But sports carried me away from being in a gang, or being associated with drugs. Sports was my way out.

It is our choices… that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities.

Beware of the man who does not return your blow: he neither forgives you nor allows you to forgive yourself.

When you realize who you live for, and who’s important to please, a lot of people will actually start living. I am never going to get caught up in that. I’m gonna look back on my life and say that I enjoyed it – and I lived it for me.

I’ve discovered that when we take time to renew our minds with God’s Word, we learn how to think like God thinks, say what God says, and act like He wants us to act.

My father was a mean, controlling and manipulative person for most of his life. He was unpredictable and unstable.

I don’t let even a day go by wherein I don’t give at 100 per cent.

People have a hard time letting go of their suffering. Out of a fear of the unknown, they prefer suffering that is familiar.

Sometimes you have to take two steps back to take ten forward.

I am just one human being.

A lifetime contract for a coach means if you’re ahead in the third quarter and moving the ball, they can’t fire you.

It is better to offer no excuse than a bad one.

When I grew up, the Devil was a reason why I had a headache or the Devil was the reason I got mad today. We always blamed the Devil. I think today when I say the Enemy, I like to make it broader. Sometimes the Enemy can be our own thoughts.

In my later years, I have looked in the mirror each day and found a happy person staring back. Occasionally I wonder why I can be so happy. The answer is that every day of my life I’ve worked only for myself and for the joy that comes from writing and creating. The image in my mirror is not optimistic, but the result of optimal behavior.

If small things have the power to disturb you, then who you think you are is exactly that: small.

Because I am a mother, I am capable of being shocked: as I never was when I was not one.

It obviously bothers people when Real Madrid win. It makes them jealous. There isn’t a level playing field.

If you’re going to spend two years of your life on something, it has to matter to you; you have to be passionate about it.

If we are to go forward, we must go back and rediscover those precious values – that all reality hinges on moral foundations and that all reality has spiritual control.

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

Without forgiveness, there’s no future.

Look within. Within is the fountain of good, and it will ever bubble up, if thou wilt ever dig.

On a given day, a given circumstance, you think you have a limit.

I’d like to think you don’t stop being creative once you get happy.

I think I have a dualistic nature.

Personally I’m always ready to learn, although I do not always like being taught.

We are all sculptors and painters, and our material is our own flesh and blood and bones. Any nobleness begins at once to refine a man’s features, any meanness or sensuality to imbrute them.

I want to do a certain thing in the world, and I am going to do it with unwavering concentration. I am concerning myself with only one essential thing: to set man free. I desire to free him from all cages, from all fears, and not to found religions, new sects, nor to establish new theories and new philosophies.

Education is an admirable thing, but it is well to remember from time to time that nothing that is worth knowing can be taught.

Many people, especially young people, would like to be more independent and on their own. But it is very difficult and they suffer from feelings of isolation. I think that is one reason why young readers support my work.

I didn’t think it was special to be able to sing.

Once we believe in ourselves, we can risk curiosity, wonder, spontaneous delight, or any experience that reveals the human spirit.

When you start to realise how much of what you’ve constructed of yourself is based on deception and lies, that is a horrifying realisation.

Duke is an ugly word in Kentucky. Nothing in the world compares to the joy of beating those hateful swine from Duke.

People always say that you can’t please everybody. I think that’s a cop-out. Why not attempt it? ‚Cause think of all the people you will please if you try.

I always wonder when it was that I was embraced.

You know, God gave me a gift to do other things besides play the game of basketball.

There is such a thing as old emotional pain living inside you. It is an accumulation of painful life experience that was not fully faced and accepted in the moment it arose. It leaves behind an energy form of emotional pain.

He who praises everybody, praises nobody.

It’s like, remember who you always were, where you came from, who your parents were, how they raised you. Because that authentic self is going to follow you all through life, so make sure that it’s solid so it’s something that you can hold on and be proud of for the rest of your life.

Do not be too moral. You may cheat yourself out of much life so.

The truth is, somebody is always talking about you, so you have to let it go… if it’s not a part of your God-given destiny.

Most people want to avoid pain, and discipline is usually painful.

Everyone has at least one story, and each of us is funny if we admit it. You have to admit you’re the funniest person you’ve ever heard of.

You have to be able to accept failure to get better.

I have learned, in my life and work as a sportswriter, that big-time Sports and big-time Politics are not so far apart in America. They are both a means to the same end, which is victory… And why not? Victory is good for you, and don’t let anybody tell you different.

What is needed, rather than running away or controlling or suppressing or any other resistance, is understanding fear; that means, watch it, learn about it, come directly into contact with it. We are to learn about fear, not how to escape from it.

Because my dad abused me, I was determined to never let a man tell me what to do. God clearly showed me that I needed to be a submissive wife if I wanted to be effective in ministry. The truth is, if we don’t learn to submit to authority, we won’t ever learn to submit to God.

The greatest day in your life and mine is when we take total responsibility for our attitudes. That’s the day we truly grow up.

In those days he was wiser than he is now; he used to frequently take my advice.

I am sure there’s going to be times when I do things wrong that no one’s going to like and everyone’s going to think I’m terrible and rubbish but I know I’m going to go through those times, and it’s just about understanding that that’s going to happen.

We all have possibilities we don’t know about. We can do things we don’t even dream we can do.

Success is not to be pursued; it is to be attracted by the person you become.

It has been hard for me to find it, but I have found love.

I need to keep working on myself for a while.

All the top players in the world play 45-50-60 games. You need that many games, even the strikers need that many games.

We are always getting ready to live but never living.

I am a professional sportswriter, among other things, and I take the games seriously. It is only one of my many powerful addictions, and I don’t mind admitting any of them.

I’m not going to stop having problems.

Know, first, who you are, and then adorn yourself accordingly.

Nothing on ‚Relapse‘ and very little on ‚Recovery‘ was produced by me.