Quotes about success
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“Impulse, subjectivity and profanation, the old adversaries of materialistic alienation, now succumb to it. … The representatives of the opposition to the authoritarian schema become witnesses to the authority of commercial success. … In the service of success they renounce that insubordinate character which was theirs.”

Theodor W. Adorno (1903–1969) German sociologist, philosopher and musicologist known for his critical theory of society

Source: On the Fetish Character in Music and the Regression of Listening (1938), p. 273

“There are three successive states of morality answering to the three principal stages of human life; the personal, the domestic, and the social stage.”

Auguste Comte (1798–1857) French philosopher

Source: A General View of Positivism (1848, 1856), p. 104

Life, Personality

“The new profession of public relations has grown up because of the increasing complexity of modern life and the consequent necessity for making the actions of one part of the public understandable to other sectors of the public. It is due, too, to the increasing dependence of organized power of all sorts upon public opinion. Governments, whether they are monarchical, constitutional, democratic or communist, depend upon acquiescent public opinion for the success of their efforts and, in fact, government is government only by virtue of public acquiescence. Industries, public utilities, educational movements, indeed all groups representing any concept or product, whether they are majority or minority ideas, succeed only because of approving public opinion. Public opinion is the unacknowledged partner in all broad efforts.
The public relations counsel, then, is the agent who, working with modern media of communications and the group formations of society, brings an idea to the consciousness of the public.”

Edward Bernays book Propaganda

Source: Propaganda (1928), p. 63

Life, Education, Communication, Idea

“Technically he was highly gifted, but also severely limited. His music is well constructed and effective, but monotonous in texture, which consists in essence mainly of artificial and gushing tunes accompanied by a variety of figures derived from arpeggios. The enormous popular success some few of Rakhmaninoff's works had in his lifetime is not likely to last, and musicians never regarded it with much favour.”

Sergei Rachmaninoff (1873–1943) Russian composer, pianist, and conductor

Eric Blom (ed.) Grove's Dictionary of Music and Musicians, 5th edn. (London: Macmillan, 1954) vol. 7, p. 27.
Criticism

Music

“I was not intrigued with the accouterments of success and fame, the furs, jewels, expensive automobiles and mansions… I can assure you that these things were not on my mind when I sat spellbound in that Pozzuoli movie house. It was what these performers on the screen were doing, not what they received for doing it.”

Sophia Loren (1934) Italian actress

As quoted in Sophia, Living and Loving: Her Own Story (1979) by A. E. Hotchner, p. 63.

Housing

“Successful people do things, and get over with it, and leave others to live their life off it. I DO them. And then I leave it to others to live their life off it.”

Shahrukh Khan (1965) Indian actor, producer and television personality

From interview with Anshul Chaturvedi

Life, People

“Although it may seem incredible, this cure helped me. At the beginning of the summer I began to compose… New musical ideas began to stir with me-far more than I needed for my concerto. By the autumn I had finished the Adagio and Finale… The Two movements I played… at a charity concert… They had a gratifying success… By the Spring I had finished the first movement of the concerto… Out of gratitude, I dedicated it to Nikolay Dahl.”

Sergei Rachmaninoff (1873–1943) Russian composer, pianist, and conductor

About his second piano concerto. Masterworks of the Orchestral Repertoire: A Guide for Listeners by Donald N. Ferguson.

Music, Spring, Idea, Autumn

“… exclude the need for appearances: what counts is not appearances; the value of life does not depend on the approval of others or on success, but on what we have inside us.”

Pope Francis (1936) 266th Pope of the Catholic Church

As quoted in "Imposition of the Ashes - Homily of pope Francis" at www.vatican.va (5 March 2014) http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/francesco/homilies/2014/documents/papa-francesco_20140305_omelia-ceneri_en.html 2010s, 2014

Life, Appearance, Dependency

“I pay low wages. I can take advantage of that. We're going to be successful, but the basis is a very low-wage, low-benefit model of employment.”

Sam Walton (1918–1992) Founder of Wal-Mart and Sam's Club

Attributed in Adam L. Penenberg, "Why Google Is Like Wal-Mart" https://archive.is/20130630165550/www.wired.com/culture/lifestyle/news/2005/04/67287?currentPage=all, Wired, 21 April 2005

“Parents always live a less pure life than their children, because they condone everything they do. The ability to condone everything in oneself but practically nothing in one's children is the boon that "experience" bestows on humanity. What parents call experience is really nothing but attempts, successful to the point of sheer cynicism, to belie everything which they found pure, true and right when they were young. They themselves don't notice the awful cynicism behind this incessant talk of "experience" being the highest aim in life: they only notice "inexperience" in their children, that is, the form of inexperience called purity and integrity, and then they get annoyed.”

