John C. Maxwell Quotations | Page 4

Seek advice, but make sure it's from someone who has successfully handled mistakes or adversities.

The more seriously you take your growth, the more seriously your people will take you.

We often wait for the resources before we make a move.

If you focus on goals, you may hit goals - but that doesn't guarantee growth. If you focus on growth, you will grow and always hit goals.

When we trust God, He can make the ordinary extraordinary!

Attitude: It is our best friend or our worst enemy.

The only thing we can control is what we do in the present. The more we replay yesterday, the further we get from today's opportunities. And the further away we move from opportunities, the tougher the road is to get back. Opportunities never look as good coming as they do going, and they wait for no one. We need to be highly attentive to spot them. And we must be focused on our present capabilities, not past regrets.

I started out in the ministry, went to college, started as a pastor, pastored for basically 25 years. That was a good time, I really enjoyed it.

We are either the masters or victims of our attitudes. It is a matter of personal choice. Who we are today is the result of choices we made yesterday. Tomorrow, we will become what we choose today. To change means to choose change.

Integrity is not a given factor in everyone's life. It is a result of self-discipline, inner trust, and a decision to be relentlessly honest in all situations in our lives.

I felt the hand and the call of God in my life that I would be doing ministry and trying to serve Him the best that I could.

The higher you want to climb, the more you need leadership. The greater the impact you want to make, the greater your influence needs to be. Whatever you will accomplish is restricted by your ability to lead others.

The true measure of your character is what you would do if you were sure no one would ever find out.

The more credible you are, the more confidence people place in you, thereby allowing you the privilege of influencing their lives.

Successful and unsuccessful people do not vary greatly in their abilities. They vary in their desires to reach their potential.

Anyone can steer a ship, but it takes a leader to chart the course

If you don’t change the direction you are going, then you’re likely to end up where you’re heading…

I really didn't settle stuff spiritually until I was 17 years of age. But through my teenage years I just knew that someday I had to settle accounts and get things straightened up and move in that direction.

You are only an attitude away from success!

Everyone has the power to impact the outcome of his life. The way to do it is to focus on today. . . It is too late for yesterday. And you can't depend on tomorrow.

A leader who produces other leaders multiples their influences.

When the pastor and his or her church have a vision, they will put their energy, time, money, and personnel into achieving it.

Fail early, fail often, but always fail forward.

Not realizing what you want is a problem of knowledge. Not pursuing what you want is a problem of motivation. Not achieving what you want is a problem of persistence.

The best gift you can ever give your mentor is to grow. They feed off your growth. I believe that everyone has the seed of success inside, but too many people can't find it in themselves and as a result do not reach their potential. But there are those whose purpose in life is to fertilize the seed of potential in another, who are rewarded by seeing that person grow and blossom before their eyes. Raising up others to a higher level is a mentor's joy and sustenance.

Without a vision our community will perish without Christ, but without a vision the church will perish as well.

Relational skills are the most important abilities in leadership.

Life doesn't do anything to you. It only reveals your spirit.

The best way to serve the individuals on the team is to see that the whole team wins.

Generally speaking, there are two kinds of learning: experience, which is gained from your own mistakes, and wisdom, which is learned from the mistakes of others.

In my leadership conferences, pastors ask, "Do you have a vision for my church?" Many times they want me to give them a picture of where they should go and what their church should look like. When these pastors do this, I always feel bad.

Your attitude is like the minds paintbrush. It can paint everything in bright, vibrant colors-creating a masterspiece.

To help people believe they can achieve victory, put them in a position to experience small successes.

Whenever I mentor people and help them discover their purpose, I always encourage them to start the process by discovering their strengths, not exploring their shortcomings. Why? Because people's purpose in life is always connected to their giftedness. It always works that way. You are not called to do something that you have no talent for. You will discover your purpose by finding and remaining in your strength zone.

I think once a person realizes that they are every day either sowing into their life either potential success, or sowing into their life potential failure, they would all of a sudden go okay, I've got to figure out what I'm going to do.

A person with an outstanding attitude makes the best of it while he gets the worst of it.

Acquiring and keeping good people is a leader's most important task.

True success comes only when every generation continues to develop the next generation.

The more you do, the more you fail. The more you fail, the more you learn. The more you learn, the better you get.

As a leader, you have to take responsibility for your own failures as well as successes. That's the only way you'll learn. If you keep learning, you'll improve. If you improve, your leadership will get better. And in time, you will earn the right to lead on the level you deserve.

The greatest of all insights is that we cannot be tomorrow what we do not do today.

I thought if I was open and honest, it would help the reader to get open and honest, and they also would realize sometimes when you write a book, people think you're an expert and that's not always true.

Without love, there can be no connection, no future, and no success together.

Grow a leader-grow the organization. A company cannot grow without until its leaders grow within.

If you want to improve your world, then focus your attention on helping others.

What I find them struggling most isn't with one of the twelve [things from daily list]; I find them struggling with what decisions to make.

When it comes to money, you can't win. If you focus on making it, you're materialistic. If you try to but don't make any, you're a loser. If you make a lot and keep it, you're a miser. If you make it and spend it, you're a spendthrift. If you don't care about making it, you're unambitious. If you make a lot and still have it when you die, you're a fool-for trying to take it with you. The only way to really win with money is to hold it loosely-and be generous with it to accomplish things of value.

