action - action 3 - action 4 - action 5

If you can fill the unforgiving
minute with sixty seconds
worth of distance run,
yours is the earth and
everything that's in it.

Rudyard Kipling

    

I cannot praise a fugitive and cloistered virtue, unexercised and unbreathed, that never sallies out and sees her adversary, but slinks out of the race, where the immortal garland is to be run for, not without dust and heat.

John Milton

     

We are responsible for what we are and what we wish ourselves to be; we have the power to make ourselves.  If what we are now has been the result of our past actions, it certainly follows that whatever we wish to be in future can be produced by our present actions, so we have to know how to act.

Swami Vivekananda

   

Whatever course you decide upon, there is always someone to tell you that you are wrong.  There are always difficulties arising which tempt you to believe that your critics are right.  To map out a course of action and follow it to an end requires courage.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

   
One hour of life, crowded to the full with glorious action, and filled with noble risks, is worth whole years of those mean observances of paltry decorum, in which people steal through existence, like sluggish waters through a marsh, without either honour or observation.

Walter Scott
  
  
Those who make a living fishing know that the sea is dangerous and the storm terrible, but they have never found these dangers sufficient reason for remaining ashore.

Vincent van Gogh
   

Sometimes our actions are much more meaningful than words.
A hug can sometimes express more than our words will
ever express.  Sometimes, just being there to listen is more
meaningful and helpful to people.

Catherine Pulsifer

   

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People today distinguish between knowledge and action
and pursue them separately, believing that one must
know before one can act. . . . They say they will wait til
they truly know before putting their knowledge into
practice.  Consequently, to the end of their lives,
they will never act and also will never know.

Wang Yang-ming
Instructions for Practical Living

  

It is from numberless diverse acts of courage and belief that
human history is shaped.  Each time a person stands up for
an ideal or strikes out against injustice, he or she sends forth
a tiny ripple of hope, and crossing each other from a million
different centers of energy and daring those ripples build
a current which can sweep down the mightiest walls
of oppression and resistance.

Robert F. Kennedy

   

Few are they who have never had a chance to achieve
happiness--and fewer those who have taken that chance.

Andre Maurois

   

I've been very blessed in life because I've never been afraid to take action. Often it turns out poorly or painfully and I have to deal with consequences, but I would much prefer to deal with those than to sit around doing nothing. Passivity has been around forever, but it seems to have become much more predominant in a culture in which we expect to be entertained and informed by the mass media and actors and athletes, fed by restaurants and an ever-increasing amount of ready-to-serve, microwavable meals, served by the people who run stores and want our return business. We're fortunate to live in the United States, one of the few countries in the world where taking a risk is valued, but if we're going to get anything out of life, we have to be among those who take the risks, not those who watch others do so. I can truly say that the positive aspects of who I am have come about because I've been willing to take risks and be hurt, while those negative parts of me are still there because I'm afraid to face them, and I'd rather be passive than act to change them.

I meet many people who seem to be unwilling or unable to take action, no matter how unpleasant their current situation.  They're completely dissatisfied with the way things are, yet they're unwilling to do anything to change their situations.  Most of them are unwilling to risk their "security," for their incomes are more important to them than their quality of life.  Yet we hear over and over again that if we're truly to get what we want out of life, we have to take action.  We have to do something, and we can't do it halfway--we must take the risk.

It's somewhat ironic that many people who refuse to act are forced into positions in which they must act, either by layoffs, the death or departure of a spouse, or other changes.  Usually, these people get by quite well, and many of them actually thrive, for they're finally in a position in which they have to depend upon themselves, in which they have to act, to be assertive in getting what they want out of life.  They have to act, and they have to act today--it's a position most people don't want to find themselves in, but in which many people find themselves--find out who they are and what they're capable of.

Longfellow said it well:  "Act, act in the living present."  Right now is all we have, isn't it?  And we can't sit around waiting for life to happen to us--I learned long ago that that is not the way things work.  Actions give us results to work with, and actions.

tom walsh

    

   

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action - action 3 - action 4 - action 5

Conditions are never just right.  People who delay action
until all factors are favorable do nothing.

William Feather

  

There are risks and costs to a program of action.  But they are far less
than the long-range risks and costs of comfortable inaction.

John F. Kennedy

   

To know what has to be done, then do it, comprises
the whole philosophy of practical life.

William Osler

  

The person who will not execute his or her resolutions when
they are fresh upon him or her can have no hope from them
afterwards; they will be dissipated, lost and perish in the hurry
and scurry of the world, or sunk in the slough of indolence.

Marie Edgeworth

    

The wise person does at once what the fool does finally.

