Do you know what you need to do?
Is motivation all you need?
These inspirational and motivational quotes can help you find and nurture the strength within you.
You can’t always choose your circumstances, but you can choose how you respond to them.
Start taking responsibility for your life, your happiness, and your dreams. You’ll be unstoppable once you take responsibility for your successes and failures.
Motivational Quotes About Life
“He who has a why to live for can bear almost any how.” ∼Friedrich Nietzsche
“Change your life today. Don’t gamble on the future, act now, without delay.”
∼Simone de Beauvoir
“I acted like Cary Grant for so long, I became him” ∼Cary Grant
“Someone is sitting in the shade today because someone planted a tree a long time ago.” ∼Warren Buffett
“Fortune knocks but once, but misfortune has much more patience.” ∼Laurence J. Peter
“Compared with what we ought to be, we are only half awake. We are making use of only a small part of our physical and mental resources. Stating the thing broadly, the human individual thus lives far within his limits. He possesses powers of various sorts which he habitually fails to use.”
∼William James
“Difficult roads often lead to beautiful destinations.” ∼Unkown
“Without new experiences, something inside of us sleeps. The sleeper must awaken.”
∼Frank Herbert
“She quietly expected great things to happen to her, and no doubt that’s one of the reasons why they did.”
∼Zelda Fitzgerald
“I must be a mermaid. I have no fear of depths and a great fear of shallow living.”
∼Anais Nin
“There are two ways of spreading light; to be the candle or the mirror that reflects it.”
∼Edith Wharton
“It’s time to write a new story”
“My life didn’t please me so I created my life.” ∼Coco Chanel
“Believe there is a great power silently working all things for good, behave and never mind he rest.”
∼Beatrix Potter
“The world is full of magic things patiently waiting for our wits to grow sharper.”
∼Eden Phillpotts
“The big question is whether you are going to be able to say a hearty yes to your adventure.”
∼Joseph Campbell
“Live the full life of the mind, exhilarated by new ideas, intoxicated by the Romance of the Unusual.”
∼Ernest Hemingway
“Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known.” ∼Carl Sagan
“Trust in dreams, for in them is hidden the gate to eternity.” ∼Khalil Gibran
“Why should you continue going after your dreams? Because seeing the look on the faces of the people who said you couldn’t… will be priceless.”
∼Kevin Ngo
“And into the forest, I go to lose my mind and find my soul”
~John Muir
“For my own part, I declare I know nothing whatever about it but to look at the stars always makes me dream.”
∼Vincent Van Gogh
“No heart has ever suffered when it goes in search of its dreams, because every second of the search is a second’s encounter with God and with eternity.”
∼Paulo Coelho, The Alchemist
“Die with memories, not dreams.” ∼Anonymous
“Our cuts heal and our scars fade. How can we say that life is not on our side?” ∼Anonymous
“By being yourself, you put something wonderful in the world that was not there before.”
∼Edwin Elliot
“No doubt you are wondering what you will find, out there.’ The Commandant said it for me. ‘Well, it would be useless for me to try and tell you. The desert tells a different story every time one ventures on it…”
∼Robert Edison Fulton Jr., One Man Caravan
“You either kiss the future or the past goodbye.” ∼Ringo Starr
“Don’t try to be young. Just open your mind. Stay interested in stuff. There are so many things I won’t live long enough to find out about, but I’m still curious about them. You know people who are already saying, ‘I’m going to be 30—oh, what am I going to do?’ Well, use that decade! Use them all!”
∼Betty White
“Our greatest glory is not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall.”
∼Confucius
“All our dreams can come true, if we have the courage to pursue them.”
∼Walt Disney
“Set a goal to achieve something that is so big, so exhilarating that it excites you and scares you at the same time.”
