Quotations and Poems

» “In this country men seem to live for action as long as they can and sink into apathy when they retire.”
– Charles Francis Adams

» “You can tell more about a person by what he says about others than you can by what others say about him.”
– Leo Aikman

» “The shortest distance between two points is under construction.”
– Noelie Alito

» “The greatest potential for control tends to exist at the point where action takes place.”
– Louis A. Allen

» “Action and faith enslave thought, both of them in order not be troubled or inconvenienced by reflection, criticism, and doubt.”
– Henri Frederic Amiel

» “Action is coarsened thought; thought becomes concrete, obscure, and unconscious.”
– Henri Frederic Amiel

» “For purposes of action nothing is more useful than narrowness of thought combined with energy of will.”
– Henri Frederic Amiel

» “A bird doesn’t sing because it has an answer, it sings because it has a song.”
– Maya Angelou

» “Effective action is always unjust.”
– Jean Anouilh

» “Are you in earnest? Seize this very minute! Boldness has genius, power, and magic in it. Only engage, and then the mind grows heated. Begin, and then the work will be completed.”
– John Anster

» “Those who are more adapted to the active life can prepare themselves for contemplation in the practice of the active life, while those who are more adapted to the contemplative life can take upon themselves the works of the active life so as to become yet more apt for contemplation.”
– St. Thomas Aquinas

» “What really distinguishes this generation in all countries from earlier generations… is its determination to act, its joy in action, the assurance of being able to change things by one’s own efforts.”
– Hannah Arendt

» “Action without a name, a ”who” attached to it, is meaningless.”
– Hannah Arendt

» “All human actions have one or more of these seven causes: chance, nature, compulsions, habit, reason, passion, desire.”
– Aristotle

» “For the things we have to learn before we can do them, we learn by doing them.”
– Aristotle

» “Men acquire a particular quality by constantly acting a particular way. We become just by performing just actions, temperate by performing temperate actions, brave by performing brave actions.”
– Aristotle

» “We become just by performing just action, temperate by performing temperate actions, brave by performing brave action.”
– Aristotle

» “Well begun is half done.”
– Aristotle

» “The only correct actions are those that demand no explanation and no apology.”
– Red Auerbach

» “Do every act of your life as if it were your last.”
– Marcus Aurelius

» “Thou wilt find rest from vain fancies if thou doest every act in life as though it were thy last.”
– Marcus Aurelius

» “Dig within. Within is the wellspring of Good; and it is always ready to bubble up, if you just dig.”
– Marcus Aurelius

» “Begin — to begin is half the work, let half still remain; again begin this, and thou wilt have finished.”
– Decimus Magnus Ausonius

» “It was prettily devised of Aesop, ”The fly sat on the axle tree of the chariot wheel and said, what dust do I raise! ””
– Francis Bacon

» “Most people of action are inclined to fatalism and most of thought believe in providence.”
– Honore De Balzac

» “It is easy to sit up and take notice, What is difficult is getting up and taking action.”
– Al Batt

» “The secret of getting ahead is getting started.”
– Sally Berger

» “Think like a man of action, and act like a man of thought.”
– Henri L. Bergson

» “Never forget that life can only be nobly inspired and rightly lived if you take it bravely and gallantly, as a splendid adventure in which you are setting out into an unknown country, to meet many a joy, to find many a comrade, to win and lose many a battle.”
– Annie Besant

» “Action is the product of the qualities inherent in nature.”
– Bhagavad Gita

» “All things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them. [Matthew 7:12]“
– Bible

» “But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves. [James 1:22]“
– Bible

» “All rivers run into the sea, yet the sea is not full.”
– Bible

» “Do unto others as you would have others do unto you. [Matthew 7:120]“
– Bible

» “You can’t aim a duck to death.”
– Gael Boardman

» “Action springs not from thought, but from a readiness for responsibility.”
– Dietrich Bonhoeffer

» “The world can only be grasped by action, not by contemplation. The hand is the cutting edge of the mind.”
– Jacob Bronowski

» “It is vain to say human beings ought to be satisfied with tranquillity: they must have action; and they will make it if they cannot find it.”
– Charlotte Bronte

» “Let your performance do the thinking.”
– H. Jackson Brown Jr.

» “Take action in order to move toward your goals.”
– Les Brown

» “You must take action now that will move you towards your goals. Develop a sense of urgency in your life.”
– Les Brown

» “It’s motive alone which gives character to the actions of men.”
РJean De La Bruy̬re

» “Someone’s sitting in the shade today because someone planted a tree a long time ago.”
– Warren Buffett

» “Let us do or die.”
– Robert Burns

» “The critical ingredient is getting off your butt and doing something. It’s as simple as that. A lot of people have ideas, but there are few who decide to do something about them now. Not tomorrow. Not next week. But today. The true entrepreneur is a doer, not a dreamer.”
– Nolan Bushnell

» “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

» “Dwell not on the past. Use it to illustrate a point, then leave it behind. Nothing really matters except what you do now in this instant of time. From this moment onwards you can be an entirely different person, filled with love and understanding, ready with an outstretched hand, uplifted and positive in every thought and deed.”
– Eileen Caddy

» “A good action is never lost; it is a treasure laid up and guarded for the doer’s need.”
– Pedro Calderón de la Barca

» “A dog barks when his master is attacked. I would be a coward if I saw that God’s truth is attacked and yet would remain silent.”
– John Calvin

» “Leap, and the net will appear.”
– Julie Cameron

» “Everything you want is out there waiting for you to ask. Everything you want also wants you. But you have to take action to get it.”
– Jack Canfield

» “Action hangs, as it were, ”dissolved” in speech, in thoughts whereof speech is the shadow; and precipitates itself therefrom. The kind of speech in a man betokens the kind of action you will get from him.”
– Thomas Carlyle

» “The end of man is action, and not thought, though it be of the noblest.”
– Thomas Carlyle

