150 Best Goals Quotes To Help You Achieve Greatness

These inspiring quotes about reaching your goals can help you succeed.

There's no better time to take stock of your short- and long-term goals and make things happen! So to encourage you to get inspired and stay motivated, this list of the 150 best quotes about achieving and reaching your goals can help you get there.

From inspirational quotes about goal-setting and ambition to motivational quotes about turning your wildest dreams into realities, these wise words and smart sayings will give you that extra push you need to help you make all your goals come true in 2023 and beyond.

Print them out and hang them on your mirror for a daily dose of inspiration or share them with a like-minded friend. We promise you'll be glad you did.

Here are 150 of the best goals quotes that will encourage you to stay motivated and help you achieve success.

150 Best Goals Quotes

1. “If you want to be happy, set a goal that commands your thoughts, liberates your energy and inspires your hopes.” —Andrew Carnegie

2. “Success is the progressive realization of a worthy goal or ideal.” —Earl Nightingale

3. “The trouble with not having a goal is that you can spend your life running up and down the field and never score.” —Bill Copeland

Related: 40 Quotes About Success

4. “I think goals should never be easy, they should force you to work, even if they are uncomfortable at the time.” —Michael Phelps

5. “You should set goals beyond your reach so you always have something to live for.” —Ted Turner

6. “It must be borne in mind that the tragedy of life doesn’t lie in not reaching your goal. The tragedy lies in having no goals to reach.” —Benjamin E. Mays

7. “When it is obvious that the goals cannot be reached, don't adjust the goals, adjust the action steps.” – Confucius

8. “There’s nothing better than achieving your goals, whatever they might be.” – Paloma Faith

9. “Stay focused, go after your dreams and keep moving toward your goals.” – LL Cool J

10. “You cannot expect to achieve new goals or move beyond your present circumstances unless you change.” – Les Brown

Related: Best New Year's Quotes 

11. “Without some goals and some efforts to reach it, no man can live.” – John Dewey

12. “Goals are not only absolutely necessary to motivate us. They are essential to really keep us alive.” – Robert H. Schuller

13. “Set realistic goals, keep re-evaluating, and be consistent.” – Venus Williams

14. “Set realistic goals, keep re-evaluating, and be consistent.” – Ginni Rometti

15. “It's an up and down thing, the human goals, because the human is always an explorer, an adventurist.” – Cesar Millan

16. “If you set your goals ridiculously high and it's a failure, you will fail above everyone else's success.” – James Cameron

17. “I am constantly re-evaluating my goals and trying to strike items from my to-do list that aren't critical.” – Aisha Tyler

18. “All successful people have a goal. No one can get anywhere unless he knows where he wants to go and what he wants to be or do.” – Norman Vincent Peale

19. “Where are the people who don't have goals headed? Those 97 percent end up working for the three percent.” – Shiv Khera

20. “I like to tell young people to work hard for your goals and live in the moment.” – Nadia Comaneci

21. “People often say I have so much energy, that I never stop; but that's what it takes to accomplish your goals.” – Curtis Jackson

22. “My personal goals are to be happy, healthy and to be surrounded by loved ones.” – Kiana Tom

23. “You need lofty goals. Then cement it with a great work ethic.” – Jerry West

24. “It’s harder to stay on top than it is to make the climb. Continue to seek new goals.”– Pat Summitt

25. “If you want to live a happy life, tie it to a goal, not to people or things.”– Albert Einstein

26. “One way to keep momentum going is to have constantly greater goals.”– Michael Korda

27. “If you aim for nothing, you'll hit it every time.” – Unknown

28. “The greater danger for most of us isn’t that our aim is too high and miss it, but that it is too low and we reach it.”– Michelangelo

29. “I am always more interested in what I am about to do than what I have already done.”– Rachel Carson

30. “Setting goals is the first step in turning the invisible into the visible.”– Tony Robbins

31. “Goals are the fuel in the furnace of achievement.”– Brian Tracy

32. “If a goal is worth having, it’s worth blocking out the time in your day-to-day life necessary to achieve it.”– Jill Koenig

33. “In between goals is a thing called life, that has to be lived and enjoyed.”– Sid Caeser

