Persevering on a task even though the resolution is not immediately apparent.
Stick to it!
“Be like a postage stamp—stick to one thing until you get there.”
Margaret Carty
Failed in business, 1831
Defeated for legislature, 1832
Again failed in business, 1833
Elected to legislature, 1834
Defeated for Speaker, 1838
Defeated for elector, 1840
Defeated for Congress, 1843
Elected to Congress, 1846
Defeated for Congress, 1848
Defeated for Senate, 1855
Defeated for vice-president, 1858
Defeated for Senate, 1858
Elected President of the United States, 1860
Abraham Lincoln
“Patience, persistence and perspiration make an unbeatable combination for success.”
Napolean Hill, author
“Every day you miss playing or practicing is one day longer it takes to be good.”
Ben Hogan, golfer
“Nothing in the world can take the place of persistence.
Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful men with talent.
Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb.
Education will not; the world is full of educated failures.
Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent.”
Calvin Coolidge
“Faith that the thing can be done is essential to any great achievement.”
Thomas N. Carruther
“Always bear in mind that your own resolution to succeed is more important than any other thing.”
Abraham Lincoln
“Tribulation produces perseverance; and perseverance, character; and character, hope.”
Romans 5:3-4
“Constant dripping hollows out a stone.”
Lucretius
“All effort is in the last analysis sustained by faith that it is worth making.”
Ordway Tweed
“When you have a great and difficult task, something perhaps almost impossible,
if you only work a little at a time, everyday a little, suddenly the work will finish itself.”
Isak Dinesen
“Age wrinkles the body. Quitting wrinkles the soul.”
Douglas MacArthur
“I hated every minute of training, but I said, ‘Don’t quit.
Suffer now and live the rest of your life like a champion.’ “
Muhammad Ali
“The difference between perseverance and obstinacy is that one comes from a strong will, and the other from a strong won’t.”
Henry Ward Beecher
“In the realm of ideas, everything depends on enthusiasm;
in the real world, all rests on perseverance.”
Goethe
“Courage and perseverance have a magical talisman,
before which difficulties disappear and obstacles vanish into air.”
John Quincy Adams
“To be able to concentrate for a considerable time is essential to difficult achievement.”
Bertrand Russell
“If I had to select one quality, one personal characteristic that I regard as being most highly correlated with success whatever the field, I would pick the trait of persistence. Determination. The will to endure to the end, to get knocked down 70 times and get up off the floor saying, ‘Here comes number 71!’ “
Richard M. Devos
“Mastery is not something that strikes in an instant, like a thunderbolt, but gathering a power that moves steadily through time, like weather.”
John W. Gardner
“If the only tool you have is a hammer, you will treat the whole world as if it were a nail.”
Edward de Bono
“Flaming enthusiasm, backed up by horse sense and persistence, is the quality that most often makes for success.”
Dale Carnegie
“Persistence is the twin sister of excellence.
One is a matter of quality; the other, a matter of time.”
Marabel Morgan
“Big shots are only little shots who keep shooting.”
Christopher Morley
“Most of the important things in the world have been accomplished by people who have kept on trying when there seemed to be no hope at all.”
Dale Carnegie
“It takes a long time to become young.”
Pablo Picasso
“It is a great nuisance that knowledge can be acquired only by hard work.”
W. Somerset Maugham
“If I have the belief that I can do it, I shall surely acquire the capacity to do it even if I may not have it at the beginning.”
Mahatma Gandhi
“It’s never crowded along the extra mile.”
Dr. Wayne Dyer
“It’s hard to wring my hands when I am busy rolling up my sleeves.”
Linda Geraci
“Those who succeed and do not push on to greater failure are the spiritual middle-classers.”
Eugene O’Neill
“Life is often compared to a marathon, but I think it is more like being a sprinter;
long stretches of hard work punctuated by brief moments in which we are given the opportunity to perform at our best.”
Michael Johnson
“Winning isn’t everything. *Wanting* to win is.”
Catfish Hunter
“Whatever course you decide upon, there is always someone to tell you that you are wrong.
There are always difficulties arising which tempt you to believe that your critics are right.
To map out a course of action and follow it to an end requires courage.”
Ralph Waldo Emerson
“When you get in a tight place and everything goes against you,
till it seems as though you could not hold a minute longer, never give up then,
for that is just the place and time that the tide will turn.”
Harriet Beecher Stowe
“Always continue the climb.
It is possible for you to do whatever you choose if you first get to know who you are and are willing to work with a power that is greater than ourselves to do it.”
