I’m something of a ‘Quote-Collector’. I dig reading cool stuff people smarter than myself have put together. Amusing, enlightening, motivating, it’s all good. Anybody got any good ones? I’ll break the ice with one of my favorites:
“Hard pressed on my right. My center is yielding. Impossible to maneuver. Situation excellent, I am attacking.”
– Ferdinand Foch, the Battle of the Marnej
This thread was done quite a while ago, so I’ll post what I gleaned form that one:
No one has time to train. Do you have a time-consuming job, a heavy college load, or family responsibilities? Too bad. You’ll make time to train. You won’t sacrifice your job or your family, but you will have to place a few things on the Altar of Buff.
There’s nothing easier than not being able to find the time to do things you don’t want to do. It’s a copout. It’s a weak excuse. Get up at 5am to train if you have to. Stay up late. Hey, did you catch that last episode of “Frasier.” You did? Ah ha! Caught you! That’s when you should’ve been training! The point is none of us have time to do what it takes to build an impressive body; instead, we make the time. Bite off more than you can chew and chew like hell.
If none of this lights your fire, hey, that’s cool. Everyone has their own way of staying motivated. My advice is to look beyond the traditional sources of inspiration and motivation and find out what gets you off. If all else fails, find a person you admire and emulate them. I like the “Oak” and Bruce Lee. In fact, as you walk into my home gym you’ll see Bruce’s words hanging on the wall. I’ll let the Dragon bring this Dog to a close:
“If you always put limits on yourself and the things you can do, physical or anything, you might as well be dead. It will spread into your work, your morality, your entire being. There are no limits, only plateaus. But then you must not stay there. You must go beyond them. If it kills you, it kills you.”
–Chris Shugart
“Be too proud to show the wounds.”
"Those who can, do; Those who can't, teach; Those who can't teach, teach gym." - Woody Allen
Lance Armstrong, On the Tour de France: There is no reason to attempt such a feat of idiocy, other than the fact that some people, that is to say some people like me, have a need to search the depths of their stamina for self-definition. (I'm the guy who can take it.) It's a contest in purposeless suffering. But for reasons of my own, I think it may be the most gallant athletic endeavor in the world. To me, of course, it's about living.
Citius, Altius, Fortius" Faster, Higher, Stronger
1.Tough times never last, but tough people do.
2.Do not free the camel of the burden of his hump; you may be freeing him from being a camel.
3.Better to light a candle than to curse the darkness
4.Obstacles are those frightful things you see when you take your eyes off the goal.
5.The strongest man in the world is he who stands alone
6.It is not what they take away from you that counts.It's what you do with what you have left
7.The harder you work, it's harder to surrender
8.The quality of a person's life is in direct proportion to their commitment to excellence, regardless of their chosen field of endeavor.
Nobody thought of this! "Every man dies, but not every man really lives."
"Ah because you're black?" "HELL NO, Damn alligator bit my hand off!" Chubb from Happy Gilmore
"If you're not getting bigger, you're getting smaller." --me
Here is one that I've always liked. "Talent is God's gift to us. What we do with that talent is our gift back to God."
Philippians 3:14 I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.
Philippians 4:13 I can do everything through him who gives me strength.
"Do or do not, there is no try" - Yoda
"Give 110%, because if you don't your opponent will"
"Power is nothing without control."
"There is no spoon." from The Matrix
"I've seen monkey shit fights at the city zoo more organized than this!" from The Replacements.
"Nothing would more contribute to make a man wise than to have always an enemy in view." (Lord Halifax)
"Democracy, I do not conceive that ever God did ordain as a fit government either for church or commonwealth. If the people be governors, who shall be governed?" (John Cotton)
"Our ancestors, in their wisdom, considered that all women, because of their innate weakness, should be under the control of guardians."(Cicero)
"..it is appropriate that the noblest race should rule over all the others; the Roman people was the noblest; therefore it was appropriate that they should rule over all the others." (Dante Alighieri)
“The scars will take me far, they always do.”
“I think about the
meaning of pain. Pain is personal. It really belongs to the one feeling it.
Probably the only thing that is your own. I like mine.”
“Keep your blood
clean, your body lean, and your mind sharp.” All from the man: Henry
Rollins
don't let your mouth right a check your ass can't cash.
"Those who cling to life die, and those who defy death live" -Uyesugi Kenshin
"Every morning in Africa, a gazelle wakes up and knows that if it is to live, it must be faster than the fastest lion. Every morning, a lion wakes up, and knows that if it is to eat, it must be faster than the slowest gazelle. Whether you are a lion or a gazelle, when the sun comes up, you better be running." - Kenyan Proverb
"We few, we happy few, we band of brothers; For he today that sheds his blood with me shall be my brother" - Shakespeare, King Henry V (IV,iii,60)
'it is dangerous to be in the right when the recognized authorities are in the wrong' Voltaire
I will endure the pain that goes with achievement and glory, rather than accept the contentment that goes with mediocrity.
" there comes a time in every man's life when he must spit in his hands,hoist the black flag, and begin slitting throats"..... or something to that effect, search the web for H.L Mencken; he has some of the best, if not most famous quotes going.
