We tend to make courage too dramatic. Courage is often doing something simple, unpleasant, or boring again and again until we get it down pat. People who are physically challenged and who have the determination to get around their handicaps are great examples because their courage makes them test their limits every day.
Dave Thomas (1932-2002)
American Businessman, Founder of Wendy's International Restaurant Chain
It is a hard rule of life, and I believe a healthy one, that no great plan is ever carried out without meeting and overcoming endless obstacles that come up to try the skill of a man's hand, the quality of his courage, and the endurance of his faith.
Donald Douglas (1892-1981)
Founder Douglas Aircraft Company, later McDonnell Douglas
There was no such thing as half-trying. Whether it was running a race or catching a football, competing in school -- we were to try. And we were to try harder than anyone else. We might not be the best, and none of us were, but we were to make the effort to be the best.
Senator Robert F. Kennedy, in a tribute to his father, Joseph P. Kennedy
The meaning of life is creative love. Not love as an inner feeling, as a private sentimental emotion, but love as a dynamic power moving out into the world and doing something original.
Tom Morris, from his book
If Aristotle Ran General Motors
It teaches the strong to know when they are weak and the brave to face themselves when they are afraid. To be proud and unbowed in defeat yet humble and gentle in victory. And to master ourselves before we attempt to master others. And to learn to laugh, yet never forget how to weep. And to give the predominance of courage over timidity.
General Douglas MacArthur, on the virtues of competitive athletics.
Being forced to work, and forced to do your best, will breed in you temperance and self-control, diligence and strength of will, cheerfulness and content, and a hundred virtues which the idle never know.
Charles Kingsley (1819-1875)
English Novelist and Clergyman
Hold yourself responsible for a higher standard than anybody else expects of you. Never excuse yourself. Never pity yourself. Be a hard master to yourself - and be lenient to everybody else.
Henry Ward Beecher (1813-1887)
American Presbyterian Minister
To be pure and strong, to be honest and earnest, to be kindly and thoughtful, and in all to be true, to be manly and womanly. He can do more for others who has done most with himself.
S.D. Gordon (1859-1936)
American Devotional Speaker and Writer
We act as though comfort and luxury were the chief requirements of life, when all that we need to make us really happy is something to be enthusiastic about.
-- Charles Kingsley (1819-1875) English Novelist and Clergyman
You, enlightened, self-sufficient, self-governed, endowed with gifts above your fellows, the world expects you to produce as well as to consume, to add to and not to subtract from its store of good, to build up and not to tear down, to ennoble and not degrade. The time is short, the opportunity is great; therefore, crowd the hours with the best that is in you.
-- John Hibben, president of Princeton University, 1913 graduation address
Perhaps the most valuable result of all education is the ability to make yourself do the thing you have to do, when it ought to be done, whether you like it or not.
Walter Bagehot (1826-1877)
English Journalist and Economist