Inspirational Words to Lift Your Spirits
Our inspirational words in the form of quotes from notables were selected with the idea of lifting spirits. There are ups and downs in everyone’s lives – that’s what makes it so interesting.
Part of the trick to a successful life is not dwelling too much on the negative. These thoughts and inspirations can help. Look and see if you find inspirational words to elevate your mood.
Quotes to Inspire and Motivate
1.) When one door closes, another opens. But often, we look so long so regretfully upon the closed door that we fail to see the one that has opened for us.
Helen Keller
2.) There is time for everything.
Thomas A. Edison
3.) Don’t bunt. Aim out of the ballpark.
David Ogilvy
4.) Misfortunes often sharpen the genius.
Ovid
5.) My mission in life is not merely to survive but to thrive; and to do so with some passion, some compassion, some humor, and some style.
Maya Angelou
6.) The essential thing is not knowledge but character.
Joseph Le Conte
Do the Right Thing Inspirational Words
7.) A good name will shine forever.
Unknown
8.) A fair reputation is a plant, delicate in its nature and by no means rapid in its growth. It will not shoot up in a night like the gourd of the prophet, but, like that gourd, it may perish in a night.
Jeremy Taylor
9.) The great hope of society is individual character.
William Ellery Channing
10.) Talents are best nurtured in solitude. Character is best formed in the stormy billows of the world.
Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe
11.) The ones who are crazy enough to think they can change the world are the ones who do.
Unknown
12.) Reach high, for stars lie hidden in your soul. Dream deep, for every dream precedes the goal.
Pamela Vaull Starr
13.) It is precisely the possibility of realizing a dream that makes life interesting.
Paulo Coelho
14.) Problems are only opportunities in work clothes.
Henry J. Kaiser
15.) It is the surmounting of difficulties that makes heroes.
Lajos Kossuth
16.) A man can be as great as he wants to be. If you believe in yourself and have the courage, the determination, the dedication, the competitive drive and if you are willing to sacrifice the little things in life and pay the price for the things that are worthwhile, it can be done.
Vince Lombardi
17.) Wherever we look upon this earth, the opportunities take shape within the problems.
Nelson A. Rockefeller
18.) Seek not, my soul, the life of the immortals;
but enjoy to the full the resources that are within thy reach.
Pindar
Inspirational Words to Lift Your Spirits
19.) In teaching history, there should be extensive discussion of personalities who benefited mankind through independence of character and judgment.
Albert Einstein
20.) Don’t compromise yourself. You are all you’ve got.
Janis Joplin
21.) There comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular, but he must take it because his conscience tells him it is right.
Martin Luther
22.) That which does not kill you makes you stronger.
Nietzsche
23.) We always strive after what is forbidden and desire the things refused us.
Ovid
24.) Sweet are the uses of adversity,
Which like the toad, ugly and venomous,
Wears yet a precious jewel in his head.
William Shakespeare
25.) A wretched soul, bruis’d with adversity,
We bid be quiet when we hear it cry;
But were we burthen’d with like weight of pain,
As much, or more, we should ourselves complain.
William Shakespeare
26.) Surmounted difficulties not only teach but hearten us in our future struggles.
James Sharp
27.) Adversity introduces a man to himself.
Unknown
28.) Who aims at excellence will be above mediocrity; who aims at mediocrity will be far short of it.
Unknown
Inspiring Thoughts
29.) The art of living lies less in eliminating our troubles than in growing with them.
Bernard M. Baruch
30.) Be your character what it will; it will be known, and nobody will take it upon your word.
Lord Chesterfield
31.) Character is what you think in the dark.
Dwight L. Moody
32.) Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven’t found it yet, keep looking. Don’t settle. As with all matters of the heart, you’ll know when you find it.
Steve Jobs
Character Counts Quotes
33.) Character and personal force are the only investments that are worth anything.
Walt Whitman
34.) Every thought willingly contemplated, every word meaningly spoken, every action freely done, consolidates itself in the character and will project itself onward in a permanent continuity.
Henry Giles
35.) A man’s character is like his shadow, which sometimes follows and sometimes precedes him, and which is occasionally longer, occasionally shorter than he is.
Madame de la Rochejuquelein
36.) Every man, as to character, is the creature of the age in which he lives. Very few are able to raise themselves above the ideas of their times.
Voltaire
37.) Nothing of character is really permanent but virtue and personal worth.
Daniel Webster
38.) Character is like a tree, and reputation is like its shadow. The shadow is what we think of it; the tree is the real thing.
Abraham Lincoln
Good Inspirational Quotes
39.) In the absence of clearly defined goals, we become strangely loyal to performing daily acts of trivia.
Unknown
40.) Vitality shows not only in the ability to persist but in the ability to start over.
F. Scott Fitzgerald
41.) Good fortune and bad are equally necessary to man to fit him to meet the contingencies of this life.
Unknown
42.) If you can’t yet do great things, do small things in a great way.
Napoleon Hill
43.) Try not to become a man of success, but rather become a man of value.
Albert Einstein
Tip: Look for opportunities to incorporate quotes and inspirational words into your everyday life, e.g., the boilerplate of your emails, dinnertime conversation, photo captions, and more.
Be Positive Quotations
44.) The rays of happiness, like those of light, are colorless when unbroken.
Henry W. Longfellow
45.) It’s fine to celebrate success, but it is more important to heed the lessons of failure.
Bill Gates
46.) There is no excellence uncoupled with difficulties.
Ovid
47.) Distrust any enterprise that requires new clothes.
