61 Persistence Quotes To Inspire

In the pursuit of our goals, persistence often serves as the invisible force that propels us forward, even when the path seems steep and riddled with obstacles. It's the unwavering commitment to keep pushing, to rise after each fall, and to maintain hope in the face of adversity. To celebrate this invaluable virtue, we've curated a collection of the top 61 persistence quotes that are sure to inspire and motivate you. Whether you’re striving for personal growth, professional success, or simply trying to get through a tough day, these quotes will remind you why persistence is key to achieving your dreams. Dive in and let these words of wisdom ignite the perseverance within you.

1. “You must keep sending work out; you must never let a manuscript do nothing but eat its head off in a drawer. You send that work out again and again, while you're working on another one. If you have talent, you will receive some measure of success - but only if you persist.” - Isaac Asimov

2. “Knowing trees, I understand the meaning of patience. Knowing grass, I can appreciate persistence.” - Hal Borland

3. “Nothing in this world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful men with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not; the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent. The slogan 'Press On!' has solved and always will solve the problems of the human race.” - Calvin Coolidge

4. “Courage is the most important of all the virtues because without courage, you can't practice any other virtue consistently.” - Maya Angelou

5. “Whether you like it or not, you are committed to the human endeavor. I cannot ally myself with such a purely negative goal as avoidance of suffering. Suffering is a chance you take by the fact of being alive.” - William S. Burroughs

6. “It is better to take many small steps in the right direction than to make a great leap forward only to stumble backward.” - Louis Sachar

7. “We are made to persist.that's how we find out who we are.” - Tobias Wolff

8. “Everything passes, but nothing entirely goes away.” - Jenny Diski

9. “Did you hear about the rose that grew from a crack in the concrete? Proving nature's laws wrong, it learned to walk without having feet. Funny, it seems to by keeping it's dreams; it learned to breathe fresh air. Long live the rose that grew from concrete when no one else even cared.” - Tupac Shakur

10. “The difference between perseverance and obstinacy is, that one often comes from a strong will, and the other from a strong won't.” - Henry Ward Beecher

11. “Persistence is the key to solving most mysteries.” - Christopher Pike

12. “A mans life is interesting primarily when he has failed. I well know. For its a sign that he tried to surpass himself.” - Georges Clemenceau

13. “...When you die, the energy that kept you alive filters into the people you loved. Did you know that? It's like a fire you've tended all your life, and the sparks are all scattered into the wind.... That's why we survive as long as we do, because the people who loved us keep us going.” - Kevin Brockmeier

14. “Cat, I'll let you in on a little secret. We don't all love our jobs every day. And doing something you have passion for doesn't make the work part of it any easier...It just makes you less likely to quit.” - Kate Jacobs

15. “O snailClimb Mount FujiBut slowly, slowly!” - Kobayashi Issa

16. “As if the dead really do persist, even in a bottle of wine.” - Thomas Pynchon

17. “Life isn't as magical here, and you're not the only one who feels like you don't belong, or that it's better somewhere else. But there ARE things worth living for. And the best part is you never know what's going to happen next.” - O.R. Melling

18. “No matter how much falls on us, we keep plowing ahead. That's the only way to keep the roads clear.” - Greg Kincaid

19. “In my experience, nothing worthwhile has ever really been all that easy. But it certainly has been worthwhile regardless how difficult it seemed. ” - Robert Fanney

20. “The only things you learn are the things you tame” - Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

21. “I wrote a book. It sucked. I wrote nine more books. They sucked, too. Meanwhile, I read every single thing I could find on publishing and writing, went to conferences, joined professional organizations, hooked up with fellow writers in critique groups, and didn’t give up. Then I wrote one more book.” - Beth Revis

22. “They key of persistence opens all door closed by resistence ” - John Di Lemme

23. “Even the best inborn potentialities for achievement do not render unnecessary patient and persistent practice.” - Ralph Alfred Habas

24. “Persistence contagious.” - Toba Beta

25. “Slight persistent effort can move you successfully forward in anything you do.” - Kelli Wilson

26. “It may take little time to get where you want to be, but if you pause and think for a moment, you will notice that you are no longer where you were. Do not stop—keep going.” - Rodolfo Costa

27. “Unless commitment is made, there are only promises and hopes; but no plans.” - Peter F. Drucker

28. “Let the man who has to make his fortune in life remember this maxim. Attacking is his only secret. Dare, and the world always yields: or, if it beat you sometimes, dare again, and it will succumb.” - William Makepeace Thackeray

29. “I don't believe in failure. I'm perseverant - I believe in failing.” - Bauvard

30. “Fight ever on: this earthly stuff If used God’s way will be enough. Face to the firing line o friendFight out life’s battle to the end. One soldier, when the fight was red,Threw down his broken sword and fled.Another snatched it, won the day, With what his comrade flung away.” - Edwin Markham

31. “The sky is not my limit...I am.” - T.F. Hodge

32. “Persistence. Perfection. Patience. Power. Prioritize your passion. It keeps you sane.” - Criss Jami