Stig Dagerman book A Burnt Child

Source: A Burnt Child (1948), p. 135

Life, Children, Parent

“The class struggle tactics is not only more correct in principle; it is also more practical and successful than compromise tactics.”

Wilhelm Liebknecht (1826–1900) German socialist politician

No Compromise – No Political Trading (1899)

“I frankly confess that, for myself, even if it could be, I should not want "free-will" to be given me, nor anything to be left in my own hands to enable me to endeavour after salvation; not merely because in face of so many dangers, and adversities and assaults of devils, I could not stand my ground; but because even were there no dangers. I should still be forced to labour with no guarantee of success.¦ But now that God has taken my salvation out of the control of my own will, and put it under the control of His, and promised to save me, not according to my working or running, but according to His own grace and mercy, I have the comfortable certainty that He is faithful and will not lie to me, and that He is also great and powerful, so that no devils or opposition can break Him or pluck me from Him. Furthermore, I have the comfortable certainty that I please God, not by reason of the merit of my works, but by reason of His merciful favour promised to me; so that, if I work too little, or badly, He does not impute it to me, but with fatherly compassion pardons me and makes me better. This is the glorying of all the saints in their God.”

Martin Luther book On the Bondage of the Will

Source: On the Bondage of the Will (1525), p. 313-314

God, Lie, Faith

“Yet if the only form of tradition, of handing down, consisted in following the ways of the immediate generation before us in a blind or timid adherence to its successes, "tradition" should positively be discouraged. We have seen many such simple currents soon lost in the sand; and novelty is better than repetition. Tradition is a matter of much wider significance. It cannot be inherited, and if you want it you must obtain it by great labour. It involves, in the first place, the historical sense, which we may call nearly indispensable to anyone who would continue to be a poet beyond his twenty-fifth year…”

T.S. Eliot book Tradition and the Individual Talent

Tradition and the Individual Talent (1919)

Way, Sense

“One minute decides the outcome of a battle, one hour the success of a campaign, one day the fate of empires.”

Alexander Suvorov (1730–1800) Russian military commander

other version: One minute can decide the outcome of the battle, one hour - the outcome of the campaign, and one day - the fate of the country.
"Encyclopedia of Russian History" - Page 1504 by James R. Millar - Soviet Union - 2004.

Fate

“To do a common thing uncommonly well brings success.”

Henry J. Heinz (1844–1919) American businessman

Henry J. Heinz, cited in: John Woolf Jordan (1915). Genealogical and Personal History of Western Pennsylvania. p. 38

Business

“Self-belief does not necessarily ensure success, but self-disbelief assuredly spawns failure.”

Albert Bandura book Self-Efficacy

[Self-efficacy: The exercise of control, Bandura, Albert, w:Albert Bandura, 1997, W. H. Freeman, New York, 9780716728504, http://books.google.com/books?id=eJ-PN9g_o-EC&printsec=frontcover&dq=bandura+isbn:9780716728504&hl=en&ei=HAwYTbKsLpTmsQPp8cCPCg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CCMQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q&f=false] (p. 77)

Failure

“Consultation with a wise advisor is a blessing, grace, guidance and success.”

Musa al-Kadhim (745–799) Seventh of the Twelve Imams and regarded by Sunnis as a renowned scholar

Ibn Shu’ba al-Harrani, Tuhaf al-'Uqul, p. 420.
Regarding Knowledge & Wisdom, Religious

“He, therefore, who desires peace, should prepare for war. He who aspires to victory, should spare no pains to form his soldiers. And he who hopes for success, should fight on principle, not chance. (Book 3, Foreword)”
Igitur qui desiderat pacem, praeparet bellum; qui uictoriam cupit, milites inbuat diligenter; qui secundos optat euentus, dimicet arte, non casu.

Publius Flavius Vegetius Renatus book De re militari

De Re Militari (also Epitoma Rei Militaris), Book III, "Dispositions for Action"
Variant: Si vis pacem para bellum. ("If you want peace, prepare for war.")

Pain, War, Books, Peace

“You don't have to be a genius or a visionary or even a college graduate to be successful. You just need a framework and a dream.”

