Theme
Success
Achievement, winning, and what it really costs.
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Verified quotes about success
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“A champion is defined not by their wins but by how they can recover when they fall”
“A real decision is measured by the fact that you've taken a new action”
“All personal breakthroughs begin with a change in beliefs”
“Anybody can sympathise with the sufferings of a friend, but it requires a very fine nature—it requires, in fact, the nature of a true Individualist—to sympathise with a friend's success”
“Be so good they can't ignore you”
“Don't aim at success. The more you aim at it and make it a target, the more you are going to miss it”
“Genius is one percent inspiration and ninety-nine percent perspiration”
“Genius is one percent inspiration, ninety-nine percent perspiration”
“Getting the right people in the right jobs is a lot more important than developing a strategy”
“Great works are performed not by strength but by perseverance”
“Happiness lies in the joy of achievement and the thrill of creative effort”
“He has half the deed done who has made a beginning”
“He that can have patience can have what he will”
“He who is not courageous enough to take risks will accomplish nothing in life”
“Hitting a baseball — I've said it a thousand times — is the single most difficult thing to do in sport”
“I am the greatest! I'm the greatest thing that ever lived”
“I attribute my success to this: I never gave or took any excuse”
“I came, I saw, I conquered”
“I do not think that there is any other quality so essential to success of any kind as the quality of perseverance”
“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 overcome while trying to succeed”
“I'm the best ever. I'm the most brutal and vicious, and most ruthless champion there's ever been. There's no one that can stop me. Lennox is a conqueror? No, I'm Alexander! He's no Alexander. I'm the best ever. There's never been anybody as ruthless. I'm Sonny Liston. I'm Jack Dempsey. There's no one like me. I'm from their cloth. There is no one that can match me. My style is impetuous. My defense is impregnable, and I'm just ferocious. I want your heart. I want to eat his children. Praise be to Allah!”
“I've always believed the British Open is one of the greatest championships in the world”
“I've failed over and over and over again in my life, and that is why I succeed”
“If A is success in life, then A equals X plus Y plus Z. Work is X, play is Y and Z is keeping your mouth shut”
“If one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life which he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours”
“If you invent a breakthrough in artificial intelligence so machines can learn, that is worth 10 Microsofts”
“in the zone”
“It is remarkable how much long-term advantage people like us have gotten by trying to be consistently not stupid, instead of trying to be very intelligent”
“Making money is art and working is art and good business is the best art”
“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”
“No man will make a great business who wants to do it all himself, or to get all the credit of doing it”
“Once You Are Dead, You Are Made for Life”
“Optimism is the faith that leads to achievement; nothing can be done without hope”
“Put all your eggs in one basket, and then watch that basket”
“Real artists ship”
“Real freedom is having nothing. I was freer when I didn't have a cent”
“Riches and honours acquired by unrighteousness are to me as a floating cloud”
“Show me a hero and I'll write you a tragedy”
“Strong, deeply rooted desire is the starting point of all achievement”
“Success always obsoletes the very behavior that achieved it”
“Success is a lousy teacher. It seduces smart people into thinking they can't lose”
“Success is to be measured not so much by the position one has reached as by the obstacles overcome”
“Success ultimately rests on small things, lots of small things”
“That's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind”
“That's the trouble, a sex symbol becomes a thing. I just hate to be a thing”
“The beginning is the most important part of the work”
“The ceiling is the roof”
“The more difficult the victory, the greater the happiness in winning”
“The quality of your life is the quality of your communication”
“The real price of every thing, what every thing really costs to the man who wants to acquire it, is the toil and trouble of acquiring it”
“They can because they think they can”
“We choose to go to the Moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard”
“We go to openings of envelopes”
“We're more popular than Jesus now; I don't know which will go first — rock and roll or Christianity”
“When you want something, all the universe conspires in helping you to achieve it”
“You can have everything in life you want, if you will just help enough other people get what they want”
“A football team is like a piano. You need eight men to carry it and three who can play the damn thing”
“A good PR story is infinitely more effective than a front page ad”
“A man has to have goals — for a day, for a lifetime — and that was mine, to have people say, 'There goes Ted Williams, the greatest hitter who ever lived.'”
“A penalty is a cowardly way to score”
“An organization's ability to learn, and translate that learning into action rapidly, is the ultimate competitive business advantage”
“Attitude is a little thing that makes a big difference”
“Baseball is the only field of endeavor where a man can succeed three times out of ten and be considered a good performer”
“Cool Papa was so fast that he could turn off the light switch and get into bed before the room got dark”
“Don't pay any attention to what they write about you. Just measure it in inches”
“Energy and persistence conquer all things”
“Eureka! I have found it!”
