Motivational Quotes
Motivational Quotes - Everyone is working hard on getting faster. This time of year, most of us are inside for our training making the mental aspect of our training incrementally more challenging. I have a white board on the wall in my Power Penthouse / Pain Cave where I write goals for the week & work out and motivational quotes.
Below is a list of quotes that I have pulled together, some resonating with me on certain days and in certain moods. I hope you find a couple that help you on your challenging days. Please contribute your favorites and we can pull together a summary set of empowering words for our mental 6 pack.
"We are judged by what we finish, not by what we start" - Anonymous
"Pain is temporary. It may last a minute, or an hour, or a day, or a year, but eventually it will subside and something else will take its place. If I quit however, it lasts forever." - Lance Armstrong
"Do, or do not. There is no try" - Yoda
"Do you think my muscles have anything to do with my being faster and stronger?" -Morpheus, The Matrix
"The longer the race gets, the stronger I get" - Michael McCormack.
You can keep going and your legs might hurt for a week or you can quit and your mind will hurt for a lifetime. (Mark Allen)
In the words of John Blazeman:
Live more than your neighbors.
Unleash yourself upon the world and go places.
Go now. Giggle, no, Laugh. No...stay out past dark
And bark at the moon like the wild dog that you are
Understand that this is not a dress rehearsal.
This is it. Your life.
Face your fears and live your dreams. Take it all in.
Yes, every chance you get. Come close.
And by all means, whatever you do, get it on film.
Every day, think as you wake up,
Today I am fortunate to have woken up,
I am alive, I have a precious human life,
I am not going to waste it.
I am going to use all my energies
To develop myself.
To expand my heart out to others,
To achieve enlightenment for the benefit of all beings,
I am going to have kind thoughts towards others,
I am not going to get angry, or think badly about others,
I am going to benefit others As much as I can."
"Bathed in sweat, bent over and gasping for breath at the finish line, the athlete might have wondered aloud if this is what death must feel like. In time this athlete will surely realize the opposite. Indeed, this is what life feels like."
-George Straznitskas
You can't get much done in life if you only work on the days when you feel good. - Wayne Gretzky
You'll miss 100% of the shots you never take. Michael Jordan
I've failed over and over again in my life and that is why I succeed. - Muhammad Ali
T.S. Elliot once said, "Only those who risk going too far can possibly find out how far one can go."
"The will to succeed is nothing without the will to prepare" - Juma Ikaanga
"Today I do what others will not, so that tomorrow I can do what others can't"
"Pain is weakness leaving the body."
"Pain is speed entering the body"
"Don't surrender to comfort"
"Someone, somewhere in the world, is training while you are not. When you race him, he will win." -Tom Flemming
"The real glory is being knocked to your knees and then coming back. That's real glory." - Vince Lombardi
"Luck? Sure. But only after long practice and only with the ability to think under pressure." - Babe Didrikson Zaharias
"The most important key to achieving great success is to decide upon your goal and launch, get started, take action, move." - John Wooden
"Luck? Sure. But only after long practice and only with the ability to think under pressure." - Babe Didrikson Zaharias
"The most important key to achieving great success is to decide upon your goal and launch, get started, take action, move." - John Wooden
"It's lack of faith that makes people afraid of meeting challenges, and I believed in myself."- Muhammad Ali
You miss 100% of the shots you don't take."- Wayne Gretzky
"The only one who can tell you 'you can't ' is you. And you don't have to listen."- Nike
"Motivation is a fire from within. If someone else tries to light that fire under you, chances are it will burn very briefly."
