Martin Seligman Quotes

The final upshot of thinking is the exercise of volition, and of this thought no longer forms a part; but belief is only a stadium of mental action, an effect upon our nature due to thought, which will influence future thinking.

To make a deep mental path, we must think over and over the kind of thoughts we wish to dominate our lives.

If you think a certain thought long enough and hard enough, it becomes a fixed belief and you will find yourself behaving on the outside in a manner consistent with it.

In a cruel land, you either learned to laugh at cruelty or spent your life weeping.

There are many things in life over which you have no choice. But the greatest activity of life is well within your dominion. You can choose what you think about. You can be the air traffic controller of your mental airport. You occupy the control tower and can direct the mental traffic of your world. Thoughts circle above, coming and going. If one of them lands, it's because you gave it permission. If it leaves, it's because you directed it to do so. You can select your thought pattern.

The way you think either expresses or undermines faith.

The thoughts you choose to think and believe right now are creating your future. These thoughts form your experiences, tomorrow, next week, and next year.

A man is the sum of his misfortunes. One day you'd think misfortune would get tired but then time is your misfortune

We are what we think we are. The habitual inclination of our thoughts determines our talents and abilities, and our personality. So whatever you want to be, start to develop that pattern now.

If you believe something enough, it comes true eventually, and that's so true even with lies. If you tell yourself a lie, after a few years you'll think it's true.

Your manners will depend very much upon the quality of what you frequently think on; for the soul is as it were tinged with the colour and complexion of thought.

A belief system is nothing more than a thought you've thought over and over again.

What you think about expands. If your thoughts are centered on what's missing, then what's missing, by definition, will have to expand.

The ability to find meaning in the most difficult times, I think, is one of the most important skills of life.

Dialogue is a space where we may see the assumptions which lay beneath the surface of our thoughts, assumptions which drive us, assumptions around which we build organizations, create economies, form nations and religions. These assumptions become habitual, mental habits that drive us, confuse us and prevent our responding intelligently to the challenges we face every day.

To call out for the hand of the enemy is a rather extreme measure, yet a better one, I think, than to remain in continual fever over an accident that has no remedy. But since all the precautions that a man can take are full of uneasiness and uncertainty, it is better to prepare with fine assurance for the worst that can happen, and derive some consolation from the fact that we are not sure that it will happen.

Whatever a person frequently thinks and reflects on, that will become the inclination of their mind.

Hush, self, let me think.

Some of us say, "Lord knows how much I can bear". I think you can assume that you can bear more than you have a right to bear.

To one who is accustomed to thinking a lot, every new thought that he hears or reads about immediately appears as a link in a chain.

The level of achievement that we have at anything, is a reflection, of how well, we were able to focus on it. Because the only thing that's holding you back, is the way you're thinking.

I insist on a lot of time being spent, almost every day, to just sit and think. That is very uncommon in American business.

I don't think I have nerves of steel, far from it, but I can certainly stand up to things. I am not afraid to look suffering straight in the eyes.

Failure-it centers me. Too much success has me thinking, All right, what's goin' on?

It is your reaction to adversity, not the adversity itself, that determines how your life’s story will develop.