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DO ONE THING and BetterWorld Kids Clubs are projects of The EMILY Fund (The Emily Silverstein Fund, Inc.)

ACTION QUOTES

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* If you don't like something, change it.
If you can't change it, change your attitude.
-- Maya Angelou

* If you don't like something, change it.
If you can't change it, change your attitude.
-- Maya Angelou

* There is never time in the future in which we will work out our salvation. The challenge is in the moment; the time is always now.
-- James A. Baldwin

I'm tired of dreaming. I'm into doing at the moment. It's, like, let's only have goals that we can go after.
-- Bono

* The world is more malleable than you think and it's waiting for you to hammer it into shape.
-- Bono

* There is no time left for anything but to make peace work a dimension of our every waking activity.
-- Elise Boulding

I have discovered the secret of happy- it is work, either with the hands or the head. The moment I have something to do, the draughts are open and my chimney draws, and I am happy.~ John Burroughs

* "For anything worth having one must pay the price; and the price is always work, patience, love, self-sacrifice"
~ John Burroughs

* Do what you can to show you care about other people, and you will make our world a better place.
-- Rosalynn Carter

* There is clearly much left to be done, and whatever else we are going to do, we had better get on with it.
-- Rosalynn Carter

* "There are no magic answers, no miraculous methods to overcome the problems we face, just the familiar ones: honest search for understanding, education, organization, action ... and the kind of commitment that will persist despite the temptations of disillusionment, despite many failures and only limited successes, inspired by the hope of a brighter future."
-- Noam Chomsky

"There are no magic answers, no miraculous methods to overcome the problems we face, just the familiar ones: honest search for understanding, education, organization, action that raises the cost of state violence for its perpetrators or that lays the basis for institutional change -- and the kind of commitment that will persist despite the temptations of disillusionment, despite many failures and only limited successes, inspired by the hope of a brighter future."
-- Noam Chomsky

* "...what’s the worst thing that could happen if you fail? Think big, and go for it! Some days will be challenging and frustrating, but if you are doing what you want, they will never be boring. What more can we ask for?"
-- Ami Dar

* "Imagine, Connect, Act."
-- Ami Dar

* The self is not something ready-made, but something in continuous formation through choice of action.
-- John Dewey

* Our planet's alarm is going off, and it is time to wake up and take action!
~ Leonardo DiCaprio

* Follow effective action with quiet reflection. From the quiet reflection will come even more effective action.
-- Peter F. Drucker

* “Now is the accepted time, not tomorrow, not some more convenient season. It is today that our best work can be done and not some future day or future year. It is today that we fit ourselves for the greater usefulness of tomorrow. Today is the seed time, now are the hours of work, and tomorrow comes the harvest and the playtime.”
-- W. E. B. DuBois

* You're not obligated to win. You're obligated to keep trying to do the best you can every day.
-- Marian Wright Edelman

Don't waste life in doubts and fears; spend yourself on the work before you, well assured that the right performance of this hour's duties will be the best preparation for the hours and ages that will follow it.
~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

* When you do a thing, do it with all your might. Put your whole soul into it. Stamp it with your own personality. Nothing great was ever achieved without enthusiasm. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

* You cannot do a kindness too soon because you never know how soon it will be too late. -- Ralph Waldo Emerson

* Start by doing what's necessary; then do what's possible; and suddenly you are doing the impossible.
-- Saint Francis of Assisi

* "Every life needs a purpose to which it can give the energies of its mind and the enthusiasm of its heart. Start by doing what's necessary; then do what's possible and suddenly you are doing the impossible."
-- Saint Francis of Assisi

* Never leave that till tomorrow
which you can do today.
-- Benjamin Franklin

* Well done is better than well said.
-- Benjamin Franklin

* Action expresses priorities.
-- Mohandas K. Gandhi

* “Almost everything you do will seem insignificant, but it is important that you do it”
-- Mohandas K. Gandhi

* "Average people and the average community can change the world. You can do it just based on common sense, determination, persistence and patience."
~ Lois Gibbs

* "...ordinary people are capable of doing truly extraordinary things.
~ Richard Goldman

* Every individual matters. Every individual has a role to play. Every individual makes a difference.
~ Jane Goodall

* Working for peace in the future is to work for peace in the present moment.
-- Thich Nhat Hanh

* Don't wait for anyone to deputize you or authorize you or empower you. You have to just start out with yourself...and put one foot in front of the other.
-- Hazel Henderson

* "Never put off until tomorrow what you can do today.
~ Thomas Jefferson

* Determine never to be idle. No person will have occasion to complain of the want of time who never loses any. It is wonderful how much may be done if we are always doing. ~ Thomas Jefferson

* Do you want to know who you are? Don't ask. Act! Action will delineate and define you. ~ Thomas Jefferson

* It is wonderful how much may be done if we are always doing. ~ Thomas Jefferson

* Come, then, let us go forward together with our united strength - and win a better future for generations to come.
-- Van Jones

* Good words do not last long unless they amount to something.
-- Chief Joseph (1732-1794)

* “When we do the best that we can, we never know what miracle is wrought in our life, or in the life of another.”
-- Helen Keller

* I long to accomplish a great and noble task, but it is my chief duty to accomplish humble tasks as though they were great and noble. The world is moved along, not only by the mighty shoves of its heroes, but also by the aggregate of the tiny pushes of each honest worker.
-- Helen Keller

