Starting a business is tough. Not just practically or financially—but emotionally, too. Which is why these top inspirational business quotes are so valuable.
Each of these quotes is a bite-sized morsel of wisdom, capable of injecting small business owners with much-needed motivation and encouragement to succeed.
So, when you’re exhausted, frustrated, anxious, worried, or just plain freaking out, read these inspirational business quotes for some remarkable ideas.
Best business quotes of all time
Prepare yourself for a collection of motivational business quotes that will light up your entrepreneurial spirit. Each one is a nugget of wisdom from the journeys of the world's most successful entrepreneurs, ready to spark innovation and drive in your own venture.
- “The secret of change is to focus all your energy not on fighting the old but on building the new.” —Socrates, father of Western philosophy
- “Always deliver more than expected.” —Larry Page, co-founder of Google
- “Don’t take too much advice. Most people who have a lot of advice to give—with a few exceptions—generalize whatever they did. Don’t over-analyze everything. I myself have been guilty of over-thinking problems. Just build things and find out if they work.” —Ben Silbermann, founder of Pinterest
- “If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more, and become more, you are a leader.” —John Quincy Adams, sixth president of the United States
- “Whenever you see a successful business, someone once made a courageous decision.” —Peter F. Drucker
- “Be undeniably good. No marketing effort or social media buzzword can be a substitute for that.” —Anthony Volodkin, founder of Hype Machine
- “What do you need to start a business? Three simple things: know your product better than anyone, know your customer, and have a burning desire to succeed.” —Dave Thomas, founder of Wendy’s
- “If you can’t feed a team with two pizzas, it’s too large.” —Jeff Bezos, founder and CEO of Amazon
- “If people like you, they’ll listen to you, but if they trust you, they’ll do business with you.” —Zig Ziglar, author, salesman, and motivational speaker
- “If you are not embarrassed by the first version of your product, you’ve launched too late.” —Reid Hoffman, co-founder of LinkedIn
- “The value of an idea lies in the using of it.” —Thomas Edison, co-founder of General Electric
- “The stars will never align, and the traffic lights of life will never all be green at the same time. The universe doesn’t conspire against you, but it doesn’t go out of its way to line up the pins either. Conditions are never perfect. ‘Someday’ is a disease that will take your dreams to the grave with you. Pro and con lists are just as bad. If it’s important to you and you want to do it ‘eventually,’ just do it and correct course along the way.” —Tim Ferriss, author of The 4-Hour Work Week
- “Make every detail perfect and limit the number of details to perfect.” —Jack Dorsey, co-founder of Twitter
- “Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do.” —Steve Jobs, co-founder, chairman and CEO of Apple Inc.
- “Always look for the fool in the deal. If you don’t find one, it’s you.” —Mark Cuban, AXS TV chairman and entrepreneur
- “Your most unhappy customers are your greatest source of learning.” —Bill Gates, co-founder of Microsoft
- “If you just work on stuff that you like and you’re passionate about, you don’t have to have a master plan with how things will play out.” —Mark Zuckerberg, founder of Facebook
- “If you define yourself by how you differ from the competition, you’re probably in trouble.” —Omar Hamoui, co-founder of AdMob
- “Wonder what your customer really wants? Ask. Don’t tell.” —Lisa Stone, co-founder and CEO of BlogHer
- “When you find an idea that you just can’t stop thinking about, that’s probably a good one to pursue.” —Josh James, CEO and co-founder of Omniture
- “It’s not about ideas. It’s about making ideas happen.” —Scott Belsky, co-founder of Behance
- “Make the most of yourself by fanning the tiny, inner sparks of possibility into flames of achievement.” —Golda Meir, fourth Prime Minister of Israel
- “There’s nothing wrong with staying small. You can do big things with a small team.” —Jason Fried, 37signals founder and co-author of Rework
- “The fastest way to change yourself is to hang out with people who are already the way you want to be.” —Reid Hoffman, co-founder of LinkedIn
- “Chase the vision, not the money. The money will end up following you.” —Tony Hsieh, CEO of Zappos
- “The most dangerous poison is the feeling of achievement. The antidote is to every evening think what can be done better tomorrow.” —Ingvar Kamprad, founder of IKEA
- “Nothing works better than just improving your product.” —Joel Spolsky, co-founder of Stack Overflow
- “Get five or six of your smartest friends in a room and ask them to rate your idea.” —Mark Pincus, CEO of Zynga
- “Money is like gasoline during a road trip. You don’t want to run out of gas on your trip, but you’re not doing a tour of gas stations.” —Tim O’Reilly, founder and CEO of O’Reilly Media
- “Get big quietly so you don’t tip off potential competitors.” —Chris Dixon, investor at Andreessen Horowitz
- “Design is not just what it looks like and feels like. Design is how it works.” —Steve Jobs, co-founder, chairman, and CEO of Apple Inc.
