Quotes About Purpose

Art for art's sake, with no purpose, for any purpose perverts art. But art achieves a purpose which is not its own. (1804)

Problems tend to be put into their proper perspective the moment we get off SELF, and on PURPOSE. By choosing your purpose in life - a purpose that serves the greater good - and devoting the majority of your time, energy, and attention everyday toward living it, you discover the secret to a life of fulfillment.

I think success is about purpose. People ask about success at different points in your life. As I look back, I think people that are successful feel good about what they are doing, and they can look back at what they've done and they feel good about it. People sometimes ask about success and they say, "What's your legacy?" and I say, "I think it's really a dumb question." I think the question is: What am I doing now? Do I feel good about myself? Am I proud of myself? Whatever purpose there is in life, I think success is about purpose. It's not about material things.

The idea that the State originated to serve any kind of social purpose is completely unhistorical. It originated in conquest and confiscation - that is to say, in crime. It originated for the purpose of maintaining the division of society into an owning-and-exploiting class and a propertyless dependent class - that is, for a criminal purpose.

When I go to a music concert, I don't say, "My purpose is to get to the end and enjoy the finale." If that were the purpose, everybody would write finales and nothing more. The purpose of the concert is to enjoy each note as you go along.

As has been stated, the purpose of money is to split barter into two parts so that the seller is free to find his source of supply later and elsewhere. This is the sole purpose of money. Any effort to use money to serve another purpose is perversive; and this statement condemns the entire managed money philosophy.

War is not violence and killing, pure and simple; war is controlled violence, for a purpose. The purpose of war is to support your government's decisions by force. The purpose is never to kill the enemy just to be killing him but to make him do what you want him to do. Not killing... but controlled and purposeful violence.

Many a scientist has patiently designed experiments for the purpose of substantiating his belief that animal operations are motivated by no purposes. He has perhaps spent his spare time in writing articles to prove that human beings are as other animals so that 'purpose' is a category irrelevant for the explanation of their bodily activities, his own activities included. Scientists animated by the purpose of proving that they are purposeless constitute an interesting subject for study.

The degree to which the people of America are being dumbed down on purpose every day is striking. And all for the express purpose of maintaining in power a political party [the Democrats] which seeks a permanent underclass and as many dependent people on government as possible. As many uninformed, misinformed, know-nothings as they can get.

It's not a matter of becoming a superstar. Fame and money aren't the purpose of all this. No actor's going to say, 'I don't want to be famous.' But the main purpose for doing what I'm doing is the passion in the work.

All the greatest men are maniacs. They are possessed by a mania which drives them forward towards thier goal. The great scientists, the philosophers, the religious leaders - all maniacs. What else but a blind singlenee of purpose could have given focus to thier genius, would have kept them in the groove of purpose. Mania... is as priceless as genius.

We tend to set up success in Christian work as our purpose, but our purpose should be to display the glory of God in human life, to live a life "hidden with Christ in God" in our everyday human conditions.

The purpose of the world is for youto be lost in it, ultimately. The purpose of the world is for you to suffer, to create the suffering that seems to be what is needed for the awakening to happen.

Some people flinch when you talk about art in the context of the needs of society thinking you are introducing something far too common for a discussion of art. Why should art have a purpose and a use? Art shouldn't be concerned with purpose and reason and need, they say. These are improper. But from the very beginning, it seems to me, stories have indeed been meant to be enjoyed, to appeal to that part of us which enjoys good form and good shape and good sound.

The outer purpose belongs to the horizontal dimension of space and time; the inner purpose concerns a deepening of your Being in the vertical dimension of the timeless Now.

As we study the Word of God rightly divided we are to understand that God has arranged His dealings with mankind into two programs. We have His prophesied purpose and His secret purpose. Prophecy has to do with the earth and Christ's reign upon it during the millennial kingdom, while the Mystery concerns our exaltation with Christ in the heavenlies.

What's the purpose of NATO? Well actually we have an official answer. It isn't publicized much, but a couple of years ago, the secretary-general of NATO made a formal statement explaining the purpose of NATO in the post-Cold War world is to control global energy systems, pipelines, and sea lanes. That means it's a global system and of course he didn't say it, it's an intervention force under US command, as we've seen in case after case. So that's NATO.

A life without purpose is a languid, drifting thing; Every day we ought to review our purpose, saying to ourselves: This day let me make a sound beginning, for what we have hitherto done is naught!

The purpose that you wish to find in life, like a cure you seek, is not going to fall from the sky. ...I believe purpose is something for which one is responsible; it's not just divinely assigned.

God created man on purpose, and for a purpose.

We have focused on the miracle-thing and I think we often overlook the message of Hanukkah. To me, the core of the holiday is the cleaning of the temple.... The accomplishment was in restoring the temple to the purpose for which it was built. Now think of the temple as a symbol. Perhaps it represents my life. The world has tried to use me for its own (perhaps good, but none-the-less extrinsic) purposes. But now I can rededicate myself to my own original purpose.

I'd hope that the story A Dog's Purpose helps everyone reflect on how many different "lives" we all live - from children to teenager to adults to seniors - and how each phase of life presents new situations along the way to discovering our ultimate purpose.

After all, what is your host's purpose in having a party? Surely not for you to enjoy yourself; if that were their sole purpose, they'd have simply sent champagne and women over to your place by taxi.

Like the vital rudder of a ship, we have been provided a way to determine the direction we travel. The lighthouse of the Lord beckons to all as we sail the seas of life. Our home port is the celestial kingdom of God. Our purpose is to steer an undeviating course in that direction. A man without a purpose is like a ship without a rudder—never likely to reach home port. To us comes the signal: Chart your course, set your sail, position your rudder, and proceed.

