Pursue Your Goals Quotes

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Be grateful for what you already have while you pursue your goals. If you aren’t grateful for what you already have, what makes you think you would be happy with more.
Roy T. Bennett (The Light in the Heart)
You can only become truly accomplished at something you love. Don’t make money your goal. Instead pursue the things you love doing and then do them so well that people can’t take their eyes off of you.
Maya Angelou
Pursue your goal. Opinions be damned.
Stacy Verdick Case
Intellectual honesty means pursuing the truth regardless of whether or not it serves your interests or goals.
Milan Kordestani (I'm Just Saying: The Art of Civil Discourse: A Guide to Maintaining Courteous Communication in an Increasingly Divided World)
I’m not saying you shouldn’t pursue dreams and goals. Just don’t forsake the present for the unknowns of the future. A lot of happiness is bypassed, overlooked, postponed to a time years from now that may never come. Don’t bide your time and miss out on this moment for a tomorrow with no guarantee.
Kim Holden (Bright Side (Bright Side, #1))
Don't live the same day over and over again and call that a life. Life is about evolving mentally, spiritually, and emotionally.
Germany Kent
There is no such thing as unlimited trust. At some point, all beings with free will can, and will, betray you when you're no longer pursuing the same goals.
Rachel Caine (Unknown (Outcast Season, #2))
The world bursts at the seams with people ready to tell you you're not good enough. On occasion, some may be correct. But do not do their work for them. Seek any job; ask anyone out; pursue any goal. Don't take it personally when they say 'no' — they may not be smart enough to say 'yes.
Keith Olbermann
The secret to your purpose is to find what you feel is important, and not pursue what others would think is important. When you think highly of yourself, me thinking highly of you will never be enough!
Shannon L. Alder
There will never be a perfect time to pursue your goals. You have NOW, and that's pretty much all you need.
Keisha Blair (Holistic Wealth: 32 Life Lessons to Help You Find Purpose, Prosperity, and Happiness)
Pursuing happiness, and I did, and still do, is not at all the same as being happy- which I think is fleeting, dependent on circumstances, and a bit bovine. If the sun is shining, stand in it- yes, yes, yes. Happy times are great, but happy times pass- they have to- because time passes. The pursuit of happiness is more elusive; it is lifelong, and it is not goal-centred. What you are pursuing is meaning- a meaningful life. There's the hap- the fate, the draw that is yours, and it isn't fixed, but changing the course of the stream, or dealing new cards, whatever metaphor you want to use- that's going to take a lot of energy. There are times when it will go so wrong that you will barely be alive, and times when you realize that being barely alive, on your own terms, is better than living a bloated half-life on someone else's terms.
Jeanette Winterson (Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal?)
When you find yourself in the thickness of pursuing a goal or dream, stop only to rest. Momentum builds success.
Suzy Kassem (Rise Up and Salute the Sun: The Writings of Suzy Kassem)
Enlightenment is not something you achieve. It is the absence of something. All your life you have been going forward after something, pursuing some goal. Enlightenment is dropping all that.
Charlotte Joko Beck (Everyday Zen)
If you hold a candle close to you, its flame rises. And if you hold it away from you, its flame shrinks. The same way you hold a candle close to you, keep all your plans, aspirations, projects, and dreams close to you too. Do not share your plans or goals until you complete them, because as you hold your candle away from you — envy, jealousy, and resentment may put out your flame before it grows.
Suzy Kassem (Rise Up and Salute the Sun: The Writings of Suzy Kassem)
The difficulties of life should not distract you from the pursuit of your goals. Graciously pursue your goals.
Lailah Gifty Akita
Be grateful for what you already have while you pursue your goals.
Roy Bennett
The goals of an intelligent life, according to Socrates, is to pursue the philosophic quest—to increase one’s knowledge of self and world.
Timothy Leary (Your Brain Is God (Leary, Timothy))
It is important for a woman to have the duplicity to make good use of whatever gifts she might have, however valueless they might seem... You have to have the inner strength to pursue your goal, and not care how many enemies you make along the road. It is not easy.
Anne O'Brien (The King's Concubine)
You aren’t going to find the time to pursue your goals; you’re going to make the time to pursue your goals. And the first thing you’re going to need to accept is that you are in control of your schedule.
Rachel Hollis (Girl, Stop Apologizing: A Shame-Free Plan for Embracing and Achieving Your Goals (Girl, Wash Your Face))
Do not be afraid to pursue your God-given goals.
Lailah Gifty Akita (Pearls of Wisdom: Great mind)
If the sun is shining, stand in it- yes, yes, yes. Happy times are great, but happy times pass- they have to- because time passes. The pursuit of happiness is more elusive; it is life-long, and it is not goal-centred. What you are pursuing is meaning- a meaningful life... There are times when it will go so wrong that you will be barely alive, and times when you realise that being barely alive, on your own terms, is better than living a bloated half-life on someone else's terms.
Jeanette Winterson (Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal?)
Still the voices of your critics. Listen intently to your own voice, to the person who knows you best. Then answer these questions: Do you think you should move ahead? How will you feel if you quit pursuing this thing you want to do? And what does your best self advise? What you hear may change your life.
Steve Goodier
If your faith doesn't remove the mountain... Get to climbing.
Johnnie Dent Jr.
Pursuing happiness, and I did, and I still do, is not at all the same as being happy--which I think is fleeting, dependent on circumstances...If the sun is shining, stand in it---yes, yes, yes. Happy times are great, but happy times pass--they have to because time passes. The pursuit of happiness is more elusive; it is life-long, and it is not goal-centered. What you are pursuing is meaning--- a meaningful life. There's the hap-- the fate, the draw that is yours, and it isn't fixed, but changing the course of the stream, or dealing new cards, whatever metaphor you want to use---that's going to take a lot of energy. There are times when it will go so wrong that you will barely be alive, and times when you realise that being barely alive, on your own terms, is better than living a bloated half-life on someone else's terms. The pursuit isn't all or nothing--- it's all AND nothing.
Jeanette Winterson
hope is a combination of setting goals, having the tenacity and perseverance to pursue them, and believing in our own abilities.