- “Character cannot be developed in ease and quiet. Only through experience of trial and suffering can the soul be strengthened, ambition inspired, and success achieved.” —Helen Keller, US author, political activist, and lecturer
- “Don’t try to be original, just try to be good.” —Paul Rand, graphic designer
- “Always think outside the box and embrace opportunities that appear, wherever they might be.” —Lakshmi Mittal, chairman & CEO of ArcelorMittal
- “Don’t worry about people stealing your design work. Worry about the day they stop.” —Jeffrey Zeldman, entrepreneur and web designer
- “The last 10% it takes to launch something takes as much energy as the first 90%.” —Rob Kalin, founder of Etsy
- “If you’re interested in the living heart of what you do, focus on building things rather than talking about them.” —Ryan Freitas, co-founder of About.me
- “Best startups generally come from somebody needing to scratch an itch.” —Michael Arrington, founder and co-editor of TechCrunch
- “Some people dream of success, while other people get up every morning and make it happen.” —Wayne Huizenga, prolific US business person.
- “Ideas are easy. Implementation is hard.” —Guy Kawasaki, entrepreneur and co-founder of Alltop
- “An entrepreneur is someone who has a vision for something and a want to create.” —David Karp, founder, and CEO of Tumblr
- “Get a mentor in the applicable field if you’re at all unsure of what you’re looking for.” —Kyle Bragger, founder of Forrst and co-founder of Exposure
- “Every day that we spent not improving our products was a wasted day.” —Joel Spolsky, co-founder of Stack Overflow
- “Anything that is measured and watched improves.” —Bob Parsons, founder of GoDaddy
- “Stay self-funded as long as possible.” —Garrett Camp, founder of Expa, Uber, and StumbleUpon
- “Don’t play games that you don’t understand, even if you see lots of other people making money from them.” —Tony Hsieh, CEO of Zappos
- “Timing, perseverance, and 10 years of trying will eventually make you look like an overnight success.” —Biz Stone, co-founder of Twitter
- “Human beings have an innate inner drive to be autonomous, self-determined, and connected to one another. And when that drive is liberated, people achieve more and live richer lives.” —Daniel Pink, author
- “Fortunes are built during the down market and collected in the upmarket.” —Jason Calacanis, founder of LAUNCH Ticker
- “It’s more effective to do something valuable than to hope a logo or name will say it for you.” —Jason Cohen, founder of Smartbear Software
- “No more romanticizing about how cool it is to be an entrepreneur. It’s a struggle to save your company’s life—and your own skin—every day of the week.” —Spencer Fry, co-founder of CarbonMade
- “You can’t make anything viral, but you can make something good.” —Peter Shankman, founder of HARO
- “Don’t worry about funding if you don’t need it. Today, it’s cheaper to start a business than ever.” —Noah Everett, founder of Twitpic
- “Data beats emotions.” —Sean Rad, founder of Tinder
- “I never dreamed about success, I worked for it.” —Estée Lauder, founder of Estée Lauder Cosmetics
- “I try not to make any decisions that I’m not excited about.” —Jake Nickell, founder and CEO of Threadless
- “See things in the present, even if they are in the future.” —Larry Ellison, co-founder of Oracle
- “You don’t need to have a 100-person company to develop that idea.” —Larry Page, co-founder of Google
- “Ideas are commodity. Execution of them is not.” —Michael Dell, chairman, and CEO of Dell
- “A business that makes nothing but money is a poor business.” —Henry Ford, founder of the Ford Motor Company
- “All humans are entrepreneurs, not because they should start companies but because the will to create is encoded in human DNA.” —Reid Hoffman, co-founder of LinkedIn
