I’ve always put everybody else’s child first before my own health, before my own outfit, before my own time frame.

I believe that the greatest gift you can give your family and the world is a healthy you.

Writing is fun – at least mostly. I write for four hours every day. After that I go running. As a rule, 10 kilometers (6.2 miles). That’s easy to manage.

You’re never too old, too wacky, too wild, to pick up a book and read to a child.

To be a successful father… there’s one absolute rule: when you have a kid, don’t look at it for the first two years.

The years between fifty and seventy are the hardest. You are always being asked to do things, and yet you are not decrepit enough to turn them down.

I know from having had a child, and from having been a child myself, that children will copy you.

As long as your body is healthy and under control and death is distant, try to save your soul; when death is immanent what can you do?

I’m focusing on me. I’m focusing on my family’s security, my family’s financial security, so that’s all I can do.

My children came out as individuals in their own right. They were not my products. They had their own characters and were very strong-minded. I gave them a lot of freedom when they were still very young. The one thing they got from me is morals. They would never betray anyone. They are really good people.

For an Ethiopian mother, if you have a chubby kid, it means you’re doing something good.

The person who doesn’t scatter the morning dew will not comb gray hairs.

I think a father is important for everyone. If you don’t have, then maybe not so much. In the world today, it’s possible that you grow up with only one parent in the family.

Most women put off entertaining until the kids are grown.

My husband’s a pediatrician, so he and I talk about parenting all the time. You can’t raise children who have more shame resilience than you do.

Spend more time in study and prayer. That’s the secret of successful evangelism.

It seems like we wake up and it’s a race until you get to bed. It gets to you after a while and you think, ‚What the hell am I doing?‘

I want to work; then, as my kids get older, I want to have adventures. I want to visit all their countries: learn and live inside all their cultures.

Did you know there’s a difference between being busy and being fruitful? Did you ever stop to think that just being busy – running around in circles all day but not accomplishing anything – is the same as wasting your time? It’s frustrating to expend so much energy and time and not have any fruit from your effort!

There are going to be good days and bad days. Bottom line.

The least productive people are usually the ones who are most in favor of holding meetings.

When you wash your hands, when you make a cup of coffee, when you’re waiting for the elevator – instead of indulging in thinking, these are all opportunities for being there as a still, alert presence.

I want my kids to see me as Dad, for God’s sake, not a television personality.

My greatest blessing has been the birth of my son. My next greatest blessing has been my ability to turn people into children of mine.

Modern cynics and skeptics… see no harm in paying those to whom they entrust the minds of their children a smaller wage than is paid to those to whom they entrust the care of their plumbing.

Over the holidays, and even during filming, I realized that I actually like my body, even if it’s not perfect according to the book. I just feel sexy. For the first time, I don’t want to get rid of the curves. I just want to tone it up. My body is comfortable, and it’s not unhealthy, so I’m going to rock with it.

I’ve said this time and again: My greatest concern coming into the White House was making sure my girls came out whole and normal, and decent and kind, just like I would expect them to if we were living on the South Side of Chicago. And it takes work to keep White House life normal for the kids.

Sometimes, women in families put themselves last until it manifests itself in their own health.

I’ve spent too much time giving speeches, traveling the world.

In order to heal others, we first need to heal ourselves. And to heal ourselves, we need to know how to deal with ourselves.

You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth.

I have to be alone very often. I’d be quite happy if I spent from Saturday night until Monday morning alone in my apartment. That’s how I refuel.

Every man has a right to a Saturday night bath.

I learned never to empty the well of my writing, but always to stop when there was still something there in the deep part of the well, and let it refill at night from the springs that fed it.

Nothing is so fatiguing as the eternal hanging on of an uncompleted task.

I never like being touched, ever. People used to say I held my breath when they were hugging me. I still do.

I don’t pick up toys. I crush them.

I can’t play bridge. I don’t play tennis. All those things that people learn, and I admire, there hasn’t seemed time for. But what there is time for is looking out the window.

Jump out the window if you are the object of passion. Flee it if you feel it. Passion goes, boredom remains.

With every word we utter, with every action we take, we know our kids are watching us. We as parents are their most important role models.

It was a favorite expression of Theophrastus that time was the most valuable thing that a man could spend.

I have a lot of other stuff to accomplish before I get to kids. Whenever the time is right, I’ll just know. If I had a girl, she’d probably be really rebellious. She would be like a bundle of karma. I would love to bring them up in Barbados.

If there is anything that we wish to change in the child, we should first examine it and see whether it is not something that could better be changed in ourselves.

Just on a practical side, if you wake up early in the morning – like at 4:30 in the morning – you’re going to have some free time to yourself to make things happen, to take care of things that are important to you.

No man goes before his time – unless the boss leaves early.

The basic thing nobody asks is why do people take drugs of any sort? Why do we have these accessories to normal living to live? I mean, is there something wrong with society that’s making us so pressurized, that we cannot live without guarding ourselves against it?

Please don’t ask me to do that which I’ve just said I’m not going to do, because you’re burning up time. The meter is running through the sand on you, and I am now filibustering.

It usually takes me more than three weeks to prepare a good impromptu speech.

Too many people treat parenting like it’s the 20th item on their to-do list.

What did I owe the rest of the world? Nothing.

I’m one of the slowest drivers on the road. I mosey along. If you’re doing anything too fast, including living life too fast, that creates sudden death. If I have to be somewhere on time, I make sure I leave early enough.

After the first day of practice, there’s not one guy who’s playing at 100 percent or who feels great. Sometimes, getting up in the morning and brushing your teeth is the hardest part of the day – it just hurts.

Just talk to me as a father – not what the Constitution says. What do you feel?

Better keep yourself clean and bright; you are the window through which you must see the world.

As a cure for worrying, work is better than whiskey.

I would like to see people more aware of where their food comes from. I would like to see small farmers empowered. I feed my daughter almost exclusively organic food.

One cannot think well, love well, sleep well, if one has not dined well.

Children wish fathers looked but with their eyes; fathers that children with their judgment looked; and either may be wrong.

Let parents bequeath to their children not riches, but the spirit of reverence.

To make your children capable of honesty is the beginning of education.

Giving responsibility is the key to success with boys, especially with the rowdiest and most difficult boys.