Seth Godin Work Quotations

The myth that the CEO is going to discover you and nurture you and ask you to join her for lunch is just that, a Hollywood myth.

Now for the first time, you can choose yourself. You can be responsible for what you do and how you do it. You have to do the hard work of finding and pleasing an audience.

Fear is the workout we give ourselves imagining what will happen if things don't work out. . . . Worry is our effort to imagine every possible way to avoid the outcome that is causing us fear, and failing that, to survive the thing that we fear if it comes to fruition.

You are far more likely to do your best work if you are willing to delight a few as opposed to soothe the masses.

I was amplifying the negative at the expense of the positive, not to serve any useful function, not to make my writing better, but to destroy it. The lizard brain, so attuned to people laughing behind our backs, was on high alert for this sort of criticism and would do anything it could to stop me from writing again. I haven't sought out and read a review or a tweet since.

It's entirely possible that there won't be a standing ovation at the end of your journey. That's okay. At least you lived.

The rest of the world isn't nearly as important as the few who are here.

The opportunity is not in being momentarily popular with the anonymous masses. It's in being missed when you're gone, in doing work that matters to the tribe you choose.

Courage doesn't always involve physical heroism in the face of death. It doesn't always require giant leaps worthy of celebration. Sometimes, courage is the willingness to speak the truth about what you see and to own what you say.

If you could do tomorrow over again, would you?

I'm not proposing that you let the crowd dictate, or that you work hard to fit in. Far from it. I'm proposing that you know the impact your choices are having and act accordingly.

Becoming a superstar takes about 10,000 hours of hard work.

'Teamwork' is the word that bosses use when they actually mean 'Do what I say'

Living and breathing an authentic story is the best way to survive in a conversation-rich world.

Great work is the result of seeking out tension, not avoiding it.

Networking that matters is helping people achieve their goals.

It turns out that the people who like their jobs the most are also the ones who are doing the best work, making the greatest impact, and changing the most.

As you've probably discovered, great work makes us uncomfortable.

The problem with putting it all on the line is that it might not work out. The problem with not putting it all on the line is that it will never (ever) change things for the better. Not much of a choice, I think.

Take the long way. Do the hard work, consistently and with generosity and transparency. And then you won't waste time doing it over.

Don't measure anything unless the data helps you make a better decision or change your actions. If you're not prepared to change your diet or your workouts, don't get on the scale.

Set up a life you don't need to escape from.

You are not your resume, you are your work.

If you're going to build a lean enterprise, you can test and measure how often the company ships iterations, how often it fails, how often it is putting things in front of people that don't work.

Kickstarter eliminates the risk that publishers and booksellers face. They have limited resources and limited shelf space, and Kickstarter is proof to them that something is going to work.

Many people are starting to realize that they work a lot and that working on stuff they believe in (and making things happen) is much more satisfying then just getting a paycheck and waiting to get fired (or die).

Great work is always shunned at first.

One way to work the system is to work the system. The other way is to refuse to work it.

Before you promise to change the world, it makes sense to do the hard work of changing your neighborhood.

Art is what we're doing when we do our best work.

You don't make art after you become an artist. You become an artist by ceaselessly making art.

Our best work can't possibly appeal to the average masses, only our average work can. Finding the humility to happily walk away from those that don't get it unlocks our ability to do great work.