Michael Dell (1965) Businessman, CEO

Entrepreneur: Michael Dell https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/197566 (13 October 2012)

Motivational, Success, Dreams

“We cannot bank our hopes on possibilities. We must put our trust in ourselves, in our capabilities and efforts and strength and preparations not only for our success but even to avoid our own defeat.”

Aung San (1915–1947) Burmese revolutionary leader

Presidential address to the AFPFL Supreme Council Session (August 1946)

Hope, Effort

“If children had teachers for judgment and eloquence as they have for languages, if their memory was exercised less than their energy or their natural genius, if instead of deadening their vivacity of mind we tried to elevate the free scope and impulses of their souls, what might not result from a fine disposition? As it is, we forget that courage, or love of truth and glory are the virtues that matter most in youth; and our one endeavor is to subdue our children’s spirits, in order to teach them that dependence and suppleness are the first laws of success in life.”

Luc de Clapiers, Marquis de Vauvenargues (1715–1747) French writer, a moralist

Source: Reflections and Maxims (1746), pp. 185-186.

Love, Life, Children, Truth

“Now one could say, at the risk of some superficiality, that there exist principally two types of scientists. The ones, and they are rare, wish to understand the world, to know nature; the others, far more frequent, wish to explain it. The first are searching for truth, often with knowledge that they will not attain it; the second strive for plausibility, for the achievement of an intellectually consistent, and hence successful, view of the world.”

Erwin Chargaff (1905–2002) Ukrinian-born biochemist who emigrated to the United States

Heraclitean Fire: Sketches from a Life Before Nature, Paul & Co Pub Consortium, June, 1978.

Truth, World, Search, Understanding

“It's nothing to do with us at all, our success is due to the taste of the public.”

Bon Scott (1946–1980) Rock musician

Countdown interview, Mascot Airport, Sydney, April 1976.

“I am a completely carefree person. I don’t care a damn what people think. But the rumours affect the people I know. I remember a newspaper publishing something like that once when I was actually in hospital, suffering from a kidney stone. I was shooting with a drip in my arm, but nobody bothered about that. That’s another reason I am now putting the people who love me and really care for me first, instead of satisfying the media and the fans. Success is not just measured by what people think about you, but rather by what you feel. At the end of the day, if I am going to work really hard and feel empty inside, it doesn’t make sense to me.”

Sukirti Kandpal (1987) Indian actress

Sukirti on rumours and success http://www.bollywoodlife.com/news-gossip/sukirti-kandpal-i-dont-care-a-damn-what-people-think/

Love, People, Feeling, Thinking

“If the development by the enemy as well as by us of thermonuclear weapons could have been averted, I think we would be in a somewhat safer world today than we are…I do not think we want to argue technical questions here, and I do not think it is very meaningful for me to speculate as to how we would have responded had the technical picture at that time been more as it was later.
However, it is my judgment in these things that when you see something that is technically sweet, you go ahead and do it and you argue about what to do about it only after you have had your technical success. That is the way it was with the atomic bomb. I do not think anybody opposed making it; there were some debates about what to do with it after it was made. I cannot very well imagine if we had known in late 1949 what we got to know by early 1951 that the tone of our report would have been the same.”

Robert Oppenheimer (1904–1967) American theoretical physicist and professor of physics

Oppenheimer testifying in his defense in his 1954 security hearings, discussing the American reaction to the first successful Russian test of an atomic bomb and the debate whether to develop the "super" hydrogen bombs with vastly higher explosive power; from volume II of the Oppenheimer hearing transcripts http://www.osti.gov/includes/opennet/includes/Oppenheimer%20hearings/Vol%20II%20Oppenheimer.pdf, pg 95/266 (emphasis added)

World, Way, Imagination, Question

“…he had a tremendous propensity for getting lost when driving. This was largely because of his "Zen" method of navigation, which was simply to find any car that looked as if it knew where it was going and follow it. The results were more often surprising than successful, but he felt it was worth it for the sake of the few occasions when it was both.”

Douglas Adams The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul

Source: The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul (1988), Ch. 4

Cars

“Without any censorship, in the West fashionable trends of thought and ideas are carefully separated from those which are not fashionable; nothing is forbidden, but what is not fashionable will hardly ever find its way into periodicals or books or be heard in colleges. Legally your researchers are free, but they are conditioned by the fashion of the day. There is no open violence such as in the East; however, a selection dictated by fashion and the need to match mass standards frequently prevent independent-minded people from giving their contribution to public life. There is a dangerous tendency to form a herd, shutting off successful development.”

Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn (1918–2008) Russian writer

Harvard University address (1978)

Life, People, Books, Way

“Ivanov came to quite the same conclusion, though life supplied him with quite different material to think about. He puts it like this: many lives have a mystical sense, but not everyone reads it right; more often than not it is given to us in cryptic form, and when we fail to decipher it we despair because our lives seem meaningless… the secret of a great life is often a man’s success in deciphering the mysterious symbols vouchsafed to him, understanding them, and so learning to walk in the true path.”

Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn book The Oak and the Calf

The Oak and the Calf (1975)

Life, Secret, Understanding, Thinking

“Only a numskull is pleased at being a so-called 'success' with women, only a dunderhead is puffed up by it. A real man is much more likely to be dismayed at realizing that a woman has lost her heart to him when he can't reciprocate her feelings.”

Stefan Zweig book Beware of Pity

Beware of Pity (1939)

Women, Feeling, Heart

“We must demonstrate that it is possible to overcome poverty, misery and decay by democratic means, and we must ourselves believe, and must show others, that our American tradition of the dignity and liberty of the individual is not a luxury for easy times but is the basic source of the strength and security of a successful society.”

Jane Jacobs (1916–2006) American–Canadian journalist, author on urbanism and activist (1916-2006)

Political questionnaire response (1952)

Time

“I eagerly await tomorrow's mail to have news of Russia and Poland. For now, I have to content myself with a few vague rumors which float around. I have heard about new, bloody skirmishes in Poland between the people and troops; I was told that, even in Russia, there was a conspiracy against the czar and the whole royal family.
I am equally passionate about the struggle between the North and the Southern American states. Of course, my heart goes out to the North. But alas! It is the South who acted with the most force, wisdom, and solidarity, which makes them worthy of the triumph they have received in every encounter so far. It is true that the South has been preparing for war for three years now, while the North has been forced to improvise. The surprising success of the ventures of the American people, for the most part happy; the banality of the material well being, where the heart is absent; and the national vanity, altogether infantile and sustained with very little cost; all seem to have helped deprave these people, and perhaps this stubborn struggle will be beneficial to them in so much as it helps the nation regain its lost soul. This is my first impression; but it could very well be that I will change my mind upon seeing things up close. The only thing is, I will not have enough time to examine really closely.”

Mikhail Bakunin (1814–1876) Russian revolutionary, philosopher, and theorist of collectivist anarchism

Letter http://dwardmac.pitzer.edu/anarchist_archives/bakunin/letters/toherzenandogareff.html to Aleksandr Ivanovich Herzen and Ogareff from San Francisco (3 October 1861); published in Correspondance de Michel Bakounine (1896) edited by Michel Dragmanov

Wisdom, War, People, Family

“The Second World War supplied the occasion for the spending, and Keynesian economics supplied the rationale. But Keynesian fiscal policy had political appeal even before the war demonstrated its economic success. For unlike the various proposals for structural reform, such as vigorous antitrust action or national economic planning, Keynesian economics offered a way for the government to control the economy without having to choose among controversial views of the good society. Where earlier reformers had sought economic arrangements that would cultivate, citizens of a certain kind, Keynesians undertook no formative mission; they proposed simply to accept existing consumer preferences and to regulate the economy by manipulating aggregate demand.”

Michael J. Sandel (1953) American political philosopher

1. America's Search for a Public Philosophy
Public Philosophy (2005)

War, World, Way

“No longer can I complain that the unrighteous man reaches the highest pinnacle of success. He is raised aloft that he may be hurled down in more headlong ruin.”
Iam non ad culmina rerum iniustos crevisse queror; tolluntur in altum ut lapsu graviore ruant.

Claudian (370–404) Roman Latin poet

Iam non ad culmina rerum iniustos crevisse queror; tolluntur in altum ut lapsu graviore ruant. In Rufinum, Bk. I, lines 21-23 http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Claudian/In_Rufinum/1*.html#21.

“Only two suppositions seem to be open to us — Either each species of crocodile has been specially created, or it has arisen out of some pre-existing form by the operation of natural causes.
Choose your hypothesis; I have chosen mine. I can find no warranty for believing in the distinct creation of a score of successive species of crocodiles in the course of countless ages of time.”

