Destiny is made known silently.
—Agnes de Mille (American Dancer)

You only have power over people so long as you don’t take everything away from them. But when you’ve robbed a man of everything he’s no longer in your power—he’s free again.
—Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn (Russian Novelist)

If the track is tough and the hill is rough, THINKING you can just ain’t enough!
—Shel Silverstein (American Cartoonist, Author)

Always be smarter than the people who hire you.
—Lena Horne (American Singer, Actress)

The feeble tremble before opinion, the foolish defy it, the wise judge it, the skillful direct it.
—Madame Roland (French Revolutionary)

Life is a gathering to which only a limited number are invited at a time, and the invitation is never repeated.
—Hans Carossa (German Novelist)

We have to learn to be our own best friends because we fall too easily into the trap of being our own worst enemies.
—Roderick Thorp (American Novelist)

The voice you hear when you read to yourself is the clearest voice: you speak it speaking to you.
—Thomas Lux (American Poet)

Like an old gold-panning prospector, you must resign yourself to digging up a lot of sand from which you will later patiently wash out a few minute particles of gold ore.
—Dorothy Bryant (American Novelist)

Hollywood never knew there was a Vietnam War until they made the movie.
—Jerry Stiller (American Actor, Comedian)

Don’t let anyone rob you of your imagination, your creativity, or your curiosity. It’s your place in the world; it’s your life. Go on and do all you can with it, and make it the life you want to live.
—Mae Jemison (American Physician, Astronaut)

The body has to be utilized for service to others. More bliss can be got from serving others than from merely serving oneself.
—Sathya Sai Baba (Indian Hindu Religious Leader)

A man always has two reasons for what he does good one, and the real one.
—J. P. Morgan (American Financier, Philanthropist)

The mind is like a richly woven tapestry in which the colors are distilled from the experiences of the senses, and the design drawn from the convolutions of the intellect.
—Carson McCullers (American Novelist)

You have no idea how promising the world begins to look once you have decided to have it all for yourself. And how much healthier your decisions are once they become entirely selfish.
—Anita Brookner (English Novelist, Art Historian)

Shelving hard decisions is the least ethical course.
—Adrian Cadbury (British Businessman)

Each department of knowledge passes through three stages. The theoretic stage; the theological stage and the metaphysical or abstract stage.
—Auguste Comte (French Philosopher)

If the world seems unfair or beyond our understanding, sublime places suggest that it is not surprising that things should be thus. We are the playthings of the forces that laid out the oceans and chiselled the mountains.
—Alain de Botton (Swiss-born British Philosopher)

You do not become a “dissident” just because you decide one day to take up this most unusual career. You are thrown into it by your personal sense of responsibility, combined with a complex set of external circumstances. You are cast out of the existing structures and placed in a position of conflict with them. It begins as an attempt to do your work well, and ends with being branded an enemy of society.
—Vaclav Havel (Czech Dramatist, Statesman)

If you can’t take a good kicking, you shouldn’t parade how much luckier you are than other people.
—Charles Saatchi (British Businessman, Art Collector)

Leadership involves finding a parade and getting in front of it.
—John Naisbitt (American Trend Analyst)

A good scientist is a person in whom the childhood quality of perennial curiosity lingers on. Once he gets an answer, he has other questions.
—Frederick Seitz (American Physicist)

Uncertainty and expectation are the joys of life. Security is an insipid thing, through the overtaking and possessing of a wish discovers the folly of the chase.
—William Congreve (English Dramatist)

Clients still expect to be able to communicate with the businesses that serve them over the phone. So while it’s useful to have excellent skills and solutions in place to assist with all your other communication channels, you can’t neglect the importance of a classic telephone call.

With that in mind, you should always be aiming to enhance the experience that callers receive when they get in touch this way. Here are a few strategies and solutions that will make a big difference.

Set standards for the tone of conversations

You want to keep the tone of your client communication consistent, so just as you wouldn’t veer from formal to casual in an email, the same rule applies in a phone call.

Being friendly, helpful and openly supportive is important in this context, of course. You don’t want clients to come away from a call thinking that they’ve been a burden because of the phrasing of certain questions.

Embrace active listening

Active listening isn’t just something you can do during face-to-face conversations. It’s also a useful skill to foster when the phone is your main means of communicating with others.

There are various elements involved, such as providing the other person room to speak and express themselves fully, rather than interrupting. This is obviously useful in the case that the caller is coping with shyness. It’s also about reinforcing what’s been said through repetition, which is useful for both parties so that clarity is achieved.