Stephen R. Covey
Stephen R. Covey
If at first you don’t succeed, you are running about average. M.H. Alderson
Nothing succeeds like success. Proverb
I learned that if you want to make it bad enough, no matter how bad it is, you can make it. Gale Sayers
My thoughts before a big race are usually pretty simple. I tell myself: Get out of he blocks, run your race, stay relaxed. If you run your race, you'll win....Channel your energy. Focus. Carl Lewis
You have no control over what the other guy does. You only have control over what you do. A J Kitt
If you set a goal for yourself and are able to achieve it, you have won your race. Your goal can be to come in first, to improve your performance, or just finish the race its up to you. Dave Scott
Winning is only half of it. Having fun is the other half. Bum Phillips
You are never a loser until you quit trying. Mike Ditka
Champions aren't made in the gyms. Champions are made from something they have deep inside them -- a desire, a dream, a vision. Muhammad Ali
If you aren't going all the way, why go at all? Joe Namath
The will to win is important, but the will to prepare is vital. Joe Paterno
You have to expect things of yourself before you can do them. Michael Jordan
“By failing to prepare you are preparing to fail.” Benjamin Franklin
"In life prepare for the hard and all you will encounter will be the required or easy."
- Paul Thompson
- Paul Thompson
“Men succeed when they realize that their failures are the preparation for their victories."
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Ralph Waldo Emerson
"I will prepare and some day my chance will come." - Abraham Lincoln
"The most prepared are the most dedicated." - Raymond Berry
"Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity." - Seneca
"In the field of observation, chance favors only the prepared minds." -Louis Pasteur
"You don't run twenty-six miles at five minutes a mile on good looks and a secret recipe." - Frank Shorter
"The trouble with not having a goal is that you can spend your life running up and down the field and never score." -Bill Copeland
"Goals are not only absolutely necessary to motivate us. They are essential to really keep us alive." - Robert H. Schuller
"For me, goals are my road map to the life I want. They have helped me accomplish things I once thought were impossible." - Catherine Pulsifer, from Wings of Wisdom
"Choosing a goal and sticking to it changes everything." - Scott Reed
"You have to set goals that are almost out of reach. If you set a goal that is attainable without much work or thought, you are stuck with something below your true talent and potential." Steve Garvey
"The difference between the impossible and the possible lies in a man's determination." - Tommy Lasorda
"If you believe in yourself, have dedication and pride and never quit, you'll be a winner. The price of victory is high, but so are the rewards." - Paul Bryant
"You can't get much done in life if you only work on the days when you feel good." - Jerry West
"If you believe in yourself, have dedication and pride and never quit, you'll be a winner. The price of victory is high, but so are the rewards." - Paul Bryant
"You can't get much done in life if you only work on the days when you feel good." - Jerry West
"The answer to three questions will determine your success or failure.
1 - Can people trust me to do my best?
2 - Am I committed to the task in hand?
3 - Do I care about other people and show it?
If the answers to all three questions are yes, there is no way you can fail." - Lou Holtz
1 - Can people trust me to do my best?
2 - Am I committed to the task in hand?
3 - Do I care about other people and show it?
If the answers to all three questions are yes, there is no way you can fail." - Lou Holtz
"The difference between a successful person and others is not a lack of strength, not a lack of knowledge, but rather in a lack of will." - Vincent T. Lombardi
"Do you know what my favorite part of the game is? The opportunity to play." - Mike Singletary
"Do you know what my favorite part of the game is? The opportunity to play." - Mike Singletary
"The spirit, the will to win, and the will to excel are the things that endure. These qualities are so much more important than the events that occur." - Vince Lombardi
"It's not whether you get knocked down; it's whether you get back up." - Vince Lombardi
"It's not whether you get knocked down; it's whether you get back up." - Vince Lombardi
"If you don't invest very much, then defeat doesn't hurt very much and winning is not very exciting." - Dick Vermeil
"I didn't just jump back on the bike and win. There were a lot of ups and downs, good results and bad results, but this time I didn't let the lows get to me." - Lance Armstrong
"Experience tells you what to do; confidence allows you to do it." - Stan Smith
"The difference between the impossible and the possible lies in a man's determination." - Tommy Lasorda
"The difference between the impossible and the possible lies in a man's determination." - Tommy Lasorda
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Comments
" The greatest unhappiness in life comes from, giving up what you want most, for what you want now !!"
