Motivational Quotes

Excellence

To do great things is difficult, but to command great things is more difficult.

- Nietzsche, Friedrich

Best Quotes about Excellence

Winners have the ability to step back from the canvas of their lives like an artist gaining perspective. They make their lives a work of art -- an individual masterpiece.

Waitley, Denis

It is those who have this imperative demand for the best in their natures, and who will accept nothing short of it, that holds the banners of progress, that set the standards, the ideals, for others.

Marden, Orison Swett

There never will exist anything permanently noble and excellent in the character which is a stranger to resolute self-denial.

Scott, Sir Walter

Excellence means when a man or woman asks of himself more than others do.

Gasset, Jose Ortega Y

Put the uncommon effort into the common task... make it large by doing it in a great way.

Marden, Orison Swett

One of the most essential things you need to do for yourself is to choose a goal that is important to you. Perfection does not exist -- you can always do better and you can always grow.

Brown, Les

Being forced to work, and forced to do your best, will breed in you temperance and self-control, diligence and strength of will, cheerfulness and content, and a hundred virtues which the idle will never know.

Kingsley, Charles

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

Carnegie, Andrew

You can start right where you stand and apply the habit of going the extra mile by rendering more service and better service than you are now being paid for.

Hill, Napoleon

10.

We distinguish the excellent man from the common man by saying that the former is the one who makes great demands on himself, and the latter who makes no demands on himself.

Gasset, Jose Ortega Y

11.

It is the mark of an instructed mind to rest satisfied with the degree of precision which the nature of the subject admits and not to seek exactness when only an approximation of the truth is possible.

Aristotle

12.

The real contest is always between what you've done and what you're capable of doing. You measure yourself against yourself and nobody else.

Gaberino, Geoffrey

13.

The ancient Greek definition of happiness was the full use of your powers along lines of excellence.

John F. Kennedy

14.

There is none who cannot teach somebody something, and there is none so excellent but he is excelled.

Gracian, Baltasar

15.

To aim at excellence, our reputation, and friends, and all must be ventured; to aim at the average we run no risk and provide little service.

Goldsmith, Oliver

16.

You do not merely want to be considered just the best of the best. You want to be considered the only ones who do what you do.

Garcia, Jerry

17.

To enjoy enduring success we should travel a little in advance of the world.

Mcdonald, John

18.

The excellency of every art is its intensity, capable of making all disagreeable evaporate.

Keats, John

19.

Great men are but common men more fully developed and ripened.

Marden, Orison Swett

20.

I want to be all that I am capable of becoming.

Mansfield, Katherine

21.

Whoever I am, or whatever I am doing, some kind of excellence is within my reach.

Gardner, John W.

22.

Don't waste your time striving for perfection, instead, strive for excellence -- doing your best.

Olivier, Sir Lawrence

23.

We do not do well except when we know where the best is and when we are assured that we have touched it and hold its power within us.

Joubert, Joseph

24.

Do a little bit more than average and from that point on our progress multiplies itself out of all proportion to the effort put in.

Meyer, Paul J.

25.

Do a little more each day than you think you possibly can.

Thomas, Lowell

26.

If you want to achieve excellence, you can get there today. As of this second, quit doing less-than-excellent work.

Watson, Thomas J.

27.

No matter how small and unimportant what we are doing may seem, if we do it well, it may soon become the step that will lead us to better things.

Pollock, Channing

28.

You must be resolutely determined that whatever you do shall always be the best of which you are capable.

Popplestone, Charles E.

29.

Badness you can get easily, in quantity; the road is smooth, and it lies close by, But in front of excellence the immortal gods have put sweat, and long and steer is the way to it.

Hesiod

30.

Make it a life-rule to give your best to whatever passes through your hands. Stamp it with your manhood. Let superiority be your trademark...

Marden, Orison Swett

31.

The man who comes up with a means for doing or producing almost anything better, faster or more economically has his future and his fortune at his fingertips.

Getty, J. Paul

32.

Excellence is to do a common thing in an uncommon way.

Washington, Booker T.

33.

I always remember an epitaph which is in the cemetery at Tombstone, Arizona. It says: Here lies Jack Williams. He done his damnedest. I think that is the greatest epitaph a man can have.

Truman, Harry S

34.

To enjoy the things we ought and to hate the things we ought has the greatest bearing on excellence of character.

Aristotle

35.

There's a way to do better... find it.

Edison, Thomas A.

36.

Excellence is doing ordinary things extraordinarily well.

Gardner, John W.

37.

Great men are little men expanded; great lives are ordinary lives intensified.

Peterson, Wilferd A.

38.

The most splendid achievement of all is the constant striving to surpass yourself and to be worthy of your own approval.

Waitley, Denis

39.

There is one plain rule of life. Try thyself unweariedly till thou findest the highest thing thou art capable of doing, faculties and outward circumstances being both duly considered, and then do it.

Mill, John Stuart

40.

I never had a policy; I have just tried to do my very best each and every day.

Lincoln, Abraham

41.

Determine to become one of the best. Sufficient money will almost automatically follow if you get to be one of the best in your chosen field, whatever it is.

Mitchell, Don G.

42.

It takes a long time to bring excellence to maturity.

Publilius Syrus

43.

Only a mediocre person is always at his best.

Maugham, W. Somerset

44.

One of the great undiscovered joys of life comes from doing everything one attempts to the best of one's ability. There is a special sense of satisfaction, a pride in surveying such a work, a work which is rounded, full, exact, complete in its parts, which the superficial person who leaves his or her work in a slovenly, slipshod, half-finished condition, can never know. It is this conscientious completeness which turns any work into art. The smallest task, well done, becomes a miracle of achievement.

Mandino, Og

45.

It is only in your mind that you have to excel, at anything or everything. Of course, it would be very nice to excel at most things. Indeed, we recommend that you try and do your best. But realistically, you are entitled to do the bare minimum to get by. All your accomplishments are just a bonus, something to enjoy, not requirements. You don't have to do anything to prove that you are worthy of existing.

Albert Ellis, Michael Abrams, Lidia Dengelegi

46.

Excellent firms don't believe in excellence -- only in constant improvement and constant change.

Peters, Thomas J.

47.

I use nothing but the best ingredients. My cookies are always baked fresh. I price cookies so that you cannot make them at home for any less. And I still give cookies away.

Fields, Debbie

48.

When you say you'll meet someone at 11:00 AM, be there at 10:45. When you promise a check on the 30th, send it on the 28th. Whatever you agree to do, do it a bit more. Start with your employees, then extend it to everyone you deal with. News will soon get around that you are a person of your word.

Scott, Charles Prestwich

49.

People come out to see you perform and you've got to give them the best you have within you. The lives of most men are patchwork quilts. Or at best one matching outfit with a closet and laundry bag full of incongruous accumulations. A lifetime of training for just ten seconds.

Owens, Jesse

50.

The renown which riches or beauty confer is fleeting and frail; mental excellence is a splendid and lasting possession.

Sallust