success - success 3

 I've never sought success in order
to get fame and money; it's the talent
and the passion that count in success.

Ingrid Bergman
   

You cannot fail at being yourself.  A cat doesn't try to be a tiger, and you shouldn't try to be something you aren't.  You are a process, not a product.  Your job is to discover what you are and create that creature.  You still won't be perfect, but success isn't about perfection--it is about authenticity.  You are a success if you are being your real, authentic self.

Bernie Siegel

      
Success can make you go one of two ways--it can make you a prima donna, or it can smooth the edges, take away the insecurities, let the nice things come out.

Barbara Walters
  
Success is not measured by how well you fulfill the expectations of others, but by how honestly you live up to your own expectations.

Linda Principe
   
 Sometimes I worry about being a success in a mediocre world.

Lily Tomlin
   

Your success and happiness lie in you.  External conditions are the accidents of life, its outer trappings.  The great, enduring realities are love of service. Joy is the holy fire that keeps our purpose warm and our intelligence aglow.  Resolve to keep happy, and your joy and you shall form an invincible host against difficulty.

Helen Keller
  

Most people see success as being rich and famous or powerful
and influential.  Others see it as being at the top of their profession
and standing out from the rest.
   The wise see success in a more personal way; they see it as achieving
the goals they have set for themselves, and then feeling pride and
satisfaction in their accomplishments.  True success is felt in the heart,
not measured by money and power.
   So be true to yourself and achieve those goals you set.  For success is
reaching those goals and feeling proud of what you have accomplished.

Tim Tweedie

   

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Enthusiasm is one of the most powerful engines of success.
When you do a thing, do it with all your might. . . .
Be active, be energetic, be enthusiastic and faithful,
and you will accomplish your objective.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
  

To me, the capacity to earn money has never been a measurement of
success.  It is my belief that people must develop a philosophy early
in life which permits them to have as much pleasure, enjoyment and
satisfaction now as is possible without injuring themselves or others.
Money can help to do this, but it is not and must not become the sole
aim of a person's existence.  We all know what happened to King Midas.

Rudy Vallee
 

Success is being who you are, and feeling proud of yourself for
every task and challenge that you face and conquer along the way.

Deanna Beisser
 
If you give a part
  of yourself to life,
the part you receive back
  will be so much greater.
Never regret the past,
  but learn by it.
Never lose sight of your dreams;
a person who can dream
  will always have hope.
Believe in yourself;
  if you do, everyone else will.
You have the ability
  to accomplish anything,
but never do it at
  someone else's expense.
If you can go through life
  loving others,
you will have achieved
the greatest success of all.

Judy LeSage
   

 

You will succeed best when you put the restless,
anxious side of affairs out of mind, and allow
the restful side to live in your thoughts.

Margaret Stowe

success
   

People succeed because they believe, not only that they can and
will succeed, but also that success is worth the price they pay for it.

Tom Hopkins
 

Attention to detail is the secret of success in every sphere of
life, and little kindnesses, little acts of consideration, little
appreciations, little confidences,. . . . they are all that are
needed to keep the friendship sweet.

Hugh Black
   

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Whether in the workplace or in personal relationships,
success belongs to those who are willing to take responsibility
for attaining their desires--those who respond to life
actively rather than passively.

Nathaniel Branden
Self-Esteem Every Day

  

There are no secrets of success.  Success is doing the
things you know you should do.  Success is not doing
the things you know you shouldn’t do.  Success is not
limited to any one area of your life.  It encompasses
all the facets of your relationships:  as parent, as wife
or husband, as citizen, neighbor, worker and all of the
others.  Success is not confined to any one part of your
personality but is related to the development of all the
parts:  body, mind, heart and spirit.  It is making
the most of your total self.

Wilferd A. Peterson

  

Put your heart, mind, intellect and soul even
to your smallest acts.  This is the secret of success.

Swami Sivananda

 

   
Until you have learned to be tolerant with those who
do not always agree with you; until you have cultivated
the habit of saying some kind word of those whom you
do not admire; until you have formed the habit of looking
for the good instead of the bad there is in others,
you will be neither successful nor happy.

Napoleon Hill
   

Beware of your definition of success:  If it has more to do with what other
people think of you than it does with what you know of your own
abilities, you may be confusing applause with achievement.

Joan Chittister
Seeing with Our Souls

   

At age 4, success is not peeing in your pants.
  At age 12, success is having friends.
    At age 16, success is having a driver's license.
      At age 20, success is having sex.
        At age 35, success is having money.
          At age 40, success is finding meaning & purpose to life.
          At age 45, success is finding meaning & purpose to life.
        At age 50, success is having money.
      At age 60, success is having sex.
    At age 70, success is having a driver's license.
  At age 75, success is having friends.
At age 80, success is not peeing in your pants.

unattributed
   

   
Overstraining is the enemy of accomplishment.  Calm strength that
arises from a deep and inexhaustible source is what brings success.

