Success and failure are equally disastrous.

Goals allow you to control the direction of change in your favor.

I think and think for months and years. Ninety-nine times, the conclusion is false. The hundredth time I am right.

Inside every cynical person, there is a disappointed idealist.

It’s never crowded along the extra mile.

Seeing is not always believing.

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

In war as in life, it is often necessary when some cherished scheme has failed, to take up the best alternative open, and if so, it is folly not to work for it with all your might.

It isn’t sufficient just to want – you’ve got to ask yourself what you are going to do to get the things you want.

I’d rather be a victor than a victim.

If I think more about death than some other people, it is probably because I love life more than they do.

When I was younger, I felt pressure to become someone else once I became successful.

Most people have the opportunity of a lifetime flash right in front of them, and they fail to see it. A year later, they find out about it, after everyone else got rich.

And when it rains on your parade, look up rather than down. Without the rain, there would be no rainbow.

The difference between us and them, between you and success, is not that you never fail, but it’s how you recover from those failures – is that you keep getting up time and time again. You figure out what you did wrong, and then you make it right. I say that to my kids every day.

In this great country, we celebrate success. We don’t want to penalize those who have done well.

One must know oneself. If this does not serve to discover truth, it at least serves as a rule of life and there is nothing better.

Before everything else, getting ready is the secret of success.

Instead of comparing our lot with that of those who are more fortunate than we are, we should compare it with the lot of the great majority of our fellow men. It then appears that we are among the privileged.

Intelligence without ambition is a bird without wings.

Richard Burton came from the same town as me, so I thought I’d follow my nose, and follow my luck. I think I’ve been very lucky.

Every man is rich or poor according to the proportion between his desires and his enjoyments.

You can’t do something forever.

A mother takes twenty years to make a man of her boy, and another woman makes a fool of him in twenty minutes.

The man who does more than he is paid for will soon be paid for more than he does.

When you are right you cannot be too radical; when you are wrong, you cannot be too conservative.

The good things of prosperity are to be wished; but the good things that belong to adversity are to be admired.

People think because I’ve got some success, I’ve made it, but in my eyes it’s like, ‚How long has Jay Z been in the business? How many albums has he got?‘ Not that I’m trying to be Jay Z, but I am trying to be around for a long time.

You can’t have it all, all at once. Who – man or woman – has it all, all at once? Over my lifespan, I think I have had it all. But in different periods of time, things were rough. And if you have a caring life partner, you help the other person when that person needs it.

To some extent I liken slavery to death.

Words are only painted fire; a look is the fire itself.

Educate the masses, elevate their standard of intelligence, and you will certainly have a successful nation.

No man is ever whipped until he quits in his own mind.

There are two ways to live: you can live as if nothing is a miracle; you can live as if everything is a miracle.

California has a special relationship with the Internet. Many of the core technologies that power the Internet were invented here. Many of the most successful online entrepreneurs and content creators – in business, the arts, and countless other endeavors – got their start here.

All partisan movements add to the fullness of our understanding of society as a whole. They never detract; or, in any case, one must not allow them to do so. Experience adds to experience.

To observations which ourselves we make, we grow more partial for th‘ observer’s sake.

Basically, when you get to my age, you’ll really measure your success in life by how many of the people you want to have love you actually do love you.

I think my first thought on reaching the summit- of course, I was very, very pleased to be there, naturally – but my first thought was one of a little bit of surprise. I was a little bit surprised that here I was, Ed Hillary, on top of Mt. Everest. After all, this is the ambition of most mountaineers.

I think that as you grow up, as you get older, we can’t get bitter, we can’t get jaded.

A #2 pencil and a dream can take you anywhere.

You are the universe, you aren’t in the universe.

Good planning is important. I’ve also regarded a sense of humor as one of the most important things on a big expedition. When you’re in a difficult or dangerous situation, or when you’re depressed about the chances of success, someone who can make you laugh eases the tension.

As far as a glass ceiling, I feel that all you can do is give it your absolute best with whatever gifts the universe has given you. And if you make it in some way that other people can recognize, that’s fine. But even if you don’t quote-unquote make it, you’re fine if you’ve given it your whole heart and soul.

In this big ball of people, I’m just one grain of sand on this beach.

We cannot learn men from books.

I’ll die a crazy old man!

I still learn, but I think it’s the best thing in life to have a kid.

I don’t think it’s possible to have a sense of tragedy without having a sense of humor.

We can do anything we want to if we stick to it long enough.

Take a method and try it. If it fails, admit it frankly, and try another. But by all means, try something.

Without discipline, there’s no life at all.

Great works are performed not by strength but by perseverance.

I’ve learned that you shouldn’t go through life with a catcher’s mitt on both hands; you need to be able to throw something back.

The love of life is necessary to the vigorous prosecution of any undertaking.

A journey is like marriage. The certain way to be wrong is to think you control it.

My childhood did not prepare me for the fact that the world is full of cruel and bitter things.

I think, in politics, half the people are gonna like you, and half the people are not gonna like you, no matter what you do or what you say… It’s like there are no right answers. If there were, everyone would choose the right answers. They’re all opinions.

There’s something which impels us to show our inner souls. The more courageous we are, the more we succeed in explaining what we know.

We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.

A friend who is far away is sometimes much nearer than one who is at hand. Is not the mountain far more awe-inspiring and more clearly visible to one passing through the valley than to those who inhabit the mountain?