If every choice you make comes from an honest place, you’re solid, and nothing anybody can say about you can rock you or change your opinion.

I know that I always wanted things. I was always proud of my people, proud of my home, but I always wanted more. I think most people do.

If you want to get each individual’s honest opinion, you don’t want that opinion to be influenced by others who are present, much less allow a group to coordinate what they are going to say.

I can honestly say that I was never affected by the question of the success of an undertaking. If I felt it was the right thing to do, I was for it regardless of the possible outcome.

You’re looking at a middle-class guy. I am who I am.

Life is a matter of really tough choices.

I look at where I’m at today and realize that most of my success is owed to the mentors that was in my life.

The nobler a man, the harder it is for him to suspect inferiority in others.

Fear? If I have gained anything by damning myself, it is that I no longer have anything to fear.

Having unlimited choices can paralyze you creatively.

I don’t want to be too critical of what other people do, but when people go back to do the same thing that they did, I’m completely confused. I’m like, ‚Didn’t you make that movie already?‘ I’ve been very fortunate, and I’m well taken care of, so the least I can do is try to go forward.

Vanity is but the surface.

One of my goals from really early on was that if I was ever fortunate enough to be successful in music, I would want to stay the same person and the same songwriter.

A shady business never yields a sunny life.

I even found it difficult to watch myself playing on TV because I couldn’t identify with the person on the screen. I couldn’t get to grips with it. It was as if it was all happening to someone else.

I believe enlightenment or revelation comes in daily life. I look for joy, the peace of action. You need action. I’d have stopped writing years ago if it were for the money.

There is as much difference between the counsel that a friend giveth, and that a man giveth himself, as there is between the counsel of a friend and of a flatterer. For there is no such flatterer as is a man’s self.

Don’t wait to be successful at some future point. Have a successful relationship with the present moment and be fully present in whatever you are doing. That is success.

I do not know myself, and God forbid that I should.

It takes 20 years to build a reputation and five minutes to ruin it. If you think about that, you’ll do things differently.

I think it’s my responsibility, as a person of influence… to sometimes try to do what I can.

Make bold choices and make mistakes. It’s all those things that add up to the person you become.

I didn’t leave bodybuilding until I felt that I had gone as far as I could go. It will be the same with my film career. When I feel the time is right, I will then consider public service. I feel that the highest honor comes from serving people and your country.

Success is to be measured not so much by the position that one has reached in life as by the obstacles which he has overcome.

I had therefore to remove knowledge, in order to make room for belief.

Truly, I would not hang a dog by my will, much more a man who hath any honesty in him.

If you desire to be good, begin by believing that you are wicked.

The woman that deliberates is lost.

I think I have always had a little humor.

Some people carry their heart in their head and some carry their head in their heart. The trick is to keep them apart yet working together.

It is a most delightful reflection that if I come to the throne of God in prayer, I may feel a thousand defects, but yet there is hope. I usually feel more dissatisfied with my prayers than with anything else I do.

All my adult life people have been helping me.

There are three things extremely hard: steel, a diamond, and to know one’s self.

The commander in the field is always right and the rear echelon is wrong, unless proved otherwise.

I don’t think I get angry.

In my case Pilgrim’s Progress consisted in my having to climb down a thousand ladders until I could reach out my hand to the little clod of earth that I am.

Ever since I was a child I have had this instinctive urge for expansion and growth. To me, the function and duty of a quality human being is the sincere and honest development of one’s potential.

As to marriage or celibacy, let a man take which course he will, he will be sure to repent.

When I had to make a decision whether or not an activity was appropriate for the Sabbath, I simply asked myself, ‚What sign do I want to give to God?‘ That question made my choices about the Sabbath day crystal clear.

We have a choice about how we take what happens to us in our life and whether or not we allow it to turn us. We can become consumed by hate and darkness, or we’re able to regain our humanity somehow, or come to terms with things and learn something about ourselves.

Never say anything about yourself you do not want to come true.

Moral excellence comes about as a result of habit. We become just by doing just acts, temperate by doing temperate acts, brave by doing brave acts.

To compromise simply means that you go a tiny bit below what you know is right.

To add value to others, one must first value others.

It is a fine game to play – the game of politics – and it is well worth waiting for a good hand before really plunging.

In my younger days, I was trying to write sophisticated prose and fantastic stories.

Every man prefers belief to the exercise of judgment.

Avoid popularity if you would have peace.

All over the place, from the popular culture to the propaganda system, there is constant pressure to make people feel that they are helpless, that the only role they can have is to ratify decisions and to consume.

If we could first know where we are, and whither we are tending, we could then better judge what to do, and how to do it.

Some people can just let things go, but I can’t, especially if there’s something that worries me or makes me sad.

I think life is a matter of choices and that wherever we are, good or bad, is because of choices we make.

I have no delusions about my likability in every scenario. I know that in order to get things done the way you want them, oftentimes your position will be unpopular.

Be slow in choosing a friend, slower in changing.

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

There is nothing in the world more shameful than establishing one’s self on lies and fables.

What nourishes me also destroys me.

I never knew a more presumptuous person than myself. The fact that I say that shows that what I say is true.

Once I’ve decided to do something, I do usually try to carry it through to fruition.

I don’t dislike any of my exes. If I took time to form a relationship, it’s gonna hurt when we move on, but are you puttin‘ White-Out over all that beautiful time together? That was real time in your life. It’s connected to where you are today.

To know what you know and what you do not know, that is true knowledge.