George Matthew Adams Quotes

Each day of your life, as soon as you open your eyes in the morning, you can square away for a happy and successful day. It's the mood and the purpose at the inception of each day that are the important facts in charting your course for the day. We can always square away for a fresh start, no matter what the past has been. It's today that is the paramount problem always. Yesterday is but history.

What is more beautiful than a sea of water with a number of white-winged boats skirting its surface? Poetry and beauty contesting with the wind and the waves!

Enthusiasm is a kind of faith that has been set afire

It's what each of us sows, and how, that gives us character and prestige. Seeds of kindness, goodwill, and human understanding, planted in fertile soil, spring up into deathless friendships, big deeds of worth, and a memory that will not soon fade out. We are all sowers of seeds-and let us never forget it!

One reason why so many people are unhappy, not knowing why, is that they have burdened their minds with resentments. These evil thoughts pile right on top of happier and generous ones and smother them so that they never get expression. Resentments are a form of hate ... What a dearth of good will and co-operation there are among human beings and nations! What a world this would be if we all worked together, and as a popular diplomat recently expressed it-played together!

We can accomplish almost anything within our ability if we but think we can.

You can go to doctors until the last cow has been placed in its shed. You can journey the earth in search of peace of mind. You can experiment with a dozen theories, hoping for a relief from worries, or the problems which beset you, but unless you learn to relax you will end up disappointed. Tension is a killer! Just relax and note the immediate effect. One of peace and ease of mind. One in which every organ of the body joins. In relaxation there is unity of mind, body and spirit.

Everyone knows that weeds eat out the life of the garden and of the productive fields. It's like that in the building and developing of character. No one knows our own faults and tendencies better than we do ourselves, so that it is up to each one of us to keep the weeds out, and to keep all growth vigorous and fruitful.

Encouragement is oxygen to the soul. Good work can never be expected from a worker without encouragement. No one ever climbed spiritual heights without it. No one ever lived without it.

If we had no regard for others' feelings or fortune, we would grow cold and indifferent to life itself.

If you have nothing to do, look at yourself and see if there isn't something close at hand that you can improve. It may make you wealthy, although it is more likely it will make you happy.

That one who does not get fun and enjoyment out of every day in which he lives, needs to reorganize his life. And the sooner the better, for pure enjoyment throughout life has more to do with one's happiness and efficiency than almost any other single element.

It's marvelous the change that comes about when a man gets together all his forces and centers them upon the doing of one thing at a time.

Learn to keep the door shut, keep out of your mind and out of your world every element that seeks admittance with no definite helpful end in view.

We cannot waste time. We can only waste ourselves.

It is the spirit of a person that hangs above him like a star in the sky.

The difficult tasks to be performed are not the ones that mean physical and mental labor, but the ones that you dislike, are the ones that you do not love. There are unpleasant angles to nearly every important job to be done in this world, but there must be an over all love for doing each, else precious time and effort are uselessly wasted. I shall never forget noting a sign above a construction job that read: "Builder of Difficult Foundations." That man must have loved that calling, else he would not have made a point of advertising the fact!

The organized person ... makes the most of his time and goes to his bed for the night perfectly relaxed for rest and renewal.

Always expect the best. Then if you have to hurdle a few tough problems, you will have generated the strength and courage to do so.

There is a tendency among some businesses to criticize and belittle their competitors. This is a bad procedure. Praise them. Learn from them. There are times when you can co-operate with them to their advantage and to yours! Speak well of them and they will speak well of you. You can't destroy good ideas. Take advantage of them.

Every one of us, unconsciously, works out a personal philosophy of life, by which we are guided, inspired, and corrected, as time goes on. It is this philosophy by which we measure out our days, and by which we advertise to all about us the man, or woman, that we are... It takes but a brief time to scent the life philosophy of anyone. It is defined in the conversation, in the look of the eye, and in the general mien of the person. It has no hiding place. It's like the perfume of a flower -- unseen, but known almost instantly. It is the possession of the successful, and the happy. And it can be greatly embellished by the absorption of ideas and experiences of the useful of this earth.

People do not want what we have in our pockets half as much as they want what is in our hearts. If we combine both, intelligently, however, according to our means, we give wisely and well.

A cheerful frame of mind, reinforced by relaxation ... is the medicine that puts all ghosts of fear on the run.

The further you get from nature, the less happy you are; and the nearer, the more exultant you become over the world and all that there is in it.

Courage is heartworth making itself felt in deeds. It never waits for chances; it makes chances.

The easiest thing in the world is to succeed. You can't help it if you follow the rules and play the game the best way you know how according to yourself, instead of according to the one next to you, or above you, or somewhere away from you.

The birth of the baby Jesus stands as the most significant event in all history, because it has meant the pouring into a sick world the healing medicine of love which has transformed all manner of hearts for almost two thousand years.

Each day can be one of triumph if you keep up your interests.

Beauty of expression is so akin to the voice of the sea.

There is a growing sentiment in America that regular saving should be ignored-that the government will take care of people and give them security when they get beyond a certain age or become old and unable to work, but it must be borne in mind that the people who earn and do save, take care of the government! Were it not for the thrifty and the willing workers, the government would be in a bad way.

Let us remember that the Christmas heart is a giving heart, a wide open heart that thinks of others first. The birth of the baby Jesus stands as the most significant event in all history, because it has meant the pouring into a sick world of the healing medicine of love which has transformed all manner of hearts for almost two thousand years ... Underneath all the bulging bundles is this beating Christmas heart.

This world and life of ours are filled with inequalities. The worst possible use to make of this fact, however, is to allow resentments to possess us. All of us have imagined limitations, but we have also the privilege of pushing them aside, and spreading our lives out! We never know any of our limitations until we put ourselves to the test. There are always "growing pains" working within us.

No matter what your work today, if it is worth while at all - time to plan it out, time to do it well, and time to finish it, is your day's greatest gift and your greatest job.

No one ever gets too big to make mistakes. The secret is that the big man is greater than his mistakes, because he rises right out of them and passes beyond them.

You are your greatest investment. The more you store in that mind of yours, the more you enrich your experience, the more people you meet, the more books you read, and the more places you visit, the greater is that investment in all that you are. Everything that you add to your peace of mind, and to your outlook upon life, is added capital that no one but yourself can dissipate.

It is easier to win than to fail. Everybody sides with the winner. But the failure walks alone.