My Favourite Inspirational Quotes on Life and Design
by Olegs Belousovs •
My collection of random famous (and not) quotes, taken from various books, articles, and said by parents/friends, on the topics of life, work, and design.
When the power of love overcomes the love of power the world will know peace.
The beginning is the half of every action.
It is difficult to judge beauty: beauty is an enigma.
Believe in yourself and stop trying to convince others.
The distance between dreams and reality is called discipline.
Reality leaves a lot to the imagination.
Finché la gente accetterà la spazzatura, sarà redditizio venderla.
You can only organize something if you understand how it works.
Meglio vivere d’istanti e d’istinti che distanti e distinti.
Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one’s courage.
The art of being wise is the art of knowing what to overlook.
It always seems impossible until it’s done.
Always in motion is the future.
Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself.
Comparison is the death of joy.
When you stop moving, the music stops.
The artist who aims at perfection in everything achieves it in nothing.
Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity.
The journey of a thousand miles begins with one step.
Count your age by friends, not years. Count your life by smiles, not tears.
Everything that needs to be said has already been said. But since no one was listening, everything must be said again.
I think you just have to work hard for about 10 years before you know what you’re doing.
A great pleasure in life is doing what people say you cannot do.
If our eyes are always looking for weakness, we begin to lose the intuition to notice the beauty.
Those who do not want to imitate anything, produce nothing.
The things you own end up owning you.
When a flower doesn’t bloom, you fix the environment in which it grows, not the flower.
Art is theft.
A designer knows he has achieved perfection, not when there is nothing left to add, but when there is nothing left to take away.
If you get, give. If you learn, teach.
In a time of drastic change, it is the learners who inherit the future.
You aren’t learning anything when you’re talking.
Come il ferro è consumato dalla ruggine, così gli invidiosi sono consumati dalla loro stessa passione.
Strive not to be a success, but rather to be of value.
Data explains, stories inspire.
Excellence is doing ordinary things extraordinarily well.
The most important things in life aren’t things.
The good life consists in enjoying the creativity of others, and in sharing our own, not just in having our basic needs met.
What people say, what people do, and what people say they do are entirely different things.
Imagination is more important than knowledge. For knowledge is limited to all we now know and understand, while imagination embraces the entire world, and all there ever will be to know and understand.
The best way to predict the future is to create it.
If you can change your mind, you can change your life.
The question is not what you look at, but what you see.
Appreciation is a wonderful thing. It makes what is excellent in others belong to us as well.
We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.
Senza crisi non ci sono sfide, senza sfide la vita è una routine, una lenta agonia.
Logic will get you from A to B. Imagination will take you everywhere.
Tell me and I forget, teach me and I may remember, involve me and I learn.
If you obey all the rules you miss all the fun.
The bitterest tears shed over graves are for words left unsaid and deeds left undone.
What we fear of doing most is usually what we most need to do.
Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day; teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.
An ounce of practice is generally worth more than a ton of theory.
A critic is a man who knows the way but can’t drive the car.
What works good is better than what looks good, because what works good lasts.
Dovete andare fieri del vostro nemico; allora i successi del vostro nemico saranno anche i vostri successi.
Put the customer first. Invent. And be patient.
For the want of a nail the shoe was lost, For the want of a shoe the horse was lost, For the want of a horse the rider was lost, For the want of a rider the battle was lost, For the want of a battle the kingdom was lost, And all for the want of a horseshoe nail.
Не имей сто рублей, а имей сто друзей.
He who loves practice without theory is like the sailor who boards ship without a rudder and compass and never knows where he may cast.
The best way to predict your future is to create it.
A true leader does not give orders. A true leader gives explanations.
Know the rules well, so you can break them effectively.
It’s easier to make things people want, than it is to make people want things.
If you can’t solve a problem, then there is an easier problem you can solve: find it.
Everything popular is wrong.
Travel is the only thing you buy that makes you richer.
Many of life’s failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.
Work to become, not to acquire.
The biggest communication problem is we do not listen to understand. We listen to reply.
When you are tired of saying it, they are starting to hear it.
Serious-minded people have few ideas. People with ideas are never serious.
Design is like air, you only notice it when it’s bad.
No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it’s not the same river and he’s not the same man.
Without data you’re just another person with an opinion.
Being right keeps you in place, being wrong forces you to explore.
The best design is the simplest one that works.
There is a difference between knowing the path and walking the path.
To understand is to know what to do.
Everywhere is a walking distance if you have the time
Non lo so quale sia la chiave del successo, ma la chiave per il fallimento è nel cercare di accontentare tutti.
The measure of intelligence is the ability to change.
Great things are done by a series of small things brought together.
A goal without a plan is just a wish.
The real risk is in not changing. I have to feel that I’m after something. If I make money, fine. But I’d rather be striving. It’s the striving, man, it’s that I want.
Many of the things you can count, don’t count. Many of the things you can’t count really count.
The future is a journey, not a destination.
The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.
Everything that irritates us about others can lead us to an understanding of ourselves.
Everybody is interesting when they are interested in something.
Those who tell the stories rule society.