34. “You can always find a solution if you try hard enough.”– Lori Greiner

35. “The going is the goal.”– Horace Kallen

36. “A good goal is like a strenuous exercise — it makes you stretch.”– Mary Kay Ash

37. “Knowing is not enough; we must apply. Willing is not enough; we must do.”– Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

38. “There are only two rules for being successful. One, figure out exactly what you want to do, and two, do it.”– Mario Cuomo

39. “What you get by achieving your goals is not as important as what you become by achieving your goals.”– Henry David Thoreau

40. “Life can be pulled by goals just as surely as it can be pushed by drives.” – Viktor Frankl

41. “The great glorious masterpiece of man is to know how to live with purpose.”– Michel de Montaigne

Related: How To Set And Achieve Personal Goals—It's Easier Than You Think With This Simple Framework

42. “Intention without action is an insult to those who expect the best from you.”– Andy Andrews

43. A goal is not always meant to be reached, it often serves simply as something to aim at.” – Bruce Lee

44. “You cannot change your destination overnight, but you can change your direction overnight.”– Jim Rohn

45. “If the plan doesn’t work, change the plan, but never the goal.”– Unknown

46. “Discipline is the bridge between goals and accomplishment.”– Jim Rohn

47. “To reach a port, we must sail — Sail, not tie at anchor — Sail, not drift.”– Franklin Roosevelt

48. “Be practical as well as generous in your ideals. Keep your eyes on the stars, but remember to keep your feet on the ground.”– Theodore Roosevelt

49. “The greatest mistake you can make in life is to continually be afraid you will make one.”– Elbert Hubbard

50. “Do not let what you cannot do interfere with what you can do.”– John Wooden

51. “You are never too old to set a new goal or to dream a new dream.” — C.S. Lewis

52. "If we have a goal and a plan, and are willing to take risks and mistakes and work as a team, we can choose to do the hard thing." — Scott Kelly

53. “Never give up. Today is hard, tomorrow will be worse, but the day after tomorrow will be sunshine.” - Jack Ma

54. “We think, mistakenly, that success is the result of the amount of time we put in at work, instead of the quality of time we put in.” — Arianna Huffington

55. “You can’t be that kid standing at the top of the waterslide, overthinking it. You have to go down the chute.” - Tina Fey

56. “If something is important enough, even if the odds are against you, you should still do it.” - Elon Musk

57. “A goal without a timeline is just a dream.” - Robert Herjavec

58. "It always seems impossible until it's done." - Nelson Mandela

59. "Success consists of going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm." - Winston Churchill

60. “You have to be able to get up and dust yourself off and always be going forward.” - Rita Moreno

61. “Hustling is putting every minute and all your effort into achieving the goal at hand. Every minute needs to count.” - Gary Vaynerchuk

62. “A year from now you may wish you had started today.” – Karen Lamb

63. “Dream your own dreams, achieve your own goals. Your journey is your own and unique.” – Roy T. Bennett

64. “It’s better to be at the bottom of the ladder you want to climb than at the top of the one you don’t.” –Stephen Kellogg

65. “Life is short, fragile and does not wait for anyone. There will NEVER be a perfect time to pursue your dreams and goals. ” – Unknown

66. “A goal is a dream with a deadline.” – Napoleon Hill

67. “Things won are done; joy’s soul lies in the doing.” – William Shakespeare

68. “Every ceiling, when reached, becomes a floor, upon which one walks as a matter of course and prescriptive right.” – Aldous Huxley

69. “Our goals can only be reached through a vehicle of a plan, in which we must fervently believe, and upon which we must vigorously act. There is no other route to success.” – Pablo Picasso

70. “The virtue lies in the struggle, not in the prize.” – Richard Monckton Milnes

71. “A good archer is known not by his arrows but by his aim.” – Thomas Fuller

72. “In absence of clearly defined goals, we become strangely loyal to performing daily acts of trivia.” – Unknown

73.  “Think little goals and expect little achievements. Think big goals and win big success.”― David Joseph Schwartz

Related: 100 Quotes about Change

74. “No desired achievement is gained without any goal setting.”― Wayne Chirisa

75. “I love the challenge of starting at zero every day and seeing how much I can accomplish.”― Martha Stewart

