100+ Inspirational Quotes for Men: Wisdom, Courage, and Motivation

"If you are working on something exciting that you really care about, you don’t have to be pushed. The vision pulls you."

- Steve Jobs

"It takes more courage to reveal insecurities than to hide them, more strength to relate to people than to dominate them, more ‘manhood’ to abide by thought-out principles rather than blind reflex. Toughness is in the soul and spirit, not in muscles and an immature mind."

- Alex Karras

"Success means doing the best we can with what we have. Success is the doing, not the getting; in the trying, not the triumph. Success is a personal standard, reaching for the highest that is in us, becoming all that we can be."

- Zig Ziglar

"I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life and that is why I succeed."

- Michael Jordan

"Some people want it to happen, some wish it would happen, others make it happen."

- Michael Jordan

"Success is peace of mind, which is a direct result of self-satisfaction in knowing you made the effort to become the best of which you are capable."

- John Wooden

"Waste no more time arguing about what a good man should be. Be one."

- Marcus Aurelius

"Try not to become a man of success, but rather become a man of value."

- Albert Einstein

"Nothing will work unless you do."

- Maya Angelou

"Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts"

- Winston S. Churchill

"Man becomes great exactly in the degree in which he works for the welfare of his fellow-men."

- Mahatma Gandhi

"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

"The only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven’t found it yet, keep looking. Don’t settle."

- Steve Jobs

"Luck is not something you can mention in the presence of self-made men."

- E. B. White

"It's at the borders of pain and suffering that the men are separated from the boys."

- Emil Zatopek

"Do one thing every day that scares you."

- Eleanor Roosevelt

"If your dreams don’t scare you, they are too small."

- Richard Branson

"We need to accept that we won’t always make the right decisions, that we’ll screw up royally sometimes―understanding that failure is not the opposite of success, it’s part of success."

- Arianna Huffington

"It’s hard to beat a person who never gives up."

- Babe Ruth

"Don’t limit yourself. Many people limit themselves to what they think they can do. You can go as far as your mind lets you. What you believe, remember, you can achieve."

- Mary Kay Ash

"The secret of getting ahead is getting started."

- Mark Twain

"If you get tired, learn to rest, not to quit."

- Banksy

"The man who moves a mountain begins by carrying away small stones."

- Confucius

"Things do not change; we change."

- Henry David Thoreau

"When we strive to become better than we are, everything around us becomes better too."

- Paulo Coelho

"Our greatest glory is not in never failing, but in rising up every time we fail."

- Ralph Waldo Emerson

"The most difficult thing is the decision to act, the rest is merely tenacity. The fears are paper tigers. You can do anything you decide to do. You can act to change and control your life; and the procedure, the process is its own reward."

- Amelia Earhart

"You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself in any direction you choose. You’re on your own, and you know what you know. And you are the guy who’ll decide where to go."

- Dr. Seuss

"Never be bullied into silence. Never allow yourself to be made a victim. Accept no one’s definition of your life; define yourself."

- Robert Frost

"Your talent determines what you can do. Your motivation determines how much you’re willing to do. Your attitude determines how well you do it."

- Lou Holtz

"I never dreamed about success. I worked for it."

- Estée Lauder

"We need to accept that we won’t always make the right decisions, that we’ll screw up royally sometimes – understanding that failure is not the opposite of success, it’s part of success."

- Arianna Huffington

"To be successful, you have to be selfish, or else you never achieve. And once you get to your highest level, then you have to be unselfish. Stay reachable. Stay in touch. Don’t isolate."

- Michael Jordan

"If you have men who will exclude any of God's creatures from the shelter of compassion and pity, you will have men who will deal likewise with their fellow men."

- Francis of Assisi

"What you do makes a difference, and you have to decide what kind of difference you want to make."

- Jane Goodall

"I choose to make the rest of my life the best of my life."

- Louise Hay

"A surplus of effort could overcome a deficit of confidence."

- Sonia Sotomayor

"Doubt is a killer. You just have to know who you are and what you stand for."

