Adapt & Advance Quotes
The strongest do not survive change; the most adaptable do. The man who adjusts his sails keeps advancing while everyone else fights the wind. This Resilience path holds history's wisest quotes on adapting without losing direction. Scroll through and put them to work.
Choose a Pillar of Greatness
Pick a Type of Insight
“Change may not always bring growth, but there is no growth without change.”
“Don't live the same year 75 times and call it a life.”
“It is never too late to be wise.”
“Most people die when they're 25 but aren't buried until they're 75.”
“I like a state of continual becoming, with a goal in front and not behind.”
“The greatest thing about tomorrow is, I will be better than I am today. There is no such thing as a setback. The lessons I learn today I will apply tomorrow, and I will be better.”
“The cure for boredom is curiosity. There is no cure for curiosity.”
“It's not that we need new ideas, but we need to stop having old ideas.”
“The most dangerous poison is the feeling of achievement. The antidote is to every evening think what can be done better tomorrow.”
“The world is full of people who have never, since childhood, met an open doorway with an open mind.”
“Learning is not a spectator sport.”
“Learn. Ceaselessly. Learn to code, to write persuasively, to understand new technologies, to bring out the best in your team, to find underused resources and to spot patterns.”
“The greatest thing in this world is not so much where we stand as in what direction we are moving.”
“The ability to learn is not fixed. It can change with your effort.”
“There is no better personal development tool than running your own business.”
“I'm hungry for knowledge. The whole thing is to learn every day, to get brighter and brighter. That's what this world is about.”
“The biggest room in the world is the room for improvement.”
“No matter who you are, no matter what you did, no matter where you've come from, you can always change, become a better version of yourself.”
“In order to have you must do, and in order to do you must be.”
“A full belly is little worth where the mind is starved.”
“If you're not embarrassed by last week's work, you're not learning fast enough.”
“As a CEO, I am finding that I have to become a learning CEO. I have to go to school all the time because I am learning new skills that I need to run this company. I have to constantly renew my skills.”
“You renew yourself every day. Sometimes you're successful, sometimes you're not, but it's the average that counts.”
“In any given moment we have two options: to step forward into growth or to step back into safety.”
“Excellent firms don't believe in excellence - only in constant improvement and constant change.”
“Change is hard at first, messy in the middle and gorgeous at the end.”
“When it is obvious that the goals cannot be reached, don't adjust the goals, adjust the action steps.”
“Anyone who stops learning is old, whether at twenty or eighty. Anyone who keeps learning stays young. The greatest thing in life is to keep your mind young.”
“In a time of drastic change it is the learners who inherit the future. The learned usually find themselves equipped to live in a world that no longer exists.”
“Empty your mind, be formless, shapeless, like water. You put water into a cup, it becomes the cup. Water can flow or it can crash. Be water, my friend.”
“If you want to fly, you have to give up the things that weigh you down.”
“Adapt what is useful, reject what is useless, and add what is specifically your own.”
“The pessimist complains about the wind; the optimist expects it to change; the realist adjusts the sails.”
“The art of progress is to preserve order amid change and to preserve change amid order.”
“To the man who only has a hammer, everything he encounters begins to look like a nail.”
“Everything is affected by and is part of everything else, changing constantly from one state to another. The rain becomes the river; the river surrenders to the sea and the cycle begins over again. Nothing is ever lost. The melody changes - the dance goes on.”
“Part of being a winner is knowing when enough is enough. Sometimes you have to give up the fight and walk away”
“Retreat does not come quickly to the brightest people, yet strategic retreat, sacrifice, and deciding what to give up are at the core of success”
“The more you adapt, the more interesting you are.”
“We cannot direct the wind, but we can adjust the sails.”
“When the winds of change blow, some people build walls and others build windmills.”
“Blessed are the hearts that can bend; they shall never be broken.”
“Resilience is the ability to attack while running away.”
“All fixed set patterns are incapable of adaptability or pliability. The truth is outside of all fixed patterns.”
“Be like water making its way through cracks. Do not be assertive, but adjust to the object, and you shall find a way round or through it. If nothing within you stays rigid, outward things will disclose themselves.”
“You must welcome change as the rule but not as your ruler.”
“A wise man adapts himself to circumstances, as water shapes itself to the vessel that contains it.”
“You can't stop the waves, but you can learn to surf.”
“When we are no longer able to change a situation, we are challenged to change ourselves.”
“You will never change your life until you change something you do daily.”
