Quotes about action

"In a land which is fully settled, most men must accept their local environment or try to change it by political means; only the exceptionally gifted or adventurous can leave to seek his fortune elsewhere. In America, on the other hand, to move on and make a fresh start somewhere else is still the normal reaction to dissatisfaction and failure."

Auden, W. H. on action
3 fans of this quote   

"Man is the only creature who refuses to be what he is."

Camus, Albert on action
21 fans of this quote   

"No sooner is your ocean filled, than he grumbles that it might have been of better vintage. Try him with half of a Universe, of an Omnipotence, he sets to quarrelling with the proprietor of the other half, and declares himself the most maltreated of men. Always there is a black spot in our sunshine: it is even as I said, the Shadow of Ourselves."

Carlyle, Thomas on action   

"There are three wants which never can be satisfied: that of the rich, who wants something more; that of the sick, who wants something different; and that of the traveler, who says, Anywhere but here."

Emerson, Ralph Waldo on action
22 fans of this quote   

"The problem lay buried, unspoken for many years in the minds of American women. It was a strange stirring, a sense of dissatisfaction, a yearning that women suffered in the middle of the twentieth century in the United States. Each suburban housewife struggled with it alone. As she made the beds, shopped for groceries, matched slipcover material, ate peanut butter sandwiches with her children, chauffeured Cub Scouts and Brownies, lay beside her husband at night, she was afraid to ask even of herself the silent question: Is this all?"

Friedan, Betty on action   

"The idiot who praises, with enthusiastic tone, All centuries but this, and every country but his own."

Gilbert, W. S. on action
3 fans of this quote   

"The chemistry of dissatisfaction is as the chemistry of some marvelously potent tar. In it are the building stones of explosives, stimulants, poisons, opiates, perfumes and stenches."

Hoffer, Eric on action   

"Change occurs in direct proportion to dissatisfaction, but dissatisfaction never changes."

Horton, Doug on action
13 fans of this quote   

"If there is dissatisfaction with the status quo, good. If there is ferment, so much the better. If there is restlessness, I am pleased. Then let there be ideas, and hard thought, and hard work. If man feels small, let man make himself bigger."

Humphrey, Hubert H. on action   

"No, no, we are not satisfied, and we will not be satisfied until justice rolls down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream."

King Jr. Martin Luther on action
34 fans of this quote   

"A fierce unrest seethes at the core, of all existing things:, it was the eager wish to soar, that gave the gods their wings."

Marquis, Don on action   

"As long as I have a want, I have a reason for living. Satisfaction is death."

Shaw, George Bernard on action
9 fans of this quote   

"If we are suffering illness, poverty, or misfortune, we think we shall be satisfied on the day it ceases. But there too, we know it is false; so soon as one has got used to not suffering one wants something else."

Weil, Simone on action   

"Oh, I'm not going to do anything to them. The thought that I might will be enough to keep them going."

Bowkett, Chris on action   

"Man who stand on hill with mouth open will wait long time for roast duck to drop in."

Confucius on action
13 fans of this quote   

"It's better to waste one's youth than to do nothing with it at all."

Courteline, Georges on action
5 fans of this quote   

"Just as there is no loss of basic energy in the universe, so no thought or action is without its effects, present or ultimate, seen or unseen, felt or unfelt."

Cousins, Norman on action
3 fans of this quote   

"There's as much risk in doing nothing as in doing something."

Crow, Trammell on action
4 fans of this quote   

"The sleeping fox catches no poultry."

Franklin, Benjamin on action   

"If you stand still long enough, you'll get stuck"

Hasselhoff, David on action
3 fans of this quote   

"Many are called but few get up."

Herford, Oliver on action
3 fans of this quote   

"You won't skid if you stay in a rut."

Hubbard, Kin on action   

"Nothing else so destroys the power to stand alone as the habit of leaning upon others. If you lean, you will never be strong or original. Stand alone or bury your ambition to be somebody in the world."

Marden, Orison Swett on action
4 fans of this quote   

"How long will they kill our prophets while we stand aside and look?"

Marley, Bob on action
3 fans of this quote   

"One of the best lessons children learn through video games is standing still will get them killed quicker than anything else."

Milea, Jinx on action   

"A sedentary life is the real sin against the Holy Spirit. Only those thoughts that come by walking have any value."

Nietzsche, Friedrich on action
3 fans of this quote   

"To sit back hoping that someday, some way, someone will make things right is to go on feeding the crocodile, hoping he will eat you last -- but eat you he will."

Reagan, Ronald on action
11 fans of this quote   

"Sitting quietly, doing nothing, spring comes and the grass grows by itself."

Saying, Zen on action
5 fans of this quote   

"My friend, why have you drifted so far away? All motion is relative, maybe it is you who have moved away by standing still."

Unknown, Source on action   

"Anything you do can get you fired; this includes doing nothing."

Unknown, Source on action   

"Doing nothing is the most tiresome job in the world because you cannot quit and rest."

Unknown, Source on action
4 fans of this quote   

"It is following the line of least resistance that makes men and rivers crooked."

Unknown, Source on action
3 fans of this quote   

"Solve it. Solve it quickly, solve it right or wrong. If you solve it wrong, it will come back and slap you in the face, and then you can solve it right. Lying dead in the water and doing nothing is a comfortable alternative because it is without risk, but it is an absolutely fatal way to manage a business."

Watson, Thomas J. on action   

"To do nothing at all is the most difficult thing in the world, the most difficult and the most intellectual."

Wilde, Oscar on action
8 fans of this quote   

"Reactionary: A man walking backwards with his face to the future."

Bevan, Aneurin on action   

"Like other revolutionaries I can thank God for the reactionaries. They clarify the issue."

Collingwood, Robin G. on action   

"A reactionary is a somnambulist walking backwards."

Roosevelt, Franklin D. on action   

"Those old faces, in Pasadena, California, and Tucson, Arizona, and Dallas, crumpling in hatred and fear at the mention of the United Nations or those liberals in government who constitute for them the fifth column of communism, yearn for an America that is as far from the society of the present as is the extended family system in village India."

Segal, Ronald on action   

"All the reputedly powerful reactionaries are merely paper tigers. The reason is that they are divorced from the people. Look! Was not Hitler a paper tiger? Was Hitler not overthrown? U.S. imperialism has not yet been overthrown and it has the atomic bomb. I believe it also will be overthrown. It, too, is a paper tiger."

Zedong, Mao on action   

"To be able to look back upon one's past life with satisfaction is to live twice."

Acton, Lord on action
10 fans of this quote