- Jennifer Lopez

"No one changes the world who isn’t obsessed."

- Billie Jean King

"I learned a long time ago that there is something worse than missing the goal, and that’s not pulling the trigger."

- Mia Hamm

"Ultimate vulnerability. That’s manly."

- Cameron Conaway

"Life is so damn short. For f***’s sake, just do what makes you happy."

- Bill Murray

"Try not to become a man of success, but rather try to become a man of value."

- Albert Einstein

"The value of a man should be seen in what he gives and not in what he is able to receive."

- Albert Einstein

"A man may conquer a million men in battle but one who conquers himself is, indeed, the greatest of conquerors."

- Buddha

"The greatest thing a man can possibly do in this world is to make the most possible out of the stuff that has been given him. This is success, and there is no other…"

- Orison Swett Marden

"Waste no more time arguing what a good man should be. Be one."

- Marcus Aurelius

"No man stands so tall as when he stoops to help a child."

- Abraham Lincoln

"First find the man in yourself if you will inspire manliness in others."

- Amos-Bronson-Alcott

"There is nothing noble in being superior to your fellow man; true nobility is being superior to your former self."

- Ernest Hemingway

"The only place where success comes before work is in the dictionary."

- Vidal Sassoon

"I am not a product of my circumstances. I am a product of my decisions."

- Stephen R. Covey

"Picture yourself in your mind’s eye as having already achieved this goal. See yourself doing the things you’ll be doing when you’ve reached your goal."

- Earl Nightingale

"The best revenge is massive success."

- Frank Sinatra

"Nothing great was ever achieved without enthusiasm."

- Ralph Waldo Emerson

"Success is the best revenge."

- Kanye West

"Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work."

- Thomas Edison

"Concentrate all your thoughts upon the work in hand. The sun’s rays do not burn until brought to a focus."

- Alexander Graham Bell

"The minute you get away from fundamentals – whether its proper technique, work ethic, or mental preparation -the bottom can fall out of your game, your schoolwork, your job, whatever you’re doing."

- Michael Jordan

"Working hard for something we don’t care about is called stress: Working hard for something we love is called passion."

- Simon Sinek

"Men do not quit playing because they grow old; they grow old because they quit playing."

- Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

"The harder you work, the harder it is to surrender."

- Marv Levy

"Talent means nothing, while experience, acquired in humility and with hard work, means everything."

- Patrick Suskind

"All our dreams can come true, if we have the courage to pursue them."

- Walt Disney

"You’re braver than you believe, stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think."

- A.A. Milne

"Do what you can, with what you have, where you are."

- Theodore Roosevelt

"Everything you’ve ever wanted is sitting on the other side of fear."

- George Addair

"'Tis easy enough to be pleasant, When life flows along like a song; But the man worth while is the one who will smile when everything goes dead wrong."

- Ella Wheeler Wilcox

"To be a star, you must shine your own light, follow your own path, and don’t worry about darkness, for that is when the stars shine brightest."

- Napoleon Hill

"You cannot swim for new horizons until you have the courage to lose sight of the shore."

- William Faulkner

"Don’t judge each day by the harvest you reap but by the seeds that you plant."

- Robert Louis Stevenson

"Knowledge will give you power, but character respect."

- Bruce Lee

"Try not to become a man of success. Rather become a man of value."

- Albert Einstein

"Perhaps a man’s character is like a tree, and his reputation like its shadow. The shadow is what we think of it; the tree is the real thing."

- Abraham Lincoln

"Many men owe the grandeur of their lives to their tremendous difficulties."

- Charles Spurgeon

"I’m a greater believer in luck, and I find the harder I work, the more I have of it."

- Thomas Jefferson

"If you want to overcome the whole world, overcome yourself."

- Fyodor Dostoevsky

"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

"A man is not finished when he is defeated. He is finished when he quits."

- Richard Nixon

"Either men will learn to live like brothers, or they will die like beasts."

