This is a compilation of thoughts and quotes that I have found or written recently, as well as many that I've collected throughout the years. Most thoughts are posted randomly, as I feel inspired. A listing of quotes can be found alphabetically (check the 2008 and 2009 archives listing), or by source.

Feel free to suggest additions!


“For as he thinketh in his heart, so is he.” – Proverbs 23:7

Tuesday, December 16, 2008

Goals & Plans Quotes

1. The most important thing about goals is having one. - Geoffry F. Albert

2. Obstacles are those frightful things you see when you take your eyes off your goals. - Henry Ford

3. Big goals can create a fear of failure. Lack of goals guarantees it. - Unknown

4. Not failure, but low aim, is crime. - James Russell Lowell

5. Goals are dreams we convert to plans and take action to fulfill. - Zig Ziglar

6. If you aim at nothing, you'll hit it every time. – Unknown

7. Never quit. It is the easiest cop-out in the world. Set a goal and don't quit until you attain it. When you do attain it, set another goal, and don't quit until you reach it. Never quit. - Paul 'Bear' Bryant

8. A goal is a planned conflict of the status quo... a goal means doing something new, leaving familiar, comfortable terrain of our comfort zones and exploring new frontiers. Sometimes exploring new terrain can be adventurous, but quite often it scares us half to death. - Hyrum Smith

9. People look at an event like the Olympics and think that the Gold Medal is the ultimate goal, but it's not. The process of getting there is far more important. - Scott Hamilton

10. Aim at heaven and you will get earth thrown in; aim at earth and you get neither. - C. S. Lewis

11. Make no little plans, they have no magic to stir men’s blood and probably themselves will not be realized. Make big plans; aim high in hope and work, remembering that a noble, logical diagram once recorded will never die, but long after we are gone will be a living thing, asserting itself with ever-growing insistency. Remember that our sons and grandsons are going to do things that would stagger us. Let your watchword be order and your beacon beauty. Think big. - Daniel Burnham

12. Shoot for the moon. Even if you miss, you'll land among the stars. - Les Brown

13. Choosing a goal and sticking to it changes everything. - Scott Reed

14. It is good to have an end to journey toward; but it is the journey that matters, in the end. - Ursula K. Le Guin

15. We are built to conquer environment, solve problems, achieve goals, and we find no real satisfaction or happiness in life without obstacles to conquer and goals to achieve. - Maxwell Maltz

16. Determine what specific goal you want to achieve. Then dedicate yourself to its attainment with unswerving singleness of purpose, the trenchant zeal of a crusader. - Paul J. Meyer

17. Goals provide the energy source that powers our lives. One of the best ways we can get the most from the energy we have is to focus it. That is what goals can do for us; concentrate our energy. - Denis Waitley

18. Discipline is the bridge between goals and accomplishment. - Jim Rohn

19. A person should set his goals as early as he can and devote all his energy and talent to getting there. With enough effort, he may achieve it. Or he may find something that is even more rewarding. But in the end, no matter what the outcome, he will know he has been alive. - Walt Disney

20. Goals are a means to an end, not the ultimate purpose of our lives. They are simply a tool to concentrate our focus and move us in a direction. The only reason we really pursue goals is to cause ourselves to expand and grow. Achieving goals by themselves will never make us happy in the long term; it’s who you become as you overcome the obstacles necessary to achieve your goals, that can give you the deepest and most long-lasting sense of fulfillment. - Anthony Robbins

21. When it is obvious that the goals cannot be reached, don't adjust the goals, adjust the action steps. - Confucius

22. Arriving at one goal is the starting point to another. - John Dewey

23. Our plans miscarry because they have no aim. When a man does not know what harbor he is making for, no wind is the right wind. - Seneca

24. You must have long-range goals to keep you from being frustrated by short-range failures. - Charles C. Noble

25. Once you have established the goals you want and the price you're willing to pay, you can ignore the minor hurts, the opponent's pressure and the temporary failures. - Vince Lombardi

26. We advance on our journey only when we face our goal, when we are confident and believe we are going to win out. - Orison Swett Marden

