Don’t give in to excuses that can keep you from really living the best life God has for you.

It is too difficult to think nobly when one thinks only of earning a living.

To me, constructive criticism is when people take ownership of their ideas. That’s why I don’t listen to anything that’s anonymous. But it’s hard; when there’s something hurtful out there, I still want to read it over and over and memorize it and explain my point of view to the person.

If someone is going down the wrong road, he doesn’t need motivation to speed him up. What he needs is education to turn him around.

Our truest life is when we are in dreams awake.

My only fault is that I don’t realize how great I really am.

Unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot, nothing is going to get better. It’s not.

Do we not realize that self respect comes with self reliance?

I never see what has been done; I only see what remains to be done.

Whenever I’m around some who is modest, I think, ‚Run like hell and all of fire.‘ You don’t want modesty, you want humility.

Losing is tough.

Doing is the great thing, for if people resolutely do what is right, they come in time to like doing it.

You cannot change your destination overnight, but you can change your direction overnight.

Nobody looks like they did when they were 20, so why not take advantage of the fact that you’re changing, emotionally as well as physically?

It is natural to want to have a future.

We herd sheep, we drive cattle, we lead people. Lead me, follow me, or get out of my way.

Simply put, you believe that things or people make you unhappy, but this is not accurate. You make yourself unhappy.

When you know what you want, and want it bad enough, you will find a way to get it.

Winners make a habit of manufacturing their own positive expectations in advance of the event.

The only way to discover the limits of the possible is to go beyond them into the impossible.

One can never consent to creep when one feels an impulse to soar.

I can’t jump the highest. I’m obviously not the biggest, not the strongest.

The only thing is, people have to develop courage. It is most important of all the virtues. Because without courage, you can’t practice any other virtues consistently.

Deliver me from writers who say the way they live doesn’t matter. I’m not sure a bad person can write a good book, If art doesn’t make us better, then what on earth is it for.

I do not know anyone who has got to the top without hard work. That is the recipe. It will not always get you to the top, but should get you pretty near.

That feeling is so intoxicating, walking off the court holding the Larry O’Brien trophy. So I just want to do that again.

Great works are performed not by strength but by perseverance.

I’m not a bad person.

Working hard is very important. You’re not going to get anywhere without working extremely hard.

Autobiographies are only useful as the lives you read about and analyze may suggest to you something that you may find useful in your own journey through life.

I have had some cosmetic surgery, especially after I lost weight and stuff, and I’ve had my breasts lifted – but not injected. That would scare me to death, anyway.

If someone you know makes a bad decision or uses bad judgment, it doesn’t mean you have to allow that to alter your attitude. Why should you allow anyone else’s bad decisions to send you into a tailspin of misery?

Don’t spend time beating on a wall, hoping to transform it into a door.

People deal too much with the negative, with what is wrong. Why not try and see positive things, to just touch those things and make them bloom?

We were poor. But my mom never accepted that. She worked hard to become a residential contractor – got her master’s with honors at the University of New Orleans. I used to go to every class with her. Her father was my paternal figure.

The beginning of compunction is the beginning of a new life.

Never marry someone in hope that they’ll change later.

We’re going to have to work. We’re going to have to play well. Nothing will be given to us.

If you’re put on a pedestal, you’re supposed to behave yourself like a pedestal type of person. Pedestals actually have a limited circumference. Not much room to move around.

Your Highest Self is not just an idea that sounds lofty and spiritual. It is a way of being. It is the very first principle that you must come to understand and embrace as you move toward attracting to you that which you want and need for this parenthesis in eternity that you know as your life.

I know Elon, we’re very like minded in many ways. We’re not conceptual twins. One thing I want us to do is go to Mars, but for me it’s one thing. He’s singularly focused on that. I think motivation wise, for me I don’t find that Plan B idea motivating. I don’t want a plan B for Earth, I want Plan B to make sure Plan A works.

To those whose talents are above mediocrity, the highest subjects may be announced. To those who are below mediocrity, the highest subjects may not be announced.

The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existing.

If you are full of motivation as a player, if you are full of concentration, I am open arms.

Don’t talk about what you have done or what you are going to do.

There is no substitute for victory.

So long as a man imagines that he cannot do this or that, so long as he is determined not to do it; and consequently so long as it is impossible to him that he should do it.

I have the Midas touch, in the way that when I hook up with a project, I feel, not speaking cocky or conceited, but there’s a confidence I have. I learned that from Muhammad Ali; I used to bodyguard him. He taught me about confidence. So when it comes to any job I work, I’m gonna do it good; I’m going to bring it over the top.

Be at war with your vices, at peace with your neighbors, and let every new year find you a better man.

The chains of habit are too weak to be felt until they are too strong to be broken.

The desire of gold is not for gold. It is for the means of freedom and benefit.

With a tree, all the growth takes place at the growing tips. Humanity is exactly the same. All the growth takes place in the growing tip: among that one percent of the population. It’s made up of pioneers, the beginners. That’s where the action is.

I’m just like you – I want to be a good human being. I’m doing my best, and I’m working at it. And I’m trying to be a Christian. I’m always amazed when people walk up to me and say, ‚I’m a Christian.‘ I always think, ‚Already? You’ve already got it?‘ I’m working at it. And at my age, I’ll still be working at it at 96.

I teach children to be winners.

What interests me in life is curiosity, challenges, the good fight with its victories and defeats.

Winners embrace hard work. They love the discipline of it, the trade-off they’re making to win. Losers, on the other hand, see it as punishment. And that’s the difference.

You may make some mistakes – but that doesn’t make you a sinner. You’ve got the very nature of God on the inside of you.

If you deserve it, go get it.

Whether you think that you can, or that you can’t, you are usually right.

What makes life dreary is the want of a motive.

There is nothing, Sir, too little for so little a creature as man. It is by studying little things that we attain the great art of having as little misery and as much happiness as possible.