Everyone has those challenging days at work when it feels tough to keep going. It’s during these times that we need some extra encouragement and motivation to push through. In today’s post, I want to share 125 of the most uplifting and inspiring quotes that can help you stay motivated in the workplace.
These quotes are meant to provide you with a boost of energy on those tired mornings, offer words of wisdom and kindness when you’re feeling down after a setback, and inspire new perspectives when facing tough challenges.
I hope you’ll find these quotes comforting, uplifting, and useful as you navigate through your workday.
Encouraging and Motivational Quotes for the Workplace
“Concentrate all your thoughts upon the work in hand. The sun’s rays do not burn until brought to a focus.” – Alexander Graham Bell
“The secret of getting ahead is getting started. The secret of getting started is breaking your complex overwhelming tasks into small manageable tasks, and then starting on the first one.” – Mark Twain
“Let me tell you the secret that has led me to my goals: my strength lies solely in my tenacity.” – Louis Pasteur
“Either you run the day or the day runs you.” – Jim Rohn
“It does not matter how slowly you go, so long as you do not stop.” – Confucius
“When we strive to become better than we are, everything around us becomes better too.” – Paulo Coelho
“Don’t judge each day by the harvest you reap but by the seeds that you plant.” – Robert Louis Stevenson
“Just one small positive thought in the morning can change your whole day.” – Dalai Lama
“Whether you think you can, or you think you can’t – you’re right.” – Henry Ford
“The future depends on what you do today.” – Mahatma Gandhi
“The man who moves a mountain begins by carrying away small stones.” – Confucius
“Start by doing what’s necessary, then what’s possible; and suddenly you are doing the impossible.” – Saint Francis of Assisi
“People rarely succeed unless they have fun in what they are doing.” – Dale Carnegie
“Don’t wait. The time will never be just right.” – Napoleon Hill
“You don’t have to see the whole staircase, just take the first step.” – Martin Luther King, Jr.
“This is the real secret of life – to be completely engaged with what you are doing in the here and now. And instead of calling it work, realize it is play.” – Alan Wilson Watts
“Motivation is a fire from within. If someone else tries to light that fire under you, chances are it will burn very briefly.” – Stephen R. Covey
“Try not to become a person of success, but rather try to become a person of value.” – Albert Einstein
“It is not a daily increase, but a daily decrease. Hack away at the inessentials.” – Bruce Lee
“I am not a product of my circumstances. I am a product of my decisions.” – Stephen Covey
“Attitude is a choice. Happiness is a choice. Optimism is a choice. Kindness is a choice. Giving is a choice. Respect is a choice. Whatever choice you make makes you. Choose wisely.” – Roy T. Bennett
Short and Encouraging Quotes for Work
“Hard work beats talent when talent doesn’t work hard.” – Tim Notke
“Be so good they can’t ignore you.” – Steve Martin
“Nothing will work unless you do.” – Maya Angelou
“The more I want to get something done the less I call it work.” – Richard Bach
“Even if you’re on the right track, you’ll get run over if you just sit there.” – Will Rogers
“The best way to get started is to quit talking and begin doing.” – Walt Disney
“Don’t count the days, make the days count.” – Muhammad Ali
“The best revenge is massive success.” – Frank Sinatra
“Doubt kills more dreams than failure ever will.” – Suzy Kassem
“Build your own dreams or someone else will hire you to build theirs.” – Farrah Gray
“What you do today can improve all your tomorrows.” – Ralph Marston
“The most effective way to do it is to do it.” – Amelia Earhart
“Talent wins games, but teamwork wins championships.” – Michael Jordan
“Impossible is just an opinion.” – Paulo Coelho
“Someone’s sitting in the shade today because someone planted a tree a long time ago.” – Warren Buffett
“It’s hard to beat a person who never gives up.” – Babe Ruth
“Light tomorrow with today.” – Elizabeth Barrett Browning
“It is never too late to be what you might have been.” – George Eliot
“Don’t watch the clock; do what it does. Keep going.” – Sam Levenson
“Excellence is not a skill. It’s an attitude.” – Ralph Marston
Funny and Encouraging Quotes for Those Boring Days at Work
“An expert is a man who has made all the mistakes which can be made in a very narrow field.” – Niels Bohr