» “Our grand business is not to see what lies dimly at a distance, but to do what lies clearly at hand.”
– Thomas Carlyle

» “No man lives without jostling and being jostled; in all ways he has to elbow himself through the world, giving and receiving offence.”
– Thomas Carlyle

» “Everywhere in life, the true question is not what we gain, but what we do.”
– Thomas Carlyle

» “Narrative is linear, but action has breadth and depth as well as height and is solid.”
– Thomas Carlyle

» “As I grow older, I pay less attention to what people say. I just watch what they do.”
– Andrew Carnegie

» “Life leaps like a geyser for those who drill through the rock of inertia.”
– Alexis Carrel

» “There is no use trying, said Alice; one can’t believe impossible things. I dare say you haven’t had much practice, said the Queen. When I was your age, I always did it for half an hour a day. Why, sometimes I’ve believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.”
– Lewis Carroll

» “People may doubt what you say, but they will believe what you do.”
– Lewis Cass

» “Good actions ennoble us, and we are the sons of our own deeds.”
– Miguel De Cervantes

» “The person of intellect is lost unless they unite with energy of character. When we have the lantern of Diogenese we must also have his staff.”
– Sebastien-Roch Nicolas De Chamfort

» “Every action of our lives touches on some chord that will vibrate in eternity.”
– Edwin Hubbel Chapin

» “In action be primitive; in foresight, a strategist.”
– Rene Char

» “I do not believe in a fate that falls on men however they act; but I do believe in a fate that falls on them unless they act.”
– Gilbert K. Chesterton

» “It is not whether your words or actions are tough or gentle; it is the spirit behind your actions and words that announces your inner state.”
– Ching Ning Chu

» “I never worry about action, but only inaction.”
– Winston Churchill

» “We should not be so taken up in the search for truth, as to neglect the needful duties of active life; for it is only action that gives a true value and commendation to virtue.”
– Marcus T. Cicero

» “Action makes more fortune than caution.”
– Luc De Clapiers

» “He who believes is strong; he who doubts is weak. Strong convictions precede great actions.”
– James Freeman Clarke

» “A man who waits to believe in action before acting is anything you like, but he’s not a man of action.. You must act as you breathe.”
– Georges Clemenceau

» “When a man asks himself what is meant by action he proves that he isn’t a man of action. Action is a lack of balance. In order to act you must be somewhat insane. A reasonably sensible man is satisfied with thinking.”
– Georges Clemenceau

» “Begin to free yourself at once by doing all that is possible with the means you have, and as you proceed in this spirit the way will open for you to do more.”
– Robert Collier

» “Take the first step, and your mind will mobilize all its forces to your aid. But the first essential is that you begin. Once the battle is startled, all that is within and without you will come to your assistance.”
– Robert Collier

» “If you don’t make things happen then things will happen to you.”
– Lanes Company

» “The superior man acts before he speaks, and afterwards speaks according to his action.”
– Confucius

» “The superior man is modest in his speech but exceeds in his actions.”
– Confucius

» “Let every man or woman here, if you never hear me again, remember this, that if you wish to be great at all, you must begin where you are and with what you are. He who would be great anywhere must first be great in his own Philadelphia.”
– Russel H. Conwell

» “We are born to action; and whatever is capable of suggesting and guiding action has power over us from the first.”
– Charles Horton Cooley

» “Unless a capacity for thinking be accompanied by a capacity for action, a superior mind exists in torture.”
– Benedetto Croce

» “Jump into the middle of things, get your hands dirty, fall flat on your face, and then reach for the stars.”
– Joan L. Curcio

» “The difficulties you meet will resolve themselves as you advance. Proceed, and light will dawn, and shine with increasing clearness on your path.”
– D’Alembert

» “For what is liberty but the unhampered translation of will into act?”
– Dante Alighieri

» “A fair request should be followed by the deed in silence.”
– Dante Alighieri

» “The secret of getting things done is to act!”
– Benjamin O. David

» “The self is not something ready-made, but something in continuous formation through choice of action.”
– John Dewey

» “We cannot seek or attain health, wealth, learning, justice or kindness in general. Action is always specific, concrete, individualized, unique.”
– John Dewey

» “Just as a flower which seems beautiful and has color but no perfume, so are the fruitless words of the man who speaks them but does them not.”
– Dhammapada

» “If you keep thinking about what you want to do or what you hope will happen, you don’t do it, and it won’t happen.”
– Joe Dimaggio

» “We keep moving forward, opening new doors, and doing new things, because we’re curious and curiosity keeps leading us down new paths.”
– Walt Disney

» “Action may not always bring happiness; but there is no happiness without action.”
– Benjamin Disraeli

» “Taking a new step, uttering a new word, is what people fear most.”
– Fyodor Dostoevski

» “Start with what is right rather than what is acceptable.”
– Peter F. Drucker

» “Never mind your happiness; do your duty.”
– William J. Durant

» “Everything is in motion. Everything flows. Everything is vibrating.”
– Wayne Dyer

» “Go for it now. The future is promised to no one.”
– Wayne Dyer

» “What you are will show in what you do.”
– Thomas A. Edison

» “Resolved, never to do anything which I should be afraid to do, if it were my last of life.”
– Edward Edwards

» “All such action would cease if those powerful elemental forces were to cease stirring within us.”
– Albert Einstein

» “All these primary impulses, not easily described in words, are the springs of man’s actions.”
– Albert Einstein

» “But their intervention makes our acts to serve ever less merely the immediate claims of our instincts.”
– Albert Einstein

» “Thought is the organizing factor in man, intersected between the causal primary instincts and the resulting actions.”
– Albert Einstein

» “We are all ruled in what we do by impulses; and these impulses are so organized that our actions in general serve for our self preservation and that of the race.”
– Albert Einstein

» “It will never rain roses: when we want to have more roses we must plant more trees.”
– George Eliot

