Popular quotes about Work! Wisdom and inspiration are here!
Most of the earth's inhabitants work to get by. They work because they have to. They didn't pick this or that kind of job out of passion; the circumstances of their lives did the choosing for them. Loveless work, boring work, work valued only because others haven't got even that much, however loveless and boring - this is one of the harshest human miseries. And there's no sign that coming centuries will produce any changes for the better as far as this goes.
Wislawa SzymborskaThe best preparation for work is not thinking about work, talking about work, or studying for work: it is work.
William WeldI advocate for people who believe sex work is work. But women have so many avenues open. In the same way, a trans woman or a hijra should have that many doors open. If later on she chooses sex work, that's fine. But she shouldn't have to choose sex work because all the other doors are closed. Every hijra or trans person is not a sex worker. We need our own respect. And whoever chooses sex work after having all doors open, I really respect that.
Laxmi Narayan TripathiWhen the artist is truly the servant of the work, the work is better than the artist; Shakespeare knew how to listen to his work, and so he often wrote better than he could write; Bach composed more deeply, more truly than he knew, Rembrandt's brush put more of the human spirit on canvas than Rembrandt could comprehend. When the work takes over, then the artist is enabled to get out of the way, not to interfere. When the work takes over, then the artist listens.
Madeleine L'EngleWork Does Not Need You, You Need Work. Through Work, Destiny Unfolds. Your work is to discover your work and then with all your heart give yourself to it.
Chin-Ning ChuBut what is work and what is not work? Is it work to dig, to carpenter, to plant trees, to fell trees, to ride, to fish, to hunt, to feed chickens, to play the piano, to take photographs, to build a house, to cook, to sew, to trim hats, to mend motor bicycles? All of these things are work to somebody, and all of them are play to somebody. There are in fact very few activities which cannot be classed either as work or play according as you choose to regard them.
George OrwellWork on causal theories of knowledge - early work by Armstrong, and Dretske, and Goldman - seemed far more satisfying. As I started to see the ways in which work in the cognitive sciences could inform our understanding of central epistemological issues, my whole idea of what the philosophical enterprise is all about began to change. Quine certainly played a role here, as did Putnam's (pre-1975) work in philosophy of science, and the exciting developments that went on in that time in philosophy of mind.
Hilary KornblithI realized that work doesnt beget work. Good work begets work. So I got a lot more patient and stopped worrying about working all the time.
Brady CorbetWe may explain success mainly by one word and that word is WORK! WORK!! WORK!!! WORK!!!!
Frederick DouglassWe only workย the most I ever work is three days a week. Very rare that I will work four. If Iย'm involved in a scenario where they need me to be in it, I don'ยt mind. They always work around my childrenยs schedule, their sports, and stuff like that. Thatยs been very important to me.
Ric FlairMy research and practice indicates that people need to be doing work they love and to love the work they do. They need to feel that their efforts matter for the people and causes about which they really care. Further, they need to be doing work with people they respect and enjoy. Finally, they need to feel free to choose where, when and how it all gets done. It's not easy to put these conditions in place, but it is certainly possible to do so, as I have seen and shown in my work in organizations and communities using the Total Leadership approach.
Stewart D. FriedmanWe honor life when we work. The type of work is not important: the fact of work is. All work feeds the soul if it is honest and done to the best of our abilities and if it brings joy to others.
Matthew FoxVanity is something that will only get in the way of doing your best work, and ultimately if you're truly vain you care more about your work than how you look in your work. I actually consider myself a pretty vain guy when it comes to that.
Philip Seymour HoffmanNo man is born into the world whose work is not born with him. There is always work, and tools to work with, for those who will, and blessed are the horny hands of toil. The busy world shoves angrily aside the man who stands with arms akimbo until occasion tells him what to do; and he who waits to have his task marked out shall die and leave his errand unfulfilled.
James Russell LowellThe artist has the power to signoff the work by deconstructing the work itself: I've finished this work now and I'll sign it and relegate the painting to simply something that services my signature. The painting becomes the colorful backdrop of the signature.
Gavin TurkI think context, location matters a lot. Because location obviously in my situation, it's the space in which the work is going to be exhibited. And since some of the work I do is created onsite, it requires a different type of space, versus the smaller drawings or more subject-oriented work. So that the context becomes important.
Shahzia SikanderI feel that opiates - I include opium and all its derivatives, such as morphine, heroin, pantopon, etc. - are quite useless for any sort of creative work, useful though they may be for routine work. Much of the hard physical work in the Far East is done by opium addicts.
William S. BurroughsI owe my sucess in one per cent to my talent, in ten per cent to luck, and in ninety per cent to hard word. Work, work, and more work is the secret to success.
Ignacy Jan PaderewskiListen carefully to first criticisms made of your work. Note just what it is about your work that critics don't like - then cultivate it. That's the only part of your work that's individual and worth keeping.
Jean CocteauThe work is the work. The work is not me. I like the anonymity that directors can have about their films. Even though it's my voice, I'm a storyteller.
Frank OceanJust try to be yourself and resist complacency and ignorance. All you can do is work, work; work and be disciplined.
Raoul PeckI'm usually the last to see my influence in other people's work. People give me stuff and say "Oh look, this guy's ripping you off," and I'm like "What do you mean?" Often I see the people that I've ripped off filtered into my own work. In other people's work, I can only see specific, tiny little instances of inflections stolen from another artist.
Daniel ClowesThe material you work with is that which you will come to resemble. That which you work against will always work against you, including yourself.
Henry RollinsI feel like doing theatre helps my on-camera work and my on-camera work kind of helps my theatre work. So I love to be able to bounce through the mediums.