Choose a great phone system

With the help of the best small business phone system, your ability to handle client calls will increase many times over.

Being able to enjoy perks like access to voicemail, automated call forwarding, and many other perks besides will let you compete with larger companies while still keeping telecommunications costs under control.

Adopt geographic numbers for local targeting

Calls from non-geographic numbers, or those which are clearly coming from elsewhere in the country or the world, are less likely to be answered by prospects.

On the other hand if you’ve got a geographic number that’s local to them, it will be more trusted and also less expensive for them to call as well.

Put efficiency at the top of the agenda

What people really want out of a call with a business is for it to be handled swiftly. There are a few ways to go about this, and implementing an automated call handling service which responds to voice commands or button presses can help. It means basic queries are fielded in a jiffy, rather than needing for a human agent to be available.

Another solution is to look into the most common causes for calls from clients, and see if there are any routes for tackling them which don’t need a phone conversation in the first place. This might mean adding a knowledge base to your website, or implementing a fix to an issue which is apparent in your products.

Avoid hold times by returning calls instead

Another annoyance which clients might encounter is being left on hold for long periods when they get in touch.

Instead of having a lengthy hold process in place, it’s better to give clients a means of requesting a call back from an employee when one is available. Once again, modern phone systems are here to empower you in this regard.

Train team members in the product or service you sell

It might seem obvious, but if the people who are talking to customers on the phone don’t understand what it is that you’re selling inside out, they won’t be able to aid them in an optimal way.

Proper training and hands-on experience are required to plug any gaps in their knowledge and make your team more effective on the phone, rather than leaving them floundering in the face of unexpected questions.

Final thoughts

You can’t expect your phone communication with clients to improve if you aren’t willing to analyze performance right now, and fix flaws that become apparent.

Impactful phone communication can win more prospects over and keep customers loyal for longer, which will help your business grow and flourish in full.

It can sometimes feel like the odds are stacked against you when you are thinking about quitting smoking. It doesn’t help when everyone keeps telling you how hard it is to do, but the fact is that it is very difficult. It is an addiction as well as a habit, you will be craving nicotine and you will be thinking about lighting up at certain times of day and after certain activities. But quitting smoking is possible, and it is something that you are more than capable of. Here are some important things to remember.

Your Support Network Is There To Help You

Quitting a bad habit can be tough if you are doing it by yourself. If you live with a partner, tell them what you are doing and ask them for support. It’s a tough time for our mental health right now anyway, so think about how you can reduce the amount of stress and anxiety you are putting yourself through. Talk to your friends about what you are doing, and don’t be afraid to ask them for a little encouragement.

You Deserve Rewards For Quitting

Speaking of encouragement, it is important to remember just how great a thing quitting smoking is. This is something that is worth celebrating, and marking the milestones is a great way of reminding yourself of how far you have come. Some people find it helpful to mark the number of days they have gone without a cigarette, but you may want to celebrate months after a certain point. Remember how much money you would usually be spending on cigarettes and treat yourself to something special as a reward.

Find An Alternative You Like

If you choose to find an alternative to smoking cigarettes, you should make sure that it is something that you are going to be able to keep using during the withdrawal period. Don’t choose something that you actively dislike (don’t pick gum if you never chew gum anyway, for example). Many people who quit smoking find that the act of smoking itself is one of the hardest things to leave behind, which is where vaping comes in. You can use a vape pen which looks and feels familiar, and you can find a flavour of e-liquid that you like. There are so many different options to choose from, and you can browse them at Go Smoke Free. They have a great selection of e-cigarettes, vape fluid flavours, and excellent TrustPilot reviews.

Cold Turkey Is Hard

There are some people out there who find that going cold turkey is the best way to quit any addiction or habit. They just cut it out of their lives and tough it out. However, this is not only very difficult, it also means that you may be more likely to fall off the wagon as you will not have made any attempt to ease into it. Think about looking at alternatives such as gum, lozenges, or vaping. Slow and steady may win the race, and don’t be afraid to talk to your GP if you need some extra tips.

