We have a 'strategic' plan. It's called doing things. Herb Kelleher

• initiative

This is the context.

To reach the port of heaven, we must sail, sometimes with the wind, sometimes against it - but we must sail, and not drift, nor lie at anchor. Oliver Wendell Holmes

• initiative

Things may come to those who wait, but only the things left by those who hustle. Abraham Lincoln

• effort
• initiative

A life spent making mistakes is not only more honorable but more useful than a life spent doing nothing. George Bernard Shaw

• failure
• mistakes
• initiative

You can't build a reputation on what you are going to do. Henry Ford

• reputation
• actions
• initiative

This country [America] was not built by men who relied on somebody else to take care of them. It was built by men who relied on themselves, who dared to shape their own lives, who had enough courage to blaze new trails - enough confidence in themselves to take the necessary risks. J. Ollie Edmunds

• confidence
• Americans
• America
• independence
• risk
• self reliance
• initiative
• chance

The difference between getting somewhere and nowhere is the courage to make an early start. The fellow who sits still and does just what he is told will never be told to do big things. Charles M. Schwab

• initiative

Nobody can give you freedom. Nobody can give you equality or justice or anything. If you're a man, you take it. Malcolm X

• freedom
• equality
• justice
• initiative

Initiative is to success what a lighted match is to a candle. Orlando Battista

• success
• initiative

Details often kill initiative, but there have been few successful men who weren't good at details. Don't ignore details. Lick them. William Given Jr.

• initiative
• details

Every successful man I have heard of has done the best he could with conditions as he found them, and not waited until the next year for better. Edgar Watson Howe

• circumstance
• initiative

Nobody's problem is ideal. Nobody has things just as he would like them. The thing to do is to make a success with what material I have. It is sheer waste of time and soul-power to imagine what I would do if things were different. They are not different. Dr. Frank Crane

• circumstance
• initiative

"Some day" doesn't exist, never has, and never will. There is no "some day". There's only today. When tomorrow comes, it will be another today; so will the next day. They all will. There is never anything but today. Jeff Olson

• actions
• time management
• initiative

This is the source.

It can take a good amount of energy and initiative to get yourself started in a new activity - but it takes far, far less to keep yourself doing it once you've started. Jeff Olson

• initiative

This is the source.

Whatever you can do, or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius, power and magic in it. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

• confidence
• initiative

This is the source.

The way to get started is to quit talking and begin doing. Walt Disney

• actions
• initiative

The few who do are the envy of the many who only watch. Jim Rohn

• actions
• initiative

Most people spend their entire lives on a fantasy island called 'Someday I'll'. Denis Waitley

• time management
• initiative

A man would do nothing if he waited until he could do it so well that no one could find fault. Cardinal Newman

• criticism
• initiative

All problems become smaller if you don't dodge them but confront them. Touch a thistle timidly, and it pricks you; grasp it boldly, and its spines crumble. William Halsey

• confidence
• initiative
• boldness

The greatest risk in life is to wait for and depend upon others for your own security. Denis Waitley

• security
• risk
• self reliance
• initiative

Chance favors those in motion. James Austin

• initiative
• chance

Business is dependent upon action. It cannot go forward by hesitation. Those in executive positions must fortify themselves with facts and accept responsibility for decisions based upon them. Often greater risk is involved in postponement than in making a wrong decision. Harry Hopf

• leadership
• decisiveness
• initiative

If the wind will not serve, take to the oars. Anonymous

• initiative

There never was a winner who wasn't a beginner. Denis Waitley

• initiative

The only people who achieve much are those who want knowledge so badly that they seek it while the conditions are still unfavorable. Favorable conditions never come. Clive Staples Lewis

• opportunity
• initiative

There are two kinds of men who never amount to much: those who cannot do what they are told and those who can do nothing else. Cyrus Curtis

• initiative

For thus I estimate the qualities of the mind: 1, good humor; 2, integrity; 3, industry; 4, science. The preference of the first to the second quality may not at first be acquiesced in; but certainly we had all rather associate with a good-humored, light-principled man, than with an ill-tempered rigorist in morality. Thomas Jefferson

• integrity
• personality
• initiative

This is as true in everyday life as it is in battle: We are given one life, and the decision is ours whether to wait for circumstances to make up our mind or whether to act and, in acting, to live. Omar Bradley

• actions
• initiative

Let us not be content to wait and see what will happen, but give us the determination to make the right things happen. Peter Marshall

• initiative

Just begin and the mind grows heated; continue, and the task will be completed! Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