- Max Lerner

"Commitment means that it is possible for a man to yield the nerve center of his consent to a purpose or cause, a movement or an ideal, which may be more important to him than whether he lives or dies."

- Howard Thurman

"Great things are not done by impulse, but by a series of small things brought together."

- Vincent Van Gogh

"If we all did the things we are really capable of doing, we would literally astound ourselves."

- Thomas A. Edison

"Men do not fail; they give up trying."

- Elihu Root

"A woman simply is, but a man must become."

- Camille Paglia

"If you don’t build your dream, someone else will hire you to help them build theirs."

- Dhirubhai Ambani

"He who conquers himself is the mightiest warrior."

- Confucius

"One man with courage makes a majority."

- Andrew Jackson

"One secret of success in life is for a man to be ready for his opportunity when it comes."

- Benjamin Disraeli

"The successful man will profit from his mistakes and try again in a different way."

- Dale Carnegie

"A successful man is one who can lay a firm foundation with the bricks others have thrown at him."

- David Brinkley

"The two most important days in your life are the day you’re born and the day you find out why."

- Mark Twain

"I’m not in this world to live up to your expectations, and you’re not in this world to live up to mine."

- Bruce Lee

"The battles that count aren’t the ones for gold medals. The struggles within yourself—the invisible, inevitable battles inside all of us—that’s where it’s at."

- Jesse Owens

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

- Frederick Douglass

"Courage is like a muscle. We strengthen it by use."

- Ruth Gordo

"You’ll never get bored when you try something new. There’s really no limit to what you can do."

- Dr. Seuss

"I think it’s intoxicating when somebody is so unapologetically who they are."

- Don Cheadle

"If you don’t like the road you’re walking, start paving another one."

- Dolly Parton

"If it makes you nervous, you’re doing it right."

- Childish Gambino

"If you perform the sacrifice of doing your duty, you do not have to do anything else. Devoted to duty, man attains perfection."

- Bhagavad Gita

"Associate with men of good quality if you esteem your own reputation; for it is better to be alone than in bad company."

- George Washington

"Just one small positive thought in the morning can change your whole day."

- Dalai Lama

"To have become a deeper man is the privilege of those who have suffered."

- Oscar Wilde

"Relentlessly prune bullshit, don’t wait to do things that matter, and savor the time you have. That’s what you do when life is short."

- Paul Graham

"More is lost by indecision than wrong decision."

- Marcus Tullius Cicero

"Today is your opportunity to build the tomorrow you want."

- Ken Poirot

"He that can have patience can have what he will."

- Benjamin Franklin

"Keep a little fire burning; however small, however hidden."

- Cormac McCarthy

"Stronger by weakness, wiser men become."

- Edmund Waller

"I always thought it was me against the world, and then one day I realized it’s just me against me."

- Kendrick Lamar

"The more I want to get something done, the less I call it work."

- Richard Bach

"You can never leave footprints that last if you are always walking on tiptoe."

- Leymah Gbowee

"Whatever you are, be a good one."

- Abraham Lincoln

"We need to do a better job of putting ourselves higher on our own ‘to do’ list."

- Michelle Obama

"Smart people learn from everything and everyone, average people from their experiences, stupid people already have all the answers."

- Socrates

"Magic is believing in yourself. If you can make that happen, you can make anything happen."

- Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

"In order to be irreplaceable one must always be different."

- Coco Chanel

"The world is changed by your example, not by your opinion."

- Paulo Coelho

"Billionaires are created by a mindset. It is a decision, not an event."

- Brian Tracy

"If you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change."

- Wayne Dyer

"Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that."

- Martin Luther King Jr.

"Keep your face to the sunshine and you cannot see the shadows."

- Helen Keller

"I wake up every morning and think to myself, ‘How far can I push this company in the next 24 hours?’"

- Leah Busque

"Treat all men alike. Give them the same law. Give them an even chance to live and grow."

- Chief Joseph

"There are far, far better things ahead than any we leave behind."

- C.S. Lewis

"A man who has committed a mistake and doesn’t correct it is committing another mistake."

