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Self-Discipline Quotes

By Alan Reiner | Jul 21, 2024 | 54 quotes

Self-discipline is less about willpower and more about building habits that carry you toward your goals even when motivation fades. The quotes here treat discipline as a practical skill, one tied closely to self-respect, effort, and the gap between dreaming and doing.

These quotes are useful for vision boards, fitness journals, motivational presentations, or social media posts about personal growth. Take a look through the collection.

  1. “We all have dreams. But in order to make dreams come into reality, it takes an awful lot of determination, dedication, self-discipline, and effort.”

    Jesse Owens
  2. “Respect your efforts, respect yourself. Self-respect leads to self-discipline. When you have both firmly under your belt, that's real power.”

    Clint Eastwood
  3. “With self-discipline most anything is possible.”

    Theodore Roosevelt
  4. “In reading the lives of great men, I found that the first victory they won was over themselves… self-discipline with all of them came first.”

    Harry S Truman
  5. “By constant self-discipline and self-control you can develop greatness of character.”

    Grenville Kleiser
  6. “Self-discipline is what separates the winners and the losers.”

    Thomas Peterffy
  7. “Self-discipline is an act of cultivation. It requires you to connect today's actions to tomorrow's results. There's a season for sowing a season for reaping. Self-discipline helps you know which is which.”

    Gary Ryan Blair
  8. “Happiness is dependent on self-discipline. We are the biggest obstacles to our own happiness. It is much easier to do battle with society and with others than to fight our own nature.”

    Dennis Prager
  9. “The only discipline that lasts is self-discipline.”

    Bum Phillips
  10. “Work while you work, play while you play - this is a basic rule of repressive self-discipline.”

    Theodor W. Adorno
  11. “I think self-discipline is something, it's like a muscle. The more you exercise it, the stronger it gets.”

    Daniel Goldstein
  12. “Self-government won't work without self-discipline.”

    Paul Harvey
  13. “I value self-discipline, but creating systems that make it next to impossible to misbehave is more reliable than self-control.”

    Tim Ferriss
  14. “The Olympic Games showed us that with self-discipline and dedication we can be champions.”

    Anurag Thakur
  15. “Self-denial and self-discipline, however, will be recognized as the outstanding qualities of a good soldier.”

    William Lyon Mackenzie King
  16. “I can tell you character traits I admire and work to develop in myself - perseverance, self-discipline, courage to stand up for what is right even when it is against one's friends or one's self.”

    Dalia Mogahed
  17. “Long-term, we must begin to build our internal strengths. It isn't just skills like computer technology. It's the old-fashioned basics of self-reliance, self-motivation, self-reinforcement, self-discipline, self-command.”

    Steven Pressfield
  18. “When people ask me about what I learned from martial arts, I don't talk about favorite punches or kicks, or about fights won or lost. I talk about learning self-discipline, about ethics and manners and benevolence and fairness.”

    Jonathan Maberry
  19. “I think of discipline as the continual everyday process of helping a child learn self-discipline.”

    Fred Rogers
  20. “I see my upbringing as a great success story. By disciplining me, my parents inculcated self-discipline. And by restricting my choices as a child, they gave me so many choices in my life as an adult. Because of what they did then, I get to do the work I love now.”

    Amy Chua
  21. “I do like athletes as they have amazing self-discipline.”

    Seal
  22. “Everybody starts at the top, and then has the problem of staying there. Lasting accomplishment, however, is still achieved through a long, slow climb and self-discipline.”

    Helen Hayes
  23. “It is time to return to core values, time to get back to basics, to self-discipline and respect for the law, to consideration for the others, to accepting responsibility for yourself and your family - and not shuffling it off on other people and the state.”

    John Major
  24. “Worrying about bills, food, or other problems leaves less capacity to think ahead or to exert self-discipline. So, poverty imposes a mental tax.”

    Nicholas Kristof
  25. “Whether you call it Buddhism or another religion, self-discipline, that's important. Self-discipline with awareness of consequences.”

    Dalai Lama
  26. “Many men and women in the world demonstrate great willpower and self-discipline in overcoming bad habits and the weaknesses of the flesh.”

    Ezra Taft Benson
  27. “I can have incredible self-discipline. But see, I think it's obviously a form of stupidity.”

    John Malkovich
  28. “Giftedness gives you this amazing tool kit for handling self-discipline and gives you an area of knowledge, but then it also gives you this weird set of aspirations.”

    Alissa Quart
  29. “If you set goals for yourself, and you're like a lot of other people, you probably realize it's not that your goals are physically impossible that's keeping you from achieving them; it's that you lack the self-discipline to stick to them. It's physically possible to lose weight. It's physically possible to exercise more.”