33. “The devil's happy when the critics run you off.” - Criss Jami

34. “The rewrites are a struggle right now. Sometimes I wish writing a book could just be easy for me at last. But when I think about it practically, I am glad it's a struggle. I am (as usual) attempting to write a book that's too hard for me. I'm telling a story I'm not smart enough to tell. The risk of failure is huge. But I prefer it this way. I'm forced to learn, forced to smarten myself up, forced to wrestle. And if it works, then I'll have written something that is better than I am.” - Shannon Hale

35. “Change is hardest at the beginning, messiest in the middle and best at the end.” - Robin Sharma

36. “Don't ever give up. Don't ever give in. Don't ever stop trying. Don't ever sell out. And if you find yourself succumbing to one of the above for a brief moment, pick yourself up, brush yourself off, whisper a prayer, and start where you left off.But never, ever, ever give up.” - Richelle E. Goodrich

37. “One bulb at a time. There was no other way to do it. No shortcuts--simply loving the slow process of planting. Loving the work as it unfolded. Loving an achievement that grew slowly and bloomed for only three weeks each year.” - Jaroldeen Asplund Edwards

38. “Patience and persistence are the keys... The keys to unlock doors of success... With these two virtues, you grow in reasoning and experience.” - Ogwo David Emenike

39. “Waiting is a form of passive persistence.” - Ogwo David Emenike

40. “Holding on, holding out and holding fast when the going is tough constitutes a winning mindset.” - Ogwo David Emenike

41. “Do it badly; do it slowly; do it fearfully; do it any way you have to, but do it.” - Steve Chandler

42. “When your only regret is if anyone thinks you regret anything - that is the definition of conviction.” - Criss Jami

43. “To be a highflier and a name to conjure with, you must decide your dimension, plan your path, master the moment, focus on the future, determine your degree, push your persistence and leadyour life.” - Ifeanyi Enoch Onuoha

44. “You never know what's around the corner. It could be everything. Or it could be nothing. You keep putting one foot in front of the other, and then one day you look back and you've climbed a mountain.” - Tom Hiddleston

45. “I will not be defined by the marks left on me by the world, but by the mark I leave on the world (referring to the facial scars he still carries from his successful 1991 battle against cancer, which caused him to be turned down for a customer service job because he was "too ugly").” - James Houston Turner

46. “You can either follow your dreams with determination and persistence until they become true, or you can be blown by the winds of fate - were anything can happen.” - Steven Redhead

47. “Intelligence entails a strong mind, but genius entails a heart of a lion in tune with a strong mind.” - Criss Jami

48. “To shine and outshine the shining stars, to take your abilities to the greatest height, to sit on top of the world, you must fortify yourself with persistence, the determination and willingness to stay in the same direction over a long period of time whatever the cost might be.” - Ogwo David Emenike

49. “Moja putanja spiralnog je oblika i život je postupno odmata. Sudjelujem, svakodnevno gubim ponešto slobode, umaram glasnice, ali uspjet ću već zbog toga što nisam motiviran koristoljubljem.” - Jasna Horvat

50. “Temporary setbacks are overshadowed by persistence.” - Quentin L. Cook

51. “Whatever you do in your life, always go the distance.” - Ken Norton

52. “Patience can be bitter but her fruit is always sweet.” - Habeeb Akande

53. “Persistence is the twin sister of excellence. One is a matter of quality; the other, a matter of time.” - Habeeb Akande

54. “People don't just live one life. They keep coming back until they get it right.” - C R Strahan

55. “Most of Csongor's time in T'Rain had been spent blundering about in a state of hapless newbie confusion. Only his long experience as a system administrator, struggling with Byzantine software installations, had prevented hum from plummeting into despair and simply giving up. Not that any of the sysadmin's knowledge and skills were applicable here. The psychological stance was the thing: the implicit faith, a little naive and a little cocky, that by banging his head against the problem for long enough he'd be able to break through in the end.” - Neal Stephenson

56. “As you think and act, so your world becomes.” - T. Scott McLeod

57. “It's not about what you're capable of, it's about what you are willing to endure.” - Orrin Woodward

58. “While persistence offers no guarantees, it does give 'luck' a chance to operate.” - Tom Shippey

59. “A warm sunny evening, the plash and gurgle of the waves in the rock pools, the rush of the cold gin. I thought for the first time of my novel, abandoned, all these years, and I came up, unprompted, with the perfect title. Octet. Octet by Logan Mountstuart. Perhaps I will surprise them all, yet.” - William Boyd

60. “You must dare, and dare again, and then dare a little bit more, and go on daring.” - Justin Cotillard

61. “Writing is difficult. You do it all alone without encouragement and without any certainty that you'll ever be published or paid or even that you'll be able to finish the particular work you've begun. It isn't easy to persist amid all that. [...] Sometimes when I'm interviewed, the interviewer either compliments me on my 'talent', my 'gift' or asks me how I discovered it. [...] I used to struggle to answer this politely, to explain that I didn't believe much in writing talent. People who want to write either do it or they don't. At last I began to say that my most important talent - or habit - was persistence. Without it, I would have given up writing long before I finished my first novel. It's amazing what we can do if we simply refuse to give up.” - Octavia E. Butler