Thousands have been inspired by the life-changing words and philosophies found in quotes. The right words can often trigger ideas that bring needed motivation, inspiration, or the solution to a problem.

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Achievement

Don't mistake movement for achievement. It's easy to get faked out by being busy. The question is: Busy doing what?
- Jim Rohn  More...

The only world in which "defeat" exists as a reality is the one darkened by the false idea that what may have happened to us a moment ago is the same as what's possible for us to achieve now. - Guy Finley  More...

When an idea reaches critical mass, there is no stopping the shift its presence will induce. - Marianne Williamson  More...

The greatest inventions and accomplishments began as the flicker of an idea. This tiny flame was then fueled by desire and faith. Watch out for those tiny little ideas. You have the potential to turn them into great things. - Steve Brunkhorst  More...

The world needs dreamers and the world needs doers. But above all, the world needs dreamers who do.
- Sarah Ban Breathnach More...

You cannot climb a mountain if you will not risk a fall.
- Rick Beneteau  More...

Have the dogged determination to follow through to achieve your goal; regardless of circumstances or whatever other people say, think, or do.  - Paul J. Meyer

Winners compare their achievements with their goals, while losers compare their achievements with those of other people.
- Nido Qubein

Ordinary people believe only in the possible. Extraordinary people visualize not what is possible or probable, but rather what is impossible. And by visualizing the impossible, they begin to see it as possible. - Cherie Carter-Scott

Think of yourself as on the threshold of unparalleled success. A whole, clear glorious life lies before you. Achieve! Achieve! Andrew Carnegie (1835-1919)

Desire is the starting point of all achievement, not a hope, not a wish, but a keen pulsating desire which transcends everything. - Napoleon Hill

Human beings who leave hehind them no great achievements, but only a sequence of small kindnesses, have not had wasted lives. - Charlotte Gray

Those who truly have the spirit of champions are never wholly happy with an easy win. Half the satisfaction stems from knowing that it was the time and the effort you invested that led to your high achievement. - Nicole Haislett

Achievement requires more than a vision - it takes courage, resolve and tenacity. - Neil Eskelin

Motivation

You don't have to get it perfect – you just have to get it going. Babies don't walk the first time they try, but eventually they do. - Mark Victor Hansen

True motivation comes from within - from the willingness to see a dream fulfilled - from the desire to leave the world better than you found it. - Steve Brunkhorst  More...

People often say that motivation doesn't last. Well, neither does bathing. That's why we recommend it daily. - Zig Ziglar

When a goal matters enough to a person, that person will find a way to accomplish what at first seemed impossible.
- Nido Qubein

Success

Always remember that striving and struggle precede success, even in the dictionary. - Sarah Ban Breathnach  More...

The first step toward success is taken when you refuse to be a captive of the environment in which you first find yourself.
- Mark Caine

Success is not measured by money or fame but by how you feel about your own goals and accomplishments and the time and effort you put into them. - Willie Stargell

If one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours. - Henry David Thoreau

It's usually the last ounce of effort that tips the scales of success. - Rick Beneteau  More...

There is more to success than reaching goals. People have accumulated vast fortunes only to live their final years unfulfilled and spiritually poor. Success must also include a joyful appreciation of living — an authentic joy that pulls us toward the next episode of our life's purpose.
- Steve Brunkhorst  More...

