121 Effective Quotes on Determination and Willpower

Life is full of hard times and big dreams. The power to keep going, even when things get tough, is what we call determination and willpower. It’s like having a strong motivator inside you that never wants to quit. 

So, here are some wise quotes on determination and willpower of those who have learned what it is and harnessed its strength to achieve their definition of success.

These quotes will inspire you to stay motivated, conquer hurdles, and strive for excellence, so you don’t give up on your goal. Use these quotes to channel your inner strength and give yourself a boost when you need it.

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Here is the List of 121 Powerful Quotes on Determination and Willpower

1. “There’s only one way to succeed in anything, and that is to give it everything.” — Vince Lombardi

2. “The greatest waste in the world is the difference between what we are and what we could become.” — Ben Herbster

3. “You have to stay focused and be mentally tough. That’s what I’ve really learned: every day is a grind, and you have to go hard.” — Chris Gronkowski

4. “I believe success is achieved by ordinary people with extraordinary determination.” — Zig Ziglar

5. “All powers are within you, you can do anything and everything.” — Swami Vivekananda

6. “The will to succeed is important, but what’s more important is the will to prepare.” — Bobby Knight

7. “Willpower is the art of practicing control over the pull of immediate desires.” — Roy Baumeister

8. “Don’t be satisfied with stories, how things have gone with others. Unfold your own myth.” — Rumi

9. “In the confrontation between the stream and the rock, the stream always wins, not through strength but by perseverance.” — H. Jackson Brown Jr.

10. “The development of willpower -I will, I won’t and I want- may define what it means to be human.” — Kelly McGonigal

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11. “Whatever your determination or will power, it is foolish to try to change the nature of things. Things work the way they do because that is the way of things.” — Miyamoto Musashi

12. “In the absence of willpower the most complete collection of virtues and talents is wholly worthless.” — Aleister Crowley

13. “We all have dreams. But in order to make dreams come into reality, it takes an awful lot of determination, dedication, self-discipline, and effort.” — Jessie Owens

14. “Going that one more round when you don’t think you can – that’s what makes all the difference in your life.” — Sylvester Stallone

15. “Never give in except to convictions of honor and good sense.” — Winston Churchill

16. “We must remember that one determined person can make a significant difference, and that a small group of determined people can change the course of history.” — Sonia Johnson

17. “It always seems impossible until it is done.” — Nelson Mandela

18. “When a goal matters enough to a person, that person will find a way to accomplish what at first seemed impossible.” — Nido R. Qubein

19. “The ability to delay gratification is a master key to unlocking long-term achievement.” — Walter Mischel

20. “Success seems to be connected with action. Successful people keep moving. They make mistakes, but they don’t quit.” — Conrad Hilton

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21. “If you hear a voice within you say ‘you cannot paint,’ then by all means paint, and that voice will be silenced.” — Vincent van Gogh

22. “You are stopping you. You are giving up instead of getting hard.” — David Goggins

23. “As soon as you trust yourself, you will know how to live.” — Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

24. “Willpower is the override switch of the upper brain over the lower.” — Ros Taylor

25. “Pride is holding your head up when everyone around you has theirs bowed. Courage is what makes you do it.” — Bryce Courtenay

26. “It’s a lot more than mind over matter. It takes relentless self discipline to schedule suffering into your day, every day.” — David Goggins

27. “Always be yourself and have faith in yourself. Do not go out and look for a successful personality and try to duplicate it.” — Bruce Lee

28. “Reflect upon your present blessings, of which every man has many — not on your past misfortunes, of which all men have some.” — Charles Dickens

29. “When you’re different, sometimes you don’t see the millions of people who accept you for what you are. All you notice is the person who doesn’t.” — Jodi Picoul

30. “Willpower is the key to success. Successful people strive no matter what they feel by applying their will to overcome apathy, doubt or fear.” — Dan Millman

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31. “Obstacles don’t have to stop you. If you run into a wall, don’t turn around and give up. Figure out how to climb it, go through it, or work around it.” — Michael Jordan

32. “People with a strong will power will always have the bigger picture in mind. They will be able to forgo small pleasures in order to help attain bigger goals.” — Brian Adams

33. “Don’t waste your energy trying to change opinions … do your thing, and don’t care if they like it.” — Tina Fey

34. “The chains of habit are too weak to be felt until they are too strong to be broken.” — Samuel Johnson

35. “The way to develop self-confidence is to do the thing you fear and get a record of successful experiences behind you.” — William Jennings Bryan

36. “The moment you doubt whether you can fly, you cease forever to be able to do it.” — J.M. Barrie

37. “By constant self-discipline and self-control, you can develop greatness of character.” — Grenville Kleiser

38. “Each time you overcome an obstacle, your willpower grows stronger.” — Remez Sasson

39. “Willpower is not some mythical force that we either have or don’t have. Willpower is our decision to use higher-mind thinking instead of lazing around in the clutches of our primal mind.” — A. B. Curtiss

