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I run on the road, long before I dance under the lights.
Muhammad Ali
1942-, American Boxer

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We often look at stars, and all we see is their stardom. We consider them to have just arrived at that stardom overnight. What we don't see is the many hours of sacrifice, hard work, sweat, and tears that has gone in to getting them to the "star" status.
Muhammad Ali put it well. He had to put in the work, behind the scenes when no one was watching. That work enabled him to show case his talent in front of the world. Without that work behind the scenes he would have never become the great boxer that he was.
We can take a lot from that lesson and apply it to our lives. Many of us have goals. We must do the "dirty work" that it takes to achieve those goals. Even when no one is around to cheer us on, motivate us, or even help. We must be those things to ourselves.

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I do not have superior intelligence or faultless looks. I do not captivate a room or run a mile under six minutes. I only succeeded because I was still working after everyone else went to sleep.
Greg Evans

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Most of were not born with outright talent. We had to work for everything we wanted. Often, that is the difference between failure and success. Who is willing to not only go the mile, but continue on until they do not have to continue anymore. We have to be willing to do what others won't do. That applies in business, and in relationships. We have to rely on our steadfastness, and perserverance. We have to want to outwork others.

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I do not have superior intelligence or faultless looks. I do not captivate a room or run a mile under six minutes. I only succeeded because I was still working after everyone else went to sleep.

Greg Evans
Suspense Novelist

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Success often depends on persistence, and dedication to the task at hand. Success often depends on a person's willingness to do what others won't do. You have to work with what you are given. We are not all gifted with physical beauty or rare talent. We must rely on our desire to success, coupled with endurance to outlast the next person. You can achieve your goal.

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The secret of success is this: there is no secret of success.

Elbert Hubbard
1859-1915, American Author, Publisher

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There is no template for success. The road is different for each individual. The things that need to be maintained on the way are your integrity, honesty, and love for others. Success is not just measured in money, or material things. It can be measured in friendships, and relationships made on your way to where you are going.

Enjoy the journey.

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Young person, to achieve, must first get out of his mind any notion either of the ease or rapidity of success. Nothing ever just happens in this world.

Edward William Bok
1863-1930, Dutch-born American Editor

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This is good lesson to learn ourselves, and to teach the young people in our lives. It took me a long time to realize that success is not an overnight adventure, but instead it is a marathon full of rainy miles. The road to success goes up hill a lot of the way, with many traps, and many opportunies to take short goes. There a lot of crossroads, and lots of opportunities to turn and go back.

Success is not just the end, but the way in which we go about the journey. We may achieve what we believe to be success, but did we do it with integrity, character, and love. Think about it.

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Things turn out best for those who make the best of the way things turn out.

Jack Buck

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Life is not a perfect journey. There are peaks, and there are valleys. There are triumphs and there are failures. Everyone who consistently attempts to succeed will experience failures. Those who attempt nothing have already failed.

When your life comes to its end, and you look back it you will find that your successes were often achieved out of less than ideal circumstances. You will see that success could have easily been failure if you had given up; if you had stopped where others said you should stop.

When you find that things do not turn out the way you envisioned them, make the best of it. Then you will find your stength to turn things around. Then you will see some success.

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Many of life's failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up

Thomas Alva Edison

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The difference between achieving our goals, or not is often in direct relation to our endurance in chasing that dream. We often set a timetable that we believe our goal should be reached. That is a good thing to do. The problem is that we often miscalculate how long it will take, and labor intensity needed. When you decide to set aside a dream or goal make sure that you have exhausted all avenues to achieve it. Then in looking back you will know that you gave it your all.

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The elevator to success is out of order. You'll have to use the stairs... one step at a time.

Joe Girard
American Sales Trainer, Author, Lecturer

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The essence of this quote is one that took me a while to grasp. I always thought my goals, and dreams would and should come to me automatically and with very little effort. I thought "the elevator" was my transport.

I have finally come to realize that for most of us there is no elevator waiting to take us to the success we desire. Instead there are "stair" steps waiting to move us up one step at a time by sweat equity, tears, perserverence, and good old fashion hard work.

So I encourage all of you to realize that fact. Your dreams and goals are not likely to be come by the space of a night. If they do then it is quite possible that your dreams and goals are not set very high. Tend to your path everyday, step by step, and watch progress be made. When knocked down, get back up and take another step forward. In time you will see the possibility of your dreams and goals draw closer and closer.

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The greatest glory in living lies not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall.

Nelson Mandela

South African Statesman - b 1918 - Nobel Prize Winner 1993

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Everyday life presents so many opportunities to fail or succeed. Each of us has fallen prey to both. The one, success, is desired. The other, falling (failure), is not desired. Falling is not always as bad as it may seem. We learn many valuable lessons in falling. The least of which is not the lesson that we need to rise.

Falling is not always bad. But staying down is. If you have fallen, make it a point to rise again. Those successful people that you admire are not people that have not fallen. They are people that have risen after the fall; often over and over and over again. I have heard it said that failure leads to success.

Don't feel bad everytime you fall. But just know that you must rise, dust yourself off, and continue down the road. There will you find success.

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I've missed over 9,000 shots in my career. I've lost almost 300 games. 26 times I've been trusted to take the game-winning shot . . . and missed. I've failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed.

Michael Jordan

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The sad thing about success is that most people only send the end result; success. They do not see all the sweat and tears that got a person to the desired result. Michael Jordan was not born with a basketball in his hands. He developed an extraordinary will to succeed. That will propelled him to do the extra work necessary to achieve what his mind showed him could be his. When many of us were sleep, or watching T.V Mike was working on his game.

I like what he said about his failures. It is not as if he succeeded from day one. He has had his share of failures. But he pushed through them. He got up, dusted his self off, and kept going. He worked harder, and harder. Then people started to notice him. They noticed his success. They noticed what the countless hours in the gym got him. Made jump shots, slam dunks, defensive stops were only the results of silent days and nights in the gym with no one else around. What he did in private revealed itself in public. We did not see the private times though. You want success? There will be a lot of private times before the public ever cheers. Ask Mike. He'll tell you.

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A man cannot be said to succeed in this life who does not satisfy one friend.

Henry David Thoreau