Dan AmboyerAnd all knowledge is vain save when there is work, and all work is empty save when there is love; and when you work with love you bind yourself to yourself, and to one another, and to God.
Khalil GibranYour intuition will tell you where you need to go; it will connect you with people you should meet; it will guide you toward work that is meaningful for you - work that brings you joy, work that feels right for you.
Shakti GawainIt's an enormous amount of work: there are 28 separate buildings, and I work on the choice of the colors for everything. Outside colors, balcony colors, etc.. And all of this has to work together, in harmony.
John HenchToo much of our work amounts to the drudgery of arranging means toward ends, mechanically placing the right foot in front of the left and the left in front of the right, moving down narrow corridors toward narrow goals. Play widens the halls. Work will always be with us, and many works are worthy. But the worthiest works of all often reflect an artful creativity that looks more like play than work.
James OgilvyIf I read a script and the subject stays with me - then that's when I want to go to work. Before, I was very addicted to being on set, and I was doing three or four movies a year for many years. Now, fortunately, I can go to work only when I am passionate about a project, and the rest of the time, I can live my life. I'm not interested in doing movies just as a marathon. When I go to work now, I have much more to give. But the other way, you get empty.
Penelope CruzI don't think I could ever stop doing serious movies and just do comedies, or vice versa, but there is something cool about going to work everyday and you're just trying to make your friends laugh. That's nice work if you can get it, you know what I mean? It's different than going to work and knowing that I've gotta slap someone in the face today, and then I've gotta cry, and someone's gonna die, I've gotta get myself to that place.
John C. ReillyMy father taught me to work, but not to love it. I never did like to work, and I don't deny it. I'd rather read, tell stories, crack jokes, talk, laugh -- anything but work.
Abraham LincolnI'm not digging tunnels, I'm not building buildings. My work is not hard, my work is refreshing, my work is pleasant. The more the better. Lying around and getting no job is debilitating.
Morgan FreemanFor example I don't work with William Hurt the same way that I will work with Viggo. They're different guys and they work in different ways. So a good sensitive director has his general style and technique and personality that he uses but you don't impose that on the actors.
David CronenbergThere are two aspects to making movies: One is the feeling of wanting to push myself into stuff that I don't know how to do. Then there's the other impulse to try and earn a living. I want to be careful about not confusing those too much - not that those things can't have a healthy overlap. Plenty of people start out making work that isn't terribly commercial, and then make work that's more commercial but still good. You just want to watch out for that thing where you tell yourself that you're doing your best work when you're not.
Andrew BujalskiIf there's a deadline, I work late. If not, I like to have normal hours, and get up early and work. When things are going well, I hate to quit. And then I'll work 'till exhausted.
Dave BrubeckI think that whether you've just begun writing or whether you've been writing for fifty years - I mean, I'm excited to get there and tell you about it when I do - I think that there's always the challenge of believing in yourself enough to get the work done and not being so taken with yourself that you're unwilling to continue to work on the work.
Emily BartonEnthusiasm is more active than faith, though enthusiasm cannot remove mountains nor call into action any of the omnipotent forces which faith can command. Activity is often at the expense of more solid, useful elements, and generally to the total neglect of prayer. To be too busy with God's work to commune with God, to be busy with doing church work without taking time to talk to God about His work, is the highway to backsliding, and many people have walked therein to the hurt of their immortal souls.
Edward McKendree BoundsNo man is born into the world whose work Is not born with him. There is always work, And tools to work withal, for those who will; And blessed are the horny hands of toil.
James Russell LowellTo be an actor you need various things. You need to have a head for choosing the roles. You have to be, hopefully, easy to work with so people enjoy working with you. You have to deal with missing roles, with not being asked to work, with doing good work and then being castigated by the critics for it. You have to have a skin that can deal with all of that. I, fortunately, seem to have the makeup which allows me to deal with the business. I mean, not as everybody.
Jeremy IronsI do recognize the most valuable work being done across the country is that work being done inside the four walls in our homes. And let us not forget how important the work of the mother and father are to raising responsible citizens.
Ann RomneyFor the essential thing about the work of art is that it is work, and very hard work too.
Joyce CaryI think that very often younger writers don't appreciate how much hard work is involved in writing. The part of writing that's magic is the thinnest rind on the world of creation. Most of a writer's life is just work. It happens to be a kind of work that the writer finds fulfilling in the same way that a watchmaker can happily spend countless hours fiddling over the tiny cogs and bits of wire. ... I think the people who end up being writers are people who don't get bored doing that kind of tight focus in small areas.
Diane AckermanI don't know how anyone can work on people's mouths all day long. That disgusts me. I'd rather work on the other end than work on mouths.
Joelle CarterIf you're a fan of my work and I'm a fan of your work, it just seems logical for us to work on something together.
Ali ShiraziniaIndustry in art is a necessity - not a virtue - and any evidence of the same, in the production, is a blemish, not a quality; a proof, not of achievement, but of absolutely insufficient work, for work alone will efface the footsteps of work.
James WhistlerYour work matters a great deal to God, to others and to our world. There is no ordinary work. The work God has called you to do is extraordinary. Don't miss out on God's best by taking an ordinary approach to it.
Tom NelsonNo one likes to work for free. To copy an artist's work and download it free is stealing. It's hard work writing and recording music, and it's morally wrong to steal it.
Gary WrightBut even technical work filled with formulas can be valuable and important. Einstein offered a lot of technical work on quantum physics, which mostly eludes me. I refer to his work, and I have studied it, but I am not a physicist. But look at Einstein's simple statement that the most important decision you ever will make is the decision whether you live in a friendly universe or a hostile universe.
Wayne Dyer