Inspirational Quotations

A determined soul will do more with a rusty monkey wrench than a loafer will accomplish with all the tools in a machine shop.
—Rupert Hughes (American Historian)

The point of the teachings is to control your own mind. Restrain your mind from greed, and you will keep your body right, your mind pure and your words faithful. Always thinking of the transiency of your life, you will be able to desist from greed and anger and will be able to avoid all evils.
—Buddhist Teaching

Creativity represents a miraculous coming together of the uninhibited energy of the child with its apparent opposite and enemy-the sense of order imposed on the disciplined adult intelligence.
—Norman Podhoretz (American Political Activist)

The art of progress is to preserve order amid change, and to preserve change amid order. Life refuses to be embalmed alive. The more prolonged the halt in some unrelieved system of order, the greater the crash of the dead society.
—Alfred North Whitehead (English Mathematician)

Greed is the root cause of all sins. Greed is the cause of all problems that one faces. Greed fuels the growth of enemies. Excessive greed destroys one’s life.
—Subhashita Manjari

Only your real friends will tell you when your face is dirty.
—Sicilian Proverb

In a higher world it is otherwise; but here below to live is to change, and to be perfect is to change often.
—John Henry Newman (British Catholic Clergyman)

When you are in doubt, be still, and wait. When doubt no longer exists for you, then go forward in courage.
—Unknown

Science has heroes, but no gods. The great Names are not our superiors, or even our rivals, they are passed milestones on our road; and the most important milestone is the hero yet to come.
—Eliezer Yudkowsky (American Scientist)

Don’t let what you cannot do interfere with what you can do.
—John Wooden (American Sportsperson)

There is work that is work and there is play that is play; there is play that is work and work that is play. And in only one of these lies happiness.
—Gelett Burgess

Happiness is a Swedish sunset; it is there for all, but most of us look the other way and lose it.
—Mark Twain (American Humorist)

A gem cannot be polished without friction, nor a man perfected without trials.
—Chinese Proverb

Hatred is the sign of a secret attraction that is eager to flee from itself and furious to deny its own existence. That too is God’s play in His creature.
—Sri Aurobindo (Indian Yogi, Nationalist)

Shallow men believe in luck. Strong men believe in cause and effect.
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (American Philosopher)

From success to failure is one step; from failure to success is a long road.
—Yiddish Proverb

This is mine, that belongs to others, this is how narrow-minded people think. Broad minded people consider this whole world to be one family.
—Subhashita Manjari

A man who does not think and plan long ahead will find trouble right at his door.
—Confucius (Chinese Philosopher)

Shallow men believe in luck, believe in circumstances. It was somebody’s name, or he happened to be there at the time, or it was so then, and another day it would have been otherwise.—Strong men believe in cause and effect.—The man was born to do it, and his father was born to be the father of him and of this deed, and by looking narrowly, you shall see there was no luck in the matter, but it was all a problem in arithmetic, or an experiment in chemistry.
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (American Philosopher)

I don’t think anything is unrealistic if you believe you can do it. I think if you are determined enough and willing to pay the price, you can get it done.
—Mike Ditka (American Sportsperson)

Don’t let what you can’t do stand in the way of what you can.
—John Wooden (American Sportsperson)

Know contentment and you will suffer no disgrace. Know when to stop and you will meet with no danger. You can then endure.
—Laozi (Chinese Philosopher)

A lofty idea must be had, not of what one is doing, but of what one may someday do. Otherwise there is no point in working on.
—Edgar Degas (French Painter)

It’s never a good idea to wait to do anything; given the uncertainty of life, just get going.
—Warren Buffett (American Investor)

Ability is a poor man’s wealth.
—John Wooden (American Sportsperson)

The day you decide to do it is your lucky day.
—Japanese Proverb

A diamond is a chunk of coal that made good under pressure.
—Anonymous

The price of anything is the amount of life you exchange for it.
—Henry David Thoreau (American Philosopher)

Real knowledge, like everything else of the highest value, is not to be obtained easily. It must be worked for, studied for, thought for, and, more than all, it must be prayed for.
—Thomas Arnold

Whoever is friendly in adversity, is indeed a true friend. In prosperity, even a wicked person wants to be a friend.
—Panchatantra

A goal is created three times. First as a mental picture. Second, when written down to add clarity and dimension. And third, when you take action towards its achievement.
—Gary Ryan Blair

Asks the Possible of the Impossible, “Where is your dwelling-place?” “In the dreams of the Impotent,” comes the answer.
—Rabindranath Tagore (Indian Hindu Polymath)

That which can be destroyed by the truth should be. That which the truth nourishes should thrive.
—Eliezer Yudkowsky (American Scientist)

To speak or not to speak—when that is the question, silence should take the place of speech.
—Mohandas K. Gandhi (Indian Hindu Political leader)