Baltasar Gracian

Action is the antidote to despair.

Joan Baez

Everything comes to those who hustle while they wait.

Thomas Alva Edison

There is only one proof of ability:  action.

Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach

When you're frightened don't sit still, keep on doing something.  The act of doing will give you back your courage.

Grace Ogot

  

It will never rain roses:  when we want
to have more roses we must plant more trees.

George Eliot

   

Life begets life.  Energy creates energy.
It is by spending oneself that one becomes rich.

Sarah Bernhardt

 

action - action 3 - action 4 - action 5

We have some inspiring and motivational books that may interest you.  Our main way of supporting this site is through the sale of books, either physical copies or digital copies for your Amazon Kindle (including the online reader).  All of the money that we earn through them comes back to the site in one way or another.  Just click on the picture to the left to visit our page of books, both fiction and non-fiction!

 

It is in our power to stretch out our arms and, by doing
good in our actions, to seize life and set it in our soul.

Origen

   

People judge you by your actions, not your intentions.
You may have a heart of gold, but so has a hard-boiled egg.

Good Reading

 

I have long since come to believe that people never mean
half of what they say, and that it is best to disregard
their talk and judge only their actions.

Dorothy Day

    
Articles and book excerpts on Action:

Active and Receptive      Shakti Gawain
Are You Staying on Track?      Jeff Keller

Be Willing to Be a Little Outrageous to Get What You Want      Lisa Jimenez

Conquer Doubt      Vic Johnson

Emotional Response Primer      Louise Morganti Kaelin

How to Cheer Yourself up When You're Down      Colleen Moulding

I Can't      tom walsh

Just Do It!      Kathy Paauw

The Meaning behind Our Words      T.W. Winslow

Pay It Forward      Gail Pursell Elliott

A Psalm of Life      Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Thoughts on the Serenity Prayer      Ray Whiting

What Happened?      Julie Jordan Scott

Why Do People Fail?      Robert Taylor

Keep Track of Your Results      Jim Rohn
How I Stopped "Waiting for Jack"   Kristen Moeller

  
Virtue is not to be considered in the light of mere innocence, or abstaining
from harm; but as the exertion of our faculties in doing good.

Joseph Butler
  

People are always blaming circumstances for what they are.  I don't
believe in circumstances.  The people who get on in this world are
the people who get up and look for the circumstances they want
and if they can't find them, make them.

George Bernard Shaw

  

You are what you do, not what you say you'll do.

Carl Jung

   
  
Live your truth. Express your love. Share your enthusiasm. Take action
towards your dreams. Walk your talk. Dance and sing to your music.
Embrace your blessings. Make today worth remembering.

Steve Maraboli
Unapologetically You
  

All human actions have one or more of these seven causes:
chance, nature, compulsion, habit, reason, passion, and desire.

Aristotle
Selected Works

  

Imagination means nothing without doing.

Charles Chaplin

   
Too many times we stand aside
And let the waters slip away
'Til what we put off for tomorrow
Has now become today
So don't you sit upon the shoreline
And say you're satisfied
Choose to chance the rapids
And dare to dance the tide. . . .
And there's bound to be rough waters
And I know I'll take some falls
But with the good Lord as my captain
I can make it through them all

Victoria Shaw, Garth Brooks
   
Wishing
Ella Wheeler Wilcox

Do you wish the world were better?
Let me tell you what to do:
Set a watch upon your actions,
Keep them always straight and true;
Rid your mind of selfish motives;
Let your thoughts be clean and high.
You can make a little Eden
Of the sphere you occupy.

Do you wish the world were wiser?
Well, suppose you make a start,
By accumulating wisdom
In the scrapbook of your heart.
Do not waste one page on folly;
Live to learn, and learn to live.
If you want to pass on knowledge
You must get it, ere you give.

Do you wish the world were happy?
Then remember day by day
Just to scatter seeds of kindness
As you pass along the way;
For the pleasures of the many
May be oft times traced to one,
As the hand that plants an acorn
Shelters armies from the sun.
   

    

Found online:
 

 
(Found online images come from a variety of unattributed
sources from various social media pages.  They're too nice
not to share!)

  
   

Alone in his car heading west, it's easy for Jason
to feel sorry for himself and mad at the world.  But
then he gives a ride to Hector and learns that life
isn't nearly as negative as we sometimes see it,
and that the prejudice and discrimination that
he's experiencing aren't unique to him--and aren't
impossible to overcome.  The friendship between
this young man and his 70-year-old passenger is
an inspiring story of love and dealing with
obstacles in our lives.    
Book - Kindle