If I inspire you, pay for it, period.

There is one thing that gets you out of bed in the morning, and that is discipline. Because your dreams and your goals are not there waking up for you in the morning.

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.

If ever I feel the soul within me elevate and expand to those dimensions not wholly unworthy of its Almighty Architect, it is when I contemplate the cause of my country, deserted by all the world beside, and I standing up boldly and lone and hurling defiance at her victorious oppressors.

Some people go to priests; others to poetry; I to my friends.

Never elated when someone’s oppressed, never dejected when another one’s blessed.

I agree with Balzac and 19th-century writers, black and white, who say, ‚I write for money.‘ Yes, I think everybody should be paid handsomely; I insist on it, and I pay people who work for me, or with me, handsomely.

Thanks to my reading, I have never been caught flat-footed by any situation, never at a loss for how any problem has been addressed… It doesn’t give me all the answers, but it lights what is often a dark path ahead.

The great secret of success is to go through life as a man who never gets used up.

I have never started a poem yet whose end I knew. Writing a poem is discovering.

My mother never gave up one me. I messed up in school so much they were sending me home, but my mother sent me right back.

I wake up every day inspiring myself, because God gave me life.

Ambition is the germ from which all growth of nobleness proceeds.

Every great person is always being helped by everybody; for their gift is to get good out of all things and all persons.

Each doctor makes a much, much more important job than I do, but at the end, nobody talks about him. We all know about it, but we don’t really think about it.

It is a no-fail, incontrovertible reality: If you get, give. If you learn, teach. You can’t do anything with that except do it.

It usually helps me write by reading – somehow the reading gear in your head turns the writing gear.

Extreme hopes are born from extreme misery.

Credit is a system whereby a person who can not pay gets another person who can not pay to guarantee that he can pay.

I wanted to use my fame and this face that everyone knows so well to help uplift and inspire people around the world.

I like to work with artists from around the world. There are so many new inspiring filmmakers.

You must capture and keep the heart of the original and supremely able man before his brain can do its best.

Quality is not an act, it is a habit.

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

In all my work, I try to say – ‚You may be given a load of sour lemons, why not try to make a dozen lemon meringue pies?‘

Healthy discontent is the prelude to progress.

Whatever your life’s work is, do it well. A man should do his job so well that the living, the dead, and the unborn could do it no better.

I had so many people try to talk me out of starting a rocket company, it was crazy.

God’s desire is that we excel.

You are victors, not victims!

People are like dirt. They can either nourish you and help you grow as a person or they can stunt your growth and make you wilt and die.

I always have to be writing.

In the world today many people rightfully feel entitled to have success and the good things in life, but they usually understand it will require sacrifice and hard work.

Accept the challenges so that you can feel the exhilaration of victory.

The best leaders understand the motivations of their team members and know their people – their lives and their families. But a leader must never grow so close to subordinates that one member of the team becomes more important than another, or more important than the mission itself.

There is no such thing on earth as an uninteresting subject; the only thing that can exist is an uninterested person.

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.

We must open the doors of opportunity. But we must also equip our people to walk through those doors.

Many of my fans often tell me that they listen to my songs to get through things. And therefore, obviously, I hope that they can picture being in a place where things are better… I hope my songs can bring people to a calm place.

We must rekindle the fire of idealism in our society.

I think it all comes down to motivation. If you really want to do something, you will work hard for it.

We are all hungry and thirsty for concrete images. Abstract art will have been good for one thing: to restore its exact virginity to figurative art.

Together, we can help make sure that every family that walks into a restaurant can make an easy, healthy choice.

I am an example of what is possible when girls from the very beginning of their lives are loved and nurtured by people around them. I was surrounded by extraordinary women in my life who taught me about quiet strength and dignity.

You will never fulfill your destiny doing work you despise.

Affirmation without discipline is the beginning of delusion.

While they were saying among themselves it cannot be done, it was done.

Yesterday is not ours to recover, but tomorrow is ours to win or lose.

If you are a small company taking on a big company, you need to have a sense of humor.

The key to success is to focus our conscious mind on things we desire not things we fear.

Make yourself necessary to somebody.

I just do the best I can and write something interesting, to tell stories in an interesting way and move forward from there.

My inspiration is R. Kelly, Michael Jackson, and Prince – for the vocals, anyway.

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

Do something wonderful, people may imitate it.

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.

A leader is one who knows the way, goes the way, and shows the way.

I believe in sketching because there is something very sensitive in sketching, you know, in sketches that you don’t have out of a computer that looks the same like everybody even if, later on, the dresses are OK, but I like to sketch, and I like to see trails made after my sketches that look the same. It is you know, what I like.

I’m afraid to fail again.

The gift of fantasy has meant more to me than my talent for absorbing positive knowledge.

It’s like a jar of salad dressing sitting on a shelf… most of the seasoning settles to the bottom of the bottle. But when you shake that bottle up, all the ingredients mix together and then the dressing can add flavor to a salad. In the same way, we can stir ourselves up and regain the reverence, respect and awe we once had for the Lord.