Og Mandino Quotations

Failure will never overtake me if my determination to succeed is strong enough.

Always do your best. What you plant now, you will harvest later.

Always seek out the seed of triumph in every adversity.

Treasure the love you receive above all. It will survive long after your good health has vanished.

I will love the light for it shows me the way, yet I will endure the darkness because it shows me the stars.

Beginning today, treat everyone you meet as if they were going to be dead by midnight. Extend to them all the care, kindness and understanding you can muster, and do it with no thought of any reward. Your life will never be the same again.

Always render more and better service than is expected of you, no matter what your task may be.

I am here for a purpose and that purpose is to grow into a mountain, not to shrink to a grain of sand.

Tomorrow is only found in the calendar of fools.

It is those who concentrates on but one thing at a time who advance in this world. The great man or woman is the one who never steps outside his or her specialty or foolishly dissipates his or her individuality.

I have never heard anything about the resolutions of the apostles, but a good deal about their acts.

You never know what events are going to transpire to get you home.

Work as though you would live forever, and live as though you would die today. Go another mile!

I seek constantly to improve my manners and graces, for they are the sugar to which all are attracted.

Obstacles are necessary for success because in selling, as in all careers of importance, victory comes only after many struggles and countless defeats. Yet each struggle, each defeat, sharpens your skills and strengths, your courage and your endurance, your ability and your confidence and thus each obstacle is a comrade-in-arms forcing you to become better... or quit. Each rebuff is an opportunity to move forward; turn away from them, avoid them, and you throw away your future.

There is an immeasurable distance between late and too late.

To be always intending to make a new and better life but never to find time to set about it is as to put off eating and drinking and sleeping from one day to the next until you're dead.

The person who knows one thing and does it better than anyone else, even if it only be the art of raising lentils, receives the crown he merits. If he raises all his energy to that end, he is a benefactor of mankind and its rewarded as such.

Take the attitude of a student, never be too big to ask questions, never know too much to learn something new.

Sound character provides the power with which a person may ride the emergencies of life instead of being overwhelmed by them. Failure is... the highway to success.

To do anything truly worth doing, I must not stand back shivering and thinking of the cold and danger, but jump in with gusto and scramble through as well as I can.

Today, and every day, deliver more than you are getting paid to do. The victory of success will be half won when you learn the secret of putting out more than is expected in all that you do. Make yourself so valuable in your work that eventually you will become indispensable. Exercise your privilege to go the extra mile, and enjoy all the rewards you receive. You deserve them!

Live this day as if it will be your last. Remember that you will only find ''tomorrow'' on the calendars of fools. Forget yesterday's defeats and ignore the problems of tomorrow. This is it. Doomsday. All you have. Make it the best day of your year. The saddest words you can ever utter are, ''If I had my life to live over again. ''Take the baton, now. Run with it! This is your day! Beginning today, treat everyone you meet, friend or foe, loved one or stranger, as if they were going to be dead at midnight. Extend to each person, no matter how trivial the contact, all the care and kindness and understanding and love that you can muster, and do it with no thought of any reward. Your life will never be the same again.

The only certain means of is to render more and better service than is expected of you, no matter what your task may be.

Every memorable act in the history of the world is a triumph of enthusiasm. Nothing great was ever achieved without it because it gives any challenge or any occupation, no mater how frightening or difficult, a new meaning. Without enthusiasm you are doomed to a life of mediocrity but with it you can accomplish miracles.

If I feel depressed I will sing. If I feel sad I will laugh. If I feel ill I will double my labor. If I feel fear I will plunge ahead. If I feel inferior I will wear new garments. If I feel uncertain I will raise my voice. If I feel poverty I will think of wealth to come. If I feel incompetent I will think of past success. If I feel insignificant I will remember my goals. Today I will be the master of my emotions.

You will achieve grand dream, a day at a time, so set goals for each day -- not long and difficult projects, but chores that will take you, step by step, toward your rainbow. Write them down, if you must, but limit your list so that you won't have to drag today's undone matters into tomorrow. Remember that you cannot build your pyramid in twenty-four hours. Be patient. Never allow your day to become so cluttered that you neglect your most important goal -- to do the best you can, enjoy this day, and rest satisfied with what you have accomplished.

