Motivational Quotes

Purpose

Many people flounder about in life because they do not have a purpose, an objective toward which to work.

- Halas, George

Best Quotes about Purpose

I know of no such unquestionable badge and ensign of a sovereign mind as that of tenacity of purpose...

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

Your purpose is to make your audience see what you saw, hear what you heard, feel what you felt. Relevant detail, couched in concrete, colorful language, is the best way to recreate the incident as it happened and to picture it for the audience.

Carnegie, Dale

The whole life is but a point of time; let us enjoy it, therefore, while it lasts, and not spend it to no purpose.

Plutarch

The sense of paralysis proceeds not so much out of the mammoth size of the problem but out of the puniness of the purpose.

Cousins, Norman

Never be afraid to treat the path alone. Know which is your path and follow it wherever it may lead you; do not feel you have to follow in someone else's footsteps.

Bellin, Gita

The man without a purpose is like a ship without a rudder -- waif, a nothing, a no man. Have a purpose in life, and, having it, throw such strength of mind and muscle into your work as God has given you.

Carlyle, Thomas

If we don't stand for something, we may fall for anything.

We know there is intention and purpose in the universe, because there is intention and purpose in us.

Shaw, George Bernard

Make sure the thing you're living for is worth dying for.

Mayes, Charles

10.

Blessed are the single-hearted, for they shall enjoy much peace. If you refuse to be hurried and pressed, if you stay your soul on God, nothing can keep you from that clearness of spirit which is life and peace. In that stillness you will know what His will is.

Carmichael, Amy

11.

Every man is occasionally visited by the suspicion that the planet on which he is riding is not really going anywhere; that the Force which controls its measured eccentricities hasn't got anything special in mind. If he broods on this somber theme long enough he gets the doleful idea that the laughing children on a merry-go-round or the thin, fine hands of a lady's watch are revolving more purposely than he is.

Thurber, James

12.

Great minds have purposes; others have wishes.

Irving, Washington

13.

Men achieve a certain greatness unawares, when working to another aim.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

14.

What is my life if I am no longer useful to others.

Goethe, Johann Wolfgang Von

15.

Existence is a strange bargain. Life owes us little; we owe it everything. The only true happiness comes from squandering ourselves for a purpose.

Cowper, William

16.

I see no business in life but the work of Christ.

Martyn, Henry

17.

He who clings to life shall lose it -- but losing it in a right cause will gain it.

18.

They are not only idle who do nothing, but they are idle also who might be better employed.

Socrates

19.

Lack of something to feel important about is almost the greatest tragedy a man may have.

Morgan, Arthur E.

20.

It's not so much how busy you are, but why you are busy. The bee is praised. The mosquito is swatted.

O'Connor, Mary

21.

Be above it! Make the world serve your purpose, but do not serve it.

Goethe, Johann Wolfgang Von

22.

To be a Sufi is to cease from taking trouble; and there is no greater trouble for thee than thine own self, for when thou art occupied with thyself, thou remainest away from God.

Sa'id, Abu

23.

Are we interested in sight seeing or soul saving?

24.

For I say unto you in all sadness of conviction that to think great thoughts you must be heroes as well as idealists. Only when you have worked alone -- when you have felt around you are a black gulf of solitude more isolating than that which surrounds the dying man, and in hope and despair have trusted to your own unshaken will -- then only can you gain the secret isolated joy of the thinker, who knows that a hundred years after he is dead and forgotten men who have never heard of him will be moving to the measure of his thought -- the subtle rapture of postponed power, which the world knows not because it has no external trappings, but which to his prophetic vision is more real than that which commands an army. And if this joy should not be yours, still it is only thus you can know that you have done what lay in you to do -- can say that you have lived, and be ready for the end.

Holmes Jr., Oliver Wendell

25.

The only failure a man ought to fear is failure in cleaving to the purpose he sees to be best.

Eliot, George

26.

You, betrayed by time and space, Seek and find your proper place.

Wizard, Her Majesty's

27.

The longest journey is the journey inwards. Of him who has chosen his destiny, Who has started upon his quest for the source of his being.

Hammarskjold, Dag

28.

All men should strive to learn before they die, what they are running from, and to, and why.

Thurber, James

29.

A man should conceive of a legitimate purpose in his heart, and set out to accomplish it. He should make this purpose the centralizing point of his thoughts. It may take the form of a spiritual ideal, or it may be a worldly object, according to his nature at the time being; but whichever it is, he should steadily focus his thought forces upon the object which he has set before him. He should make this purpose his supreme duty, and should devote himself to its attainment, not allowing his thoughts to wander away into ephemeral fancies, longings, and imaginings. This is the royal road to self-control and true concentration of thought. Even if he fails again and again to accomplish his purpose (as he necessarily must until weakness is overcome), the strength of character gained will be the measure of his true success, and this will form a new starting point for future power and triumph.

Allen, James

30.

It is good to have an end to journey toward; but it is the journey that matters, in the end

Hemingway, Ernest

31.

Man becomes greater in proportion to knowing himself and his faculties. Let him become conscious of what he is and he will soon also learn what he should be.

Schelling, Felix E.

32.

Anyone can live heroically and successfully for one day. The man who achieves a high purpose makes that day the pattern for all the days of his life.

33.

In a just cause the weak will beat the strong.

Sophocles

34.

Many people flounder about in life because they do not have a purpose, an objective toward which to work.

Halas, George

35.

To the person with a firm purpose all men and things are servants.

Goethe, Johann Wolfgang Von

36.

Multitudes of people, drifting aimlessly to and fro without a set purpose, deny themselves such fulfillment of their capacities, and the satisfying happiness which attends it. They are not wicked, they are only shallow. They are not mean or vicious; they simply are empty -- shake them and they would rattle like gourds. They lack range, depth, and conviction. Without purpose their lives ultimately wander into the morass of dissatisfaction. As we harness our abilities to a steady purpose and undertake the long pull toward its accomplishment, rich compensations reward us. A sense of purpose simplifies life and therefore concentrates our abilities; and concentration adds power.

Hildebrand, Kenneth

37.

What on earth are you doing for Heaven's sake?

38.

Brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended, but one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward toward to those things which are ahead, I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.

Bible

39.

One thing I have desired of the Lord, that will I seek: That I may dwell in the house f the Lord all the days of my life, to behold the beauty of the Lord, and to inquire in His temple. [Psalms 27:4]

Bible

40.

What allows us, as human beings, to psychologically survive life on earth, with all of its pain, drama, and challenges, is a sense of purpose and meaning

Angelis, Barbara De

41.

I just wake up and say, You're a bum, go do something worthwhile today.

Brooks, Garth

42.

Nothing can resist the human will that will stake even its existence on its stated purpose.

Disraeli, Benjamin

43.

Only the consciousness of a purpose that is mightier than any man and worthy of all men can fortify and inspirit and compose the souls of men.

Lippmann, Walter

44.

What makes life dreary is the want of a motive.