Realize that true happiness lies within you. Waste no time and effort searching for peace and contentment and joy in the world outside. Remember that there is no happiness in having or in getting, but only in giving. Reach out. Share. Smile. Hug. Happiness is a perfume you cannot pour on others without getting a few drops on yourself.
—Og Mandino

My creed is this: Happiness is the only good. The place to be happy is here. The time to be happy is now. The way to be happy is to make others so.
—Robert G. Ingersoll (American Atheist Politician)

Action is the foundational key to all success.
—Tony Robbins (American Actor Author)

A thought is an arrow shot at the truth; it can hit a point, but not cover the whole target. But the archer is too well satisfied with his success to ask anything farther.
—Sri Aurobindo (Indian Yogi, Nationalist)

No man chooses evil because it is evil; he only mistakes it for happiness, the good he seeks.
—Mary Wollstonecraft (British Children’s Books Writer)

Evolution is not finished; reason is not the last word nor the reasoning animal the supreme figure of Nature. As man emerged out of the animal, so out of man the superman emerges.
—Sri Aurobindo (Indian Yogi, Nationalist)

Everything actual must also first have been possible, before having actual existence.
—Albert Pike (American Military Leader)

Failure is not fatal, but failure to change might be.
—John Wooden (American Sportsperson)

Adversity reveals genius, prosperity conceals it.
—Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus) (Roman Poet)

Wisdom is divided into two parts: (a) having a great deal to say, and (b) not saying it.
—Anonymous

The test of a man is how much he can bear and how much he can share and how soon he confesses a mistake and makes amends for it.
—J. P. Vaswani (Indian Hindu Philosopher)

With confidence, you can reach truly amazing heights; without confidence, even the simplest accomplishments are beyond your grasp.
—Jim Loehr

Every man I meet is in some way my superior. In that I learn of him.
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (American Philosopher)

A loser doesn’t know what he’ll do if he loses, but talks about what he’ll do if he wins, and a winner doesn’t talk about what he’ll do if he wins, but knows what he’ll do if he loses.
—Eric Berne

No man becomes rich unless he enriches others.
—Andrew Carnegie (Scottish-American Industrialist, Philanthropist)

An effort made for the happiness of others lifts us above ourselves.
—Lydia Maria Child (American Abolitionist)

Let us keep a firm grip upon our money, for without it the whole assembly of virtues are but as blades of grass.
—Bhartruhari

The soul is a fire that darts its rays through all the senses; it is in this fire that existence consists; all the observations and all the efforts of philosophers ought to turn towards this ME, the centre and moving power of our sentiments and our ideas.
—Anne Louise Germaine de Stael

Security is mostly a superstition. It does not exist in nature. Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than outright exposure. Life is either a daring adventure, or nothing.
—Helen Keller (American Author)

Don’t mistake activity for achievement.
—John Wooden (American Sportsperson)

Good luck is the willing handmaid of a upright and energetic character, and conscientious observance of duty.
—James Russell Lowell (American Poet)

Unhappiness is not knowing what we want, and killing ourselves to get it.
—Don Herold (American Humorist)

When we rejoice in our fullness, then we can part without fruits with joy.
—Rabindranath Tagore (Indian Hindu Polymath)

The surest way to happiness is to lose yourself in a cause greater than yourself.
—Unknown

There is no duty we so much underrate as the duty of being happy. By being happy, we sow anonymous benefits upon the world, which remain unknown even to ourselves, or when they are disclosed, surprise nobody so much as the benefactor.
—Robert Louis Stevenson (Scottish Novelist)

It is more important to know where you are going than to get there quickly. Do not mistake activity for achievement.
—Mabel Newcomer

A knowledge of the path cannot be substituted for putting one foot in front of the other.
— M. C. Richards

So it’s probably eighty percent luck and twenty percent skill.
— Chris LeDoux

Each of us is great insofar as we perceive and act on the infinite possibilities which lie undiscovered and unrecognized about us.
— James Harvey Robinson

We are convinced that happiness is never to be found, and each believes it is possessed by others, to keep alive the hope of obtaining it for himself.
— Samuel Johnson

If you can dream it, you can do it.
— Walt Disney

Death is not extinguishing the light; it is putting out the lamp because the dawn has come.
— Rabindranath Tagore

Do not anticipate trouble, or worry about what may never happen. Keep in the sunlight.
— Benjamin Franklin

Music is the art of the prophets, the only art that can calm the agitations of the soul…
— Martin Luther

Anger is that powerful internal force that blows out the light of reason.
— Ralph Waldo Emerson

A helping word to one in trouble is like a switch in a railroad track… an inch between wreck and smooth, rolling prosperity.
— Henry Ward Beecher

Be true when you are tempted, be true when you don’t want to be, be true when it means standing alone from the rest of the world.
— Ruth B. Wright

Beauty is truth’s smile when she beholds her own face in a perfect mirror.
—Rabindranath Tagore (Indian Hindu Polymath)

If you have nothing else to do, look at yourself and see if there isn’t something close at hand that you can improve. It may make you wealthy, although it is more likely it will make you happy.
—George Madison Adams (American Politician)

