Be smarter than other people, just don’t tell them so.

When I let go of what I am, I become what I might be.

Divide and rule, the politician cries; unite and lead, is watchword of the wise.

Control your own destiny! Control your own destiny!

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

He that hath knowledge spareth his words.

If you set out to be liked, you would be prepared to compromise on anything at any time, and you would achieve nothing.

Nothing will work unless you do.

Forty is when you actually begin even deserving to be on stage telling people what you think.

Being a housewife and a mother is the biggest job in the world, but if it doesn’t interest you, don’t do it – I would have made a terrible mother.

Let us touch the dying, the poor, the lonely and the unwanted according to the graces we have received and let us not be ashamed or slow to do the humble work.

Anger makes dull men witty, but it keeps them poor.

Success is steady progress toward one’s personal goals.

Do what you can, with what you have, where you are.

It is very important to generate a good attitude, a good heart, as much as possible. From this, happiness in both the short term and the long term for both yourself and others will come.

Don’t part with your illusions. When they are gone, you may still exist, but you have ceased to live.

The wit knows that his place is at the tail of a procession.

That which is not good for the bee-hive cannot be good for the bees.

The idea of recognising your strengths and using them in as versatile a way as you can is cool to me.

Great and good are seldom the same man.

I want people to draw strength from me.

Virtue she finds too painful an endeavour, content to dwell in decencies for ever.

Showing off is the fool’s idea of glory.

The human body has two ends on it: one to create with and one to sit on. Sometimes people get their ends reversed. When this happens they need a kick in the seat of the pants.

Most folks are as happy as they make up their minds to be.

Modesty is not only an ornament, but also a guard to virtue.

When one begins to live by habit and by quotation, one has begun to stop living.

I don’t even know how to speak up for myself, because I don’t really have a father who would give me the confidence or advice.

I’ve always been really, really aware of my insecurities – really, really aware. I never developed that thick skin that keeps you from letting things get to you.

We ought to fly away from earth to heaven as quickly as we can; and to fly away is to become like God, as far as this is possible; and to become like him is to become holy, just, and wise.

One of the things I realized is that if you do not take control over your time and your life, other people will gobble it up. If you don’t prioritize yourself, you constantly start falling lower and lower on your list, your kids fall lower and lower on your list.

Let him that is without stone among you cast the first thing he can lay his hands on.

Strength and growth come only through continuous effort and struggle.

I would like to be remembered as someone who did the best she could with the talent she had.

I didn’t always have 14,000 people wanting to hang out with me on a Saturday night.

I just do the best I can and write something interesting, to tell stories in an interesting way and move forward from there.

Whatever that means, however you got on that mountain, why not try to climb it? And do it in your own way.

I never sell a book. I sell myself. And the way to sell yourself is to be an instrument of love.

You aren’t learning anything when you’re talking.

The older I get the more wisdom I find in the ancient rule of taking first things first. A process which often reduces the most complex human problem to a manageable proportion.

Old age has deformities enough of its own. It should never add to them the deformity of vice.

Make yourself necessary to somebody.

I continuously go further and further learning about my own limitations, my body limitation, psychological limitations. It’s a way of life for me.

I haven’t written my own epitaph, and I’m not sure I should. Whatever it is, I hope it will be simple, and that it will point people not to me, but to the One I served.

That is never too often repeated, which is never sufficiently learned.

There is a wisdom of the head, and a wisdom of the heart.

For me, I don’t want to cheat the game by saying, or kind of doing lip service by saying, I want to be the greatest ever. I want to be able to show it.

Just as treasures are uncovered from the earth, so virtue appears from good deeds, and wisdom appears from a pure and peaceful mind. To walk safely through the maze of human life, one needs the light of wisdom and the guidance of virtue.

Live to learn, and you will really learn to live.

Knowing that you are going to die is, I suspect, the beginning of wisdom.

Honesty is the first chapter in the book of wisdom.

To read without reflecting is like eating without digesting.

Life is not accumulation, it is about contribution.

I’m going to use all my tools, my God-given ability, and make the best life I can with it.

Fill your bowl to the brim and it will spill. Keep sharpening your knife and it will blunt.

The words of truth are always paradoxical.

You can do the same thing with $20 million that you would do with $50 million. So at a certain point in your life and in your career, you realise that it’s not about the money.

As long as you live, keep learning how to live.

As pessimistic as I am about the nature of human beings and our capacity for atrocity and malevolence and betrayal and laziness and inertia, and all those things, I think we can transcend all that and set things straight.

All difficult things have their origin in that which is easy, and great things in that which is small.

And obviously, from our own personal point of view, the principal challenge is a personal challenge.