Success is waking up in the morning, whoever you are, wherever you are, however old or young, and bounding out of bed because there's something out there you love to do, that you believe in, that you're good at — something that's bigger than you are, and you can hardly wait to get at it again today.
- Whit Hobbs

Excellence

There isn't a ruler, a yard stick or a measuring tape in the entire world long enough to compute the strength and capabilities inside you. - Paul J. Meyer

When we acknowledge that all of life is sacred and that each act is an act of choice and therefore sacred, then life is a sacred dance lived consciously each moment. When we live at this level, we participate in the creation of a better world.
- Scout Cloud Lee

There comes that mysterious meeting in life when someone acknowledges who we are and what we can be, igniting the circuits of our highest potential. - Rusty Berkus

Excellence can be attained if you - care more than others think is wise - risk more than others think is safe - dream more than others think is practical - and expect more than others think is possible. - Anonymous

Vision and Faith

When you get to the end of all the light you know, and it's time to step into the darkness of the unknown, faith is knowing that one of two things shall happen: either you will be given something solid to stand on, or you will be taught how to fly.
- Edward Teller

When the night is cloudy, I still believe in stars, Even when the darkness blocks the light. They're shining out like beacons on the other side of hope. You can see them when you hold your heart just right. - Selia Qynn

Whatever you vividly imagine, ardently desire, sincerely believe, and enthusiastically act upon... must inevitably come to pass!
- Paul J. Meyer

Every thought has the power to bring into being the visible from the invisible. It is absolutely necessary for us all to understand that everything we think, do or say comes back to us. Every thought, word or action—without exception—manifests itself as an actual reality. - Ann Wigmore

Cherish your visions and your dreams. They are the children of your soul, the blueprints of your ultimate achievements.
- Napoleon Hill

Optimism is the faith that leads to achievement. Nothing can be done without hope or confidence. - Helen Keller

Vision enables you to glimpse into the future, to sense its hope and power, because you yourself are the means for that future's creation." - Sara Paddison

Hold a picture of yourself long enough in your mind’s eye and you will be drawn toward it. - Dr. Harry Emerson Fosdick

The only limit to our realization of tomorrow will be our doubts of today; Let us move forward with strong and active faith.
– Franklin D. Roosevelt

If you don't have a vision for the future, then your future is threatened to be a repeat of the past. - A. R. Bernard

Life does not consist mainly, or even largely, of facts and happenings. It consists mainly of the stream of thought that is forever flowing through one’s head. - Mark Twain

Look ahead; envision the beautiful blessings waiting on your distant shores. If you follow your personal stepping-stones with joy, love, faith and gratitude, the swiftest currents will not impede your journey. – Steve Brunkhorst  More...

Strength and Courage

Somehow I can't believe that there are any heights that can't be scaled by a man who knows the secrets of making dreams come true. This special secret - curiosity, confidence, courage, and constancy, and the greatest of all is confidence. When you believe in a thing, believe in it all the way, implicitly and unquestionable. - Walt Disney

You gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, "I lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along." ...You must do the thing you think you cannot do. - Eleanor Roosevelt (1884-1962)

There are deep, changeless connections inside of us that help us to manage change. Part of our inner self-care involves remembering those very loving people who will always inspire us with their values and courage. - Steve Brunkhorst  More...

Courage is, with love, the greatest gift. We are, each of us, defeated many times - but if we accept defeat with cheerfulness, and learn from it, and try another way - then we will find fulfilment. - Rosanne Ambrose-Brown

Possibility and Opportunity

When these stars die, after the ageless darkness, more stars will come. Under them our future selves will be. When their stars die, yet more stars will come. This is unending, for the darkness itself is eternal, and while there is darkness, there will always be the possibility of stars. - A. Wohsedis

Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work. - Thomas Edison

The secret of success in life is for a man to be ready for his opportunity when it comes. - Benjamin Disraeli

Opportunity is like a gold mine... if you don't pick up the shovel, then you will be living in someone else's shaft.
- Doug Firebaugh

Resolve and Commitment

Desire is the key to motivation, but it's determination and commitment to an unrelenting pursuit of your goal -- a commitment to excellence -- that will enable you to attain the success you seek. - Mario Andretti

Commitment turns a promise into reality with words that speak boldly of your intentions and actions that speak louder than words. - Steve Brunkhorst  More...

