Just some inspiring quotes about work and success to kickstart your week

It’s Monday, you’re looking down the barrel of another long week, and you need some super-human motivation to get you through the day. Forget coffee, consider the wise words of hard-working women as your Monday morning inspiration. They’re a happy reminder that good things come to those who work like crazy. These women are the movers and shakers who have achieved awesome things through unyielding hard work. There’s a reason you never hear success stories about people who had everything come easy to them — they don’t exist. So from Beyoncé to Michelle Obama to Lena Dunham, I present to you some inspirational quotes from women who have busted their behinds to make their dreams come true.

1. Lucille Ball “Luck? I don’t know anything about luck. I’ve never banked on it and I’m afraid of people who do. Luck to me is something else: Hard work — and realizing what is opportunity and what isn’t.”

2. Beyoncé

“Power means happiness; power means hard work and sacrifice.”

3. Margaret Thatcher  “I do not know anyone who has got to the top without hard work. That is the recipe. It will not always get you to the top, but should get you pretty near.”

4. Zooey Deschanel “Nothing has ever come easy for me, and I think that’s a really good thing. I learned at an early age that you have to work hard for what you get.” 

5. Taylor Swift “My parents raised me to never feel like I was entitled to success. That you have to work for it. You have to work so hard for it.”
6. Mindy Kaling

“I just want ambitious teenagers to know it is totally fine to be quiet, observant kids. Besides being a delight to your parents, you will find you have plenty of time later to catch up.” – 7. Ellen DeGeneres

“I work really hard at trying to see the big picture and not getting stuck in ego. I believe we’re all put on this planet for a purpose, and we all have a different purpose …When you connect with that love and that compassion, that’s when everything unfolds.”
8. Michelle Obama “You may not always have a comfortable life and you will not always be able to solve all of the world’s problems at once but don’t ever underestimate the importance you can have because history has shown us that courage can be contagious and hope can take on a life of its own.”

9. Diane Sawyer “Whatever you want in life, other people are going to want it too. Believe in yourself enough to accept the idea that you have an equal right to it.”

10. Coco Chanel “The most courageous act is still to think for yourself. Aloud.”

11. Tina Fey “This is what I tell young women who ask me for career advice. People are going to try to trick you. To make you feel that you are in competition with one another. ‘You’re up for a promotion. If they go for a woman, it’ll be between you and Barbara.’ Don’t be fooled. You’re not in competition with other women. You’re in competition with everyone.”

12. Amy Poehler “If you can sleep, breathe, work hard, wish for the best and do everything you can to prepare, I bet you’ll do well — as well as you can. And that’s all anybody can ask for.”
13. Lena Dunham “It’s interesting how we often can’t see the ways in which we are being strong — like, you can’t be aware of what you’re doing that’s tough and brave at the time that you’re doing it because if you knew that it was brave, then you’d be scared.” 14. Melinda Gates“A woman with a voice is by definition a strong woman. But the search to find that voice can be remarkably difficult.”
15. Ella Fitzgerald“Just don’t give up trying to do what you really want to do. Where there is love and inspiration, I don’t think you can go wrong.”
16. Gilda Radner “I wanted a perfect ending. Now I’ve learned, the hard way, that some poems don’t rhyme, and some stories don’t have a clear beginning, middle, and end. Life is about not knowing, having to change, taking the moment and making the best of it, without knowing what’s going to happen next. Delicious ambiguity.” (Images via here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here)