... women have their roots in the ground, and often those roots are starved and ravaged, yet there is not a human alive who cannot reach and touch, with... her fingers, the very top of God's rainbow.

The master of a single trade can support a family. The master of seven trades cannot support himself. The wind is never for the sailor who knows not to what port he is bound.

Failure is a man's inability to reach his goals in life, whatever they may be

There are two kinds of discontented in this world, the discontented that works and the discontented that wrings its hands. The first gets what it wants and the second loses what it has. There is no cure for the first but success and there is no cure at all for the second. The very worst of my vices and bad habits will abate of themselves if they are brought to an accounting every day.

Let your actions always speak for you, but be forever on guard against the terrible traps of false pride and conceit that can halt your progress. The next time you are tempted to boast, just place your fist in a full pail of water, and when you remove it, the hole remaining will give you a correct measure of your importance.

I will smile at friend and foe alike and make every effort to find, in him or her, a quality to praise, now that I realize the deepest yearning of human nature is the craving to be appreciated.

A field of clay touched by the genius of man becomes a castle.

The prizes of life are at the end of each journey, not near the beginning; and it is not given to me to know how many steps are necessary in order to reach my goal. Failure I may still encounter at the thousandth step, yet success hides behind the next bend in the road. Never will I know how close it lies unless I turn the corner.

You can never win when you wear the ugly cloak of self-pity and the sour sound of whining.

My procrastination which has held me back was born of fear ... now I know that to conquer fear I must always act without hesitation and the flutters in my heart will vanish. Now I know that action reduces the lion of terror.... I will walk where the failure fears to walk.

Cultivate the habit of laughter.

Take great comfort in knowing that ALL great feats are accomplished one small step at a time.

He who worries about calamities suffers them twice over.

I determine to render more and better service, each day, than I am being paid to render. Those that reach the top are the ones who are not content with doing only what is required of them.

Now I know that patience and time can do more than even strength and passion. The years of frustration are ready to be harvested. All that I have managed to accomplish, and all that I hope to accomplish, has been and will be by that plodding, patient, persevering process which builds the ant heap, particle by particle, thought by thought, step by step.

Live this day as if it will be your last. Remember that you will only find "tomorrow" on the calendars of fools.

Do the very best that you can, in the things you do best, and you will know in thy soul, that you are the greatest success in the world.

I will form good habits and become their slaves.

Every memorable act in the history of the world is a triumph of enthusiasm. Nothing great was ever achieved without it because it gives any challenge or any occupation, no mater how frightening or difficult, a new meaning. Without enthusiasm you are doomed to a life of mediocrity but with it you can accomplish miracles

The wind is never for the sailor who knows not to what port he is bound.

Many succumb to despair and fail without realizing that they already possess all the tools needed to acquire great wealth.

Laugh and your life will be lengthened for this is the great secret of long life.

I can accomplish far more than I have, and I will, for why would the miracle which produced me end with my birth? Why can I not extend that miracle to my deeds of today?

Choice! The key is choice. You have options. You need not spend your life wallowing in failure, ignorance, grief, poverty, shame, and self-pity. But hold on! If this is true then why have so many among us apparently elected to live in this manner? The answer is obvious. Those who live in unhappy failure have never exercised their options for a better way of life because they have never been aware that had any choices

Failure is... the highway to success.

I will commit not the terrible crime of aiming too low. I will do the work that a failure will not do. I will always let my reach exceed my grasp.

Always strive to make the next hour better than this one.

Each problem has a positive side.

God will never give you any problems that he thinks you can't solve.

A day merely survived is no cause for celebration.

Green grass grows where dry desert ends.

Many years ago, when I was just about as complete a failure as one can become, I began to spend a good deal of time in libraries, looking for some answers. I found all the answers I needed in that golden vein of ore that every library has.

Today.....I begin a new life".

I will walk where failures fear to walk.

Why do we continue to breed little minds who can find no recompense for their own failures other than to belittle and mock the talents, even the dress, of others? When will everyone realize that we are all equal in the eyes of God?

