I mean, when you grow up in the inner city and you grow up in a single-parent household, that’s – those are humbling times, you know?

We learned about gratitude and humility – that so many people had a hand in our success, from the teachers who inspired us to the janitors who kept our school clean… and we were taught to value everyone’s contribution and treat everyone with respect.

Any of us can be happy and have a good attitude when everything is going our way. But I believe it’s the real test of your character and of your faith to say, ‚Things are not going our way, but I’m still being good to people; I’m still attending church; I still have a good attitude.‘

It is better to lead from behind and to put others in front, especially when you celebrate victory when nice things occur. You take the front line when there is danger. Then people will appreciate your leadership.

Anyone who wants to be pope doesn’t care much for themselves, God doesn’t bless them. I didn’t want to be pope.

My dad had a church of 90 people when I was born. It was just, over the years it continued to grow.

I claim to be a simple individual liable to err like any other fellow mortal. I own, however, that I have humility enough to confess my errors and to retrace my steps.

Adversity has ever been considered the state in which a man most easily becomes acquainted with himself.

I know that I’m not the easiest person to live with. The challenge I put on myself is so great that the person I live with feels himself challenged. I bring a lot to bear, and I don’t know how not to.

Writing is challenging work because it’s so easy to get consumed with how it’s going, what’s going to happen to it, who’s going to like or not like it. You want to get all of that stuff out of your head and just let the work flow.

Think not that humility is weakness; it shall supply the marrow of strength to thy bones. Stoop and conquer; bow thyself and become invincible.

Humility is the solid foundation of all virtues.

Character is formed in the stormy billows of the world.

Whenever I’m around some who is modest, I think, ‚Run like hell and all of fire.‘ You don’t want modesty, you want humility.

I mean… in life… what relationship is easy?

There is an innocence in admiration; it is found in those to whom it has never yet occurred that they, too, might be admired some day.

The first test of a truly great man is his humility. By humility I don’t mean doubt of his powers or hesitation in speaking his opinion, but merely an understanding of the relationship of what he can say and what he can do.

The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing.

The only thing I have to go by is what my mother and father told me, how I was brought up.

My faith was tested like Job. That’s the message I try to tell other people: just because you believe in God, serve God, feed the hungry, clothe the naked, people gotta realize, it don’t mean things not gonna happen to you.

I don’t think I could think of a single thing that’s more isolating than being famous.

I was sure I’d set the world on fire, and it was hard for a young feller like me to realize the truth – that I hadn’t set the world on fire, and I was totally unprepared to handle the consequences if ‚The Big Trail‘ had been a success and launched me as a star.

Just because I managed to do a little something, I don’t want anyone back home to think I got the big head.

Marriage is like putting your hand into a bag of snakes in the hope of pulling out an eel.

Fondly we think we honor merit then, When we but praise ourselves in other men.

He that humbleth himself wishes to be exalted.

Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick. Don’t lose faith.

I don’t look at a man who’s expert in one area as a specialist. I look at him as a rookie in ten other areas.

I am not some goddess that dropped down from the sky to sing pop music; I am not some extra-incredible human person that needs to be told how wonderful they are all day and kissed.

I feel like the way I was raised was to be able to see through all the titles in this world – from religion to race.

It’s hard to improve public education – that’s clear.

Being a full human being is difficult, frightening, and problematical.

Being brought up very religious, I have a fear of people that look to idol gods.

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

In inner-city, low-income communities of color, there’s such a high correlation in terms of educational quality and success.

Just as we develop our physical muscles through overcoming opposition – such as lifting weights – we develop our character muscles by overcoming challenges and adversity.

To realize that you do not understand is a virtue; Not to realize that you do not understand is a defect.

We all knew this. We all knew that it would take more time than any of us want to dig ourselves out of this hole created by this economic crisis.

My life is a struggle.

I grew up in a very nice house in Houston, went to private school all my life and I’ve never even been to the ‚hood. Not that there’s anything wrong with the ‚hood.

All these walls that keep us from loving each other as one family or one race – racism, religion, where we grew up, whatever, class, socioeconomic – what makes us be so selfish and prideful, what keeps us from wanting to help the next man, what makes us be so focused on a personal legacy as opposed to the entire legacy of a race.

I grew up in a funny way.

I went through a lot of battles in high school.

I’m just like you – I want to be a good human being. I’m doing my best, and I’m working at it. And I’m trying to be a Christian. I’m always amazed when people walk up to me and say, ‚I’m a Christian.‘ I always think, ‚Already? You’ve already got it?‘ I’m working at it. And at my age, I’ll still be working at it at 96.

Optimism comes less easily today, not because democracy is less vigorous, but because democracy’s enemies have refined their instruments of repression.

So let’s be honest with ourselves and not take ourselves too serious, and never condemn the other fellow for doing what we are doing every day, only in a different way.

Trials teach us what we are; they dig up the soil, and let us see what we are made of.

It is unwise to be too sure of one’s own wisdom. It is healthy to be reminded that the strongest might weaken and the wisest might err.

A gem cannot be polished without friction, nor a man perfected without trials.

That’s correct, I flunked out of high school twice because I couldn’t write.

My mother would kill me if I posed nude! My mother raised me with certain standards.

I’m honest enough to say I don’t know everything. You know, I don’t. I don’t understand all of God. I don’t understand, you know, some kind of why bad things happen.

Mr. Attlee is a very modest man. Indeed he has a lot to be modest about.

Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark.

I definitely don’t plead guilty to being a heartthrob.

Boot camp sucks – SEAL training sucks – but you know what? That’s what makes you good.

I wish every American had an opportunity to sit down, to go to a base, to meet with families, to meet with service members, to sit down with our veterans – because we would think differently about our challenges as individuals.

I was a housewife, so I learned to write in times off, and I don’t think I ever gave it up, though there were times when I was very discouraged because I began to see that the stories I was writing were not very good, that I had a lot to learn, and that it was a much, much harder job than I had expected.

I never get too high on my stardom or what I can do.

Showing off is the fool’s idea of glory.

Being president is like being a jackass in a hailstorm. There’s nothing to do but to stand there and take it.