Military school was great and especially great for leadership and then I spent two years in Vietnam.

Maturity is a bitter disappointment for which no remedy exists, unless laughter could be said to remedy anything.

We are never deceived; we deceive ourselves.

I have a cult-like following because I exemplify what it is to be a human being.

Compromise used to mean that half a loaf was better than no bread. Among modern statesmen it really seems to mean that half a loaf; is better than a whole loaf.

Chavez, who came out of the ranks of the Venezuelan Army, is methodical and tireless. I have observed him over the course of 17 years, since his first visit to Cuba. He is an extremely humanitarian and law-abiding person; he has never taken revenge on anybody.

Women tend to be more intuitive, or to admit to being intuitive, and maybe the hard science approach isn’t so attractive. The way that science is taught is very cold. I would never have become a scientist if I had been taught like that.

Enemies are so stimulating.

People who truly understand what is meant by self-reliance know they must live their lives by ethics rather than rules.

I have surrounded myself with very smart people.

I am not interested in power for power’s sake, but I’m interested in power that is moral, that is right and that is good.

Everything is political. I will never be a politician or even think political. Me just deal with life and nature. That is the greatest thing to me.

I wanted in my lifetime to vote for a radical Native American woman, since my vision of any future that we might have is that it will be led by women and older women.

With tech companies, whoever’s the leader is always questioned, you know. They say, ‚Is this the end of them?‘ And – there’s more – more times people think that’s the case than it really is the case.

Our passions are like convulsion fits, which, though they make us stronger for a time, leave us the weaker ever after.

It is more difficult to rule yourself than to rule a city.

Work out your own salvation. Do not depend on others.

Songwriting is my way of channeling my feelings and my thoughts. Not just mine, but the things I see, the people I care about. My head would explode if I didn’t get some of that stuff out.

When I was younger, I was testing myself and questioning everything, but now it’s less about that and more about these are the years of my life with my family.

I’m a mentor to anybody who’s interested.

Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.

When I grew up, the Devil was a reason why I had a headache or the Devil was the reason I got mad today. We always blamed the Devil. I think today when I say the Enemy, I like to make it broader. Sometimes the Enemy can be our own thoughts.

We forge the chains we wear in life.

He who has great power should use it lightly.

Any lady who is first lady likes being first lady. I don’t care what they say, they like it.

As I followed my dream – stayed in-Spirit, that is, inspired – I made more money in the first year after I gave up my employment than I had made in the previous 35 years of my life.

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

Too often we act – ask our schools to be truant officers, our teachers to be truant officers, because we’re giving them children who have, you know, they’re not ready to learn. And if they’re not ready to learn by the third grade, they know they’re behind.

I think that I am better than the people who are trying to reform me.

What we face may look insurmountable. But I learned something from all those years of training and competing. I learned something from all those sets and reps when I didn’t think I could lift another ounce of weight. What I learned is that we are always stronger than we know.

Honor thy error as a hidden intention.

The spirit becomes free only when it ceases to be a support.

I don’t like to read things that people write about me. I’d rather read what kids have to say about me because it’s not their profession to do that.

If in our daily life we can smile, if we can be peaceful and happy, not only we, but everyone will profit from it. This is the most basic kind of peace work.

I think the healthy way to live is to make friends with the beast inside oneself, and that means not the beast but the shadow. The dark side of one’s nature. Have fun with it and you know, is to accept everything about ourselves.

Founding a company is hard. Most of it isn’t smooth. You’ll have to make very hard decisions. You have to fire a few people. Therefore, if you don’t believe in your mission, giving up is easy. The majority of founders give up. But the best founders don’t give up.

Real education enhances the dignity of a human being and increases his or her self-respect. If only the real sense of education could be realized by each individual and carried forward in every field of human activity, the world will be so much a better place to live in.

To be idle and to be poor have always been reproaches, and therefore every man endeavors with his utmost care to hide his poverty from others, and his idleness from himself.

When we get to wishing a great deal for ourselves, whatever we get soon turns into mere limitation and exclusion.

Because of our sacred regard for each human intellect, we consider the obtaining of an education to be a religious responsibility.

Ordinary riches can be stolen; real riches cannot. In your soul are infinitely precious things that cannot be taken from you.

Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything – all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure – these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important.

The closest I ever came to getting married was just before I started singing. In fact, my first record saved my neck.

Any reading not of a vicious species must be a good substitute for the amusements too apt to fill up the leisure of the labouring classes.

We all have a tendency to avoid our weaknesses. When we do that, we never progress or get any better.

We all know we have a finite period of time. I just feel if I’m going to be alive, I want to be challenged – to be as immortal as possible. The path to that isn’t an easy way, but it’s a rewarding way.

I am the only person in the world I should like to know thoroughly.

Wars may be fought with weapons, but they are won by men. It is the spirit of men who follow and of the man who leads that gains the victory.

I care not what others think of what I do, but I care very much about what I think of what I do! That is character!

When your higher self is present, it always promotes peace.

My celebrity status allows me an opportunity, allows me a pulpit to preach and reach out to the people. Not even always preaching but just leading, motivating them by being a leader.

What is needed, rather than running away or controlling or suppressing or any other resistance, is understanding fear; that means, watch it, learn about it, come directly into contact with it. We are to learn about fear, not how to escape from it.

The more that learn to read the less learn how to make a living. That’s one thing about a little education. It spoils you for actual work. The more you know the more you think somebody owes you a living.

Solitude is independence.

Nothing new here, except my marrying, which to me is a matter of profound wonder.

A leader who confines his role to his people’s experience dooms himself to stagnation; a leader who outstrips his people’s experience runs the risk of not being understood.

A man who has not passed through the inferno of his passions has never overcome them.

William Gladstone has not a single redeeming defect.

I don’t like it when people who are young act like they’re 40. That’s taking too much on. Putting up a shield and trying to act like you’re so mature or whatever – I don’t try to act mature. Some people might say I’m mature for my age, but it’s not something I’m trying to do, you know? I’m just me.

Leaders who fail to prune their pride will meet demise. That’s not a guess, it’s a guarantee. With pride, it’s not a matter of ‚if‘ we will fall, but ‚when.‘ There are no exceptions.

God has given you one face, and you make yourself another.