Brené Brown (The Gifts of Imperfection: Let Go of Who You Think You're Supposed to Be and Embrace Who You Are)
As long as you keep secrets and suppress information, you are fundamentally at war with yourself. Hiding your core feelings takes an enormous amount of energy, it saps your motivation to pursue worthwhile goals, and it leaves you feeling bored and shut down. Meanwhile, stress hormones keep flooding your body, leading to headaches, muscle aches, problems with your bowels or sexual functions—and irrational behaviors that may embarrass you and hurt the people around you. Only after you identify the source of these responses can you start using your feelings as signals of problems that require your urgent attention.
Bessel van der Kolk (The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma)
Whatever your identity, background, or political ideology, you will be happier, healthier, stronger, and more likely to succeed in pursuing your own goals if you do the opposite of what Misoponos advised. That means seeking out challenges (rather than eliminating or avoiding everything that “feels unsafe”), freeing yourself from cognitive distortions (rather than always trusting your initial feelings), and taking a generous view of other people, and looking for nuance (rather than assuming the worst about people within a simplistic us-versus-them morality).
Jonathan Haidt (The Coddling of the American Mind: How Good Intentions and Bad Ideas Are Setting Up a Generation for Failure)
Be bold but be smart. Don't be afraid to fail or intimidated by the possibility of criticism or ridicule in pursuing your important goals, but don't take foolish risks either, especially where the upside is small and the downside is serious.
Michael Josephson
Failure is not the end of life. It is the beginning of a greater success, if thy will persist.
Lailah Gifty Akita (Pearls of Wisdom: Great mind)
Passionately pursue your goals.
Lailah Gifty Akita
Believe in yourself. Determine to pursue your goals.
Lailah Gifty Akita
Go confidently in the direction of your dreams. Live the life you have imagined. —UNKNOWN If anyone tells you that you can’t live the life you imagined, you don’t have to prove them wrong—just keep on working your hardest and know in your heart that you can achieve it. Use their doubtful attitude as motivation. Goal: You deserve all the happiness in the world, so pursue it with all the madness and passion in your soul.
Demi Lovato (Staying Strong: 365 Days a Year)
I was one of those people who stumbled into things, who followed whims and took side roads, instead of finding some goal to pursue forward with unflagging commitment. I didn't even know what I wanted to be when I grew up, what I wanted to major in when I went to college. And I had always been blithely convinced that if I followed the side roads for long enough I'd trip over something wonderful, that thing you never know you're looking for until you land on it that suddenly makes the universe a much bigger place than it ever had been before.
Emily Horner
Imagine that all of a sudden, pursuing your goal is not an option at all for you anymore. It has been magically taken away. How do you feel? If you feel relief, then you know it wasn't right for you. But if you feel heartbroken imagining a world where you can't chase your goal, then the decision to commit is clear.
Alexi Pappas (Bravey)
Don’t be afraid to pursue your goals—even your dreams! But know that there is no shortcut to excellence and competence. Education is the difference between wishing you could help other people and being able to help them.
Russell M. Nelson (Accomplishing the Impossible: What God Does, What We Can Do)
There comes a time when you have to drop your burdens in order to fight for yourself and your dreams. Many of us carry baggage from the past that hinders our ability to fight for the things we want in life, our goals, our dreams. If you learn in this book to let go of those burdensome emotions and memories, then one of my chief objectives will be realized; you will be able to pursue and live your dreams.
Les Brown (Live Your Dreams: Say "YES" To Life)
Work for what you want, the pursuit of life.
Lailah Gifty Akita (Think Great: Be Great! (Beautiful Quotes, #1))
Your plans and goals don’t scare the devil in anyway. Your courage to pursue your plans and goals always keeps him on the run. Be bold to make it happen!
Israelmore Ayivor (Leaders' Watchwords)
When the path is clear to pursue a fledgling goal, the path is also clear for deeper insight into your desires.
David Miller (AWOL on the Appalachian Trail)
Cinderella Rule #16 Standards. Goals. Everyone has them. Or should. But before you judge yourself a success or failure, make certain the standards you're applying are your own. And that the goals you're trying to achieve aren't being pursued for the wrong reasons.
Donna Kauffman (The Cinderella Rules (Glass Slipper, Inc., #1))
according to who they are, not what they do. • My value comes from who I am, not what I do. • Pursue excellence no matter what. • Sometimes you have to say F your feelings and choose to be excellent.
Joshua Medcalf (Burn Your Goals: The Counter Cultural Approach to Achieving Your Greatest Potential)
Do not settle for less than exactly what you want. Your heart’s desires are there for a reason. Chase them. Pursue them relentlessly. Do not lose sight of your goals. They are your very reason for being.
Franki Durban
redefine your goal, so that it’s not to pursue justice or punish unfairness but to accept the unfairness of the world, bear the humiliation and helplessness that go with it, and then seek to do the most good.
Michael I. Bennett (F*ck Feelings: One Shrink's Practical Advice for Managing All Life's Impossible Problems)
When you pursue your goals with passion, you will attract people who love you; but you’ll also attract haters. I’m okay with that; I welcome it. I don’t want to live life as a spectator. I’ve learned that if no one is cheering you on and/or booing you; it means you're not in the game.
Steve Maraboli
If you’re pursuing a project for mostly instrumental reasons, it’s often a good idea to do an additional step of research: determining whether learning the skill or topic in question will actually help you achieve your goal.
Scott H. Young (Ultralearning: Master Hard Skills, Outsmart the Competition, and Accelerate Your Career)
To reach your full potential, you have to set goals that will stretch you. You must not be afraid of taking risks. You must learn to recognize opportunities and have the courage to pursue them. You have to make better choices that will provide better results. Finally, you need to avoid the negative influences of other people and surround yourself with successful people who will encourage you to pursue your dreams.
Zig Ziglar (Born to Win: Find Your Success Code)
My point, though, is that saying thank you every once in a while just isn’t enough when you’re demanding that other people make real sacrifices so you can pursue your goals. It’s not only the fun, showy things like vacations that get the message across. You also have to be willing to do what you can to create the conditions that allow your partner the freedom to focus single-mindedly at times. It’s not easy but it is possible with careful planning, regardless of the scope of your ambition or the demands of your job.
Chris Hadfield (An Astronaut's Guide to Life on Earth)
Never allow the ill-thoughts of people stop you from pursuing your goals and dreams.
Lailah Gifty Akita
Anytime you announce your dream; two things happen, it's either it motivates you to get it done or the feeling of accomplishment sets in and discourages you from pursuing it
Bernard Kelvin Clive
Do what you can with the resources that you have or you will never do anything at all.
