Whether you want to build new habits, stop worrying or become more productive, self-help books can help you unlock your potential, and make you happier and healthier.
Self-improvement books help start you out on your journey, others give you a boost. Profoundly inspirational quotes from self-help books will remind you that you’re smarter, stronger, and wiser than you think.
If you’re searching for famous quotes from greatest books that perfectly capture what you’d like to say or just want to feel inspired yourself, browse through an amazing collection of best quotes about happiness, positivity quotes and inspirational quotes about change.
Famous Quotes From Self-Help Books
No matter where you are in life, you’ll save a lot of time by not worrying too much about what other people think about you. The earlier in your life that you can learn that, the easier the rest of it will be. – Sophia Amoruso, Girl Boss
It isn’t what you have or who you are or where you are or what you are doing that makes you happy or unhappy. It is what you think about it. – Dale Carnegie, How to Win Friends & Influence People
We see the world, not as it is, but as we are or, as we are conditioned to see it. – Stephen R. Covey, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change
Being comfortable can hurt your creative entrepreneurial spirit. – Blake Mycoskie, Start Something That Matters
When we are no longer able to change a situation, we are challenged to change ourselves. – Viktor E Frankl, Man’s Search for Meaning
When defeat comes, accept it as a signal that your plans are not sound, rebuild those plans, and set sail once more toward your coveted goal. – Napoleon Hill, Think and Grow Rich
Time isn’t precious at all, because it is an illusion. What you perceive as precious is not time but the one point that is out of time: the Now. That is precious indeed. The more you are focused on time—past and future—the more you miss the Now, the most precious thing there is. – Eckhart Tolle, The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
Be grateful for what you have now. As you begin to think about all the things in your life you are grateful for, you will be amazed at the never-ending thoughts that come back to you of more things to be grateful for. You have to make a start, and then the law of attraction will receive those grateful thoughts and give you more just like them. – Rhonda Byrne, The Secret
Until you value yourself, you won’t value your time. Until you value your time, you will not do anything with it. – M. Scott Peck, The Road Less Traveled, Timeless Edition: A New Psychology of Love, Traditional Values and Spiritual Growth
Life is never incomplete if it is an honorable one. At whatever point you leave life, if you leave it in the right way, it is whole. – Seneca, Stoic Philosophy of Seneca
A man’s true delight is to do the things he was made for. – Marcus Aurelius, Meditations
But you are the average of the five people you associate with most, so do not underestimate the effects of your pessimistic, unambitious, or disorganized friends. If someone isn’t making you stronger, they’re making you weaker. – Timothy Ferriss, The 4-Hour Workweek: Escape 9-5, Live Anywhere, and Join the New Rich
The primary cause of unhappiness is never the situation but your thoughts about it. – Eckhart Tolle, A New Earth: Awakening to Your Life’s Purpose
What you are afraid of is never as bad as what you imagine. The fear you let build up in your mind is worse than the situation that actually exists. – Spencer Johnson, Who Moved My Cheese?: An Amazing Way to Deal with Change in Your Work and in Your Life
See yourself as a work in progress. – Brian Tracy, Eat That Frog
You have to begin to tell the story of your life as you now want it to be and discontinue the tales of how it has been or of how it is. – Esther & Jerry Hicks, Money and the Law of Attraction: Learning to Attract Wealth, Health, and Happiness
Look at things not as they are, but as they can be. Visualization adds value to everything. A big thinker always visualizes what can be done in the future. He isn’t stuck with the present. – David J. Schwartz, The Magic of Thinking Big
There is only one thing that makes a dream impossible to achieve: the fear of failure. – Paulo Coelho, The Alchemist
The way to happiness: Keep your heart free from hate, your mind from worry. Live simply, expect little, give much. Scatter sunshine, forget self, think of others. Try this for a week and you will be surprised. – Norman Vincent Peale, The Power of Positive Thinking
What we fear doing most is usually what we most need to do. – Ralph Waldo Emerson, Selected Writings of Ralph Waldo Emerson
How you start your day is how you live your day. How you live your day is how you live your life. – Louise L. Hay, You Can Heal Your Life
Knowing others is intelligence; knowing yourself is true wisdom. Mastering others is strength; mastering yourself is true power. – Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching
Winners are not afraid of losing. But losers are. Failure is part of the process of success. People who avoid failure also avoid success. – Robert T. Kiyosaki, Rich Dad Poor Dad: What The Rich Teach Their Kids About Money That the Poor and Middle Class Do Not!