- “Great customer service is a critical competitive advantage for a business.” —Steve Benson, editorial cartoonist
- “In the end, a vision without the ability to execute it is probably a hallucination.” —Steve Case, co-founder of AOL
- “Step out of the history that is holding you back. Step into the new story you are willing to create.” —Oprah Winfrey, media proprietor
- “No matter how brilliant your mind or strategy, if you’re playing a solo game, you’ll always lose out to a team.” —Reid Hoffman, co-founder of LinkedIn
- “Don’t be cocky. Don’t be flashy. There’s always someone better than you.” —Tony Hsieh, CEO of Zappos
- “Embrace what you don’t know, especially in the beginning, because what you don’t know can become your greatest asset. It ensures that you will absolutely be doing things different from everybody else.” —Sara Blakely, founder of SPANX
- “Diligence is the mother of good luck.” —Benjamin Franklin, a Founding Father of the United States
- “A person who is quietly confident makes the best leader.” —Fred Wilson, co-founder of Union Square Ventures
- “Risk more than others think is safe. Dream more than others think is practical.” —Howard Schultz, former chairman and CEO of Starbucks
Inspirational quotes about life
Let’s continue our list with some of the top inspirational quotes about life. Every now and then, everyone needs to hear about the positive side of life and the potential it has to offer. These inspirational quotes about life will help empower you to succeed.
- “Life is 10% what happens to us and 90% how we react to it.” —Charles R. Swindoll, author, educator, and radio preacher
- “If you can dream it, you can do it.” —Walt Disney, co-founder of the Walt Disney Company
- “However difficult life may seem, there is always something you can do and succeed at.” —Stephen Hawking, English theoretical physicist, cosmologist, and author
- “When I’m old and dying, I plan to look back on my life and say, ‘Wow, that was an adventure,’ not, ‘Wow, I sure felt safe.’” —Tom Preston-Werner, co-founder of Github
- “Accept responsibility for your life. Know that it is you who will get you where you want to go, no one else.” —Les Brown, motivational speaker, author, and former politician
- “The biggest adventure you can take is to live the life of your dreams.” ―Oprah Winfrey, media proprietor
- “You are never too old to set another goal or to dream a new dream.” —Les Brown, motivational speaker
- “The way to get started is to quit talking and begin doing.” —Walt Disney, co-founder of the Walt Disney Company
- “Lean forward into your life. Begin each day as if it were on purpose.” ―Mary Anne Radmacher, author
- “There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.” ―Maya Angelou, poet, singer, and civil rights activist
- “Do not let the memories of your past limit the potential of your future. There are no limits to what you can achieve on your journey through life, except in your mind.” ―Roy T. Bennett, author
- “You get in life what you have the courage to ask for.” ―Oprah Winfrey, media proprietor
- “Life isn’t about finding yourself. Life is about creating yourself.” ―George Bernard Shaw, playwright
- “A man who dares to waste one hour of time has not discovered the value of life.” —Charles Darwin, naturalist, geologist and biologist
- “Education costs money. But then so does ignorance.” —Sir Claus Moser, statistician
- “The biggest adventure you can take is to live the life of your dreams.” —Michael Jordan, former professional basketball player
Inspirational quotes about success
Success doesn’t happen overnight. You have to take each day as an opportunity to meet your potential and to improve. Here’s a list of our favorite inspirational quotes about success to get your day started.
