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