Something in human nature causes us to start slacking off at our moment of greatest accomplishment. As you become successful, you will need a great deal of self-discipline not to lose your sense of balance, humility, and commitment.
- H. Ross Perot

There is no scarcity of opportunity to make a living at what you love; there's only a scarcity of resolve to make it happen.
- Dr. Wayne Dyer

I believe life is constantly testing us for our level of commitment, and life's greatest rewards are reserved for those who demonstrate a never-ending commitment to act until they achieve. This level of resolve can move mountains, but it must be constant and consistent. As simplistic as this may sound, it is still the common denominator separating those who live their dreams from those who live in regret. - Tony Robbins

Nature's Light

Softly the evening came. The sun from the western horizon like a magician extended his golden want o'er the landscape; trinkling vapors arose; and sky and water and forest seemed all on fire at the touch, and melted and mingled together.
- Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Climb the mountains and get their good tidings. Nature´s peace will flow into you as sunshine flows into trees. The winds will blow their own freshness into you, and the storms their energy, while cares will drop off like autumn leaves. - John Muir

The universe is one great kindergarten for man. Everything that exists has brought with it its own peculiar lesson. The mountain teaches stability and grandeur; the ocean immensity and change. Forests, lakes, and rivers, clouds and winds, stars and flowers, stupendous glaciers and crystal snowflakes - every form of animate or inanimate existence, leaves its impress upon the soul of man. - Orison Swett Marden

I saw in the northwest first rise, in the rose-tinted horizon sky, a dark, narrow, craggy cloud, narrow and projecting as no cloud on earth, seen against the rose-tinted sky - the crest of a thunderstorm, beautiful and grand. - Henry David Thoreau

And after ten years spent in the heart of it, bathing in its glorious floods of light, seeing the sunbursts of morning among the icy peaks, the flush of alpenglow, and a thousand dashing waterfalls with their marvelous abundance of irised spray, it still seems to me above all others the Range of Light. - John Muir

Next time a sunrise steals your breath or a meadow of flowers leaves you speechless, remain that way. Say nothing, and listen as heaven whispers, "Do you like it? I did it just for you." - Max Lucado

The sun illuminates only the eye of the man, but shines into the heart of the child. In the presence of nature, a wild delight runs through the man, in spite of real sorrows.
- Ralph Waldo Emerson

At first a small line of inconceivable splendor emerged on the horizon, which quickly expanding, the sun appeared in all of his glory, unveiling the whole face of nature, vivifying every colour of the landscape, and sprinkling the dewy earth with glittering light. - Ann Radcliffe

A leaf, a sun-beam, a landscape, the ocean, make an analogous impression on the mind. What is common to them all, --that perfectness and harmony, is beauty. The standard of beauty is the entire circuit of natural forms,-- the totality of nature... - Ralph Waldo Emerson

Contentment and Serenity

Grow old along with me! The best is yet to be, the last of life, for which the first was made; our times are in his hand who saith, 'A whole I planned, youth shows but half; trust God: See all, nor be afraid! - Robert Browning

Rest is not idleness, and to lie sometimes on the grass on a summer day listening to the murmur of water, or watching the clouds float across the sky, is hardly a waste of time.
- Sir John Lubbock

As we become curators of our own contentment on the Simple Abundance path...we learn to savor the small with a grateful heart.  - Sarah Ban Breathnach More...

The three indispensables of genius are understanding, feeling, and perseverance. The three things that enrich genius are contentment of mind, the cherishing of good thoughts, and exercising the memory. - Robert Southey (1774 - 1843)

Kindness and Happiness

Having a heart for making a difference means that something or someone made a difference in my heart first. - Lee Wise  More...