Thomas Henry Huxley (1825–1895) English biologist and comparative anatomist

1860s, On a Piece of Chalk (1868)

Age, Nature, Time

“Before, he had fought against the money code, and yet he had clung to his wretched remnant of decency. But now it was precisely from decency that he wanted to escape. He wanted to go down, deep down, into some world where decency no longer mattered; to cut the strings of his self-respect, to submerge himself—to sink, as Rosemary had said. It was all bound up in his mind with the thought of being under ground. He liked to think of the lost people, the under-ground people: tramps, beggars, criminals, prostitutes. It is a good world that they inhabit, down there in their frowzy kips and spikes. He liked to think that beneath the world of money there is that great sluttish underworld where failure and success have no meaning; a sort of kingdom of ghosts where all are equal. That was where he wished to be, down in the ghost-kingdom, below ambition. It comforted him somehow to think of the smoke-dim slums of South London sprawling on and on, a huge graceless wilderness where you could lose yourself forever.”

George Orwell book Keep the Aspidistra Flying

Source: Keep the Aspidistra Flying (1936), Ch. 10

Money, People, World, Failure

“I've been very lucky to have achieved a lot of the things that I dreamt of achieving as a young man. But, at the end of the day – and I truly believe this – it is not about achieving great wealth or success. Because they don't bring happiness ultimately. They really don't. What matters is whether or not you've fulfilled the idea of having led an interesting life, whether you've contributed in some way to the world around you.”

Leonardo DiCaprio (1974) American actor and film producer

Interview: "Leonardo DiCaprio: 'wealth and success don't make you happy'" http://www.telegraph.co.uk/film/the-revenant/leonardo-dicaprio-interview/ by Chloe Fox, The Telegraph (9 January 2016)

Life, World, Way, Idea

“Ignorance alone stands in the way of socialist success.”

Eugene V. Debs (1855–1926) American labor and political leader

The Socialist Party and the Working Class (1904)
Context: Ignorance alone stands in the way of socialist success. The capitalist parties understand this and use their resources to prevent the workers from seeing the light.
Intellectual darkness is essential to industrial slavery.

Way

“I allow neither the bootmaker nor the architect nor the savant to impose his authority upon me. I listen to them freely and with all the respect merited by their intelligence, their character, their knowledge, reserving always my incontestable right of criticism and censure. I do not content myself with consulting authority in any special branch; I consult several; I compare their opinions, and choose that which seems to me the soundest. But I recognize no infallible authority, even in special questions; consequently, whatever respect I may have for the honesty and the sincerity of such or such an individual, I have no absolute faith in any person. Such a faith would be fatal to my reason, to my liberty, and even to the success of my undertakings; it would immediately transform me into a stupid slave, an instrument of the will and interests of others.”

Mikhail Bakunin book God and the State

God and the State (1871; publ. 1882)
Context: Does it follow that I reject all authority? Far from me such a thought. In the matter of boots, I refer to the authority of the bootmaker; concerning houses, canals, or railroads, I consult that of the architect or engineer. For such or such special knowledge I apply to such or such a savant. But I allow neither the bootmaker nor the architect nor the savant to impose his authority upon me. I listen to them freely and with all the respect merited by their intelligence, their character, their knowledge, reserving always my incontestable right of criticism and censure. I do not content myself with consulting authority in any special branch; I consult several; I compare their opinions, and choose that which seems to me the soundest. But I recognize no infallible authority, even in special questions; consequently, whatever respect I may have for the honesty and the sincerity of such or such an individual, I have no absolute faith in any person. Such a faith would be fatal to my reason, to my liberty, and even to the success of my undertakings; it would immediately transform me into a stupid slave, an instrument of the will and interests of others.

Stupidity, Faith, Intelligence, Question

“If we do our best, we are a success. Success is the maximum utilization of the ability that you have.”

Zig Ziglar (1926–2012) American motivational speaker

As quoted in The Subconscious Diet : It's Not What You Put in Your Mouth; It Is What You Put in Your Mind (2005) by Hugh B. Sanders, p. 104 
Context: Success means doing the best we can with what we have. Success is the doing, not the getting — in the trying, not the triumph. Success is a personal standard — reaching for the highest that is in us — becoming all that we can be. If we do our best, we are a success. Success is the maximum utilization of the ability that you have.

“I've almost asked that question, then realized it's good for my soul not to know. For a while! Just to let the evening wear on and see what I think of this person without knowing what he does and how successful he is, or what a failure. We're ranking everybody every minute of the day.”

Arthur Miller (1915–2005) playwright from the United States

Paris Review (Summer 1966)
Context: Success, instead of giving freedom of choice, becomes a way of life. There's no country I've been to where people, when you come into a room and sit down with them, so often ask you, "What do you do?" And, being American, many's the time I've almost asked that question, then realized it's good for my soul not to know. For a while! Just to let the evening wear on and see what I think of this person without knowing what he does and how successful he is, or what a failure. We're ranking everybody every minute of the day.

