Sometimes the simple things are just the hardest — you know — like tackling typical work projects or making yourself productive and motivated. We’re here to help. Here are some of the productivity quotes we like to keep handy when we’re having one of those days.
20 Productivity Quotes
- “Amateurs sit and wait for inspiration, the rest of us just get up and go to work.”
― Stephen King, On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft
- “If you spend too much time thinking about a thing, you’ll never get it done.”
― Bruce Lee
- “Whenever you are asked if you can do a job, tell ’em, ‘Certainly I can!’ Then get busy and find out how to do it.”
― Theodore Roosevelt
- “Your mind is for having ideas, not holding them.”
― David Allen, Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity
- “To be disciplined is to follow in a good way. To be self disciplined is to follow in a better way.”
― Corita Kent
- “If we attend continually and promptly to the little that we can do, we shall ere long be surprised to find how little remains that we cannot do.”
― Samuel Butler
- “Concentrate all your thoughts upon the work in hand. The Sun’s rays do not burn until brought to a focus”
― Alexander Graham Bell
- “You don’t actually do a project; you can only do action steps related to it. When enough of the right action steps have been taken, some situation will have been created that matches your initial picture of the outcome closely enough that you can call it “done.”
- “When we truly need to do is often what we most feel like avoiding.”
― David Allen, Ready for Anything: 52 Productivity Principles for Getting Things Done
- “The simple act of paying positive attention to people has a great deal to do with productivity.”
― Tom Peters
- “Don’t interpret anything too much. This is time waster number 1.”
― Dee Dee Artner
- “If you have time to whine then you have time to find solution.”
― Dee Dee Artner
- “Resist the short term temptation of procrastination; the immediate pleasure and relief that it brings does not fare in comparison to the long lasting damage it does to your dreams and goals.”
― Noel DeJesus
- “The true price of anything you do is the amount of time you exchange for it.”
― Henry David Thoreau, Walden
- “Never put off til tomorrow, what you can do the day after tomorrow.”
― Mark Twain
- “Work is a process, and any process needs to be controlled. To make work productive, therefore, requires building the appropriate controls into the process of work.”
― Peter F. Drucker, Management: Tasks, Responsibilities, Practices
- “Multitasking is a lie.”
― Gary Keller, The One Thing: The Surprisingly Simple Truth Behind Extraordinary Results
- “…you cannot eat every tadpole and frog in the pond, but you can eat the biggest and ugliest one, and that will be enough, at least for the time being.”
― Brian Tracy, Eat That Frog!: 21 Great Ways to Stop Procrastinating and Get More Done in Less Time
- “Productivity is never an accident. It is always the result of a commitment to excellence, intelligent planning, and focused effort.”
― Paul J. Meyer
- “Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones you did do, so throw off the bowlines, sail away from safe harbor, catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore, Dream, Discover.”
– Mark Twain
Share Your Favorite Productivity Quotes
Do you have a favorite inspirational quote that serves as a pick-me-up when you’re feeling unmotivated? Or do you have a go-to resource for finding your work mojo? We’d love to hear from you — share your favorite sayings, productivity quotes, or websites below.