Oprah Winfrey
“Nothing of worth or weight can be achieved with half a mind, with a faint heart, and with a lame endeavor.”
Isaac Barrow
“Success seems to be connected with action. Successful men keep moving.
They make mistakes but they don’t quit.”
Conrad Hilton
“Studies indicate that the one quality all successful people have is persistence.
They’re willing to spend more time accomplishing a task and to persevere in the face of many difficult odds. There’s a very positive relationship between people’s ability to accomplish any task and the time they’re willing to spend on it.”
Joyce Brothers, psychologist and author
“Striving for success without hard work is like trying to harvest where you haven’t planted.”
David Bly
“The man who removes a mountain begins by carrying away small stones.”
Chinese proverb
“Grant me the courage not to give up, even though I think it’s hopeless.”
Admiral Chester W. Nimitz
“Obstacles don’t have to stop you. If you run into a wall, don’t turn around and give up.
Figure out how to climb it, go through it, or work around it.”
Michael Jordan
“Being defeated is often a temporary condition. Giving up is what makes it permanent.”
Marlene vos Savant
“I think there are two keys to being creatively productive.
One is not being daunted by one’s fear of failure. The second is sheer perseverance.”
Mary-Claire King
“Fall seven times, stand up eight.”
Japanese proverb
“Perseverance is the hard work you do after you get tired of doing the hard work you already did.”
Newt Gingrich
“It’s always too soon to quit!”
Norman Vincent Peale
“The true art of memory is the art of attention.”
Samuel Johnson
“Energy and persistence conquer all things.”
Benjamin Franklin
“I think and think for months and years. Ninety-nine times the conclusion is false. The hundredth time I am right.”
Albert Einstein
“Great works are performed not by strength, but by perseverance.”
Samuel Johnson
“Greatness comes with recognizing that your potential is limited only by how you choose, how you use your freedom, how resolute you are, how persistent you are – in short, by your attitude.”
Peter Koestenbaum, philosopher
“No matter how big and tough a problem may be, get rid of confusion by taking one little step towards solution. Do something. Then try again. At the worst, so long as you don’t do it the same way twice, you will eventually use up all the wrong ways of doing it and thus the next try will be the right one.”
George F. Nordenhold
“Either I will find a way, or I will make one.”
Philip Sidney
“It’s not that I’m so smart, it’s just that I stay with problems longer.”
Albert Einstein
“In the struggle between the stone and the water, in time, the water wins.”
Chinese proverb
“Strength does not come from winning. Your struggles develop your strengths.
When you go through hardships and decide not to surrender, that is strength.”
Arnold Schwarzenegger
“The man who can drive himself further once the effort gets painful is the man who will win.”
Roger Bannister
“To give yourself the best possible chance of playing to your potential, you must prepare for every eventuality. That means practice.”
Steve Ballesteros, professional golfer
“Let us then be up and doing,
With a heart for any fate;
Still achieving, still pursuing,
Learn to labor and to wait.”
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
“If something is boring after two minutes, try it for four. If still boring, then eight. Then sixteen.
Then thirty-two. Eventually one discovers that it is not boring at all.”
John Cage
“Diligence is the mother of good luck.”
Benjamin Franklin
“The greatest results in life are usually attained by simple means and the exercise of ordinary qualities.
These may for the most part be summed up in these two—commonsense and perseverance.”
Owen Feltham, writer
“Character consists of what you do on the third and fourth tries.”
James A. Michener
“When the world says, ‘Give up,’
Hope whispers, ‘Try it one more time.’ “
Unknown
“Hard work spotlights the character of people: some turn up their sleeves, some turn up their noses, and some don’t turn up at all.”
Sam Ewing
“Let me tell you the secret that has led me to my goal. My strength lies solely in my tenacity.”
Louis Pasteur
“Failure is the condiment that gives success its flavor.”
Truman Capote
“That which we persist in doing becomes easier to do.
Not that the nature of the thing has changed but the power to do it has changed.”
Ralph Waldo Emerson
“Persistence is what makes the impossible possible, the possible likely, and the likely definite.”
Robert Half, executive
“Failure is usually the line of least persistence.”
Wilfred Beaver
“You don’t win an Olympic gold medal with a few weeks of intensive training.”
Seth Godin
“I found that I could find the energy… that I could find the determination to keep on going. I learned that your mind can amaze your body, if you just keep telling yourself, I can do it…I can do it…I can do it!”
Jon Erickson, scientist and author
“Effort only fully releases its reward after a person refuses to quit.”