Soul, Failure, Question, Thinking

“All in all it is difficult not to feel that pacifism, as it appears among a section of the intelligentsia, is secretly inspired by an admiration for power and successful cruelty.”

George Orwell (1903–1950) English author and journalist

"Notes on Nationalism" (1945)
Context: The majority of pacifists either belong to obscure religious sects or are simply humanitarians who object to taking life and prefer not to follow their thoughts beyond that point. But there is a minority of intellectual pacifists, whose real though unacknowledged motive appears to be hatred of western democracy and admiration for totalitarianism. Pacifist propaganda usually boils down to saying that one side is as bad as the other, but if one looks closely at the writing of the younger intellectual pacifists, one finds that they do not by any means express impartial disapproval but are directed almost entirely against Britain and the United States. Moreover they do not as a rule condemn violence as such, but only violence used in defence of western countries. The Russians, unlike the British, are not blamed for defending themselves by warlike means, and indeed all pacifist propaganda of this type avoids mention of Russia or China. It is not claimed, again, that the Indians should abjure violence in their struggle against the British. Pacifist literature abounds with equivocal remarks which, if they mean anything, appear to mean that statesmen of the type of Hitler are preferable to those of the type of Churchill, and that violence is perhaps excusable if it is violent enough. After the fall of France, the French pacifists, faced by a real choice which their English colleagues have not had to make, mostly went over to the Nazis, and in England there appears to have been some small overlap of membership between the Peace Pledge Union and the Blackshirts. Pacifist writers have written in praise of Carlyle, one of the intellectual fathers of Fascism. All in all it is difficult not to feel that pacifism, as it appears among a section of the intelligentsia, is secretly inspired by an admiration for power and successful cruelty.

Feeling, Appearance

“What now strikes us as remarkable about the new moneyed class of the nineteenth century is their complete irresponsibility; they see everything in terms of individual success, with hardly any consciousness that the community exists.”

George Orwell (1903–1950) English author and journalist

"Charles Dickens" (1939)
Context: Dickens's attitude is easily intelligible to an Englishman, because it is part of the English puritan tradition, which is not dead even at this day. The class Dickens belonged to, at least by adoption, was growing suddenly rich after a couple of centuries of obscurity. It had grown up mainly in the big towns, out of contact with agriculture, and politically impotent; government, in its experience, was something which either interfered or persecuted. Consequently it was a class with no tradition of public service and not much tradition of usefulness. What now strikes us as remarkable about the new moneyed class of the nineteenth century is their complete irresponsibility; they see everything in terms of individual success, with hardly any consciousness that the community exists.

Money, Communication

“To be successful, you have to have your heart in your business, and your business in your heart. ”

Tom Watson (1874–1956) American businessman

Success, Business, Business, Heart

“Success isn’t determined by how many times you win, but by how you play the week after you lose.”

Pelé (1940–2022) Brazilian association football player

Time

“I have nothing in common with lazy people who blame others for their lack of success.”

Kobe Bryant (1978–2020) American basketball player

People

“I think success is when you are confronted with utter defeat of your world, your intimacy, your ideas, your public picture, your heritage, your previous achievements. When in one moment it looks like there is one, and nothing that helps you. When almost every look is also a look of doubt, when you yourself put everything under the question mark. When all the illusions about yourself fall, illusions about your surroundings, about people, about faith and religion, about flags, about objects of love and how much are you in love…and then, in that moment of personal and private holocaust, of that ocean of pain looking like all inner strength faded away, and there is no right for excuses about your existence. When at that moment you rise and keep moving forward, you start and you lead a creative and productive life. Yes, I think that is objective strength and power.”

Alfred Freddy Krupa (1971) Croatian contemporary painter, master draughtsman, book artist and art teacher, the pioneer of the New Ink Art m…

Overcoming a Personal Holocaust, Alfred Freddy Krupa (in the article by Ante Vranković), Life As A Human (Canada), 2019
2010s

Faith, Religion, Pain, Question

“The pursuit of success is marked by numerous characteristics; including, perseverance, commitment, education, and wisdom, to name a few. The road to failure can also be described with countless personality traits, including, unreliable, indolence, ignorance, and ineptitude.
However, during my thirty years as an administrator I have witnessed the most significant rationale for failure that cannot be described in a single word. It is a characteristic some people possess, often referred to by psychologists as the, need-to-be-liked-syndrome. Unfortunately, for some, their existence is predicated upon pleasing others, and seeking approval and recognition. They have become an inmate or prisoner to the thoughts and opinions of others.
In other words, they lack self-value, and therefore must receive it from others. When you do not value yourself, then it will be difficult to obtain joy and contentment in one’s life. Remember; you have worth and value.”