    Daniel Goldstein
  30. “I like the detail work of telling a story in small pieces, as is done in movie-making, and also the long leap of faith needed to see a theatre performance through each night. Both require focus and self-discipline.”

    Viggo Mortensen
  31. “Just because you're struggling with self-discipline doesn't mean you have to raise the white flag and declare your self-improvement efforts a complete failure. Instead, work to increase the chances that you'll stick to your healthier habits - even when you don't feel like it.”

    Amy Morin
  32. “I'm very passionate about the use of sports in young people's lives to build self-esteem and self-discipline and self-confidence. It's been a big thing for me.”

    Ed Skrein
  33. “I just feel like if I push myself and I kill myself, then I have self-discipline within myself. That's how you turn into a true pro.”

    Emmanuel Sanders
  34. “One of our problems is our sense of discipline - dancers have an extraordinary sense of self-discipline.”

    Siobhan Davies
  35. “For me it was perfect, because it wasn't a very competitive environment, and it was a studio program. They basically send you off, and say, bring us some work, and we'll help you improve it. It really rewarded self-discipline.”

    Anthony Doerr
  36. “The Dalai Lama's entire being is about peace and harmony, forgiveness and self-discipline. Those are qualities to be admired. I am really looking forward to meeting His Holiness.”

    Joe Nichols
  37. “I used to refer to myself as a 'theoretical anorexic,' just as crazy when it came to body image, but saved by a lack of self-discipline. My daughters do everything better than I do - they're smarter, more beautiful, happier. What if they end up better at anorexia, too?”

    Ayelet Waldman
  38. “I've developed a self-discipline since the time I was a child.”

    George Hamilton
  39. “Instilling a sense of self-discipline and focus when the kids are younger makes it so much easier by the time they get into high school.”

    Amy Chua
  40. “Being home schooled is awesome because you can make your own schedule, so as far as time management, it's up to you how much you get done and when you get it done. It's all got to get done; how you do it is up to you. You need a lot of self-discipline, but luckily, I have it.”

    Jason Dolley
  41. “As wonderful as they were, my parents didn't teach me anything about self-discipline, concentration, patience, or focus. If I hadn't had a family myself, I probably never would've done anything. Marriage taught me responsibility.”

    Dick Van Dyke
  42. “I don't have the self-discipline for diets; I break rules I set for myself, so I try and eat more healthily, juice more, and avoid sugar.”

    Sally Phillips
  43. “The most difficult thing about painting is the self-discipline. When I finish a job, I give myself a few days, but then I have to discipline myself quite fiercely if I want to do some painting that's worthwhile. Otherwise, you're just doodling. It's much easier when you're just told what you have to do.”

    John Hurt
  44. “Most talk about 'super-geniuses' is nonsense. I have found that when 'stars' drop out, successors are usually at hand to fill their places, and the successors are merely men who have learned by application and self-discipline to get full production from an average, normal brain.”

    Charles M. Schwab
  45. “I gave up tennis to study, but not before it had shown me how to focus and concentrate. It taught me self-discipline: I was playing four or five hours a day and doing five-mile runs. When I stopped, my energy had to be channelled into something else.”

    Ray Fearon
  46. “Getting new information through Web-surfing almost always feels more rewarding than having to generate new information in the work that is in front of us. It therefore takes increasing amounts of self-discipline to stay on task.”

    Daniel Levitin
  47. “I'm especially honored that The Black Gents will debut Off-Broadway and pay tribute to The Tuskegee Airmen and other ancestors of that time who have embodied excellence, self-determination, and self-discipline.”

    Lamman Rucker
  48. “I think most people have a general sense that when you're released from prison, life is hard, but, you know, if you work hard and apply self-discipline and stay out of trouble, you can make it. But that's true only for a relative few.”

    Michelle Alexander
  49. “I concluded that Donald Trump lacked the temperament, the judgment and the self-discipline to heal the divisions in our country - which are very real - and to be commander in chief.”

    Susan Collins
  50. “I had a difficult relationship with my parents, who died young, but they instilled self-discipline and a sense of honour and loyalty and accountability. I'm grateful for that.”

    Monty Don
  51. “Marriage civilizes males by making them responsible for their children and by imposing on boys the need to develop the bourgeois habits of self-discipline and work that make them attractive mates.”

    Heather Mac Donald
  52. “My father did lots of things. He had an orange-juice factory. He did real estate. He did commercial selling. He was always up and about doing all sorts of weird and wonderful things and being adventurous. I always admired his self-discipline. He was very good at getting everything done. He was very tidy.”

    John Torode
  53. “Playing football helped me to gain self-discipline, confidence, negotiation skills, teamwork and leadership.”

    Marcel Desailly
  54. “I played football for 19 years… Football gave me self-discipline, motivation and heart.”

    Matt Mitrione

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