∼Bob Proctor
“Discipline equals freedom.” ∼Jocko Willink
“Hard choices, easy life. Easy choices, hard life.” ∼Jerzy Gregorek
“It does not matter how slowly you go as long as you do not stop.” ∼Confucius
“Everything you’ve ever wanted is on the other side of fear.” ∼George Addair
“Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.”
∼Winston Churchill
“There is only one thing that makes a dream impossible to achieve: the fear of failure.”
∼Paulo Coelho, The Alchemist
“I will live this day as if it is my last. And if it is not, I shall fall to my knees and give thanks.”
~Og Mandino, Greatest Salesman in the World
“Believe in yourself. You are braver than you think, more talented than you know, and capable of more than you imagine.”
∼Roy T. Bennett
“I have learned over the years that when one’s mind is made up, this diminishes fear; knowing what must be done does away with fear.”
∼Rosa Parks
“It’s not whether you get knocked down. It’s whether you get up.” ∼Vince Lombardi
“Believe in yourself, take on your challenges, dig deep within yourself to conquer fears. Never let anyone bring you down. You got to keep going.”
∼Chantal Sutherland
“Too many of us are not living our dreams because we are living our fears.” ∼Les Brown
“If you believe it will work out, you’ll see opportunities. If you believe it won’t, you will see obstacles.”
∼Wayne Dyer
“What dying man can purchase another breath though he willingly give all his gold? What price dare I place on the hours ahead? I will make them priceless!”
~Og Mandino, Greatest Salesman in the World
“Permanence, perseverance and persistence in spite of all obstacles, discouragements, and impossibilities: It is this, that in all things distinguishes the strong soul from the weak.”
∼Thomas Carlyle
“Faith and fear both demand you believe in something you cannot see. You choose!”
∼ Bob Proctor
“Success means doing the best we can with what we have. Success is the doing, not the getting; in the trying, not the triumph. Success is a personal standard, reaching for the highest that is in us, becoming all that we can be.”
∼Zig Ziglar
“If you set goals and go after them with all the determination you can muster, your gifts will take you places that will amaze you.”
∼Les Brown
“Believe you can and you’re halfway there.” ∼Theodore Roosevelt
“The best view comes after the hardest climb.” ∼Anonymous
“Your mind is a powerful thing. When you fill it with positive thoughts, your life will start to change.”
∼Anonymous
“What comes easy won’t last long, and what lasts long won’t come easy.” ∼Anonymous
“Do the thing and you will have the power.” ∼Ralph Waldo Emerson
“Perhaps this is the moment for which you have been created.” ∼Anonymous
“Start by doing what’s necessary; then do what’s possible; and suddenly you are doing the impossible.”
∼Francis of Assisi
“In a world where you can be anything, be kind.” ∼Anonymous
“One day the people who didn’t believe in you will tell everyone how they met you.” ∼Johnny Depp
“I attribute my success to this: I never gave or took any excuse.” ∼Florence Nightingale
“Always believe that something wonderful is about to happen.” ∼Dr. Sukhraj Dhillon
“Those who don’t believe in magic will never find it.” ∼Roald Dahl
“Be the reason someone smiles today.” ∼Anonymous
“Never give up, for that is just the place and time that the tide will turn.” ∼Harriet Beecher Stow
“Never give up! Never surrender!” ∼Galaxy Quest
“Whatever you hold in your mind on a consistent basis is exactly what you will experience in your life.”
∼Tony Robbins
“Most of the important things in the world have been accomplished by people who have kept on trying when there seemed to be no hope at all.”
∼Dale Carnegie
“Strength does not come from physical capacity. It comes from an indomitable will.”
∼Mahatma Gandhi
“All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to us.”
∼J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings
“God’s gift to you is more talent and ability than you will ever use in one lifetime. Your gift to God is to develop and utilize as much of that talent and ability as you can, in this lifetime.”
∼Steve Bow
“Big results require big ambitions. Aim high. Behave honorably. Prepare to be alone at times, and to endure failure. Persist! The world needs all you can give. To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.
