Thoughts on work
People don’t choose their careers—they are engulfed by them. 
Office life typically proceeds behind a mask of shallow cheerfulness, leaving workers grievously unprepared to handle the fury and sadness continually aroused by their colleagues. Every man’s work, whether it be literature or music or pictures or architecture or anything else, is always a portrait of himself.
—Samuel Butler
Diligence is the mother of good fortune, and the goal of a good intention was never reached through its opposite, laziness.
This became a credo of mine: Attempt the impossible in order to improve your work.
All labour has dignity. 
One never notices what has been done; one can only see what remains to be done.—Marie Curie
The three most harmful addictions are heroin, carbohydrates and a monthly salary.
—Nassim Nicholas Taleb
How can I take an interest in my work when I don’t like it? A sluggard’s appetite is never filled, but the desires of the diligent are fully satisfied.
—Proverbs 13:4
Anyone can do any amount of work, provided it isn’t the work he is supposed to be doing at the moment.
The price one pays for pursuing any profession or calling is an intimate knowledge of its ugly side. I have found some of the best reasons I ever had for remaining at the bottom simply by looking at the men at the top.
—Frank Moore Colby
Fill today with work; fill tomorrow with hope.Images: Mondadori Portfolio/Getty Images; Ulf Andersen/Getty Images; Culture Club / Getty Images; Howard Sochurek / The Life Picture Collection / Getty Images; John Springer Collection / Corbis / Corbis/Getty Images; Peter Turnley / Corbis / Vcg Via Getty Images; Ann Ronan Pictures / Print Collector / Getty Images; John Kobal Foundation/Getty Images; Prisma / Uig/Getty Images;Wolverhampton City Council / Arts And Heritage / Alamy
(This story appears in the 30 November, -0001 issue of Forbes India. To visit our Archives, click here.)
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