Someone is sitting in the shade today because someone planted a tree a long time ago.

Show me someone who has done something worthwhile, and I’ll show you someone who has overcome adversity.

When we do the best that we can, we never know what miracle is wrought in our life, or in the life of another.

When one door closes, another opens; but we often look so long and so regretfully upon the closed door that we do not see the one which has opened for us.

Kitty Wells was the first and only Queen of Country Music, no matter what they call the rest of us. She was a great inspiration to me as well as every other female singer in the country music business. In addition to being a wonderful asset to country music, she was a wonderful woman.

If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where they should be. Now put the foundations under them.

I’d rather learn from one bird how to sing than teach ten thousand stars how not to dance.

I will be conquered; I will not capitulate.

I am not afraid of saying something and going and pursuing it. That’s it. I see it in my mind. I say it out loud. I go and do it.

No great genius has ever existed without some touch of madness.

Be not simply good – be good for something.

All ballplayers should quit when it starts to feel as if all the baselines run uphill.

As your career grows, the list of things that makes you happy should not become smaller, it should become bigger.

I don’t want no handouts. I want to get it out the mud.

The imagination imitates. It is the critical spirit that creates.

A word of encouragement from a teacher to a child can change a life. A word of encouragement from a spouse can save a marriage. A word of encouragement from a leader can inspire a person to reach her potential.

Two out of every five people on Earth today owe their lives to the higher crop outputs that fertilizer has made possible.

Whoever is winning at the moment will always seem to be invincible.

Never be afraid to trust an unknown future to a known God.

There’s no one way to be creative. Any old way will work.

Don’t work for recognition, but do work worthy of recognition.

There are basically two types of people. People who accomplish things, and people who claim to have accomplished things. The first group is less crowded.

Our main business is not to see what lies dimly at a distance, but to do what lies clearly at hand.

My mother had a saying: ‚Kamala, you may be the first to do many things, but make sure you’re not the last.‘

Since I was old enough to understand what a songwriter/producer is, I’ve had a curiosity about how Max Martin creates what he creates. I wanted to see that happen. I wanted to be there. I wanted to learn from him.

I firmly believe that unless one has tasted the bitter pill of failure, one cannot aspire enough for success.

A rooster crows only when it sees the light. Put him in the dark and he’ll never crow. I have seen the light and I’m crowing.

I think New York has evolved in my work just the way the city has.

No one was ever great without some portion of divine inspiration.

If you think in terms of a year, plant a seed; if in terms of ten years, plant trees; if in terms of 100 years, teach the people.

You can write a song about being in love with someone, but you don’t have to be in love with anyone.

Do not think of your faults, still less of other’s faults; look for what is good and strong, and try to imitate it. Your faults will drop off, like dead leaves, when their time comes.

Anything you really want, you can attain, if you really go after it.

Fight with a happy heart.

I just kind of wake up with a new idea and new dreams every day, and I follow that dream, as they say.

One man with courage is a majority.

To have done anything just for money is to have been truly idle.

My kind of composing is more like the work of a gardener. The gardener takes his seeds and scatters them, knowing what he is planting but not quite what will grow where and when – and he won’t necessarily be able to reproduce it again afterwards either.

If we’re really honest with ourselves, most of us will admit that we want to impress people, and this is what’s causing us to do what we do.

The mind is the limit. As long as the mind can envision the fact that you can do something, you can do it, as long as you really believe 100 percent.

Today, we’re very dependent on cheap energy. We just take it for granted – all the things you have in the house, the way industry works.

Never confuse a single defeat with a final defeat.

And you find as a writer there are certain spots on the planet where you write better than others, and I believe in that. And New Orleans is one of them.

Don’t be afraid to give your best to what seemingly are small jobs. Every time you conquer one it makes you that much stronger. If you do the little jobs well, the big ones will tend to take care of themselves.

I’m chasing perfection.

I never worry about action, but only inaction.

If you’re not failing every now and again, it’s a sign you’re not doing anything very innovative.

I can’t do nothing just a little.

It is not enough to conquer; one must learn to seduce.

I shall never be ashamed of citing a bad author if the line is good.

The man who has no imagination has no wings.

I’m just going to say it: I’m pro-guilt. Guilt is good. Guilt helps us stay on track because it’s about our behavior. It occurs when we compare something we’ve done – or failed to do – with our personal values.

We work to become, not to acquire.

Anything that encourages people to pick up an instrument and play, I’m fully behind.

Competition is a sin.

Every strike brings me closer to the next home run.

It’s not worth doing something unless you were doing something that someone, somewere, would much rather you weren’t doing.

Life doesn’t require that we be the best, only that we try our best.

I draw from the crowd a lot.

Never succumb to the temptation of bitterness.

If everything isn’t black and white, I say, ‚Why the hell not?‘