» “‘Tis God gives skill, but not without men’s hand: He could not make Antonio Stradivarius’s violins without Antonio.”
– George Eliot

» “Human beings must have action; and they will make it if they cannot find it.”
– George Eliot

» “We must not sit still and look for miracles; up and doing, and the Lord will be with thee. Prayer and pains, through faith in Christ Jesus, will do anything.”
– Sir John Eliot

» “There is a tendency for things to right themselves.”
– Ralph Waldo Emerson

» “Why should we be cowed by the name of Action?.”
– Ralph Waldo Emerson

» “We are taught by great actions that the universe is the property of every individual in it.”
– Ralph Waldo Emerson

» “Thought is the blossom; language the bud; action the fruit behind it.”
– Ralph Waldo Emerson

» “The German intellect wants the French sprightliness, the fine practical understanding of the English, and the American adventure; but it has a certain probity, which never rests in a superficial performance, but asks steadily, To what end? A German public asks for a controlling sincerity.”
– Ralph Waldo Emerson

» “The ancestor of every action is thought.”
– Ralph Waldo Emerson

» “Real action is in silent moments.”
– Ralph Waldo Emerson

» “Men’s actions are too strong for them. Show me a man who has acted, and who has not been the victim and slave of his action.”
– Ralph Waldo Emerson

» “Let us, if we must have great actions, make our own so. All action is of infinite elasticity, and the least admits of being inflated with celestial air, until it eclipses the sun and moon.”
– Ralph Waldo Emerson

» “Do not be too timid and squeamish about your actions. All life is an experiment.”
– Ralph Waldo Emerson

» “Act, if you like, but you do it at your peril. Men’s actions are too strong for them. Show me a man who has acted and who has not been the victim and slave of his action.”
– Ralph Waldo Emerson

» “A man’s action is only a picture book of his creed.”
– Ralph Waldo Emerson

» “We are always getting ready to live, but never living.”
– Ralph Waldo Emerson

» “An ounce of action is worth a ton of theory.”
– Friedrich Engels

» “No sooner said than done — so acts your man of worth.”
– Quintus Ennius

» “Everyone who got where he is had to begin where he was.”
– Richard L. Evans

» “The undertaking of a new action brings new strength.”
– Evenus

» “The man who removes a mountain begins by carrying away small stones.”
– William Faulkner

» “Your actions, and your action alone, determines your worth.”
– Johann G. Fichte

» “No steam or gas ever drives anything until it is confined. No Niagara is ever turned into light and power until it is tunneled. No life ever grows until it is focused, dedicated, disciplined.”
– Harry Emerson Fosdick

» “It is by acts and not by ideas that people live.”
– Anatole France

» “You learn to speak by speaking, to study by studying, to run by running, to work by working; in just the same way, you learn to love by loving.”
– St. Francis De Sales

» “Words may show a man’s wit but actions his meaning.”
– Benjamin Franklin

» “The words printed here are concepts. You must go through the experiences.”
– Frederick Carl Frieseke

» “A man of action forced into a state of thought is unhappy until he can get out of it.”
– John Galsworthy

» “A man is the sum of his actions, of what he has done, of what he can do, Nothing else.”
– Mahatma Gandhi

» “Whatever you do may seem insignificant, but it is most important that you do it.”
– Mahatma Gandhi

» “Action expresses priorities.”
– Charles A. Garfield

» “Give me the ready hand rather than the ready tongue.”
– Giuseppe Garibaldi

» “Deliberation is the work of many men. Action, of one alone.”
– Charles De Gaulle

» “Every man of action has a strong dose of egoism, pride, hardness, and cunning. But all those things will be regarded as high qualities if he can make them the means to achieve great ends.”
– Charles De Gaulle

» “You have to be fast on your feet and adaptive or else a strategy is useless.”
– Lou Gerstner

» “A heart to resolve, a head to contrive, and a hand to execute.”
– Edward Gibbon

» “Man cannot discover new oceans unless he has the courage to lose sight of the shore.”
– Andre Gide

» “One mustn’t allow acting to be like stockbroker — you must not take it just as a means of earning a living, to go down every day to do a job of work. The big thing is to combine punctuality, efficiency, good nature, obedience, intelligence, and concentration with an unawareness of what is going to happen next, thus keeping yourself available for excitement.”
– John Gielgud

» “Then indecision brings its own delays, And days are lost lamenting o’er lost days. Are you in earnest? Seize this very minute; What you can do, or dream you can, begin it.”
– Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

» “Fresh activity is the only means of overcoming adversity.”
– Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

» “When all is said the greatest action is to limit and isolate one’s self.”
– Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

» “Before you can do something you must first be something.”
– Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

» “How shall we learn to know ourselves? By reflection? Never; but only through action. Strive to do thy duty; then you shall know what is in thee.”
– Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

» “Knowing is not enough; we must apply. Willing is not enough; we must do.”
– Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

» “The deed is everything, the glory is naught.”
– Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

» “We will burn that bridge when we come to it.”
– Nick Gorski

» “The wise man does at once what the fool does finally.”
– Baltasar Gracian

» “Dreams will get you nowhere, a good kick in the pants will take you a long way.”
– Graffiti

» “There is a vitality, a life force, a quickening that is translated through you into action, and there is only one of you in all time, this expression is unique, and if you block it, it will never exist through any other medium; and be lost. The world will not have it. It is not your business to determine how good it is, not how it compares with other expression. It is your business to keep it yours clearly and directly, to keep the channel open. You do not even have to believe in yourself or your work. You have to keep open and aware directly to the urges that motivate you. Keep the channel open. No artist is pleased. There is no satisfaction whatever at any time. There is on a queer, divine dissatisfaction, a blessed unrest that keeps us marching and makes us more alive than the others.”
– Martha Graham