We are products of our past, but we don’t have to be prisoners of it. – Rick Warren, The Purpose Driven Life: What on Earth Am I Here For?
One of the best ways to make yourself happy is to make other people happy. One of the best ways to make other people happy is to be happy yourself. – Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project (Revised Edition): Or, Why I Spent a Year Trying to Sing in the Morning, Clean My Closets, Fight Right, Read Aristotle, and Generally Have More Fun
The top players in every field think differently when all the marbles are on the line. Great performers focus on what they are doing, and nothing else…They let it happen, let it go. They couldn’t care less about the results. – John Eliot, Overachievement: The New Science of Working Less to Accomplish More
Don’t Take Anything Personally. Nothing others do is because of you. What others say and do is a projection of their own reality, their own dream. When you are immune to the opinions of others, you won’t be the victim of needless suffering. – Don Miguel Ruiz, The Four Agreements: A Practical Guide to Personal Freedom
As the physically weak man can make himself strong by careful and patient training, so the man of weak thoughts can make them strong by exercising himself in right thinking. – James Allen, As a Man Thinketh
There is one single thread binding my way together…the way of the Master consists in doing one’s best…that is all. – Confucius, The Analects of Confucius
There are secret opportunities hidden inside every failure. – Sophia Amoruso, Girl Boss
You can make more friends in two months by becoming interested in other people than you can in two years by trying to get other people interested in you. – Dale Carnegie, How to Win Friends & Influence People
Sow a thought, reap an action; sow an action, reap a habit; sow a habit, reap a character; sow a character, reap a destiny. – Stephen R. Covey, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change
A quitter never wins and a winner never quits. – Napoleon Hill, Think and Grow Rich
Focus on what you can control: your actions. How you react to negative feelings will be the key to your success. – Blake Mycoskie, Start Something That Matters
Any action is often better than no action, especially if you have been stuck in an unhappy situation for a long time. If it is a mistake, at least you learn something, in which case it’s no longer a mistake. If you remain stuck, you learn nothing. – Eckhart Tolle, The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
There is a truth deep down inside of you that has been waiting for you to discover it, and that truth is this: you deserve all good things life has to offer. – Rhonda Byrne, The Secret
Life is difficult. This is a great truth, one of the greatest truths. It is a great truth because once we truly see this truth, we transcend it. Once we truly know that life is difficult–once we truly understand and accept it–then life is no longer difficult. Because once it is accepted, the fact that life is difficult no longer matters. – M. Scott Peck,, The Road Less Traveled, Timeless Edition: A New Psychology of Love, Traditional Values and Spiritual Growth
A person’s success in life can usually be measured by the number of uncomfortable conversations he or she is willing to have. – Timothy Ferriss, The 4-Hour Workweek: Escape 9-5, Live Anywhere, and Join the New Rich
What holds most people back isn’t the quality of their ideas, but their lack of faith in themselves. You have to live your life as if you are already where you want to be. – Russell Simmons, Do You!
What would you do if you weren’t afraid? – Spencer Johnson, Who Moved My Cheese?: An Amazing Way to Deal with Change in Your Work and in Your Life
80 Percent of the constraints, the factors that are holding you back from achieving your goals, are internal. – Brian Tracy, Eat That Frog
Think you are weak, think you lack what it takes, think you will lose, think you are second class – think this way and you are doomed to mediocrity. – David J. Schwartz, The Magic of Thinking Big
The word courage comes from the same stem as the French word Coeur, meaning “heart.” Thus just as one’s heart, by pumping blood to one’s arms, legs, and brain enables all the other physical organs to function, so courage makes possible all the psychological virtues. Without courage other values wither away into mere facsimiles of virtue. – Rollo May, The Courage to Create
Learn to use your emotions to think, not think with your emotions. – Robert T. Kiyosaki, Rich Dad Poor Dad: What The Rich Teach Their Kids About Money That the Poor and Middle Class Do Not!