Linda Alfiori
Then you are not pursuing your goal in life, when you are unfulfilled and just cruising along unconsciously, I believe that you are literally committing spiritual suicide.
Les Brown (Live Your Dreams: Say "YES" To Life)
Faith motivates us to pursue these goals. Hope leads to expectation, which creates peace, excitement, and health in our minds, thus increasing brain and body health.
Caroline Leaf (Switch On Your Brain: The Key to Peak Happiness, Thinking, and Health)
It's possible to pursue something for yourself, while simultaneously showing up well for the people you love.
Rachel Hollis (Girl, Stop Apologizing: A Shame-Free Plan for Embracing and Achieving Your Goals)
Every ounce of energy you invest in pursuing your goals will help you grow toward God’s plan for you . . . even if you end up somewhere you hadn’t counted on.
Chip Gaines (Capital Gaines: Smart Things I Learned Doing Stupid Stuff)
Walt was a dreamer, but one who pursued his goals with clarity and an almost ferocious intensity.” JACK KINNEY DISNEY ANIMATOR
Pat Williams (How to Be Like Walt: Capturing the Disney Magic Every Day of Your Life)
It takes self-discipline and persistence action to achieve the goal.
Lailah Gifty Akita (Pearls of Wisdom: Great mind)
Today is all you have. Pursue your goals.
Lailah Gifty Akita
Pursue the enquiry ‘Who am I?’ relentlessly. Analyse your entire personality. Try to find out where the I-thought begins. Go on with your meditations. Keep turning your attention within. One day the wheel of thought will slow down and an intuition will mysteriously arise. Follow that intuition, let your thinking stop, and it will eventually lead you to the goal.
Paul Brunton (A Search In Secret India: The classic work on seeking a guru)
Wisdom is really the key to wealth. With great wisdom, comes great wealth and success. Rather than pursuing wealth, pursue wisdom. The aggressive pursuit of wealth can lead to disappointment. Wisdom is defined as the quality of having experience, and being able to discern or judge what is true, right, or lasting. Wisdom is basically the practical application of knowledge. Rich people have small TVs and big libraries, and poor people have small libraries and big TVs. Become completely focused on one subject and study the subject for a long period of time. Don't skip around from one subject to the next. The problem is generally not money. Jesus taught that the problem was attachment to possessions and dependence on money rather than dependence on God. Those who love people, acquire wealth so they can give generously. After all, money feeds, shelters, and clothes people. They key is to work extremely hard for a short period of time (1-5 years), create abundant wealth, and then make money work hard for you through wise investments that yield a passive income for life. Don't let the opinions of the average man sway you. Dream, and he thinks you're crazy. Succeed, and he thinks you're lucky. Acquire wealth, and he thinks you're greedy. Pay no attention. He simply doesn't understand. Failure is success if we learn from it. Continuing failure eventually leads to success. Those who dare to fail miserably can achieve greatly. Whenever you pursue a goal, it should be with complete focus. This means no interruptions. Only when one loves his career and is skilled at it can he truly succeed. Never rush into an investment without prior research and deliberation. With preferred shares, investors are guaranteed a dividend forever, while common stocks have variable dividends. Some regions with very low or no income taxes include the following: Nevada, Texas, Wyoming, Delaware, South Dakota, Cyprus, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Panama, San Marino, Seychelles, Isle of Man, Channel Islands, Curaçao, Bahamas, British Virgin Islands, Brunei, Monaco, Qatar, United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Bermuda, Kuwait, Oman, Andorra, Cayman Islands, Belize, Vanuatu, and Campione d'Italia. There is only one God who is infinite and supreme above all things. Do not replace that infinite one with finite idols. As frustrated as you may feel due to your life circumstances, do not vent it by cursing God or unnecessarily uttering his name. Greed leads to poverty. Greed inclines people to act impulsively in hopes of gaining more. The benefit of giving to the poor is so great that a beggar is actually doing the giver a favor by allowing the person to give. The more I give away, the more that comes back. Earn as much as you can. Save as much as you can. Invest as much as you can. Give as much as you can.
H.W. Charles (The Money Code: Become a Millionaire With the Ancient Jewish Code)
Humanity is under great pressure to evolve because it is our only chance of survival as a race. This will affect every aspect of your life and close relationships in particular. Never before have relationships been as problematic and conflict ridden as they are now. As you may have noticed, they are not here to make you happy or fulfilled. If you continue to pursue the goal of salvation through a relationship, you will be disillusioned again and again. But if you accept that the relationship is here to make you conscious instead of happy, then the relationship will offer you salvation, and you will be aligning yourself with the higher consciousness that wants to be born into this world. For those who hold on to the old patterns, there will be increasing pain, violence, confusion, and madness.
Eckhart Tolle (The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment)
You can only become truly accomplished at something you love. Don’t make money your goal. Instead pursue the things you love doing and then do them so well that people can’t take their eyes off of you.
Jeff Napier (291 Maya Angelou Quotes)
It’s the Very Good Reason you cannot pursue your goal. Perfectionism will tell you, “If you’re going to do it, you might as well do it right.” And when we leave the idea of “right” undefined, it tends to get complicated, usually in one of two ways. In the first kind of noble obstacle, perfectionism sneakily tells you that you cannot move toward your goal until you do something else: “I can’t do X until Y.” In the second kind, perfectionism tells you that reaching your goal could actually produce bad results or make you a bad person. Would-be entrepreneurs often express fear that they’ll become workaholics
Jon Acuff (Finish: Give Yourself the Gift of Done)
Quit living as if the purpose of life is to arrive safely at death. Set God-sized goals. Pursue God-ordained passions. Go after a dream that is destined to fail without divine intervention. Keep asking questions. Keep making mistakes. Keep seeking God. Stop pointing out problems and become part of the solution. Stop repeating the past and start creating the future. Stop playing it safe and start taking risks. Expand your horizons. Accumulate experiences. Enjoy the journey. Find every excuse you can to celebrate everything you can. Live like today is the first day and last day of your life. Don’t let what’s wrong with you keep you from worshiping what’s right with God. Burn sinful bridges. Blaze new trails. Criticize by creating. Worry less about what people think and more about what God thinks. Don’t try to be who you’re not. Be yourself. Laugh at yourself. Don’t let fear dictate your decisions. Take a flying leap of faith. Chase the lion!