Rabindranath Tagore
   

We are prone to judge success by the index of our salaries or the
size of our automobiles rather than by the quality of our service
and the relationship to mankind.

Martin Luther King, Jr.

  

Success is not to be gained by a blind and slavish following of anyone's
rules or advice, our own any more than any other person's.  There is no
royal road to success--  no patent process by which the unsuccessful are
to be magically transformed. . . . Rules and advice may greatly assist--and
they undoubtedly do this--but the real work must be accomplished
by the individual.  He or she must carve out his or her own destiny.

William W. Atkinson

   
   

   

Success can eliminate as many options as failure.

Tom Robbins

   

The measure of success is not whether you have a tough problem
to deal with, but whether it's the same problem you had last year.

John Foster Dulles

  

If people are highly successful in their profession they lose their senses.
Sight goes.  They have no time to look at pictures.  Sound goes.  They
have no time to listen to music.  Speech goes.  They have no time
for conversation.  They lose their sense of proportion.

Virginia Woolf

  

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's difficult for people to come to the understanding that only a small minority
of the people ever really get the word about life, about living abundantly and
successfully.  Success in the important departments of life seldom comes naturally,
no more naturally than success at anything--a musical instrument, sports, fly-fishing,
tennis, golf, business, marriage, parenthood, landscape gardening.  But somehow
people wait passively for success to come to them, living as other people are living
in the unspoken, tacit assumption that other people know how to live successfully.

Earl Nightingale
   

Life is made up of small pleasures.  Happiness is made up of those tiny
successes.  The big ones come too infrequently.  And if you don't collect
all these tiny successes, the big ones don't really mean anything.

Norman Lear

    

If I were to give advice to a young person starting out
in life, I should say to that person:  If you aim for
a large, broad-gauged success, do not begin your
business career, whether you sell your labor or are
and independent producer, with the idea of getting from
the world by hook or crook all you can.  In the choice
of your profession or your business employment, let
your first thought be:  Where can I fit in so that I may
be most effective in the work of the world?  Where can
I lend a hand in a way most effectively to advance
the general interests?  Enter life in such a spirit,
choose your vocation in that way, and you
have taken the first step on the highest road
to a large success.

John D Rockefeller

   

Success sometimes seems like a collection of products, or a place
that you can get to or buy.  When we are small we think we will be
happy when we can finally turn over or walk or go to school.  Then
it's being old enough to date or drive or finish school--that really
feels like success.
Some people think that success is getting married.  That's when they'll
really be happy.  Or that real happiness comes when a baby finally
arrives.  Maybe we'll be successful and happy when we get that job
or promotion, or when the kids finally leave home and we have some
peace.  Success might be when the house is finished or when we retire.
The "golden years"--that's it.  That's when we reach success.
Success is every minute you live.
It's the process of living.  It's stopping for the moments of beauty,
of pleasure; the moments of peace.  Success is not a destination
that you ever reach.  Success is the quality of the journey.

Jennifer James
Success Is the Quality of Your Journey

   

   
Success can be defined in many ways, and it is important to realize
that your individual definition needs to be clear in your mind.  Once
you have established your personal vision of success, you can begin
the process of achieving your goal.  Many successful people can attest
to the multitude of difficulties that were overcome on the journey to
their destination.  Sometimes the obstacles seem insurmountable, but
when that happens, clearly bring forward your original vision to your
conscious mind.  Re-picture your dream repeatedly until you have the
courage and patience to await the next development.  Often patience
and anticipation are precisely what is required for new breakthroughs.

John Marks Templeton
Worldwide Laws of Life
    

What I now realize is that success does not have to be a lengthy journey.
Unfortunately most of us have to learn this by going through life striving
for career achievement and paying the price. True success is based on how
we view things relating to our life and career. Success does not mean
obtaining material possessions or career status. I learned from friends we
met in Colorado that some people with little money are successful. We had
college teaching friends that did not have a great deal of money but enjoyed
simple things like making biscotti, buying a good bottle of wine, listening
to jazz at the coffee shop or exploring the mountains. They had more than I
ever had when I was using society’s definition of success. True success is
genuine satisfaction, happiness and contentment with yourself and the
world around you. Truly enjoying life, family, friends, work, hobbies
and all that life has to offer.

Fred W. Tanner

   

Many people have the ambition to succeed; they may even have
a special aptitude for their job.  And yet they do not move
ahead.  Why?  Perhaps they think that since they can
master the job, there is no need to master themselves.