- Success usually comes to those who are too busy to be looking for it.” —Henry David Thoreau, essayist, poet, and philosopher
- “People who succeed have momentum. The more they succeed, the more they want to succeed, and the more they find a way to succeed. Similarly, when someone is failing, the tendency is to get on a downward spiral that can even become a self-fulfilling prophecy.” —Tony Robbins, life and business strategist, and author
- “The road to success and the road to failure are almost exactly the same.” —Colin R. Davis, conductor for the London Symphony Orchestra
- “Would you like me to give you a formula for success? It’s quite simple, really: Double your rate of failure. You are thinking of failure as the enemy of success. But it isn’t at all. You can be discouraged by failure or you can learn from it, so go ahead and make mistakes. Make all you can. Because remember, that’s where you will find success.” —Thomas J. Watson, former president of IBM, political figure, and philanthropist
- Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.” —Winston Churchill, prime minister of Great Britain during World War II
- “Today’s accomplishments were yesterday’s impossibilities.” —Robert H. Schuller, motivational speaker
- “Success is the sum of small efforts—repeated day in and day out.” —Robert Collier, author
- “Successful people do what unsuccessful people are not willing to do. Don’t wish it were easier; wish you were better.” —Jim Rohn, business philosopher
- “There are no secrets to success. It is the result of preparation, hard work, and learning from failure.” —Colin Powell, US statesman and retired four-star general in the United States Army
- “A successful man is one who can lay a firm foundation with the bricks others have thrown at him.” —David Brinkley, newscaster
- “Success seems to be largely a matter of hanging on after others have let go.” —William Feather, publisher and author
- “Try not to become a man of success. Rather, become a man of value.” —Albert Einstein, theoretical physicist
- “Stop chasing the money and start chasing the passion.” —Tony Hsieh, CEO of Zappos
- “I never took a day off in my twenties. Not one.” —Bill Gates, co-founder of Microsoft
- “I owe my success to having listened respectfully to the very best advice, and then going away and doing the exact opposite.” —G. K. Chesterton, writer, poet, and philosopher
- “If you really look closely, most overnight successes took a long time.” —Steve Jobs, co-founder, chairman and CEO of Apple Inc.
- “Success seems to be connected with action. Successful people keep moving. They make mistakes, but they don’t quit.” —Conrad Hilton, founder of the Hilton Hotels chain
Quotes about not giving up
Never give up. Keep chasing your dreams. Life will be hard at times, and the strength lies in not giving up. Take a look at the best inspirational quotes about not giving up.
- “If you can’t fly, then run. If you can’t run, then walk. And, if you can’t walk, then crawl. But whatever you do, you have to keep moving forward.” —Martin Luther King Jr., leader of the US civil rights movement
- “I got lucky because I never gave up the search. Are you quitting too soon? Or are you willing to pursue luck with a vengeance?” —Jill Konrath, speaker, author and thought leader
- “In the middle of difficulty lies opportunity.” —Albert Einstein, theoretical physicist
- “The real test is not whether you avoid this failure, because you won’t. It’s whether you let it harden or shame you into inaction, or whether you learn from it; whether you choose to persevere.” —Barack Obama, 44th president of the United States
- “Our greatest weakness lies in giving up. The most certain way to succeed is always to try just one more time.” —Thomas Edison, entrepreneur and inventor
- “The pessimist sees difficulty in every opportunity. The optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty.” —Winston Churchill, prime minister of Great Britain during World War II
- “You have to believe in yourself when no one else does—that makes you a winner right there.” —Venus Williams, professional tennis player
- “We may encounter many defeats but we must not be defeated.” —Maya Angelou, poet, singer, and civil rights activist
- “Strength shows not only in the ability to persist, but in the ability to start over.” —F. Scott Fitzgerald, fiction writer
- “Let me tell you the secret that has led to my goal. My strength lies solely on my tenacity.” —Louis Pasteur, biologist, microbiologist and chemist
- “Never give up on a dream just because of the time it will take to accomplish it. The time will pass anyway.” —Earl Nightingale, radio speaker and author
- “You do what you can for as long as you can, and when you finally can’t, you do the next best thing. You back up but you don’t give up.” ―Chuck Yeager, former US Air Force officer
- “Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try Again. Fail again. Fail better.” —Samuel Beckett, Irish avant-garde novelist and playwright
- “It’s fine to celebrate success but it is more important to heed the lessons of failure.” —Bill Gates, co-founder of Microsoft
Quotes about working hard
Hard work helps to turn dreams into reality. These top quotes about working hard will help you get the job done.
