When the going gets tough, sometimes you need some extra pearls of wisdom to help encourage and motivate your team. Here are 37 of our favourite motivational quotes
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“If your ship doesn’t come in, swim out to meet it.”
– Jonathan Winters
“The only place where success comes before work is in the dictionary.”
– Vidal Sassoon
“The way to get started is to quit talking and begin doing.”
– Walt Disney
“Let no feeling of discouragement prey upon you, and in the end you are sure to succeed.”
– Abraham Lincoln
“Don’t always scrape and search for compliments. Criticism is what builds character and strength”
– Unknown
“You can’t build a reputation on what you are going to do.”
– Henry Ford
“I can’t change the direction of the wind, but I can adjust my sails to always reach my destination.”
– Jimmy Dean
“Do or do not. There is no try.”
– Yoda
“Build your own dreams, or someone else will hire you to build theirs.”
– Farrah Gray
“Believe you can and you’re halfway there.”
– Theodore Roosevelt
“Even if you’re on the right track, you’ll get run over if you just sit there”
– Will Rogers
“Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work.”
– Thomas Edison
“Hard work spotlights the character of people. Some turn up their sleeves. Some turn up their noses, and some don’t turn up at all.”
– Sam Ewing
“Do you know what happens when you give a procrastinator a good idea? Nothing.”
–Donald Gardner
“The tragedy of life doesn’t lie in not reaching your goal. The tragedy lies in having no goals to reach.”
– Benjamin Mays
“Action is the foundational key to all success.”
– Pablo Picasso
“I find that the harder I work, the more luck I seem to have.”
– Thomas Jefferson
“Life begins at the end of your comfort zone.”
– Neale Donald Walsch
“Nothing in the world is more common than unsuccessful people with talent.”
– Unknown
“The secret of getting ahead is getting started.”
– Mark Twain
“Innovation distinguishes between a leader and a follower.”
– Steve Jobs
“The function of leadership is to produce more leaders, not more followers.”
– Ralph Nader
“The successful warrior is the average man, with laser-like focus.”
– Bruce Lee
“You must expect great things of yourself before you can do them.”
– Michael Jordan
“Be miserable. Or motivate yourself. Whatever has to be done, it’s always your choice.”
– Wayne Dyer
“You may have to fight a battle more than once to win it.”
– Margaret Thatcher
“The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is now.”
– Chinese proverb
“I am not a product of my circumstances. I am a product of my decisions.”
– Stephen Covey
“There is only one way to avoid criticism: do nothing, say nothing, and be nothing.”
– Aristotle
“We need to accept that we won’t always make the right decisions, that we’ll screw up royally sometimes, understanding that failure is not the opposite of success – it’s part of success.”
– Arianna Huffington
“You can fail at what you don’t want – so you might as well take a chance on doing what you love.”
– Jim Carrey
“I wish I could tell you it gets better. But it doesn’t get better. You get better.”
– Joan Rivers
“Sometimes you will never know the value of a moment until it becomes a memory.”
– Dr Seuss
“The trouble with most of us is that we would rather be ruined by praise than saved by criticism.”
– Norman Vincent Pearl
“The master has failed more times than the beginner has even tried.”
– Stephen McCranie
“Normality is a paved road: it’s comfortable to walk, but no flowers grow.”
– Vincent van Gogh
This article was first published in February 2017. It was updated in August 2018 for freshness, clarity and accuracy.