One of the most essential things you need to do for yourself is to choose a goal that is important to you. Perfection does not exist—you can always do better and you can always grow.
—Les Brown
Excellence is best described as doing the right things right—selecting the most important things to be done and then accomplishing them 100% correctly.
—Unknown
True happiness is the full use of your powers along lines of excellence in a life affording scope.
—John F. Kennedy (1917–63) American Head of State, Journalist
It is just the little difference between the good and the best that makes the difference between the artist and the artisan. It is just the little touches after the average man would quit that makes the master’s fame.
—Orison Swett Marden (1850–1924) American New Thought Writer, Physician, Entrepreneur
The master of the art of living makes little distinction between his work and his play, his labor and his leisure, his mind and his body, his information and his recreation, his love and his religion. He hardly knows which is which. He simply pursues his vision of excellence at whatever he does, leaving others to decide whether he is working or playing. To him, he’s always doing both.
—James A. Michener (1907–97) American Novelist, Short Story Writer, Historian
Winners have the ability to step back from the canvas of their lives like an artist gaining perspective. They make their lives a work of art—an individual masterpiece.
—Denis Waitley (b.1933) American Motivational Speaker, Author
Life is like a play: it’s not the length, but the excellence of the acting that matters.
—Seneca the Younger (Lucius Annaeus Seneca) (c.4 BCE–65 CE) Roman Stoic Philosopher, Statesman, Tragedian
There is one plain rule of life. Try thyself unweariedly till thou findest the highest thing thou art capable of doing, faculties and outward circumstances being both duly considered, and then do it.
—John Stuart Mill (1806–73) English Philosopher, Economist
The less justified a man is in claiming excellence for his own self, the more ready he is to claim all excellence for his nation, his religion, his race or his holy cause… A man is likely to mind his own business when it is worth minding; when it is not, he takes his mind off his own meaningless affairs by minding other people’s business.
—Eric Hoffer (1902–83) American Philosopher, Author
Do a little more each day than you think you possibly can.
—Lowell Thomas (1892–1981) American Writer, Businessperson, Journalist, Radio Personality
Continuous effort – not strength or intelligence – is the key to unlocking our potential.
—Winston Churchill (1874–1965) British Head of State, Political leader, Historian, Journalist, Author
Excellence is a better teacher than mediocrity. The lessons of the ordinary are everywhere. Truly profound and original insights are to be found only in studying the exemplary.
—Warren Bennis (1925–2014) American Business Academic, Author
Johnson well says, “He who waits to do a great deal of good at once will never do anything.” Life is made up of little things. It is very rarely that an occasion is offered for doing a great deal at once. True greatness consists in being great in little things.
—Charles Simmons (1924–2017) American Editor, Novelist
The superior man is modest in his speech but exceeds in his actions.
—Confucius (551–479 BCE) Chinese Philosopher
Excellent people are honored wherever they go.
—Tibetan Proverb
Excellence is not a skill. It is an attitude.
—Ralph Marston
Don’t waste your time striving for perfection, instead, strive for excellence—doing your best.
—Laurence Olivier (1907–89) English Actor, Producer, Director
Excellence is not being the best; it is doing your best.
—The Holy Bible Scripture in the Christian Faith
Put the uncommon effort into the common task … make it large by doing it in a great way.
—Orison Swett Marden (1850–1924) American New Thought Writer, Physician, Entrepreneur
Strive for excellence, not perfection.
—H. Jackson Brown, Jr. (b.1940) American Self-Help Author
Excellence is not an act but a habit. The things you do the most are the things you will do the best.
—Marva Collins (b.1936) American Educator
Excellence means when a man or woman asks of himself more than others do.
—Jose Ortega y. Gasset (1883–1955) Spanish Critic, Journalist, Philosopher
Excellence in any department can be attained only by the labor of a lifetime; it is not to be purchased at a lesser price.
—Samuel Johnson (1709–84) British Essayist
If one is master of one thing and understands one thing well, one has at the same time, insight into and understanding of many things.