Just go rent/buy "The Outlaw Josey Wales." Clint Eastwood is of course the star, if you didn't know that are you really a man? Anyway, here are a few of the movies best quotes: Josey Wales : "You a bounty hunter?" Bounty Hunter : "A man's got to do something for a living these days." Josey Wales : "Dying ain't much of a living, boy." Then of course he blows the guy away.......After killing to guys:Boy : "Wish we had time to bury them fellas." Josey Wales : "The hell with them fellas. Buzzards gotta eat...same as worms.".....Josey Wales : "Whenever I get to liking some one they ain't around long." Chief : "I noticed when you get to disliking someone they around for long neither."........."When things look bad, and it looks like you're not gonna make it, then you gotta get mean. I mean plumb mad dog mean. Cause if you lose your head and you give up, then you neither live nor win, that's just the way it is.".........."Are you gonna pull those pistols or whistle Dixie?"
"Pain is just weakness leaving the body"
"The only easy day was yesterday"
"May God have mercy on my enemies, because I won't"
"We must either find a way or make one."
"Those who dare to fail miserably can achieve greatly." - Robert Kennedy
To avoid failure; Say nothing, do nothing, be nothing... - Anonymous.
"Your best? Losers always whine about their best. Winners go home and fuck the prom queen." -the Rock
"You ever dance with the devil in the pale moon light?" - The Joker, in Batman
"Action is eloquence" -shakespeare
"Are you gonna bark all day little doggie, or are you gonna bite?" - Reservoir Dogs
Don't show your teeth if you can't bite..
The more we prepare during peacetime the less we bleed in battle!
The classic line from Gladiator, "What we do in life, echos in eternity."
“Remember, when you are downtown drinking a beer- There is always someone out there training to kill you.” -Ranger 1SG
“You dont drown by falling in the water, you drown by staying there.” -Steven King
"Its not the bullet with my name on it that scares me, its the one that says,“The NEXT one has your name on it!”
“Tie two birds together, though they have four wings, they cannot fly”…the Blind Man
He who hesitates…Masterbates!!
What I would tell my posse before we would go out to the clubs!! (in my youth)
It is not advisable, James, to venture unsolicited opinions. You should spare yourself the embarrassing discovery of their exact value to your listener…Ayn Rand, in Atlas Shrugged
“Masturbates”, my friend, but hilarious nonetheless… 
Here’s one from an Eminem song: “Success is my only mother f—ing option, failure’s not.”
To climb the mountain you must first reach the mountain,
To reach the mountain you must first see the mountain,
To see the mountain you must first dream the impossible dream.
Unknown
Thank you. I’ve cut and pasted your post to use in email.
Thanks.
Actually, the only one that I can really lay claim to is the one from Lance Armstrong. All the others were cut and pasted from an earlier thread, and I deleted off who originally posted them. Even the one that says “–me” isn’t me. I’ve got the original thread in a Word file, so the original posters could be unearthed, if needed.
Brider had some great quotes collected. Here are some I’ve kept around:
Life is 10 percent what you make it and 90 percent how you take it. Ben Franklin
“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 matter how frightening or difficult, a new meaning. Without enthusiasm you are doomed to a life of mediocrity but with it you can accomplish miracles.” Og Mandino
Imagination is more important than knowledge. Knowledge is limited. Imagination encircles the world. Albert Einstein
“I have often been afraid, but I would not give in to it. I made myself act as though I was not afraid and gradually my fear disappeared.” Theodore Roosevelt
“Being defeated is only a temporary condition; giving up is what makes it permanent.”
Marilyn vos Savant
“The problems of the world cannot possibly be solved by skeptics or cynics whose horizons are limited by obvious realities. We need men and women who can dream of things that never were.” John F. Kennedy
“One machine can do the work of fifty ordinary men. No machine can do the work of one extraordinary man.” Elbert Hubbard
“Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new.” Albert Einstein
“The quality of a person’s life is in direct proportion to their commitment to excellence, regardless of their chosen field of endeavor.”
Vince Lombardi
“When one door closes another one opens; but we so often look so long and so regretfully upon the closed door, that we do not see the ones which open for us.”
Alexander Graham Bell
Yeah, thanks Brider. Even if they weren’t all yours, they are inspirational nonetheless. If you can’t get up for one of those, you’ve got issues. I am going to keep those by the bed for when I wake up in the morning and want to go back to sleep.
Work is the curse of the drinking classes (Oscar Wilde)
I thing General Patton once said…“Never let the body tell the mind what to do.”
“Seek knowledge from cradle to grave” -Qur’an
“The abdomen: why man does not easily mistake himself for a god.” - Nietzsche
Know yourself and seek self improvement. Unknown.
Never eat or drink anything that comes out of your body.Unknown.
Can’t never could and won’t never will.Unknown.
“Never let what you can’t do keep you from doing what you can do.” --John Wooden
I love to read quotes that get me up. Theres nothing like it. Theres so many that I could put down, but I’ll just throw one out there. “Before I get in the ring, I have already won or lost somewhere far away from witnesses - behind the lines, in the gym, and out there on the road long before I dance under the lights.” Oh shit!!! If that don’t get you ready your dead man!
Brider, great quotes. Ike the best one I’ve read comes from the “Gates of Fire” by Pressfield about the 300 Spartan leader, Dianekes, when told that the Persians were so numerous that when they attack, their arrows will blot out the sun…“Good, then we’ll have our battle in the shade.”