- Confucius Kongzi

"If people are doubting how far you can go, go so far that you can’t hear them anymore."

- Michele Ruiz

"The heart of man is very much like the sea; it has its storms, it has its tides, and in its depths, it has its pearls too."

- Vincent Van Gogh

"He is a wise man who does not grieve for the things which he has not, but rejoices for those which he has."

- Epictetus

"If you want to lift yourself up, lift up someone else."

- Booker T. Washington

"We can see through others only when we can see through ourselves."

- Bruce Lee

"Do what you feel in your heart to be right―for you’ll be criticized anyway."

- Eleanor Roosevelt

"The best way out is always through."

- Robert Frost

"It is often the small steps, not the giant leaps, that bring about the most lasting change."

- Queen Elizabeth II

"We all walk in the dark and each of us must learn to turn on his or her own light."

- Earl Nightingale

"Someone will declare, ‘I am the leader!’ and expect everyone to get in line and follow him or her to the gates of heaven or hell. My experience is that it doesn’t happen that way. Others follow you based on the quality of your actions rather than the magnitude of your declarations."

- Bill Walsh

"Most men, when they think they are thinking, are merely rearranging their prejudices."

- Knute Rockne

"What hurts you blesses you."

- Rumi

"What’s right is what’s left if you do everything else wrong."

- Robin Williams

"Do not trust all men, but trust men of worth; the former course is silly, the latter a mark of prudence."

- Democritus

"One must judge men not by their opinions, but by what their opinions have made of them."

- Georg C. Lichtenberg

"Men can only be happy when they do not assume that the object of life is happiness."

- George Orwell

"The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation. What is called resignation is confirmed desperation."

- Henry David Thoreau

"Without feelings of respect, what is there to distinguish men from beasts?"

- Confucius

"Men must know their limitations."

- Clint Eastwood

"First, forget inspiration. Habit is more dependable. Habit will sustain you whether you’re inspired or not. Habit will help you finish and polish your stories. Inspiration won’t. Habit is persistence in practice."

- Octavia Butler

"If the highest aim of a captain were to preserve his ship, he would keep it in port forever."

- Thomas Aquinas

"Don’t confuse having a career with having a life."

- Hillary Clinton

"There is no such thing as work-life balance. It is all life. The balance has to be within you."

- Sadhguru

"We don’t stop playing because we grow old; we grow old because we stop playing."

- George Bernard Shaw

"Write it. Shoot it. Publish it. Crochet it. Sauté it. Whatever. MAKE."

- Joss Whedon

"Fairy tales are more than true: not because they tell us that dragons exist, but because they tell us that dragons can be beaten."

- Neil Gaiman

"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 which has been opened for us."

- Helen Keller

"It’s no use going back to yesterday, because I was a different person then."

- Lewis Carroll

"Happiness is not something ready made. It comes from your own actions."

- Dalai Lama

"If something is important enough, even if the odds are stacked against you, you should still do it."

- Elon Musk

"Don’t be afraid to give up the good to go for the great."

- John D. Rockefeller

"No one is to blame for your future situation but yourself. If you want to be successful, then become ‘Successful.’"

- Jaymin Shah

"The greatest deception men suffer is from their own opinions."

- Leonardo da Vinci

"Men are like steel. When they lose their temper, they lose their worth."

- Chuck Norris

"Impossible is just an opinion."

- Paulo Coelho

"Everything you can imagine is real."

- Pablo Picasso

"Your passion is waiting for your courage to catch up."

- Isabelle Lafleche

"You’ve gotta dance like there’s nobody watching, love like you’ll never be hurt, sing like there’s nobody listening, and live like it’s heaven on earth."

- William W. Purkey

"Men are more easily governed through their vices than through their virtues."

- Napoleon Bonaparte

"Neutral men are the devil's allies."

- Edwin Hubbel Chapin

"It is the privilege of the gods to want nothing, and of godlike men to want little."

- Diogenes

"Only the paranoid survive."

