I was away last week attending board meetings in Colorado and taking a few days off, after spending the prior week at the ABA Litigation Section Annual Conference in Chicago.  One of the things I’ve been looking forward to upon my return is the chance to take a class in coaching techniques for inspiring peak performance.  So far I’m loving this course, especially since it has included some of my all-time favorite quotes:

“Go confidently in the direction of your dreams.  Live the life you have always imagined.”

“We are what we repeatedly do.  Excellence, then, is not an act but a habit.”  

“Dreams come true when desire transforms them into concrete action.  Ask life for great gifts and you encourage life to deliver them to you.”  

Can you match the person with their quotation?  These gems come from Aristotle, Napoleon Hill, and Henry David Thoreau.  Unfortunately, these quotes from the coaching course are lacking gender balance, so here’s one I like that I’m adding from Anna Freud:

“I was always looking outside myself for strength and confidence, but it comes from within.  It is there all the time.”