76. “The great secret about goals and visions is not the future they describe but the change in the present they engender.”― David Allen

77. “The way to achieve your goals is step by step, you just need to build enough track, to be ahead of the train.” – John Milton Lawrence

78. “The only goals you don’t achieve in life are the goals you don’t set.” ― Matt Fox

79. “If you really look closely, most overnight successes took a long time.” — Steve Jobs

80. “It doesn’t matter how many times you fail. You only have to be right once and then everyone can tell you that you are an overnight success.” — Mark Cuban

81. “All our dreams can come true, if we have the courage to pursue them.” – Walt Disney

82. “Don’t worry about being successful but work toward being significant and the success will naturally follow.” – Oprah Winfrey

83. “Remember why you started.” – Unknown

84. “The way to get started is to quit talking and begin doing.” – Walt Disney

85. “You have to believe it before you see it.” – Unknown

86. “If you don’t have big dreams and goals, you’ll end up working for someone that does.” – Unknown

87. “Someone is sitting in the shade today because someone planted a tree a long time ago.” – Warren Buffet

88. “Never give up on a dream just because of the time it will take to accomplish it.” – Unknown

89. “Goals are dreams brought to life.” – Amy Leigh Mercree

90. “Wish it. Plan it. Do it.” - Jaipal Singh

91. “You know that one thing you've always dreamed about? Write it down. Then take the first step. Today.” – Petra Poje

92. “One person may not, whereas another person will. Your job is to find a person who will help you reach your goal.” – Germany Kent

93. “A birthday is a time to reflect on the year gone by, but to also set your goals for the upcoming year." Catherine Pulsifer

94. “The goal is not to be better than the other man, but your previous self.” – Dalai Lama

95. “Many of us carry baggage from the past that hinders our ability to fight for the things we want in life, our goals, our dreams.” – Les Brown

96. “Motivation is what drives a person to move forward and put action towards making their goals happen.” - Brian Cagneey

97. "Motivation is interwoven with the goals you make and the habits you form in order to achieve them." — Matthew Lewis Browne

98. “We must share our dreams with people who will see us working toward and accomplishing our goals. Be encouraged by people who say, "How about trying it this way?" ” – David DeNotaris

99. “The best way to approach a goal is to first break it down into very small bite-size steps. Each one of these steps should lead logically to the next step to be completed in a linear order.” - Byron Pulsifer

100. “The main thing to keep in mind is that there can be many sets of small goals involved in working up to your final and ultimate goal.” — Ben Johnson

101. "Empowerment involves analyzing your own life and believing that you are able to reach realistic goals." — Poppy Fingley

102. “The goal you set must be challenging. At the same time, it should be realistic and attainable, not impossible to reach. It should be challenging enough to make you stretch, but not so far that you break.” —Rick Hansen

103. “Goals can change from time to time but then remember to focus on your priorities.” — Roger Collmar

104. “Goals produce focus. Without a goal, there is no reason to focus on anything. Think of a goal as a target.” —Bill Price

105. “Without a goal, you will continue creating yourself in the manner you have been doing it so far. And obtaining the same expected results, more often, unconsciously.” — Helena Angel

106. “While working on completing your goal, you may encounter possible setbacks. Instead of beating yourself up, look at them as opportunities to learn and grow.” —Kyle Nussen

107. "The key to thriving with accomplishing any goal would be dependent on working with dedication, yet lots of people do not interpret just how important it really is!" — Sarfraz Sohail

108. "Any unforeseen challenges that crop up are only there to test your resolve on your way to ultimate success in reaching your goal." — Byron Pulsifer

109. “Making sure our goals are properly aligned with our passions only makes sense" — Josh Hinds

110. "Goals are like a map. They help us determine where we want to end up, and give us personal direction on which to focus our energy." — Catherine Pulsifer

111. "By having big goals and pushing yourself towards them you will have a lot more energy because you know exactly what you're doing and what you're doing it for." — Troy Foster

112. "If you want to do something and you have a goal, do it, don't wait, because your channel might change sometime soon - and quite unexpectedly." — Sean Swarner