John Stevenson

success
   
The road to success, for me, was a long and arduous journey, strewn
with obstacles and traps, pitfalls and hurdles--all created by myself.
Painful as it is, I speak of those sad and frustrating times whenever I
am invited  to address sales gatherings, corporate conventions,  and
success rallies, in the hope that my personal experiences will serve
as sufficient evidence for all who hear me that they have it in their own
power to make their lives as glorious or as terrible as they choose.

Og Mandino
Og Mandino's Great Trilogy
  

Whether your focus is on preserving and strengthening family ties in a world
of increasingly unstable relationships, gaining access to a decent job, growing
and evolving as a person, or guiding a company through the stormy seas of
a fiercely competitive global marketplace--whether your goals are material,
emotional, or spiritual--the price of success is the same:  thinking, learning.
To be asleep at the wheel--to rely only on the known, familiar,
and automatized--is to invite disaster.

Nathaniel Branden
Self-Esteem Every Day

  

The secret of the truly successful is that they have learned very well
early in life how not to be busy.  They saw through the adage that
anything worth doing is worth doing well.  The truth is, many things
are worth doing only in the most slovenly, halfhearted fashion
possible, and many things are not worth doing at all.

Barbara Ehrenreich

   
The secret of success is learning how to use pain and pleasure
instead of having pain and pleasure use you.  If you do that, you’re
in control of your life.  If you don’t, life controls you.

Tony Robbins
  

         
    

Yes, life can be mysterious and confusing--but there's much of life that's actually rather dependable and reliable.  Some principles apply to life in so many different contexts that they can truly be called universal--and learning what they are and how to approach them and use them can teach us some of the most important lessons that we've ever learned.
My doctorate is in Teaching and Learning.  I use it a lot when I teach at school, but I also do my best to apply what I've learned to the life I'm living, and to observe how others live their lives.  What makes them happy or unhappy, stressed or peaceful, selfish or generous, compassionate or arrogant?  In this book, I've done my best to pass on to you what I've learned from people in my life, writers whose works I've read, and stories that I've heard.  Perhaps these principles can be a positive part of your life, too!
Universal Principles of Living Life Fully.  Awareness of these principles can explain a lot and take much of the frustration out of the lives we lead.

    
    

    
    

Three versions of a similar passage:  there's a passage on success that's usually attributed to Emerson, but that very probably is a misattribution.  Unfortunately, over the years the various versions have changed, and it's pretty hard to tell where these ideas came from originally.  We won't attempt to answer the question of source definitively--we'll just give you the three versions as they're written.
To laugh often and much; to win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of children; to earn the appreciation of honest criticism and endure the betrayal of false friends; to appreciate beauty and find the best in others; to leave this world a bit better whether by a healthy child, a garden patch, a redeemed social condition; to know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived--this is to have succeeded.

Ralph Waldo Emerson
Success

They have achieved success
who have lived well,
laughed often, and loved much;

who have enjoyed the trust of
pure men and women,

the respect of intelligent people and
the love of little children;

who have filled their niche and accomplished their tasks;

who have left the world better than they found it
whether by an improved poppy,
a perfect poem or a rescued soul;

who have never lacked appreciation of Earth's beauty
or failed to express it;

who have always looked for the best in others and
given them the best they had;

whose lives were an inspiration;
whose memory a benediction.

--Bessie Anderson Stanley, 1904

("Success" was written as the winning entry in a contest run by Brown Book Magazine in 1904.  Bessie won a cash prize of $250 which paid off the mortgage on the house, among other things.  It was included in Bartlett's Book of Quotations for decades, and if you can find an old edition from the 30's or 40's, it should be in there.  They dropped it, I think in the 60's, but I don't know why.

The family isn't sure how the poem got mangled and attributed to Emerson, but it was further confused by Ann Landers and her sister Abby.  Ann Landers used to (mis)quote it all the time and cite Emerson as the source.  My great-uncle Art, a retired federal judge who died last March, and she had a decade-long correspondence as he argued for a public correction.  She finally conceded and in her book, The Ann Landers Encyclopedia, prints the whole story.

~~Bethanne Larson, a granddaughter of Bessie Stanley)
Thanks to robinsweb.com for this info.
That Person is a Success
Who has lived well,
    laughed often and loved much;
Who has gained the respect of intelligent people
    and the love of children;
Who has filled his or her niche
    and accomplished his or her task;
Who leaves the world better than he or she found it,
    whether by improved poppy, a perfect poem,
    or a rescued soul;
Who never lacked appreciation of earth's beauty
    or failed to express it.
Who looked for the best in others
    and gave the best he or she had.

Robert Louis Stevenson