Words are not without power. However, their true power comes not from standing alone as words, but from being put into action. The best ideas in the world are meaningless if they are not implemented. What’s more, a “good idea” isn’t actually a very good idea if there is no way to implement it.

So how do we go about implementing our ideas in the real world?

This is the eternal question, the one that separates the so-called “armchair philosopher” from the man of action. And while it’s great to have aspirations and dreams, it’s much, much better to actually begin putting these ideas into practice. Anything short of this isn’t self-actualization, but the functional equivalent of daydreaming.

You doubtless need little convincing of the importance of following your aspirations in life. Clarifying what it is you want, however, is the first step toward building your dream, making it into a reality.

Some of the most important and powerful people in history have strong words to encourage you to make your dreams into a reality. We hope that you find these inspiring, then use that inspiration to go take action.

Quotes About Taking Action

 

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“Not in his speech, not in his thoughts, I see his greatness, only in his actions, in his life.”

– Hermann Hesse, Siddartha

 

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“Entrepreneurs are simply those who understand that there is little difference between obstacle and opportunity and are able to turn both to their advantage.”

– Niccolò Machiavelli

 

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“People pay for what they do, and still more for what they have allowed themselves to become. And they pay for it very simply; by the lives they lead.”

– James Baldwin

 

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“You are what you do, not what you say you’ll do.”

– Carl Jung

 

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“You do not write your life with words…You write it with actions. What you think is not important. It is only important what you do.”

– Patrick Ness, A Monster Calls

 

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“I love quotes…but, in the end, knowledge has to be converted to action or it’s worthless.”

– Tony Robbins

 

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“We are defined by our actions, not our words.”

– Kielyr’s characterCaptain Fantastic

“Watch your thoughts, they become your words; watch your words, they become your actions; watch your actions, they become your habits; watch your habits, they become your character; watch your character, it becomes your destiny.”

– Lao Tzu

 

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“Action speaks louder than words but not nearly as often.”

– Mark Twain

 

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“All hat; no cattle.”

– American proverb

Quotes About Following Your Dreams

“I’ve always liked Hamming’s famous double-barreled question: What are the most important problems in your field, and why aren’t you working on one of them? It’s a great way to shake yourself up. But it may be overfitting a bit. It might be at least as useful to ask yourself: if you could take a year off to work on something that probably wouldn’t be important but would be really interesting, what would it be?”

– Paul Graham

 

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“Fortune sides with him who dares.”

– Virgil

 

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“What we fear doing most is usually what we most need to do.”

– Tim Ferriss

 

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“If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where they should be. Now put the foundations under them.”

– Ralph Waldo Emerson

 

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“To sit back and let fate play its hand out and never influence it is not the way man was meant to operate.”

– John Glenn

 

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“It is not titles that make men illustrious, but men who make titles illustrious.”

– Niccolò Machiavelli

“I find thinking in mythological terms has helped people visibly. You can see it happen. It erases anxieties. It puts them in accord with the inevitabilities of their life. And they can see the positive values and the negative aspects of what is positive. It’s whether you’re going to say ‘no’ to the serpent or ‘yes’ to the serpent.  It’s as easy as that. ‘No’ to the adventure or ‘yes’ to the adventure of being alive.”

– Joseph Campbell, Bill Moyers, Season 1 Episode 1, Joseph Campbell and the Power of Myth – “The Hero’s Adventure”

“By artists, I don’t mean someone who picks up a paintbrush. I mean someone who’s doing it for its own sake, who loves the craft…Really great developers very often will code for the sheer joy of it, or to solve a very specific problem that they have.”

– Naval Ravikant

 

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“If you were born without wings, do nothing to prevent them from growing.”

– Coco Chanel

 

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“The greater danger for most of us lies not in setting our aim too high and falling short; but in setting our aim too low, and achieving our mark.”

– Michelangelo Buonarroti