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Work Quotes

Quotes on the meaning of work.

Several quotes here describe work as a solitary process, one that takes real effort to protect from distraction, while others connect a person's politics directly to the character of their work. Related reading includes Growth Quotes.

Being in a room full of my art makes me incredibly nervous because the work always gets damaged when it's shown, and I hate my openings.

Quotes by Charles Ray

I do a lot of thinking about my work while I'm walking. More in the early morning when I'm trekking in the mountains. When I'm walking in the city, I think more about people around me - my brothers, my...

Quotes by Charles Ray

Work is rich. It can be looked at psychologically or philosophically or personally. The interpretive nature of work is different than the work itself. The interpretation of work isn't the key to understanding it. I'm worried about making a good...

Quotes by Charles Ray

I don't buy art just to make artists happy any more than I want to make them sad if I sell their work.

Quotes by Charles Saatchi

I hate to sound like a romantic adolescent, but I believe artists don't generally see art as a career choice; they simply can't overcome their desire to make art, and will live on little income for as long as they...

Quotes by Charles Saatchi

Few people in contemporary art demonstrate much curiosity. The majority spend their days blathering on, rather than trying to work out why one artist is more interesting than another, or why one picture works and another doesn't.

Quotes by Charles Saatchi

I've heard that almost all the people crowding around the big art openings barely look at the work on display and are just there to hobnob. Nothing wrong with that, except that none of them ever come back to look...

Quotes by Charles Saatchi

To my mind, the best investment a young man starting out in business can possibly make is to give all his time, all his energies, to work - just plain, hard work.

Quotes by Charles M. Schwab

When I first went to work... I had over me an impetuous, hustling man. It was necessary for me to be up to the top notch to give satisfaction. I worked faster than I otherwise would have done, and to...

Quotes by Charles M. Schwab

I find my greatest happiness in thinking of those days in Homestead when I labored to bring a thing to perfection entirely by myself. In the evenings, I would go into the hills and look down on my work, and...

Quotes by Charles M. Schwab

A concern that produces its own raw materials, and works them up through the various processes until it delivers the manufactured product in the domestic or foreign market, can work on a narrower margin all around, and yet do full...

Quotes by Charles M. Schwab

I'm making better than two million a year, but it's hard work. The luxuries and pleasures I enjoy in my spare time keep me in condition to do that work. Carnegie and Frick have more money than I have, but...

Quotes by Charles M. Schwab

Fundamentally, the basis of all modern progress is the efficiency of labor. And the only sure road to restored prosperity is through the thrift and hard work of our people as a whole.

Quotes by Charles M. Schwab

I mention the need of cooperation and confidence among the men who work, no matter what may be their relative ranks, because it is the vital factor underlying everything. Only as we are willing to work today, work as we...

Quotes by Charles M. Schwab

He who has mingled in the fray of duty that the brave endure, must have made foes. If you have none, small is the work that you have done.

Quotes by Charles Mackay

As an old man who remembers the intellectual exhilaration and the pleasure of having done good work that characterized the CIA when it was young, I wonder if it might not be better to speak and think in terms of...

Quotes by Charles McCarry

I've consciously tried not to romanticize anything, especially not intelligence work. I've always said that I've been writing a series of episodic, naturalistic novels. The people just happen to be spies, politicians, civil servants.

Quotes by Charles McCarry

I used to work for the Clippers - I sold tickets - so I was in the Staples Center all the time. I'm a big Clippers fan.

Quotes by Charles Michael Davis

I want the new upper class to start preaching what it practices. They are getting married and staying married in large numbers. They work like crazy, long hours. They even do better going to church than lots of the rest...

Quotes by Charles Murray

We have a new lower class that's large and growing that has fallen away from a lot of the basic core behaviors and institutions that made America work, and we have a new upper class that's increasingly isolated from and...

Quotes by Charles Murray

Frequently Asked Questions

What kind of quotes are on the "Work" page?
These lean toward the thoughtful side of work — the idea that "intellectual work is essentially a lonely process," the belief that one's politics and "the character of his particular work are inseparable," and an image of people unwinding after work all over the world talking about life's bigger questions.
Is there a spiritual angle to any of these?
While these particular quotes are secular, if you're looking for a spiritual perspective on work, see Prayers for that theme.
Do these quotes connect work to personal identity?
Yes, one of the strongest lines here argues that your politics and "the character of his particular work are inseparable" — the idea that what you do reflects who you are. If that resonates, Growth quotes explore a similar idea of work shaping the person.
Is there anything here about effort or persistence?
These specific quotes focus more on the nature and meaning of work than on effort itself, but Effort quotes cover that ground directly.
What about setting goals through work?
For that angle, Goal quotes is the better fit — the "Work" page here is more about the character and process of working itself.

There's also a lighter side - people unwinding after work to talk through life's bigger questions over drinks. See Effort Quotes and Goal Quotes for more on getting things done.