- Andy Grove

"For tis not in mere death that men die most."

- Elizabeth Barrett Browning

"Whatever makes men good Christians, makes them good citizens."

- Daniel Webster

"Men rise from one ambition to another: first, they seek to secure themselves against attack, and then they attack others."

- Niccolo Machiavelli

"We should weep for men at their birth, not at their death."

- Montesquieu

"A bachelor is a guy who never made the same mistake once."

- Phyllis Diller

"A gentleman is simply a patient wolf."

- Lana Turner

"Honor is simply the morality of superior men."

- H. L. Mencken

"The true index of a man's character is the health of his wife."

- Cyril Connolly

"It’s Monday … time to motivate and make dreams and goals happen. Let’s go!"

- Heather Stillufsen

"Men tire themselves in pursuit of rest."

- Laurence Sterne

"A lot of times, women don't get the male perspective in regards to a relationship, what men go through when they're not really dealing well."

- Morris Chestnut

"Circumstances rule men; men do not rule circumstances."

- Herodotus

"If we have the attitude that it’s going to be a great day, it usually is."

- Catherine Pulsifier

"Passion makes idiots of the cleverest men, and makes the biggest idiots clever."

- Francois de La Rochefoucauld

"All men have an instinct for conflict: at least, all healthy men."

- Hilaire Belloc

"Men are like sheep, of which a flock is more easily driven than a single one."

- Richard Whately

"Men always want to be a woman's first love - women like to be a man's last romance."

- Oscar Wilde

"When women love us, they forgive us everything, even our crimes; when they do not love us, they give us credit for nothing, not even our virtues."

- Honore de Balzac

"Like all young men I set out to be a genius, but mercifully laughter intervened."

- Lawrence Durrell

"Do not put such unlimited power into the hands of husbands. Remember all men would be tyrants if they could."

- Abigail Adams

"The less men think, the more they talk."

- Montesquieu

"Pride, envy, avarice - these are the sparks have set on fire the hearts of all men."

- Dante Alighieri

"Culture makes all men gentle."

- Menander

"There’s no better way to get even with someone than by being happy!"

- Al Franken

"Revenge is sweet, but it will fill you up with negative energy not positive energy. Think about what the real lessons are to take away from your situation."

- Steve Maraboli

"When somebody hurts you, just say 'thank you' and move on."

- Madonna Ciccone

"Men often act knowingly against their interest."

- David Hume

"I am an agnostic; I do not pretend to know what many ignorant men are sure of."

- Clarence Darrow

"Men tend to feel threatened; women tend to feel guilty."

- Edwin Louis Cole

"What do women do when they get together? We sit around and talk! Men, not so much. My theory is that this difference is genetic and dates back to the hunter-gatherer societies, when the men had to be quiet as they hunted, lest they scare away the bison and then everyone starved to death and it was all their fault."

- Jenna McCarthy

"I usually make up my mind about a man in ten seconds, and I very rarely change it."

- Margaret Thatcher

"Every man needs two women: a quiet home-maker, and a thrilling nymph."

- Iris Murdoch

"Men get to be a mixture of the charming mannerisms of the women they have known."

- F. Scott Fitzgerald

"Men aren't necessities. They're luxuries."

- Cher

"By nature, men love newfangledness."

- Geoffrey Chaucer

"Boys will be boys, and so will a lot of middle-aged men."

- Kin Hubbard

"If the world were a logical place, men would ride side saddle."

- Rita Mae Brown

"Men don't care what's on TV. They only care what else is on TV."

- Jerry Seinfeld

"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."

"Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man’s character, give him power."

"The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is now."

"Hold the vision, trust the process."

"People who wonder if the glass is half empty or full miss the point. The glass is refillable."

- Unknown

"The same boiling water that softens the potato hardens the egg. It’s what you’re made of. Not the circumstances."

- Unknown

"You can either experience the pain of discipline or the pain of regret. The choice is yours."

- Unknown

"Nothing is stronger than a broken man rebuilding himself."