Reward Quotes

“I am a humanist, which means, in part, that I have tried to behave decently without expectations of rewards or punishments after I am dead.”
― Kurt Vonnegut

“You need to spend time crawling alone through shadows to truly appreciate what it is to stand in the sun.”
― Shaun Hick

“You have the right to work, but never to the fruit of work. You should never engage in action for the sake of reward, nor should you long for inaction. Perform work in this world, Arjuna, as a man established within himself - without selfish attachments, and alike in success and defeat.”
― Anonymous, The Bhagavad Gita

“I still encourage anyone who feels at all compelled to write to do so. I just try to warn people who hope to get published that publication is not all it is cracked up to be. But writing is. Writing has so much to give, so much to teach, so many surprises. That thing you had to force yourself to do---the actual act of writing---turns out to be the best part. It's like discovering that while you thought you needed the tea ceremony for the caffeine, what you really needed was the tea ceremony. The act of writing turns out to be its own reward.”
― Anne Lamott

“Each time a person passes by you and you say 'hello', imagine that person turning into a candle. The more positivity, love and light you reflect, the more light is mirrored your way. Sharing beautiful hellos is the quickest way to earn spiritual brownie points. You should start seeing hellos as small declarations of faith. Every time you say hello to a stranger, your heart acknowledges over and over again that we are all family.”
― Suzy Kassem, Rise Up and Salute the Sun: The Writings of Suzy Kassem

“It may be possible for each to think too much of his own potential glory hereafter; it is hardly possible for him to think too often or too deeply about that of his neighbor. The load, or weight, or burden of my neighbor's glory should be laid daily on my back, a load so heavy that only humility can carry it, and the backs of the proud will be broken. ...

"It is in light of these overwhelming possibilities, it is with the awe and the circumspection proper to them, that we should conduct all our dealings with one another, all friendships, all loves, all play, all politics. There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilizations -- these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub and exploit. ... Next to the Blessed Sacrament itself, your neighbor is the holiest object presented to your senses.”
― C.S. Lewis, The Weight of Glory

“Life isn't as magical here, and you're not the only one who feels like you don't belong, or that it's better somewhere else. But there ARE things worth living for. And the best part is you never know what's going to happen next.”
― O.R. Melling, The Summer King

“The end is not the reward; the path you take, the emotions that course through you as you grasp life - that is the reward.”
― Jamie Magee, Embody

“All those who love Nature she loves in return, and will richly reward, not perhaps with the good things, as they are commonly called, but with the best things of this world-not with money and titles, horses and carriages, but with bright and happy thoughts, contentment and peace of mind.”
― John Lubbock

“I'm not interested in absolute moral judgments. Just think of what it means to be a good man or a bad one. What, after all, is the measure of difference? The good guy may be 65 per cent good and 35 per cent bad—that's a very good guy. The average decent fellow might be 54 per cent good, 46 per cent bad—and the average mean spirit is the reverse. So say I'm 60 per cent bad and 40 per cent good—for that, must I suffer eternal punishment?

"Heaven and Hell make no sense if the majority of humans are a complex mixture of good and evil. There's no reason to receive a reward if you're 57/43—why sit around forever in an elevated version of Club Med? That's almost impossible to contemplate.”
― Norman Mailer, On God: An Uncommon Conversation

“The reward of a work is to have produced it; the reward of effort is to have grown by it.”
― Antonin Sertillanges, The Intellectual Life: Its Spirit, Conditions, Methods

“The reward is in the risk.”
― Rachel Cohn, Dash & Lily's Book of Dares

“There are people who prefer to say 'yes' and there are people who prefer to say 'no'. Those who say 'yes' are rewarded by the adventures they have. Those who say 'no' are rewarded by the safety they attain.”
― Keith Johnstone

“Hard work should be rewarded by good food.”
― Ken Follett, The Pillars of the Earth

“And he writhed inside at what seemed the cruelty and unfairness of the demand. He had not yet learned that if you do one good deed your reward usually is to do another and harder and better one.”
― C.S. Lewis (The Horse and His Boy)

“I have not yet lost a feeling of wonder, and of delight, that this delicate motion should reside in all the things around us, revealing itself only to him who looks for it. I remember, in the winter of our first experiments, just seven years ago, looking on snow with new eyes. There the snow lay around my doorstep — great heaps of protons quietly precessing in the earth's magnetic field. To see the world for a moment as something rich and strange is the private reward of many a discovery.”
― Edward M. Purcell

“‎Determination, effort, and practice are rewarded with success.”
― Mary Lydon Simonsen, The Perfect Bride for Mr. Darcy

“True happiness is not found in any other reward than that of being united with God. If I seek some other reward besides God Himself, I may get my reward but I cannot be happy.”
― Thomas Merton, No Man Is an Island

“Good times are a reminder and a reward for dealing with the difficult and challenging times we all go through. The trick is to celebrate the good times in advance of the difficult times. Always remember, good times await you after the difficult times pass….”
― James A. Murphy, The Waves of Life Quotes and Daily Meditations

“Apathy is a trap. There is no challenge... so there is no reward. Remember, there is always free cheese in a mousetrap.”
― Steve Maraboli

“Birth is painful and delightful. Death is painful and delightful. Everything that ends is also the beginning of something else. Pain is not a punishment; pleasure is not a reward.”
― Pema Chödrön, When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times

“Systemic processes tend to reward people for making decisions that turn out to be right—creating great resentment among the anointed, who feel themselves entitled to rewards for being articulate, politically active, and morally fervent.”
― Thomas Sowell, The Vision of the Anointed: Self-Congratulation as a Basis for Social Policy

“Persistence and determination are always rewarded.”
― Christine Rice

“As the sun shines I will make hay
To keep failure at bay
For there remaineth a pay
For my honest toil each day.”
― Ogwo David Emenike

“[T]hrough bitter experience I have learned that it is best to promise little and then to reward hard work with generosity.”
― Tahir Shah, In Search of King Solomon's Mines

“no matter how little it might seem, if you are doing it for the Lord and you are doing it with a pure heart, it is not a waste of time”
― Sunday Adelaja

“Shown her how life could reward the places where you least exerted effort, while denying what you desired and worked so ardently toward most.”
― Kathy Wang, Family Trust

“After all the years, after everything that you'd had to endure, after everything that you'd undertaken, however good or bad, long after you'd given up all hope, the reward.”
― Marlene Van Niekerk, Agaat

“Some folks are first in line to demand rewards, but last in line to earn them.”
― Frank Sonnenberg, BECOME: Unleash the Power of Moral Character and Be Proud of the Life You Choose

“Guy Speer called it cocaine brain. Neuroscientists have found that the prospect of making money stimulates the same primitive reward circuits in the brain that cocaine does…”
― Atul Gawande, The Checklist Manifesto: How to Get Things Right