Gandolfo – (RJ Intindola)

1997

Personality, People, Failure, Self-confidence

“Wonder not at the failures, rather learn to marvel at success.”

Swami Samarpanananda Monk, Author, Teacher

Junglezen Sheru ( Page 89 )

Failure, Learning

“Successful people who wish to maintain their successes must make the decision to do so.”

Isaac Mashman (2000) businessman, speaker

Making love, People, Decision

“If one advances confidently in the direction of his dream, and endeavours to live the life which he had imagines, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours.”

Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862) 1817-1862 American poet, essayist, naturalist, and abolitionist

Life, Confidence, Imagination, Dreams

“Destiny is smiling at the people who are going to become successful, but are still struggling in the present moment.”

Mwanandeke Kindembo (1996) Congolese author

Smile, People

“Reading more books will only confuse you more and you will be dreaming about success instead of becoming successful yourself.”

Mwanandeke Kindembo (1996) Congolese author

Reading, Dreams, Books

“Shortcuts will only satisfy and give you success in the present moment. But the future is preserved for those who are fully prepared for it. The people who didn't skip the basics.”

Mwanandeke Kindembo (1996) Congolese author

Future, People

“You have nothing to trust to but your own energy and the sublime instinct of an ancient people. You must act as if everything depended on your individual efforts. The secret of success is constancy of purpose. Go to your homes, and teach there these truths, which will soon be imprinted on the conscience of the land. Make each man feel how much rests on his own exertions... Act in this spirit, and you will succeed. You will maintain your country in its present position. But you will do more than that, you will deliver to your posterity a land of liberty, of prosperity, of power, and of glory.”

Benjamin Disraeli (1804–1881) British Conservative politician, writer, aristocrat and Prime Minister

Source: Speech to the National Union of Conservative and Constitutional Associations in Crystal Palace, London (24 June 1872), quoted in Selected Speeches of the Late Right Honourable the Earl of Beaconsfield, Volume II, ed. T. E. Kebbel (1882), pp. 534-535

Home, Dependency, Country, Effort

“Quality leadership necessitates the ability to positively influence others within the organization to achieve success and common goals.”

Gandolfo – (RJ Intindola)

1999

“Do not be abashed
by your
Failures.

Learn from them…
and Re-start!

In every Mistake,
there is a great potential for Growth.

You learn more from Failure
than
Success!”

Stephie Pahlavi Zan

Failure, Learning

“Do not compare your struggles to anyone else's.
Do not become discouraged by another's success.
Create your own path and do not ever give up!”

Stephie Pahlavi Zan

“I do not think that there is any other quality so essential to success of any kind as the quality of perseverance.”

John D. Rockefeller (1839–1937) American business magnate and philanthropist

As quoted in How They Succeeded (1901) by Orison Swett Marden
Context: I do not think that there is any other quality so essential to success of any kind as the quality of perseverance. It overcomes almost everything, even nature.

Thinking, Perseverance

“To act—that is true wisdom. I can be what I want to be, but I have to want whatever it is. Success consists in being successful, not in having the potential for success.”

Fernando Pessoa book The Book of Disquiet

Source: The Book of Disquiet

Wisdom

“If you wish success in life, make perseverance your bosom friend, experience your wise counselor, caution your elder brother and hope your guardian genius.”

Joseph Addison (1672–1719) politician, writer and playwright

The earliest appearance of this proverb yet located is in Eliza Cook's Journal Vol. 11, (1854), p. 128, and the earliest attribution to Addison yet found is in Public Ledger Almanac (1887), p. 20.
Disputed
Source: https://www.google.com/books/edition/The_New_Era/XD8DAAAAYAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=addison%20%22hope%20your%20guardian%20genius%22&pg=PA1&printsec=frontcover&bsq=addison%20%22hope%20your%20guardian%20genius%22 Many Thoughts of Many Minds

Life, Hope, Perseverance

“A thinker sees his own actions as experiments and questions — as attempts to find out something. Success and failure are for him answers above all.”

Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) German philosopher, poet, composer, cultural critic, and classical philologist

Sec. 41
The Gay Science (1882)

Failure, Question

“Success is a journey not a destination. The doing is usually more important than the outcome. Not everyone can be Number 1.”

