I can be a cruel person.

We are the creative force of our life, and through our own decisions rather than our conditions, if we carefully learn to do certain things, we can accomplish those goals.

There are always three speeches, for every one you actually gave. The one you practiced, the one you gave, and the one you wish you gave.

Quality is not an act, it is a habit.

I could never give relationship advice to anybody!

There’s a deceptive sin that can keep us from walking in love: pride. It’s deceptive because when you have pride, you’re usually too proud to admit it. I know this because I used to have teachings on pride and they didn’t sell well.

Whoever is careless with the truth in small matters cannot be trusted with important matters.

Freedom conceives that the mind and spirit of man can be free only if he be free to pattern his own life, to develop his own talents, free to earn, to spend, to save, to acquire property as the security of his old age and his family.

Not only must we be good, but we must also be good for something.

Let our advance worrying become advance thinking and planning.

The paradox of education is precisely this – that as one begins to become conscious one begins to examine the society in which he is being educated.

It is better to do one’s own duty, however defective it may be, than to follow the duty of another, however well one may perform it. He who does his duty as his own nature reveals it, never sins.

The final forming of a person’s character lies in their own hands.

It is a great shock at the age of five or six to find that in a world of Gary Coopers you are the Indian.

The U. S. Constitution doesn’t guarantee happiness, only the pursuit of it. You have to catch up with it yourself.

You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself in any direction you choose. You’re on your own, and you know what you know. And you are the guy who’ll decide where to go.

Success has always been a great liar.

I never even thought of myself as deadpan until someone wrote an article about me about a year after I was doing comedy. There was a paper called the ‚Boston Phoenix,‘ and someone wrote a description of what I was doing and that’s where I first saw ‚deadpan.‘

All my stepchildren carried the burden of my fame. Sometimes they would read terrible things about me, and I’d worry about whether it would hurt them. I would tell them: ‚Don’t hide these things from me. I’d rather you ask me these things straight out, and I’ll answer all your questions.‘

People have got to know whether or not their president is a crook. Well, I’m not a crook. I earned everything I’ve got.

Pretension is a poor joke that you play on yourself. Snap out of it. Recognise your strengths, work on your weaknesses. Real achievement is liking what you see in the mirror every morning.

Always first draw fresh breath after outbursts of vanity and complacency.

Before you try to keep up with the Joneses, be sure they’re not trying to keep up with you.

Nobody can ever say that being negative ever helped them at all – not in any way.

We all have done something unethical.

My fans don’t feel like I hold anything back from them. They know whatever I’m going through now, they’ll hear about it on a record someday. They’ll hear the real story. There’s a little bit of lag time. It’s not as instant as going on a gossip blog. But it’s much more accurate.

Never let your ego get so close to your position that when your position goes, your ego goes with it.

None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free.

Because your own strength is unequal to the task, do not assume that it is beyond the powers of man; but if anything is within the powers and province of man, believe that it is within your own compass also.

I’m very free-spirited.

I have opinions of my own, strong opinions, but I don’t always agree with them.

Use your health, even to the point of wearing it out. That is what it is for. Spend all you have before you die; do not outlive yourself.

I have never felt that the one thing that I am ‚known for‘ is what I am.

Many a man thinks he is patient when, in reality, he is indifferent.

I deeply regret any harm, or any perceived harm, that I may have done to anyone by any behaviour of mine.

Wherever you are, be there totally. If you find your here and now intolerable and it makes you unhappy, you have three options: remove yourself from the situation, change it, or accept it totally. If you want to take responsibility for your life, you must choose one of those three options, and you must choose now. Then accept the consequences.

‚Happiness‘ is a pointless goal.

Leaders must be close enough to relate to others, but far enough ahead to motivate them.

I was born with a great gift, and sometimes with that comes a destructive streak.

Man is the only creature that refuses to be what he is.

Experience does not err. Only your judgments err by expecting from her what is not in her power.

We all need people who will give us feedback. That’s how we improve.

My weak spot is laziness. Oh, I have a lot of weak spots: cookies, croissants.

Pride is pleasure arising from a man’s thinking too highly of himself.

People who use time wisely spend it on activities that advance their overall purpose in life.

We can never obtain peace in the outer world until we make peace with ourselves.

You cannot always control what goes on outside. But you can always control what goes on inside.

Like all dreamers, I mistook disenchantment for truth.

Maturity is the ability to reap without apology and not complain when things don’t go well.

No such thing as a man willing to be honest – that would be like a blind man willing to see.

First say to yourself what you would be; and then do what you have to do.

Nothing is more intolerable than to have to admit to yourself your own errors.

What we think, we become.

Take advantage of every opportunity to practice your communication skills so that when important occasions arise, you will have the gift, the style, the sharpness, the clarity, and the emotions to affect other people.

To observations which ourselves we make, we grow more partial for th‘ observer’s sake.

It is after all the greatest art to limit and isolate oneself.

One should always play fairly when one has the winning cards.

Many people identify their sense of self with the problems they have, or think they have.

The man who is aware of himself is henceforward independent; and he is never bored, and life is only too short, and he is steeped through and through with a profound yet temperate happiness.

Everything is generated through your own will power.

To believe in something, and not to live it, is dishonest.