Empowering Black Voices: Inspirational Quotes About Success to Ignite Your Ambition

"I've missed more than 9,000 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

"There are no secrets to success. It is the result of preparation, hard work, and learning from failure."

- Colin Powell

"Every great dream begins with a dreamer. Always remember, you have within you the strength, the patience, and the passion to reach for the stars to change the world."

- Harriet Tubman

"If you can’t fly then run, if you can’t run then walk, if you can’t walk then crawl, but whatever you do you have to keep moving forward."

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

"Believe in yourself and have confidence that you can compete against all odds. Have a vision of what you'd like to accomplish and be able to articulate that vision."

- Robert Johnson

"I built a conglomerate and emerged the richest black man in the world in 2008 but it didn’t happen overnight. It took me 30 years to get to where I am today. Youths of today aspire to be like me but they want to achieve it overnight. It’s not going to work. To build a successful business, you must start small and dream big. In the journey of entrepreneurship, tenacity of purpose is supreme."

- Aliko Dangote

"Success isn’t about how much money you make; it’s about the difference you make in people’s lives."

- Michelle Obama

"Success is to be measured not so much by the position that one has reached in life as by the obstacles which he has overcome while trying to succeed."

- Booker T. Washington

"Every time you state what you want or believe, you're the first to hear it. It's a message to both you and others about what you think is possible. Don't put a ceiling on yourself."

- Oprah Winfrey

"You have to believe in yourself when no one else does."

- Serena Williams

"I had to make my own living and my own opportunity. But I made it! Don’t sit down and wait for the opportunities to come. Get up and make them."

- Madam C.J. Walker

"You have to believe in yourself when no one else does -- that makes you a winner right there."

- Venus Williams

"Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world."

- Nelson Mandela

"Pursue the things you love doing, and then do them so well that people can't take their eyes off you."

- Maya Angelou

"You can only become accomplished at something you love. Don't make money your goal. Instead pursue the things you love doing and then do them so well that people can't take their eyes off you."

- Maya Angelou

"One important key to success is self-confidence. An important key to self-confidence is preparation."

- Arthur Ashe

"Don’t listen to those who say YOU CAN’T. Listen to the voice inside yourself that says, I CAN."

- Shirley Chisolm

"If you wake up deciding what you want to give versus what you’re going to get, you become a more successful person. In other words, if you want to make money, you have to help someone else make money."

- Russell Simmons

"We may encounter many defeats, but we must not be defeated."

- Maya Angelou

"I believe in destiny. But I also believe that you can’t just sit back and let destiny happen. A lot of times, an opportunity might fall into your lap, but you have to be ready for that opportunity. You can’t sit there waiting on it. A lot of times you are going to have to get out there and make it happen."

- Spike Lee

"You don’t become what you want, you become what you believe."

- Oprah Winfrey

"Those who say it can’t be done are usually interrupted by others doing it."

- James Baldwin

"Am I good enough? Yes I am."

- Michelle Obama

"Success is to be measured not so much by the position that one has reached in life as by the obstacles which he has overcome."

- Booker T. Washington

"Obstacles don’t have to stop you. If you run into a wall, don’t turn around and give up. Figure out how to climb it, go through it, or work around it."

- Michael Jordan

"The most common way people give up their power is by thinking they don’t have any."

- Alice Walker

"Winning is great, sure, but if you are really going to do something in life, the secret is learning how to lose. Nobody goes undefeated all the time. If you can pick up after a crushing defeat, and go on to win again, you are going to be a champion someday."

- Wilma Rudolph

"Just don’t give up what you’re trying to do. Where there is love and inspiration, I don’t think you can go wrong."

- Ella Fitzgerald

"Never ever chase money. You should chase success, because with success money follows."

- Wilfred Emmanuel-Jones

"The harder you work, the luckier you get’’"

- Mike Adenuga

"Hold on to your dreams of a better life and stay committed to striving to realize it."

- Earl G. Graves, Sr.

"Have a vision. Be demanding."

- Colin Powell

"Never be limited by other people's limited imaginations."

- Dr. Mae Jemison

"I have discovered in life that there are ways of getting almost anywhere you want to go, if you really want to go."

- Langston Hughes

"Whatever we believe about ourselves and our ability comes true for us."

- Susan L. Taylor

"I was walking through [Harvard] Yard in the evening, and a Black woman I did not know was passing me on the sidewalk ... She leaned over as we crossed and said, 'Persevere.'"

- Ketanji Brown Jackson

"Education is transformational. It changes lives. That is why people work so hard to become educated and why education has always been the key to the American Dream, the force that erases arbitrary divisions of race and class and culture and unlocks every person's God-given potential."

- Condoleezza Rice

"Change will not come if we wait for some other people or some other time. We are the ones we’ve been waiting for. We are the change that we seek."

- President Barack Obama

"The function of education is to teach one to think intensively and to think critically. Intelligence plus character — that is the goal of true education."

- Martin Luther King Jr.

"Knowledge is the pathway from slavery to freedom."

- Frederick Douglass

"To bring about change, you must not be afraid to take the first step. We will fail when we fail to try."

- Rosa Parks

"Freedom is never given; it is won."

- A. Philip Randolph

"Education is the key to unlock the golden door of freedom."

- George Washington Carver

"History has shown us that courage can be contagious and hope can take on a life of its own."

- former First Lady Michelle Obama

"If you don’t get out there and define yourself, you’ll be quickly and inaccurately defined by others."

- Michelle Obama

"Don't sell yourself short. You will meet people along the way who will be lining up to place limits on you. You don't need to beat them to the punch."

- Leslie Odom Jr.