- “So often people are working hard at the wrong thing. Working on the right thing is probably more important than working hard.” —Caterina Fake, co-founder of Flickr
- “If you’re passionate about something and you work hard, then I think you will be successful.” —Pierre Omidyar, founder and chairman of eBay
- “I find that the harder I work, the more luck I seem to have.” —Thomas Jefferson, Founding Father and president of the United States
- “When we strive to become better than we are, everything around us becomes better too.” —Paulo Coelho, lyricist and novelist
- “A dream does not become reality through magic; it takes sweat, determination, and hard work.” —Colin Powell, US statesman and retired four-star general in the United States Army
- “There is simply no substitute for hard work when it comes to achieving success.” —Heather Bresch, CEO of Mylan
- “Success is no accident. It is hard work, perseverance, learning, studying, sacrifice, and most of all, love of what you are doing or learning to do.” —Pelé, professional footballer
- “No great achiever—even those who made it seem easy—ever succeeded without hard work.” —Jonathan Sacks, author and politician
- “The only thing that overcomes hard luck is hard work.” —Harry Golden, writer
- “There is no substitute for hard work.” —Thomas Edison, entrepreneur and inventor
- “It’s hard to beat a person who never gives up.” —Babe Ruth, professional baseball player
Quotes about challenges
We all face challenges in life. They can either make you or break you. We’ve compiled a list of our favorite quotes about challenges that will encourage you to keep going.
- “Don’t be afraid to give up the good to go for the great.” —John D. Rockefeller, oil industry business magnate
- “If you are not willing to risk the usual, you will have to settle for the ordinary.” —Jim Rohn, entrepreneur, author, and motivational speaker
- “Fearlessness is like a muscle. I know from my own life that the more I exercise it the more natural it becomes to not let my fears run me.” —Arianna Huffington, co-founder of The Huffington Post and founder of Thrive Global
- “You gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, I lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along. You must do the thing you think you cannot do.” —Eleanor Roosevelt, known as First Lady of the World for her human rights advocacy
- “If you can push through that feeling of being scared, that feeling of taking a risk, really amazing things can happen.” —Marissa Mayer, former president and CEO of Yahoo!
- “Believe you can and you’re halfway there.” —Theodore Roosevelt, 26th president of the United States
- “Challenges are what make life interesting, and overcoming them is what makes life meaningful.” —Joshua J. Marine, author
- “Obstacles don’t have to stop you. If you run into a wall, don’t turn around and give up. Figure out how to climb it, go through it, or work around it.” —Michael Jordan, former professional basketball player
- “It always seems impossible until it’s done.” —Nelson Mandela, former president of South Africa, political leader, and philanthropist
- “I am not a product of my circumstances. I am a product of my decisions.” —Stephen Covey, educator, author, and businessman
- “The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy.” —Martin Luther King, Jr., leader of the civil rights movement
- “Being challenged in life is inevitable, being defeated is optional.” —Roger Crawford, public speaker, author, and certified tennis professional
- “Life’s challenges are not supposed to paralyze you, they’re supposed to help you discover who you are.” —Bernice Johnson Reagon, song composer, and social activist
- “When we least expect it, life sets us a challenge to test our courage and willingness to change; at such a moment, there is no point in pretending that nothing has happened, or in saying that we are not yet ready. The challenge will not wait. Life does not look back.” —Paulo Coelho, lyricist and novelist
- “There are two types of people who will tell you that you cannot make a difference in this world: those who are afraid to try and those who are afraid you will succeed.” —Ray Goforth, director of strategy and partnerships at Spredfast
Quotes about overcoming failure
There will be days when things don’t go as planned. You may feel defeated and let down. But that’s a part of life. It’s how you deal with the failures in life that makes you who you are. Here’s a list of our favorite quotes about overcoming failure that will motivate you to forget past mistakes and take a giant stride forward.
