1850-1924, American Author, Founder of Success Magazine
A constant struggle, a ceaseless battle to bring success from inhospitable surroundings, is the price of all great achievements.
Orison Swett Marden – [Price]
A good system shortens the road to the goal.
Orison Swett Marden – [Planning]
A strong, successful man is not the victim of his environment. He creates favorable conditions. His own inherent force and energy compel things to turn out as he desires.
Orison Swett Marden – [Environment]
Achievement is not always success, while reputed failure often is. It is honest endeavor, persistent effort to do the best possible under any and all circumstances.
Orison Swett Marden – [Success]
All who have accomplished great things have had a great aim, have fixed their gaze on a goal which was high, one which sometimes seemed impossible.
Orison Swett Marden – [Impossibility]
Be larger than your task.
Orison Swett Marden – [Courage]
Begin where you are; work where you are; the hour which you are now wasting, dreaming of some far off success may be crowded with grand possibilities.
Orison Swett Marden – [Action]
But how shall I get ideas? ''Keep your wits open! Observe! Observe! Study! Study! But above all, Think! Think! And when a noble image is indelibly impressed upon the mind — Act!
Orison Swett Marden – [Ideas]
Character is the indelible mark that determines the only true value of all people and all their work.
Orison Swett Marden – [Character]
Concentration is the factor that causes the great discrepancy between men and the results they achieve… the difference in their power of calling together all the rays of their ability and concentrating on one point.
Orison Swett Marden – [Concentration]
Deep within man dwell those slumbering powers; powers that would astonish him, that he never dreamed of possessing; forces that would revolutionize his life if aroused and put into action.
Orison Swett Marden – [Possibilities]
Doing common things uncommonly well.
Orison Swett Marden – [Excellence]
Don't wait for extraordinary opportunities. Seize common occasions and make them great. Weak men wait for opportunities; strong men make them.
Orison Swett Marden – [Opportunity]
Every experience in life, everything with which we have come in contact in life, is a chisel which has been cutting away at our life statue, molding, modifying, shaping it. We are part of all we have met. Everything we have seen, heard, felt or thought has had its hand in molding us, shaping us.
Orison Swett Marden – [Environment]
Every germ of goodness will at last struggle into bloom and fruitage… true success follows every right step.
Orison Swett Marden – [Success]
Every youth owes it to himself and to the world to make the most possible out of the stuff that is in him…
Orison Swett Marden – [Youth]
Great men are but common men more fully developed and ripened.
Orison Swett Marden – [Excellence]
He is the richest man who enriches his country most; in whom the people feel richest and proudest; who gives himself with his money; who opens the doors of opportunity widest to those about him; who is ears to the deaf; eyes to the blind, and feet to the lame. Such a man makes every acre of land in his community worth more, and makes richer every man who lives near him.
Orison Swett Marden – [Leaders and Leadership]
If we put the emphasis upon the right things, if we live the life that is worth while and then fail, we will survive all disasters, we will out-live all misfortune. We should be so well balanced and symmetrical, that nothing which could ever happen could throw us off our center, so that no matter what misfortune should overtake us, there would still be a whole magnificent man or woman left after being stripped of everything else.
Orison Swett Marden – [Honesty]
If you do not feel yourself growing in your work and your life broadening and deepening, if your task is not a perpetual tonic to you, you have not found your place.
Orison Swett Marden – [Fun]