Mark Batterson
You cannot pursue all your goals simultaneously or satisfy all your desires at once. And it's an emotional drain to think you can. Instead, you must focus on long-term fulfillment rather than short-term success and, at various points in your life, think carefully about your priorities.
Eric C. Sinoway
Quit living as if the purpose of life is to arrive safely at death. Set God-sized goals. Pursue God-ordained passions. Go after a dream that is destined to fail without divine intervention. Keep asking questions. Keep making mistakes. Keep seeking God. Stop pointing out problems and become part of the solution. Stop repeating the past and start creating the future. Stop playing it safe and start taking risks. Expand your horizons. Accumulate experiences. Enjoy the journey. Find every excuse you can to celebrate everything you can. Live like today is the first day and last day of your life. Don’t let what’s wrong with you keep you from worshiping what’s right with God. Burn sinful bridges. Blaze new trails. Don’t let fear dictate your decisions. Take a flying leap of faith. Quit holding out. Quit holding back. Go all in with God. Go all out for God.
Mark Batterson (All In: You Are One Decision Away From a Totally Different Life)
The designer's real goal is to enrich the player's internal experiences. That goal is harder to achieve, and it's damned difficult to measure. But it's the truth. And pursuing that truth makes your designs smaller, simpler, more focused, and more elegant than they could ever get by strategy counting.
Tynan Sylvester (Designing Games: A Guide to Engineering Experiences)
Focus is one of the main pillars of self-discipline; a person who lacks the ability to focus is almost certainly one who will also lack discipline. Focus itself is dependent on something that neuroscientists call executive functions. The three executive functions that we are most concerned with when it comes to being disciplined are working memory, impulse control, and cognitive flexibility and adaptability. You can see why they are aptly named the executive functions. Your brain has to be able to set and pursue goals, prioritize activities, filter distractions, and control unhelpful inhibitions.
Peter Hollins (The Science of Self-Discipline: The Willpower, Mental Toughness, and Self-Control to Resist Temptation and Achieve Your Goals (Live a Disciplined Life Book 1))
I’m not saying you shouldn’t pursue dreams and goals. Just don’t forsake the present for the unknowns of the future. A lot of happiness is bypassed, overlooked, postponed to a time years from now that may never come. Don’t bide your time and miss out on this moment for a tomorrow with no guarantee.” By now we’re on the
Kim Holden (Bright Side (Bright Side, #1))
Social oppression is at work when the ways of others diminish who we are or stop us from pursuing our own goals. Often the most highly adaptive among us are the least aware of this process, and often they are socially the least successful and authentic—they have adapted into a predictable character and have lost their spontaneity and authenticity.
Brendon Burchard (The Motivation Manifesto: 9 Declarations to Claim Your Personal Power)
Listen to your heart. Dare to pursue your most cherish goals.
Lailah Gifty Akita
Never let those who say it can't be done obstruct you from pursuing your goals.
Lailah Gifty Akita
Passion fuels dreams. Commitment fuels action. Get clear about what you want to do and why you want to do it. Take action. Your time is now.
Julie Connor (Dreams to Action Trailblazer's Guide)
Grit embodies—but is not the same as—resilience, ambition, and self-control. The University of Pennsylvania psychologist and researcher Angela Duckworth defines it as passion and sustained persistence in trying to achieve a goal over the very long haul, with no particular concern for rewards or recognition along the way. Resilience is about overcoming adversity; ambition, at some level, suggests a desire for wealth, fame, and/or power; self-control can help you resist temptations, but that doesn’t necessarily mean you’re persistently pursuing a long-term goal.
Susan David (Emotional Agility: Get Unstuck, Embrace Change, and Thrive in Work and Life)
Ask yourself: Are you spending your time on the right things? You may have causes, goals, interests. Are they even worth pursuing? I've long held on to a clipping from a newspaper in Roanoke, Virginia. It featured a photo of a pregnant woman who had lodged a protest against a local construction site. She worried that the sound of jackhammers was injuring her unborn child. But get this: In the photo, the woman is holding a cigarette. If she cared about her unborn child, the time she spent railing against jackhammers would have been better spent putting out that cigarette.
Randy Pausch (The Last Lecture)
Even if all the changes don't work the way you hope, you are doing wonders for yourself just by actively engaging in change. Every time you confront the stagnant areas in your life that you previously have avoided, you will find that your fears are lessening and your confidence is growing. And with the increased confidence, you will want to change even more--to get out of your old patterns and start daring to do the things that have caused you the most emotional terror in the past. You will find yourself filled with an energy you haven't had before to pursue your own goals.
Art E. Berg (The Impossible Just Takes a Little Longer: Living with Purpose and Passion)
We teach our players, in response to any situation they face, to press pause and ask: What does this situation require of me? Pressing pause gives you time to think. It gets you off autopilot and helps you gain clarity about the outcome you are pursuing, the situation you are experiencing, and the Above the Line action you need to take to achieve the outcome. There are two important benefits of pressing pause: A) It helps you avoid doing something foolish or harmful B) It focuses you on acting with purpose to accomplish your goals A productive pause could last only a split second, which helps you regain your focus and take control of your action. It could last an hour, a day, or longer. The purpose is to take the time necessary to be intentional about the way you think and act. Pressing pause does not come naturally; it is a skill that must be developed. The more you practice, the more skilled you become at being able to identify how and when to use it effectively.
Urban Meyer (Above the Line: Lessons in Leadership and Life from a Championship Season)
I mean, to talk about "corporate greed" is like talking about "military weapons" or something like that―there just is no other possibility. A corporation is something that is trying to maximize power and profit: that's what it is. There is no "phenomenon" of corporate greed, and we shouldn't mislead people into thinking there is. It's like talking about "robber's greed" or something like that―it's not a meaningful thing, it's misleading. A corporation's purpose is to maximize profit and market share and return to investors, and all that kind of stuff, and if its officers don't pursue that goal, for one thing they are legally liable for not pursuing it. There I agree with Milton Friedman [right-wing economist] and those guys: if you're a C.E.O., you must do that―otherwise you're in dereliction of duty, in fact dereliction of duty. And besides that, if you don't do it, you'll get kicked out by the shareholders or the Board of Directors, and you won't be there very long anyway.
Noam Chomsky (Understanding Power: The Indispensable Chomsky)
God, was I being too selfish? I could feel my eyes stinging . . . and my resolve crumbling. “Well, Lizzie. It sounds as if you have a decision to make,” my dad said with a sigh. “Dad . . . if you tell me to take this job, I will.” My dad just looked at me for a moment, considering. “Do you want this job?” “No!” I sniffled. “It would be terrible. But if you need me to—” “Then don’t you dare.” His words came out fierce—fiercer than I’ve ever heard in my entire life. “Your mother’s and my financial problems are our own. You don’t get to carry that burden. You’ll have your own as soon as your student loans come due, so don’t worry about us.” “But—” “You have dreams, Lizzie.” He laid a hand on my shoulder. “Goals. Now is the time in your life to pursue them. Don’t put them on hold. Because if you do, pretty soon you’ll be middle-aged with three children, working a job simply to pay the bills. And you’ll have forgotten what those dreams were.
Bernie Su (The Secret Diary of Lizzie Bennet (Lizzie Bennet Diaries))
The best posture you can adopt when pursuing your goals is neither to stand nor sit. The best position is to STANDOUT! Everyone may be sitting; but don't sit! Many people may be standing; but don't just stand. When you stand, be outstanding!
Israelmore Ayivor (The Great Hand Book of Quotes)
Pursuing happiness, and I did, and still do, is not at all the same thing as being happy - which I think is fleeting, dependent on circumstances, and a bit bovine...The pursuit of happiness is more elusive; it is life-long, and it is not goal-centered. What you are pursuing is meaning - a meaningful life...There are times when it will go so wrong that you will barely be alive, and times when you realise that being barely alive, on your own terms, is better than living a bloated half-life on someone else's terms.
Jeanette Winterson (Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal?)
You need to circle the goals God wants you to go after, the promises God wants you to claim, and the dreams God wants you to pursue. And once you spell Jericho, you need to circle it in prayer. Then you need to keep circling until the walls come tumbling down.
Mark Batterson (The Circle Maker (Enhanced Edition): Praying Circles Around Your Biggest Dreams and Greatest Fears)
The true goal of all spiritual practices is to keep yourself fooled, to maintain the self-deception, to see what's not and not see what is. That's why the stated goals are always unverifiable and ill-defined: its not about attaining them, its about pursuing them. Who wants to wake up? When we have a little itch that threatens to awaken us in the night, we want to scratch the itch and make it go away. not let it evict us from our slumbers. Same thing here. In this sense. spiritual practice—meditation. for instance—is one hundred percent effective. If a spiritual practice satisfies your urge to do something spiritual. if it makes you think you're making progress. if it scratches your itch without disturbing your slumber, then it's doing exactly what it's supposed to be doing.
Jed McKenna (spiritual warfare: The Damnedest Thing)
It is the thought that the least efficient way of of finding either happiness or pleasure is to pursue them. Put in terms of happiness, we can see it like this: To be happy you must quite literally "lose yourself". You must lose yourself in some pursuit; you need to forget your own happiness and find other goals and projects, other objects of concern that might include the welfare of some other people, or the cure of the disease, or simply in the variety of everyday activities with their little successes and setbacks.
Simon Blackburn (Mirror, Mirror: The Uses and Abuses of Self-Love)
The world bursts at the seams with people ready to tell you you're not good enough. On occasion, some may be correct. But do not do their work for them. Seek any job; ask anyone out; pursue any goal. Don't take it personally when they say 'no' — they may not be smart enough to say 'yes'.
Keith Olbermann
In Wegner’s studies, participants are asked to try hard not to think about something, such as a white bear, or food, or a stereotype. This is hard to do. More important, the moment one stops trying to suppress a thought, the thought comes flooding in and becomes even harder to banish. In other words, Wegner creates minor obsessions in his lab by instructing people not to obsess. Wegner explains this effect as an “ironic process” of mental control. 32 When controlled processing tries to influence thought (“Don’t think about a white bear!”), it sets up an explicit goal. And whenever one pursues a goal, a part of the mind automatically monitors progress, so that it can order corrections or know when success has been achieved. When that goal is an action in the world (such as arriving at the airport on time), this feedback system works well. But when the goal is mental, it backfires. Automatic processes continually check: “Am I not thinking about a white bear?” As the act of monitoring for the absence of the thought introduces the thought, the person must try even harder to divert consciousness. Automatic and controlled processes end up working at cross purposes, firing each other up to ever greater exertions. But because controlled processes tire quickly, eventually the inexhaustible automatic processes run unopposed, conjuring up herds of white bears. Thus, the attempt to remove an unpleasant thought can guarantee it a place on your frequent-play list of mental ruminations.
Jonathan Haidt (The Happiness Hypothesis: Finding Modern Truth in Ancient Wisdom)
At the city gate and by your fireside I have seen you prostrate yourself and worship your own freedom, Even as slaves humble themselves before a tyrant and praise him though he slays them. Ay, in the grove of the temple and in the shadow of the citadel I have seen the freest among you wear their freedom as a yoke and a handcuff. And my heart bled within me; for you can only be free when even the desire of seeking freedom becomes a harness to you, and when you cease to speak of freedom as a goal and a fulfilment. You shall be free indeed when your days are not without a care nor your nights without a want and a grief, But rather when these things girdle your life and yet you rise above them naked and unbound. And how shall you rise beyond your days and nights unless you break the chains which you at the dawn of your understanding have fastened around your noon hour? In truth that which you call freedom is the strongest of these chains, though its links glitter in the sun and dazzle your eyes. And what is it but fragments of your own self you would discard that you may become free? If it is an unjust law you would abolish, that law was written with your own hand upon your own forehead. You cannot erase it by burning your law books nor by washing the foreheads of your judges, though you pour the sea upon them. And if it is a despot you would dethrone, see first that his throne erected within you is destroyed. For how can a tyrant rule the free and the proud, but for a tyranny in their own freedom and a shame in their own pride? And if it is a care you would cast off, that care has been chosen by you rather than imposed upon you. And if it is a fear you would dispel, the seat of that fear is in your heart and not in the hand of the feared. Verily all things move within your being in constant half embrace, the desired and the dreaded, the repugnant and the cherished, the pursued and that which you would escape. These things move within you as lights and shadows in pairs that cling. And when the shadow fades and is no more, the light that lingers becomes a shadow to another light. And thus your freedom when it loses its fetters becomes itself the fetter of a greater freedom.