What you do every day matters more than what you do once in a while. – Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project (Revised Edition): Or, Why I Spent a Year Trying to Sing in the Morning, Clean My Closets, Fight Right, Read Aristotle, and Generally Have More Fun
You are essentially who you create yourself to be and all that occurs in your life is the result of your own making. – Stephen Richards, Think Your way to Success: Let Your Dreams Run Free
You combine hard work, creativity, and self-determination, and things start to happen. – Sophia Amoruso, Girl Boss
Everybody in the world is seeking happiness—and there is one sure way to find it. That is by controlling your thoughts. Happiness doesn’t depend on outward conditions. It depends on inner conditions. – Dale Carnegie, How to Win Friends & Influence People
Of course, motivation is not permanent. But then, neither is bathing; but it is something you should do on a regular basis. – Zig Ziglar, Raising Positive Kids in a Negative World
It’s not what happens to us, but our response to what happens to us that hurts us. – Stephen R. Covey, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change
I will eliminate hatred, envy, jealousy, selfishness, and cynicism, by developing love for all humanity, because I know that a negative attitude toward others can never bring me success. I will cause others to believe in me, because I will believe in them, and in myself. – Napoleon Hill, Think and Grow Rich
In a very real sense we have two minds, one that thinks and one that feels. – Daniel Goleman, Emotional Intelligence: Why It Can Matter More Than IQ
Successful people are those who are willing to delay gratification and make sacrifices in the short term so that they can enjoy far greater rewards in the long term. – Brian Tracy, Eat That Frog
We cannot choose our external circumstances, but we can always choose how we respond to them. – Epictetus, Enchiridion
See if you can catch yourself complaining, in either speech or thought, about a situation you find yourself in, what other people do or say, your surroundings, your life situation, even the weather. To complain is always nonacceptance of what is. It invariably carries an unconscious negative charge. When you complain, you make yourself into a victim. When you speak out, you are in your power. So change the situation by taking action or by speaking out if necessary or possible; leave the situation or accept it. All else is madness. – Eckhart Tolle, The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
A lot of people feel like they’re victims in life, and they’ll often point to past events, perhaps growing up with an abusive parent or in a dysfunctional family. Most psychologists believe that about 85 percent of families are dysfunctional, so all of a sudden you’re not so unique. My parents were alcoholics. My dad abused me. My mother divorced him when I was six… I mean, that’s almost everybody’s story in some form or not. The real question is, what are you going to do now? What do you choose now? Because you can either keep focusing on that, or you can focus on what you want. And when people start focusing on what they want, what they don’t want falls away, and what they want expands, and the other part disappears. – Rhonda Byrne, The Secret
So what is the difference between “power thinking” and “positive” thinking? The distinction is slight but profound. To me, people use positive thinking to pretend that everything is rosy, when they really believe that it’s not. With power thinking, we understand that everything is neutral, that nothing has meaning except for the meaning we give it, and that we are going to make up a story and give something it’s meaning. – T Harv Eker, Secrets of the Millionaire Mind
It is only because of problems that we grow mentally and spiritually. – M. Scott Peck, The Road Less Traveled, Timeless Edition: A New Psychology of Love, Traditional Values and Spiritual Growth
The question you should be asking isn’t, ‘What do I want?’ or ‘What are my goals?’ but ‘What would excite me?’ – Timothy Ferriss, The 4-Hour Workweek: Escape 9-5, Live Anywhere, and Join the New Rich
We all have something that we are meant to do. Your genius will shine through, and happiness will fill your life, the instant you discover your higher purpose you will then direct all your energies towards it. – Robin Sharma, The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari
Those who believe they can move mountains, do. Those who believe they can’t, cannot. Belief triggers the power to do. – David J. Schwartz, The Magic of Thinking Big
Our only limitations are those we set up in our own minds. – Napoleon Hill, Think and Grow Rich
What we call our destiny is truly our character and that character can be altered. The knowledge that we are responsible for our actions and attitudes does not need to be discouraging, because it also means that we are free to change this destiny. – Anaïs Nin, The Diary of Anais Nin
Personally I am very fond of strawberries and cream, but I have found that for some strange reason, fish prefer worms. So when I went fishing, I didn’t think about what I wanted. I thought about what they wanted. I didn’t bait the hook with strawberries and cream. Rather, I dangled a worm or grasshopper in front of the fish and said: ‘Wouldn’t you like to have that?’
