I’ve recently had a few things happen that have changed my outlook on life.

First, I read The 4-Hour Workweek by Tim Ferriss, which deeply impacted how I want my life to be. I go into much more detail about my thoughts on this in my post, This Is Your Wake Up Call.

I also suffered an unexpected and tragic loss of a friend and coworker. The news of his passing hit me hard. Really hard. Not only because he was a great guy with a young family and a lot to live for, but because it made me put my own life in perspective. My frustration with my job and my unfulfilling lifestyle were instantly magnified 10 times over.

Here was a guy, only 7 years older than I am, who seemed to really enjoy his life. Now gone.

I spend my days constantly thinking of how “one day” I will be enjoying my life. “One day”, I will be living how I want to live. Well, what if “one day” never happens? Life is incredibly short. NOW is the time to enjoy life, not later.

I came incredibly close to quitting that day, but chose not to. Why? Fear. Fear that I wouldn’t be able to support my family. Fear that I would be forced to sell my home and have to rent some shitty apartment. Fear that I would be worse off than I am now.

Why do we let fear control how we live our lives?

After rationalizing my decision not to quit a hundred times in my head, I needed some inspiration to remind me of the importance of having freedom over our time and not taking any moments for granted. I had been compiling inspirational quotes for some time and now have the perfect reason to post them.