Kahlil Gibran (The Prophet)
As Christians we face two tasks in our evangelism: saving the soul and saving the mind, that is to say, not only converting people spiritually, but converting them intellectually as well. And the Church is lagging dangerously behind with regard to this second task. If the church loses the intellectual battle in one generation, then evangelism will become immeasurably more difficult in the next. The war is not yet lost, and it is one which we must not lose: souls of men and women hang in the balance. For the sake of greater effectiveness in witnessing to Jesus Christ Himself, as well as for their own sakes, evangelicals cannot afford to keep on living on the periphery of responsible intellectual existence. Thinking about your faith is indeed a virtue, for it helps you to better understand and defend your faith. But thinking about your faith is not equivalent to doubting your faith. Doubt is never a purely intellectual problem. There is a spiritual dimension to the problem that must be recognized. Never lose sight of the fact that you are involved in spiritual warfare and there is an enemy of your soul who hates you intensely, whose goal is your destruction, and who will stop at nothing to destroy you. Reason can be used to defend our faith by formulating arguments for the existence of God or by refuting objections. But though the arguments so developed serve to confirm the truth of our faith, they are not properly the basis of our faith, for that is supplied by the witness of the Holy Spirit Himself. Even if there were no arguments in defense of the faith, our faith would still have its firm foundation. The more I learn, the more desperately ignorant I feel. Further study only serves to open up to one's consciousness all the endless vistas of knowledge, even in one's own field, about which one knows absolutely nothing. Don't let your doubts just sit there: pursue them and keep after them until you drive them into the ground. We should be cautious, indeed, about thinking that we have come upon the decisive disproof of our faith. It is pretty unlikely that we have found the irrefutable objection. The history of philosophy is littered with the wrecks of such objections. Given the confidence that the Holy Spirit inspires, we should esteem lightly the arguments and objections that generate our doubts. These, then, are some of the obstacles to answered prayer: sin in our lives, wrong motives, lack of faith, lack of earnestness, lack of perseverance, lack of accordance with God’s will. If any of those obstacles hinders our prayers, then we cannot claim with confidence Jesus’ promise, “Whatever you ask in my name, I will do it”. And so I was led to what was for me a radical new insight into the will of God, namely, that God’s will for our lives can include failure. In other words, God’s will may be that you fail, and He may lead you into failure! For there are things that God has to teach you through failure that He could never teach you through success. So many in our day seem to have been distracted from what was, is and always will be the true priority for every human being — that is, learning to know God in Christ. My greatest fear is that I should some day stand before the Lord and see all my works go up in smoke like so much “wood, hay, and stubble”. The chief purpose of life is not happiness, but knowledge of God. People tend naturally to assume that if God exists, then His purpose for human life is happiness in this life. God’s role is to provide a comfortable environment for His human pets. But on the Christian view, this is false. We are not God’s pets, and the goal of human life is not happiness per se, but the knowledge of God—which in the end will bring true and everlasting human fulfilment. Many evils occur in life which may be utterly pointless with respect to the goal of producing human happiness; but they may not be pointless with respect to producing a deeper knowledge of God.
William Lane Craig (Hard Questions, Real Answers)
A goal is not a life—but it may be what gives shape and direction to the way we live each day. If our goals are what we want to accomplish, “meaning” is why we want to accomplish them. We continue to do our best raising a child, even when that child makes us consider running away to join the circus. We persist at a frustrating job because we know we’re making a difference in people’s lives. We pursue our art, even when we know we may never make a living at it, because we simply would not be fully ourselves if we stopped. Though your goals may differ from ours, they share a common, overarching theme: they give us a sense of engagement with something larger than ourselves.
Emily Nagoski (Burnout: The Secret to Unlocking the Stress Cycle)
When you face asymmetric risk, it makes total sense to be bold, to grab the opportunity at hand. At the extreme, when the downside is very low (or nonexistent, as in the “nothing to lose” case) and the upside is really high, it’s actually riskier not to make the bold move. The downside of not even taking a chance is emotional: potentially a lifetime of regret and wondering What if? The upside of taking a chance always includes emotional benefits—even if things don’t work out. There’s a great sense of pride at having pursued an important goal wholeheartedly. If you’ve given something your all, you’ll get a lot of positive memories out of the experience no matter what happens.
Bill Perkins (Die with Zero: Getting All You Can from Your Money and Your Life)
Reflect on your life When we’re constantly busy and overstimulated, we sometimes fail to take a step back. We can’t see the forest for the trees. Use your dopamine detox as a way to zoom out. To do so: Reflect on your goals. What goals are you pursuing? Are they the right ones for you? Are you making progress toward them each day? And if you keep doing what you’re doing, will you reach them? Assess how you’re using your time. Are you being truly productive each day? Do you spend time on things that matter? Which activities or projects do you really need to focus on? Which ones do you want to stop doing? Self-reflect. Are you where you want to be in life? What inner work could you do to improve yourself?