- “It is better to fail in originality than to succeed in imitation.” —Herman Melville, novelist
- “Do not be embarrassed by your failures; learn from them and start again.” —Richard Branson, founder of the Virgin Group
- “It doesn’t matter how many times you fail. It doesn’t matter how many times you almost get it right. No one is going to know or care about your failures, and neither should you. All you have to do is learn from them and those around you, because all that matters in business is that you get it right once. Then everyone can tell you how lucky you are.” —Mark Cuban, entrepreneur, owner of Landmark Theaters and Chairman of AXS TV
- “I knew that if I failed I wouldn’t regret that, but I knew the one thing I might regret is not trying.” —Jeff Bezos, founder, and CEO of Amazon
- “The only thing worse than starting something and failing … is not starting something.” —Seth Godin, author, entrepreneur, and blogger
- “Don’t worry about failure; you only have to be right once.” —Drew Houston, founder and CEO of Dropbox
- “Failure will never overtake me if my determination to succeed is strong enough.” —Og Mandino, author
- “Everything you’ve ever wanted is on the other side of fear.” —George Addair, real-estate developer
- “Don’t worry about failures, worry about the chances you miss when you don’t even try.” —Jack Canfield, author, motivational speaker, corporate trainer, and entrepreneur
- “Many of life’s failures are experienced by people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.” —Thomas Edison, entrepreneur and inventor
- “The only real mistake is the one from which we learn nothing.” —Henry Ford, founder of the Ford Motor Company
- “Failure is success if we learn from it.” —Malcolm Forbes, entrepreneur and former publisher of Forbes magazine
- “Failure is so important. We speak about success all the time. It is the ability to resist failure or use failure that often leads to greater success. I’ve met people who don’t want to try for fear of failing.” —J.K. Rowling, novelist
- “I’ve missed more than 9,000 shots in my career. I’ve lost almost 300 games. Twenty-six times I’ve been trusted to take the game-winning shot and missed. I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed.” —Michael Jordan, former professional basketball player
Funny quotes to cheer you up
Everyone has a bad day once in a while. These inspirational quotes are guaranteed to inspire you and bring a smile to your face.
- “People often say that motivation doesn’t last. Well, neither does bathing—that’s why we recommend it daily.” —Zig Ziglar, author
- “I always wanted to be somebody, but now I realize I should have been more specific.”—Lily Tomlin, actress
- “The road to success is dotted with many tempting parking spaces.” —Will Rogers, performer
- “I didn’t fail the test. I just found 100 ways to do it wrong.” —Benjamin Franklin, Founding Father of the United States
- “When I hear somebody sigh, ‘Life is hard,’ I am always tempted to ask, ‘Compared to what?’” —Sydney Harris, journalist
- “The elevator to success is out of order. You’ll have to use the stairs … one step at a time.” —Joe Girard, salesman
- “Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work.” —Thomas Edison, entrepreneur and inventor
- “You must learn from the mistakes of others. You can’t possibly live long enough to make them all yourself.” —Sam Levenson, humorist
- “Listen, smile, agree, and then do whatever you were gonna do anyway.“ —Robert Downey Jr., actor
- “Remember, today is the tomorrow you worried about yesterday.” —Dale Carnegie, writer
- “Even if you are on the right track, you’ll get run over if you just sit there.” —Will Rogers, performer
Inspirational movie quotes
Movies have a certain memorable aspect about them. They have a unique way of teaching us lessons that stay in our memory. Whether it’s by making us smile, or by moving us to tears, movies have a magic about them. Here are some of the best inspirational quotes from movies.