» “If you think about it seriously, all the questions about the soul and the immortality of the soul and paradise and hell are at bottom only a way of seeing this very simple fact: that every action of ours is passed on to others according to its value, of good or evil, it passes from father to son, from one generation to the next, in a perpetual movement.”
– Antonio Gramsci

» “Knowledge is of no value unless you put it into practice.”
– Heber J. Grant

» “The secret to success is to start from scratch and keep on scratching.”
– Dennis Green

» “You have to make it happen.”
– Joe Greene

» “For as one star another far exceeds, So souls in heaven are placed by their deeds.”
– Robert Greene

» “In our era, the road to holiness necessarily passes through the world of action.”
– Dag Hammarskjold

» “Don’t wait until everything is just right. It will never be perfect. There will always be challenges, obstacles and less than perfect conditions. So what. Get started now. With each step you take, you will grow stronger and stronger, more and more skilled, more and more self-confident and more and more successful.”
– Mark Victor Hansen

» “A human action becomes genuinely important when it springs from the soil of a clear-sighted awareness of the temporality and the ephemerally of everything human. It is only this awareness that can breathe any greatness into an action.”
– Vaclav Havel

» “You know more of a road by having traveled it than by all the conjectures and descriptions in the world.”
– William Hazlitt

» “The more we do, the more we can do; the more busy we are, the more leisure we have.”
– William Hazlitt

» “Mark this well, you proud men of action! you are, after all, nothing but unconscious instruments of the men of thought.”
– Heinrich Heine

» “Never confuse motion with action.”
– Ernest Hemingway

» “The world has the habit of making room for the man whose actions show that he knows where he is going.”
– Napoleon Hill

» “Action is the real measure of intelligence.”
– Napoleon Hill

» “Do it now! can affect every phase of your life. It can help you do the things you should do but don’t feel like doing. It can keep you from procrastinating when an unpleasant duty faces you. But it can also help you do those things that you want to do. It helps you seize those precious moments that, if lost, may never be retrieved.”
– Napoleon Hill

» “Do not wait; the time will never be ”just right.” Start where you stand, and work with whatever tools you may have at your command, and better tools will be found as you go along.”
– Napoleon Hill

» “Action is at bottom a swinging and flailing of the arms to regain one’s balance and keep afloat.”
– Eric Hoffer

» “One of the marks of a truly vigorous society is the ability to dispense with passion as a midwife of action –the ability to pass directly from thought to action.”
– Eric Hoffer

» “The link between ideas and action is rarely direct. There is almost always an intermediate step in which the idea is overcome. De Tocqueville points out that it is at times when passions start to govern human affairs that ideas are most obviously translated into political action. The translation of ideas into action is usually in the hands of people least likely to follow rational motives. Hence, it is that action is often the nemesis of ideas, and sometimes of the men who formulate them. One of the marks of the truly vigorous society is the ability to dispense with passion as a midwife of action the ability to pass directly from thought to action.”
– Eric Hoffer

» “You must get involved to have an impact. No one is impressed with the won-lost record of the referee.”
– John H. Holcomb

» “You don’t always win your battles, but it’s good to know you fought.”
– Marjorie Holmes

» “I find the great thing in this world is not so much where we stand, as in what direction we are moving: To reach the port of heaven, we must sail sometimes with the wind and sometimes against it, but we must sail, and not drift, nor lie at anchor.”
– Oliver Wendell Holmes

» “Don’t be a spectator, don’t let life pass you by.”
– Lou Holtz

» “When all is said and done, more is said than done.”
– Lou Holtz

» “He has half the deed done who has made a beginning”
– Horace

» “He who has begun has half done. Dare to be wise; begin.”
– Horace

» “Don’t think, just do.”
– Reiko Horton

» “An acre of performance is worth a whole world of promise.”
– William Dean Howells

» “Positive anything is better than negative nothing.”
– Elbert Hubbard

» “Allow motion to equal emotion.”
– Elbert Hubbard

» “Our acts make or mar us, we are the children of our own deeds.”
– Victor Hugo

» “Initiative is doing the right thing without being told.”
– Victor Hugo

» “The action is best that secures the greatest happiness for the greatest number.”
– Francis Hutcheson

» “The great end of life is not knowledge but action.”
– Thomas H. Huxley

» “Apply yourself. Get all the education you can, but then, by God, do something. Don’t just stand there, make it happen.”
– Lee Iacocca

» “People say to me, ”You were a roaring success. How did you do it?” I go back to what my parents taught me. Apply yourself. Get all the education you can, but then, by God, do something. Don’t just stand there, make something happen.”
– Lee Iacocca

» “So what do we do? Anything. Something. So long as we just don’t sit there. If we screw it up, start over. Try something else. If we wait until we’ve satisfied all the uncertainties, it may be too late.”
– Lee Iacocca

» “The discipline of writing something down is the first step toward making it happen.”
– Lee Iacocca

» “How to gain, how to keep, how to recover happiness is in fact for most men at all times the secret motive o all they do, and of all they are willing to endure.”
– Dean William R. Inge

» “The successful men of action are not sufficiently self-observant to know exactly on what their success depends.”
– Joseph Jacobs

» “Action seems to follow feeling, but really action and feeling go together; and by regulating the action, which is under the more direct control of the will, we can indirectly regulate the feeling, which is not.”
– William James

» “Begin to be now what you will be hereafter.”
– St. Jerome

» “Act as if the maxim of your action were to become through your will a be general natural law.”
– Immanuel Kant

» “My father didn’t tell me how to live; he lived, and let me watch him do it.”
– Clarence Buddinton Kelland

» “I am only one, but still I am one. I cannot do everything, but still I can do something; And because I cannot do everything I will not refuse to do the something that I can do.”
– Helen Keller

» “Now is the time for all good men to come to.”
– Walt Kelly

» “Keep on going and the chances are you will stumble on something, perhaps when you are least expecting it. I have never heard of anyone stumbling on something sitting down.”
– Charles F. Kettering

