Quotes About Determination

He didn't like the thought of them knowing he'd been scared. Didn't like the thought of them knowing what a fool he'd been. Oh, to hell with that! Tell everyone! He'd done it! He'd been driven to do it and he'd done it and that was it. That was him. That was part of who he was.

I teach "The Singers" to suggest to my students how little choice we have about what kind of writer we'll turn out to be.

It was just a strong feeling in my hart that it was no gud for Foxes to give up and just be ded on perpose.

There comes that phase in life when, tired of losing, you decide to stop losing, then continue losing. Then you decide to really stop losing, and continue losing. The losing goes on and on so long you begin to watch with curiosity, wondering how low you can go. - Christmas , In Persuasion Nation

We are ready, sir; are angry, are capable, our hopes are coiled up so tight as to be deadly, or holy: turn us loose, sir, let us at it, let us show what we can do.

If this isn't the essential American story, I don't know what is: Guy hews a life out of nothing, by working every waking moment, with no education, no government help, no external advantages whatsoever, and no ulterior motive. What did he want? A place where his kids could grow up, with less fear and more material comforts.

Tell them we are tired of being nothing, and doing nothing, and mattering not at all to anyone, and living in a state of constant fear, the Reverend said.

Ruinmore, ruinmore, we felt, must endeavor not to ruinmore.

Our path is not for everyone. Many people—I do not mean to disparage them? Lack the necessary resolve.

Sir, if you are as powerful as I feel that you are, and as inclined toward us as you seem to be, endeavor to do something for us, so that we might do something for ourselves. We are ready, sir; are angry, are capable, our hopes are coiled up so tight as to be deadly, or holy: turn us loose, sir, let us at it, let us show what we can do.

The choosing, the choosing, that's all we've got.

If my wife wishes to leave me, may I compel her at arms to stay in our "union"? Especially when she is a fiercer fighter than I, better organized, quite determined to be free of me?

No one who has ever done anything worth doing has gone uncriticized. As regards the matter at hand (as regards him), I am, at least, above any— Thus thought Mr. Lincoln. But

Sir, if you are as powerful as I feel that you are, and as inclined toward us as you seem to be, endeavor to do something for us, so that we might do something for ourselves. We are ready, sir; are angry, are capable, our hopes are coiled up so tight as to be deadly, or holy: turn us loose, sir, let us at it, let us show what we can do. --thomas havens

Then do that again, over and over, until I'm pleased.

It's very hard in the beginning to understand that the whole idea is not to beat the other runners. Eventually you learn that the competition is against the little voice inside you that wants you to quit.

Success means having the courage, the determination, and the will to become the person you believe you were meant to be.

He runs because he has to. Because in being a runner, in moving through pain and fatigue and suffering, in imposing stress upon stress, in eliminating all but the necessities of life, he is fulfilling himself and becoming the person he is.

courage is the bridge between our minds and our bodies.

We may think there is willpower involved, but more likely...change is due to want power. Wanting the new addiction more than the old one. Wanting the new me in preference to the person I am now.

George Steiner

You work three jobs? Uniquely American, isn't it? I mean, that is fantastic that you're doing that. To a divorced mother of three, Omaha, Nebraska, Feb. 4, 2005

We will not tire, we will not falter, and we will not fail.

I will not forget this wound to our country or those who inflicted it. I will not yield; I will not rest; I will not relent in waging this struggle for freedom and security for the American people.