Napoleon Hill
“The great thing, and the hard thing, is to stick to things when you have outlived the first interest, and not yet got the second, which comes with a sort of mastery.”
Janet Erskine Stuart
“Perseverance alone does not assure success.
No amount of stalking will lead to game in field that has none.”
I Ching
“When we accept tough jobs as a challenge to our ability and wade into them with joy and enthusiasm, miracles can happen.”
Arland Gilbert, writer
“It does not matter how slowly you go so long as you do not stop.”
Confucius
“People of mediocre ability sometimes achieve outstanding success because they don’t know when to quit.”
George Herbert Allen
“The habit of persistence is the habit of victory.”
Herbert Kaufman
“Satisfaction lies in the effort not the attainment.
Full effort is full victory.”
Mahatma Gandhi
“I think I’d like to be remembered as someone who beat the odds through just plain determination. … that I persevered. Because I think that being somewhat of a pest to life, constantly plaguing and pursuing, will bring results.”
Sylvester Stallone
“Don’t watch the clock; do what it does. Keep going.”
Sam Levenson, comedian and author
“Paralyze resistance with persistence.”
Woody Hayes, football coach
“Talent is cheaper than table salt. What separates the talented individual from the successful one is a lot of hard work.”
Stephen King
“I am not judged by the number of times I fail, but by the number of times I succeed. And the number of times I succeed is in direct proportion to the number of times I can fail and keep trying.”
Tom Hopkins, sales trainer and author
“It is no disgrace to start all over. It is usually an opportunity.”
George Matthew Adams, writer
“The odds are with you if you keep on trying.”
Keith DeGreen, radio host and financial planner
“My motto was always to keep swinging. Whether I was in a slump or feeling badly or having trouble off the field, the only thing to do was keep swinging.”
Hank Aaron, baseball great
“Continuous effort—not strength or intelligence—is the key to unlocking our potential.”
Winston Churchill
“If people knew how hard I worked to achieve my mastery, it wouldn’t seem so wonderful after all.”
Michelangelo
“If you have been assigned a task, you had better seriously evaluate your ability to complete it. There is no honor in accepting a remarkably daunting task if you can’t get it done correctly. Lives depend on you. You should not shelter yourself in menial tasks but should carefully assess all situations and take on any challenge you feel able to accomplish. Moreover, remember that once you have committed, you are in. If you suddenly find that you’re in over your head, you had better sprout gills and come up with a way to finish the job.”
R. Needham, in Team Secrets Of The Navy Seals: The Elite Military Force’s Leadership Principles For Business
“Vitality shows not only in the ability to persist, but in the ability to start over.”
F. Scott Fitzgerald
“Persistent people begin their success where others end in failure.”
Edward Eggleston, author and preacher
“Many of life’s failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.”
Thomas Edison
“Champions keep playing until they get it right.”
Billie Jean King
“The person who makes a success of living is the one who sees his goal steadily and aims for it unswervingly.”
Cecil B. DeMille
“You work your whole life to try to be the best you can, even if it’s for only one day or one week.”
Lindsay Davenport, tennis player
“By perseverance the snail reached the ark.”
Charles Hadon Spurgeon
“Genius, that power which dazzles mortal eyes/is oft but perseverance in disguise”
Orison Swett Marden
“Keep right on to the end of the road”
Harry Lauder
“Never say die”
Proverb
“I am a kind of burr: I shall stick.”
William Shakespeare
“If at first you don’t succeed,
Try, try again.”
William Edward Hickson
“Where there is a will there is a way.”
Proverb
“Persistent prophecy is a familiar way of assuring the event.”
George Gissing
“Tis known by the name of perseverance in a good cause, and of obstinacy in a bad one.”
Laurence Sterne
“The necessity of the times more than ever, calls for our utmost circumspection, deliberation, fortitude, and perseverance.”
Samuel Adams
“I’ve failed over and over again in my life and that is why I succeed.”
Michael Jordan, basketball legend
“Much good work is lost for the lack of a little more.”
Edward H. Harriman, railroad executive
“Diamonds ore only lumps of coal that stuck to their jobs.”
B. C. Forbes; Forbes Magazine
“Who ever said anybody has a right to give up?”
Marian Wright Edelman
“Identify your personal limits and then push past them.
Then set new barriers, and repeat the process, again and again and again.”
Nicole Haislett, swimmer, Olympic gold medalist
“The three great essentials to achieve anything worth while are, first, hard work; second, stick-to-itiveness; third, common sense.”