Arthur Ashe (1943–1993) American tennis player

“I'd rather be a failure at something I enjoy than a success at something I hate.”

George Burns (1896–1996) American comedian, actor, and writer

Hate, Failure

“The significant relationships of early adulthood are thus construed as the means to an end of individual achievement, and these "transitional figures" must be cast off or reconstructed following the realization of success. If in the process, however, they become, like Dido, an impediment to the fulfillment of the Dream, then the relationship must be renounced, "to allow the developmental process" to continue. This process is defined by Levinson explicitly as one of individuation: "throughout the life cycle, but especially in the key transition periods… the developmental process of individuation is going on." The process refers "to the changes in a person's relationships to himself and to the external world," the relationships that constitute his "Life Structure" (p. 195).

If in the course of "Becoming One's Own Man," this structure is discovered to be flawed and threatens the great expectations of the Dream, then in order to avert "serious Failure or Decline," the man must "break out" to salvage his Dream. This act of breaking out is consummated by a "marker event" of separation, such as "leaving his wife, quitting his job, or moving to another region" (p. 206). Thus the road to mid-life salvation runs through either achievement or separation.”

Carol Gilligan (1936) American feminist, ethicist, and psychologist

Source: In a Different Voice: Psychological Theory and Women's Development

Life, World, Dreams, Failure

“The greatest revenge is massive success.”

Les Brown (1945) American politician

Revenge

“Nothing is too small. I counsel you, put down in record even your doubts and surmises. Hereafter it may be of interest to you to see how true you guess. We learn from failure, not from success!”

Bram Stoker book Dracula

Professor Abraham Van Helsing to Dr. John Seward
Source: Dracula (1897)

Failure, Learning

“If a book about failures doesn't sell, is it a success?”

Jerry Seinfeld (1954) American comedian and actor

Funny, Books, Failure

“Nothing is lost that we do not first see as lost. Visions born of fear give birth to our failing.
Visions born of hope give birth to our success.
What is possible lives within us, and it only remains for us to discover it.”

Terry Brooks (1944) American writer

Fear, Hope, Birth

“… you have to use your failures as stepping stones to success. You have to maintain a fine balance between hope and despair. In the end it’s all a question of balance.”

Rohinton Mistry A Fine Balance

Source: A Fine Balance

Hope, Failure, Question, Despair

“You'll never achieve real success unless you like what you're doing.”

Dale Carnegie (1888–1955) American writer and lecturer

“We all strive for safety, prosperity, comfort, long life, and dullness. The deer strives with his supple legs, the cowman with trap and poison, the statesman with pen, the most of us with machines, votes, and dollars, but it all comes to the same thing: peace in our time. A measure of success in this is all well enough, and perhaps is a requisite to objective thinking, but too much safety seems to yield only danger in the long run. Perhaps this is behind Thoreau’s dictum: In wildness is the salvation of the world. Perhaps this is the hidden meaning in the howl of the wolf, long known among mountains, but seldom perceived among men.”

Aldo Leopold book A Sand County Almanac

“Arizona and New Mexico: Thinking Like a Mountain”, p. 133. This is a paraphrase of Thoreau: see explanation by the Walden Woods project http://www.walden.org/Library/Quotations/The_Henry_D._Thoreau_Mis-Quotation_Page). Source: A Sand County Almanac, 1949, "Arizona and New Mexico: On Top," & "Arizona and New Mexico: Thinking Like a Mountain"

Life, Men, World, Peace

“… success is not a comparison of what we have done with what others have done.”

Myles Munroe (1954–2014) Bahamian Evangelical Christian minister

Source: understanding your potential discovering the hidden you

“Success is getting what you want; happiness is wanting what you get.”

Ingrid Bergman (1915–1982) Film actress from Sweden

Motivational, Success, Happy, For women

“There is only one success … to be able to spend your life in your own way.”

Christopher Morley Where the Blue Begins

Where the Blue Begins (1922)

Success, Cute, Graduation, Life

“The more tranquil a man becomes, the greater is his success, his influence, his power for good. Calmness of mind is one of the beautiful jewels of wisdom.”

James Allen (1864–1912) British philosophical writer

As A Man Thinketh (1902), Serenity
Context: The calm man, having learned how to govern himself, knows how to adapt himself to others; and they, in turn, reverence his spiritual strength, and feel that they can learn of him and rely upon him. The more tranquil a man becomes, the greater is his success, his influence, his power for good.

Wisdom, Beauty