Success can be a choice.
We can choose to put ourselves on a journey that leads to success or we can choose to never get started in the first place.
If you’re struggling to take those first few steps or it feels like you’re struggling to reach the finish line, then these 35 inspirational quotes may just help you find the courage to keep moving forward.
#1.
So many times we expect success to just come our way.
Sometimes we feel like we should be given success automatically from the hard work we’ve put into our cause.
The fact is that the easiest way to find success is to take charge of your goal by creating a plan that can help you win.
If you’re playing it safe, there’s a good chance success will remain just out of reach.
#2.
Nothing can stop the man with the right mental attitude from achieving his goal; nothing on earth can help the man with the wrong mental attitude.
– Thomas Jefferson
Have you ever noticed that some people always seem to come out on top?
It isn’t because they have luck on their side.
It’s because they have a mental attitude that wills them toward success.
#3.
If you wish success in life, make perseverance your bosom friend, experience your wise counselor, caution your elder brother, and hope your guardian genius.
– Joseph Addison
There is the odd success story that comes out of the blue and happens instantly.
For the most part, however, reaching success is like climbing up a long set of stairs.
It’s tough to jump more than 2-3 steps at a time, even when you’re in a hurry.
You must persevere to make to the top.
You might get tired and you might even need to take a rest from time to time, but you keep on moving.
#4.
Blame. It’s around us every day, seemingly all day.
The fact is that it is easier to blame others for our lack of success than it is to admit that we couldn’t adjust to changing circumstances.
There are some things that are outside of our control.
It may rain today. It may be windy today. That doesn’t mean you stop going outside. It just means you put on a coat and bring your umbrella.
#5.
The difference between winning and losing is most often not quitting.
– Walt Disney
We don’t call it “quitting” or “giving up.”
We say that we’re tired. We decide that there are more important things that we could be doing.
Our favorite TV show might be on or there are video games to play.
Success often comes from an ability to stick with a task to see it through to its completion.
We use excuses far too often to justify quitting and that keeps many from achieving the success that they were destined to have.
#6.
Success is most often achieved by those who don’t know that failure is inevitable.
– Coco Chanel
Fear can hold us back from many things.
A fear of commitment, for example, can hold us back from experiencing the greatest love of our lives.
A fear of success can keep us in a world where failure is our only option.
There is always a risk involved when we take a step forward on our journey toward success.
Instead of focusing on that fear, look to the end of your journey.
Focus on the success that’s awaiting you.
#7.
We all have the will to win. It’s part of our very soul.
The experiences of life can drive that desire to win downward and make it seem like it is no longer there, but that is a lie.
You can win. You can succeed. You can reach your full potential.
You just have to dig down deep sometimes to find where that will to win has been buried so it can get to work.
#8.
Success is to be measured not so much by the position that one has reached in life as by the obstacles which he has overcome while trying to succeed.
– Booker T. Washington
So often we define success by the outcomes we’re able to receive from our efforts.
That isn’t really where success can be found.
Our personal growth will always be our greatest success story and that comes when we’re able to overcome the roadblocks that come our way during the journey we take.
Outcomes are fleeting, but personal growth stays with us for the rest of our lives.
#9.
Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.
– Mark Twain
It’s easy to get caught up in the moment.
There are bills to pay. School lunches to pack for the kids. The car might need to get fixed. Your boss might give you a tight deadline and put tons of pressure on you to deliver.
When we look back on our lives, these are not the moments we remember.
It is the moments where we spent time with our families, took a risk that paid off, or took that vacation to a place you’d never been before.
If you have the chance to explore, take it.
If you can chase your dreams as you’re exploring, then you’ve got the best of both worlds at your fingertips.
Grab hold and never let go.
#10.
Many people will take this quote and say that you’ve got to dress the part.
If you want to be a success, then you’ve got to put on the clothes that successful people wear.
Let’s look at this a different way.
If you start a journey and expect it to fail, then there’s a good chance that your expectations will become a self-fulfilling prophecy.
You cannot experience success if you’re always expecting failure.
The best way to find success is to expect that you’ll find it one day.
#11.
Accept responsibility for your life. Know that it is you who will get you where you want to go, no one else.
– Les Brown
We all make mistakes.
When mistakes happen, there are one of two things that happen: we either take responsibility for what happened and learn from it or we find an excuse.
To find success, we must accept responsibility for our mistakes. Humans are fallible creatures.Pretending we are perfect is pointless.
What we can do is take each experience, glean knowledge from what happened, and then apply that knowledge to future situations so we can be closer to our success than ever before.
#12.
Success isn’t going to happen if we isolate after a failure occurs.
A dark room of loneliness can feel comforting for awhile, but in the end we all tend to be our own harshest critics.
People don’t expect a 100% success rate.