Thomas Edison
“There were no shortcuts, I realized. It took years of racing to build up the mind and body and character until a rider had logged hundreds of races and thousands of miles of road. I wouldn’t be able to win a Tour de France until I had enough iron in my legs, and lungs, and brain and Heart.”
Lance Armstrong
“Think P.I.G. — that’s my motto. P stands for persistence, I stands for integrity, and G stands for guts. These are the ingredients for a successful business and a successful life.”
Linda Chandler, corporate motivational speaker
“It takes 20 years of hard work to become an overnight success.”
Diana Rankin, writer and public speaker
“To succeed in life in today’s world, you must have the will and tenacity to finish the job.”
Chin-Ning Chu, Chinese-American business consultant and author
“Some succeed because they are destined to; most succeed because they are determined to.”
Anatole France
“When I thought couldn’t go on, I forced myself to keep going.
My success is based on persistence, not luck.”
Estée Lauder
“Do not think of today’s failures, but of the success that may come tomorrow.
You have set yourself a difficult task, but you will succeed if you persevere;
and you will find a joy in overcoming obstacles.”
Helen Keller
“Resolve never to quit, never to give up, no matter what the situation.”
Jack Nicklaus
“Just keep going. Everybody gets better if they keep at it.”
Ted Williams, Hall of Fame baseball player
“Obstacles can’t stop you. Problems can’t stop you.
Most of all, other people can’t stop you. Only you can stop you.”
Jeffrey Gitomer, author
“When the going gets tough, the tough get going.”
Wayne Braithwaite, Barry Eastmond
“What is the single most important quality in a tennis champion? I would have to say desire, staying in there and winning matches when you are not playing that well.”
John McEnroe
“Practice is a means of inviting the perfection desired.”
Martha Graham, dancer and choreographer
“Patience is the companion of wisdom.”
St. Augustine
“I will persist until I succeed. Always will I take another step. If that is of no avail I will take another, and yet another.
In truth, one step at a time is not too difficult… I know that small attempts, repeated, will complete any undertaking.”
Og Mandino, author
“There is no failure except in no longer trying.”
Elbert Hubbard
“Perseverance is not a long race; it is many short races one after another.”
Walter Elliott
“Nothing stops the man who desires to achieve. Every obstacle is simply a course to develop his achievement muscle. It’s a strengthening of his powers of accomplishment.”
Thomas Carlyle, Scottish writer and historian
“Courage doesn’t always roar. Sometimes courage is the quiet voice at the end of the day saying, ” ‘I will try again tomorrow.’ “
Mary Anne Radmacher, American writer
“I do not think there is any other quality so essential to success of any kind as the quality of perseverance.
It overcomes almost everything, even nature.”
John Rockefeller, industrialist
“You get some success. You run into some walls.
It’s how tenacious you are, how irrepressible, how ultimately optimistic and tenacious you are about it that will determine your success.”
Steven Ballmer, CEO of Microsoft
“Defeat is simply a signal to press onward.”
Helen Keller
“Can’t is the worst word that’s written or spoken;
doing more harm here than slander or lies;
On it is many a strong spirit broken, and with it many a good purpose dies.
It springs from the lips of the thoughtless each morning and robs us of courage we need through the day;
It rings in our ears like a timely sent warning and laughs when we falter and fall by the way.
Can’t is the father of feeble endeavor, the parent of terror and halfhearted work;
It weakens the efforts of artisans clever, and makes of the toiler an indolent shirk.
It poisons the soul of a man with a vision, it stifles in infancy many a plan;
It greets honest toiling with open derision and mocks at the hopes and dreams of a man.
Can’t is a word none should speak without blushing;
To utter it should be a symbol of shame; ambition and courage it daily is crushing;
It blights a man’s purpose and shortens his aim.
Despise it with all of your hatred of error;
Refuse it the lodgment it seeks in your brain;
Arm against it as a creature of terror, and all that you dream of you someday shall gain.
Can’t is the word that is foe to ambition, an enemy ambushed to shatter your will;
Its prey is forever the man with a mission and bows but to courage and patience and skill.
Hate it, with hatred that’s deep and undying, for once it is welcomed ‘twill break any man;
whatever the goal you are seeking, keep trying and answer this demon by saying: ‘I can.’ “
Edgar Guest
“A failure is not always a mistake, it may simply be the best one can do under the circumstances. The real mistake is to stop trying.”
B.F. Skinner, American psychologist, inventor and author
“No problem can withstand the assault of sustained thinking.”
Voltaire