—Vincent van Gogh (1853–90) Dutch Painter
The society which scorns excellence in plumbing because plumbing is a humble activity, and tolerates shoddiness in philosophy because philosophy is an exalted activity, will have neither good plumbing nor good philosophy. Neither its pipes nor its theories will hold water.
—John W. Gardner (1912–2002) American Activist
I start where the last man left off.
—Thomas Edison (1847–1931) American Inventor, Scientist, Entrepreneur
I am a writer because writing is the thing I do best.
—Flannery O’Connor (1925–1964) American Novelist
Great men are little men expanded; great lives are ordinary lives intensified.
—Wilferd Arlan Peterson (1900–95) American Author
Men have various subjects in which they may excel, or at least would be thought to excel, and though they love to hear justice done to them where they know they excel, yet they are most and best flattered upon those points where they wish to excel and yet are doubtful whether they do or not.
—Earl of Chesterfield (1694–1773) English Statesman, Man of Letters
Excellence is an art won by training and habituation. We do not act rightly because we have virtue or excellence, but we rather have those because we have acted rightly. We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act but a habit.
—Aristotle (384BCE–322BCE) Ancient Greek Philosopher, Scholar
If anything is worth doing, do it with all your heart.
—Buddhist Teaching
Next to excellence, comes the appreciation of it.
—William Makepeace Thackeray (1811–63) English Novelist
I was raised to believe that excellence is the best deterrent to racism or sexism. And that’s how I operate my life.
—Oprah Winfrey (b.1954) American TV Personality
Surely a man has come to himself only when he has found the best that is in him, and has satisfied his heart with the highest achievement he is fit for.
—Woodrow Wilson (1856–1924) American Head of State
Every job is a self-portrait of the person who did it. Autograph your work with excellence.
—Unknown
Each excellent thing, once learned, serves for a measure of all other knowledge.
—Philip Sidney (1554–86) English Soldier Poet, Courtier
It is the nature, and the advantage, of strong people that they can bring out the crucial questions and form a clear opinion about them. The weak always have to decide between alternatives that are not their own.
—Dietrich Bonhoeffer (1906–45) German Lutheran Pastor, Theologian
One shining quality lends a luster to another, or hides some glaring defect.
—William Hazlitt (1778–1830) English Essayist
The love of fame is almost another name for the love of excellence; or it is the ambition to attain the highest excellence, sanctioned by the highest authority, that of time.
—William Hazlitt (1778–1830) English Essayist
There is always a best way of doing everything.
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–82) American Philosopher
Satisfaction lies in the effort, not in the attainment. Full effort is full victory.
—Mohandas K. Gandhi (1869–1948) Indian Hindu Political leader
I always remember an epitaph which is in the cemetery at Tombstone, Arizona. It says: “Here lies Jack Williams. He done his damnedest.” I think that is the greatest epitaph a man can have.
—Harry S. Truman (1884–1972) American Head of State
Let nothing be done in your life, which will cause you fear if it becomes known to your neighbor.
—Epicurus (c.341–270 BCE) Greek Philosopher
The best preparation for tomorrow is to do today’s work superbly well.
—William Osler (1849–1919) Canadian Physician
Today, and every day, deliver more than you are getting paid to do. The victory of success will be half won when you learn the secret of putting out more than is expected in all that you do. Make yourself so valuable in your work that eventually you will become indispensable. Exercise your privilege to go the extra mile, and enjoy all the rewards you receive. You deserve them!
—Og Mandino (1923–96) American Self-Help Author
You get the best out of others when you give the best of yourself.
—Harvey Samuel Firestone (1868–1938) American Industrialist
If happiness is activity in accordance with excellence, it is reasonable that it should be in accordance with the highest excellence.
—Aristotle (384BCE–322BCE) Ancient Greek Philosopher, Scholar
It is not from ourselves that we learn to be better than we are.
—Wendell Berry (b.1934) American Poet, Novelist, Environmentalist
We do not do well except when we know where the best is and when we are assured that we have touched it and hold its power within us.
—Joseph Joubert (1754–1824) French Writer, Moralist
All my life I’ve always had the urge to do things better than anybody else.
—Babe Didrikson Zaharias (1914–56) American Athlete, Golfer