Jon Acuff Quotes

“Fear comes free. Faith takes work.”

“If you’re going to risk and maybe fail, fail at something that matters. Fail gloriously so that even in failure, lives change.”

“If you can worry, you can wonder. If you can doubt, you can dominate. If you can spin, you can soar.”

“One of the greatest mistakes you can make in life is assuming all your thoughts are true.”

“You don’t ask the bottomless, ’What do I want to do with my life?’ but instead, ’What have I done in my life that I loved doing?’”

“Wild talent and a bad attitude eventually lose to mild talent and a good attitude.”

“You have the perfect amount of time each day for the things that matter most. The key is spending time on those things.”

“An accountability partner you only contact when you are winning isn’t an accountability partner, it’s a cheerleader.”

“The starting line is the only line you completely control.”

“90 percent perfect and shared with the world always changes more lives than 100 percent perfect and stuck in your head.”

“Goals you refuse to chase don’t disappear — they become ghosts that haunt you.”

“No one pursuing a life of average was ever made fun of by other average people. But if you decide to travel the road to awesome, you will be.”

“If you pursue the right goal in the wrong way, you still end up in the wrong place.”

“Your willingness to discipline one part of your life creates freedom in another.”

“Data kills denial, which prevents disaster.”

“Want to give your dream the best shot of success? Learn how to be successful at work.”

“Fear is not a dragon to be slain once, it’s an ocean to be swum daily.”

“A friend is someone you share your day with. An advocate is someone you shape your career with.”

“Sometimes, people who hate on your dream aren’t really mad about your dream. They’re mad because you’re making them jealous.”

“Age is no longer the primary factor that determines where you are on the map. Life is now less about how old you are and more about when you decide to live.”

“Intentions are ambitious liars.”

“A dream you don’t have to fight for isn’t a dream — it’s a nap. One changes your afternoon. The other changes your world. Keep fighting.”

“The antidote to overthinking isn’t more thinking — the antidote is action.”

“Regretting that you didn’t start earlier is a great distraction from moving on your dream today, and the reality is that today is earlier than tomorrow.”

“Generosity is always cheaper than greed.”

“If you ask fear if something is going to work, the answer will always be no.”

“Next time you feel unqualified to be used by God remember this, he tends to recruit from the pit, not the pedestal.”

“Be brave enough to be bad at something new.”

“The distance between comfortable and comatose is surprisingly short.”

“Burn your dream bright. Pursue it with the best of who you are. But don’t confuse hustle with burnout. Hustle fills you up. Burnout empties you.”

“Starting is fun, but the future belongs to finishers.”

“People are mistaken when they think chasing your dream is a selfish thing to do. As if perhaps being average is an act of humility.”

“Scars you refuse to hide can become lighthouses that warn other people who are headed to the same rocks you crashed on.”

“Choose your attitude every day until eventually it chooses you right back.”

“I’ve never met a thirteen-year-old who said ’My dad was never around because he was always working, but I have a sweet mountain bike so it was all worth it.’”

“You might be too bored to work on your dream, but just don’t buy into the lie that you are too busy.”

“People who can’t be questioned often end up doing questionable things.”

“You can start a thousand businesses, launch 100 projects, and take dozens of companies public, but you only have one shot at being part of your kid's childhood. Your kid doesn't care about your platform, they care about your presence.”

“I’m not a fan of ’finding your purpose.’ I’m a fan of ’living with purpose.’”

“Developing tolerance for imperfection is the key factor in turning chronic starters into consistent finishers.”

“I don’t want you to wake up at sixty-five and realize, ’I spent forty of my best years doing something that just funded my life.’”

“When you keep your day job, all opportunities become surplus propositions rather than deficit remedies.”

“Don’t climb a single rung up the entitlement ladder. Demanding something you haven’t truly earned is a great way to get stuck.”

“Life is dreamed in big leaps and revealed in small steps.”

“Not because of my words — those are cheap and untrustworthy. But because of my actions, which are expensive and trustworthy.”

“All you have to do is win more today than you did yesterday and repeat the whole thing tomorrow.”

“If you want help for your dream, start by helping someone else with their dream.”

“Don’t compare your beginning to someone else’s middle.”

“Instead of chasing ’enough,’ you have to define it. If you chase it, you’ll never catch it.”

“Instead of saying, ’I don’t have what it takes,’ say, ’I have what it takes to try.’”

“Hustle is doing the things you don’t enjoy sometimes to earn the right to do the things you love.”

“Unfortunately, perfectionism dies slowly. It’s persistent and particularly dangerous because it masquerades as excellence.”

“Hustle tries. Then it fails. Then it tries again, because of grit, which is simply being brave when you don’t feel like being brave.”

“The only way to accomplish a new goal is to feed it your most valuable resource: time.”

“Advocates and mentors know all the cheat codes. Here’s the crazy part: If you’ll listen, they will give them to you.”

“Average is so popular because average is familiar.”

“Misery loves company, but company often multiplies your misery.”

“Overthinking is when what you think gets in the way of what you want.”

“If we want our jobs to change, we have to change first.”

“You are never more creative for new ideas than when you are almost done with an old one. ’What’s next’ will always look more interesting than ’what’s now.’”

“Always play to the size of your heart, not to the size of your audience.”

“Quitting a job doesn’t jump-start a dream because dreams take planning, purpose, and progress to succeed. That stuff has to happen before you quit.”

“Passion is often found in the crucible of work.”