150 Quotes About Success To Inspire You To Reach Your Goals

Looking for wise and motivational quotes on success to inspire the best in you?

There are many definitions of success.

But what it stands for to each of us tends to share a common thread.

Often, we find it hard to put into words just what defines success.

So I have been lucky enough to compile a long list of wise words from people who said what we were feeling, but struggled to say.

I hope that you enjoy reading these quotes on success, as much as I enjoyed finding them.

For more inspiration, also check out our collection of goal setting quotes.

Check out our most popular quote article, a list of short inspirational quotes for daily inspiration.

Explore our complete collection of motivational quotes here.

Famous Quotes on Success and Hard Work

1. “Things work out best for those who make the best of how things work out.” – John Wooden

You will also enjoy our article on achievement quotes.

2. “Identify your problems but give your power and energy to solutions.” – Tony Robbins

You will also enjoy our article on eminem quotes.

3. “You live longer once you realize that any time spent being unhappy is wasted.” – Ruth E. Renkl

You will also enjoy our article on John D Rockefeller Quotes.

4. “The only true wisdom is knowing that you know nothing.” – Socrates

5. “Let no feeling of discouragement prey upon you, and in the end, you are sure to succeed.”  – Abraham Lincoln

6. “When your life flashes before your eyes, make sure you’ve got plenty to watch.” – Anonymous

7. “Screw it, let’s do it!” – Richard Branson

8. “Be content to act, and leave the talking to others.” – Baltasar Gracian

9. “Innovation distinguishes between a leader and a follower.” – Steve Jobs

10. “The more you loose yourself in something bigger than yourself, the more energy you will have.” – Norman Vincent Peale

11. “If your ship doesn’t come in, swim out to meet it!” – Jonathan Winters

12. “People often say that motivation doesn’t last. Well, neither does bathing – that’s why we recommend it daily.” – Zig Ziglar

13. “Courage is being scared to death, but saddling up anyway.” – John Wayne (see more wise John Wayne quotes)

14. “Too many of us are not living our dreams because we are living our fears.” – Les Brown

15. “The link between my experience as an entrepreneur and that of a politician is all in one word: freedom.” – Silvio Berlusconi

16. “The entrepreneur builds an enterprise; the technician builds a job.” – Michael Gerber

17. “A real entrepreneur is somebody who has no safety net underneath them.” – Henry Kravis

18. “Most new jobs won’t come from our biggest employers. They will come from our smallest. We’ve got to do everything we can to make entrepreneurial dreams a reality.”- Ross Perot

19. “My son is now an ‘entrepreneur’. That’s what you’re called when you don’t have a job.” – Ted Turner

20. “As we look ahead into the next century, leaders will be those who empower others.” – Bill Gates

21. “As long as you’re going to be thinking anyway, think big.” – Donald Trump

22. “If you want to achieve excellence, you can get there today. As of this second, quit doing less-than-excellent work.” – Thomas J. Watson

23. “Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work.” – Thomas Edison

24. “The only place where success comes before work is in the dictionary.” – Vidal Sassoon

Also check out these inspiring actions speak louder than words quotes that will empower you.

The Best Quotes To Inspire Success in You

25. “Capital isn’t scarce; vision is.” – Sam Walton

26. “Failure defeats losers, failure inspires winners.” – Robert T. Kiyosaki

27. “Some people dream of great accomplishments, while others stay awake and do them.” – Anonymous

28. “I will tell you how to become rich. Close the doors. Be fearful when others are greedy. Be greedy when others are fearful.” – Warren Buffet

29. “Going into business for yourself, becoming an entrepreneur, is the modern-day equivalent of pioneering on the old frontier.” – Paula Nelson

30. “Poor people have a big TV. Rich people have big library.” – Jim Rohn

31. “A goal is a dream with a deadline.” – Napoleon Hill

32. “Every day I get up and look through the Forbes list of the richest people in America. If I’m not there, I go to work.” – Vinnie Rege

33. “Expect the best. Prepare for the worst. Capitalize on what comes.” – Zig Ziglar

34. “People are not lazy. They simply have important goals – that is, goals that do not inspire them.” – Tony Robbins

35. “Nobody talks of entrepreneurship as survival, but that’s exactly what it is.” – Anita Roddick

36. “The best reason to start an organization is to make meaning; to create a product or service to make the world a better place.” – Guy Kawasaki

37. “A friendship founded on business is a good deal better than a business founded on friendship.” – John D. Rockefeller

38. “I’ve been blessed to find people who are smarter than I am, and they help me to execute the vision I have.” – Russell Simmons

39. “I find that when you have a real interest in life and a curious life, that sleep is not the most important thing.” – Martha Stewart

40. “Logic will get you from A to B. Imagination will take you everywhere.” – Albert Einstein
If you’re enjoying these quotes, make sure to read our collection of logic quotes about the power of decision making.