27. The life of every man is a diary in which he means to write one story, and writes another, and his humblest hour is when he compares the volume as it is with what he vowed to make it. - James M. Barrie

28. New boots...big steps. - Chinese Proverb

29. Man is a goal seeking animal. His life only has meaning if he is reaching out and striving for his goals. - Aristotle

30. Being easy-going when you have a goal to reach seldom makes the going easy. -Frank Tyger

31. Obstacles are those frightful things you see when you take your eyes off your goal. - Henry Ford

32. Never look down to test the ground before taking your next step; only he who keeps his eye fixed on the far horizon will find his right road. - Dag Hammarskjold

33. The goal ever recedes from us. The greater the progress the greater the recognition of our unworthiness. Satisfaction lies in the effort, not in the attainment. -Mahatma Gandhi

34. It is right to be contented with what we have, never with what we are. – Mackintosh

35. We must walk consciously only part way toward our goal, and then leap in the dark to our success. - Henry David Thoreau

36. True happiness is not made in getting something. True happiness is becoming something. This can be done by being committed to lofty goals. We cannot become something without commitment. - Ashton

37. You have to set goals that are almost out of reach. If you set a goal that is attainable without much work or thought, you are stuck with something below your true talent and potential. - Steve Garvey

38. The major reason for setting a goal is for what it makes of you to accomplish it. What it makes of you will always be the far greater value than what you get. - Jim Rohn

39. If you have a goal in life that takes a lot of energy, that requires a lot of work, that incurs a great deal of interest and that is a challenge to you, you will always look forward to waking up to see what the new day brings. - Susan Polis Schultz

40. Let me tell you the secret that has led me to my goal: my strength lies solely in my tenacity. - Louis Pasteur

41. The greater danger for most of us lies not in setting our aim too high and falling short; but in setting our aim too low, and achieving our mark. - Michelangelo

42. It is good to have an end to journey toward, but it is the journey that matters in the end. - Ursula K. LeGuin

43. Just don't give up trying to do what you really want to do. Where there is love and inspiration, I don't think you can go wrong. - Ella Fitzgerald

44. To seek one's goals and to drive toward it, steeling one's heart, is most uplifting. - Henrik Ibsen

45. The greatest goal you can set this upcoming year is to make peace with your life, no matter your circumstances. - Unknown

46. You cannot expect to achieve new goals or move beyond your present circumstances unless you change. - Les Brown

47. Goals allow you to control the direction of change in your favor. - Brian Tracy

48. The roads we take are more important than the goals we announce. Decisions determine destiny. - Frederick Speakman

49. Arriving at one goal is the starting point to another. - John Dewey

50. You must have long range goals to keep you from being frustrated by short range failures. - Charles C. Noble

51. We are built to conquer environment, solve problems, achieve goals, and we find no real satisfaction in life without obstacles to conquer and goals to achieve. - Maxwell Maltz

52. If you would hit the mark, you must aim a little above it; Every arrow that flies feels the attraction of earth. - Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

53. When obstacles arise, you change your direction to reach your goal; you do not change your decision to get there. - Zig Ziglar

54. If a person does not know what port they are steering for, no wind is favorable to them. - Marcus Annaeus Seneca

55. Man is a goal seeking animal. His life only has meaning if he is reaching out and striving for his goals. - Aristotle

56. If you do not develop the hunger and courage to pursue your goal, you will lose your nerve and you will give up on your dream. - Les Brown

57. A good goal is like a strenuous exercise - it makes you stretch. - Mary Kay Ash

58. If you want to reach a goal, you must "see the reaching" in your own mind before you actually arrive at your goal. - Zig Ziglar

59. We, whoever we are, must have a daily goal in our lives, no matter how small or great, to make that day mean something. - Maxwell Maltz

60. If you paint in your mind a picture of bright and happy expectations, you put yourself into a condition conducive to your goal. - Norman Vincent Peale

61. What you get by achieving your goals is not as important as what you become by achieving your goals. - Zig Ziglar

62. You may not accomplish every goal you set -no one does- but what really matters is having goals and going after them wholeheartedly. - Les Brown