The desire to reach for the sky runs deep in our human psyche.
—Cesar Pelli (Argentinean-American Architect)

The two women exchanged the kind of glance women use when no knife is handy.
—Ellery Queen (American Crime Fiction Authors)

While there are practical and sometimes moral reasons for the decomposition of the family, it coincides neither with what most people in society say they desire nor, especially in the case of children, with their best interests.
—Robert Neelly Bellah (American Sociologist)

A Realist is an idealist who has gone through the fire and been purified. A skeptic is an idealist who has gone through the fire and been burned.
—Warren W. Wiersbe (American Pastor, Biblical Scholar)

He who believes in nobody knows that he himself is not to be trusted.
—Berthold Auerbach (German Novelist)

Problems arise in that one has to find a balance between what people need from you and what you need for yourself.
—Jessye Norman (American Soprano)

An artist has to go to every extreme, to stretch his sensibility through excess and suffering in order to feel and to communicate more. I have always been fascinated by blood. Pain can be vitalizing; it gives intensity in the place of vagueness and emptiness. If we don’t suffer, how do we know that we live?
—Sebastian Horsley (English Painters, Author)

I’m struck by how laughter connects you with people. It’s almost impossible to maintain any kind of distance or any sense of social hierarchy when you’re just howling with laughter. Laughter is a force for democracy.
—John Cleese (British Comic Actor, Writer)

We’re constantly being told what other people think we are, and that’s why it is so important to know yourself.
—Sarah McLachlan (Canadian Musician)

A wise person should never divulge the loss of his wealth, distress in his mind, malpractices at his home or that he has been cheated or insulted.
—The Hitopadesha (Indian Collection of Fables)

It’s a dangerous thing to think we know everything.
—Jack Kuehler (American Businessman)

Opinion often consists of a kind of criticism. But criticism can come out of love.
—Robert Frank (Swiss-American Photographer)

Indolence and stupidity are first cousins.
—Antoine de Rivarol (French Writer)

Where the heart is full of kindness which seeks no injury to another, either in act or thought or wish, this full love creates an atmosphere of harmony, whose benign power touches with healing all who come within its influence. Peace in the heart radiates peace to other hearts, even more surely than contention breeds contention.
—Patanjali (Indian Hindu Philosopher)

What is here is also there; what is there, is also here. Who sees multiplicity but not the one indivisible Self must wander on and on from death to death.
—The Upanishads (Sacred Books of Hinduism)

Ideas are the real substance of human life. Ideas guide our actions and even control our movements. It is just as well to put them in order first and then to display their anatomy.
—Jonathan Miller (English Stage Director)

Children read to learn—even when they are reading fantasy, nonsense, light verse, comics or the copy on cereal packets, they are expanding their minds all the time, enlarging their vocabulary, making discoveries: it is all new to them.
—Joan Aiken (British Fantasy Writer)

On the neck of a young man sparkles no gem so gracious as enterprise.
—Hafez (Persian Poet)

The most popular labor-saving device is still money.
—Phyllis George (American Sportscaster)

Disease is the tax which the soul pays for the body, as the tenant pays house-rent for the use of the house.
—Ramakrishna Paramahamsa (Indian Hindu Philosopher)

A masterpiece of a game can be ruined by insensitivity to the feelings of an adversary.
—Yasunari Kawabata (Japanese Novelist, Short Story Writer)

Egotism is the art of seeing in yourself what others cannot see.
—George V. Higgins (American Novelist)

If you are not willing to take pain to live by your principles, there is no point in having principles.
—Marvin Bower (American Business Consultant)

Applause that comes thundering with such force you might think the audience merely suffers the music as an excuse for its ovations.
—Greil Marcus (American Music Journalist)

Only those who are asleep make no mistakes.
—Ingvar Kamprad (Swedish Businessman)

I must confess I am a fop in my heart; ill customs influence my very senses, and I have been so used to affectation that without the help of the air of the court what is natural cannot touch me.
—George Etherege (English Dramatist)

I had no ambition to make a fortune. Mere money-making has never been my goal; I had an ambition to build.
—John D. Rockefeller (American Industrialist, Philanthropist)

It is a sad day when one looks back and sees that his largest regrets have become some of the most integral elements of his dreams.
—John Knowles (American Novelist)

The insufferable arrogance of human beings to think that Nature was made solely for their benefit, as if it was conceivable that the sun had been set afire merely to ripen men’s apples and head their cabbages.
—Cyrano de Bergerac (French Writer, Duelist.)

