Quote Of The Day Archives: Courage

The only courage that matters is the kind that gets you from one moment to the next.
-- Mignon McLaughlin

Don't do what you want. Do what you don't want. Do what you're trained not to want. Do the things that scare you the most. -- Chuck Palahniuk

It is hard to fight an enemy who has outposts in your head. -- Sally Kempton

To see what is right and not to do it is want of courage. -- Confucius

Hide not your talents, they for use were made. What's a sun-dial in the shade?-- Benjamin Franklin

Courage is the power to let go of the familiar. -- Raymond Lindquist

In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends. -- Martin Luther King Jr.

Whatever you do will be insignificant, but it is very important that you do it. -- Mahatma Gandhi

Fortune does not change men, it unmasks them. -- Suzanne Necker

If we can connect in some tiny way with a human that doesn't agree with us, then maybe we won't blow up the planet. -- Nancy White

Never knock on Death's door: Ring the bell and run away! Death really hates that!
-- Matt Frewer

Dare to be yourself. -- Andre Gide

Our lives improve only when we take chances -- and the first and most difficult risk we can take is to be honest with ourselves. -- Walter Anderson

Do not weep; do not wax indignant. Understand. --Baruch Spinoza

A show of daring oft conceals great fear. -- Lucan

The first and great commandment is: Don't let them scare you. -- Elmer Davis

If I have lost confidence in myself, I have the universe against me.
-- Ralph Waldo Emerson

It is better to suffer wrong than to do it, and happier to be sometimes cheated than not to trust. -- Samuel Johnson

Never grow a wishbone, where your backbone ought to be. -- Clementine Paddleford

You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, 'I have lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along. You must do the thing you think you cannot do. -- Eleanor Roosevelt

Shut out all of your past except that which will help you weather your tomorrows.
-- Sir William Osler

Go confidently in the direction of your dreams. Live the life you have imagined.
-- Henry David Thoreau

A coward turns away, but a brave man's choice is danger. -- Euripides

Everyone is necessarily the hero of his own life story. -- John Barth

Many of life's failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success
when they gave up. -- Thomas A. Edison

Courage is being scared to death -- but saddling up anyway. -- John Wayne

The greatest tragedy is not the brutality of the evil people, but rather the silence of the good people. -- Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Take a chance! All life is a chance. The man who goes farthest is generally the one who is willing to do and dare. -- Dale Carnegie

Courage is not the absence of fear, but rather the judgment that something else is more important than fear. -- Ambrose Redmoon

Those who have invested the most, are the last to surrender. -- Unknown

Kites rise highest against the wind -- not with it. -- Winston Churchill

Those of us who refuse to risk and grow get swallowed up by life. -- Patty Hansen

Neutrality only helps the oppressor, never the victim. -- Elie Weisel

Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one's courage. -- Anais Nin

To go against the dominant thinking of your friends, of most of the people you see every day is perhaps the most difficult act of heroism you can have.
-- Theodore H. White

The winds easily erode the soft and mutable. -- Bill Purdin

As for what you're calling hard luck -- well, we made New England out of it, that and codfish. -- Stephen Vincent Benet

To be in hell is to drift; to be in heaven is to steer. -- George Bernard Shaw

He who fears being conquered is sure of defeat. -- Napoleon Bonaparte

We must travel in the direction of our fear. -- John Berryman

Adventure is not outside of you, it is within. -- David Grayson

Courage is fear holding on a minute longer. -- General Patton

A group of frogs were hopping contentedly through the woods, going about their froggy business, when two of them fell into a deep pit.

All of the other frogs gathered around the pit to see what could be done to help their companions. When they saw how deep the pit was, the rest of the dismayed group agreed that it was hopeless and told the two frogs in the pit that they should prepare themselves for their fate, because they were as good as dead.

Unwilling to accept this terrible fate, the two frogs began to jump with all of their might. Some of the frogs shouted into the pit that it was hopeless, and that the two frogs wouldn't be in that situation if they had been more careful, more obedient to the froggy rules, and more responsible. The other frogs continued sorrowfully shouting that they should save their energy and give up, since they were already as good as dead.

The two frogs continued jumping as hard as they could, and after several hours of desperate effort were quite weary. Finally, one of the frogs took heed to the calls of his fellows. Spent and disheartened, he quietly resolved himself to his fate, lay down at the bottom of the pit, and died as the others looked on in helpless grief.

The other frog continued to jump with every ounce of energy he had, although his body was wracked with pain and he was completely exhausted. His companions began anew, yelling for him to accept his fate, stop the pain and just die. The weary frog jumped harder and harder and -- wonder of wonders! Finally leapt so high that he sprang from the pit.

Amazed, the other frogs celebrated his miraculous freedom and then gathering around him asked, "Why did you continue jumping when we told you it was impossible?" Reading their lips, the astonished frog explained to them that he was deaf, and that when he saw their gestures and shouting, he thought they were cheering him on. What he had perceived as encouragement inspired him to try harder and to succeed against all odds.

