Motivational Quotes

Purpose

At a turbulent public meeting once I lost my temper and said some harsh and sarcastic things. The proposal I was supporting was promptly defeated. My father who was there, said nothing, but that night, on my pillow I found a marked passage from Aristotle: Anybody can become angry--that is easy, but to be angry with the right person and to the right degree and at the right time and for the right purpose, and in the right way -- that is not within everybody's power and is not easy.

- Gordon, Arthur

Best Quotes about Purpose

The only failure a man ought to fear is failure in cleaving to the purpose he sees to be best.

Eliot, George

The crowning blessing of life is to be born with a bias to some pursuit.

Tallentyre, S. G.

If you don't stand up for something, you may fall for anything.

Brown, Les

Gordon, Arthur

Only the consciousness of a purpose that is mightier than any man and worthy of all men can fortify and inspirit and compose the souls of men.

Lippmann, Walter

The aims of life are the best defense against death.

Levi, Primo

We need not only a purpose in life to give meaning to our existence but also something to give meaning to our suffering. We need as much something to suffer for as something to live for.

Hoffer, Eric

Once we are destined to live out our lives in the prison of our mind, our duty is to furnish it well.

Ustinov, Peter

Existence is a strange bargain. Life owes us little; we owe it everything. The only true happiness comes from squandering ourselves for a purpose.

Cowper, William

10.

Great minds have purposes; others have wishes.

Irving, Washington

11.

It is essential that we enable young people to see themselves as participants in one of the most exciting eras in history, and to have a sense of purpose in relation to it.

Rockefeller, Nelson

12.

Why do I not seek some real good; one which I could feel, not one which I could display?

Seneca

13.

Anyone can live heroically and successfully for one day. The man who achieves a high purpose makes that day the pattern for all the days of his life.

14.

You can come to understand your purpose in life by slowing down and feeling your heart's desires.

Wieder, Marcia

15.

Only conduct yourselves in a manner worthy of the gospel of Christ; so that whether I come and see you or remain absent, I may hear of you that you are standing firm in one spirit, with one mind striving together for the faith of the gospel. [Philippians 1:27]

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16.

I live for my sons. I would be lost without them.

Diana, Princess of Wales

17.

Multitudes of people, drifting aimlessly to and fro without a set purpose, deny themselves such fulfillment of their capacities, and the satisfying happiness which attends it. They are not wicked, they are only shallow. They are not mean or vicious; they simply are empty -- shake them and they would rattle like gourds. They lack range, depth, and conviction. Without purpose their lives ultimately wander into the morass of dissatisfaction. As we harness our abilities to a steady purpose and undertake the long pull toward its accomplishment, rich compensations reward us. A sense of purpose simplifies life and therefore concentrates our abilities; and concentration adds power.

Hildebrand, Kenneth

18.

Never be afraid to treat the path alone. Know which is your path and follow it wherever it may lead you; do not feel you have to follow in someone else's footsteps.

Bellin, Gita

19.

Be above it! Make the world serve your purpose, but do not serve it.

Goethe, Johann Wolfgang Von

20.

I just wake up and say, You're a bum, go do something worthwhile today.

Brooks, Garth

21.

To the person with a firm purpose all men and things are servants.

Goethe, Johann Wolfgang Von

22.

Pep without purpose is piffle.

23.

The sense of paralysis proceeds not so much out of the mammoth size of the problem but out of the puniness of the purpose.

Cousins, Norman

24.

There is no road to success but through a clear strong purpose. Nothing can take its place. A purpose underlies character, culture, position, attainment of every part.

Munger, Thornton T.

25.

It is good to follow one's own bent, so long as it leads upward.

Gide, Andre

26.

A pilgrim is a wanderer with purpose.

Pilgrim, Peace

27.

He who clings to life shall lose it -- but losing it in a right cause will gain it.

28.

Winners are people with definite purpose in life.

Waitley, Denis

29.

All men should strive to learn before they die, what they are running from, and to, and why.

Thurber, James

30.

Blessed are the single-hearted, for they shall enjoy much peace. If you refuse to be hurried and pressed, if you stay your soul on God, nothing can keep you from that clearness of spirit which is life and peace. In that stillness you will know what His will is.

Carmichael, Amy

31.

Everything happens for a reason and a purpose, and it serves you.

Robbins, Anthony

32.

Strong lives are motivated by dynamic purposes; lesser ones exist on wishes and inclinations.

Hildebrand, Kenneth

33.

What on earth are you doing for Heaven's sake?

34.

How could there be any question of acquiring or possessing, when the one thing needful for a man is to become -- to be at last, and to die in the fullness of his being.

Saint-Exupery, Antoine De

35.

For I say unto you in all sadness of conviction that to think great thoughts you must be heroes as well as idealists. Only when you have worked alone -- when you have felt around you are a black gulf of solitude more isolating than that which surrounds the dying man, and in hope and despair have trusted to your own unshaken will -- then only can you gain the secret isolated joy of the thinker, who knows that a hundred years after he is dead and forgotten men who have never heard of him will be moving to the measure of his thought -- the subtle rapture of postponed power, which the world knows not because it has no external trappings, but which to his prophetic vision is more real than that which commands an army. And if this joy should not be yours, still it is only thus you can know that you have done what lay in you to do -- can say that you have lived, and be ready for the end.

Holmes Jr., Oliver Wendell

36.

It's not so much how busy you are, but why you are busy. The bee is praised. The mosquito is swatted.

O'Connor, Mary

37.

A purpose you impart is no longer your own.

Goethe, Johann Wolfgang Von

38.

A just cause is not ruined by a few mistakes.

Dostoevsky, Fyodor

39.

The man without a purpose is like a ship without a rudder -- waif, a nothing, a no man. Have a purpose in life, and, having it, throw such strength of mind and muscle into your work as God has given you.

Carlyle, Thomas

40.

What allows us, as human beings, to psychologically survive life on earth, with all of its pain, drama, and challenges, is a sense of purpose and meaning

Angelis, Barbara De

41.

The longest journey is the journey inwards. Of him who has chosen his destiny, Who has started upon his quest for the source of his being.

Hammarskjold, Dag

42.

Our chief usefulness to humanity rests on our combining power with high purpose. Power undirected by high purpose spells calamity, and high purpose by itself is utterly useless if the power to put it into effect is lacking.

Roosevelt, Theodore

43.

Everything in the universe has a purpose. Indeed, the invisible intelligence that flows through everything in a purposeful fashion is also flowing through you.

Dyer, Wayne

44.

People should follow their own energy.

Schultz, Will

45.

It is your work in life that is your ultimate seduction.

Picasso, Pablo

46.

Knowing our personal mission further enhances the flow of mysterious coincidences as we are guided toward our destinies. First we have a question, then dreams, daydreams, and intuitions lead us toward the answers, which usually are synchronistically provided by the wisdom of another human being.

Redfield, James

47.

My life has no purpose, no direction, no aim, no meaning, and yet I'm happy. I can't figure it out. What am I doing right.

Schulz, Charles M.

48.

Many people flounder about in life because they do not have a purpose, an objective toward which to work.

Halas, George

49.

Better to die of something than to die in old age of nothing.

Sharpman, Al

50.

Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were entreating through us; we beg you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. [2 Corinthians 5:20]

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