Thibaut Meurisse (Dopamine Detox : A Short Guide to Remove Distractions and Get Your Brain to Do Hard Things (Productivity Series Book 1))
As actor and comedian Lily Tomlin once said, “The road to success is always under construction.” So don’t allow yourself to be detoured from getting to your ONE Thing. Pave your way with the right people and place. BIG IDEAS Start saying “no.” Always remember that when you say yes to something, you’re saying no to everything else. It’s the essence of keeping a commitment. Start turning down other requests outright or saying, “No, for now” to distractions so that nothing detracts you from getting to your top priority. Learning to say no can and will liberate you. It’s how you’ll find the time for your ONE Thing. Accept chaos. Recognize that pursuing your ONE Thing moves other things to the back burner. Loose ends can feel like snares, creating tangles in your path. This kind of chaos is unavoidable. Make peace with it. Learn to deal with it. The success you have accomplishing your ONE Thing will continually prove you made the right decision. Manage your energy. Don’t sacrifice your health by trying to take on too much. Your body is an amazing machine, but it doesn’t come with a warranty, you can’t trade it in, and repairs can be costly. It’s important to manage your energy so you can do what you must do, achieve what you want to achieve, and live the life you want to live. Take ownership of your environment. Make sure that the people around you and your physical surroundings support your goals. The right people in your life and the right physical environment on your daily path will support your efforts to get to your ONE Thing. When both are in alignment with your ONE Thing, they will supply the optimism and physical lift you need to make your ONE Thing happen. Screenwriter Leo Rosten pulled everything together for us when he said, “I cannot believe that the purpose of life is to be happy. I think the purpose of life is to be useful, to be responsible, to be compassionate. It is, above all, to matter, to count, to stand for something, to have made some difference that you lived at all.” Live with Purpose, Live by Priority, and Live for Productivity. Follow these three for the same reason you make the three commitments and avoid the four thieves—because you want to leave your mark. You want your life to matter. 18
Gary Keller (The ONE Thing: The Surprisingly Simple Truth About Extraordinary Results)
December 31 YOUR DEDICATION The way of Love, upon which you may step at any moment—at this moment if you like—requires no formal permit, has no entrance fee, and no conditions whatever. You need no expensive laboratory in which to train, because your own daily life, and your ordinary daily surroundings, are your laboratory. You need no reference library, no professional training; no external acts of any kind. All you need is to begin steadfastly to reject from your mentality everything that is contrary to the law of love. You must build up by faithful daily exercise the true Love Consciousness. Love will heal you. Love will comfort you. Love will guide you. Love will illumine you. Love will redeem you from sin, sickness, and death, and lead you into your promised land. Say to yourself: “My mind is made up; I have counted the cost; and I am resolved to attain the Goal by the path of Love. Others may pursue knowledge, or organize great enterprises for the benefit of humanity, or scale the austere heights of asceticism; but I have chosen the path of Love. My own heart is to be my workshop, my laboratory, my great enterprise, and love is to be my contribution to humanity.
Emmet Fox (Around the Year with Emmet Fox: A Book of Daily Readings)
Questions for Self-Examination 1.  How do you define creativity? Do you consider yourself a creative person? Do you follow through on your creative ideas? 2.  How often do you direct your creative energies into negative paths of expression? Do you exaggerate or embellish “facts” to support your point of view? 3.  Are you comfortable with your sexuality? If not, are you able to work toward healing your sexual imbalances? Do you use people for sexual pleasure, or have you felt used? Are you strong enough to honor your sexual boundaries? 4.  Do you keep your word? What is your personal code of honor? of ethics? Do you negotiate your ethics depending upon your circumstances? 5.  Do you have an impression of God as a force that exerts justice in your life? 6.  Are you a controlling person? Do you engage in power plays in your relationships? Are you able to see yourself clearly in circumstances related to power and money? 7.  Does money have authority over you? Do you make compromises that violate your inner self for the sake of financial security? 8. How often do survival fears dictate your choices? 9.  Are you strong enough to master your fears concerning finances and physical survival, or do they control you and your attitudes? 10.  What goals do you have for yourself that you have yet to pursue? What stands in the way of your acting upon those goals?
Caroline Myss (Anatomy of the Spirit: The Seven Stages of Power and Healing)
What is adventure? Adventure offers every human being the ability to live ‘the’ moment of his or her most passionate idea, fantasy or pursuit. It may take form in the arts, acting, sports, travel or other creative endeavors. Once engaged, a person enjoys ‘satori’ or the perfect moment. That instant may last seconds or a lifetime. The key to adventure whether it be painting, dancing, sports or travel: throw yourself into it with rambunctious enthusiasm and zealous energy—which leads toward uncommon passion for living. By following that path, you will attract an amazing life that will imbue your spirit and fulfill your destiny as defined by you alone. In the end, you will savor the sweet taste of life pursuing goals that make you happy, rewarded and complete. As a bonus, you may share your life experiences with other bold and uncommon human beings that laugh at life, compare themselves with no one and enjoy a whale of a ride! Frosty Wooldridge from How to Live a Life of Adventure: The Art of Exploring the World
Frosty Wooldridge (How to Live a Life of Adventure: The Art of Exploring the World)
The ‘Regal Seven (key) Ingredients of a Successful Company’ is: Pursue the goal of Profit Maximization keeping in mind the shareholders interests. To be achieved by developing and rendering Quality Goods and Services at a Reasonable Price. By inculcating Value and Ethics within the structure Through Sound People Management principles devised and effectively implemented. Further organizing Learning Programs and instill concept of ‘Learning and Earning’ Develop/Construct Customer Satisfaction. Build-Build-Build ; Build vision based values, Build your staff, Build customer satisfaction ; and witness your organization being built in the market.
Henrietta Newton Martin
The evolutionary process of productive adaption and ascent—the process of seeking, obtaining, and pursuing more and more ambitious goals—does not just pertain to how individuals and society move forward. It is equally relevant when dealing with setbacks, which are inevitable. At some point in your life you will crash in a big way. You might fail at your job or with your family, lose a loved one, suffer a serious accident or illness, or discover the life you imagined is out of reach forever. There are a whole host of ways that something will get you . At such times, you will be in pain and might think that you don’t have the strength to go on. You almost always do, however; your ultimate success will depend on you realizing that fact, even though it might not seem that way at the moment. This is why many people who have endured setbacks that seems devastating at the time ended up happy as (or even happier than) they originally were after they successfully adapted to them. The quality of your life will depend on the choices you make at those painful moments. The faster one appropriately adapts, the better. No matter what you want out of life, your ability to adapt and move quickly and efficiently through the process of personal evolution will determine your success and your happiness. If you do it well, you can cahnge your psychological reaction to it so that what was painful can become something you crave.
Ray Dalio (Principles: Life and Work)
Your life becomes meaningful in precise proportion to the depths of the responsibility you are willing to shoulder. That is because you are now genuinely involved in making things better. You are minimizing the unnecessary suffering. You are encouraging those around you, by example and word. You are constraining the malevolence in your own heart and the hearts of others. A bricklayer may question the utility of laying his bricks, monotonously, one after another. But perhaps he is not merely laying bricks. Maybe he is building a wall. And the wall is part of a building. And the building is a cathedral. And the purpose of the cathedral is the glorification of the Highest Good. And under such circumstances, every brick laid is an act that partakes of the divine. And if what you are doing in your day-to-day activity is not enough, then you are not aiming at the construction of a proper cathedral. And that is because you are not aiming high enough. Because if you were, then you would experience the sense of meaning in relationship to your sufficiently high goal, and it would justify the misery and limitations of your life. If you have something meaningful to pursue, then you are engrossed in life. You are on a meaningful path. The most profound and reliable instinct for meaning—if not perverted by self-deceit and sin (there is no other way to state it)—manifests itself when you are on the path of maximum virtue.
