27 Quotes to Inspire Your Career Change

It isn't easy to change your career. When you've spent years working toward one goal, only to get there and realize that it isn't what you thought it would be, the easiest thing to do is to keep at it and hope it gets better, or to trick yourself into believing that career fulfillment is impractical—maybe even a myth. Making the choice to seize control over your career path requires a leap of faith. It requires you to say to yourself, I don't know that this will work, but I do know that what I'm doing now is not working. So, I'm going try.

We've compiled a list of our favorite inspirational quotes about career change to help you find the courage to pursue a career you love.[bctt tweet="27 Inspirational #Quotes About Going After a Job You Love, by @zimmerbugg #careerchange"]

1) The most difficult thing is the decision to act, the rest is merely tenacity.

—Amelia Earhart

2) We cannot change what we are not aware of, and once we are aware, we cannot help but change.

― Sheryl Sandberg

3) In a chronically leaking boat, energy devoted to changing vessels is more productive than energy devoted to patching leaks.

—Warren Buffett

4) Our finest moments are most likely to occur when we are feeling deeply uncomfortable, unhappy, or unfulfilled. For it is only in such moments, propelled by our discomfort, that we are likely to step out of our ruts and start searching for different ways or truer answers.

—M. Scott Peck

5) The future depends on what you do today.

—Mahatma Gandhi

6) I am not a product of my circumstances. I am a product of my decisions.

—Stephen Covey

7) Why do they always teach us that it's easy and evil to do what we want and that we need discipline to restrain ourselves? It's the hardest thing in the world--to do what we want. And it takes the greatest kind of courage. I mean, what we really want.

― Ayn Rand

8) The only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven't found it yet, keep looking. Don't settle.

—Steve Jobs

9) Fear, uncertainty and discomfort are your compasses toward growth.

—Celestine Chua

10) It is never too late to be what you might have been.

—George Eliot

11) I've learned that "making a living" is not the same thing as "making a life"

― Maya Angelou

12) There is no passion to be found in playing small—in settling for a life that is less than you are capable of living.

—Nelson Mandela

13) Man cannot discover new oceans unless he has the courage to lose sight of the shore.

—Andre Gide

14) There is only one way to avoid criticism: Do nothing, say nothing, and be nothing.

—Aristotle

15) A mind that is stretched by new experiences can never go back to its old dimensions.

—Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

16) If it scares you, it might be a good thing to try.

—Seth Godin

17) When the grass looks greener on the other side of the fence, it may be that they take better care of it there.

—Cecil Selig

18) The best way to predict the future is to create it.

—Abraham Lincoln

19) I want to look back on my career and be proud of the work, and be proud that I tried everything.

—Jon Stewart

20) Motivation is a fire from within. If someone else tries to light that fire under you, chances are it will burn very briefly.

—Stephen R. Covey

21) You miss 100 percent of the shots you never take.

—Wayne Gretzky

22) The best thing you can do is the right thing; the next best thing you can do is the wrong thing; the worst thing you can do is nothing.

—Theodore Roosevelt

23) If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?

—Steve Jobs

24) When one door closes another opens but all too often there is a long hallway in between.

―Rick Jarow

25) A man can succeed at almost anything for which he has unlimited enthusiasm.

—Charles Schwab

26) It is not as much about who you used to be, as it is about who you choose to be.

―Sanhita Baruah

27) Insist on yourself. Never imitate.

—Ralph Waldo Emerson

Photo credit: katelynleblanc via Flickr cc