• initiative

There are two ways to climb an oak tree. You can climb it, or you can sit on an acorn and wait for it to grow. Anonymous

• initiative

You can always find a capable helping hand at the end of your own sleeve. Zig Ziglar

• resourcefulness
• initiative

Most people wait until everything is just right before they do anything. They refuse to go out on a limb where the fruit is. They refuse to bet on themselves. Zig Ziglar

• risk
• initiative
• chance

Those who wait until all the lights are on green before starting will never leave home. Zig Ziglar

• risk
• initiative
• chance

Two sure ways to fail: Think and never do, or do and never think. Zig Ziglar

• planning
• initiative

Good leaders don't wait for official blessing to try things out. They're prudent, not reckless. But they also realize a fact of life in most organizations: if you ask enough people for permission, you'll inevitably come up against someone who believes his job is to say "no." So the moral is, don't ask. Less effective middle managers endorsed the sentiment, "If I haven't explicitly been told 'yes,' I can't do it," whereas the good ones believed, "If I haven't explicitly been told 'no,' I can." There's a world of difference between these two points of view. Colin Powell

• leadership
• initiative

If you wait until all the lights are "green" before you leave home, you'll never get started on your trip to the top. Zig Ziglar

• risk
• initiative

Most of us go through life as failures, because we are waiting for the "time to be right" to start doing something worthwhile. Do not wait. The time will never be "just right." Start where you stand, and work with whatever tools you may have at your command, and better tools will be found as you go along. Napoleon Hill

• initiative

You can't do everything at once, but you can do something at once. Zig Ziglar

• initiative

The first choice we make each and every day is, "Will we act upon life, or will we merely be acted upon?" Stephen Covey

• initiative

Those who get the most out of life and those who give the most are those who make the choice to act. Stephen Covey

• initiative

Average people look for ways of getting away with it; successful people look for ways of getting on with it. Jim Rohn

• initiative

When life does not go our way or we inadvertently make a mistake, it is so easy to make excuses, place blame on others, or argue that circumstances were against us. But we only progress in life to the extent that we take responsibility for our actions and attitudes, and put forth the initiative necessary to create our own circumstances. Stephen Covey

• self improvement
• progress
• excuses
• responsibility
• initiative

If you want to accomplish anything in life, you can't just sit back and hope it will happen. You've got to make it happen. Chuck Norris

• initiative

People are always blaming their circumstances for what they are. I do not believe in circumstances. The people who get on in this world are the people who get up and look for the circumstances they want, and if they cannot find them, make them. George Bernard Shaw

• circumstance
• initiative

If your ship doesn't come in, swim out to it. Jonathan Winters

• initiative

God gives every bird his worm, but he does not throw it into the nest. Anonymous

• work
• initiative

You don't have to be great to get started, but you have to get started to be great. Les Brown

• initiative

Doing nothing is a comfortable alternative because it is without immediate risk, but it is an absolutely fatal way to manage a business. Thomas Watson Jr.

• risk
• initiative

I have found opportunities do not come to those who wait. They are captured by those who attack. William Danforth

• opportunity
• initiative

Implement now, perfect later. Larry Winget

• perfection
• initiative

This is the source.

The first part of success is Get-to-it-iveness; the second part of success is Stick-to-it-iveness. Orison Marden

• persistence
• success
• initiative

Inaction breeds doubt and fear. Action breeds confidence and courage. If you want to conquer fear, do not sit home and think about it. Go out and get busy. Dale Carnegie

• courage
• fear
• initiative

It takes considerable energy to get yourself into motion and moving. But it takes much less energy to keep yourself moving, once you get going. Brian Tracy

• initiative

You can commit no greater folly than to sit by the roadside until someone comes along and invites you to ride with him to wealth or influence. John Gough

• initiative

It is common sense to take a method and try it. If it fails, admit it frankly and try another. But above all, try something. Franklin Delano Roosevelt

• initiative

Don't be too timid and squeamish about your actions. All life is an experiment. The more experiments you make the better. Ralph Waldo Emerson

• initiative

Don't wait until you feel positive to move forward. Act your way into feeling good. John Maxwell

• optimism
• initiative

Life isn't fair. It isn't going to be fair. Stop sniveling and whining and go out and make it happen for you. Dick Butler

• initiative
• fairness

We should be taught not to wait for inspiration to start a thing. Action always generates inspiration. Inspiration seldom generates action. Frank Tibolt

