Eliminate the word impossible from your thinking and speaking vocabularies. Impossible is a failure word. The thought “It’s impossible” sets off a chain reaction of other thoughts to prove you’re right.
—David J. Schwartz
Capacity is a state of mind. How much we can do depends on how much we think we can do. When you really believe you can do more, your mind thinks creatively and shows you the way.
—David J. Schwartz
Believe it can be done. When you believe something can be done, really believe, your mind will find the ways to do it. Believing a solution paves the way to solution.
—David J. Schwartz
Topics: Belief
There is a good side to every situation.
—David J. Schwartz
Topics: Success & Failure
Do what you fear and fear disappears.
—David J. Schwartz
Topics: Fear, Courage
Look at things not as they are, but as they can be. Visualization adds value to everything. A big thinker always visualizes what can be done in the future. He isn’t stuck with the present
—David J. Schwartz
Believe Big. The size of your success is determined by the size of your belief. Think little goals and expect little achievements. Think big goals and win big success. Remember this, too! Big ideas and big plans are often easier—certainly no more difficult—than small ideas and small plans.
—David J. Schwartz
Topics: Goals, Belief
A man big enough to be humble appears more confident than the insecure man who feels compelled to call attention to his accomplishments. A little modesty goes a long way.
—David J. Schwartz
To fight fear, act. To increase fear—wait, put off, postpone.
—David J. Schwartz
Topics: Difficulty, Obstacles, Courage, Action
All great achievements require time.
—David J. Schwartz
Topics: Achieving, Achievement, Persistence, Perseverance, Achieve, Great
Take the initiative. Be like the successful. Go out of your way to meet people. And don’t be timid. Don’t be afraid to be unusual. Find out who the other person is, and be sure he knows who you are.
—David J. Schwartz
To be on top, you’ve got to feel like you’re on top. Give yourself a pep talk and discover how much bigger and stronger you feel.
—David J. Schwartz
Look at things… as they can be.
—David J. Schwartz
Topics: Potential, Possibilities
You win when you refuse to fight petty people. Fighting little people reduces you to their size.
—David J. Schwartz
Luck. Take a second look at what appears to be someone’s “good luck.” You’ll find not luck but preparation, planning, and success-producing thinking.
—David J. Schwartz
Topics: Luck, Opportunity
Here is the basic rule for winning success. Let’s mark it in the mind and remember it. The rule is: Success depends on the support of other people. The only hurdle between you and what you want to be is the support of other people.
—David J. Schwartz
Topics: Success & Failure, People, Support, Win, Success, War, Mind
The person determined to achieve maximum success learns the principle that progress is made one step at a time. A house is built one brick at a time. Football games are won a play at a time. A department store grows bigger one customer at a time. Every big accomplishment is a series of little accomplishments.
—David J. Schwartz
Topics: Things, Little Things
The success combination in business is: Do what you do better… and: Do more of what you do.
—David J. Schwartz
As you approach your job each day, ask yourself, “Am I worthy in every respect of being imitated? Are all my habits such that I would be glad to see them in my subordinates?
—David J. Schwartz
Initiative is a special kind of action. It’s doing something worthwhile without being told to do it. The person with initiative has a standing invitation to join the high income brackets in every business and profession.
—David J. Schwartz
When you believe something is impossible, your mind goes to work for you to prove why. But when you believe, really believe, something can be done, your mind goes to work for you and helps you find the ways to do it.
—David J. Schwartz
Think you are weak, think you lack what it takes, think you will lose, think you are second class—think this way and you are doomed to mediocrity.
—David J. Schwartz
Remind yourself regularly that you are better than you think you are. Successful people are not supermen. Success does not require a superintellect. Nor is there anything mystical about success. And success isn’t based on luck. Successful people are just ordinary folks who have developed belief in themselves and what they do. Never—yes, never—sell yourself short.
—David J. Schwartz
Topics: Belief
Nothing—absolutely nothing—in this life gives you more satisfaction than knowing you’re on the road to success and achievement. And nothing stands as a bigger challenge than making the most of yourself.
—David J. Schwartz
Think success, don’t think failure. At work, in your home, substitute success thinking for failure thinking. When you face a difficult situation, think, “I’ll win,” not “I’ll probably lose.” When you compete with someone else, think, “I’m equal to the best,” not “I’m out-classed.” When opportunity appears, think “I can do it,” never “I can’t. Let the master thought “I-will-succeed” dominate your thinking process. Thinking success conditions your mind to create plans that produce success. Thinking failure does the exact opposite. Failure thinking conditions the mind to think other thoughts that produce failure.
—David J. Schwartz
Topics: Thought
Look important. It helps you think important. How you look on the outside has a lot to do with how you feel on the inside.
—David J. Schwartz
How we think shows through in how we act. Attitudes are mirrors of the mind. They reflect thinking.
—David J. Schwartz
Topics: Thinking, Attitude, Chance, Circumstance
Be an experimental person. Break up fixed routines. Expose yourself to new restaurants, new books, new theaters, new friends; take a different route to work someday, take a different vacation this year, do something new and different this weekend.
—David J. Schwartz
It is well to respect the leader. Learn from him. Observe him. Study him. But don’t worship him. Believe you can surpass. Believe you can go beyond. Those who harbor the second-best attitude are invariably second-best doers.
—David J. Schwartz
Topics: Imitation
Big thinkers are specialists in creating positive, forward-looking, optimistic pictures in their own minds and in the minds of others. To think big, we must use words and phrases that produce big, positive mental images.
—David J. Schwartz
Topics: Leadership
Wondering Whom to Read Next?
- Russell Hoban American Author
- Ursula K. Le Guin Science-fiction writer
- Lois McMaster Bujold American Novelist
- Orson Scott Card American Author
- Isaac Bashevis Singer Polish-born American Children’s Books Writer
- Celia Thaxter American Poet
- Damon Runyon American Writer, Journalist
- Jimmy Buffett American Singer-Songwriter
- William H. Gass American Novelist
- Louise Erdrich American Children’s Books Writer
Leave a Reply