85 Perfection Quotes to Inspire Excellence

These practice and perfection quotes will encourage you to strive for greatness.

It’s not realistic to ever be perfect, but always striving to do your best will help you achieve greatness. This collection of the best inspirational quotes will encourage you to be the most perfect version of yourself possible.

How do you reach your goals while on your quest for perfection?

When you believe in yourself, it’s possible to reach even your wildest dreams. These perfection and excellence quotes will motivate you to work hard and surpass everyone’s expectations.

When you’re working on a passion project and following your heart, you may be determined to achieve perfection. However, it is important not to let the idea of perfection stop you from getting the work done.

These progress over perfection quotes will remind you that trying your best is the most important factor in achieving success. Read this list of perfection quotes whenever you need inspiration.

Perfection quotes to inspire excellence

1. “Perfection is not attainable, but if we chase perfection we can catch excellence.” – Vince Lombardi

2. “Have no fear of perfection – you’ll never reach it.” – Salvador Dali

3. “Strive for continuous improvement, instead of perfection.” – Kim Collins

4. “Perfection is impossible; just strive to do your best.” – Angela Watson

5. “Success is the result of perfection, hard work, learning from failure, loyalty, and persistence.” – Colin Powell

6. “The man with insight enough to admit his limitations comes nearest to perfection.” – Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

7. “Imperfection and perfection go so hand in hand, and our dark and our light are so intertwined, that by trying to push the darkness or the so-called negative aspects of our life to the side… we are preventing ourselves from the fullness of life.” – Jeff Bridges

8. “Perfection is achieved, not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away.” – Antoine de Saint-Exupery

9. “The pursuit of perfection often impedes improvement.” – George Will

10. “I don’t believe in perfection. I don’t think there is such a thing. But the energy of wanting things to be great is a perfectionist energy.” – Reese Witherspoon

Perfection quotes to inspire you to improve yourself

11. “I am careful not to confuse excellence with perfection. Excellence I can reach for; perfection is God’s business.” – Michael J. Fox

12. “The artist who aims at perfection in everything achieves it in nothing.” – Eugene Delacroix

13. “Imperfection is perfection.” – Flume

14. “Everyone is comparing lives on social media and wants the perfect body, perfect image, perfect outfit, perfect life – we’re striving for this perfection, and it’s so unhealthy because there’s no such thing as perfection.” – Emily Atack
If you’re enjoying these quotes, you’ll love our collection of thought-provoking social media quotes.

15. “Perfection has to do with the end product, but excellence has to do with the process.” – Jerry Moran

16. “Aim at perfection in everything, though in most things it is unattainable. However, they who aim at it, and persevere, will come much nearer to it than those whose laziness and despondency make them give it up as unattainable.” – Philip Stanhope

17. “The perfection of art is to conceal art.” – Quintilian

18. “You are loved just for being who you are, just for existing. You don’t have to do anything to earn it. Your shortcomings, your lack of self-esteem, physical perfection, or social and economic success – none of that matters. No one can take this love away from you, and it will always be here.” – Ram Dass

If you’re enjoying these quotes, make sure to read our collection of Ram Dass quotes about the power of meditation.

19. “Style is the perfection of a point of view.” – Richard Eberhart

20. “I think the perfection of love is that it’s not perfect.” – Taylor Swift

Perfection quotes to inspire you to do your best

21. “We curate our lives around this perceived sense of perfection because we get rewarded in these short term signals: Hearts, likes, thumbs up. We conflate that with value, and we conflate it with truth, and instead, what it really is is fake, brittle popularity that’s short term and leaves you even more vacant and empty before you did it.” – Chamath Palihapitiya

22. “If I waited for perfection… I would never write a word.” – Margaret Atwood (see more Margaret Atwood quotes)

23. “Perfection is impossible, but you don’t stop aiming for it.” – Saquon Barkley

24. “Spirituality is not a formula; it is not a test. It is a relationship. Spirituality is not about competency; it is about intimacy. Spirituality is not about perfection; it is about connection. The way of the spiritual life begins where we are now in the mess of our lives.” – Mike Yaconelli

25. “This is the very perfection of a man, to find out his own imperfections.” – Saint Augustine

26. “The true work of art is but a shadow of the divine perfection.” – Michelangelo

27. “I don’t love Photoshop; I like imperfection. It doesn’t mean ugly. I love a girl with a gap between her teeth, versus perfect white veneers. Perfection is just… boring. Perfect is what’s natural or real; that is beauty.” – Marc Jacobs
If you’re enjoying these quotes, make sure to read our collection of imperfection quotes about embracing your flaws.