If you have no critics you’ll likely have no success.
You can’t stop the waves, but you can learn to surf.
In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice, there is.
The difference between successful people and very successful people is that very successful people say no to almost everything.
È meglio essere primi che meglio degli altri.
It is far better for a man to go wrong in freedom than to go right in chains.
Fear is often just the imagination taking a wrong turn.
Never reply when you are angry. Never make a promise when you are happy. Never make decision when you are sad.
Action may not always bring happiness; but there is no happiness without action.
La conoscenza non è sufficiente, dobbiamo applicarla. La volontà non è abbastanza, dobbiamo agire.
There is no such thing as a self-made man. You will reach your goals only with the help of others.
It’s better to burn out than to fade away.
…there is nothing new under the sun.
If our eyes are always looking for weakness, we begin to lose the intuition to notice the beauty.
We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.
I always wanted to be somebody, but now I realize I should have been more specific.
The best defense is a good offense.
…a wealth of information creates a poverty of attention…
Quit picking fights and go make something!
Life is too short to keep doing the same thing over and over and over again.
Management is doing things right; leadership is doing the right things.
You only think you know, as a matter of fact. And most of your actions are based on incomplete knowledge and you really don’t know what it is all about, or what the purpose of the world is, or know a great deal of other things. It is possible to live and not know.
La motivazione è il carburante del lavoro intellettuale.
Children are the living messages we send to a time we will not see.
It’s not that I’m so smart, it’s just that I stay with problems longer.
Decide what you stand for. And then stand for it all the time.
You never know what you can do till you try.
Leave something for someone but don’t leave someone for something.
If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go with others.
If our eyes are always looking for weakness, we begin to lose the intuition to notice the beauty.
Waiting for inspiration is like standing at the airport waiting for a train.
The best design tool is a long eraser with a pencil at one end.
It’s better to see once than hear a hundred times.
It is amazing what you can accomplish if you do not care who gets the credit.
The main thing is to keep the main thing, the main thing.
As to methods there may be a million and then some, but principles are few. The man who grasps principles can successfully select his own methods. The man who tries methods, ignoring principles, is sure to have trouble.
Success is not delivering a feature; success is learning how to solve the customer’s problem.
Music is the space between the notes.
Without great solitude no serious work is possible.
You are as great as the cause that you serve and as young as your dreams.
Risk comes from not knowing what you’re doing.
Even the strongest man cannot lift himself up.
Don’t criticize unless you can do better.
The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong.
Uncertainty is an uncomfortable position. But certainty is an absurd one.
Decide that you want it more than you are afraid of it.
There is nothing so useless as doing efficiently that which should not be done at all.
Good design is as little design as possible.
When the wind of change blows, some people build walls, others build windmills.
You can fool everyone else, but you can’t fool your own mind.
You can do anything, but not everything.
The more one does and sees and feels, the more one is able to do, and the more genuine may be one’s appreciation of fundamental things like home, and love, and understanding companionship.
Men have become the tools of their tools.
Every entrepreneur I have ever met is an artist. They are all forced to become comfortable with failure. And for entrepreneurs, their canvas is their company.
The days are long, but the years are short.
Make yourself become who you are.
I think you travel to search and you come back home to find yourself there.
Ciò che conta è quello che impari quando sai già tutto.
Success is the ability to go from failure to failure without losing your enthusiasm.
I don’t know what I think until I write it down.
If everything is important, then nothing is.
In the beginner’s mind there are many possibilities, in the expert’s mind there are few.
It is often easier to ask for forgiveness than to ask for permission.
Knowing is not enough; we must apply. Willing is not enough; we must do.
Change will lead to insight far more often than insight will lead to change.
A mind is like a parachute. It doesn’t work if it is not open.
The days are long, but the years are short.
You can’t TRY to do things, you must simply DO them.
When there’s nothing, you can do anything.
The problem contains the solution.
Diciamo di ammazzare il tempo come se, purtroppo, non fosse il tempo ad ammazzare noi.
Whatever we say, we are always talking about ourselves.
Moderation is a fatal thing… Nothing succeeds like excess.
A dream will not become an innovation if there is no realisation.
Designer can design a solution to a problem, but they can’t design a solution to a disagreement.
Hell is other people.
Time is the only resource we have that is nonrenewable.
As our island of knowledge grows, so does the shore of our ignorance.
What is important is seldom urgent and what is urgent is seldom important.
Gran parte dello stress deriva da impegni – presi con se stessi o con gli altri – gestiti in modo non adeguato.
It is not wrong to go back for that which you have forgotten.
If you find yourself in a hole, stop digging.
The artist is nothing without the gift, but the gift is nothing without the work.
Try to learn something about everything and everything about something.
First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.
What you do every day matters more than what you do once in a while.
What you do every day matters more than what you do once in a while.
Education is what survives when what has been learned has been forgotten.
Life is ours to be spent, not to be saved.
Your work is something you do, not who you are.
Do not judge me by my successes; judge me by how many times I fell down and got back up again.
View obstacles as opportunities for growth.
Fall seven times and stand up eight.
The main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing.