30 of the Most Inspirational Leadership Quotes

March 7, 2019

5 min read

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No one can deny the power of a good quote. Here are 38 to motivate and inspire you to be your best.

“I alone cannot change the world, but I can cast a stone across the water to create many ripples.” — Mother Teresa

“I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” — Maya Angelou

“Whether you think you can or you think you can’t, you’re right.” — Henry Ford

“If you look at what you have in life, you’ll always have more. If you look at what you don’t have in life, you’ll never have enough.” — Oprah Winfrey

“I can’t change the direction of the wind, but I can adjust my sails to always reach my destination.” — Jimmy Dean

“Nothing is impossible, the word itself says ‘I’m possible’!” — Audrey Hepburn

“To handle yourself, use your head; to handle others, use your heart.” — Eleanor Roosevelt

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

“Do or do not. There is no try.” — Yoda

“What’s money? A man is a success if he gets up in the morning and goes to bed at night and in between does what he wants to do.” –Bob Dylan

“Whatever the mind of man can conceive and believe, it can achieve.” — Napoleon Hill

“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 safe harbor, catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.” — Mark Twain

“I’ve missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I’ve lost almost 300 games. Twenty-six times I’ve been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed.” — Michael Jordan

“Strive not to be a success, but rather to be of value.” — Albert Einstein

“I am not a product of my circumstances. I am a product of my decisions.” — Stephen Covey

“The most common way people give up their power is by thinking they don’t have any.” — Alice Walker

“It is during our darkest moments that we must focus to see the light.” — Aristotle Onassis

“Don’t judge each day by the harvest you reap but by the seeds that you plant.” — Robert Louis Stevenson

“If you hear a voice within you say, ‘You cannot paint,’ then by all means paint and that voice will be silenced.” — Vincent Van Gogh

“Build your own dreams, or someone else will hire you to build theirs.” — Farrah Gray

“Remember that not getting what you want is sometimes a wonderful stroke of luck.” — Dalai Lama

“A person who never made a mistake never tried anything new.” — Albert Einstein

“I have been impressed with the urgency of doing. Knowing is not enough; we must apply. Being willing is not enough; we must do.” — Leonardo da Vinci

“When one door of happiness closes, another opens, but often we look so long at the closed door that we do not see the one that has been opened for us.” — Helen Keller

“When I was 5 years old, my mother always told me that happiness was the key to life. When I went to school, they asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up. I wrote down ‘happy.’ They told me I didn’t understand the assignment, and I told them they didn’t understand life.” — John Lennon

Related: 13 Habits of Exceptionally Likable People

“The only person you are destined to become is the person you decide to be.” — Ralph Waldo Emerson

“We can easily forgive a child who is afraid of the dark; the real tragedy of life is when men are afraid of the light.” — Plato

“Nothing will work unless you do.” — Maya Angelou