We cannot live only for ourselves. A thousand fibers connect us with our fellow men; and among those fibers, as sympathetic threads, our actions run as causes, and they come back to us as effects. - Herman Melville

That best portion of a good man s life? His little, nameless, unremembered acts of kindness and of love.
- William Wordsworth

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

Happiness is spiritual, born of truth and love. It is unselfish; therefore it cannot exist alone, but requires all mankind to share it. - Mary Baker Eddy

Constant kindness can accomplish much. As the sun makes ice melt, kindness causes misunderstanding, mistrust, and hostility to evaporate. - Albert Schweitzer

I expect to pass through life but once. If therefore, there can be any kindness I can show, or any good thing I can do to any fellow being, let me do it now, and not defer or neglect it, as I shall not pass this way again. - William Penn

If we can augment our gift giving by giving more of ourselves to those we love, all the time and in various ways, we will have a good chance of helping them and ourselves live happier, better lives. - Earl Nightingale

People are like stars... we all have our own special light that shines from within. Sometimes we find our light to be dim and we struggle to shine... but that is when we need the light shed from the other stars to help us light our path once again. A true light that comes from within, from our divine Maker is so brilliant that it penetrates into the souls of the other stars onto which it shines, leaving it's impression for eternity. Are you shining for someone today? - Unkhown

Love

The scenario can get really delightful, what with a not so perfect world that we have, finding your soulmate in the most strange times is perhaps the most beautiful thing that can happen to any individual. - Robert Johannsen

There is a time for risky love. There is a time for extravagant gestures. There is a time to pour out your affections on one you love. And when the time comes, seize it, don't miss it.
- Max Lucado

We're the bridge across forever, arching above the sea, adventuring for our pleasure, living mysteries for the fun of it, choosing disasters triumphs challenges impossible odds, testing ourselves over and again, learning love and love and love!
- Richard Bach

Love is like a friendship caught on fire. In the beginning a flame, very pretty, often hot and fierce, but still only light and flickering. As love grows older, our hearts mature and our love becomes as coals, deep-burning and unquenchable.
- Bruce Lee

The man or woman you really love will never grow old to you. Through the wrinkles of time, through the bowed frame of years, you will always see the dear face and feel the warm heart union of your eternal love. -Alfred Armand Montapert

Love is patient, love is kind.
It does not envy, it does not boast.
It is not proud.
It is not rude, it is not self-seeking.
It is not easily angered.
It keeps no record of wrongs.
Love does not delight in evil
but rejoices with the truth.
It always protects, always trusts,
always hopes, always perseveres.
Love never fails.

First Corinthians 13:4

Only you can call me into aliveness. Each time you try to understand and because you really care, my heart begins to grow wings, very small wings, very feeble wings, but wings. With your sensitivity and sympathy, and your power of understanding, you can breathe life into me. - Charles C. Finn

For one human being to love another: that is perhaps the most difficult of our tasks; the ultimate, the last test and proof, the work for which all other work is but preparation.
- Rainer Maria Rilke

To love someone is beautiful. To love and admire someone is a beautiful privilege. - Lee Wise   More...

Miracles occur naturally as expressions of love. The real miracle is the love that inspires them. In this sense everything that comes from love is a miracle. - Marianne Williamson   More...

There were many ways of breaking a heart. Stories were full of hearts broken by love, but what really broke a heart was taking away its dream - whatever that dream might be.
- Pearl Buck (1892-1973)

We can cure physical diseases with medicine, but the only cure for loneliness, despair, and hopelessness is love. There are many in the world who are dying for a piece of bread, but there are many more dying for a little love.
- Mother Teresa (1910-1997)

Some day, after we have mastered the winds, the waves, the tides and gravity, we shall harness the energies of love. Then, for the second time in the history of the world, man will have discovered fire. - Pierre Teilhard De Chardin (1881-1955)

I had found a kind of serenity, a new maturity... I didn't feel better or stronger than anyone else but it seemed no longer important whether everyone loved me or not - more important now was for me to love them. Feeling that way turns your whole life around; living becomes the act of giving.
- Beverly Sills

Humor and Laughter

For health and the constant enjoyment of life, give me a keen and ever-present sense of humor; it is the next best thing to an abiding faith in providence.
- George Barrell Cheever (1807-1890)