"My humanness doesn’t insulate me from racism or sexism. In fact, I think I can deal effectively with the world precisely because I am a black woman who is so comfortable in my black-womanness. I know what I can accomplish. And anything I have accomplished, I did so not in spite of being a black woman, but because I am a black woman."

- Gabrielle Union

"I was raised to believe that excellence is the best deterrent to racism or sexism."

- Oprah Winfrey

"We may encounter many defeats but we must not be defeated."

- Maya Angelou

"Change will not come if we wait for some other person or some other time. We are the ones we've been waiting for. We are the change that we seek."

- Barack Obama

"Nothing will work unless you do."

- Maya Angelou

"Don't follow the path. Go where there is no path and begin the trail. When you start a new trail equipped with courage, strength, and conviction, the only thing that can stop you is you!"

- Ruby Bridges

"Everything negative - pressure, challenges - is all an opportunity for me to rise."

- Kobe Bryant

"Start where you are. Use what you have. Do what you can."

- Arthur Ashe

"If there is no struggle, there is no progress."

- Frederick Douglass

"Never underestimate the power of dreams and the influence of the human spirit. We are all the same in this notion: The potential for greatness lives within each of us."

- Wilma Rudolph

"You can't just sit there and wait for people to give you that golden dream. You've got to get out there and make it happen for yourself."

- Diana Ross

"Successful people don't have fewer problems. They have determined that nothing will stop them from going forward."

- Benjamin Carson

"You have to be able to accept failure to get better."

- LeBron James

"If you fall behind, run faster. Never give up, never surrender, and rise up against the odds."

- Jesse Jackson

"When I dare to be powerful, to use my strength in the service of my vision, then it becomes less and less important whether I am afraid."

- Audre Lorde

"Never be limited by other people’s limited imaginations."

- Dr. Mae Jemison

"If they don’t give you a seat at the table, bring a folding chair."

- Shirley Chisholm

"I am no longer accepting the things I cannot change. I am changing the things I cannot accept."

- Angela Y. Davis

"The way to win is to try."

- Stacey Abrams

"I got my start by giving myself a start."

- Madam CJ Walker

"Only make decisions that support your self-image, self-esteem, and self-worth."

- Oprah Winfrey

"If you are always trying to be normal, you will never know how amazing you can be."

- Dr. Maya Angelou

"Let nothing dim the light that shines from within."

- Maya Angelou

"Even if it makes others uncomfortable, I will love who I am."

- Janelle Monáe

"I call something a miracle when an ordinary person achieves something extraordinary. We all have the potential to create miraculous changes."

- Tina Turner

"If you wanna make the world a better place, take a look at yourself, then make that change."

- Michael Jackson

"You are your best thing."

- Toni Morrison

"If they don’t give you a seat at the table, bring in a folding chair."

- Rep. Shirley Chisholm

"The time is always right to do what is right."

- Martin Luther King Jr.

"When you can’t find someone to follow, you have to find a way to lead by example."

- Roxane Gay

"You have to act as if it were possible to radically transform the world. And you have to do it all the time."

- Angela Davis

"Self-definition and self-determination is about the many varied decisions that we make to compose and journey toward ourselves, about the audacity and strength to proclaim, create, and evolve into who we know ourselves to be. It’s okay if your personal definition is in a constant state of flux as you navigate the world."

- Janet Mock

"You have to give yourself permission, even when you’re doing it."

- Toni Morrison

"Hold fast to dreams, for if dreams die, life is a broken-winged bird that cannot fly."

- Langston Hughes

"Success is the sweetest revenge."

- Vanessa Williams

"He who is not courageous enough to take risks will accomplish nothing in life."

- Muhammad Ali

"You never know how or when you’ll have an impact, or how important your example can be to someone else."

- Denzel Washington

"One light feeds another. One strong family lends strength to more. One engaged community can ignite those around it. This is the power of the light we carry."

- Michelle Obama

"If you know what you want, ask for it. And be specific—you just might get it."

- Elaine Welteroth

"I believe a child going without an education is a crime."

- Vice President Kamala Harris

"Education is the passport to the future, for tomorrow belongs to those who prepare for it today."

- Malcolm X

"Education is our passport to the future, for tomorrow belongs to the people who prepare for it today."

- Malcolm X

"Power doesn't have to show off. Power is confident, self-assuring, self-starting and self-stopping, self-warming and self-justifying. When you have it, you know it."

- Ralph Ellison

"In pursuing your highest ambitions, don’t let your personal safety diminish the safety of your stepsister. In wielding the power that is deservedly yours, don’t permit it to enslave your stepsisters. Let your might and your power emanate from that place in you that is nurturing and caring."

- Toni Morrison

"There’s always something to suggest that you’ll never be who you wanted to be. Your choice is to take it or keep on moving."

- Phylicia Rashad

"Learning to stand in somebody else’s shoes, to see through their eyes, that’s how peace begins."

- former President Barack Obama

"Be healthy and take care of yourself, but be happy with the beautiful things that make you, you."

- Beyoncé

"When the heart is right, the mind and body will follow."

- Coretta Scott King

"I believe in living. I believe in birth. I believe in the sweat of love and in the fire of truth. And I believe that a lost ship, steered by tired, seasick sailors, can still be guided him to port."

- Assata Shakur

"Success is liking yourself, liking what you do, and liking how you do it."

"I’m grateful for all the breaks and honors and opportunities I’ve had, but I always believe I won’t have it made until the humblest black kid in the most remote backwoods of America has it made."

"Never let anyone—any person or any force—dampen, dim or diminish your light."

"Change will not come if we wait for some other person or some other time. We are the ones we’ve been waiting for. We are the change that we seek."

"In order to rise from its own ashes, a Phoenix first must burn."