» “It is not good enough for things to be planned — they still have to be done; for the intention to become a reality, energy has to be launched into operation.”
– Pir Vilayat Khan

» “In the final analysis, the questions of why bad things happen to good people transmutes itself into some very different questions, no longer asking why something happened, but asking how we will respond, what we intend to do now that it happened.”
– Rabbi Harold S. Kushner

» “Our actions are like the terminations of verses, which we rhyme as we please.”
– Francois De La Rochefoucauld

» “Somebody should tell us, right at the start of our lives, that we are dying. Then we might live life to the limit, every minute of every day. Do it! I say. Whatever you want to do, do it now! There are only so many tomorrows.”
– Michael Landon

» “Act well at the moment, and you have performed a good action for all eternity.”
– Johann Kaspar Lavater

» “He who has no taste for order, will be often wrong in his judgment, and seldom considerate or conscientious in his actions.”
– Johann Kaspar Lavater

» “He who limps is still walking.”
– Stanislaw J. Lec

» “Sometimes something worth doing is worth overdoing.”
– David Letterman

» “Next in importance to having a good aim is to recognize when to pull the trigger.”
– Elmer G. Letterman

» “You can’t start at the top.”
– Samuel Levenson

» “Sings. Hope in every sphere of life is a privilege that attaches to action. No action, no hope.”
– Peter Levi

» “Follow effective action with quiet reflection. From the quiet reflection will come even more effective action.”
– James Levin

» “I am tomorrow, or some future day, what I establish today. I am today what I established yesterday or some previous day.”
– Harvey Spencer Lewis

» “The sure conviction that we could if we wanted to is the reason so many good minds are idle.”
– Georg C. Lichtenberg

» “Actions are the seed of fate deeds grow into destiny.”
– A. L. Linall Jr.

» “As our case is new, we must think and act anew.”
– Abraham Lincoln

» “I want it said of me by those who knew me best, that I always plucked a thistle and planted a flower where I thought a flower would grow.”
– Abraham Lincoln

» “One thought driven home is better than three left on base.”
– James Liter

» “The actions of men are the best interpreters of their thoughts.”
– John Locke

» “Our deeds disguise us. People need endless time to try on their deeds, until each knows the proper deeds for him to do. But every day, every hour, rushes by. There is no time.”
– Haniel Long

» “Each morning sees some task begun, each evening sees it close; Something attempted, something done, has earned a night’s repose.”
– Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

» “Build today, then strong and sure, With a firm and ample base; And ascending and secure. Shall tomorrow find its place.”
– Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

» “What really matters is what you do with what you have.”
– Shirley Lord

» “If you act like you know what you’re doing, you can do anything you want — except neurosurgery.”
– John Lowenstein

» “As people are walking all the time, in the same spot, a path appears.”
– Lu Xun

» “Do the things you know, and you shall learn the truth you need to know.”
– George Macdonald

» “Existence was given us for action. Our worth is determined by the good deed we do, rather than by the fine emotions we feel,”
– Edgar F. Magnin

» “If you go on working with the light available, you will meet your Master, as he himself will be seeking you.”
– Ramana Maharshi

» “Between eighteen and twenty, life is like an exchange where one buys stocks, not with money, but with actions. Most men buy nothing.”
– Andre Malraux

» “Often the difference between a successful person and a failure is not one has better abilities or ideas, but the courage that one has to bet on one’s ideas, to take a calculated risk — and to act.”
– Maxwell Maltz

» “Let your actions always speak for you, but be forever on guard against the terrible traps of false pride and conceit that can halt your progress. The next time you are tempted to boast, just place your fist in a full pail of water, and when you remove it, the hole remaining will give you a correct measure of your importance.”
– Og Mandino

» “I have never heard anything about the resolutions of the apostles, but a good deal about their acts.”
– Horace Mann

» “Begin where you are; work where you are; the hour which you are now wasting, dreaming of some far off success may be crowded with grand possibilities.”
– Orison Swett Marden

» “Let us not be content to wait and see what will happen, but give us the determination to make the right things happen.”
– Peter Marshall

» “The common conception is that motivation leads to action, but the reverse is true — action precedes motivation. You have to ”prime the pump” and get the juice flowing, which motivates you to work on your goals. Getting momentum going is the most difficult part of the job, and often taking the first step is enough to prompt you to make the best of your day.”
– Robert J. Mckain

» “We cannot live only for ourselves. A thousand fibers connect us with our fellow men; and among those fibers, as sympathetic threads, our actions run as courses, and they come back to us as effects.”
– Herman Melville

» “I go on working for the same reason that a hen goes on laying eggs.”
– H. L. Mencken

» “Whatever fortune brings, don’t be afraid of doing things.”
– A. A. Milne

» “You will be better advised to watch what we do instead of what we say.”
– John N. Mitchell

» “You can’t pick cherries with your back to the tree.”
– John Pierpont Morgan

» “Do not wait for leaders; do it alone, person to person.”
– Mother Teresa

» “There should be less talk; a preaching point is not a meeting point. What do you do then? Take a broom and clean someone’s house. That says enough.”
– Mother Teresa

» “Let us be tried by our actions.”
– Motto

» “It is impossible to walk rapidly and be unhappy.”
– Dr. Howard Murphy

» “This body, full of faults, has yet one great quality: Whatever it encounters in this temporal life depends upon one’s actions.”
– Siddha Nagarjuna

» “Action itself, so long as I am convinced that it is right action, gives me satisfaction.”
– Jawaharlal Nehru

» “Action to be effective must be directed to clearly conceived ends.”
– Jawaharlal Nehru

» “He who would learn to fly one day must first learn to stand and walk and run and climb and dance; one cannot fly into flying.”
– Friedrich Nietzsche

