- Source
Forbes
- Author
TJ McCue
- 3
Oct
In an age of always-on technology, it is easy to lose track of the basics. I felt these nine ideas and 74 quotes captured the “good life” on and beyond the typical career path; they also apply to startup mode. Please share in the comments – what underpins and motivates you on the path to business success?
- Have an Attitude of Gratitude
- To Thine Own Self Be True
- Take the Road Less Traveled
- Be a Friend, Make a Friend
- Have a Sense of Humor
- Learn from Your Mistakes (Move On, Forgive Yourself)
- Take a Sabbath Rest
- Pass it On, Pay it Forward
- And if all else fails, just Keep putting One Foot in Front of the Other
Have an Attitude of Gratitude
The essence of all beautiful art, all great art, is gratitude.
–Friedrich Nietzsche
To Thine Own Self Be True
The best measure of a man’s honesty isn’t his income tax return. It’s the zero adjust on his bathroom scale.
–Arthur C. Clarke
The superior man understands what is right; the inferior man understands what will sell.
–Confucius
Real riches are the riches possessed inside.
–B. C. Forbes
To me, business isn’t about wearing suits or pleasing stockholders. It’s about being true to yourself, your ideas and focusing on the essentials.
–Richard Branson
An untruth kept in the heart, is a burden which weighs down the soul.
–Blake Beattie
Take the Road Less Traveled
Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it is time to pause and reflect.
–Mark Twain
In business or in life, don’t follow the wagon tracks too closely.
–H. Jackson Brown, Jr.
The secret of business is to know something that nobody else knows.
–Aristotle Onassis
No enterprise is more likely to succeed than one concealed from the enemy until it is ripe for execution.
–Niccolo Machiavelli
Mental fight means thinking against the current, not with it. It is our business to puncture gas bags and discover the seeds of truth.
–Virginia Woolf
Hell, there are no rules here – we’re trying to accomplish something.
–Thomas A. Edison
Be a Friend, Make a Friend
All lasting business is built on friendship.
–Alfred A. Montapert
You can close more business in two months by becoming interested in other people than you can in two years by trying to get people interested in you.
–Dale Carnegie
I never ask a man what his business is, for it never interests me. What I ask him about are his thoughts and dreams.
–H. P. Lovecraft
The way to get things done is not to mind who gets the credit for doing them.
–Benjamin Jowett
Don’t worry about people stealing your ideas. If your ideas are any good, you’ll have to ram them down people’s throats.
–Howard Aiken
Don’t let your ego get too close to your position, so that if your position gets shot down, your ego doesn’t go with it.
–Colin Powell
Pass it on / Pay it forward
Be the change you want to see in the world.
–Gandhi
A life lived for others, is the only life worth living.
–Albert Einstein
If you can’t feed a hundred people, then just feed one.
–Mother Teresa
You may be only one person in this world, but to one person at one time, you are the world.
–Anonymous
I hope the fruits of my labor are ripe for many generations to come.
–Donovan Nichols
Have A Sense Of Humor
A child of five would understand this. Send someone to fetch a child of five.
–Groucho Marx
My definition of an intellectual is someone who can listen to the William Tell Overture without thinking of the Lone Ranger.
–Billy Connolly
There cannot be a crisis next week. My schedule is already full.
–Henry A. Kissinger
To succeed in life, you need three things: a wishbone, a backbone and a funny bone.
–Reba McEntire
I’m odd looking. Sometimes I think I look like a funny muppet.
–Angelina Jolie
The best ideas come as jokes. Make your thinking as funny as possible.
–David Ogilvy
Life would be tragic if it weren’t funny.
–Stephen Hawking
From there to here, and here to there, funny things are everywhere.
–Dr. Seuss
It’s a funny old world.
–Margaret Thatcher
Life can be dramatic and funny all in the same day.
–Jennifer Aniston
You can’t really be strong until you see a funny side to things.
–Ken Kesey
You need to be silly to be funny.
–William Shatner
If you tell the truth about how you’re feeling, it becomes funny.
–Larry David
Intellectual property has the shelf life of a banana.
–Bill Gates
Learn from Your Mistakes (Move On, Forgive Yourself)
A man doesn’t know what he knows until he knows what he doesn’t know.
–Laurence J. Peter
It takes considerable knowledge just to realize the extent of your own ignorance.
–Thomas Sowell
Have enough sense to know, ahead of time, when your skills will not extend to wallpapering.
–Marilyn vos Savant
If I had to live my life again, I’d make the same mistakes, only sooner.
–Tallulah Bankhead
If you can’t get rid of the skeleton in your closet, you’d best teach it to dance.
–George Bernard Shaw
Never put a sock in a toaster.
–Eddie Izzard
There are no secrets to success. It is the result of preparation, hard work, and learning from failure.
–Colin Powell
Sometimes when you innovate, you make mistakes. It is best to admit them quickly, and get on with improving your other innovations.
–Steve Jobs
Just because something doesn’t do what you planned it to do doesn’t mean it’s useless.
–Thomas A. Edison
If you listen to your fears, you will die never knowing what a great person you might have been.
–Robert H. Schuller
Failure doesn’t mean you are a failure it just means you haven’t succeeded yet.
–Robert H. Schuller
When times are bad is when the real entrepreneurs emerge.
–Robert Kiyosaki
Sales are contingent upon the attitude of the salesman – not the attitude of the prospect.
–W. Clement Stone
My recipe for dealing with anger and frustration: set the kitchen timer for twenty minutes, cry, rant, and rave, and at the sound of the bell, simmer down and go about business as usual.
–Phyllis Diller
Take a Sabbath Rest
A man should never neglect his family for business.
–Walt Disney
I have never once regretted missing a business opportunity so that I could be with my children and grandchildren.
–Mitt Romney
All animals, except man, know that the principal business of life is to enjoy it.
–Samuel Butler
And if all else fails, just Keep putting One Foot in Front of the Other
Concentrate on what you need to do… Do step one. Begin! That’s the important thing- Did you do step one? Did you actually do it?. . . It’s not a matter of ‘Can you do it?’ If you do it, you