113. "Productivity depends on executing important tasks in line with your goals." — Romuald Andrade

114. "If you want to achieve your goal, the strategy you are using need not be clever or original but it should bring results." — Andrii Sedniev

115. "You can accomplish whatever your mind can see!" — Catherine Pulsifer

116. "Basically being in a team is an amalgamation of different things that have a common intention of meeting the assigned goal." — Derek Stanzma

117. “Without any goal, it's as if you are only doing things in random.” — Ryan Cooper

118. “Set goals and focus on completing one goal at a time.” —K. Collins

119. “Once you know specifically what you're aiming for, you'll find that you can muster up enthusiasm for your goal more easily.” — AJ Winters

120. “Set your goals high, and don’t stop till you get there.” – Bo Jackson

121. “Sometimes, I shake if I have to do something that I’ve never done before; maybe not noticeably, but inside. But I’ll do it, because I know it’s not an insurmountable task; I’ve done plenty of tasks in my life." – Martha Stewart

122. “Envision, create, and believe in your own universe, and the universe will form around you.” – Tony Hsieh

123. “I know how it looks. But just start. Nothing is insurmountable.” – Lin-Manuel Miranda

124. “There is nothing wrong with dedication and goals, but if you focus on yourself, all the lights fade away and you become a fleeting moment in life.” – Pete Maravich

125. “I’m competitive with myself, but not with other people. I set goals for myself. I don’t really care about winning or losing as long as I do my best.” – Lucas Grabeel

126. “As a professional athlete, a lot is going to be said about you—but I just try to move forward and try to achieve my goals.” – LeBron James

127. “Remember that goals are not aspirations—they are not wishes that you want to have. They are things that you have to do.” —Robert Gardner

128. “Your goals, minus your doubts, equal your reality.” – Ralph Marston

129. “People with goals succeed because they know where they’re going.” – Earl Nightingale

130. “The game has its ups and downs, but you can never lose focus of your individual goals and you can’t let yourself be beat because of lack of effort." – Michael Jordan

131. “Review your goals twice every day in order to be focused on achieving them.” – Les Brown

132. “You need to overcome the tug of people against you as you reach for high goals.” – George S. Patton

133. “A winner is someone who recognizes his God-given talents, works his tail off to develop them into skills, and uses these skills to accomplish his goals.” – Larry Bird

134. “Each of you, as an individual, must pick your own goals. Listen to others, but do not become a blind follower.” – Thurgood Marshall

135. “Leadership is working with goals and vision; management is working with objectives.” – Russel Honore

136. “Goals transform a random walk into a chase.” – Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

137. “Success is steady progress toward one’s personal goals.” - Jim Rohn

138. “Everybody has goals, aspirations or whatever, and everybody has been at a point in their life where nobody believed in them.” – Eminem

139. “Greatness is not measured by what a man or woman accomplishes, but by the opposition, he or she has overcome to reach his goals.” — Dorothy Height

140. “Exercise to stimulate, not to annihilate. The world wasn’t formed in a day, and neither were we. Set small goals and build upon them.” – Lee Haney

141. “I live off a motto that says, ‘yesterday is history, tomorrow is a mystery’. I have goals and agendas. Where ever I’ll be tomorrow, that’s where I’ll be.” – Vanilla Ice

142. “The new year stands before us, like a chapter in a book, waiting to be written. We can help write that story by setting goals.” – Melody Beattie

143. “Stop setting goals. Goals are pure fantasy unless you have a specific plan to achieve them.” – Stephen Covey

144. “No matter how many goals you have achieved, you must set your sights on a higher one.” – Jessica Savitch

145. “To win big you sometimes have to risk big things.” – Bill Gates

146. “Instead of looking at the past, I put myself ahead twenty years and try to look at what I need to do now in order to get there then.” – Diana Rossma

147. “Everyone’s dream can come true if you just stick to it and work hard.” – Serena Williams

148. “It’s important to set your own goals and work hard to achieve them.” – Yuichiro Miura

149. “You can do anything if you set goals. You just have to push yourself.” – RJ Mitte

150. “If you set goals and go after them with all the determination you can muster, your gifts will take you places that will amaze you.” – Les Brown

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