They do, however, expect you to get back on your horse and try again.
#13.
There is only one success – to be able to spend your life in your own way.
– Christopher Morley
Many people work the 9-5 grind, come home to spend a couple of hours with their family, and live for the weekend.
That makes life seem like it sails on by and your loved ones become ships that simply pass by you in the night.
Life doesn’t have to be that way.
You can be in control of the way you spend your time.
When you can find that control and then make as many moments matter as possible, then you will have found the ultimate success that life has to offer.
#14.
I do not know the word ‘quit.’ Either I never did, or I have abolished it.
– Susan Butcher
You’ll never cross the finish line if you decide to quit.
It can be difficult to reach some dreams or find some successes, but the reward at the end of the race is always worth the effort it takes.
Success sometimes requires us to feel uncomfortable in order for us to feel the joy at the end of the journey.
#15.
To be successful, you have to have your heart in your business, and your business in your heart.
– Sr. Thomas Watson
Success might be a choice, but it is a choice that is easier to make when you have a passion for what it is you are doing.
Anyone can earn a paycheck working in a job that they hate.
You don’t have to be that person.
Follow your passion and your heart will lead you toward the success that you want to have.
#16.
There’s nothing wrong with admiring people.
Some have idols that they pattern their lives after and have found great success in doing so.
You can design your own life plan based on the successful life plans of others.
What you cannot do is rely on someone else to design your life plan.
If you’re relying on others to navigate you toward your expectation of success, you will invariably be disappointed by what you find at the end of your journey.
#17.
Because we define success off of an ultimate outcome, we often miss the perfect moments that exist around each of us every day.
Success can be making sure your neighbor who just got fired has enough food to feed their family for a week.
It can be in the adoption of a stray dog.
It can be giving a ride to someone so they can get to work on time.
Instead of having tunnel-vision on one end goal, keep your eyes open for a chance to do something.
The joy of a journey isn’t in how fast you get to the end of it.
It is in what you are able to experience along the way.
#18.
FEAR has two meanings: ‘Forget everything and run’ or ‘Face everything and rise.’ The choice is yours.
– Zig Ziglar
Fear can be motivating, but it can also be debilitating.
We often let it be the latter instead of the former and then blame fear for our inability to find success.
You are in control of the energy that fear can provide you.
Choose to stand up in spite of fear and you will give yourself the chance to experience something amazing.
If you choose to run away, then you lose that opportunity to find success.
#19.
If you want to make a permanent change, stop focusing on the size of your problems and start focusing on the size of you!
– T. Harv Eker
You have the power to be the person you want to be.
Some problems might seem overwhelming at first, but that’s because you’re looking at the outcome instead of looking for what you can do at this very moment.
We won’t solve global hunger by the end of the working day, but we can plant seeds so that more food can grow.
Take a step forward each day and the size of the problem will ever be as big as you initially thought it was.
#20.
Success is a state of mind. If you want success, start thinking of yourself as a success.
– Joyce Brothers
If you choose to experience success, you are not guaranteeing that it will come your way.
You are guaranteeing yourself a fair shot at it.
We often get these two perspectives confused with each other, so when success doesn’t come, there is a lack of confidence and self-esteem sure to follow.
Nothing in life is guaranteed – except, as the famous saying goes, death and taxes.
Take a shot and see what happens.
#21.
Playing it safe will never help you find the maximum level of success you were meant to achieve.
Sometimes the most difficult decisions we make aren’t to start a journey toward success, but to keep going when there is so much that is unknown in front of us.
#22.
If you always do what you’ve always done, you’ll always get what you’ve always got.
– Henry Ford
No one likes it when change comes along.
Change forces us out of our comfort zones.
It requires us to think outside the box.
It means we must do something that we haven’t done before in order to achieve a different result.
If you feel like you’re not achieving success, then it’s time to do something different.
Otherwise you’re always going to receive the same results that are leaving you with disappointment.
#23.
Choices. When we make a choice, something happens.
This is where success is born.
Everyone has challenging circumstances that can try to hold them back.
These are chains that must be cast off.
What happened in your life could be tragic, painful, and leave you hanging by a thread sometimes, but those circumstances don’t have to be in control.
You make the choices. You stay in control. When you do that, you really can do anything.
#24.
The world would be a very different place if everyone gave up when they faced adversity or experienced failure.
Failure is simply an experience that can be used to find an even higher level of success if we’re willing to pay attention to the lessons that are being offered to us.
Stephen King received hundreds of rejection letters when he first got started writing.
There are numerous stories like this.
Your story can join these others if you’re willing to keep moving forward.
#25.
People don’t let you have success.
You choose to move toward it.
There will be people who try to drag you down and keep you from that success for one simple reason: misery loves company.