∼Alfred Lord Tennyson
“Perseverance is the hard work you do after you get tired of doing the hard work you already did.”
∼Newt Gingrich
“The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams.”
∼Franklin D. Roosevelt
“I am not a product of my circumstances. I am a product of my decisions.”
∼Stephen Covey
“Don’t be pushed around by the fears in your mind. Be led by the dreams in your heart.”
∼Roy T. Bennett
“You are not only a part of the song; your life is a song.”
∼Emily Silva, Moonlight Gratitude
“To believe in the things you can see and touch is no belief at all. But to believe in the unseen is both a triumph and a blessing.”
∼Bob Proctor
“If you can tune into your purpose and really align with it, setting goals so that your vision is an expression of that purpose, then life flows much more easily.”
∼Jack Canfield
“Whatever the mind can conceive and believe, it can achieve.”
∼Napoleon Hill
“It doesn’t matter where you are, you are nowhere compared to where you can go.”
∼Bob Proctor
“Don’t wish it were easier. Wish you were better.” ∼Jim Rohn
“It’s not about perfect. It’s about effort. And when you bring that effort every single day, that’s where transformation happens. That’s how change occurs.”
∼Jillian Michaels
“Thoughts become things. If you see it in your mind, you will hold it in your hand.”
∼ Bob Proctor, You Were Born Rich
“Strength doesn’t come from what you can do. It comes from overcoming the things you once thought you couldn’t.”
∼Rikki Rogers
“Learn from the past, set vivid, detailed goals for the future, and live in the only moment of time over which you have any control: now.”
∼Denis Waitley
“you can do anything if you put your focus on how to do it rather than on why you can’t.”
∼Bob Proctor
“Fortune always favors the brave, and never helps a man who does not help himself.”
∼P. T. Barnum
“Go confidently in the direction of your dreams. Live the life you have imagined.”
∼Henry David Thoreau
“No great thing is created suddenly, any more than a bunch of grapes or a fig. If you tell me that you desire a fig, I answer that there must be time. Let it first blossom, then bear fruit, then ripen.”
∼Epictetus
“Keep your eyes on the stars, and your feet on the ground.” ∼Theodore Roosevelt
“We aim above the mark to hit the mark.” ∼Ralph Waldo Emerson
“Confidence comes not from always being right but from not fearing to be wrong.”
∼Peter T. Mcintyre
“Old ways won’t open new doors.” ~Anonymous
“One way to keep momentum going is to have constantly greater goals.”
∼Michael Korda
“When a million reasons can bring you down, find one reason to keep you up.”
∼Anonymous
“In the end, we only regret the chances we didn’t take…relationship we are afraid to have, and the decisions we waited too long to make.”
∼Anonymous
“No one is you and that is your power.” ∼Dave Grohl
“It’s never too late to love yourself again.” ∼Bryant McGill
“Millions of people can believe in you, and yet none of it matters if you don’t believe in yourself.”
∼Anonymous
“Be like a postage stamp. Stick to it until you get there”
∼ Bob Proctor
“If you can dream it, then you can achieve it. You will get all you want in life if you help enough other people get what they want.”
∼Zig Ziglar
“Where there is a will, there is a way. If there is a chance in a million that you can do something, anything, to keep what you want from ending, do it. Pry the door open or, if need be, wedge your foot in that door and keep it open.”
∼Pauline Kael
“No matter how far down the wrong road you’ve gone, turn back.”
∼Turkish Proverb
“The only person you are destined to become is the person you decide to be.”
∼Ralph Waldo Emerson
“Your personal growth is the only thing that matters. You own and write your story; no one else does. Believe in the unique step up the mountain.”
∼Brittany Burgunder
“Perfection is not attainable, but if we chase perfection we can catch excellence.”
∼Vince Lombardi
“If you don’t like something, change it. If you can’t change it, change your attitude.”