I love feeling like I have purpose and maybe that's the purpose I'm giving myself.

To me, leadership is about first defining purpose. Why does a company exist and what problem does it solve for customers? How is it different than everyone else, and what difference do they plan to make in the world? Companies (and people) should be measured based on the impact they make in the world. If the purpose and solution are solid, the money will follow.

It is worthwhile for one to make an effort to achieve happiness. Just as the purpose of a plant is to grow, so it is that the main purpose of every human being is to survive and to grow until death.

...the statement, "The purpose of the law is to cause justice to reign," is not a rigorously accurate statement. It ought to be stated that the purpose of the law is to prevent injustice from reigning. In fact, it is injustice, instead of justice, that has an existence of its own. Justice is achieved only when injustice is absent.

While [the] precious, vital message [of the Restoration] has been proclaimed across the world, Satan has been most effective in causing people to ignore it or to look in the wrong places for it. The vast majority of Father's children have not only forgotten their Father in Heaven and the purpose of mortal life, but they rarely even think of Him nor ponder for what purpose they are here in mortality. They have been led to be absorbed by mundane things that distract them from the essential ones. Don't you make that mistake.

The first purpose of your life is to be loved by God! Yes, it is important to serve him, obey, and trust him, but your first purpose is to love him.

Art has always been my salvation. And my gods are Herman Melville, Emily Dickinson, Mozart. I believe in them with all my heart. And when Mozart is playing in my room, I am in conjunction with something I can’t explain — I don’t need to. I know that if there’s a purpose for life, it was for me to hear Mozart. Or if I walk in the woods and I see an animal, the purpose of my life was to see that animal. I can recollect it, I can notice it. I’m here to take note of. And that is beyond my ego, beyond anything that belongs to me, an observer, an observer.

Because children grow up, we think a child's purpose is to grow up. But a child's purpose is to be a child. Nature doesn't disdain what lives only for a day. It pours the whole of itself into the each moment. We don't value the lily less for not being made of flint and built to last.

We need the stars... We need purpose! We need the image the Destiny to take root among the stars gives us of ourselves as a purposeful, growing species. We need to become the adult species that the Destiny can help us become! If we're to be anything other than smooth dinosaurs who evolve, specialize and die, we need the stars.... When we have no difficult, long-term purpose to strive toward, we fight each other. We destroy ourselves. We have these chaotic, apocalyptic periods of murderous craziness.

What does purpose mean? It means the deepest desire for our short lives to mean something. . . . To speak a language of purpose is to return to first principles and to be able to answer, in plain English, the plain questions of Why? Why should we chip in to help someone else? Why should we defer gratification? Why should we care about the long term? Why should we trust anyone who seems to be limiting our ability to do what we want?

It reminded us that propaganda in some form or other lurks in every book, that every work of art has a meaning and a purpose - a political, social and religious purpose - that our aesthetic judgements are always coloured by our prejudices and beliefs

Every musical phrase has a purpose. It's like talking. If you talk with a particular purpose, people listen to you, but if you just recite, it's not as meaningful.

Everything is here for a purpose, from horses to vine shoots. What's surprising about that? Even the sun will tell you, "I have a purpose," and the other goods as well.

If you want to know why you were jplaced on this planet, you must begin with God. You were born by his purpose and for his purpose.

For me, promotional thing about some new album coming out destroys a lot of the excitement of making records. Records, movies, books - they're not supposed to be like math books. The purpose of them is to kind of take us out of ourselves and give us some sort of alternate experience or respite. To try to maximize the relationship of listening to a record through promotion is like experiencing driving a car by reading about stimulus programs. It kind of defeats the purpose.

He who with sincerity seeks his real purpose in life is himself sought by that purpose.

Most people enter into relationships with an eye toward what they can get out of them, rather than what they can put into them. The purpose of a relationship is to decide what part of yourself you'd like to see "show up," not what part of another you can capture and hold. The purpose of a relationship is not to have another who might complete you; but to have another with whom you might share your completeness.

There must be only three supreme values which govern a person's life: Reason, Purpose, and Self-esteem. Reason, as his only tool of knowledge--Purpose, as his choice of the happiness which that tool must proceed to achieve--Self-esteem, as his inviolate certainty that his mind is competent to think and his person is worthy of happiness, which means: is worthy of living. These three values imply and require all of man's virtues, and all his virtues pertain to the relation of existence and consciousness: rationality, independence, integrity, honesty, justice, productiveness, pride.

The federal statute is invalid, for no legitimate purpose overcomes the purpose and effect to disparage and injure those whom the state, by its marriage laws, sought to protect in personhood and dignity.

Sooner or later a democracy which is to survive has to be able to rely upon that enlargement of vision and purpose of those individuals who compose it, which means that their craving for devotion and self-sacrifice is satisfied in a democratic society on a nobler level, and with a finer recognition of the value of individual personality than is true of a national purpose of a totalitarian state under a dictator.

You don't decide what your purpose is in life you discover it. Your purpose is your reason for living.

To be financially wealthy you must have a purpose for your life. In other words, without purpose, you'll never know when you have enough money, and you can never be financially wealthy.

Whenever you become anxious or stressed, outer purpose has taken over, and you lost sight of your inner purpose. You have forgotten that your state of consciousness is primary, all else secondary.

The most successful leader of all is the one who sees another picture not yet actualized. He sees the things which are not yet there... Above all, he should make his co-workers see that it is not his purpose which is to be achieved, but a common purpose, born of the desires and the activities of the group.