Gary W. Keller Quotes

When we know something that needs to be done but isn’t currently getting done, we often say, “I just need more discipline.” Actually, we need the habit of doing it. And we need just enough discipline to build the habit.

It’s not enough to be busy, so are the ants. The question is, what are we busy about?

Where I’d had huge success, I had narrowed my concentration to one thing, and where my success varied, my focus had too.

The truth is that things don’t matter equally and success is found in doing what matters most.

In one study, elite violinists had separated themselves from all others by each accumulating more than 10,000 hours of practice by age 20. Thus the rule. Many elite performers complete their journey in about ten years, which, if you do the math, is an average of about three hours of deliberate practice a day, every day, 365 days a year. Now, if your ONE Thing relates to work and you put in 250 workdays a year (five days a week for 50 weeks), to keep pace on your mastery journey you’ll need to average four hours a day. Sound familiar? It’s not a random number. That’s the amount of time you need to time block every day for your ONE Thing. More than anything else, expertise tracks with hours invested. Michelangelo once said, “If the people knew how hard I had to work to gain my mastery, it wouldn’t seem wonderful at all.” His point is obvious. Time on a task, over time, eventually beats talent every time. I’d say you can “book that,” but actually you should “block it.

Here’s what I found out: We overthink, overplan, and overanalyze our careers, our businesses, and our lives; that long hours are neither virtuous nor healthy; and that we usually succeed in spite of most of what we do, not because of it.

Knocking out a hundred tasks for whatever the reason is a poor substitute for doing even one task that’s meaningful.

It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble. It’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so.” — Mark Twain

Lily Tomlin once said, “The road to success is always under construction.

Multitasking is merely the opportunity to screw up more than one thing at a time.

You do the right thing and then you do the next right thing. Over time it adds up, and the geometric potential of success is unleashed.

Multitasking is a scam.

Equality is a lie. Understanding this is the basis of all great decisions.

It is those who concentrate on but one thing at a time who advance in this world.” — Og Mandino

When you argue for your limitations, you get to keep them.