These others have already given up and your perseverance makes them feel guilty or experience regret.
Instead of taking responsibility for their choices, they try to prevent you from reaching success because that way they feel like the mirror’s reflection won’t judge them as harshly.
Don’t let people stop you from the success that you know you can reach.
Keep moving forward and take it.
#26.
The successful warrior is the average man, with laser-like focus.
– Bruce Lee
We’re all born with unique talents and skills that lead us toward success.
We often judge ourselves by the best people in our industry or those who share our passion and have already experienced success, but that is an inaccurate comparison.
We are all just average people who are all on our own journey.
It is the focus we have in keeping on that journey that will eventually separate us from everyone else.
#27.
Motivation is what gets you started. Habit is what keeps you going.
– Jim Rohn
We all have good days and we all have bad days.
There’s no reason why you can’t take a day off to enjoy the fruits of your labor, but it is also important to remember that any time you take off is the first day of a new habit.
Habits are a funny thing.
You can do the same thing for 7 weeks straight, but then choose to do something else and be on Day #1 of a brand new habit.
Motivation will keep you true to your journey.
Habits will keep your feet moving forward.
#28.
Knowing is not enough; we must apply. Wishing is not enough; we must do.
– Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe
Knowledge is just the cornerstone of a foundation of success.
We must continue building upward from this cornerstone through our actions if we’re going to be able to reach the goals we have in mind.
We can imagine success and we can wish for it, but eventually we must work to achieve it.
Good intentions never built anything.
Only your hard work is going to bring you to a successful outcome.
#29.
I cannot give you the formula for success, but I can give you the formula for failure, which is: Try to please everybody.
– Herbert Bayard Swope
If you’re working for others, then you’re working for their success instead of your own.
There isn’t anything wrong in doing that from time to time, but it cannot be the focus of your efforts every day.
If you want success, you must be working to achieve what you want.
If you’re trying to please everyone else, then they’re just going to take advantage of you and leave you behind when your work drives them forward on their journey toward success.
It can be difficult sometimes when others are critical of what you do, but stay focused on you and you’ll be OK at the end of the day.
#30.
Success usually comes to those who are too busy to be looking for it.
– Henry David Thoreau
When you’re looking for success, it changes your focus.
Instead of looking at the fine details that can help you move forward on your journey, you begin looking toward the end result.
It is rare that instant success will find you and even if it does, that success tends to be fleeting because it is built on nothing.
Be busy with the details of your plans and you’ll have a great chance to make your own success.
#31.
I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.
– Thomas Edison
This is about perspective.
If your ideas aren’t well received, you can look at it in one of two ways: that’s either one step toward your eventual success or one more person who has decided that you’re a failure.
The first perspective will drive you forward to the next innovation.
The second will drive you toward the decision to give up and quit for good.
#32.
The formula for success is simple: hard work + perseverance = a chance at success.
The Chicago Bulls had one of the best professional basketball seasons ever in 1995-1996 when they won 72 games.
They also lost 10 games in the regular season.
Following the formula for success won’t guarantee a win every time, but it does guarantee you a chance at a win.
#33.
A man is a success if he gets up in the morning and gets to bed at night, and in between he does what he wants to do.
– Bob Dylan
You can live for yourself and the ones you love or you can live for someone else.
It really is that simple and it boils down to your personal perspective.
You can work the 9-5 grind with success if your goal is to provide your family with a home, food, and some of the things they want in life and be successful.
You can also be self-employed, decide to watch soap operas all day, and then struggle to pay your rent or mortgage at the end of the month.
Follow your dreams and you really can do anything.
#34.
The #1 reason people fail in life is because they listen to their friends, family, and neighbors.
– Napoleon Hill
You need advice to find success.
No one has ever reached the end of their journey toward success without some help along the way.
The people you choose to have as your mentors, however, will either make your journey easier or more difficult depending on what their perspectives happen to be.
Sometimes your family might tell you to quit or change what you do for the best of reasons, but quitting is still you giving up on a chance to chase your dream.
#35.
You may have to fight a battle more than once to win it.
– Margaret Thatcher
You can win a battle, but still lose a war.
You can also lose a battle, but still win a war.
It all boils down to your willingness to keep going.
If you’re willing to see your journey to its natural conclusion, then you’re giving yourself a chance to find the success that you’ve always wanted to have.
The journey toward success is a difficult one.
It is filled with obstacles, setbacks, and discouragement.
Fear might be around every corner.
Yet if you’re willing to keep your feet moving forward despite these difficulties, you’ll eventually discover something beautiful when you reach the conclusion of your journey.
These inspirational quotes about success can motivate you, but you must be willing to let them.
Choose success and you”ll be giving it a chance to choose you.
Now it’s your turn. What are your favorite quotes about success? Let me know in the comments below.
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