Motivational Quotes

Perfection

Perfectionism is simply putting a limit on your future. When you have an idea of perfect in your mind, you open the door to constantly comparing what you have now with what you want. That type of self criticism is significantly deterring.

- John Eliot, Ph.D.

Best Quotes about Perfection

No barber shaves so close but another finds his work.

Proverb, English

Perfection is finally attained not when there is no longer anything to add but when there is no longer anything to take away, when a body has been stripped down to its nakedness.

Saint-Exupery, Antoine De

One that desires to excel should endeavor in those things that are in themselves most excellent.

Epictetus

Nothing would be done at all if one waited until one could do it so well that no one could find fault with it.

Newman, Cardinal J.

I am careful not to confuse excellence with perfection. Excellence, I can reach for; perfection is God's business.

Michael J. Fox

Perfection is a trifle dull. It is not the least of life's ironies that this, which we all aim at, is better not quite achieved.

Maugham, W. Somerset

Every time, all the time, I'm a perfectionist. I feel I should never lose.

Evert, Chris

If a man should happen to reach perfection in this world, he would have to die immediately to enjoy himself.

Billings, Josh

Have no fear of perfection-you'll never reach it.

Dali, Salvador

10.

Measure not by the scale of perfection the meager product of reality.

Schiller, Johann Friedrich Von

11.

Have no fear of perfection - you'll never reach it.

Salvador Dali

12.

Have patience with all things, but chiefly have patience with yourself. Do not lose courage in considering your own imperfections but instantly set about remedying them - every day begin the task anew.

Saint Francis de Sales

13.

Fix your eyes on perfection and you make almost everything speed towards it.

Channing, William Ellery

14.

I don't confuse greatness with perfection. To be great anyhow isàthe higher achievement.

Lois McMaster Bujold

15.

The artist who aims at perfection in everything achieves it in nothing.

Delacroix, Eugene

16.

Perfection is our goal, excellence will be tolerated.

Yahl, J.

17.

This is the very perfection of a man, to find out his own imperfections.

Augustine, St.

18.

To demand perfection is a sure way to be disappointed in everybody, for you will be bound to think ill of others.

Monica Fairview

19.

We never taste happiness in perfection, our most fortunate successes are mixed with sadness.

Corneille, Pierre

20.

The essence of being human is that one does not seek perfection, that one is sometimes willing to commit sins for the sake of loyalty, that one does not push asceticism to the point where it makes friendly intercourse impossible, and that one is prepared in the end to be defeated and broken up by life, which is the inevitable price of fastening one's love upon other human individuals.

Orwell, George

21.

When you aim for perfection, you discover it's a moving target.

Fisher, Geoffrey F.

22.

If you'd like to be good at something, the first thing to out the window is the notion of perfection.

Scott Berkun

23.

No one becomes perfect, but some become great.

24.

The closest to perfection a person ever comes is when he fills out a job application form.

Randall, Stanely J.

25.

The nearest to perfection that most people come is when filling out an employment application.

26.

The indefatigable pursuit of an unattainable perfection --even though nothing more than the pounding of an old piano --is what alone gives a meaning to our life on this unavailing star.

Smith, Logan Pearsall

27.

The pursuit of perfection often impedes improvement.

Will, George F.

28.

John Eliot, Ph.D.

29.

Perfection is perfectly simple; fouling things up requires true skill.

Horton, Doug

30.

I have always suspected that correctness is the last refuge of those who have nothing to say.

Wasiman, Friedrich

31.

The intellect of man is forced to choose perfection of the life, or of the work, and if it take the second must refuse a heavenly mansion, raging in the dark.

Yeats, William Butler

32.

If there was nothing wrong in the world there wouldn't be anything for us to do.

Shaw, George Bernard

33.

Assert your right to make a few mistakes. If people can't accept your imperfections, that's their fault.

Dr. David M. Burns

34.

Perfection has one grave defect. It is apt to be dull.

Maugham, W. Somerset

35.

Aim at perfection in everything, though in most things it is unattainable. However, they who aim at it, and persevere, will come much nearer to it than those whose laziness and despondency make them give it up as unattainable.

Chesterfield, Lord

36.

You can spend a lifetime, and, if you're honest with yourself, never once was your work perfect.

Heston, Charlton

37.

So much perfection argues rottenness somewhere.

Webb, Beatrice Potter

38.

Perfection is a road, not a destination. Every time I live, I get an education.

Burk Hudson

39.

All excellent things are as difficult as they are rare.

Spinoza, Baruch (Benedict de)

40.

The perfect normal person is rare in our civilization.

Horney, Karen

41.

Perfecting is our destiny, but perfection never our lot.

Weber, C. J.

42.

Be ye therefore perfect, eve as your Father who is in heaven is perfect.

Bible

43.

The thing that is really hard, and really amazing, is giving up on being perfect and beginning the work of becoming yourself.

Anna Quindlen

44.

Perfection consists not in doing extraordinary things, but in doing ordinary things extraordinarily well.

Arnauld, Angelique

45.

You have to let people see what you wrote. It will never be perfect, but perfect is overrated. Perfect is boring.

Tina Fey

46.

Everything is perfect in the universe -- even your desire to improve it.

Dyer, Wayne

47.

Perfection is achieved, not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away.

Antoine de Saint-Exupery

48.

I don't like these cold, precise, perfect people who, in order not to speak wrong, never speak at all, and in order not to do wrong, never do anything.

Beecher, Henry Ward

49.

The more perfect a thing is, the more susceptible to good and bad treatment it is.

Dante Alighieri

50.

No one ever approaches perfection except by stealth, and unknown to themselves.

Hazlitt, William