So long as I can laugh, never will I be poor.

If the ingredients for happiness are not within a person, no material success or entertainment or platinum credit cards can make that person smile.

If our lives are truly plans of God, someone had better call a meeting soon to remind us, once more, what great miracles we really are.

If I must be a slave to habit let me be a slave to good habits.

Don't let your success of today lay you into complacency for tomorrow. For that is the worst form of failure.

Each rebuff is an opportunity to move forward; turn away from them, avoid them, and you throw away your future.

I will strain my potential until it cries for mercy.

Use wisely your power of choice.

Procrastination can be driven from your personality through the simple technique of constantly commanding yourself to get into action . . . and then obeying that command immediately.

Tomorrow is the day reserved for the labor of the lazy. I am not lazy. Tomorrow is the day when the failure will succeed. I am not a failure. I will act now.

Without enthusiasm you are doomed to a life of mediocrity, but with it you can accomplish miracles.

Today I am born anew and my birthplace is a vineyard where there is fruit for all.

I'd rather learn how to prevent failure than how to gain success, because for what is success other than a state of mind?

True security lies not in the things one has, but in the things one can do without.

Never will I pursue happiness, because it is not a goal, just a by-product, and there is no happiness in having or in getting, only in giving.

In this world, the greatest rewards of success, wealth and happiness are usually obtained not through the exercise of special powers such a genius or intellect but through one's energetic use of simple means and ordinary qualities.

Already I am smiling in anticipation of the good to come

Only God can shape a flower, but any foolish child can pull it to pieces.

Do not listen to those who weep and complain, for their disease is contagious.

Weak is he who permits his thoughts to control his actions; strong is he who forces his actions to control his thoughts.

The greatest secret in the world is that you only have to be a small measurable amount better than mediocrity ...and you've got it made.

Do that which you dread and cherish those victories with pride.

Laugh at yourself for man is most comical when he takes himself too seriously.

So long as there is breath in me, that long will I persist.

Wealth, my son, should never be your goal in life. Your words are eloquent but they are mere words. True wealth is of the heart, not of the purse.

Always will I dig for reasons to applaud; never will I scratch for excuses to gossip. When I am tempted to criticize I will bite on my tongue; when I am moved to praise I will shout from the roofs.

I will embrace today's difficult tasks, take off my coat, and make dust in the world.

Never has there been a map, however carefully executed to detail and scale, which has carried its owner over even one inch of ground. Never has there been a parchment of law, however fair, which prevented one crime. Never has there been a scroll, even such as the one I hold, which so much as a penny or produced a single word of acclamation. Action, alone, is the tinder which ignites the map, the parchment, this scroll, my plans, my goals, into a living force. Action is the food and drink which will nourish my success. I will act now.

You can't conquer reality by running away from it.

The road to success, for me, was a long and arduous journey, strewn with obstacles and traps, pitfalls and hurdles-all created by myself. Painful as it is, I speak of those sad and frustrating times whenever I am invited to address sales gatherings, corporate conventions, and success rallies, in the hope that my personal experiences will serve as sufficient evidence for all who hear me that they have it in their own power to make their lives as glorious or as terrible as they choose.

I will persist until I succeed. I know that small attempts, repeated, will complete any undertaking.

And even if you have failed at all else in the eyes of the world, if you have a loving family, you are a success.

I am not a human being, i am a human becoming.

I am indeed a fortunate man and today's hours are but a bonus, undeserved. Why have I been allowed to live this extra day when others, far better than I, have departed? Is it that they have accomplished their purpose while mine is yet to be achieved? Is this another opportunity for me to become the man I know I can be?

I am convinced that the greatest legacy we can leave our children are happy memories: those precious moments so much like pebbles on the beach that are plucked from the white sand and placed in tiny boxes that lay undisturbed on tall shelves until one day they spill out and time repeats itself, with joy and sweet sadness, in the child now an adult.

No more busy work. No more hiding from success. Leave time, leave space, to grow. Now. Now! Not tomorrow!

The great difference between those who succeed and those who fail does not consist in the amount of work done by each but in the amount of intelligent work.

AI will make love my greatest weapon and none on whom I call can defend against its force.