“Excellence is to do a common thing in an uncommon way”
“Gentlemen, we are going to relentlessly chase perfection, knowing full well we will not catch it, because nothing is perfect. But we are going to relentlessly chase it, because in the process we will catch excellence. I am not remotely interested in just being good”
“God gave me my money”
“Great things are not done by impulse, but by a series of small things brought together”
“Hell, there are no rules here. We're trying to accomplish something”
“Hollywood is a place where they'll pay you a thousand dollars for a kiss and fifty cents for your soul”
“I am the greatest. I said that even before I knew I was”
“I became an entrepreneur by mistake. Ever since then I've gone into business, not to make money, but because I think I can do it better than it's been done elsewhere”
“I had four gold medals, but you can't eat four gold medals”
“I never ran my train off the track, and I never lost a passenger”
“I was born for soccer, just as Beethoven was born for music”
“I'd have been a .290 hitter without a Louisville Slugger”
“I've found that you don't need to wear a necktie if you can hit”
“If what you did yesterday seems big, you haven't done anything today”
“If you are first you are first. If you are second you are nothing”
“If you are going to achieve excellence in big things, you develop the habit in little matters. Excellence is not an exception, it is a prevailing attitude”
“If you want to be a Millionaire, start with a billion dollars and launch a new airline”
“In all my years of football I've never known a man who talked more and won less than Steve Gutman”
“Inspiration exists, but it has to find you working”
“It's hard not to play golf that's up to Jack Nicklaus standards when you are Jack Nicklaus”
“It's kind of fun to do the impossible”
“Keep Away from People Who Try to Belittle Your Ambitions”
“Many of life's failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up”
“Millions Are To Be Grabbed Out Here, and Your Only Competition Is Idiots”
“Money cannot buy health, but I'd settle for a diamond-studded wheelchair”
“Never Miss a Chance to Have Sex or Appear On Television”
“Never was anything great achieved without danger”
“Patience, persistence and perspiration make an unbeatable combination for success”
“Success is no accident. It is hard work, perseverance, learning, and sacrifice”
“Success is peace of mind which is a direct result of self-satisfaction in knowing you made the effort to become the best of which you are capable”
“The battles that count aren't the ones for gold medals. The struggles within yourself — the invisible, inevitable battles inside all of us — that's where it's at”
“The greatest victory is that which requires no battle”
“The healthiest competition occurs when average people win by putting in above-average effort”
“The ladder of success is never crowded at the top”
“The most rewarding things you do in life are often the ones that look like they cannot be done”
“The next flag they plant will be all white, and it'll be surrender”
“The secret is to work less as individuals and more as a team. As a coach, I play not my eleven best, but my best eleven”
“The way to make a million dollars is to start a religion”
“There are no secrets to success. It is the result of preparation, hard work and learning from failure”
“There is no road too long to the man who advances deliberately and without undue haste”
“There's a lot of blood, sweat and guts between dreams and success”
“They invented the All-Star game for Willie Mays”
“They say a tie is like kissing your sister. I guess that is better than kissing your brother”
“Uncontrolled variation is the enemy of quality”
“Victory belongs to the most persevering”
“We cannot seek achievement for ourselves and forget about progress and prosperity for our community”
“When you stop talking, you've lost your customer. When you turn your back, you've lost her”
“Winning isn't a sometime thing; it's an all the time thing”
“Without losers, where would the winners be?”
“You Are Only Interested in Art and I Am Only Interested in Money”
“You will never win if you have to prove that you are the winner”
“Your margin is my opportunity”
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Don’t get caught out
Commonly shared about success — but misattributed
Popular success lines that get pinned on the wrong name. If you use one, credit it correctly.
“They're Cheering Us Both, You Because Nobody Understands You, and Me Because Everybody Understands Me”
ReallyHans Albert or Eduard Einstein · not Charlie Chaplin
“Continuous Effort — Not Strength or Intelligence — Is the Key to Unlocking and Using Our Potential”
ReallyLiane Cordes · not Winston Churchill
“Briefest Correspondence: Question Mark? Exclamation Mark!”
ReallyAnonymous · not Oscar Wilde
“Three Weeks to Prepare a Good Impromptu Speech”
ReallyMark Twain
“People Who Say It Cannot Be Done Should Not Interrupt Those Who Are Doing It”
ReallyAnonymous, in Puck magazine · not Confucius
“The main thing is honesty. If you can fake that, you've got it made”
ReallyAn unnamed theatre actor · not Celeste Holm
“Victory is reserved for those who are willing to pay its price”
ReallyUnknown · not Sun Tzu
“Lose As If You Like It, and Win As If You Are Used to It”
ReallyAnonymous · not Ralph Waldo Emerson
“Successful people never worry about what others are doing”
ReallyUnknown · not Plato
“The Play Was a Great Success, But the Audience Was a Total Failure”
ReallyGeorge Bernard Shaw
“A man who, beyond the age of 26, finds himself on a bus can count himself as a failure”
ReallyBrian Howard · not Margaret Thatcher
“Don't be afraid to give up the good to go for the great”
ReallyUnknown · not John D. Rockefeller
“By working faithfully eight hours a day, you may eventually get to be a boss and work twelve hours a day”
ReallyRobert Quillen · not Robert Frost
“Don't aim for success if you want it. Just do what you love and believe in, and it will come naturally”
ReallyDavid Frost · not Robert Frost
“A Gold Mine Is a Hole in the Ground with a Liar at the Top”
ReallyAnonymous · not Bill Nye
“Actor: A Guy Who If You Ain't Talking About Him, He Ain't Listening”
ReallyGeorge Glass · not Marlon Brando
“Amateurs Practice Until They Get It Right; Professionals Practice Until They Can't Get It Wrong”
ReallyAnonymous · not Julie Andrews
“Can't Act; Slightly Bald; Can Dance a Little”
ReallyAn unidentified studio evaluator · not Fred Astaire