28. “Every particular in nature, a leaf, a drop, a crystal, a moment of time is related to the whole, and partakes of the perfection of the whole.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson

29. “Pleasure in the job puts perfection in the work.” – Aristotle

30. “I’ve seen the majestic beauty of nature and the overwhelming perfection of it. To me, there’s nothing closer to God than that.” – Cote de Pablo

Perfection quotes to help you reach your goals

31. “Perfection to me is, I walk away from a situation and say, ‘I did everything I could do right there. There was nothing more that I could do.’ I was a hundred percent, like the meter was at the top. There was nothing else I could have done. You know? Like, I worked as hard as I possibly could have. That’s perfection.” – Drake

32. “The principal mark of genius is not perfection but originality, the opening of new frontiers.” – Arthur Koestler

33. “Perfection doesn’t exist.” – Andres Iniesta

34. “We never taste happiness in perfection, our most fortunate successes are mixed with sadness.” – Pierre Corneille

35. “I am no longer concerned with sensation and innovation, but with the perfection of my style.” – Yves Saint Laurent

36. “Perfection itself is imperfection.” –  Vladimir Horowitz

37. “March on. Do not tarry. To go forward is to move toward perfection. March on, and fear not the thorns, or the sharp stones on life’s path.” – Khalil Gibran

38. “Perfection is boring. If a face doesn’t have mistakes, it’s nothing.” – Kevyn Aucoin

39. “It’s not about finding relevance or perfection or imperfection in objects, but it’s that you can accept yourself and then go out and accept others.” – Jeff Koons

40. “A minute of perfection was worth the effort. A moment was the most you could ever expect from perfection.” – Chuck Palahniuk

Insightful perfection quotes

41. “Redemption is not perfection. The redeemed must realize their imperfections.” – John Piper

42. “The pursuit of perfection, then, is the pursuit of sweetness and light.” – Matthew Arnold

43. “Perfectionism rarely begets perfection, or satisfaction – only disappointment.” – Ryan Holiday

44. “Practice means to perform, over and over again in the face of all obstacles, some act of vision, of faith, of desire. Practice is a means of inviting the perfection desired.” – Martha Graham

45. “Perfection is attained by slow degrees; it requires the hand of time.” – Voltaire

46. “I am not a perfectionist. Perfection doesn’t exist in real life. It’s a wrong title for me.” – Aamir Khan

47. “I gave up my struggle with perfection a long time ago. That is a concept I don’t find very interesting anymore. Everyone just wants to look good in the photographs. I think that is where some of the pressure comes from. Be happy. Be yourself, the day is about a lot more.” – Anne Hathaway

48. “The essence of being human is that one does not seek perfection.” – George Orwell

49. “People throw away what they could have by insisting on perfection, which they cannot have, and looking for it where they will never find it.” – Edith Schaeffer

50. “Looking for perfection is the only way to motivate yourself.” – Ronnie O’Sullivan

Other perfection quotes and sayings

51. “If you look for perfection, you’ll never be content.” – Leo Tolstoy

52. “Done is better than perfect.” – Sheryl Sandberg

53. “It’s not about perfection; it’s about the joy of striving.” – Thomas Keller

54. “No one is perfect. It’s not interesting to be perfect.” – Lindsay Lohan

55. “Perfection consists not in doing extraordinary things, but in doing ordinary things extraordinarily well.” – Marie Angelique Arnauld

56. “Producing perfection from imperfection is, after all, the highest of art forms.” – Frank Herbert

57. “I think perfection is ugly. Somewhere in the things humans make, I want to see scars, failure, disorder, distortion.” – Yohji Yamamoto

