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

Monday, January 5, 2009

Self Improvement Quotes

1. Act so as to elicit the best in others and thereby in thyself. - Felix Adler

2. Well, if you don't improve you slip inevitably backward. Or you hammer-hammer-hammer on the same spot. And you become the same old thing doing the same old thing...Get going. - Katherine Hepburn

3. Be a first-rate version of yourself, not a second-rate version of someone else. - Judy Garland

4. If you are not growing, you are dying. - Les Brown

5. It is far more useful to be aware of a single shortcoming in ourselves than it is to be aware of a thousand in somebody else. For when the fault is our own, we are in a position to correct it. - The Dalai Lama

6. I believe that any man's life will be filled with constant and unexpected encouragement, if he makes up his mind to do his level best each day, and as nearly as possible reaching the high water mark of pure and useful living. - Booker T. Washington

7. We are like blocks of stone from which the Sculptor carves a form. The blows of His chisel which hurt us so much are what make us perfect. - C.S Lewis

8. Not to invent yourself is to be false. To follow preordained rules is a profound betrayal of what it means to be human. - David Starkey

9. The brighter you are, the more you have to learn. - Don Herold

10. Our very business in life is not to get ahead of others, but to get ahead of ourselves. - Thomas L. Monson

11. Anyone who stops learning is old, whether at twenty or eighty. Anyone who keeps learning stays young. The greatest thing in life is to keep your mind young. - Henry Ford

12. As long as anyone believes that his ideal and purpose is outside him, that is is above the clouds, in the past or in the future, he will go outside himself and seek fulfillment where it cannot be found. He will look for solutions and answers at every point except where they can be found — in himself. - Erich Fromm

13. He that has energy enough to root out a vice should go further, and try to plant a virtue in its place. - Charles Caleb Colton

14. I have always been delighted at the prospect of a new day, a fresh try, one more start, with perhaps a bit of magic waiting somewhere behind the morning. - Joseph Priestley

15. The object of a new year is not that we should have a new year. It is that we should have a new soul. - G.K. Chesterton

16. What you really want for yourself is always trying to break through, just as a cooling breeze flows through an open window on a hot day. Your part is to open the windows of your mind. - Vernon Howard

17. Whatever you are, be a good one. - Abraham Lincoln

18. And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom. - Anais Nin

19. Live in terms of your strong points. Magnify them. Let your weaknesses shrivel up and die from lack of nourishment. - William Young Elliott

20. Upward Reaching

The soul of man, to what end is it striving?
What is the destiny, what is the goal?
This constant upward reaching of the soul–
What force behind it does the ceaseless driving?
Upward reaching but implies a quest
Unending, for the things we deem the best,
For that which goes to make the perfect whole–
Insatiable striving for a better role.

With what speed, then, is man’s success arriving?
Endowed with instincts meant to goad him on
Toward the infinite, from dawn to dawn,
From his struggle, how much good deriving?
Man’s speed, or progress, toward that holier sphere,
Is measured through the knowledge he gains here,
And man will go on reaching endlessly;
There is no terminal–no finality.

-Amelia Peart Macdonald

21. Every one of us, if we would reach perfection, must one time ask ourselves this question, 'What lack I yet?' if we would commence our climb upward on the highway to perfection. - Harold B. Lee

22. If you would attain to what you are not yet, you must always be displeased by what you are. For where you are pleased with yourself there you have remained. Keep adding, keep walking, keep advancing. - Saint Augustine

23. To put the world in order, we must first put the nation in order; to put the nation in order, we must put the family in order; to put the family in order, we must cultivate our personal life; and to cultivate our personal life, we must first set our hearts right. - Confucius

24. The self must know stillness before it can discover its true song. - Ralph Brum

25. The most important thing to remember is this: To be ready at any moment to give up what you are for what you might become. - W.E.B. Du Bois

26. Our task is to become our best selves. One of God’s greatest gifts to us is the joy of trying again, for no failure ever need be final. - Thomas S. Monson

27. It is necessary to try to surpass oneself always; this occupation ought to last as long as life. - Queen Christina, of Sweden

28. How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment before starting to improve the world. - Anne Frank

29. If you think you're too small to make a difference, you've obviously never been in bed with a mosquito. - Michelle Walker

30. We become what we want to be by consistently being what we want to become every day. – Richard G. Scott

31. There is nothing noble in being superior to some other man. The true nobility is in being superior to your previous self. - Hindu Proverb

32. Every action we take, everything we do, is either a victory or defeat in the struggle to become what we want to be. - Anne Byrhhe

33. Whatever you focus on, think about, read about, and talk about, you're going to attract more of into your life. - Jack Canfield

34. I am seeking, I am striving, I am in it with all my heart. - Vincent Van Gogh

35. We improve ourselves by victories over ourselves. There must be contest, and we must win. -Edward Gibbon

36. For things to change, YOU have to change. For things to get better, YOU have to get better. For things to improve, YOU have to improve. When YOU grow, EVERYTHING in your life grows with you. - Jim Rohn

37. We are all here for some special reason. Stop being a prisoner of your past. Become the architect of your future. - Robin Sharma

38. If you want to enlarge your life, you must first enlarge your thought of it and of yourself. - Orison Swett Marden

39. Our job in this lifetime is not to shape ourselves into some ideal we imagine we ought to be, but to find out who we already are and become it. - Steven Pressfield

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

41. Link yourself to your potential, not to your past. - Stephen Covey

42.  The path of awakening is not about becoming who you are. Rather it is about unbecoming who you are not. - Albert Schweitzer

43. For things to change, YOU have to change. For things to get better, YOU have to get better. For things to improve, YOU have to improve. When YOU grow, EVERYTHING in your life grows with you. - Jim Rohn

44. There are two primary choices in life: to accept conditions as they exist, or accept the responsibility for changing them. - Denis Waitley

45. Move out of your comfort zone. You can only grow if you are willing to feel awkward and uncomfortable when you try something new. - Brian Tracy

46. The ultimate challenge is to accept ourselves exactly as we are, but never stop trying to learn and grow. - Tony Schwartz

47. Before preparing to improve the world, first look around your own home three times. - Chinese Proverb

48. Let everyone sweep in front of his own door and the whole world will be clean. - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

49. Don’t spend time beating on a wall, hoping to transform it into a door. - Dr. Laura Schlessinger

50. To be aware of a single shortcoming in oneself is more useful than to be aware of a thousand in someone else. - Tenzin Gyatsofs

51. In my clinical experience, the greatest block to a person’s development is his having to take on a way of life which is not rooted in his own powers. - Rollo May

52. If you are not in the process of becoming the person you want to be, you are automatically engaged in becoming the person you don't want to be. - Dale Carnegie

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