To call something “timeless” implies that it’s reach and impact has nothing to do with the passing of time.
Below is a list of inspiration quotes from some of history’s most brilliant minds that, in my opinion, fit the definition of being timeless.
1) Whatever the mind of man can conceive and believe, it can achieve.
-Napoleon Hill
2) Success is going from failure to failure without losing your enthusiasm.
-Winston Churchill
3) Start by doing what’s necessary; then do what’s possible; and suddenly you are doing the impossible.
-Francis of Assisi
4) What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us.
-Henry S. Haskins
5) The journey of a thousand miles begins with one step.
-Lao Tzu
6) My mother said to me, “If you are a soldier, you will become a general. If you are a monk, you will become the Pope.” Instead, I was a painter, and became Picasso.
– Pablo Picasso
7) The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched – they must be felt with the heart.
-Helen Keller
8) It is never too late to be what you might have been.
-George Eliot
9) Strive not to be a success, but rather to be of value.
-Albert Einstein
10) Dream big and dare to fail.
-Norman Vaughan
11) In the middle of difficulty lies opportunity.
–Albert Einstein
12) I can’t change the direction of the wind, but I can adjust my sails to always reach my destination.
-Jimmy Dean
13) All our dreams can come true, if we have the courage to pursue them.
-Walt Disney
14) Two roads diverged in a wood, and I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference.
-Robert Frost
15) What you do speaks so loudly that I cannot hear what you say.
-Ralph Waldo Emerson
16) Until you’re ready to look foolish, you’ll never have the possibility of being great.
-Cher
17) Perfection is not attainable, but if we chase perfection we can catch excellence.
-Vince Lombardi
18) The best way to predict the future is to invent it.
-Alan Kay
19) I attribute my success to this: I never gave or took any excuse.
-Florence Nightingale
20) You must be the change you wish to see in the world.
-Gandhi
21) Whether you think you can, or think you can’t, you’re probably right.
-Henry Ford
22) Nothing is impossible, the word itself says ‘I’m possible’!
-Audrey Hepburn
23) Life is 10% what happens to me and 90% how I react to it.
-Charles R. Swindoll
24) You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take.
-Wayne Gretzky
25) Tough times never last, but tough people do.
-Dr. Robert Schuller
26) Many of life’s failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.
-Thomas Edison
27) Memories of our lives, of our works and our deeds will continue in others.
-Rosa Parks
28) If you cannot do great things, do small things in a great way.
-Napoleon Hill
29) I’ve missed more than 9000 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
30) Keep your face to the sunshine and you can never see the shadow.
-Helen Keller
31) Keep away from people who try to belittle your dreams. Small people always do that, but the really great ones make you feel that you, too, can become great.
-Mark Twain
32) Try to be a rainbow in someone’s cloud.
-Maya Angelou
33) If opportunity doesn’t knock, build a door.
-Milton Berle
34) Definiteness of purpose is the starting point of all achievement.
-W. Clement Stone
35) There is only one success: to be able to spend your life in your own way.
-Christopher Morley
36) When people hurt you over and over, think of them like sandpaper. They may scratch and hurt you a bit, but in the end, you end up polished and they end up useless.
-Chris Colfer
37) Put your heart, mind, and soul into even your smallest acts. This is the secret of success.
–Swami Sivananda
38) An obstacle is often a stepping stone.
-William Prescott
39) Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans.
-John Lennon
40) The best way out is always through.
-Robert Frost
41) I am afraid we must make the world honest before we can honestly say to our children that honesty is the best policy.
-George Bernard Shaw
42) We know what we are, but know not what we may be.
–William Shakespeare
43) Failure is the condiment that gives success its flavor.
-Truman Capote
44) Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones you did do, so throw off the bowlines, sail away from safe harbor, catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore, Dream, Discover.
–Mark Twain
45) The power of imagination makes us infinite.
-John Muir
46) There are seven things that will destroy us:
Wealth without work;
Pleasure without conscience;
Knowledge without character;
Religion without sacrifice;
Politics without principle;
Science without humanity;
Business without ethics.
– Gandhi
47) You make a living by what you get; you make a life by what you give.
-Winston Churchill
48) Life is 10% what happens to me and 90% of how I react to it.
-Charles Swindoll
49) Make each day your masterpiece.
-John Wooden
50) In looking for people to hire, you look for three qualities: integrity, intelligence, and energy. And if they don’t have the first, the other two will kill you.
-Warren Buffett
51) There are two primary choices in life: to accept conditions as they exist, or accept the responsibility for changing them.
-Denis Waitley
52) The most common way people give up their power is by thinking they don’t have any.
-Alice Walker
53) The best dreams happen when you’re awake.
-Cherie Gilderbloom
54) When I was 5 years old, my mother always told me that happiness was the key to life. When I went to school, they asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up. I wrote down “happy.” They told me I didn’t understand the assignment, and I told them they didn’t understand life.
-John Lennon
55) Do not let what you cannot do interfere with what you can do.
-John Wooden
56) The mind is everything. What you think you become.
–Buddha
57) Once you choose hope, anything’s possible.
-Christopher Reeve
58) The simple act of paying attention can take you a long way.
-Keanu Reeves
59) A journey of a thousand leagues begins beneath one’s feet.
-Lao Tzu
60) An unexamined life is not worth living.
-Socrates