∼Maya Angelou
“Do not wait; the time will never be ‘just right.’ Start where you stand, and work with whatever tools you may have at your command, and better tools will be found as you go along.”
∼George Herbert
“Press forward. Do not stop, do not linger in your journey, but strive for the mark set before you.”
∼George Whitefield
“Aim for the moon. If you miss, you may hit a star.”
∼W. Clement Stone
“You control your future, your destiny. What you think about comes about. By recording your dreams and goals on paper, you set in motion the process of becoming the person you most want to be. Put your future in good hands – your own.”
∼Mark Victor Hansen
“Everything you are seeking is seeking you in return therefore, everything that you want is already yours. It is simply becoming more aware of what you already possess.”
∼Bob Proctor
“Failure will never overtake me if my determination to succeed is strong enough.”
∼Og Mandino
“Inaction breeds doubt and fear. Action breeds confidence and courage. If you want to conquer fear, do not sit home and think about it. Go out and get busy.”
∼Dale Carnegie
“Limitations live only in our minds. But if we use our imaginations, our possibilities become limitless.”
∼Jamie Paolinetti
“Setting goals is the first step into turning the invisible into the visible.”
∼Tony Robbins
“Only those who dare to fail greatly can ever achieve greatly.”
∼Robert F. Kennedy
“Staying positive does not mean that things will turn out okay. Rather it is knowing that you will be okay no matter how things turn out.
∼Anonymous
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.
∼Eleanor Roosevelt
“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn’t do than by the things you did.”
∼Mark Twain
“Believe in yourself! Have faith in your abilities! Without a humble but reasonable confidence in your own powers you cannot be successful or happy.”
∼Norman Vincent Peale
“Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life.”
∼Steve Jobs
“Be so happy that when others look at you they become happy too.”
∼Anonymous
“Challenges are what make life interesting and overcoming them is what makes life meaningful.”
∼Joshua Marine
“I never dreamed about success. I worked for it.”
∼Estee Lauder
You cannot afford to live in potential for the rest of your life; at some point, you have to unleash the potential and make your move.
∼Eric Thomas
“It is never too late to be what you might have been.”
∼George Eliot
“The best way to gain self-confidence is to do what you are afraid to do.”
∼Swati Sharma
“When obstacles arise, you change your direction to reach your goal, you do not change your decision to get there”
.∼Zig Ziglar
“The Secret of Change Is to Focus All of Your Energy, Not on Fighting the Old, But on Building the New ”
∼Socrates
“Do what you can, with what you have, where you are.”
∼Theodore Roosevelt
“The pessimist sees difficulty in every opportunity. The optimist sees opportunity in every difficulty.
∼Winston Churchill
“You will never find time for anything. If you want time you must make it.”
∼Charles Buxton
“The greatest danger for most of us is not that our aim is too high and we miss it, but that it is too low and we reach it.”
∼Michelangelo
“The two most important days in your life are the day you are born and the day you find out why.”
∼Mark Twain
“You can’t litter negativity everywhere and then wonder why you’ve got a trashy life.
∼Anonymous
“If you can see yourself as an artist, and you can see that your life is your own creation, then why not create the most beautiful story for yourself?”
∼Miguel Ruiz
“It’s not what we do once in a while that shapes our lives, but what we do consistently.
∼Tony Robbins
If you chase anything in life chase the things that get you excited about living. Chase the things that give you hope, happiness and a glimpse of a better life. Chase the things that make you want to be a better person. Chase the things that inspire you to think, create and live joyfully. Chase the things that reinforce in your soul that you can make a difference. Chase the things that make you want to transform your heart from selfish to selfless. When you chase that kind of storm you are chasing rainbows.
∼Shannon L. Alder
“The truth is that our finest moments are most likely to occur when we are feeling deeply uncomfortable, unhappy, or unfulfilled. For it is only in such moments, propelled by our discomfort, that we are likely to step out of our ruts and start searching for different ways or truer answers.”
