Quotes about Self-improvement

The wisdom literature of thousands of years of history repeatedly validates the reality that the greatest fulfillment in improving ourselves comes in our empowerment to more effectively reach out and help others. Quality of life is inside-out.

Private victories precede public victories, that making and keeping promises to ourselves precedes making and keeping promises to others.

Build inner character first—private victory before public victory.

private victories precede public victories, that making and keeping promises to ourselves precedes making and keeping promises to others. It says it is futile to put personality ahead of character, to try to improve relationships with others before improving ourselves.

Remember to keep working from the inside out and keep getting back on track when we blow it.

It is said that wars are won in the general's tent. Sharpening the saw in the first three dimensions—the physical, the spiritual, and the mental—is a practice I call the "Daily Private Victory." And I commend to you the simple practice of spending one hour a day every day doing it—one hour a day for the rest of your life.

The inside-out approach says that private victories precede public victories, that making and keeping promises to ourselves precedes making and keeping promises to others.

The degree to which we have developed our independent will in our everyday lives is measured by our personal integrity. Integrity is, fundamentally, the value we place on ourselves. It's our ability to make and keep commitments to ourselves, to "walk our talk." It's honor with self, a fundamental part of the Character Ethic, the essence of proactive growth.

Principle-centered leadership is practiced from the inside out on four levels: 1) personal (my relationship with myself); 2) interpersonal (my relationships and interactions with others); 3) managerial (my responsibility to get a job done with others); and 4) organizational (my need to organize people—to recruit them, train them, compensate them, build teams, solve problems, and create aligned structure, strategy, and systems).

There is no effectiveness without discipline and there is no discipline without character. And there is no character without first starting and asking questions.

In stark contrast, almost all the literature in the first 150 years or so focused on what could be called the Character Ethic as the foundation of success—things like integrity, humility, fidelity, temperance, courage, justice, patience, industry, simplicity, modesty, and the Golden Rule. Benjamin Franklin's autobiography is representative of that literature. It is, basically, the story of one man's effort to integrate certain principles and habits deep within his nature.

The gravity pull of some of our habits may currently be keeping us from going where we want to go.