Willpower Quotes - Page 11

• When you abuse willpower you waste it. There really is not an infinite supply of it at your disposal. There is an infinite supply of it in the universe.

  Frederick Lenz

  Buddhism, Abuse, Waste

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• A strong will deals with the hard facts of life as a sculptor with his marbles, making them facile and yielding to his purposes, and conquering their stubbornness by a greater stubbornness in himself.

  Christian Nestell Bovee

  Strong, Purpose, Facts

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• Man liveth from hour to hour, and knoweth not what may happen; Influences circle him on all sides, and yet must he answer for his actions: For the being that is master of himself, bendeth events to his will, But a slave to selfish passions is the wavering creature of circumstance.

  Martin Farquhar Tupper

  Selfish, Passion, Men

  Martin Farquhar Tupper (1849). “Tupper's Poetical Works: Proverbial Philosophy, A Thousand Lines, Hactenus”, p.20

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• I don't understand the feeling of, the way people speak of writing as though it were, like, some kind of djinn to be summoned or like it's the Loch Ness monster or seeing a shooting star. It's a physical act. It is a thing you do with your muscles and your body and your willpower. Watch, I'll show you: get a piece of paper. Get a pencil. Put the pencil on the paper and write the word 'something.'

  Matt Fraction

  Stars, Book, Writing

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• Self-will seems to be the only virtue that takes no account of man-made laws.

  Bruce Lee

  Men, Self, Law

  Bruce Lee (2015). “Bruce Lee Striking Thoughts: Bruce Lee's Wisdom for Daily Living”, p.70, Tuttle Publishing

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• 

  A homeless guy came up to me on the street, said he hadn't eaten in four days. I told him, "Man, I wish I had your willpower.

  Rodney Dangerfield

  Men, Guy, Wish

  Rodney Dangerfield (2009). “It's Not Easy Bein' Me: A Lifetime of No Respect but Plenty of Sex and Drugs”, p.22, Zondervan

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• It is our will That thus enchains us to permitted ill. We might be otherwise, we might be all We dream of happy, high, majestical. Where is the love, beauty and truth we seek, But in our mind? and if we were not weak, Should we be less in deed than in desire?

  Percy Bysshe Shelley

  Dream, Love Is, Mind

  Percy Bysshe Shelley, Donald H. Reiman, Michael O'Neill (1985). “Fair-copy Manuscripts of Shelley's Poems in European and American Libraries: Including Percy Bysshe Shelley's Holographs and Copies in the Hand of Mary W. Shelley, Located in the United States, England, Scotland, Ireland, and Switzerland, as Well as the Holograph Draft of Keats's Robin Hood”, p.219, Taylor & Francis

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• Will, without reason, is a blind man's motion; will, against reason, is a madman's motion.

  Benjamin Whichcote

  Men, Blind, Reason

  Benjamin Whichcote (1753). “Moral and religious aphorisms collected from the manuscript papers of the reverend and learned Doctor Whichcote; and published in 1703, by Dr. Jeffery. Now re-published, with very large additions, ... by Samuel Salter, ... To which are added, Eight letter”, p.74

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• Neuroscientists have discovered that when you ask the brain to meditate, it gets better, not just at meditating, but at a wide range of self-control skills Over time, [meditators'] brains become finely tuned willpower machines.

  Kelly McGonigal

  Skills, Self, Brain

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• In Zen you practice zazen, mindfulness and other forms of introspection to find out who you are and what you want, to balance your spirit, develop willpower, increase your sense of humor and gain wisdom.

  Frederick Lenz

  Practice, Balance, Mindfulness

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• We could go to monasteries. I could show you people who are very wise and they have great willpower, but they're not happy. They lack balance. They take it all too seriously.

  Frederick Lenz

  Wise, People, Balance

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• Man has will, but woman has her way.

  Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

  Funny, Women, Humorous

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• I think every man and woman is a star. It's just a matter of realizing and becoming it. It's all a matter of willpower. The world is just how you see it. If you want to have other people tell you how to see it, then you can. But if you want to look at it differently, then it's limitless what you can do. That's why I don't feel the need to be one person. I can be as many people as I like.

  Marilyn Manson

  Stars, Men, Thinking

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• Willpower is a myth. The problem with trying to use willpower to achieve and sustain a behavioral change is that it is fueled by emotion. And as we all know, our emotions are, at best, fickle. They come and go. When your emotions start running down -- and they will -- even your best-laid plans will fall flat.

  Phil McGraw

  Running, Fall, Trying

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• Like my father before me, I'm a very passionate person, with boundless energy and tremedous willpower.

  Raymond Blanc

  Father, Power, Energy

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• We pray to you, O God ... for strength, determination, and willpower, to do instead of just to pray, to become instead of merely to wish.

  Harold S. Kushner

  Perseverance, Determination, Wish

  Harold S. Kushner (2007). “When Bad Things Happen to Good People”, p.159, Anchor

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• Willpower is not some mythical force that we either have or don't have. Willpower is our decision to use higher mind thinking instead of lazing around in the clutches of our primal mind.

  A. Curtiss

  Thinking, Decision, Mind

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• Human beings actually have quite a bit of willpower. They don't know too much about it, but they have quite a bit.

  Frederick Lenz

  Power, Too Much, Humans

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• People are timid. They don't take chances. Naturally, they're bound. They are afraid of the light. They are afraid of their own power. In the land of willpower, anything is possible.

  Frederick Lenz

  Power, Land, Light

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• The problems with willpower are many, but they may hardly be noticed by the person focused narrowly on success. First, there is little economy of means; in systems thinking terms, we act without leverage. We attain our goals, but the effort is enormous and we may find ourselves exhausted and wondering if it was worth it when we have succeeded. Ironically, people hooked on willpower may actually look for obstacles to overcome, dragons to slay, and enemies to vanquish--to remind themselves and others of their own prowess.

  Peter Senge

  Mean, Thinking, Dragons

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• So in the path of love - rather than pulling our willpower together, using our discrimination, or working - we just cry inwardly.

  Frederick Lenz

  Yoga, Together, Path Of Love

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• We have the pleasures suitable to our lot; let us not usurp those of greatness. Ours are more natural and all the more solid and sure for being humbler. Since we will not do so out of conscience, at least out of ambition let us reject ambition.

  Michel de Montaigne

  Ambition, Greatness, Be Humble

  Michel de Montaigne (1976). “The Complete Essays of Montaigne”

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• You have to believe in a placebo or it wont work, but if it works, its obviously working in some indirect way, through feedback in the immune system, let us say, or in the willpower of the patient to take a more strenuous exercise in their own therapy.

  Charles Jencks

  Believe, Exercise, Way

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• The future of Japan's economic growth depends on us having the willpower and the courage to sail without hesitation onto the rough seas of global competition.

  Shinzo Abe

  Japan, Sea, Competition

  "Japan’s New Leader Takes On Old Order to Jolt Economy" by Martin Fackler, www.nytimes.com. March 6, 2013.

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