Laughter is the sun that drives winter from the human face. - Victor Hugo (1802-1885)

Good humor is a tonic for mind and body. It is the best antidote for anxiety and depression. It is a business asset. It attracts and keeps friends. It lightens human burdens. It is the direct route to serenity and contentment. - Grenville Kleiser

Laughter is the best form of medicine. For when we laugh, we neither think, grieve, or feel. - Eugene Lam

A well-developed sense of humor is the pole that adds balance to your steps as you walk the tightrope of life.
- William Arthur Ward

Family and Relationships

I learned about the strength you can get from a close family life. I learned to keep going, even in bad times. I learned not to despair, even when my world was falling apart. I learned that there are no free lunches. And I learned the value of hard work.
- Lee Iacocca

What you have inherited from your father, you must earn over again for yourselves, or it will not be yours.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

You don't really understand human nature unless you know why a child on a merry-go-round will wave at his parents every time around — and why his parents will always wave back.
- William D. Tammeus

We played, we sang, we danced wildly. And we wandered quietly by the sea. I will always remember these days in summer — they are in my very being. You were, you are my daughter. My daughter, my joy. - Helen Thomson

If a child sees his parents day in and day out behaving with self-discipline, restraint, dignity and a capacity to order their own lives, then the child will come to feel in the deepest fibers of his being that this is the way to live. - M. Scott Peck

A child's life is like a piece of paper on which every person leaves a mark. - Chinese Proverb

Daughters are more precious than gold. More precious than any inanimate thing, however beautiful. More precious than one's dreams, however glorious.... They are its hope. And yours to love. - Marion C. Garretty

Through the changing times and seasons of life, our golden relationships are not really lost. They are there to help guide us. They are as close as a thought. - Steve Brunkhorst  More...

If you can give your son or daughter only one gift, let it be enthusiasm. - Bruce Barton

You know that children are growing up when they start asking questions that have answers. - John J. Plomp

For there is no friend like a sister in calm or stormy weather; To cheer one on the tedious way, to fetch one if one goes astray, to lift one if one totters down, to strengthen whilst one stands. - Christina Rossetti

Spiritual Awareness

The sun shines not on us but in us....The trees wave and the flowers bloom in our bodies as well as our souls, and every bird song, wind song, and; tremendous storm song of the rocks in the heart of the mountains is our song, our very own, and sings our love. - John Muir

If we want a love message to be heard, it has got to be sent out. To keep a lamp burning, we have to keep putting oil in it.
- Mother Teresa

Every natural fact is a symbol of some spiritual fact.
- Ralph Waldo Emerson

God exists in eternity. The only point where eternity meets time is in the present. The present is the only time there is.
- Marianne Williamson  More...

How do the geese know when to fly to the sun? Who tells them the seasons? How do we, humans, know when it is time to move on? As with the migrant birds, so surely with us, there is a voice within, if only we would listen to it.
- Elisabeth Kubler-Ross

We are not human beings on a spiritual journey. We are spiritual beings on a human journey. - Stephen R. Covey

It is the unseen and the spiritual in people that determines the outward and the actual. - Oswald Chambers

It gives me a deep comforting sense that things seen are temporal and things unseen are eternal. - Helen Keller

Responsibility

Provision for others is a fundamental responsibility of human life. - Woodrow Wilson

We have the divine gift of free will. We make conscious choices as spiritual beings who live in a physical world. Conscious choice is a gift that carries great responsibility.
- Steve Brunkhorst  More...

The greatest gifts you can give your children are the roots of responsibility and the wings of independence. - Denis Waitley

Action springs not from thought, but from a readiness for responsibility. - Dietrich Bonhoeffer

We are responsible for actions performed in response to circumstances for which we are not responsible. - Allan Massie

Work while you have the light. You are responsible for the talent that has been entrusted to you. - Henri Frederic Amiel