" See it, Believe it, Train it, Achieve it !! "
Thank You, I will putting some of these up.
“I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived.” ~ Henry David Thoreau, Walden (1854)
“The truest measure of Character is what we do when we think no one is looking.” ~ Unknown
"Never give up on what you really want to do. The person with big dreams is more powerful than one with all the facts." ~ Unknown
"Go confidently in the direction of your dreams. Live the life you have imagined." ~ Henry David Thoreau
"Do not go where the path may lead, go instead where there is no path and leave a trail." ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson
“If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where they should be. Now put the foundations under them.” ~ Henry David Thoreau
“To be what we are, and to become what we are capable of becoming, is the only end of life.” ~ Robert Louis Stevenson
"Superficial goals lead to superficial results." ~ Attila the Hun
"Risk more than others think is safe. Care more than others think is wise. Dream more than others think is practical. Expect more than others think is possible." ~ Claude Thomas Bissell
"Try not. Do or do not. There is no try." ~ Master Yoda, The Empire Strikes Back
"What lies behind you and what lies in front of you, pales in comparison to what lies inside of you." ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson
“Your vision will become clear only when you look into your heart. Who looks outside, dreams. Who looks inside, awakens.” ~ Carl Jung
"I've had a wonderful evening, but this wasn't it." ~ Groucho Marx
“Only those who dare to fail greatly can ever achieve greatly.” ~ Robert F. Kennedy
“We don't receive wisdom; we must discover it for ourselves after a journey that no one can take for us or spare us.” ~ Marcel Proust (1871 - 1922)
“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn't do than by the ones you did. So throw off the bowlines, Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream." ~ Mark Twain (1835-1910)
"Your life is the sum total of the choices you've made. If you don't like your life, make better choices." ~ John Gilbert
“Resistance drains energy, acceptance saves it, cheerfulness sustains it.” ~ Unknown
-Archilochus
Some awesome ones here. Great thread I love quotes.
Here's one I go to when the session is really kicking my ass:
"I hated every minute of training, but I said 'Don't quit, suffer now and live the rest of your life as a champion'" - Mohammed Ali
"It is an Ironman: it's supposed to hurt."
The man who finds himself at the top of the mountain did not fall there.
"I lift things up and put them down." Anybody else think that commercial is funny?
I'm not as philosophical ....here's some that work for me..."
"Move your arse!" - Chef Gordon Ramsey
"Cowboy up mother f---er!" - unknown, but probably a grumpy cowboy
"Git er done!" - Larry The Cable Guy
Matt, thanks for sharing all of these. This one hits home right now as in past years I have set goals that I knew I would be able to achieve.
"You have power over your mind - not outside events. Realize this, and you will find strength."
— Marcus Aurelius
So many great quotes from Steve Prefontaine!
A lot of people run a race to see who is fastest. I run to see who has the most guts, who can punish himself into exhausting pace, and then at the end, punish himself even more.
I'm going to work so that it's a pure guts race at the end, and if it is, I am the only one who can win it.
Somebody may beat me, but they are going to have to bleed to do it.
To give anything less than your best is to sacrifice the gift.
You have to wonder at times what you're doing out there. Over the years, I've given myself a thousand reasons to keep running, but it always comes back to where it started. It comes down to self-satisfaction and a sense of achievement.
"Unless you test yourself, you stagnate. Unless you try to go way beyond what you've been able to do before, you won't develop and grow. When you go for it 100%, when you don't have the fear of "what if I fail," that's when you learn, that's when you're really living." ~Mark Allen
@Rich, if you want a source for that type of cowboy quote, use this:
"Yipee kai-yay, motherf***er!" ~Bruce Willis, any Die Hard film
There is no Du, only Tri.