Why not use the same common sense when fishing for people? – Dale Carnegie, How to Win Friends & Influence People
You can make just about anything of your life-anything you will believe or will visualize, anything you will pray for and work for. Look deeply into your mind. Amazing wonders are there. Whatever the situation may be, you can improve it. – Brian Tracy, Eat That Frog
If I really want to improve my situation, I can work on the one thing over which I have control – myself. – Stephen R. Covey, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change
One who has loved truly, can never lose entirely. Love is whimsical and temperamental. Its nature is ephemeral, and transitory. It comes when it pleases and goes away without warning. Accept and enjoy it while it remains, but spend no time worrying about its departure. Worry will never bring it back. – Napoleon Hill, Think and Grow Rich
What a caterpillar calls the end of the world, we call a butterfly. – Eckhart Tolle, The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
If you are feeling good, it is because you are thinking good thoughts. – Rhonda Byrne, The Secret
It is better to be hated for what you are than to be loved for what you are not. – André Gide, Autumn Leaves
If you are insecure, guess what? The rest of the world is, too. Do not overestimate the competition and underestimate yourself. You are better than you think. – Timothy Ferriss, The 4-Hour Workweek: Escape 9-5, Live Anywhere, and Join the New Rich
We see men who have accumulated great fortunes, but we often recognize only their triumph, overlooking the temporary defeats which they had to surmount before “arriving. – Napoleon Hill, Think and Grow Rich
All men have fears, but the brave put down their fears and go forward, sometimes to death, but always to victory. – Dale Carnegie, How to Win Friends & Influence People
Admission of ignorance is often the first step in our education. – Stephen R. Covey, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change
Helen Keller became deaf, dumb, and blind shortly after birth. Despite her greatest misfortune, she has written her name indelibly in the pages of the history of the great. Her entire life has served as evidence that no one is ever defeated until defeat has been accepted as reality. – Napoleon Hill, Think and Grow Rich
Focus attention on the feeling inside you. Know that it is the pain-body. Accept that it is there. Don’t think about it – don’t let the feeling turn into thinking. Don’t judge or analyze. Don’t make an identity for yourself out of it. Stay present and continue to be the observer of what is happening inside you. – Eckhart Tolle, The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment
Neville recommends at the end of every day, before you go to sleep, to think through the events of the day. If any events or moments did not go the way you wanted, replay them in your mind in a way that thrills you. As you recreate those events in your mind exactly as you want, you are cleaning up your frequency from the day and you are emitting a new signal and frequency for tomorrow. You have intentionally created new picture for your future. It is never too late to change the pictures. – Rhonda Byrne, The Secret
Star performers start with a well-defined and concrete “impossible” goal they care deeply about and then they build a through-line that clearly connects here with there. – Robert K Cooper, The Other 90%
Surround your mind with healthy thoughts, thoughts of faith, and not fear, and you will produce faith results instead of fear results. – Brian Tracy, Eat That Frog
To enjoy life, you don’t need fancy nonsense, but you do need to control your time and realize that most things just aren’t as serious as you make them out to be. – Timothy Ferriss, The 4-Hour Workweek: Escape 9-5, Live Anywhere, and Join the New Rich
As you care less about what people think of you, you will care more about what others think of themselves. – Stephen R. Covey, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change
There is a difference between wishing for a thing and being ready to receive it. No one is ready for a thing, until he believes he can acquire it. The state of mind must be belief, not mere hope or wish. Open-mindedness is essential for belief. – Napoleon Hill, Think and Grow Rich
You’d better slow down. Don’t dance so fast. Time is short. The music won’t last. When you run so fast to get somewhere, you miss half the fun of getting there. When you worry and hurry through your day, it is like an unopened gift thrown away. Life is not a race. Do take it slower. Hear the music before the song is over. – Timothy Ferriss, The 4-Hour Workweek: Escape 9-5, Live Anywhere, and Join the New Rich
Focus on being productive instead of busy. – Timothy Ferriss, The 4-Hour Workweek: Escape 9-5, Live Anywhere, and Join the New Rich
But until a person can say deeply and honestly, “I am what I am today because of the choices I made yesterday,” that person cannot say, “I choose otherwise.” – Stephen R. Covey, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change