To dare is to lose one's footing momentarily. Not to dare is to lose oneself.
-- Soren Kierkegaard

To one who is afraid, everything rustles. -- Sophocles

If you don't have confidence, you'll always find a way not to win. -- Carl Lewis

One who wrestles with us strengthens our nerves, and sharpens our skill. Our antagonist is our helper. -- Burke

The opposite of bravery is not cowardice, but conformity. -- Dr. Robert Anthony

Perfect courage means doing unwitnessed what we would be capable of with the world looking on. -- La Rochefoucauld

If you play it safe in life, you've decided you don't want to grow anymore.
-- Shirley Hufstedler

I decided it is better to scream. . . . Silence is the real crime against humanity.
-- Nadezhda Mandelstam

It is never too late to become what you might have been. -- George Eliot

With courage you will dare to take risks, have the strength to be compassionate and the wisdom to be humble. Courage is the foundation of integrity. -- Kesgavan Nair

While one person hesitates because he feels inferior, another is busy making mistakes and becoming superior. -- Henry C. Link

It is not because things are difficult that we do not dare, it is because we do not dare that they are difficult. -- Seneca

Turn your face to the sun and the shadows fall behind you. -- Maori proverb

Some men give up their designs when they have almost reached the goal, while others, on the contrary, obtain a victory by exerting at the last moment more vigorous efforts than before. -- Polybius

To know what is right and not to do it is the worst cowardice. -- Confucius

There is no mistake so great as the mistake of not going on. -- William Blake

It's hard to beat a person who never gives up. -- Babe Ruth

Strength does not come from winning. Your struggles develop your strengths. When you go through hardships and decide not to surrender, that is strength.
-- Arnold Schwarzenegger

The street to obscurity is paved with athletes who performed great feats before friendly crowds. Greatness in major league sports is the ability to win in a stadium filled with people who are pulling for you to lose. -- George Allen

Courage doesn't always roar. Sometimes courage is a little voice at the end of the day that says... I'll try again tomorrow. -- Anonymous

Smooth seas do not make skillful sailors. -- African Proverb

What would you attempt to do if you knew you could not fail? -- Robert Schuller

Better to be occasionally cheated than perpetually suspicious. - B.C. Forbes

The wise man in the storm always prays to God, not for safety from danger, but for deliverance from fear. It is the storm within that endangers him, not the storm without.
-- Ralph Waldo Emerson

A imaginary aliment is worse than a disease. --Yiddish Proverb

We can do anything for one day. So, just for today, let us be unafraid of life, unafraid of death which is the shadow of life; unafraid to be happy to enjoy the beautiful, to believe the best.

Just for today let us live this one day only, forgetting yesterday and tomorrow, and not trying to solve the whole problem of life at once. -- Joseph Fort Newton

You cannot cross the sea by staring at the water. -- Rabindranath Tagore, Nobel Prize winner

Good timber does not grow with ease;
The stronger the wind, the stronger the trees.
-- J. Willard Marriott

As for what you're calling hard luck -- well, we made New England out of it, that and codfish. -- Stephen Vincent Benet

Real courage is when you know you're licked before you begin, but you begin anyway and see it through no matter what. -- Harper Lee

The greatest mistake you can make in this life is to be continually fearing you will make one. -- Elbert Green Hubbard

Obstacles cannot crush me; every obstacle yields to stern resolve.
-- Leonardo Da Vinci

Courage faces fear and thereby masters it.-- Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Don't compromise yourself. You are all you've got.-- Janis Joplin

The ocean usually wins. ~ Dean Marvin

Many a man never fails because he never tries. ~ Norman MacEwan

True heroism is remarkably sober, very undramtic. It is not the urge to surpass all others at whatever cost, but the urge to serve others at whatever cost.
~ Arthur Ashe *Note: This quote was provided by legendinc.com fan Cathy Reilly

A free ride is always very expensive. ~ Malcolm Forbes

One man with courage makes a majority. ~ Andrew Jackson

In a mad world only the mad are sane. ~ Akira Kurosawa

Faith is not trying to believe something regardless of the evidence: faith is daring to do something regardless of the consequences. ~ Sherwood Eddy

The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is now.
-- Chinese Proverb

Out of the strain of the doing ... into the peace of the done.
-- Julia Louise Maltilda Woodruff

The smile of God is victory. ~ John Greenleaf Whittier

Always take a job that is too big for you. ~ Harry Emerson Fosdick

We are all faced with great opportunities... brilliantly disguised as impossible situations. ~ Anonymous

Half of life is "if." ~ Anonymous

Some of life's best lessons are learned at the worst times. -- Ani Difranco "Lost Woman Song" (With thanks to Sophie.L.Fortin.2@nd.edu, who offered this quote to legendinc.com visitors.)

One must have the courage to say "no," even at the risk of displeasing others.
-- Fritz Kunkel