Jordan B. Peterson (Beyond Order: 12 More Rules For Life)
But overprotection is just one part of a larger trend that we call problems of progress. This term refers to bad consequences produced by otherwise good social changes. It’s great that our economic system produces an abundance of food at low prices, but the flip side is an epidemic of obesity. It’s great that we can connect and communicate with people instantly and for free, but this hyperconnection may be damaging the mental health of young people. It’s great that we have refrigerators, antidepressants, air conditioning, hot and cold running water, and the ability to escape from most of the physical hardships that were woven into the daily lives of our ancestors back to the dawn of our species. Comfort and physical safety are boons to humanity, but they bring some costs, too. We adapt to our new and improved circumstances and then lower the bar for what we count as intolerable levels of discomfort and risk. By the standards of our great-grandparents, nearly all of us are coddled. Each generation tends to see the one after it as weak, whiny, and lacking in resilience. Those older generations may have a point, even though these generational changes reflect real and positive progress. To repeat, we are not saying that the problems facing students, and young people more generally, are minor or “all in their heads.” We are saying that what people choose to do in their heads will determine how those real problems affect them. Our argument is ultimately pragmatic, not moralistic: Whatever your identity, background, or political ideology, you will be happier, healthier, stronger, and more likely to succeed in pursuing your own goals if you do the opposite of what Misoponos advised.
Greg Lukianoff (The Coddling of the American Mind: How Good Intentions and Bad Ideas Are Setting Up a Generation for Failure)
I agreed to the trial only for the sake of Rama, not for my own.' ‘Don’t I know that.' ‘But again … will my decision haunt me forever?’ ‘Till you take decisions for Rama’s sake and not yours, it will continue to pursue you, Sita. Look at yourself. You are enduring great pain. You think you are enduring it for the sake of someone else. You think that you have performed your duty for the sake of someone else. Your courage, your self-confidence … you have surrendered everything to others. What have you saved for yourself?’ ‘What is “I”, sister? Who am I?’ Ahalya smiled. ‘The greatest of sages and philosophers have spent their lifetimes in search of an answer to this question. You means you, nothing else. You are not just the wife of Rama. There is something more in you, something that is your own. No one counsels women to find out what that something more is. If men’s pride is in wealth, or valour, or education, or caste–sect, for women it lies in fidelity, motherhood. No one advises women to transcend that pride. Most often, women don’t realize that they are part of the wider world. They limit themselves to an individual, to a household, to a family’s honour. Conquering the ego becomes the goal of spirituality for men. For women, to nourish that ego and to burn themselves to ashes in it becomes the goal. Sita, try to understand who you are, what the goal of your life is. It is not easy at all. But don’t give up. You will discover the truth in the end. You have that ability. You have saved Sri Ramachandra, can’t you save yourself? Don’t grieve over what has already happened. It is all for your own good, and is part of the process of self-realization. Be happy. Observe nature and the evolution of life. Notice the continual changes in them. The forest doesn’t comprise ashrams alone. There are also people of many races in it. Observe their lives. You belong to this whole world, not just to Rama.
Volga (The Liberation of Sita)
HAPPINESS: "Flourishing is a fact, not a feeling. We flourish when we grow and thrive. We flourish when we exercise our powers. We flourish when we become what we are capable of becoming...Flourishing is rooted in action..."happiness is a kind of working of the soul in the way of perfect excellence"...a flourishing life is a life lived along lines of excellence...Flourishing is a condition that is created by the choices we make in the world we live in...Flourishing is not a virtue, but a condition; not a character trait, but a result. We need virtue to flourish, but virtue isn't enough. To create a flourishing life, we need both virtue and the conditions in which virtue can flourish...Resilience is a virtue required for flourishing, bur being resilient will not guarantee that we will flourish. Unfairness, injustice, and bad fortune will snuff our promising lives. Unasked-for pain will still come our way...We can build resilience and shape the world we live in. We can't rebuild the world...three primary kinds of happiness: the happiness of pleasure, the happiness of grace, and happiness of excellence...people who are flourishing usually have all three kinds of happiness in their lives...Aristotle understood: pushing ourselves to grow, to get better, to dive deeper is at the heart of happiness...This is the happiness that goes hand in hand with excellence, with pursuing worthy goals, with growing mastery...It is about the exercise of powers. The most common mistake people make in thinking about the happiness of excellence is to focus on moments of achievement. They imagine the mountain climber on the summit. That's part of the happiness of excellence, and a very real part. What counts more, though, is not the happiness of being there, but the happiness of getting there. A mountain climber heads for the summit, and joy meets her along the way. You head for the bottom of the ocean, and joy meets you on the way down...you create joy along the way...the concept of flow, the kind of happiness that comes when we lose ourselves through complete absorption in a rewarding task...the idea of flow..."Contrary to what we usually believe, moments like these, the best moments in our lives, are not the passive, receptive, relaxing times...The best moments usually occur when a person's body or mind is stretched to its limit in a voluntary effort to accomplish something difficult and worthwhile."...Joy, like sweat, is usually a byproduct of your activity, not your aim...A focus on happiness will not lead to excellence. A focus on excellence will, over time, lead to happiness. The pursuit of excellence leads to growth, mastery, and achievement. None of these are sufficient for happiness, yet all of them are necessary...the pull of purpose, the desire to feel "needed in this world" - however we fulfill that desire - is a very powerful force in a human life...recognize that the drive to live well and purposefully isn't some grim, ugly, teeth-gritting duty. On the contrary: "it's a very good feeling." It is really is happiness...Pleasures can never make up for an absence of purposeful work and meaningful relationships. Pleasures will never make you whole...Real happiness comes from working together, hurting together, fighting together, surviving together, mourning together. It is the essence of the happiness of excellence...The happiness of pleasure can't provide purpose; it can't substitute for the happiness of excellence. The challenge for the veteran - and for anyone suddenly deprived of purpose - is not simple to overcome trauma, but to rebuild meaning. The only way out is through suffering to strength. Through hardship to healing. And the longer we wait, the less life we have to live...We are meant to have worthy work to do. If we aren't allowed to struggle for something worthwhile, we'll never grow in resilience, and we'll never experience complete happiness.
Eric Greitens (Resilience: Hard-Won Wisdom for Living a Better Life)