Simulated disorder postulates perfect discipline; simulated fear postulates courage; simulated weakness postulates strength.

It was the experience of mystery – even if mixed with fear – that engendered religion.

There is moderation even in excess.

It is better to be feared than loved, if you cannot be both.

It’s in the difficult times that we’re growing and you can’t just rebuke everything hard. We’ve got to endure it and fight the good fight of faith and pass the test.

Obedience brings success; exact obedience brings miracles.

Human beings are the only animals of which I am thoroughly and cravenly afraid.

Most people dream a dream when they are asleep. But to be a writer, you have to dream while you are awake, intentionally. So I get up early in the morning, 4 o’clock, and I sit at my desk and what I do is just dream. After three or four hours, that’s enough. In the afternoon, I run. The next day, the dream will continue.

I’m not afraid of death, but I’m in no hurry to die. I have so much I want to do first.

No evil propensity of the human heart is so powerful that it may not be subdued by discipline.

The paradox of courage is that a man must be a little careless of his life even in order to keep it.

That man is not truly brave who is afraid either to seem or to be, when it suits him, a coward.

Discipline starts every day when the first alarm clock goes off in the morning. I say ‚first alarm clock‘ because I have three, as I was taught by one of the most feared and respected instructors in SEAL training: one electric, one battery powered, one windup.

In seeking comfort, we generally find a quiet corner in life where there is a minimum of conflict, and then we are afraid to step out of that seclusion.

The first duty of man is to conquer fear; he must get rid of it, he cannot act till then.

A good indignation brings out all one’s powers.

Courtesy is as much a mark of a gentleman as courage.

To see what is right and not to do it is want of courage, or of principle.

Tyranny or slavery, born of selfishness, are the two educational methods of parents; all gradations of tyranny or slavery.

An oppressive government is more to be feared than a tiger.

Returning to your family and where you came from, and your history… this is what makes you strong. It’s not looking out that’s going to do that – it’s looking in.

I do not fear computers. I fear the lack of them.

People are terrified of me, and I want them to be.

My father was a mean, controlling and manipulative person for most of his life. He was unpredictable and unstable. As a result, the atmosphere of our home was super-charged with fear because you never knew if what you did would make him mad or not.

No man is worth his salt who is not ready at all times to risk his well-being, to risk his body, to risk his life, in a great cause.

You should never view your challenges as a disadvantage. Instead, it’s important for you to understand that your experience facing and overcoming adversity is actually one of your biggest advantages.

Both old and young alike ought to seek wisdom: the former in order that, as age comes over him, he may be young in good things because of the grace of what has been, and the latter in order that, while he is young, he may at the same time be old, because he has no fear of the things which are to come.

Courage is the price that life exacts for granting peace.

Engineering didn’t take to me. And what saved me and kept me in college was I ran into ROTC cadets who were in a fraternity called The Pershing Rifles. And I found my place. I found discipline. I found structure. I found people that were like me and I liked.

But even the President of the United States sometimes must have to stand naked.

It is vain for the coward to flee; death follows close behind; it is only by defying it that the brave escape.

Without discipline, there’s no life at all.

Real courage is when you know you’re licked before you begin, but you begin anyway and see it through no matter what.

Whoever won’t fight when the President calls him, deserves to be kicked back in his hole and kept there.

Success is due to our stretching to the challenges of life. Failure comes when we shrink from them.

Do you really think it is weakness that yields to temptation? I tell you that there are terrible temptations which it requires strength, strength and courage to yield to.

Most of us experience a life full of wonderful moments and difficult moments. But for many of us, even when we are most joyful, there is fear behind our joy.

Dread, which is closely related to fear, steals the ability to enjoy ordinary life and makes people anxious about the future. It keeps them from looking forward to the next day, the next month, or the next decade.

We simply attempt to be fearful when others are greedy and to be greedy only when others are fearful.

Believers, look up – take courage. The angels are nearer than you think.

Waking up early was the first example I noticed in the SEAL Teams in which discipline was really the difference between being good and being exceptional.

There are those who believe Black people possess the secret of joy and that it is this that will sustain them through any spiritual or moral or physical devastation.

Human kindness has never weakened the stamina or softened the fiber of a free people. A nation does not have to be cruel to be tough.

I know how to swim through backlash. I can tread water through backlash… If anything, that’s all giving me power.

We fear that this moment will end, that we won’t get what we need, that we will lose what we love, or that we will not be safe. Often, our biggest fear is the knowledge that one day our bodies will cease functioning. So even when we are surrounded by all the conditions for happiness, our joy is not complete.

My mother fought cancer for almost a decade and died at 56. She held out long enough to meet the first of her grandchildren and to hold them in her arms. But my other children will never have the chance to know her and experience how loving and gracious she was.

I’m going to get an MRI to find out whether I have claustrophobia.

Having a child, that’s always been my biggest fear. I want a child and I fear a child.

Weak eyes are fondest of glittering objects.

Sometimes even to live is an act of courage.

The financial crisis should not become an excuse to raise taxes, which would only undermine the economic growth required to regain our strength.

How few there are who have courage enough to own their faults, or resolution enough to mend them.

When individual members of the team are highly disciplined, they can be trusted and, therefore, allowed to operate with very little oversight.

It is only through labor and painful effort, by grim energy and resolute courage, that we move on to better things.

Paranoia is just another word for ignorance.

I pass my life in preventing the storm from blowing down the tent, and I drive in the pegs as fast as they are pulled up.

The finest steel has to go through the hottest fire.

Happiness doesn’t come from being rich, nor merely from being successful in your career, nor by self-indulgence. One step towards happiness is to make yourself healthy and strong while you are a boy so that you can be useful and so you can enjoy life when you are a man.

If I wished to do something, even if I couldn’t find anyone who wanted to make the effort with me, I would go out solo climbing. I did find solo climbing very challenging and a little frightening. You knew that you were completely on your own, and you had to overcome all the problems and possible dangers.

The size of your success is measured by the strength of your desire; the size of your dream; and how you handle disappointment along the way.

For every disciplined effort there is a multiple reward.