William J. H. Boetcker Quotes

The secret to being a writer is that you have to write. It's not enough to think about writing or to study literature or plan a future life as an author. You really have to lock yourself away, alone, and get to work.

He who does not work shall not eat

When people say they are looking for happiness, I ask, What are you giving to the world?

Because I believe in my ... proud citizen of this country should be doing. And that is to try and put in as much as he takes out. I guess it's to the hard knocks of life that I attribute this conclusion.

None but those who work are entitled to eat.

I don't think I ever owned twenty pencils at one time. Wearing down seven number-two pencils is a good day's work.

Your rewards, all the years of your life, will be in precise proportion to your service. You are here to serve others, just as they serve you.

Your rewards in life are in direct proportion to your service

Work is the keystone of a perfect life. Work and trust in God.

I think the work ethic that was established in my family was something very important. If you plant the seed, if you sow sparingly and reap sparingly. If you sow in abundance you'll reap in abundance.

My prescription for writer's block is to face the fact that there is no such thing.... Writing well is difficult, but one can always write something. And then, with a lot of work, make it better. It's a question of having enough will and ambition, not of hoping to evade this mysterious hysteria people are always talking about.

If you're going to undertake any project, like a book, you have to show up to give.

A man's whole life is taxed for the least thing well done. It is its net result.

It's important to work hard - there's no short cut around that.

The real payoff is the writing itself, that a day when you have gotten your work done is a good day, that total dedication is the point.

I think self-esteem comes from work.

In the ordinary business of life, industry can do anything which genius can do, and very many things which it cannot.

It is when you have done your work honestly, when you have contributed your share to the common fund that you begin to live.

The one who doesn't pull his weight is not asked to pull, while the one who does, pulls for two.

You cannot continue to succeed in the world or have a fulfilling life in the world unless you choose to use your life in the service somehow to others and give back what you have been given. That's how you keep it. That's how you get it. That's how you grow it.

You were created to add to life on earth, not just take from it. God wants you to give something back.

Don't loaf and invite inspiration; light out after it with a club, and if you don't get it you will nonetheless get something that looks remarkably like it.

There's a phrase, "sitzfleisch", which means just plain sitting on your ass and getting it done. Just showing up for work. My uncle Raphael was a painter, and he used to say, "If the muse is late for work, start without her". You have to be there. You have to be there, and do it, and grind it out, even when it is grinding and you know you're probably going to rewrite all this tomorrow.

Make yourself necessary to the world, and mankind will give you bread.

There are, broadly speaking, two kinds of workers in the world, the people who do all the work, and the people who think they do all the work. The latter class is generally the busiest, the former never have time to be busy.