∼M. Scott Peck
“Confidence comes from discipline and training.”
∼Robert Kiyosaki
“Optimism is the faith that leads to achievement. Nothing can be done without hope and confidence.”
∼Helen Keller
“What you want exists. Don’t settle until you get it.”
∼Anonymous
“Success is what happens after you have survived your disappointments.”
∼Anonymous
“It never gets easier. You just get better.” ∼Anonymous
“We will always be on a lifelong journey to do better, to BE BETTER. There is no destination.”
“The only person that I want to be better than is the person I was yesterday.” ∼Jeremy
Motivational Quotes For Work and Business
“The best way to predict the future is to create it.”
∼ Peter Drucker
“If you care about what you do and work hard at it, there isn’t anything you can’t do if you want to.”
∼Jim Henson
“It’s not about ideas. It’s about making ideas happen.”
∼Scott Belsky
“As an entrepreneur, you never stop learning.”
∼Daymond John
“Chase the vision, not the money. The money will end up following you.”
∼Tony Hsieh
“We are never in lack of money. We lack people with dreams who can die for those dreams.”
∼Jack Ma
“You Only Fail When You Stop Trying.” ~Anonymous
“If you can dream it, you can do it.” ∼Walt Disney
“When something is important enough, you do it even if the odds are not in your favor.”
∼Elon Musk
“The person that turns over the most rocks wins the game.”
∼Peter Lynch
“From my very first day as an entrepreneur, I’ve felt the only mission worth pursuing in business is to make people’s lives better.”
∼Richard Branson
Most people are not going after what they want. Even some of the most serious goal seekers and goal setters, they’re going after what they think they can get.”
∼Bob Proctor
“I will persist until I succeed.”
~Og Mandino, The Greatest Salesman in the World
“Wake Up Winners are wide awake; they are alive. Every day you will find them in the marketplace making things happen. The real winners are not just dreamers. Although they have dreams, they are doers: They realize their dreams. They are the bell ringers, always attempting to wake others up to the numerous opportunities life offers.”
∼Bob Proctor, The ABCs of Success: The Essential Principles from America’s Greatest Prosperity Teacher
“Don’t watch the clock; do what it does. Keep going.” ∼Sam Levenson
“Find out what you like doing best, and get someone to pay you for doing it.”
∼Katherine Whitehorn
“Whatever you are, be a good one.”
∼Abraham Lincoln
“Be so good they can’t ignore you.” ∼Steve Martin
“There will be obstacles. There will be doubters. There will be mistakes. But with hard work, there are no limits.”
∼Michael Phelps
“If you know what to do to reach your goal, it’s not a big enough goal.”
∼Bob Proctor
“Your follower is not always your fan.” ∼Anonymous
“Success is what comes after your stop making excuses.”
∼Luis Galarza
“If you do not get the chills when you set your goal you’re not setting big enough goals.”
∼Bob Proctor
“In any moment of decision, the best thing you can do is the right thing, the next best thing is the wrong thing, and the worst thing you can do is nothing.”
∼ Bob Proctor, The ABCs of Success: The Essential Principles from America’s Greatest Prosperity Teacher
“Grind while they sleep. Learn while they party. Live like they dream.” ∼Anonymous
“Success in life comes when you simply refuse to give up, with goals so strong that obstacles, failure, and loss only act as motivation.”
∼Anonymous
“Look in the mirror. That’s your competition.” ∼Anonymous
“Every job is a self portrait of a person who does it. Autograph your work with excellence.”
∼Anonymous
“If the plan doesn’t work, change the plan. But never the goal.” ∼Anonymous
“You never lose in business. You either win or learn.”
∼Anonymous
“Success is shy – it won’t come out while you’re watching”
~Tennessee Williams
“Ability: is what you are capable of doing. Motivation: determines what you do. Attitude: determines how well you do it.”
