What follows is a compilation of quotes on work, quotes that are attributed to people from Aristotle to Zig Ziglar, including Larry Bird, Confucius, Einstein, Emerson, Gandhi, Gibran, Steve Jobs, Martin Luther King, Margaret Thatcher, and Sam Walton.  The quotations are grouped according to themes: Loving Your Work, Recognition, Purpose, When Work Seems Hard, and Work/Life Balance.

A quote is like a verbal Rohrschach test: your response to a given quotation is unique to you. If any of these quotations “grabs” you, please stop, savor that saying, and let it sink in. It’s meaningful to you in some way and for some reason. In reflecting more deeply on it, you may discover more about yourself.

Loving Your Work

Pleasure in the job puts perfection in the work.  Aristotle

The only way to do great work is to love what you do. Steve Jobs

Find something you love to do, and you’ll never have to work a day in your life.  Harvey Mackay; Confucius

Work is love made visible.  Khalil Gibran

Recognition

Workers have three prime needs: Interesting work, recognition for doing a good job, and being let in on things that are going on in the company.   Zig Ziglar

Appreciate everything your associates do for the business. Nothing else can quite substitute for a few well-chosen, well-timed, sincere words of praise. They’re absolutely free and worth a fortune.  Sam Walton

Without ambition one starts nothing. Without work one finishes nothing. The prize will not be sent to you. You have to win it.  Ralph Waldo Emerson

Purpose

Don’t try to be a man of success, try to be a man of value.  Albert Einstein

No work is insignificant. All labor that uplifts humanity has dignity and importance and should be undertaken with painstaking excellence.  Martin Luther King, Jr.

The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the service of others.  Mahatma Gandhi

When Work Seems Hard

I do not know anyone who has got to the top without hard work. That is the recipe. It will not always get you to the top, but it should get you pretty near.  Margaret Thatcher

I’ve got a theory that if you give 100 percent all of the time, somehow things will work out in the end. Larry Bird

A hundred times every day, I remind myself that my inner and outer life depend on the labors of other men, living and dead, and that I must exert myself in order to give in the same measure as I have received and am still receiving.  Albert Einstein

Work/Life Balance

And one last selected quotation, perhaps the earliest one recorded that relates to work/life balance:

You have six days to labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath for the Lord your God. Deuteronomy 5: 13, 14

Happy Labor Day, readers!