41. “Success is liking yourself, liking what you do, and liking how you do it.”  – Maya Angelou

42. “Success is walking from failure to failure with no loss of enthusiasm.” – Winston Churchill

43. “The function of leadership is to produce more leaders, not more followers.” – Ralph Nader

44. “Without continual growth and progress, such words as improvement, achievement, and success have no meaning.” – Benjamin Franklin

45. “Big pay and little responsibility are circumstances seldom found together.” – Napoleon Hill

46. “Make your product easier to buy than your competition, or you will find your customers buying from them, not you.” – Mark Cuban

47. “The road to success and the road to failure are almost exactly the same.” – Colin R. Davis

Success Quotes for Business

48. “If you don’t have a competitive advantage, don’t compete.” – Jack Welch

49. “If you set your goals ridiculously high and it’s a failure, you will fail above everyone else’s success.” – James Cameron

50. “Success usually comes to those who are too busy to be looking for it.”-  Henry David Thoreau

51. “I find that the harder I work, the more luck I seem to have.” – Thomas Jefferson

52. “Things work out best for those who make the best of how things work out.” – John Wooden

53. “Entrepreneurs average 3.8 failures before final success. What sets the successful ones apart is their amazing persistence.” – Lisa M. Amos

54. “If you are not willing to risk the usual, you will have to settle for the ordinary.” – Jim Rohn

55. “Take up one idea. Make that one idea your life – think of it, dream of it, live on that idea. Let the brain, muscles, nerves, every part of your body, be full of that idea, and just leave every other idea alone. This is the way to success.” – Swami Vivekananda

56. “Stop chasing the money and start chasing the passion.” – Tony Hsieh

57. All our dreams can come true if we have the courage to pursue them.” Walt Disney

58. “If you are willing to do more than you are paid to do, eventually you will be paid to do more than you do.” – Anonymous

59. “Only put off until tomorrow what you are willing to die having left undone.” – Pablo Picasso

60. “Whenever you see a successful person, you only see the public glories, never the private sacrifices to reach them.” Vaibhav Shah

61. “Success? I don’t know what that word means. I’m happy. But success, that goes back to what in somebody’s eyes success means. For me, success is inner peace. That’s a good day for me.” – Denzel Washington

62. “Opportunities don’t happen. You create them.” – Chris Grosser

63. Try not to become a person of success, but rather try to become a person of value.” – Albert Einstein

64. It is not the strongest of the species that survive, nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change.” – Charles Darwin

65. “Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people.” – Eleanor Roosevelt

66. “The best revenge is massive success.”- Frank Sinatra

67. “I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.” – Thomas Edison

68. “A successful man is one who can lay a firm foundation with the bricks others have thrown at him.” – David Brinkley

69. “No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.” – Eleanor Roosevelt

70. “The whole secret of a successful life is to find out what is one’s destiny to do, and then do it.” – Henry Ford
If you’re enjoying these quotes, read our collection of Henry Ford quotes from one of America’s greatest pioneers.

Motivational Quotes on Success and Achievement

71. “If you’re going through hell, keep going.” – Winston Churchill

72. What seems to us as bitter trials are often blessings in disguise.” – Oscar Wilde

73. “The distance between insanity and genius is measured only by success.” – Bruce Feirstein

74. “Don’t be afraid to give up the good to go for the great.” – John D. Rockefeller

75. “Happiness is a butterfly, which when pursued, is always beyond your grasp, but which, if you will sit down quietly, may alight upon you.” – Nathaniel Hawthorne

76. “If you can’t explain it simply, you don’t understand it well enough.” – Albert Einstein

77. “There are two types of people who will tell you that you cannot make a difference in this world: those who are afraid to try and those who are afraid you will succeed.” – Ray Goforth

78. “Start where you are. Use what you have. Do what you can.” – Arthur Ashe

79. “All progress takes place outside the comfort zone.” – Michael John Bobak

80. “You may only succeed if you desire succeeding; you may only fail if you do not mind failing.” – Philippos

Quotes on success to elevate your mind

81. Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear–not the absence of fear.” – Mark Twain

89. “We become what we think about most of the time, and that’s the strangest secret.” – Earl Nightingale

90. “I don’t know the key to success, but the key to failure is trying to please everyone.” – Bill Cosby

Quotes on success to make you fearless

91. “Though no one can go back and make a brand-new start, anyone can start from now and make a brand-new ending.” – Carl Bard

92. “Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.” – Mark Twain

93. “The first step toward success is taken when you refuse to be a captive of the environment in which you first find yourself.” – Mark Caine

94. “The successful warrior is the average man, with laser-like focus.” – Bruce Lee

95. “Keep on going, and the chances are that you will stumble on something, perhaps when you are least expecting it. I never heard of anyone ever stumbling on something sitting down.” – Charles F. Kettering

96. “Successful people begin where failures leave off. Never settle for ‘just getting the job done.’ Excel!” —Tom Hopkins

97. “Action is the foundational key to all success.” —Pablo Picasso

98. “Eighty percent of success is showing up.” —Woody Allen

99. “Success is never accidental.” – Jack Dorsey

100. “Success consists of going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm.” – Winston Churchill

Quotes on success to bring out the best in you

101. “The foundation stones for a balanced success are honesty, character, integrity, faith, love and loyalty.” —Zig Ziglar

