John Wooden Quotes

303 John Wooden Quotes

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Ability may get you to the top, but it takes character to stay there.
John Wooden

If you’re not making mistakes, you’re not doing anything.
John Wooden

Don’t mistake activity for achievement.
John Wooden

Discipline yourself and others won’t need to.
John Wooden

The main ingredient of stardom is the rest of the team.
John Wooden

When you’re through learning, you’re through.
When you are through learning, you are through.
John Wooden

The journey is better than the inn.
John Wooden

Do not let what you can’t do interfere with what you can do.
John Wooden

Failure to act is often the biggest failure of all.
John Wooden

Little things make big things happen.
John Wooden



The best way to improve the team is to improve yourself.
John Wooden

You are not a failure until you start blaming others for your mistakes.
John Wooden

The force of character is cumulative.
John Wooden

Nobody cares how much you know until they know how much you care.
John Wooden

“Love” is the greatest word in the English language. “Balance” is the second-greatest word.
John Wooden

A leader has one team, not “starters” and “substitutes.”
John Wooden

Failing to prepare is preparing to fail.
John Wooden

If you have done your job in preparing the team, the team is prepared to do its job in playing the game. So let them.
John Wooden

Be quick, but don’t hurry.
John Wooden

No written word nor spoken plea can teach your team what it should be.
John Wooden



Perfection of relevant details is silly to some, but it’s not funny to me.
John Wooden

The infection of success is often fatal.
John Wooden

More often than we ever suspect, the lives of others we do affect.
John Wooden

Define “normal” as “abnormally high.”
John Wooden

Play to win, but play fair.
John Wooden

The will to win means nothing without the will to work.
John Wooden

You cannot antagonize and influence at the same time.
John Wooden

Learn as if you were to live forever; live as if you were to die tomorrow.
John Wooden

Happiness begins where selfishness ends.
John Wooden

Fear is short-term; pride lasts.
John Wooden



There is no such thing as an overachiever.
John Wooden

Do not be vulnerable to praise or criticism from outsiders.
John Wooden

If you don’t have time to do it right, when will you have time to do it over?
John Wooden

I will get ready, and then, perhaps, my chance will come.
John Wooden

Be more interested in finding the best way, not in having it your way.
John Wooden

Make sure those under your supervision feel they are working with you, not for you.
John Wooden

Goals achieved with little effort are seldom worthwhile or long-lasting.
Goals achieved with little effort are seldom worthwhile or lasting.
John Wooden

Time spent getting even is best spent getting ahead.
Time spent getting even would be better spent trying to get ahead.
John Wooden

There is nothing stronger than gentleness.
John Wooden

Be slow to criticize. Be quick to commend.
Be slow to criticize and quick to commend.
John Wooden



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