40. “You wouldn’t worry so much about what others think of you if you realized how seldom they do.” — Eleanor Roosevelt

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41. “You’ve got to get up every morning with determination if you’re going to go to bed with satisfaction.” — George Lorimer

42. “Obstacles are what you see when you take your eyes off the goal.” — Henry Ford

43. “You have no control over other people’s taste, so focus on staying true to your own.” — Tim Gunn

44. “Don’t do your best, do whatever it takes.” — Anonymous

45. “Trust yourself. Create the kind of self that you will be happy to live with all your life. Make the most of yourself by fanning the tiny, inner sparks of possibility into flames of achievement.” — Golda Meir

46. “To assert your willpower is simply to make up your mind that you want something, and then refuse to be put off.” — Phillip Cooper

47. “It is confidence in our bodies, minds, and spirits that allows us to keep looking for new adventures.” — Oprah Winfrey

48. “Greatness is not a function of circumstance. Greatness, it turns out, is largely a matter of conscious choice, and discipline.” — James C. Collins

49. “Gold medals aren’t really made of gold. They’re made of sweat, determination, and a hard-to-find alloy called guts.” — Dan Gable

50. “To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment.” — Ralph Waldo Emerson

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51. “The darker the night, the nearer the dawn. Victory in life is decided by that last concentrated burst of energy filled with the resolve to win.” — Daisaku Ikeda

52. “Some people dream of success while others wake up and work.” — Unknown

53. “But failure has to be an option in art and in exploration — because it’s a leap of faith. And no important endeavor that required innovation was done without risk. You have to be willing to take those risks.” — James Cameron

54. “The harder the struggle, the more glorious the triumph. Self-realization demands very great willpower.” — Swami Sivananda

55. “Rest if you must, but never quit.” — John Greenleaf Whittier

56. “Argue for your limitations and, sure enough, they’re yours.” — Richard Bach

57. “All progress takes place outside the comfort zone.” — Michael John Bobak

58. “The will of man is his happiness.” — Johann Friedrich Von Schiller

59. “Your ability to discipline yourself to set clear goals, and then to work toward them everyday, will do more to guarantee your success than any other single factor.” — Brian Tracy

60. “Willpower and desire, when properly combined, make an irresistible pair.” — Napoleon Hill

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61. “Willpower is trying very hard not to do something you want to do very much.” — John Ortberg

62. “If you can win over your mind, you can win over the whole world.” — Sri Sri Ravi Shankar

63. “With but few exceptions, it is always the underdog who wins through sheer willpower.” — Johnny Weissmuller

64. “Always remember you are braver than you believe, stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think.” — Christopher Robin

65. “Willpower is the ability to eat one salted peanut.” — Anonymous

66. “The ability to subordinate an impulse to a value is the essence of the proactive person.” — Stephen Covey

67. “I determined never to stop until I had come to the end and achieved my purpose.” — David Livigstone

68. “Research shows that willpower is more important than IQ. That’s why the point isn’t to become smarter, but to become more self-disciplined.” — Adam Kirk Smith

69. “The mind always fails first, not the body. The secret is to make your mind work for you, not against you.” — Arnold Schwarzenegger

70. “Willpower is essential to the accomplishment of anything worthwhile.” — Brian Tracy

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71. “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.” — T. Harv Eker

72. “Willpower gets you started. Habits get you results.” — Priit Kallas

73. “Men are not prisoners of fate, but only prisoners of their own minds.” — Franklin D. Roosevelt

74. “You are only as lazy or lacking in willpower as you think you are.” — Ken Christian

75. “A difficult time can be more readily endured if we retain the conviction that our existence holds a purpose – a cause to pursue, a person to love, a goal to achieve.” — John Maxwell

76. “To assert your willpower is simply to make up your mind that you want something, and then refuse to be put off.” — Phillip Cooper

77. “In the end what separates a man from a slave? Money? Power? No, a man chooses, and a slave obeys!” — Andrew Ryan

78. “In the absence of willpower the most complete collection of virtues and talents is wholly worthless.” — Aleister Crowley

79. “Confidence is a habit that can be developed by acting as if you already had the confidence you desire to have.” — Brian Tracy

80. “Willpower is the key to success. Successful people strive no matter what they feel by applying their will to overcome apathy, doubt or fear.” — Dan Millman

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81. “Never go backward. Attempt, and do it with all your might. Determination is power.” — Charles Simmons

82. “The best way to think of willpower is not as some shapeless behavioral trait but as a sort of psychic muscle, one that can atrophy or grow stronger depending on how it’s used.” — Jeffrey Kluger

83. “Determination gets you a long way.” — Chelsea Clinton

84. “Most of life’s actions are within our reach, but decisions take willpower.” — Robert McKee