“If you think you are too small to be effective, you have never been in the dark with a mosquito.” – Betty Reese
“It takes less time to do a thing right than it does to explain why you did it wrong.” – Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
“All you need in this life is ignorance and confidence; then success is sure.” – Mark Twain
“I choose a lazy person to do a hard job, because a lazy person will find an easy way to do it.” – Bill Gates
“No man goes before his time – unless the boss leaves early.” – Groucho Marx
“People often say that motivation doesn’t last. Well, neither does bathing – that’s why we recommend it daily.” – Zig Ziglar
“Time is an illusion. Lunchtime is doubly so.” – Douglas Adams
“Doing nothing is very hard to do… you never know when you’re finished.” – Leslie Nielsen
“The best way to appreciate your job is to imagine yourself without one.” – Oscar Wilde
“I like work; it fascinates me. I can sit and look at it for hours.” – Jerome K. Jerome
“The only thing that ever sat its way to success was a hen.” – Sarah Brown
“If hard work is the key to success, most people would rather pick the lock.” – Claude McDonald
“Hard work never killed anybody, but why take a chance?” – Edgar Bergen
“The brain is a wonderful organ; it starts working the moment you get up in the morning and does not stop until you get into the office.” – Robert Frost
“I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by.” – Douglas Adams
“The reward for good work is more work.” – Francesca Elisia
“I always arrive late at the office, but I make up for it by leaving early.” – Charles Lamb
“By working faithfully eight hours a day you may eventually get to be boss and work twelve hours a day.” – Robert Frost
“There cannot be a crisis next week. My schedule is already full.” – Henry Kissinger
“Oh, you hate your job? Why didn’t you say so? There’s a support group for that. It’s called everybody, and they meet at the bar.” – Drew Carey
Kind and Encouraging Quotes for Setbacks in the Workplace
“Never confuse a single defeat with a final defeat.” – F. Scott Fitzgerald
“As I look back on my life, I realize that every time I thought I was being rejected from something good, I was actually being redirected to something better.” – Steve Maraboli
“I’ve learned that no matter what happens, or how bad it seems today, life does go on, and it will be better tomorrow.” – Maya Angelou
“What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson
“Tough times never last, but tough people do.” – Robert H. Schuller
“Courage doesn’t always roar. Sometimes courage is the quiet voice at the end of the day saying, ‘I will try again tomorrow.'” – Mary Anne Radmacher
“Fall seven times, stand up eight.” – Chinese Proverb
“In the depth of winter, I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer.” – Albert Camus
“Although no one can go back and make a brand new start, anyone can start from now and make a brand new ending.” – Carl Bard
“If one dream should fall and break into a thousand pieces, never be afraid to pick one of those pieces up and begin again.” – Flavia Weedn
“When one door of happiness closes, another opens, but often we look so long at the closed door that we do not see the one that has been opened for us.” – Helen Keller
“Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try Again. Fail again. Fail better.” – Samuel Beckett
“Strength does not come from winning. Your struggles develop your strengths. When you go through hardships and decide not to surrender, that is strength.” – Arnold Schwarzenegger
“A hero is an ordinary individual who finds the strength to persevere and endure in spite of overwhelming obstacles.” – Christopher Reeve
“Remember that failure is an event, not a person.” – Zig Ziglar
“At any given moment you have the power to say: This is not how the story is going to end.” – Christine Mason Miller
“Do not be embarrassed by your failures, learn from them and start again.” – Richard Branson
“Failure is simply the opportunity to begin again, this time more intelligently.” – Henry Ford
“The best way out is always through.” – Robert Frost
“The only thing that overcomes hard luck is hard work.” – Harry Golden
“Life is not easy for any of us. But what of that? We must have perseverance and, above all, confidence in ourselves. We must believe that we are gifted for something, and that this thing, at whatever cost, must be attained.” – Marie Curie
“You are never too old to set another goal or to dream a new dream.” – C.S. Lewis
