Quotes · Skopia

18 quotes

SortEditorial Year Length

Topic·Vocation✕clear

The test of a vocation is the love of the drudgery it involves.

Logan Pearsall Smith

1931

★ 6.9

Even if it falls your lot to be a street sweeper, go on out and sweep streets like Michelangelo painted pictures; sweep streets like Handel and Beethoven composed music; sweep streets like Shakespeare wrote poetry; (Go ahead) sweep streets so well that all the hosts of heaven and earth will have to pause and say, "Here lived a great street sweeper who swept his job well."

Martin Luther King, Jr.

1967

★ 5.4

Film · Crime (film) · Crime

As far back as I can remember, I always wanted to be a gangster.

Goodfellas · 1990

★ 4.6

Personal journal · Philosophical literature

Love the little trade which you have learned, and be content with it.

Marcus Aurelius

Meditations · 180

★ 4.0

We cannot all be friars, and many are the ways by which God leads his own to eternal life. Knight-errantry is religion.

Miguel de Cervantes

Don Quixote · 1615

★ 3.9

Let each man pass his days in that wherein his skill is greatest.

Sextus Propertius

Elegies (Sextus Propertius) · 24 BC

★ 3.8

Scripture · Religious literature

Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might; for there is no work, nor device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom, in the grave, whither thou goest.

Ecclesiastes 9:10

931 BC

★ 3.7

Film · Comedy (film) · Comedy

I wasn't like every other kid, you know, who dreams about being an astronaut, I was always more interested in what bark was made out of on a tree. Richard Gere's a real hero of mine. Sting. Sting would be another person who's a hero. The music he's created over the years, I don't really listen to it, but the fact that he's making it, I respect that. I care desperately about what I do. Do I know what product I'm selling? No. Do I know what I'm doing today? No. But I'm here, and I'm gonna give it my best shot.

Zoolander · 2001

★ 3.6

Speech · Commencement address

Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work, and the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven't found it yet, keep looking and don't settle. As with all matters of the heart, you'll know when you find it. And like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years go on.

2005

★ 3.6

For anyone trying to discern what to do with their life: pay attention to what you pay attention to.

Amy Krouse Rosenthal

2013

★ 3.5

Philosophical literature

Perfect freedom is reserved for the man who lives by his own work and in that work does what he wants to do.

R.G. Collingwood

1924

★ 3.5

Interview · Newspaper

It's just a job. Grass grows, birds fly, waves pound the sand. I beat people up.

1977

★ 2.1

Film · Crime drama · Thriller (film) · Crime · Thriller

When you decide to be something, you can be it. That's what they don't tell you in the church. When I was your age they would say we can become cops or criminals. Today, what I'm saying is this: when you're facing a loaded gun, what's the difference?

The Departed · 2006

★ 2.0

Novel · Coming of age story

You must find your dream, then the way becomes easy.

Demian · 1919

★ 1.9

Autobiography and memoir

Everyone has his own specific vocation or mission in life; everyone must carry out a concrete assignment that demands fulfillment. Therein he cannot be replaced, nor can his life be repeated, thus, everyone's task is unique as his specific opportunity to implement it.

Man's Search for Meaning · 1946

★ 1.9

I don't paint out of responsibility. I paint out of need.

2010

★ 1.9

I am ill every time it blows hard, and nothing but my enthusiastic love for the profession keeps me one hour at sea.

1804

★ 1.1

If I would be a young man again and had to decide how to make my living, I would not try to become a scientist or scholar or teacher. I would rather choose to be a plumber or a peddler in the hope to find that modest degree of independence still available under present circumstances.

Albert Einstein

1954

★ 1.1