102. “People don’t have to believe in you for you to succeed. Just work hard, when you succeed, they will believe.” – Stephen Keshi

103. “The size of your success is measured by the strength of your desire, the size of your dream, and how you handle disappointment along the way.” —Robert Kiyosaki

104. If you don’t care about what people think, you already passed the first step of success.” – Paulo Coelho

105. “For success, attitude is equally as important as ability.” —Walter Scott

106. The successful man will profit from his mistakes and try again in a different way.” – Dale Carnegie

107. “If you want to be successful, find out what the price is and then pay it.” – Scott Adam

108. “Success is achieved by developing our strengths, not by eliminating our weaknesses.” – Marilyn vos Savant

109. “Success is my only option, failure’s not.” – Eminem

110. “Failure is success in progress.” – Albert Einstein

Quotes on success to inspire you on your journey

111. “I know the price of success: dedication, hard work and an unremitting devotion to the things you want to see happen.” —Frank Lloyd Wright

112. “Success is a state of mind. If you want success, start thinking of yourself as a success.” – Joyce Brothers

113. “Success is simple. Do what’s right, the right way, at the right time.” —Arnold H. Glascow

114. “Success is the sum of details.” – Harvey S. Firestone

115. “One important key to success is self-confidence. An important key to self-confidence is preparation.” —Arthur Ashe

116. “The secret of achievement is to hold a picture of a successful outcome in mind.” – Henry David Thoreau

117. “The secret of success is constancy of purpose.” – Benjamin Disraeli

118. “That some achieve great success, is proof to all that others can achieve it as well.” – Abraham Lincoln

119. “Success in life comes not from holding a good hand, but in playing a poor hand well.” – Denis Waitley

120. “Successful and unsuccessful people do not vary greatly in their abilities. They vary in their desires to reach their potential.” – John C. Maxwell

More quotes on success to motivate you

121. “I have learned that success is to be measured not so much by the position that one has reached in life as by the obstacles which he has had to overcome while trying to succeed.” —Booker T. Washington

122. “Success is the sum of small efforts, repeated day-in and day-out.” –Robert Collier

123. “Success comes from knowing that you did your best to become the best that you are capable of becoming.” —John Wooden

124. “It is literally true that you can succeed best and quickest by helping others to succeed.” – Napoleon Hill

125. “Success isn’t about the end result, it’s about what you learn along the way.” —Vera Wang

126. “Some succeed because they are destined to, but most succeed because they are determined to.” – Henry Van Dyke

127. “Success is how high you bounce when you hit bottom.” – George S. Patton

128. “Success is not measured by what a man accomplishes, but by the opposition he has encountered and the courage with which he has maintained the struggle against overwhelming odds.” – Charles Lindbergh

129. “The secret of success is to do the common things uncommonly well.” – John D. Rockefeller

130. “Successful people ask better questions, and as a result, they get better answers.” – Tony Robbins

Quotes about success on its different definitions

131. “I can’t give you a sure-fire formula for success, but I can give you a formula for failure: try to please everybody all the time.” – Herbert Bayard Swope

132. “If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again. Then quit. No use being a damn fool about it.” – W.C. Fields

133. “It is better to fail in originality than to succeed in imitation.” – Herman Melville

134. “Success is not how high you have climbed, but how you make a positive difference to the world.” – Roy T. Bennett

135. “If a book about failures doesn’t sell, is it a success?” – Jerry Seinfeld

136. “Success is getting what you want, happiness is wanting what you get” – W.P. Kinsella

137. “Failure is the condiment that gives success its flavor.” – Truman Capote

138. “Success is not the key to happiness. Happiness is the key to success. If you love what you are doing, you will be successful.” – Albert Schweitzer

139. “If everyone is moving forward together, then success takes care of itself.” – Henry Ford

140. “Coming together is a beginning; keeping together is progress; working together is success.” – Edward Everett Hale

Quotes on Success To Keep You Determined

141. “Success is the progressive realization of predetermined, worthwhile, personal goals.” — Paul J. Meyer

142. “Success seems to be largely a matter of hanging on after others have let go.” — William Feather

143. “The secret of success is… to be fully awake to everything about you.” — Jackson Pollock

144. “Without an open-minded mind, you can never be a great success.” — Martha Stewart

145. “The toughest thing about success is that you’ve got to keep on being a success.” — Irving Berlin

146. “One of the secrets to success is ideas mixed with inspiration.” — Jim Rohn

147. “One sound idea is all that you need to achieve success.” — Napoleon Hill

148. “Success is often achieved by those who don’t know that failure is inevitable.” — Coco Chanel

149. “Failure is success if we learn from it.” — Malcolm Forbes

150. “Success is often the result of taking a misstep in the right direction.” — Al Bernstein

Did these quotes on success inspire you to do your best?

Success may mean different things to different people, but there is one common denominator: the need to be happy.

If you feel joy towards your work, and what you have accomplished, then that should be enough.

But in case you need a little push, keep these beautiful quotes on success handy.