At the age of six I wanted to be a cook. At seven I wanted to be Napoleon. And my ambition has been growing steadily ever since.

Part of the issue of achievement is to be able to set realistic goals, but that’s one of the hardest things to do because you don’t always know exactly where you’re going, and you shouldn’t.

The best government is that which teaches us to govern ourselves.

We are certainly not to relinquish the evidence of experiments for the sake of dreams and vain fictions of our own devising; nor are we to recede from the analogy of Nature, which is wont to be simple and always consonant to itself.

Eventually you get to this point where you understand what you want to do and get across and sound like.

No one has a right to consume happiness without producing it.

Each life is made up of mistakes and learning, waiting and growing, practicing patience and being persistent.

The most important thing is to try and inspire people so that they can be great in whatever they want to do.

Often, in the real world, it’s not the smart that get ahead but the bold.

As a young kid, I really wanted to be rich.

At some point, you grow out of being attracted to that flame that burns you over and over and over again.

You have to dream intentionally. Most people dream a dream when they are asleep. But to be a writer, you have to dream while you are awake, intentionally.

I was 18 years old, and it was a dream come true for me to work out and eat great food for free. What else do you want in life? People think that is what it is like to be in a SEAL team, but it is less than a fraction of your career as a real SEAL.

Education is the ability to listen to almost anything without losing your temper or your self-confidence.

I already am a product.

I love to see a young girl go out and grab the world by the lapels.

Character cannot be developed in ease and quiet. Only through experience of trial and suffering can the soul be strengthened, ambition inspired, and success achieved.

Perhaps one day I will go into space.

I have short goals – to get better every day, to help my teammates every day – but my only ultimate goal is to win an NBA championship. It’s all that matters. I dream about it. I dream about it all the time, how it would look, how it would feel. It would be so amazing.

The nobler a man, the harder it is for him to suspect inferiority in others.

I just enjoy it, I am living a life that I never even dreamt of.

If you can build a business up big enough, it’s respectable.

Check your ego at the door. The ego can be the great success inhibitor. It can kill opportunities, and it can kill success.

I’m always disappointed when people don’t live up to their potential. I know that a number of people look down on themselves and consequently on everybody who looks like them. But that, too, can change.

I dream of painting and then I paint my dream.

The wish to acquire more is admittedly a very natural and common thing; and when men succeed in this they are always praised rather than condemned. But when they lack the ability to do so and yet want to acquire more at all costs, they deserve condemnation for their mistakes.

But for me to have the opportunity to stand in front of a bunch of executives and present myself, I had to hustle in my own way. I can’t tell you how frustrating it was that they didn’t get that. No joke – I’d leave meetings crying all the time.

Never confuse motion with action.

If you want to achieve something, you build the basis for it.

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.

There are 309 million people out there that are trying to improve their lot in life. And we’ve got a system that allows them to do it.

Maybe some people can wake up and play PlayStation all day, but that’s never been me.

To improve is to change; to be perfect is to change often.

The essence of philosophy is that a man should so live that his happiness shall depend as little as possible on external things.

I like the dreams of the future better than the history of the past.

Instead, I have an abundance mentality: When people are genuinely happy at the successes of others, the pie gets larger.

Whatever you dwell on in the conscious grows in your experience.

Don’t be dependent. At all. Ever. Period.

No man is free who is not master of himself.

Anything you’re good at contributes to happiness.

Every thought you produce, anything you say, any action you do, it bears your signature.

I resolved to stop accumulating and begin the infinitely more serious and difficult task of wise distribution.

I want to appeal to everyone. Because I’m not saying I’m the best, but we the best.

If man makes himself a worm he must not complain when he is trodden on.

Be above it! Make the world serve your purpose, but do not serve it.

In order to fulfill the aspirations of masses, we have to sharpen the tool called the government machinery: we have to make it keen, more dynamic, and it is in this direction that we are working.

Learning to live for others isn’t something that just comes naturally to anybody. You have to train yourself to do it.

We are taught you must blame your father, your sisters, your brothers, the school, the teachers – but never blame yourself. It’s never your fault. But it’s always your fault, because if you wanted to change you’re the one who has got to change.

I think a role model is a mentor – someone you see on a daily basis, and you learn from them.

Those who intend on becoming great should love neither themselves nor their own things, but only what is just, whether it happens to be done by themselves or others.

Basically you have to suppress your own ambitions in order to be who you need to be.

It is not God’s will merely that we should be happy, but that we should make ourselves happy.

Stupidity and human incompetence are the great evils, not ambition and glory.

A man is but the product of his thoughts, what he thinks he becomes.

Mastering others is strength. Mastering yourself is true power.

It is more difficult to rule yourself than to rule a city.

I suppose my best attribute, if you want to call it that, is sincerity. I can sell sincerity because that’s the way I am.

I think your values are always influenced by your family and your community.

The harder I work, the luckier I become.

An elusive, enigmatic aura will make people want to know more, drawing them into your circle. Create such a power by hinting at something contradictory within you.

Education comes from within; you get it by struggle and effort and thought.