Positive and Uplifting Words of Encouragement for Work
“A life spent making mistakes is not only more honorable but more useful than a life spent in doing nothing.” – George Bernard Shaw
“Anyone can hide. Facing up to things, working through them, that’s what makes you strong.” – Sarah Dessen
“The only time you run out of chances is when you stop taking them.” – Alexander Pope
“Try to be a rainbow in someone else’s cloud.” – Maya Angelou
“No act of kindness, no matter how small, is ever wasted.” – Aesop
“With the new day comes new strength and new thoughts.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
“I love the man that can smile in trouble, that can gather strength from distress, and grow brave by reflection.” – Thomas Paine
“You gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
“Every great dream begins with a dreamer. Always remember, you have within you the strength, the patience, and the passion to reach for the stars to change the world.” – Harriet Tubman
“Everything you want is on the other side of fear.” – Jack Canfield
“When you arise in the morning, think of what a precious privilege it is to be alive – to breathe, to think, to enjoy, to love.” – Marcus Aurelius
“Happiness is not something ready-made. It comes from your own actions.” – Dalai Lama
“You’ll always miss 100% of the shots you don’t take.” – Wayne Gretzky
“Your attitude, not your aptitude, will determine your altitude.” – Zig Ziglar
“The expert at anything was once a beginner.” – Helen Hayes
“Instead of letting your hardships and failures discourage or exhaust you, let them inspire you.” – Michelle Obama
“It doesn’t matter who you are, where you come from. The ability to triumph begins with you. Always.” – Oprah Winfrey
“Hardships often prepare ordinary people for an extraordinary destiny.” – C.S. Lewis
“When the wrong people leave your life, the right things start happening.” – Zig Ziglar
“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.” – Mark Twain
Encouraging Quotes on Success and Hard Work
“Success isn’t always about greatness. It’s about consistency. Consistent hard work leads to success. Greatness will come.” – Dwayne Johnson
“Work hard in silence, let success be your noise.” – Frank Ocean
“The fruit of your own hard work is the sweetest.” – Deepika Padukone
“Success is the sum of small efforts, repeated day in and day out.” – Robert Collier
“The price of success is hard work, dedication to the job at hand, and the determination that whether we win or lose, we have applied the best of ourselves to the task at hand.” – Vince Lombardi
“There are no secrets to success. It is the result of preparation, hard work, and learning from failure.” – Colin Powell
“I strongly believe if you work hard, whatever you want, it will come to you.” – Beyoncé Knowles-Carter
“Keep your dreams alive. Understand to achieve anything requires faith and belief in yourself, vision, hard work, determination, and dedication. Remember all things are possible for those who believe.” – Gail Devers
“Success is no accident. It is hard work, perseverance, learning, studying, sacrifice and most of all, love of what you are doing or learning to do.” – Pele
“The only place where success comes before work is in the dictionary.” – Vidal Sassoon
“Great things come from hard work and perseverance. No excuses.” – Kobe Bryant
“There will be obstacles. There will be doubters. There will be mistakes. But with hard work, there are no limits.” – Michael Phelps
“Self-belief and hard work will always earn you success.” – Virat Kohli
“If you really want something, and really work hard, and take advantage of opportunities, and never give up, you will find a way.” – Jane Goodall
“Luck is a dividend of sweat. The more you sweat, the luckier you get.” – Ray Kroc
“I’m a great believer in luck, and I find the harder I work the more I have of it.” – Thomas Jefferson
“There is no magic to achievement. It’s really about hard work, choices, and persistence.” – Michelle Obama
“Work hard, have fun, make history.” – Jeff Bezos
“The only way to do great work is to love what you do.” – Steve Jobs
“Talent is cheaper than table salt. What separates the talented individual from the successful one is a lot of hard work.” – Stephen King
“Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.” – Winston Churchill
Looking for more inspiration and motivation for your work life? Check out these short work quotes, the hard work quotes in this post, and also this collection of hilarious work quotes for stress relief.
