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.

My mother, I suppose, is still a main figure in my life because her life was so sad and unfair, and she so brave, but also because she was determined to make me into the Sunday-school-recitation little girl I was, from the age of seven or so, fighting not to be.

Instead of worrying about what people say of you, why not spend time trying to accomplish something they will admire.

No matter what happens on the field, getting an education makes you a winner.

Where the willingness is great, the difficulties cannot be great.

You can’t knock on opportunity’s door and not be ready.

Strive not to be a success, but rather to be of value.

Ability is what you’re capable of doing. Motivation determines what you do. Attitude determines how well you do it.

Why should anybody be interested in some old man who was a failure?

I didn’t want to become a professor or get tenure or teach or anything. All I wanted to do was get a degree because Louis Leakey said I needed one, which was right, and once I succeeded I could get back to the field.

This lady is not for turning.

Nothing ever comes to one, that is worth having, except as a result of hard work.

I used to feel unsafe right in the moment of an accomplishment – I felt the ground fall from under my feet because this could be the end. And even now, while everyone is celebrating, I’m on to the next thing. I don’t want to get lost in this big cushion of success.

Do not look for approval except for the consciousness of doing your best.

People just don’t understand how obsessed I am with winning.

The healthiest competition occurs when average people win by putting above average effort.

The only limit to our realization of tomorrow will be our doubts of today.

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

To live without Hope is to Cease to live.

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

The wish to acquire more is admittedly a very natural and common thing; and when men succeed in this they are always praised rather than condemned. But when they lack the ability to do so and yet want to acquire more at all costs, they deserve condemnation for their mistakes.

If I have seen further than others, it is by standing upon the shoulders of giants.

Being self-made means never making an excuse as to why you can’t take steps toward whatever your goal is.

Never put off till tomorrow what you can do the day after tomorrow.

People aren’t supposed to look back. I’m certainly not going to do it anymore.

Years ago I met Richard Burton in Port Talbot, my home town, and afterwards he passed in his car with his wife, and I thought, ‚I want to get out and become like him‘. Not because of Wales, because I love Wales, but because I was so limited as a child at school and so bereft and lonely, and I thought becoming an actor would do that.

Nothing succeeds like success. Get a little success, and then just get a little more.

He who laughs best today, will also laughs last.

We can take a ‚It was hard to get there.‘ But we ain’t taking no loss. We’re going to win.

I am simply trying to struggle through life; trying to do God’s bidding.

I remember the last three days that I was president, I never went to bed at all. I never went to bed until we had negotiated the final release of the hostages.

To make headway, improve your head.

Life is filled with detours and dead ends, trials and challenges of every kind. Each of us has likely had times when distress, anguish, and despair almost consumed us.

Never allow a person to tell you no who doesn’t have the power to say yes.

If you are first you are first. If you are second you are nothing.

If someone has a really great boyfriend or career, I think, it’s cool that happens.

You must take action now that will move you towards your goals. Develop a sense of urgency in your life.

Unless you are breaking stuff, you are not moving fast enough.

Even when folks are hitting you over the head, you can’t stop marching. Even when they’re turning the hoses on you, you can’t stop.

If you can dream it, you can do it.

Giving up cannot be an option.

That’s when you know you’re the greatest: when you’re the greatest, and people still put odds against you.

I don’t want to hear the word ‚can’t.‘

Life doesn’t require that we be the best, only that we try our best.

Listen; there’s a hell of a good universe next door: let’s go.

Let everything you do be done as if it makes a difference.

If a man knows not what harbor he seeks, any wind is the right wind.

Do your work with your whole heart, and you will succeed – there’s so little competition.

An ant on the move does more than a dozing ox.

Take off your bedroom slippers. Put on your marching shoes,‘ he said, his voice rising as applause and cheers mounted. ‚Shake it off. Stop complainin‘. Stop grumblin‘. Stop cryin‘. We are going to press on. We have work to do.

Before anything else, preparation is the key to success.

The object of a New Year is not that we should have a new year. It is that we should have a new soul and a new nose; new feet, a new backbone, new ears, and new eyes. Unless a particular man made New Year resolutions, he would make no resolutions. Unless a man starts afresh about things, he will certainly do nothing effective.

The greatest difficulty always comes right before the birth of a dream.

As much as it might look like, to someone else, that I’m successful, I never feel like I’m anywhere. The further I go, I still feel equally further from my eventual goal. Because as I grow, I get more goals. I’m never content.

Everybody is going to have their critics. It’s easy to get discouraged in life.

Where much is expected from an individual, he may rise to the level of events and make the dream come true.

When facing a difficult task, act as though it is impossible to fail. If you are going after Moby Dick, take along the tartar sauce.

You may think it was a very little thing, and in these days it seems to me like a trifle, but it was a most important incident in my life. I could scarcely credit that I, the poor boy, had earned a dollar in less than a day; that by honest work, I had earned a dollar. I was a more hopeful and thoughtful boy from that time.

We must act out passion before we can feel it.

If you lose a big fight, it will worry you all of your life. It will plague you – until you get your revenge.

As a man sow, shall he reap. and I know that talk is cheap. But the heat of the battle is as sweet as the victory.