∼Anonymous
“Don’t downgrade your dream just to fit your reality. Upgrade your conviction to match your destiny.”
∼Anonymous
“To do great work is to love what you do.”∼Anonymous
“Work hard in silence. Let success make the noise.” ∼Anonymous
“The difference between successful people and really successful people is that really successful people say no to almost everything.”
∼Warren Buffett
“Working hard for something we don’t care about is called stress. Working hard for something we love is called passion.”
∼Anonymous
“The fishermen know that the sea is dangerous and the storm fearsome, but could never see that the dangers were a reason to continue strolling on the beach.”
∼Vincent Van Gogh
Motivational Quotes For Students
“By making yourself a life-long learner you’ll keep discovering new and exciting things about yourself and others.”
∼Rachel Robins
“Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.”
∼Nelson Mandela
“Be a student as long as you still have something to learn, and this will mean all your life.”
∼Henry L. Doherty
“Success is no accident. It is hard work, perseverance, learning, studying, sacrifice and most of all, love of what you are doing or learning to do.”
∼Pele
“The roots of education are bitter, but the fruit is sweet.”
∼Aristotle
‘It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.’ ∼Aristotle
“Press on – nothing can take the place of persistence. Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful men with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not; the world is full of educated derelicts. Perseverance and determination alone are omnipotent.”
∼Calvin Coolidge
“An educated person is a person who has so developed the faculties of their mind that they can acquire anything they want”
∼Bob Proctor
“Do a lot of reading.”
~Warren Buffett
“You don’t go to the science museum and get handed a pamphlet on electricity. You go to the science museum and you put your hand on a metal ball. Your hair sticks up straight. And you know science.”
∼Michael Scott, The Office
“Those who improve with age embrace the power of personal growth and personal achievement and begin to replace youth with wisdom, innocence with understanding, and lack of purpose with self-actualization.”
∼Bo Bennett
“Starve your distractions. Feed your focus.”
∼Anonymous
“There is no elevator to success. You have to take the stairs.”
∼Anonymous
“Excuses will always be there for you. Opportunity won’t.”
∼Anonymous
“Failure doesn’t mean it’s over. It means try with more experience.” ∼Anonymous
“Your life is a school. Everything that happens is teaching you something. Pay attention.”
∼Anonymous
“The harder you work for something, the greater you’ll feel when you achieve it.”
∼Anonymous
Inspirational Motivational Bible Verses
Jeremiah 20:11
For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.
Isaiah 40:28-31
Do you not know? Have you not heard? The LORD is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He will not grow tired or weary, and his understanding no one can fathom. 29 He gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak. 30 Even youths grow tired and weary, and young men stumble and fall; 31 but those who hope in the LORD will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.
Romans 8:31 31
What, then, shall we say in response to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us?
Romans 15:13
May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.
Lamentations 3:22-23
22 Because of the LORD’s great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. 23 They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.
1 John 3:22
22 and receive from him anything we ask, because we keep his commands and do what pleases him.
Deuteronomy 31:6
6 Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid or terrified because of them, for the LORD your God goes with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you.”
Psalm 23:1
1 The LORD is my shepherd, I lack nothing.
1 Corinthians 15:58
58 Therefore, my dear brothers and sisters, stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain.
Isaiah 41:10
Fear not, for I am with you; be not dismayed, for I am your God; I will strengthen you, I will help you, I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.
John 5:8
Jesus said to him, “Get up, take up your bed, and walk.”
Phillipians 4:13
I can do all this through him who gives me strength.
What is Your Motivation?
I hope these quotes inspire you to chase your dreams and discover your hidden talents.
What are your favorite motivational words and sayings?
Further Reading:
250 Best Encouraging Quotes About Life For Hard Times
What a great collection, some that I knew, and some I didn’t. And wow, Anonymous was very prolific! 😉
Thank you, Katherine! Yes, anonymous, a person of unknown name, is ironically famous for quotes and poems.