Growing up I didn’t watch movies.

When it comes down to it, glam rock was all very amusing. At the time, it was funny, then a few years later it became sort of serious-looking and a bit foreboding.

I’m no longer just a candidate. I’m the President. I know what it means to send young Americans into battle, for I have held in my arms the mothers and fathers of those who didn’t return. I’ve shared the pain of families who’ve lost their homes, and the frustration of workers who’ve lost their jobs.

Sitting idle at home is the most painful experience for a footballer.

I’m not talent. Not considered ‚talent‘ by Lifetime. I’d like to say I’m their savior, but that would be cocky.

There are three kinds of men. The one that learns by reading. The few who learn by observation. The rest of them have to pee on the electric fence for themselves.

Instead of being concerned that you have no office, be concerned to think how you may fit yourself for office. Instead of being concerned that you are not known, seek to be worthy of being known.

Context and memory play powerful roles in all the truly great meals in one’s life.

It is only imperfection that complains of what is imperfect. The more perfect we are the more gentle and quiet we become towards the defects of others.

And so you touch this limit, something happens and you suddenly can go a little bit further. With your mind power, your determination, your instinct, and the experience as well, you can fly very high.

It is a common enough case, that of a man being suddenly captivated by a woman nearly the opposite of his ideal.

Find people who will make you better.

Imperfection clings to a person, and if they wait till they are brushed off entirely, they would spin for ever on their axis, advancing nowhere.

I’m going to be so much better a president for having been at the CIA that you’re not going to believe it.

If you go to work on your goals, your goals will go to work on you. If you go to work on your plan, your plan will go to work on you. Whatever good things we build end up building us.

A man of genius has been seldom ruined but by himself.

It’s like a muscle – if you stop going to the gym or stop running, you get weak. The military teaches you these great values, but we don’t keep up the discipline on our own, and we lose it. So wherever you go, keep that discipline up.

Acting is the perfect idiot’s profession.

My parents weren’t actors or studio executives.

The aim of a college education is to teach you to know a good man when you see one.

In order for me to be successful… In order to be a great artist – musician, actor, painter, whatever – you must be able to be private in public at all times. That is what we do.

It is what a man thinks of himself that really determines his fate.

One of the things I realized is that if you do not take control over your time and your life, other people will gobble it up. If you don’t prioritize yourself, you constantly start falling lower and lower on your list, your kids fall lower and lower on your list.

Be smarter than other people, just don’t tell them so.

Writers are a little below clowns and a little above trained seals.

This was life in the ’30s. This is the way it was with children in the South. I tried to make it general, the kind of things that might happen to any child.

I have goals.

He who controls others may be powerful, but he who has mastered himself is mightier still.

Before you start a goal – let’s take care of our insecurities because they are going to surface when you put yourself in the crucible and you’re suffering.

If a man neglects education, he walks lame to the end of his life.

We believe that every single child has boundless promise, no matter who they are, where they come from, or how much money their parents have. We’ve got to remember that. We believe that each of these young people is a vital part of the great American story.

The Four Levels of Comedy: Make your friends laugh, Make strangers laugh, Get paid to make strangers laugh, and Make people talk like you because it’s so much fun.

Life is a succession of lessons which must be lived to be understood. All is riddle, and the key to a riddle is another riddle.

I was always taught not to answer no questions. I’m not really good at answering them because I get agitated so fast.

As much as I love the Western genre, I figured if I kept doing those, I’d eventually run out of steam on that, and that would’ve been the end of it.

Take time to gather up the past so that you will be able to draw from your experience and invest them in the future.

A day wasted on others is not wasted on one’s self.

We have to wake up. We have to refuse to be a clone.

I break ground. I trailblaze.

The simple act of paying attention can take you a long way.

It’s a great, great experience to finally get the reception that you know you rightfully deserve.

I do believe in self-help.

Only stupid people are changed by success.

Resistance to the organized mass can be effected only by the man who is as well organized in his individuality as the mass itself.

It is my own firm belief that the strength of the soul grows in proportion as you subdue the flesh.

Whenever you do a thing, act as if all the world were watching.

Pop is totally results-oriented and there is a very strong feedback loop.

It is after all the greatest art to limit and isolate oneself.

From my childhood I had been intended for the clergy. This prospect hung like a dark cloud on my mind.

If you young fellows were wise, the devil couldn’t do anything to you, but since you aren’t wise, you need us who are old.

Character is higher than intellect. A great soul will be strong to live as well as think.

I really like children to watch my movies.

Man, I really like Vegas.

We participate in a tragedy; at a comedy we only look.

And obviously, from our own personal point of view, the principal challenge is a personal challenge.

The question is not, ‚Do you have a problem?‘ The question is, ‚Does the problem have you?‘

‚Unforgiven‘ is probably an example of a script that I liked right away but thought, ‚This is great, but I’d like to do this when I’m older.‘ So I stuck it in the drawer for ten years and then took it out.

To remain a credible leader, I must always work first, hardest, and longest on changing myself. This is neither easy nor natural, but it is essential.

When I was 50 years old, I actually decided to draw up a list of half a dozen things that I really hadn’t done very well, and I was going to make efforts to improve. One of them was skiing, and I really did become a very much better skier.

If you realize all the time what’s kind of wonderful – that is, if we expand our experience into wilder and wilder regions of experience – every once in a while, we have these integrations when everything’s pulled together into a unification, in which it turns out to be simpler than it looked before.

Bring your desires down to your present means. Increase them only when your increased means permit.