The effectiveness of our memory banks is determined not by the total number of facts we take in, but the number we wish to reject.
—Jon Wynne-Tyson (British Publisher, Activist)

After hard work, the biggest determinant is being in the right place at the right time.
—Michael Bloomberg (American Businessperson)

Tidy fees are the most effective remedy, both for the doctor and the patient.
—Dario Fo (Italian Playwright)

Arguably the only goods people need these days are food and happiness.
—Terence Conran (British Designer, Entrepreneur)

Whatever your discipline, become a student of excellence in all things. Take every opportunity to observe people who manifest the qualities of mastery. These models of excellence will inspire you and guide you toward the fulfillment of your highest potential.
—Tony Buzan (British Writer, Educational Consultant)

It ought to make us feel ashamed when we talk like we know what we’re talking about when we talk about love.
—Raymond Carver (American Author)

There is a spirit and a need and a man at
the beginning of every great human advance.
Each of these must be right for that particular
moment in history, or nothing happens.
—Coretta Scott King (American Civil Rights Leader)

Knowledge is a weapon. I intend to be formidably armed.
—Terry Goodkind (American Author)

We seldom call anybody lazy, but such as we reckon inferior to us, and of whom we expect some service.
—Bernard Mandeville (British Writer)

Change hurts. It makes people insecure, confused, and angry. People want things to be the same as they’ve always been, because that makes life easier. But, if you’re a leader, you can’t let your people hang on to the past.
—Richard Marcinko (American Navy Officer)

The secret is to always let the other man have your way.
—Claiborne Pell (American Politician)

Fashion, which elevates the bad to the level of the good, subsequently turns its back on bad and good alike.
—Eric Bentley (British-American Drama Critic)

Economy, prudence, and a simple life are the sure masters of need, and will often accomplish that which, their opposites, with a fortune at hand, will fail to do.
—Clara Barton (American Humanitarian)

Goal setting has traditionally been based on past performance. This practice has tended to perpetuate the sins of the past.
—Joseph Juran (American Quality Scholar)

More than in any other performing arts the lack of respect for acting seems to spring from the fact that every layman considers himself a valid critic.
—Uta Hagen (American Actress)

Basically, the only thing we need is a hand that rests on our own, that wishes it well, that sometimes guides us.
—Hector Bianciotti (French Novelist)

Power doesn’t corrupt people, people corrupt power.
—William Gaddis (American Novelist)

I rate enthusiasm even above professional skill.
—Edward Victor Appleton (English Physicist)

Whatever you can do, do it today and then old age will be a delicious fruit.
—Thich Nhat Hanh (Vietnamese Buddhist Religious Leader)

Poetry is not an expression of the party line. It’s that time of night, lying in bed, thinking what you really think, making the private world public, that’s what the poet does.
—Allen Ginsberg (American Poet)

For every finish-line tape a runner breaks—complete with the cheers of the crowd and the clicking of hundreds of cameras—there are the hours of hard and often lonely work that rarely gets talked about.
—Grete Waitz (Norwegian Athlete)

Sometimes the most important thing in a whole day is the rest we take between two deep breaths, or the turning inwards in prayer for five short minutes.
—Etty Hillesum (Jewish Diarist)

A vision without action is called a daydream.
—James LeVoy Sorenson (American Businessman)

If you’re successful in what you do over a period of time, you’ll start approaching records, but that’s not what you’re playing for. You’re playing to challenge and be challenged.
—Lou Brock (American Baseball Player)

Try in thine own experience, each; that he speak not for one whole day unkindly of any… and see what such a day would bring to you.
—Edgar Cayce (American Faith Healer)

I think of the telephone as a spiritual thing. Your bodies don’t have to unite you, but your spirits can unite.
—Joan Walsh Anglund (American Poet, Children’s Book Author)

Life is very hard. The only people who really live are those who are harder than life itself.
—Nawal El Saadawi (Egyptian Writer, Activist)

Immortality is not a gift, Immortality is an achievement; And only those who strive mightily Shall possess it.
—Edgar Lee Masters (American Poet, Novelist)

Old books that have ceased to be of service should no more be abandoned than should old friends who have ceased to give pleasure.
—Peregrine Worsthorne (British Journalist, Author)

Balance is the enemy of art.
—Richard Eyre (British Director)

You can’t achieve anything without getting in someone’s way. You can’t be detached and effective.
—Abba Eban (Israeli Statesman)

If you apply reason and logic to this career of mine, you’re not going to get very far. You simply won’t. The journey has been incredible from its beginning. So much of life, it seems to me, is determined by pure randomness.
—Sidney Poitier (American Actor, Film Director)

We simply do not understand our place in the universe and have not the courage to admit it
—Barry Lopez (American Essayist, Fiction Writer)

Courage is as often the outcome of despair as of hope; in the one case we have nothing to lose, in the other everything to gain.
—Diane de Poitiers (French Noble)

The person who has earned love the least needs it the most.
—F. Enzio Busche (Mormon Church Leader)