Doing is the great thing, for if people resolutely do what is right, they come in time to like doing it.

When your dream is bigger than you are, you only have two choices: give up or get help.

The ancestor of every action is a thought.

Why is it that although it takes us years to get into our messes, we expect God to get us out of them in a few days?

You can’t think; you just gotta do things.

Positional leaders ignore the fact that every person has hopes, dreams, desires, and goals of his own. And leaders must bring their vision and the aspirations of the people they lead together in a way that benefits everyone.

Dignify and glorify common labor. It is at the bottom of life that we must begin, not at the top.

Success is getting what you want. Happiness is liking what you get.

In all seriousness, people think that it’s the ideas that are important. Well, everyone has ideas, all the time. I tend to write mine down and remember them, but at some point you have to apply the bum to the seat and knock out about sixty five thousand words – that’s how long a novel is.

Effective action is always unjust.

Doubt, of whatever kind, can be ended by action alone.

You can’t wait for inspiration. You have to go after it with a club.

If I’d had some set idea of a finish line, don’t you think I would have crossed it years ago?

Do not look for approval except for the consciousness of doing your best.

You know capitalism is this wonderful thing that motivates people, it causes wonderful inventions to be done. But in this area of diseases of the world at large, it’s really let us down.

Not having hope is not an excuse for not doing something.

Freedom is what everyone wants – to be able to act and live with freedom. But the only way to get to a place of freedom is through discipline.

Failure at some point in your life is inevitable, but giving up is unforgivable.

Make yourself necessary to somebody.

Now we’re in the midst of not just advocating for change, not just calling for change – we’re doing the grinding, sometimes frustrating work of delivering change – inch by inch, day by day.

When a man asks himself what is meant by action he proves that he isn’t a man of action. Action is a lack of balance. In order to act you must be somewhat insane. A reasonably sensible man is satisfied with thinking.

I have to practice to be good at guitar. I have to write 100 songs before you write the first good one.

It’s easier to resist at the beginning than at the end.

We must build dikes of courage to hold back the flood of fear.

A great thing can only be done by a great person; and they do it without effort.

Whatever you have, you must either use or lose.

If I were dropped out of a plane into the ocean and told the nearest land was a thousand miles away, I’d still swim. And I’d despise the one who gave up.

In action a great heart is the chief qualification. In work, a great head.

Believe that life is worth living and your belief will help create the fact.

Today we did what we had to do. They counted on America to be passive. They counted wrong.

The greatest difficulty always comes right before the birth of a dream.

A little more persistence, a little more effort, and what seemed hopeless failure may turn to glorious success.

A man who has no office to go, to I don’t care who he is, is a trial of which you can have no conception.

If they can make penicillin out of mouldy bread, they can sure make something out of you.

The reason we want to go on and on is because we live in an impoverished present.

Discipline is the bridge between goals and accomplishment.

I want to be thoroughly used up when I die, for the harder I work the more I live. I rejoice in life for its own sake.

I think what motivates people is not great hate, but great love for other people.

I do not live on false promises. I cannot afford to live on bad advice.

Don’t work for recognition, but do work worthy of recognition.

Far better is it to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered by failure… than to rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy nor suffer much, because they live in a gray twilight that knows not victory nor defeat.

Even as you make progress, you need the discipline to keep from backtracking and sabotaging the success as it’s happening.

If there was nothing wrong in the world there wouldn’t be anything for us to do.

I have learned that success is to be measured not so much by the position that one has reached in life as by the obstacles which he has had to overcome while trying to succeed.

My favorite affirmation when I feel stuck or out of sorts is: Whatever I need is already here, and it is all for my highest good. Jot this down and post it conspicuously throughout your home, on the dashboard of your car, at your office, on your microwave oven, and even in front of your toilets!

Don’t let yesterday use up too much of today.

I had rather be first in a village than second at Rome.

Men of lofty genius when they are doing the least work are most active.

He who seeks rest finds boredom. He who seeks work finds rest.

You have enough people against you… be for yourself.

We ourselves feel that what we are doing is just a drop in the ocean. But the ocean would be less because of that missing drop.

If you’re in this business and you are scared, then you better do something else.

Don’t compare yourself with other people; compare yourself with who you were yesterday.

One can never consent to creep when one feels an impulse to soar.

It is common sense to take a method and try it. If it fails, admit it frankly and try another. But above all, try something.

Finite to fail, but infinite to venture.

Some slaves are scoured to their work by whips, others by their restlessness and ambition.

I’d be so bored if I wasn’t going out there, knowing that I could still do it. So, I’m going to work hard to be ready to go, and I still plan on playing for a long time.

You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself in any direction you choose. You’re on your own, and you know what you know. And you are the guy who’ll decide where to go.

Act enthusiastic and you will be enthusiastic.

I was a bit challenged when I was younger to stay on the right path.