I’d rather have a lot of talent and a little experience than a lot of experience and a little talent.
—John Wooden (American Sportsperson)

Wisdom is the supreme part of happiness.
—Sophocles (Ancient Greek Dramatist)

A sense of curiosity is nature’s original school of education.
—Smiley Blanton

If you want greater prosperity in your life, start forming a vacuum to receive it.
—Catherine Ponder

No one has yet calculated how many imaginary triumphs are silently celebrated by people each year to keep up with their courage.
—Athenaeus

Every dawn signs a new contract with existence.
—Henri Frederic Amiel (Swiss Philosopher)

The company of the distinguished, fetches respect even to the unworthy. Because of its association with flowers (in a garland), the thread is also worn on head.
—Subhashita Manjari

It may be possible to forcibly snatch a jewel from the midst of powerful jaws of a crocodile. It may also be possible to cross a raging sea swimming across its high-running violent waves. One may even wear a furious snake around his head as if it is a garland of flowers. But it is impossible to win over a conceited fool.
—Subhashita Manjari

Between Yes and No, lies mediocracy.
—Ligia Kasten

Happiness consists more in the small conveniences of pleasures that occur every day, than in great pieces of good fortune that happen but seldom to a man in the course of his life.
—Benjamin Franklin (American Political leader)

Never do anything which you would not wish to do during the last hour of your life.
—J. P. Vaswani (Indian Hindu Philosopher)

Change always comes bearing gifts.
—Price Pritchett

Hope is itself a species of happiness, and, perhaps, the chief happiness which this world affords.
—Samuel Johnson (British Essayist)

The pursuit of happiness is a most ridiculous phrase: if you pursue happiness you’ll never find it.
—C. P. Snow

Believe in what you can do and be not deterred by what others say.
—Jacob Gelt Dekker

We are weighed down, every moment, by the conception and the sensation of Time. And there are but two means of escaping and forgetting this nightmare: pleasure and work. Pleasure consumes us. Work strengthens us. Let us choose.
—Charles Baudelaire (French Poet)

It is wonderful how much time good people spend fighting the devil. If they would only expend the same amount of energy loving their fellow men, the devil would die in his own tracks of ennui.
—Helen Keller (American Author)

We never understand a thing so well, and make it our own, as when we have discovered it for ourselves.
—Rene Descartes (French Philosopher, Mathematician)

There is this difference between happiness and wisdom, that he that thinks himself the happiest man really is so; but he that thinks himself the wisest is generally the greatest fool.
—Charles Caleb Colton (English Angelic Priest)

Be of good hope in the face of death. Believe in this one truth for certain, that no evil can befall a good man either in life or death, and that his fate is not a matter of indifference to the gods.
—Socrates (Anceient Greek Philosopher)

The way to get things done is not to mind who gets the credit of doing them.
—Benjamin Jowett

The spirit of man communes with Heaven;|the omnipotence of Heaven resides in man.|Is the distance between Heaven and man very great?
—Hong Zicheng

There is hardly any place or any company where you may not gain knowledge, if you please; almost everybody know some one thing, and is glad to talk about that one thing.
—Earl of Chesterfield

Every creator painfully experiences the chasm between his inner vision and its ultimate expression. The chasm is never completely bridged. We all have the conviction, perhaps illusory, that we have much more to say than appears on the paper.
—Isaac Bashevis Singer (Polish-born American Children’s Books Writer)

Eventually, we all need to be willing to face the deepest, darkest beliefs we have about ourselves. Only in this way can we come to know that they are only beliefs, and not the truth about who we are.
—Ezra Bayda

When a man feels throbbing within him the power to do what he undertakes as well as it can possibly be done, this is happiness, this is success.
—Orison Swett Marden (American New Thought Writer)

When I work fourteen hours a day, seven days a week, I get lucky.
—Armand Hammer

To attain happiness in another world we need only to believe something, while to secure it in this world we must needs do something.
—Charlotte Perkins Gilman (American Sociologist)

An avowal of poverty is no disgrace to any man; to make no effort to escape it is indeed disgraceful.
—Thucydides

A friend is there before you know it, to lend a hand before you ask it, and give you love just when you need it most.
—Unknown

Commerce is a game of skill, which every man cannot play, which few men can play well. The right merchant is one who has the just average of faculties we call commonsense; a man of strong affinity for facts, who makes up his decision on what he has seen. He is thoroughly persuaded of the truths of arithmetic. There is always a reason, in the man, for his good or bad fortune; and so, in making money. Men talk as if there were some magic about this, and believe in magic, in all parts of life. He knows that all goes on the old road, pound for pound, cent for cent-for every effect a perfect cause-and that good luck is another name for tenacity of purpose.
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (American Philosopher)

Toleration is the greatest gift of the mind; it requires the same effort of the brain that it takes to balance oneself on a bicycle.
—Helen Keller (American Author)