63. The tragedy of life doesn't lie in not reaching your goal. The tragedy lies in having no goal to reach. It isn't a calamity to die with dreams unfulfilled, but it is a calamity not to dream. It is not disgrace to reach the stars, but it is a disgrace to have no stars to reach for. Not failure, but low aim, is a sin. - Benjamin Mays

64. Make your plans as fantastic as you like, because 25 years from now they will seem mediocre. You will wonder why you did not make them 50 times as great. - Henry Curtis

65. Above all be of single aim; have a legitimate and useful purpose, and devote yourself unreservedly to it. - James Allen

66. Get yourself a goal worth working for. Better still, get yourself a project. Always have something ahead of you to look forward to - to work for and hope for. - Maxwell Maltz

67. We are built to conquer environment, solve problems, achieve goals, and we find no real satisfaction or happiness in life without obstacles to conquer and goals to achieve.
- Maxwell Maltz

68. When we accomplish a goal, it instantly loses some of its importance and we tend to lose interest. When we write down too many goals, there is plenty to keep our subconscious mind at work. - Mark Victor Hansen

69. The question you should be asking isn't, "What do I want?" or "What are my goals?" but "What would excite me?" - Tim Ferriss

70. There's nothing wrong with having a plan. Plans are great. But missions are better. Missions survive when plans fail, and plans almost always fail. - Seth Godin

71. If you want something new, you have to stop doing something old. - Peter Drucker

72. When goals go, meaning goes. When meaning goes, purpose goes. When purpose goes, life goes dead on our hands. - Carl Jung

73. If what you are doing is not moving you towards your goals, then it's moving you away from your goals. - Brian Tracy

74. Write it down. Written goals have a way of transforming wishes into wants; cant’s into cans; dreams into plans; and plans into reality. Don’t just think it…ink it! - Unknown

75. If you set goals and go after them with all the determination you can muster, your gifts will take you places that will amaze you. - Les Brown

76. We are built to conquer environment, solve problems, achieve goals, and we find no real satisfaction or happiness in life without obstacles to conquer and goals to achieve. - Maxwell Maltz

77. Determine what specific goal you want to achieve. Then dedicate yourself to its attainment with unswerving singleness of purpose, the trenchant zeal of a crusader. - Paul J. Meyer

78. When we are motivated by goals that have deep meaning, by dreams that need completion, by pure love that needs expressing, then we truly live life. - Greg Anderson

79. If you have goals and procrastination you have nothing. If you have goals and you take action, you will have anything you want. - Thomas J. Vilord

80. Nothing can add more power to your life than concentrating all your energies on a limited set of targets. - Nido Qubein

81. The more intensely we feel about an idea or a goal, the more assuredly the idea, buried deep in our subconscious, will direct us along the path to its fulfilment. - Earl Nightingale

82. This one step–choosing a goal and sticking to it–changes everything. - Scott Reed

83. Resolutions: So many will fail; NOT because they didn’t set goals, but because they didn’t set behaviors. - Steve Maraboli

84. Don't concern yourself too much with how you are going to achieve your goal - leave that completely to a power greater than yourself. All you have to do is know where you're going. The answers will come to you of their own accord, and at the right time. - Earl Nightingale

85. Achievement requires more than a vision - it takes courage, resolve and tenacity. All you have got to do is plant that seed in your mind, care for it, work steadily toward your goal, and it will become a reality. - Earl Nightingale

86. One thing a goal must do is fill us with positive emotion when we think about it. The more intensely we feel about a goal the more progressively we’ll move toward it. - Earl Nightingale

87. The greater danger for most of us lies not in setting our aim too high and falling short; but in setting our aim too low, and achieving our mark. - Michelangelo

88. Set a goal to achieve something that is so big, so exhilarating that it excites you and scares you at the same time. It must be a goal that is so appealing, so much in line with your spiritual core, that you can't get it out of your mind. If you do not get chills when you set a goal, your not setting big enough goals. - Bob Proctor

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