» “Just do it.”
– Nike Corporation

» “The most important human endeavor is the striving for morality in our actions. Our inner balance and even our very existence depend on it. Only morality in our actions can give beauty and dignity to life. Albert Einstein It is the function of art to renew our perception. What we are familiar with we cease to see. The writer shakes up the familiar scene, and, as if by magic, we see a new meaning in it.”
– Anais Nin

» “Our life is composed greatly from dreams, from the unconscious, and they must be brought into connection with action. They must be woven together.”
– Anais Nin

» “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

» “Good things happen to those who hustle.”
– Chuck Noll

» “Let your hook always be cast. In the pool where you least expect it, will be a fish.”
– Ovid

» “Men do not value a good deed unless it brings a reward.”
– Ovid

» “The odds of hitting your target go up dramatically when you aim at it.”
– Mal Pancoast

» “Act like you expect to get into the end zone.”
– Joe Paterno

» “Action is a great restorer and builder of confidence. Inaction is not only the result, but the cause, of fear. Perhaps the action you take will be successful; perhaps different action or adjustments will have to follow. But any action is better than no action at all.”
– Norman Vincent Peale

» “The activist is not the man who says the river is dirty. The activist is the man who cleans up the river.”
– H. Ross Perot

» “Every act of creation is first of all an act of destruction.”
– Pablo Picasso

» “We have all the light we need, we just need to put it in practice.”
– Peace Pilgrim

» “Where there is a will, there is a way. If there is a chance in a million that you can do something, anything, to keep what you want from ending, do it. Pry the door open or, if need be, wedge your foot in that door and keep it open.”
– Arthur Pine

» “A well begun is half ended.”
– Plato

» “When Demosthenes was asked what were the three most important aspects of oratory, he answered, ”Action, Action, Action.””
– Plutarch

» “The curse of me and my nation is that we always think things can be bettered by immediate action of some sort, any sort rather than no sort.”
– Ezra Pound

» “Either move or be moved.”
– Colin Powell

» “The chief condition on which, life, health and vigor depend on, is action. It is by action that an organism develops its faculties, increases its energy, and attains the fulfillment of its destiny.”
– Pierre Joseph Proudhon

» “Footprints on the sands of time are not made by sitting down.”
– Proverb

» “Try and trust will move mountains.”
– Proverb

» “When deeds speak, words are nothing.”
– African Proverb

» “Some will, some don’t, so what!”
– American Proverb

» “The early bird gets the worm.”
– American Proverb

» “From small beginnings come great things.”
– American Proverb

» “After all is said and done, more is said than done.”
– American Proverb

» “I hear and I forget, I see and I remember. I do and I understand.”
– Chinese Proverb

» “To talk goodness is not good… only to do it is.”
– Chinese Proverb

» “The journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step.”
– Chinese Proverb

» “Teachers open the door but you must walk through it yourself.”
– Chinese Proverb

» “Better do a good deed near at home than go far away to burn incense.”
– Chinese Proverb

» “Talk doesn’t cook rice.”
– Chinese Proverb

» “Big words seldom accompany good deeds.”
– Danish Proverb

» “As you make your bed, so you must lie in it.”
– English Proverb

» “If you want a thing done, go. If not, send. The shortest answer is doing.”
– English Proverb

» “It is better to be the hammer than the anvil.”
– French Proverb

» “God gives the nuts, but he does not crack them.”
– German Proverb

» “The greatest step is out the door.”
– German Proverb

» “Act quickly, think slowly.”
– Greek Proverb

» “The dog that trots about finds a bone.”
– Gypsy Proverb

» “What an elder sees sitting; the young can’t see standing.”
– Ibo Proverb

» “Call on God, but row away from the rocks.”
– Indian Proverb

» “The person who doesn’t scatter the morning dew will not comb gray hairs”
– Irish Proverb

» “Between 1300 and doing, many a pair of shoes is worn out.”
– Italian Proverb

» “He who walks with the lame learns how to limp.”
– Latin Proverb

» “An ant on the move does more than a dozing ox.”
– Mexican Proverb

» “He who strikes first, strikes twice.”
– Mexican Proverb

» “The act is unjustifiable that either begs for a blessing, or, having succeeded gives no thanksgiving.”
– Francis Quarles

» “Begin doing what you want to do now. We are not living in eternity. We have only this moment, sparkling like a star in our hand — and melting like a snowflake.”
– Marie Beyon Ray

» “If you want to get along, go along.”
– Sam Rayburn

» “Let no one be deluded that a knowledge of the path can substitute for putting one foot in front of the other.”
– Mary Caroline Richards

» “Do not wait for extraordinary circumstances to do good action; try to use ordinary situations.”
– Jean Paul Richter

» “You prove your worth with your actions, not with your mouth.”
– Pat Riley

» “A real decision is measured by the fact that you’ve taken a new action. If there’s no action, you haven’t truly decided.”
– Anthony Robbins

» “Action is the foundational key to all success.”
– Anthony Robbins

» “In essence, if we want to direct our lives, we must take control of our consistent actions. It’s not what we do once in a while that shapes our lives, but what we do consistently.”
– Anthony Robbins

» “We will act consistently with our view of who we truly are, whether that view is accurate or not.”
– Anthony Robbins

» “You see, in life, lots of people know what to do, but few people actually do what they know. Knowing is not enough! You must take action.”
– Anthony Robbins

» “I didn’t think; I experimented.”
– Wilhelm Roentgen

» “One of the greatest and simplest tools for learning more and growing is doing more.”
– John Roger

» “Even if you are on the right track, you will get run over if you just sit there.”
– Will Rogers

» “The few who do are the envy of the many who only watch.”
– Jim Rohn

» “Do Something. If it works, do more of it. If it doesn’t, do something else.”
– Franklin D. Roosevelt

» “When you see a rattlesnake poised to strike you, do not wait until he has struck before you crush him.”
– Franklin D. Roosevelt

» “Do what you can, with what you have, where you are.”
– Theodore Roosevelt

» “Get action. Seize the moment. Man was never intended to become an oyster.”
– Theodore Roosevelt

» “It isn’t sufficient just to want — you’ve got to ask yourself what you are going to do to get the things you want.”
– Richard D. Rosen

» “Fertilizer does no good in a heap, but a little spread around works miracles all over.”
– Percy Ross

» “Nothing wilts faster than laurels that have been rested upon.”
– Carl Rowan

» “What saves a man is to take a step. Then another step.”
– Antoine De Saint-Exupery

» “The time for action is now. It’s never too late to do something.”
– Carl Sandburg

» “All human actions are equivalent… and all are on principle doomed to failure.”
– Jean-Paul Sartre

» “He who considers too much will perform little.”
– Johann Friedrich Von Schiller

» “Whoever wants to reach a distant goal must take small steps.”
– Helmut Schmidt

» “In action a great heart is the chief qualification. In work, a great head.”
– Arthur Schopenhauer

» “You will never win if you never begin.”
– Robert H. Schuller

» “Winning starts with beginning.”
– Robert H. Schuller

» “Better to do something imperfectly than to do nothing perfectly.”
– Robert H. Schuller

» “I’d rather attempt to do something great and fail than to attempt to do nothing and succeed.”
– Robert H. Schuller

» “The truth of the matter is that you always know the right thing to do. The hard part is doing it.”
– Norman Schwarzkopf

» “The view only changes for the lead dog.”
– Sergeant Preston of The Yukon

» “Be wary of the man who urges an action in which he himself incurs no risk.”
– Joaquin Setanti

» “If it were done when ’tis done, then t’were well. It were done quickly.”
– William Shakespeare

» “Things won are done, joy’s soul lies in the doing.”
– William Shakespeare

» “Be great in act, as you have been in thought.”
– William Shakespeare

» “Action is eloquence.”
– William Shakespeare

» “Suit the action to the world, the world to the action, with this special observance, that you overstep not the modesty of nature.”
– William Shakespeare

» “You don’t have to get it right the first time.”
– Barbara Sher

» “Doing is a quantum leap from imagining. Thinking about swimming isn’t much like actually getting in the water. Actually getting in the water can take your breath away. The defense force inside of us wants us to be cautious, to stay away from anything as intense as a new kind of action. Its job is to protect us, and it categorically avoids anything resembling danger. But it’s often wrong. Anything worth doing is worth doing too soon.”
– Barbara Sher

» “Only the actions of the just smell sweet and blossom in the dust.”
– James Shirley

» “The reason why so little is done, is generally because so little is attempted.”
– Samuel Smiles

» “Begin somewhere: you cannot build a reputation on what you intend to do.”
– Liz Smith

» “The greatest of all mistakes is to do nothing because you can only do a little. Do what you can.”
– Sydney Smith

» “Heaven never helps the men who will not act.”
– Sophocles

» “If there be any truer measure of a man than by what he does, it must be by what he gives.”
– Bishop Robert South

» “Action is the highest perfection and drawing forth of the utmost power, vigor, and activity of man’s nature.”
– Bishop Robert South

» “No one will do it for you.”
– Ben Stein

» “The mark of a good action is that it appears inevitable in retrospect.”
– Robert Louis Stevenson

» “Judge each day not by the harvest you reap but by the seeds you plant.”
– Robert Louis Stevenson

» “It is the mark of a good action that it appears inevitable in retrospect.”
– Robert Louis Stevenson

» “Thinking will not overcome fear but action will.”
– W. Clement Stone

» “So many fail because they don’t get started — they don’t go. They don’t overcome inertia. They don’t begin.”
– W. Clement Stone

» “I think there is something, more important than believing: Action! The world is full of dreamers, there aren’t enough who will move ahead and begin to take concrete steps to actualize their vision.”
– W. Clement Stone

» “Now is the season for sailing; for already the chattering swallow is come and the pleasant west wind; the meadows bloom and the sea, tossed up with waves and rough blasts, has sunk to silence. Weigh thine anchors and unloose thy hawsers, O Mariner, and sail with all thy canvas set.”
– Leonidas of Tarentum

» “I have been impressed with the urgency of doing. Knowing is not enough; we must apply. Being willing is not enough; we must do.”
– Russell C. Taylor

» “Being stuck is a position few of us like. We want something new but cannot let go of the old — old ideas, beliefs, habits, even thoughts. We are out of contact with our own genius. Sometimes we know we are stuck; sometimes we don’t. In both cases we have to DO something.”
– Inga Teekens

» “I must lose myself in action, lest I wither in despair.”
– Lord Alfred Tennyson

» “To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.”
– Lord Alfred Tennyson

» “Have a bias toward action — let’s see something happen now. You can break that big plan into small steps and take the first step right away.”
– Richard Thalheimer

» “We do not learn by inference and deduction and the application of mathematics to philosophy, but by direct intercourse and sympathy.”
– Henry David Thoreau

» “I did not wish to take a cabin passage, but rather to go before the mast and on the deck of the world, for there I could best see the moonlight amid the mountains. I do not wish to go below now.”
– Henry David Thoreau

» “We should be taught not to wait for inspiration to start a thing. Action always generates inspiration. Inspiration seldom generates action.”
– Frank Tibolt

» “The chief difference between words and deeds is that words are always intended for men for their approbation, but deeds can be done only for God.”
– Count Leo Tolstoy

» “If you shoot for the stars and hit the moon, it’s OK. But you’ve got to shoot for something. A lot of people don’t even shoot.”
– Robert Townsend

» “The soul is made for action, and cannot rest till it be employed. Idleness is its rust. Unless it will up and think and taste and see, all is in vain.”
– Thomas Traherne

» “It is the direction and not the magnitude which is to be taken into consideration.”
– Thomas Troward

» “Lead, follow, or get out of the way.”
– Ted Turner

» “Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.”
– Mark Twain

» “I like these words — they seem to suggest action: If you hear a kind word spoken Of some worthy soul you know, It may fill his heart with sunshine If you’d only tell him so. If a deed, however humble, helps you On your way to go, Seek the one whose hand has helped you. Seek him out and tell him so. If your heart is touched and tender Towards sinner log and low, It might help him to do better If you could only tell him so.”
– Source Unknown

» “Action is character.”
– Source Unknown

» “Action speaks louder than words but not nearly as often”
– Source Unknown

» “Activity and sadness are incompatible.”
– Source Unknown

» “Backbone beats wishbone every time.”
– Source Unknown

» “Be both the gardener and the rose.”
– Source Unknown

» “Believe in boys and girls and men and women of a great tomorrow that what so ever the boy soweth the man shall reap.”
– Source Unknown

» “Do it now. Then it’s done.”
– Source Unknown

» “Do not ask the Lord to guide your footsteps, If you are not willing to move your feet.”
– Source Unknown

» “Don’t look back, just keep on walking.”
– Source Unknown

» “Act, don’t react!”
– Source Unknown

» “People sitting on top of the world, usually arrived there standing up.”
– Source Unknown

» “You can’t plow a field by turning it over in your mind.”
– Source Unknown

» “What the mind attends to, the mind considers. What the mind constantly considers, the mind believes. What the mind believes, the mind eventually does.”
– Source Unknown

» “Two-thirds of promotion is motion”
– Source Unknown

» “To look is one thing, to see what you look at is another, to understand what you see is a third, to learn from what you understand is still something else, but to act on what you learn is all that really matters! How do I act?”
– Source Unknown

» “The search for the perfect venture can turn into procrastination. Your idea may or may not have merit. The key is to get started.”
– Source Unknown

» “The road of life can only reveal itself as it is traveled; each turn in the road reveals a surprise. Man’s future is hidden.”
– Source Unknown

» “The only way you can bring in the harvest in the fall is to plant in the spring, and to water, weed, fertilize in the summer”
– Source Unknown

» “The only way to start is to start.”
– Source Unknown

» “The best way to get something done is to begin.”
– Source Unknown

» “Don’t wait for your ship to come in, swim out to it.”
– Source Unknown

» “Some people forget to plant in the spring, idle away the summer hours and then expect to reap in the fall.”
– Source Unknown

» “Every accomplishment starts with the decision to try.”
– Source Unknown

» “None of us are responsible for all the things that happen to us, but we are responsible for the way we act when they do happen.”
– Source Unknown

» “No rules for success will work if you don’t.”
– Source Unknown

» “Logic will not change an emotion, but action will.”
– Source Unknown

» “Keep your head and your heart going in the right direction and you will not have to worry about your feet.”
– Source Unknown

» “It’s no good agreeing with a person who can’t make up his mind.”
– Source Unknown

» “It doesn’t do any good to sit up and take notice if you keep on sitting.”
– Source Unknown

» “If your sword’s too short, add to its length by taking one step forward.”
– Source Unknown

» “If you start soon enough, you won’t have to run to catch up.”
– Source Unknown

» “Better to try something and fail than to try nothing and succeed.”
– Source Unknown

» “Some people grin and bear it; others smile and do it.”
– Source Unknown

» “Do it this very moment, Don’t put it off, There’s no use in doing a kindness, if you do it a day too late.”
– Source Unknown

» “As one acts and conducts himself, so does he become. The doer of good becomes good. The doer of evil becomes evil. One becomes virtuous by virtuous action, bad by bad action.”
– Veda Upanishads

» “When a man dies, what does not leave him? The voice of a dead man goes into fire, his breath into wind, his eyes into the sun, his mind into the moon, his hearing into the quarters of heaven, his body into the land cheerfully. earth, his spirit into space”
– Veda Upanishads

» “Doing leads more surely to talking than talking to doing.”
– Vinet

» “If you could get up the courage to begin, you have the courage to succeed.”
– David Viscott

» “We are responsible for what we are, and whatever we wish ourselves to be, we have the power to make ourselves. If what we are now has been the result of our own past actions, it certainly follows that whatever we wish to be in future can be produced by our present actions; so we have to know how to act.”
– Swami Vivekananda

» “What we need is to use what we have.”
– Basil S. Walsh

» “One may walk over the highest mountain one step at a time.”
– John Wanamaker

» “It’s easy to work for somebody else; all you have to do is show up.”
– Rita Warford

» “Every action is either strong or weak, and when every action is strong we are successful.”
– Wallace D. Wattles

» “For every action there is an equal and opposite government program.”
– Bob Wells

» “Actions lie louder than words.”
– Carolyn Wells

» “In activity we must find our joy as well as glory; and labor, like everything else that is good, is its own reward.”
– Edwin P. Whipple

» “Ideas won’t keep, something must be done about them.”
– Alfred North Whitehead

» “Periods of tranquillity are seldom prolific of creative achievement. Mankind has to be stirred up.”
– Alfred North Whitehead

» “Speak out in acts; the time for words has passed, and only deeds will suffice.”
– John Greenleaf Whittier

» “Action is the last resource of those who know not how to dream.”
– Oscar Wilde

» “No, Ernest, don’t talk about action. It is the last resource of those who know not how to dream.”
– Oscar Wilde

» “It is no use trying to sum people up. One must follow hints, not exactly what is said, nor yet entirely what is done.”
– Virginia Woolf

» “Thought and theory must precede all salutary action; yet action is nobler in itself than either thought or theory.”
– William Wordsworth

» “To begin, begin.”
– Peter Nivio Zarlenga

» “Your difficulty and my difficulty and the difficulty of every individual who ever desired to achieve something worthwhile, comes in the movement.”
– Peter Nivio Zarlenga

» “You have to ”be” before you can ”do,” and do before you can ”have.””
– Zig Ziglar

» “We will not know unless we begin.”
– Howard Zinn