* There are risks and costs to a program of action. But they are far less than the long-range risks and costs of comfortable inaction.
-- John F. Kennedy

* If you want to get peace, you can get it as soon as you like if we all pull together. ... Think peace, live peace, and breathe peace and you'll get it as soon as you like. -- John Lennon

If you want to get peace, you can get it as soon as you like if we all pull together. You're all geniuses and you're all beautiful. You don't need anybody to tell you who you are or what you are. You are what you are. Get out there and get peace. Think peace, live peace, and breathe peace and you'll get it as soon as you like. -- John Lennon

* You cannot escape the responsibility of tomorrow by evading it today.
-- Abraham Lincoln

“I do the very best I know how, the very best I can, and I mean to keep on doing so until the end”
-- Abraham Lincoln

* "If we want to reap the harvest of peace and justice in the future, we will have to sow seeds of nonviolence, here and now, in the present."
-- Mairead Corrigan Maguire

* “Use every letter you write, every conversation you have, every meeting you attend, to express your fundamental beliefs and dreams. Affirm to others the vision of the world you want. You are a free, immensely powerful source of life and goodness. Affirm it. Spread it. Radiate it. Think day and night about it and you will see a miracle happen: the greatness of your own life.”
-- Robert Muller

"Dread and procrastination are great time stealers.
Don't be a foot dragger.
Some things just need to be done. Just do it!"
-- Lynne Namka (AngriesOut.com)

"Dread and procrastination
are great time stealers.
Don't be a foot dragger.
Some things just need to be done.
Just do it!"
-- Lynne Namka (AngriesOut.com)

* This is the moment when we must come together to save this planet.
-- Barack Obama

* It took a lot of blood, sweat and tears to get to where we are today, but we have just begun. Today we begin in earnest the work of making sure that the world we leave our children is just a little bit better than the one we inhabit today.
-- Barack Obama

* Change will not come if we wait for some other person or some other time. We are the ones we've been waiting for. We are the change that we seek.
-- Barack Obama

* If you don't like the road you're walking, start paving another one.
-- Dolly Parton

It's always too early to quit. -- Norman Vincent Peale

* One thing is sure. We have to do something. We have to do the best we know how at the moment... If it doesn't turn out right, we can modify it as we go along.
-- Franklin D. Roosevelt

Get action. Seize the moment. Man was never intended to become an oyster.
-- Theodore Roosevelt

* Great thoughts speak only to the thoughtful mind, but great actions speak to all mankind.
-- Theodore Roosevelt

* Do what you can, with what you have, where you are.
-- Theodore Roosevelt

* I do not pretend to start with precise questions. I do not think you can start with anything precise. You have to achieve such precision as you can, as you go along.
-- Bertrand Russell
* Every person is the right person to act. Every moment is the right moment to begin.
-- Jonathan Schell

* Every moment has led to this moment. Now is the time. We are the ones we've been waiting for. Together we can create a better world.
-- Robert Alan Silverstein

* We can help create that better world countless Dreamers have imagined, wished for, and endeavored to make come true. Every moment has brought us to this moment. We are the ones we've been waiting for to manifest our shared Peacetopian Dream...
-- Robert Alan Silverstein

"Human history has been recorded as a succession of wars and changing empires. But a ray of hope has been carried forth throughout the ages by dreamers who have envisioned a more peaceful, just and sustainable world. The Magna Carta, the US Constitution and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights were quantum leaps forward in our collective quest for a better world. We still have far to go, but we can help create that better world countless dreamers have imagined, wished for and endeavored to make come true. Every moment has brought us to this moment. We are the ones we've been waiting for to manifest our shared peacetopian dream."
-- Robert Alan Silverstein

* Each of us has the ability to act powerfully for change; together we can restore that ancient and sustaining harmony.
-- David Suzuki

* If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where they should be. Now put the foundations under them.
-- Henry David Thoreau

* Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things 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

"There are two primary choices in life: to accept conditions as they exist,
or accept the responsibility for changing them."
-- Denis Waitley

* A life lived of choice is a life of conscious action. A life lived of chance is a life of unconscious creation.
~ Neale Donald Walsch

* I believe that any man's life will be filled with constant and unexpected encouragement, if he makes up his mind to do his level best each day, and as nearly as possible reaching the high water mark of pure and useful living.
-- Booker T. Washington
* Infuse your life with action. Don't wait for it to happen. Make it happen. Make your own future. Make your own hope.
-- Bradley Whitford

* Doing the best at this moment
puts you in the best place for the next moment.

-- Oprah Winfrey

* Doing the best at this moment
puts you in the best place for the next moment.

-- Oprah Winfrey

* The beginning is always today.
-- Mary Wollstonecraft

* I avoid grandiose plans. I start with a small piece that I can do. I go to the root of the problem and then work around it. It's building brick by brick.
-- Muhammad Yunus

* If you join a fight for social justice you may win or lose, but just by being part of the struggle, you win, and your life will be better for it.
-- Howard Zinn

 
Kids | Youth | Adults | Calendar | Quotes | Heroes | Stories | The EMILY Fund | Scholarships
DO ONE THING and BetterWorld Kids Clubs are projects of The EMILY Fund (The Emily Silverstein Fund, Inc.)
Hero portraits are included for illustration purposes only - no celebrity endorsement implied

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