58. “Nobody’s perfect. We’re all just one step up from the beasts and one step down from the angels.” – Jeannette Walls

59. “Better to do something imperfectly than to do nothing perfectly.” – Robert H. Schuller

60. “A certain type of perfection can only be realized through a limitless accumulation of the imperfect.” – Haruki Murakami

61. “You know how you’re always trying to get things to come out perfect in art because it’s real difficult in life.”― Woody Allen

62. “True perfection has to be imperfect. I know that sounds foolish, but it’s true.”― Noel Gallagher

63. “Don’t worry about getting perfect, just keep getting better.”― Frank Peretti

64. “To appreciate life’s small moments, it helps to have a sense the whole can never be made perfect.”― Alain de Botton

65. “The only skill that cannot be perfected is perfection itself.”― Daphne Delacroix

Perfection quotes about love and what it means to people

66. “I’m chasing perfection.” — Kobe Bryant

67. “Love is the bond of perfection.” — John Winthrop

68. “It is through art, and through art only, that we can realize our perfection.” — Oscar Wilde

69. “I probably do have an obsessive personality, but striving for perfection has served me well.” — Tom Ford

70. “Confusion of goals and perfection of means seems, in my opinion, to characterize our age.” — Albert Einstein

71. “Life is a moving, breathing thing. We have to be willing to constantly evolve. Perfection is constant transformation.” — Nia Peeples

72. “I think what makes people fascinating is conflict, it’s drama, it’s the human condition. Nobody wants to watch perfection.” — Nicolas Cage

73. “To feel much for others and little for ourselves; to restrain our selfishness and exercise our benevolent affections, constitute the perfection of human nature.” — Adam Smith

74. “You’re not looking for perfection in your partner. Perfection is all about the ego. With soulmate love, you know that true love is what happens when disappointment sets in – and you’re willing to deal maturely with these disappointments.” — Karen Salmansohn

75. “There would be no need for love if perfection were possible. Love arises from our imperfection, from our being different and always in need of the forgiveness, encouragement and that missing half of ourselves that we are searching for, as the Greek myth tells us, in order to complete ourselves.” — Eugene Kennedy

Perfection quotes to help you progress in life

76. “When you stop expecting people to be perfect, you can like them for who they are.” ― Donald Miller

77. “Imperfection facilitates improvement, perfection facilitates stagnation.” ― Abhijit Naskar

78. “A small step of progression is a thousand times better than a delayed step of perfection. Perfectionism procrastinates and paralyzes progress.” ― Tony Warrick

79. “Few good friends, one great partner, and something I love to do every day, that’s the idea of my little perfect life.” ― Sarvesh Jain

80. “The wise strive for their best. The foolish strive for perfection.” ― Mokokoma Mokhonoana

81. “Perfection is not a destination; it’s a never-ending process…Enjoy!” ― Jim Bouchard

82. “Perfectionism means that you try not to leave so much mess to clean up. But clutter and mess show us that life is being lived.” ― Anne Lamott

83. “Perfect should never be a goal. Perfect just happens if you let it.” ― Wendy Wunder

84. “There is desire in the perfect, beauty in the imperfect. Thus I lust over the flawless, and fall amorously forceless to the flawed.” ― Ilyas Kassam

85. “A pursuit for perfection is the most leading cause of procrastination in artists.” ― Neeraj Agnihotri

What are your favorite progress over perfection quotes to inspire you to work your hardest?

Perfection is an admirable goal, but the most important thing to remember is to always try your best. These quest for perfection quotes will motivate you to always put forth your greatest effort.

At the end of the day, striving for perfection will help you achieve excellence. Focusing on flaws will only bring you unhappiness and anxiety. Once you accept that imperfection into your life, you will become successful and satisfied.

Is perfection possible to achieve? This collection of perfection quotes will make you rethink your perspective on success and greatness. The only way to reach your goals is to accept your limitations and set realistic expectations for yourself.

What are your favorite excellence and perfection quotes that inspire you to chase your dreams? Let us know in the comment section below.