quotations about success
Beware the serpent, slyly hid, which stings
The soul with poison of Prosperity.
EDWARD ROBESON TAYLOR
"Adversity"
Success is sweet: the sweeter if long delayed and attained through manifold struggles and defeats.
AMOS BRONSON ALCOTT
Table Talk
Success: a marvelous stimulant, bubbling with inspiration and incitement. But for all except the few who are strong and steadfast, there lurks beneath the effervescence a subtle poison.
SAMUEL HOPKINS ADAMS
Success: A Novel
Trees are bowed down with weight of fruit,
Clouds big with rain hang low,
So good men humbly bear success,
Nor overweening grow.
BHARTRHARI
"The Path of Altruism"
Success demands paranoia.
JOSEPH FINDER
Paranoia
Yes, success is everything. Failure is more common. Most achieve a sort of middling thing, but fortunately one's situation is always blurred, you never know absolutely quite where you are.
DONALD BARTHELME
"The Crisis"
The secret of success is this: There is no secret of success.
ELBERT HUBBARD
The American Bible
Success makes life easier. It doesn't make living easier.
BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN
Q, August, 1992
You create everything that happens to you.... If you want to be really successful, and I know you do, then you will have to give up blaming and complaining and take total responsibility for your life--that means all your results, both your successes and your failures. That is the prerequisite for creating a life of success. It is only by acknowledging that you have created everything up until now that you can take charge of creating the future you want.
JACK CANFIELD
The Success Principles
The squalid cash interpretation put on the word success -- is our national disease.
WILLIAM JAMES
letter to H. G. Wells, September 11, 1906
Success is having ten honeydew melons and eating only the top half of each one.
BARBRA STREISAND
attributed, Little Giant Encyclopedia of Inspirational Quotes
The successful man is the one whose images correspond most closely to reality, because then his actions will lead to the results which he imagines. A man's failures depend upon the fact that his images do not correspond to reality, whether he is dealing with marriage, politics, business, or the horse races.
ERIC BERNE
The Mind in Action
Success is a mix of sailing skill, grit, determination and improvisation; having to deal with broken yards, torn sails, capsizes and, in one instance, a rudder being washed away, not to mention the obligatory blisters, sand fly bites and sunburn that come with wild camping on deserted dessert islands.
ANONYMOUS
"Ngalawa Cup: The Nuclear Option", Scuttlebutt Sailing News, July 10, 2017
Success is a journey not a destination. The doing is usually more important than the outcome. Not everyone can be Number 1.
ARTHUR ASHE
attributed, Get Motivated!: Daily Psych-Ups
The thing I remember best about "successful people" I've met is their obvious delight in what they do. And their delight seems to have very little to do with the trappings of worldly success.
FRED ROGERS
You Are Special: Neighborly Wit and Wisdom from Mister Rogers
Success and failure are not dealt out like prizes and blanks in a lottery, by chance and indiscriminately; but there is a reason for every success and failure. Indolence, chicanery, waste will cause the one; while industry, honesty, and thrift will insure the other.
JAMES PLATT
Platt's Essays
No amount of reading or memorizing will make you successful in life. It is the understanding and application of wise thought which counts.
BOB PROCTOR
You Were Born Rich
If you are a genius and unsuccessful, everybody treats you as if you were a genius, but when you come to be successful, when you commence to earn money, when you are really successful, then your family and everybody no longer treats you like a genius, they treat you like a man who has become successful.
PABLO PICASSO
attributed, Picasso
Your success and happiness are forgiven you only if you generously consent to share them.
ALBERT CAMUS
The Fall
Quality questions create a quality life. Successful people ask better questions, and as a result, they get better answers.
ANTHONY ROBBINS
attributed, 101 Best Ways to Get Ahead