Henry David Thoreau
48.) Aspiring minds must sometimes sustain loss.
Plato
49.) Times of great calamity and confusion have ever been productive of the greatest minds. The purest ore is produced from the hottest furnace, and the brightest thunderbolt is elicited from the darkest storm.
Charles Caleb Colton
50.) The man of virtue makes the difficulty to be overcome his first business and success only a subsequent consideration.
Confucius
51.) Character is, for the most part, simply habit become fixed.
C. H. Parkhurst
52.) A gentleman can withstand hardships; it is only the small man who, when submitted to them, is swept off his feet.
Confucius
Persistent Efforts Thoughts
53.) A problem is a chance for you to do your best.
Duke Ellington
54.) It is interesting to notice how some minds seem almost to create themselves, springing up under every disadvantage and working their solitary but irresistible way through a thousand obstacles.
Washington Irving
55.) There are two things to aim at in life: first, to get what you want, and after that, to enjoy it. Only the wisest of mankind has achieved the second.
Logan Pearsall Smith
56.) All sunshine makes the desert.
Proverb
57.) It is not enough to take steps which may someday lead to a goal; each step must be itself a goal and a step likewise.
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
58.) Character is, in the long run, the decisive factor in the life of individuals and of nations alike.
Theodore Roosevelt
59.) Look not mournfully into the past, it comes not back again. Wisely improve the present, it is thine. Go forth to meet the shadowy future without fear and with a manly heart.
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Short Inspirational Words
60.) Be silly, be honest, be kind.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
61.) Learn from yesterday. Live for today. Hope for tomorrow.
Albert Einstein
62.) Real change, enduring change, happens one step at a time.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg
63.) Champions keep playing until they get it right.
Billie Jean King
64.) The way to get started is to quit talking and begin doing.
Walt Disney
Inspiring Words
65.) Little minds are tamed and subdued by misfortune, but great minds rise above them.
Washington Irving
66.) Pick battles big enough to matter, small enough to win.
Jonathan Kozol
67.) A good archer is known not by his arrows but by his aim.
Thomas Fuller
68.) Adversity is the mother of progress.
Mahatma Gandhi
69.) Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it is time to pause and reflect.
Mark Twain
70.) All misfortune is but a stepping stone to fortune.
Henry David Thoreau
71.) If you tell the truth, you don’t have to remember everything.
Mark Twain
72.) Character is the real foundation of all worthwhile success.
John Hays Hammond
Words of Wisdom
73.) You are never too old to set another goal or to dream a new dream.
C.S. Lewis
74.) Talent wins games, but teamwork and intelligence win championships.
Michael Jordan
75.) It is better to fail in originality than to succeed in imitation.
Herman Melville
76.) To succeed in life, you need two things: ignorance and confidence.
Mark Twain
77.) You cannot dream yourself into a character; you must hammer and forge yourself one.
Henry David Thoreau
78.) We must be willing to let go of the life we planned so as to have the life that is waiting for us.
Joseph Campbell
Motivational Quotes
79.) The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams.
Eleanor Roosevelt
80.) How wonderful it is that nobody needs wait a single moment before starting to improve the world.
Anne Frank
81.) Champions keep playing until they get it right.
Billie Jean King
82.) I find that the harder I work, the more luck I seem to have.
Thomas Jefferson
83.) You’ve got to get up every morning with determination if you’re going to go to bed with satisfaction.
George Lorimer
84.) Develop success from failures. Discouragement and failure are two of the surest stepping stones to success.
Dale Carnegie
Positive Quotes
85.) Imperfection is beauty, madness is genius and it’s better to be absolutely ridiculous than absolutely boring.
Marilyn Monroe
86.) It is during our darkest moments that we must focus to see the light.
Aristotle
87.) Character is the result of two things: Mental attitude and the way we spend our time.
Elbert Hubbard
88.) Success is peace of mind, which is a direct result of self-satisfaction in knowing you made the effort to become the best of which you are capable.
John Wooden
89.) Fairy tales are more than true: not because they tell us that dragons exist, but because they tell us that dragons can be beaten.
Neil Gaiman
90.) Perfection is not attainable. But if we chase perfection we can catch excellence.
Vince Lombardi
Words Of Encouragement
91.) Great things are done by a series of small things brought together.
Vincent Van Gogh
92.) We will fail when we fail to try.
Rosa Parks
93.) It always seems impossible until it’s done.
Nelson Mandela
94.) Make each day your masterpiece.
John Wooden
95.) There is always light. If only we’re brave enough to see it. If only we’re brave enough to be it.
Amanda Gorman
96.) We must reach out our hand in friendship and dignity, both to those who would befriend us and those who would be our enemy.
Arthur Ashe
Motivational Inspirational Words
97.) One of the lessons that I grew up with was to always stay true to yourself and never let what somebody else says distract you from your goals.
Michelle Obama
98.) Don’t be afraid to give up the good to go for the great.
John D. Rockefeller
99.) You are never too old to set another goal or to dream a new dream.
Malala Yousafzia
100.) The most difficult thing is the decision to act; the rest is merely tenacity. Amelia Earhart
By Michael O’Halloran
Michael O’Halloran founded Greeting Card Poet in 2014 and has worked as its publisher and editor ever since. He has co-authored four books on kids’ trivia and four on coaching. Previously, Michael was the president of Magnetic Poetry. He has invented and brought over 75 new gift and toy products to market, most of which deal with wordplay. Mike is married and a father of four daughters.
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Please let us know via the Contact page if you know of any inspirational words or quotes that would fit well here. Thanks!
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