My Favorite “Live Life To The Fullest” Quotes

  1. “For the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and ask myself: “if today was the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?”  And whenever the answer has been “No” for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something. Almost everything–all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure–these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose.” ~Steve Jobs
  2. “When I stand before God at the end of my life, I would hope that I would not have a single bit of talent left, and could say, I used everything you gave me.” ~Erma Bombeck
  3. “Time is all you have and you may find one day that you have less than you think.”~Randy Pausch, The Last Lecture
  4. “Don’t ask yourself what the world needs; ask yourself what makes you come alive. And then go and do that. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.”~Harold Whitman
  5. “Life isn’t worth living unless you’re willing to take some big chances and go for broke.” ~Eliot Wiggington
  6. “What is the meaning of life? To be happy and useful.”~HH the Dalai Lama
  7. “Slow down and remember this: Most things make no difference.”~Tim Ferriss, The 4-Hour Workweek
  8. “Everything can be taken from a man but one thing; the last of the human freedoms—to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.”~Dr. Viktor Frankl
  9. “Let your life mean something. Become an inspiration to others so that they may try to do more and to become more than they are today.”~Thomas D. Willhite
  10. “Go confidently in the direction of your dreams. Live the life you have imagined.”~Henry David Thoreau
  11. “There are two components that are fundamental to enjoy life and feel good about yourself: continual learning and service.”~Tim Ferriss, The 4-Hour Workweek
  12. “Life is either a daring adventure or nothing at all”~Helen Keller
  13. “Its important to have specific dreams. Dream Big. Dream without fear.”~Randy Pausch, The Last Lecture
  14. “We must be willing to get rid of the life we’ve planned, so as to have the life that is waiting for us.”~Joseph Campbell
  15. “To live is the rarest thing in the world. Most people exist, that’s all”~Oscar Wilde
  16. “There are two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle.”~Albert Einstein
  17. “Start living now. Stop saving the good china for that special occasion. Stop withholding your love until that special person materializes. Every day you are alive is a special occasion. Every minute, every breath, is a gift from God.”~Mary Manin Morrissey
  18. “You don’t get to choose how you are going to die. Or when. You can only decide how you are going to live. Now.”~Joan Baez
  19. “The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man.”~George Bernard Shaw
  20. “Reality is negotiable.”~Tim Ferriss, The 4-Hour Workweek
  21. “He who has a why to live can bear almost any how.”~Friedrich Nietzsche
  22. “The purpose of life is a life of purpose.”~Robert Byrne
  23. “I shall pass through this life but once. Any good therefore that I can do, let me do it now. Let me not defer or neglect it. For I shall never pass this way again”~Etienne de Grellet
  24. “Men talk of killing time, while time quietly kills them.”~Dion Boucicault
  25. “Live every day as if it were your last and then some day you’ll be right.”~H.H. “Breaker” Morant
  26. “Make your life a mission – not an intermission.”~Arnold H. Glasgow
  27. “The key question to keep asking is, Are you spending your time on the right things? Because time is all you have.”~Randy Pausch, The Last Lecture
  28. “The miracle is not to walk on water. The miracle is to walk on the green earth, dwelling deeply in the present moment and feeling truly alive.”~Thich Nhat Hanh
  29. “Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one.”~Albert Einstein
  30. “Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away.”~Anonymous
  31. “There are a million ways to lose a work day, but not even a single way to get one back.”~Tom DeMarco and Timothy Lister
  32. “Go for it now. The future is promised to no one.”~Wayne Dyer
  33. “The fear of death follows from the fear of life.  A man who lives fully is prepared to die at any time.”~Mark Twain
  34. “Begin doing what you want to do now. We are not living in eternity. We have only this moment, sparkling like a star in our hand – and melting like a snow flake”~M.B. Ray
  35. “What man actually needs is not a tensionless state but rather the striving and struggling for some goal worthy of him. What he needs is not the discharge of tension at any cost, but the call of a potential meaning waiting to be fulfilled by him.”~Dr. Viktor Frankl
  36. “People say that what we are seeking is in for life. I don’t think this is what we’re really seeking. I think what we’re seeking is an experience of being alive.”~Joseph Campbell
  37. “A life without cause is a life without effect.”~Barbarella
  38. “The purpose of life is a life of purpose.”~Robert Byrne
  39. “You will never find time for anything.  If you want time you must make it.”~Charles Buxton
  40. “Dream as if you’ll live forever.  Live as if you’ll die today.”~James Dean
  41. “Don’t be fooled by the calendar.  There are only as many days in the year as you make use of.”~Charles Richards
  42. “Excitement is the more practical synonym for happiness, and it is precisely what you should strive to chase. It is the cure-all. When people suggest you follow your “passion” or your “bliss,” I propose that they are, in fact, referring to the same singular concept: excitement. This brings us full circle. The question you should be asking isn’t, “What do I want?” or “What are my goals?” but “What would excite me?”~Tim Ferriss, The 4-Hour Workweek
  43. “Here is the test to find whether your mission on earth is finished.  If you’re alive, it isn’t.”~Richard Bach
  44. “Live as if your were to die tomorrow. Learn as if you were to live forever.”~Mahatma Gandhi
  45. “You live longer once you realize that any time spent being unhappy is wasted.”~Ruth E. Renk
  46. “Every man dies. Not every man really lives.”~Braveheart
  47. “I don’t want to get to the end of my life and find that I lived just the length of it.  I want to have lived the width of it as well.”~Diane Ackerman
  48. “And in the end, it’s not the years in your life that count.  It’s the life in your years.”~Abraham Lincoln
  49. “Life is not lost by dying; life is lost minute by minute, day by dragging day, in all the thousand small uncaring ways.”~Stephen Vincent Benét
  50. “The tragedy of life is not so much what men suffer, but rather what they miss.”~Thomas Carlyle

Think About This…Really

I will leave you with a poem which I read in The 4-Hour Workweek. It was written by a young girl who was terminally ill at the time. I found it to be incredibly moving.

Have you ever watched kids
On a merry-go-round?

Or listened to the rain
Slapping on the ground?

Ever followed a butterfly’s erratic flight?
Or gazed at the sun into the fading night?

You’d better slow down.
Don’t dance so fast.

Time is short.
The music won’t last.

”Do you run through each day
On the fly?”

When you ask “How are you?”
Do you hear the reply?

When the day is done
Do you lie in your bed

With the next hundred chores
Running through your head?

You’d better slow down.
Don’t dance so fast.

Time is short.
The music won’t last.

Ever told your child,
We’ll do it tomorrow?

And in your haste,
Not see his sorrow?

Ever lost touch,
Let a good friendship die

Cause you never had time
To call and say “Hi”?

You’d better slow down.
Don’t dance so fast.

Time is short.
The music won’t last.

When you run so fast to get somewhere
You miss half the fun of getting there.

When you worry and hurry through your day,
It is like an unopened gift….Thrown away.

Life is not a race.
Do take it slower

Hear the music
Before the song is over.

 

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Do you have a favorite “live life to the fullest” quote? Share it in the comments!

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