- don't squat with your spurs on
- good judgement comes from experience, and a lotta that comes from bad judgement
- always drink upstream from the herd
- always take a good look at you're about to eat. it's not so important to know what it is but rather what is was
- the biggest troublemaker you'll ever have to deal with watches you shave his face every morning
- the easiest way to eat crow is while it's still warm - the colder it gits the harder it is to swaller
- Outcome = Event + Response.....and you control the Response. If you don't like the Outcome, change the response.
- "If you keep doing what you've always done, you'll keep getting what you've always got"
- "The world doesn't owe you anything, you have to create it"
- Successful people do the uncomfortable to create their desired outcomes"
- "Sooner or later, those who win are thosle who think they can"
- "The Choice of what you believe is up to you. Don't waste your life believing you can't! It's all about attitude"
- "It's OK to ask for guidance and advice from those who know how"
- "Things my come to those who wait, but only the things left over by those who hustle" Abe Lincoln
- "Anything worth doing well is worth doing badly in the beginning"
- "It's always too soon to quit"
- "For every failure, there is an alternative course of action!"
- "No one can make your feel inferior without your consent" Eleanor Roosevelt
- "If I am through learning, then I am through" John Wooden
- "Shoot for the moon, because even if you miss, you land among the stars" Norman Vincent Peale
- "Everyone who got to where they are had to begin where they were"
Great Thread!
"You've got to earn it" - from a Mark Allen autographed poster.
"Say Hawaii, Mate!" - from a Macca autographed poster.
"Esse quam videri" To be, rather than to seem
It is a mainstay of how I try to live my life. I never want to be a poser. =:-[
If you think you are beaten, you are;
If you think you dare not, you don’t.
If you’d like to win, but think you can’t
It’s almost a cinch that you won’t
If you think you’ll lose, you’re lost,
For out in the world we find
Success begins with a fellow’s will;
It’s all in the state of mind.
If you think you’re outclassed, you are.
You’ve got to think high to rise.
You’ve got to be sure of yourself before
You can ever win a prize.
Life’s battles don’t always go
To the stronger or faster man;
But sooner or later the man who wins
Is the one who thinks he can.
--Walter D. Wintle
"It is not the critic who counts: not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes up short again and again, because there is no effort without error or shortcoming, but who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, who spends himself for a worthy cause; who, at the best, knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement, and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who knew neither victory nor defeat."
--Theodore Roosevelt
@ Matt A: In 09, in Oct, I blew up at the IM in Oct, and six weeks later came back to set a PR/CR in Nov IM. Got me thinking a lot about stretching to and past my limits, and getting up again after "failure". "The only way to find your limits is to try and go past them."
Two of my favorites:
"Don't look back, something might be gaining on you." - Stachel Paige; good advice if you're leading a race.
"There's no success like failure and failure's no success at all" - Bob Dylan's poetic take on learning from mistakes and getting basic up after getting knocked down - another theme I'm learning about right now.
'You need to be comfortable with being uncomfortable.' I learned this one from Matt Aro, who I paced in his first 100 mile run. Matt has also run (and won) double ironmans, and last year did Badwater.
"And we remember why we came..." This is a personal one for me. It's from an old Jackson Brown song. I sing this to myself when starting out most races, particularly tris that start in sub 60 degree water!
Mike
wonderful, thanks Matt.
My favorite quote (I may have a few words off) is by Camus: "It is far better to die standing than to live on one's knees."
Mike
Be prepared. Boy Scout motto
The only time I can be deceived is when I want something. Krisnamurta
"The only way to make it stop hurting is to make it hurt more." -- Me
"You can map out a fight plan or a life plan, but when the action starts, it may not go the way you planned, and you're down to your reflexes - your training. That's where your roadwork shows. If you cheated on that in the dark of the morning, your getting found out now, under the bright lights."
Joe Frazier
I send a daily quote out to my staff and publish them to a blogger site for folks to refer back to. If interested check out www.dustysquotes.com You can generally tell when I am working to motivate myself by the quote I send out...