Top 723 Quotes & Sayings by William James
Explore popular quotes and sayings by an American philosopher William James.
Last updated on September 16, 2024.
There is but one cause of human failure. And that is man's lack of faith in his true Self.
If you care enough for a result, you will most certainly attain it.
Acceptance of what has happened is the first step to overcoming the consequences of any misfortune.
There is no more miserable human being than one in whom nothing is habitual but indecision.
Most people never run far enough on their first wind to find out they've got a second.
The greatest weapon against stress is our ability to choose one thought over another.
The sway of alcohol over mankind is unquestionably due to its power to stimulate the mystical faculties of human nature, usually crushed to earth by the cold facts and dry criticisms of the sober hour.
Belief creates the actual fact.
Faith means belief in something concerning which doubt is theoretically possible.
Could the young but realize how soon they will become mere walking bundles of habits, they would give more heed to their conduct while in the plastic state.
Human beings can alter their lives by altering their attitudes of mind.
The greatest use of a life is to spend it on something that will outlast it.
The community stagnates without the impulse of the individual. The impulse dies away without the sympathy of the community.
This life is worth living, we can say, since it is what we make it.
Man can alter his life by altering his thinking.
We are all ready to be savage in some cause. The difference between a good man and a bad one is the choice of the cause.
A chain is no stronger than its weakest link, and life is after all a chain.
Why should we think upon things that are lovely? Because thinking determines life. It is a common habit to blame life upon the environment. Environment modifies life but does not govern life. The soul is stronger than its surroundings.
Action may not bring happiness but there is no happiness without action.
We don't laugh because we're happy - we're happy because we laugh.
Action seems to follow feeling, but really action and feeling go together; and by regulating the action, which is under the more direct control of the will, we can indirectly regulate the feeling, which is not.
To be a real philosopher all that is necessary is to hate some one else's type of thinking.
Pessimism leads to weakness, optimism to power.
The deepest principle in human nature is the craving to be appreciated.
I don't sing because I'm happy; I'm happy because I sing.
Act as if what you do makes a difference. It does.
To study the abnormal is the best way of understanding the normal.
Nothing is so fatiguing as the eternal hanging on of an uncompleted task.
A great many people think they are thinking when they are merely rearranging their prejudices.
To be radical, an empiricism must neither admit into its constructions any element that is not directly experienced, nor exclude from them any element that is directly experienced.
Success or failure depends more upon attitude than upon capacity successful men act as though they have accomplished or are enjoying something. Soon it becomes a reality. Act, look, feel successful, conduct yourself accordingly, and you will be amazed at the positive results.
If you want a quality, act as if you already had it.
It is wrong always, everywhere, and for everyone, to believe anything upon insufficient evidence.
Our normal waking consciousness, rational consciousness as we call it, is but one special type of consciousness, whilst all about it, parted from it by the filmiest of screens, there lie potential forms of consciousness entirely different.
The world we see that seems so insane is the result of a belief system that is not working. To perceive the world differently, we must be willing to change our belief system, let the past slip away, expand our sense of now, and dissolve the fear in our minds.
Every man who possibly can should force himself to a holiday of a full month in a year, whether he feels like taking it or not.
If you believe that feeling bad or worrying long enough will change a past or future event, then you are residing on another planet with a different reality system.
Truth is what works.
Genius... means little more than the faculty of perceiving in an unhabitual way.
We have to live today by what truth we can get today and be ready tomorrow to call it falsehood.
The greatest enemy of any one of our truths may be the rest of our truths.
Truth lives, in fact, for the most part on a credit system. Our thoughts and beliefs pass, so long as nothing challenges them, just as bank-notes pass so long as nobody refuses them.
The sovereign cure for worry is prayer.
Believe that life is worth living and your belief will help create the fact.
It is our attitude at the beginning of a difficult task which, more than anything else, will affect its successful outcome.
The art of being wise is the art of knowing what to overlook.
Is life worth living? It all depends on the liver.
Let everything you do be done as if it makes a difference.
Do something everyday for no other reason than you would rather not do it, so that when the hour of dire need draws nigh, it may find you not unnerved and untrained to stand the test.
Whenever you're in conflict with someone, there is one factor that can make the difference between damaging your relationship and deepening it. That factor is attitude.
Time itself comes in drops.
Be willing to have it so. Acceptance of what has happened is the first step to overcoming the consequences of any misfortune.
The aim of a college education is to teach you to know a good man when you see one.
To change ones life: Start immediately. Do it flamboyantly.
A man has as many social selves as there are individuals who recognize him.
The greatest discovery of my generation is that a human being can alter his life by altering his attitudes.
When you have to make a choice and don't make it, that is in itself a choice.
There is an organic affinity between joyousness and tenderness, and their companionship in the saintly life need in no way occasion surprise.
Begin to be now what you will be hereafter.
The world is all the richer for having a devil in it, so long as we keep our foot upon his neck.
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