As a kid from Compton, you can get all the success in the world and still question your worth.

Life’s too short to hang out with people who aren’t resourceful.

Life is a series of experiences, each one of which makes us bigger, even though sometimes it is hard to realize this. For the world was built to develop character, and we must learn that the setbacks and grieves which we endure help us in our marching onward.

Weak minds sink under prosperity as well as adversity; but strong and deep ones have two high tides.

Great works are performed not by strength but by perseverance.

To win is always good for the feeling of the whole team.

Although the circumstances of our lives may seem very disengaged, with me standing here as the First Lady of the United States of America and you just getting through school, I want you to know we have very much in common. For nothing in my life ever would have predicted that I would be standing here as the first African-American First Lady.

The people of Northern Ireland have sorted out my whole life.

We never fail when we try to do our duty, we always fail when we neglect to do it.

As long as a man stands in his own way, everything seems to be in his way.

The world is put back by the death of every one who has to sacrifice the development of his or her peculiar gifts to conventionality.

When I wake up in the morning, I feel just like any other insecure 24-year-old girl.

You don’t have to be somebody different to be important. You’re important in your own right.

I still have mixed feelings about what growing up is – this thing that happens to everyone, so I’ve heard.

Moral excellence comes about as a result of habit. We become just by doing just acts, temperate by doing temperate acts, brave by doing brave acts.

I sometimes have a tendency to walk on the dark side.

None of us will ever accomplish anything excellent or commanding except when he listens to this whisper which is heard by him alone.

I know you’ve heard it a thousand times before. But it’s true – hard work pays off. If you want to be good, you have to practice, practice, practice. If you don’t love something, then don’t do it.

I have a personal ambition to live my life honestly and honor the true love that I’ve had and also the people I’ve had around me.

I know I’m a good professional, I know that no one’s harder on me than myself and that’s never going to change, under any circumstances.

You can retire from a job, but don’t ever retire from making extremely meaningful contributions in life.

How great are the dangers I face to win a good name in Athens.

I always kind of see how I want things to be better, and I’m generally not happy with how things are or the level of service that we’re providing for people or the quality of the teams that we built. But if you look at this objectively, we’re doing so well on so many of these things. I think it’s important to have gratitude for that.

I think that as you grow up, as you get older, we can’t get bitter, we can’t get jaded.

I’m not arrogant enough to look back on my career and criticize my choices. It’s really not my place.

Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe to assure the survival and the success of liberty.

It’s normal for human beings to identify with their own separate self. The problem is that we get caught in that notion of ourself as a separate individual and caught in that individual self’s agenda.

Surface R&B doesn’t work any more. The whole heartthrob thing, songs about unrealistic love and tearing your shirt off every show – that’s not really where it’s at any more. It’s becoming harder for those guys to sell records, and harder for them to succeed.

Especially for those of us who lived in single cells, you had the time to sit down and think, and we discovered that sitting down just to think is one of the best ways of keeping yourself fresh and able, to be able to address the problems facing you, and you had the opportunity, also, of examining your past.

This is certain, that a man that studieth revenge keeps his wounds green, which otherwise would heal and do well.

I stopped doing drugs when I was 20. I was finished with drugs before Nirvana even started.

I’ve learned that you shouldn’t go through life with a catcher’s mitt on both hands; you need to be able to throw something back.

When I was little… I didn’t relate to princesses. I saw Maleficent, and I just thought she was so – she was so elegant.

When you are angry or frustrated, what comes out? Whatever it is, it’s a good indication of what you’re made of.

Never fret for an only son, the idea of failure will never occur to him.

There are a lot of people who don’t know me and what I am all about.

I grew up in the east side of Detroit in an area where there was very little, except for a lot of scarcity, poverty and hunger. I never woke up saying, ‚I’m an orphan again today, isn’t this terrible? Poor me.‘

I have discovered that just because we grow weaker physically as we age, it doesn’t mean that we must grow weaker spiritually.

I don’t like it when people who are young act like they’re 40. That’s taking too much on. Putting up a shield and trying to act like you’re so mature or whatever – I don’t try to act mature. Some people might say I’m mature for my age, but it’s not something I’m trying to do, you know? I’m just me.

Partition is bad. But whatever is past is past. We have only to look to the future.

Every strike brings me closer to the next home run.

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

However difficult life may seem, there is always something you can do and succeed at.

Difficulties mastered are opportunities won.

I seldom end up where I wanted to go, but almost always end up where I need to be.

We cannot learn men from books.

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

Billy Graham is one of my great lifetime heroes. I think he epitomizes the essence of what a Christian leader should be. I have participated in some of his crusades a couple of times in Atlanta. I’ve seen the profound impact he’s had on me personally, and on other people who were not Christians and accepted Christ as Savior.

Had I been a great athlete, I’m not sure I would have even gone into coaching. I may have turned out feeling that my life ended when my athletic career ended, as happens so many times with various athletes.

Success is blocked by concentrating on it and planning for it… Success is shy – it won’t come out while you’re watching.

At the center of your being you have the answer; you know who you are and you know what you want.

There is no easy walk to freedom anywhere, and many of us will have to pass through the valley of the shadow of death again and again before we reach the mountaintop of our desires.

The way I approach this thing, when I started to get my head screwed on straight and really trying to make something of myself as an artist, when I was 19 or 20, it became more about function for me. Like, what is this song doing to you? What is the function of this type of artform? What is it doing?

Getting money is not all a man’s business: to cultivate kindness is a valuable part of the business of life.

I used to worry about every little thing, trying to figure out every problem. Well, I realize now how foolish that was. I was no more in control of my life than the man on the moon.

People rarely succeed unless they have fun in what they are doing.

We learn martial arts as helping weakness. You never fight for people to get hurt. You’re always helping people.

The important thing is that your teammates have to know you’re pulling for them and you really want them to be successful.

Don’t ever doubt yourselves or waste a second of your life. It’s too short, and you’re too special.

If you were to ask me what I want to do – I don’t want to be a celebrity, I want to make a difference.

I always say this about my music, and music in general: Music is like a time capsule. Each album reflects what I’m going through or what’s going on in my life at that moment.