Your core values are the deeply held beliefs that authentically describe your soul.

A difficult time can be more readily endured if we retain the conviction that our existence holds a purpose - a cause to pursue, a person to love, a goal to achieve.

No matter your title, people will not follow you if they don’t trust you.

I think success has a lot to do with my own personal growth.

Pay now, play later; play now, pay later.

We don't grow on accident, we grow on purpose.

Courage and initiative come when you understand your purpose in life.

There's a tendency for us to think that the secret of our success is something that is mystical and maybe someday my time will come. And it's certainly out there somewhere; it's around the bend; it's at the top of the hill.

Most accomplishments in life come more easily if you approach them strategically

The position does not make you a leader. The title, the promotion, the fancy corner office do not make you a leader. No, it is relationships with people that are the foundation, the very heart of leadership. Have you ever worked for someone you didn't like? It's difficult, isn't it? On the other hand, the leader you will follow anywhere and everywhere is one you know cares about you, and values you. This person has your best interests at heart. It is the leader who comes alongside to help you improve and grow.

Change is inevitable. Growth is optional.

If the church is going to make a difference, it will need to go through the "big give-up" stage. Churches will need to quit being selfish and become relevant.

Once our minds are 'tattooed' with negative thinking, our chances for long-term success diminish.

I think many people believe the best way they can help others is to criticize them, to give them the benefit of their 'wisdom.' I disagree. The best way to help people is to see the best in them.

Leaders touch a heart before they ask for a hand.

Brokenness involves removing inappropriate pride and self-reliance and building healthy God-reliance.

If you have great people around you, they will take you higher than your dream will. Leaders are never self-made. Those closest to you determine your level of success, so choosing the right companions as partners in pursuit of your vision is an important decision. My advice is to surround yourself with talented people who will challenge you, help you grow and inspire you to maximize your potential.

The key word in the church community is relationships, you know brother and sister in Christ.

The process of achievement comes through repeated failures and the constant struggle to climb to a higher level.

The Visalus Founders are the finest and sharpest young leaders that I have ever met.

The church that will not give up will be outdated and passed by, quicker than they realize.

Happiness simply cannot be relied upon as a measure of success.

Never allow others to put obstacles in the pathway of your dreams

I literally wrote a book on it called Your Roadmap For Success. And in it I said success is three things: knowing my purpose in life, I think it's impossible for anybody to be successful until they really discover why they're here on earth and what God has planned for them; secondly, growing to my maximum potential.

Nobody can motivate himself in a positive direction by continually using negative words.

Set the tone for your day be treating people better than you expect to be treated by them. Be the first to smile. Express your appreciation for them. Expect the best out of them. If you act first, you will set yourself up for success.

I was greatly affected by a guy named Rob Briner, who died about five years ago, who wrote a book called "Roaring Lambs", which is a book on how to be salt and light in the secular community.

Success is... knowing your purpose in life, growing to reach your maximum potential, and sowing seeds that benefit others.

Inexperienced leaders are quick to lead before knowing anything about the people they intend to lead. But mature leaders listen, learn and then lead.

The church will not stay the same. It will either blossom because someone understands the season the church is in, or it will wither very quickly.

You must do right before you feel good.

If a person doesn't govern his temper, his temper will govern him.

To achieve all that is possible, we must attempt the impossible. To be all we can be, we must dream of being more.

Everything rises and falls on leadership.

An idea is worthless unless you use it.

Remember, at the time God gives us a vision, we never have the resources available to accomplish it. We don't have the people, the money, the knowledge, or the opportunity.

Be willing to absorb some risk and failures to allow people freedom to express themselves.

We teach what we know, but we reproduce what we are.

I want to always be viewed by my readers as a friend and not as an authority or an expert.

If you can become the leader you ought to be on the inside, you will be able to become the person you want on the outside. People will want to follow you. And when that happens, you'll be able to tackle anything in this world.

The timing of your decision is just as important as the decision you make.

I think the hardest thing for a person is to know what those twelve things are that they need to work on that will bring the return of success to their life.

To achieve your dreams, you must embrace adversity and make failure a regular part of your life. If you're not failing, you're probably not really moving forward.

Make a point to continually search for a better way of doing things, even when things are going well, to ensure that a better alternative has not been overlooked and to keep your creative talents in practice.

I tell a person, "If I could go home with you tomorrow and you and I could spend the day together from maybe 8:00 to 6:00, and we went out to a restaurant at 6:30, I could tell you with a high degree of accuracy how successful you're going to be." That's huge because I'm just going to look and see, what kind of attitude do you have, how do you relate to people, how well do you prioritize your life? I'm going to see all of those things in the process of a day.

We overestimate the event and underestimate the process. Every fulfilled dream occurred because of dedication to the process.

If you travel alone, you can probably go faster. But the journey will never be as rewarding, and you probably won't be able to go as far.

Now what I do is I manage that decision. And I teach them in the book how - know what decision to make and then how to manage those decisions. It's a very - it's a personal growth book [Today Matters]; that's what it is.

When you make a commitment, you create hope. When you keep a commitment you create trust!

The true measure of leadership is influence - nothing more, nothing less.

Every time I have had a breakthrough in my life, it has been because of Prayer

I guess I'd rather be loved than respected.

Reflective thinking turns experience into insight.