• action
• inspiration
• initiative

In any moment of decision, the best thing you can do is the right thing, the next best thing you can do is the wrong thing, and the worst thing you can do is nothing. Theodore Roosevelt

• decisiveness
• initiative

The only man who never makes a mistake is the man who never does anything. Theodore Roosevelt

• mistakes
• initiative

An average plan vigorously executed is far better than a brilliant plan on which nothing is done. Brian Tracy

• planning
• initiative
• execution

The man who removes a mountain begins by carrying away small stones. William Faulkner

• persistence
• initiative

Start by doing what's necessary; then do what's possible; and suddenly you are doing the impossible. Saint Francis

• possibility
• initiative

If the potential damage is moderate or in any way reversible, don't give people the chance to say no. Most people are fast to stop you before you get started but hesitant to get in the way if you're moving. Get good at being a troublemaker and saying sorry when you really screw up. Timothy Ferriss

• action
• initiative

This is the source.

There's no difference between a pessimist who says, "Oh, it's hopeless, so don't bother doing anything," and an optimist who says, "Don't bother doing anything, it's going to turn out fine anyway." Either way, nothing happens. Yvon Chouinard

• action
• optimism
• pessimism
• initiative

The most difficult thing is the decision to act; the rest is merely tenacity. The fears are paper tigers. You can do anything you decide to do. You can act to change and control your life; and the procedure, the process is its own reward. Amelia Earhart

• action
• fear
• decisiveness
• initiative

There are fine things which you mean to do some day, under what you think will be more favorable circumstances. But the only time that is surely yours is the present, hence this is the time to speak the word of appreciation and sympathy, to do the generous deed, to forgive the fault of a thoughtless friend, to sacrifice self a little more for others. Today is the day in which to express your noblest qualities of mind and heart, to do at least one worthy thing which you have long postponed, and to use your God-given abilities for the enrichment of someone less fortunate. Today you can make your life significant and worthwhile. The present is yours to do with as you will. Grenville Kleiser

• initiative

There is a time to let things happen and a time to make things happen. Hugh Prather

• patience
• initiative

To do anything in this world worth doing, we must not stand back shivering and thinking of the cold and danger, but jump in and scramble as well as we can. Sydney Smith

• initiative

The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The next best time is now. Anonymous

• initiative

Make mistakes of ambition and not mistakes of sloth. Develop the strength to do bold things, not to suffer. Niccolò Machiavelli

• ambition
• mistakes
• initiative

The man who believes that the secrets of this world are forever hidden lives in mystery and fear. Superstition will drag him down. The rain will erode the deeds of his life. But that man who sets himself the task of singling out the thread of order from the tapestry will by the decision alone have taken charge of the world and it is only by such taking charge that he will effect a way to dictate the terms of his own fate. Cormac McCarthy

• science
• reason
• initiative

"The grass is always greener on the other side of the fence." Is it? Or maybe you just need to get up off your lazy ass and mow the lawn, water it, pull some weeds, fertilize it, take care of your own grass and stop looking over the fence. Craig Sanford

• work
• initiative
• jealousy

Most people have been brainwashed into believing that their job is to copyedit the world, not to design it. Seth Godin

• criticism
• initiative
• creativity

You can't manage luck directly, but you can manage your career in a way that makes it easier for luck to find you. To succeed, first you must do something. And if that doesn't work, which can be 90% of the time, do something else. Luck finds the doers. Scott Adams

• luck
• failure
• initiative

What you think about, talk about, and get off your ass and do something about is what comes about! Larry Winget

• work
• effort
• initiative

This is the source.

Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back, always ineffectiveness. Concerning all acts of initiative (and creation) there is one elementary truth, the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans: that the moment one definitely commits oneself, then providence moves too. All sorts of things occur to help one that would not otherwise have occurred. A whole stream of events issues from the decision, raising in one's favour all manner of unforeseen incidents and meetings and material assistance which no man would have dreamed would come his way. W. H. Murray

• commitment
• initiative
• creativity

If you want to be useful, you can always start now, with only 1 percent of what you have in your grand vision. It'll be a humble prototype version of your grand vision, but you'll be in the game. You'll be ahead of the rest, because you actually started, while others are waiting for the finish line to magically appear at the starting line. Derek Sivers

• business
• initiative

This is the source.

You don't get to escape pain. The pain that comes with action is acute, gives you scars, and makes you grow. The pain that comes from inaction is low-grade, makes you soft, and makes you decay. Kyle Eschenroeder

• self improvement
• pain
• initiative