85. “The path to success is to take massive, determined action.” — Tony Robbins

86. “Enclose your heart in times of need with the steel of your determination and your strength. In doing this, all things will be bearable.” — Lora Leigh

87. “If you want something you’ve never had, you must be willing to do something you’ve never done.” — Thomas Jefferson

88. “Nothing can stop the man with the right mental attitude from achieving his goal; nothing on earth can help the man with the wrong mental attitude.” — Thomas Jefferson

89. “Are you desperate or determined? With desperation comes frustration. With determination comes purpose, achievement, and peace.” — James A. Murphy

90. “Continuous, unflagging effort, persistence and determination will win. Let not the man be discouraged who has these.” — James Whitcomb Riley

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91. “If you don’t go after what you want, you’ll never have it. If you don’t ask, the answer is always no. If you don’t step forward, you’re always in the same place.” — Nora Roberts

92. “People are like stained-glass windows. They sparkle and shine when the sun is out, but when the darkness sets in their true beauty is revealed only if there is light from within.” — Elisabeth Kübler-Ross

93. “Let us not be content to wait and see what will happen, but give us the determination to make the right things happen.” — Horace Mann

94. “Our greatest weakness lies in giving up. The most certain way to succeed is always to try just one more time.” — Thomas Edison

95. “Nothing is impossible in this world. Firm determination, it is said, can move heaven and earth. Things appear far beyond one’s power, because one cannot set his heart on any arduous project due to want of strong will.” — Yamamoto Tsunetomo

96. “Successful people have fear, successful people have doubts, and successful people have worries. They just don’t let these feelings stop them.” — T. Harv Eker

97. “Will power is to the mind like a strong blind man who carries on his shoulders a lame man who can see.” — Arthur Schopenhauer

98. “You don’t find willpower, you create it.” — Anonymous

99. “Concentration can be cultivated. One can learn to exercise will power, discipline one’s body and train one’s mind.” — Anil Ambani

100. “Willpower is trying very hard not to do something you want to do very much.” — John Ortberg

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101. “Changing a habit requires determination, perseverance and a strong will power.” — Catherine Pulsifer

102. “Nothing can stop the man with the right mental attitude from achieving his goal; nothing on earth can help the man with the wrong mental attitude.” — Thomas Jefferson

103. “Each and every one of you has the power, the will and the capacity to make a difference in the world in which you live in.” — Harry Belafonte

104. “To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment.” — Ralph Waldo Emerson

105. “Take a chance! All life is a chance. The man who goes farthest is generally the one who is willing to do and dare.” — Dale Carnegie

106. “I count him braver who overcomes his desires than him who overcomes his enemies, for the hardest victory is victory over self.” — Aristotle

107. “A determined person will do more with a pen and paper, than a lazy person will accomplish with a personal computer.” — Catherine Pulsifer

108. “It’s not that some people have the willpower and some don’t. It’s that some people are ready to change and others are not.” — James Gordon

109. “The will to persevere is often the difference between failure and success.” — David Sarnoff

110. “One important key to success is self-confidence. An important key to self-confidence is preparation.” — Arthur Ashe

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111. “When you’re different, sometimes you don’t see the millions of people who accept you for what you are. All you notice is the person who doesn’t.” — Jodi Picoult

112. “It’s not about perfect. It’s about effort. And when you bring that effort every single day, that’s where transformation happens. That’s how change occurs.” — Jillian Michaels

113. “When someone tells me ‘no,’ it doesn’t mean I can’t do it, it simply means I can’t do it with them.” — Karen E. Quinones Miller

114. “Most of life’s actions are within our reach, but decisions take willpower.” — Robert Mckee

115. “Therefore, it’s up to you to use self-control and willpower to guide your consciousness to think the thoughts you want.” — Alex Altman

116. “Trust yourself. Create the kind of self that you will be happy to live with all your life. Make the most of yourself by fanning the tiny, inner sparks of possibility into flames of achievement.” — Golda Meir

117. “We all have the power of thought – so what are you lacking? If you have willpower, then you can change anything.” — Dalai Lama

118. “I don’t focus on what I’m up against. I focus on my goals and I try to ignore the rest.” — Venus Williams

119. “Pride is holding your head up when everyone around you has theirs bowed. Courage is what makes you do it.” — Bryce Courtenay

120. “Willpower, strength and determination, it will take you places.” — Julianna Pena

121. “Construct your determination with Sustained Effort, Controlled Attention, and Concentrated Energy. Opportunities never come to those who wait… they are captured by those who dare to attack.” — Paul J. Meyer

Final Thoughts

I hope you enjoyed these quotes on determination and willpower; they will undoubtedly help you put one foot in front of the other and motivate you to pursue your goals.

Don’t forget to share these quotes with your friends to inspire them as well. Also, if you have any favorite quotes that I missed, please share them in the comments below, and I’ll add them to the list.

Keep dreaming and destined for greatness, and you will achieve your goals.

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