Drawing is the artist's most direct and spontaneous expression, a species of writing: it reveals, better than does painting, his true personality.
Edgar DegasRead
You must aim high, not in what you are going to do at some future date, but in what you are going to make yourself do to-day. Otherwise, working is just a waste of time.
Interpretation
Set your ambitions high and focus on your daily actions to achieve them, rather than just waiting for the future.
This quote by Edgar Degas emphasizes the importance of not just having lofty goals for the future, but actively working on self-improvement and taking meaningful actions in the present. It suggests that without this focus on daily efforts, any work done becomes futile, as the true essence of success lies in what we accomplish today rather than what we plan for tomorrow.
In practice
Using this quote in a motivational speech to encourage employees to focus on daily goals.
Drawing is the artist's most direct and spontaneous expression, a species of writing: it reveals, better than does painting, his true personality.
No art is less spontaneous than mine. What I do is the result of reflection and the study of the great masters.
Everyone has talent at twenty-five. The difficulty is to have it at fifty.
It is all very well to copy what one sees, but it is far better to draw what one now only sees in one's memory. That is a transformation in which imagination collaborates with memory.
The Dance instills in you something that sets you apart. Something heroic and remote.
You have to have a high conception, not of what you are doing, but of what you may do one day: without that, there's no point in working.
Your personal power is not something that is going to reveal itself at some later date. Your power is a result of your decision to reveal it. You are powerful in whatever moment you choose to be.
Don't give up. Don't lose hope. Don't sell out.
However difficult life may seem, there is always something you can do and succeed at.
It's lack of faith that makes people afraid of meeting challenges, and I believed in myself.
Winning has nothing to do with racing. Most days don't have races anyway. Winning is about struggle and effort and optimism, and never, ever, ever giving up.
When you learn to keep fighting in the face of potential failure, it gives you a larger skill set to do what you want to do in life. It gives you vision. But you can't acquire it if you're afraid of keeping score.
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