Huge fan of quotations. Whatever you are thinking, its probably been said by a famous person – more succinctly, more eloquently.  Here are some of my favorites. The bucketing is approximate, and definitely not MECE.

We are what we repeatedly do

  • All great achievements require time. – Maya Angelou
  • Routine, in an intelligent man, is a sign of ambition. – W.H. Auden
  • Your dreams don’t work unless you do – John Maxwell
  • Continuous effort, not strength or intelligence, is the key to unlocking our potential – Winston Churchill
  • Without great solitude no serious work is possible – Pablo Picasso
  • Start where you are. Use what you have. Do what you can. – Arthur Ashe
  • A hero is one who knows how to hang on for one minute longer. Norweigan Proverb
  • We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence then, is not an act, but a habit. – Aristotle
  • That the mode in which the inevitable comes to pass is through effort. Oliver Wendell Holmes

Experience = the name we give mistakes

  • Strength does not come from winning. Your struggles develop your strengths – Arnold Schwarzenegger
  • Experience is simply the name we give our mistakes. – Oscar Wilde
  • The world breaks everyone and afterward many are strong at the broken places. – Ernest Hemingway
  • You never know how strong you are, until being strong is your only choice – Bob Marley
  • Victory is sweetest when you’ve known defeat” – Malcolm Forbes
  • A smooth sea never made a skillful sailor – Franklin D Roosevelt
  • Good judgment comes from experience, and a lot of that comes from bad judgment. – Will Rogers

Live the life you imagined

  • Go confidently in the direction of your dreams. Live the life you have imagined – Henry David Thoreau
  • Let your hopes, not your hurts, shape your future. Robert Schuller
  • You can be happy or you can be unhappy. It’s just according to the way you look at things – Walt Disney
  • Fear leads to self-doubt which is the worst enemy of creativity. – David Ogilvy
  • Don’t be pushed by your problems. Be led by your dreams – Ralph Waldo Emerson
  • I have had lots of troubles in my life, most of which never happened. – Mark Twain
  • People do not seem to realize that their opinion of the world is also a confession of character. – Ralph Waldo Emerson
  • Obstacles are those frightful things you see when you take your eyes off your goals – Ford
  • Do the thing you think you cannot do. – Eleanor Roosevelt
  • There is no passion to be found playing small, in settling for a life that is less than the one you are capable of living. – Nelson Mandela
  • When something is important enough, you do it even if the odds are not in your favor. – Elon Musk
  • I saw the angel in the marble and carved until I set him free – Michelangelo

Yesterday, you said tomorrow

  • The most effective way to do it, is to do it. – Amelia Earhart
  • Yesterday, you said tomorrow – Nike
  • One day you will wake up and there won’t be any more time to do the things you’ve always wanted. Do it now. – Paulo Coelho
  • It takes as much energy to wish as it does to plan. – Eleanor Roosevelt
  • Nothing is impossible, the word itself says ‘I’m possible – Audrey Hepburn
  • Most people get ahead during the time that others waste – Henry Ford

I am only passionate curious

  • There are no foreign lands. It is the traveler only who is foreign – Robert Louis Stevenson
  • I would rather have questions that can’t be answered than answers that can’t be questioned. – Richard Feynman
  • Approach the game with no preset agendas and you’ll probably come away surprised at your overall efforts – Phil Jackson
  • Mystery creates wonder and wonder is the basis of our desire to understand – Neil Armstrong
  • Children are wonderfully confident in their own imaginations. Most of us lose this confidence as we grow up – Sir Ken Robinson
  • With the new day comes new strength and new thoughts – Eleanor Roosevelt
  • I have no special talents. I am only passionately curious. – Albert Einstein
  • Find a place inside where there’s joy, and the joy will burn out the pain. – Joseph Campbell

Anyone who stops learning is old

  • Anyone who stops learning is old – Henry Ford
  • In times of change, learners inherit the earth, while the learned find themselves beautifully equipped to deal with a world that no longer exists. Eric Hoffer
  • To attain knowledge, add things every day. To attain wisdom, subtract things every day. – Lao Tzu

Do not mistake activity for achievement

  • Beware the barrenness of a busy life – Socrates
  • It is more important to know where you are going than to get there quickly. Do not mistake activity for achievement. – Isocrates
  • There is nothing so useless as doing efficiently that which should not be done at all – Peter Drucker

Everybody is a genius

  • What makes you different or weird—that’s your strength – Meryl Streep
  • The meaning of life is to find your gift. The purpose of life is to give it away – Picasso
  • When you are content to be simply yourself and don’t compare or compete, everyone will respect you – Lao Tzu
  • Trust yourself. Create the kind of self that you will be happy to live with all your life. – Golda Meir
  • If you cannot find peace within yourself, you will never find it anywhere else – Marvin Gaye
  • The privilege of a lifetime is being who you are – Joseph Campbell
  • When I let go of what I am, I become what I might be. – Lao Tzu
  • One of the greatest discoveries a person makes is to find they can do what they were afraid they couldn’t do. – Henry Ford
  • Absorb what is useful. Discard what is not. Add what is uniquely your own – Bruce Lee
  • Everybody is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid. ― Albert Einstein
  • Do what you feel in your heart to be right. You’ll be criticized anyway – Eleanor Roosevelt

I got all of these from a Chrome browser add-in called “Momentum”. It’s free. Shows a nature scene and provides a simple, positive quote. Enjoy.

Do you have some favorite quotes that need to be added to this list?

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