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