- ”Nobody is gonna hit as hard as life, but it ain’t how hard you can hit. It’s how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward. It’s how much you can take, and keep moving forward. That’s how winning is done.” —Rocky, Rocky Balboa
- “Don’t ever let somebody tell you you can’t do something, not even me. All right? You dream, you gotta protect it. People can’t do something themselves, they wanna tell you you can’t do it. If you want something, go get it. Period.” —Chris Gardner, The Pursuit of Happyness
- “The only thing standing between you and your goal is the bullshit story you keep telling yourself as to why you can’t achieve it.” —Jordan Belfort, The Wolf of the Wall Street
- “All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to us.” —Gandalf, The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring
- “Great men are not born great, they grow great.” —Vito Corleone, The Godfather
- “Some people can’t believe in themselves until someone else believes in them first.” —Sean Maguire, Good Will Hunting
- “Why do we fall, sir? So that we can learn to pick ourselves up.” —Alfred Pennyworth, Batman Begins
- “Life moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.” —Ferris Bueller, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off
- “After a while, you learn to ignore the names people call you and just trust who you are.” —Shrek, Shrek the Third
- “Our lives are defined by opportunities, even the ones we miss.” —Benjamin Button, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
- “What we do in life echoes in eternity.” —Maximus, Gladiator
- “Sometimes it is the people who no one imagines anything of who do the things that no one can imagine.” —Alan Turing, The Imitation Game
- “Every man dies, but not every man really lives.” —William Wallace, Braveheart
- “Someone I once knew wrote that we walk away from our dreams afraid that we may fail, or worse yet, afraid we may succeed.” —Forrester, Finding Forrester
- “It is not our abilities that show what we truly are. It is our choices.” —Dumbledore, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets
- “There should be no boundaries to human endeavor. We are all different. However bad life may seem, there is always something you can do and succeed at. While there’s life, there is hope.” —Stephen Hawking, The Theory of Everything
- “The accident is your training. Life is a choice. You can choose to be a victim or anything else you’d like to be.” —Socrates, Peaceful Warrior
- “In this lifetime, you don’t have to prove nothing to nobody, except yourself. And after what you’ve gone through, if you haven’t done that by now, it ain’t gonna never happen.” —Fortune, Rudy
- It’s supposed to be hard. If it wasn’t hard, everyone would do it. The hard is what makes it great.” —Jimmy Dugan, A League of Their Own
- “Oh yes, the past can hurt. But you can either run from it, or learn from it.” —Rafiki, The Lion King
- “No matter what anybody tells you, words and ideas can change the world.” —John Keating, Dead Poets Society
- “You mustn’t be afraid to dream a little bigger, darling.” —Eames, Inception
- “Find a truly original idea. It is the only way I will ever distinguish myself. It is the only way I will ever matter.” —John Nash, A Beautiful Mind
Quotes about work
No matter what day of the week it is, this list of inspirational quotes about work will help you get through the day.
- If you are working on something that you really care about, you don’t have to be pushed. The vision pulls you.” —Steve Jobs, co-founder, chairman and CEO of Apple Inc.
- “Don’t say you don’t have enough time. You have exactly the same number of hours per day that were given to Helen Keller, Pasteur, Michelangelo, Mother Teresa, Leonardo Da Vinci, Thomas Jefferson, and Albert Einstein.” —H. Jackson Brown Jr., US author
- “The more I want to get something done ,the less I call it work.” —Richard Bach, writer
- “Don’t count the days, make the days count.” —Muhammad Ali, professional boxer
- “A year from now you may wish you had started today.” —Karen Lamb, author
- “Someday is not a day of the week.” —Janet Dailey, author
- “What we fear of doing most is usually what we most need to do.” —Ralph Waldo Emerson, essayist, philosopher, and poet
- “Make each day your masterpiece.” —John Wooden, basketball player
- “Pleasure in the job puts perfection in the work.” —Aristotle, father of Western philosophy
Ready to ignite your entrepreneurial spirit?
If you haven’t already, make sure to bookmark this page of business quotes now and return to it to create better habits and to help escape the rat race every time you need a hit of inspiration or motivation.
One other thing:
Did you notice some of the recurring themes throughout these business quotes?
You’ll see things like:
- Work hard
- Believe in yourself
- Focus on quality
So, which of these quotes stood out most to you? Comment below!
