There is something that is much more scarce, something finer far, something rarer than ability. It is the ability to recognize ability.

I’ve been in the Los Angeles Children’s Chorus since I was 8.

Above everything else I’ve done, I’ve always said I’ve had more guts than I’ve got talent.

If I had a talent, it was for looking askew at everything, possibly more than my contemporaries. But I had to really push myself to be a writer.

I guess you could say it’s always been my destiny to be a performer.

At the end of the day, your fans are the people who support you in and out. And their opinions matter.

Tell your wife often how terrific she looks.

The person born with a talent they are meant to use will find their greatest happiness in using it.

The art of acceptance is the art of making someone who has just done you a small favor wish that he might have done you a greater one.

Generally speaking, men are held in great esteem in all parts of the world, so why shouldn’t women have their share? Soldiers and war heroes are honored and commemorated, explorers are granted immortal fame, martyrs are revered, but how many people look upon women too as soldiers?

A person who is gifted sees the essential point and leaves the rest as surplus.

Martyrdom: The only way a man can become famous without ability.

I owe the best of myself to geology, but everything it has taught me tends to turn me away from dead things.

Many are they who have a taste and love for drawing, but no talent; and this will be discernible in boys who are not diligent and never finish their drawings with shading.

Don’t worry when you are not recognized, but strive to be worthy of recognition.

It is impossible to imagine Goethe or Beethoven being good at billiards or golf.

In the United States, I am a great success, but I am not a celebrity.

Someone said to me, ‚If fifty percent of the experts in Hollywood said you had no talent and should give up, what would you do?‘ My answer was then and still is, ‚If a hundred percent told me that, all one hundred percent would be wrong.‘

If a man walks in the woods for love of them half of each day, he is in danger of being regarded as a loafer. But if he spends his days as a speculator, shearing off those woods and making the earth bald before her time, he is deemed an industrious and enterprising citizen.

The roots of all goodness lie in the soil of appreciation for goodness.

Every man, and for stronger reasons, every artist, wants to be recognized. So do I.

Never lose an opportunity of seeing anything beautiful, for beauty is God’s handwriting.

Fame itself… doesn’t really afford you anything more than a good seat in a restaurant.

I can hold my own when it comes to burping. I’ve got a good feeling that I could win a championship.

Talent and effort, combined with our various backgrounds and life experiences, has always been the lifeblood of our singular American genius.

If future generations are to remember us more with gratitude than sorrow, we must achieve more than just the miracles of technology. We must also leave them a glimpse of the world as it was created, not just as it looked when we got through with it.

I can dance to just about anything.

I’m not going to lie; listen, I’m nice at basketball.

I always had a knack for improvisation. I can write down the notes I play, but never really had a proper academic musical background. I suppose I’m blessed and cursed by the fact I have that freedom.

I’m the most recognized and loved man that ever lived cuz there weren’t no satellites when Jesus and Moses were around, so people far away in the villages didn’t know about them.

With drive and a bit of talent, you can move mountains. I know. I’ve done it.

You’ve got to invest in the world, you’ve got to read, you’ve got to go to art galleries, you’ve got to find out the names of plants. You’ve got to start to love the world and know about the whole genius of the human race. We’re amazing people.

I have a definite talent for convincing people to try something new. I am a good salesman. When I’m on form, I can sell anything.

The Artist is he who detects and applies the law from observation of the works of Genius, whether of man or Nature. The Artisan is he who merely applies the rules which others have detected.

There is no substitute for talent. Industry and all its virtues are of no avail.

My kids are coming up in a different time then me. Interracial couples are of the norm. With me, it’s about making sure my kids understand the importance of education and having opportunities that I didn’t. My goal as a parent is to make sure they don’t take what they have for granted.

The colonel replied that he didn’t care how my men had got the job done. He was happy that it had been accomplished. He said that, obviously, no matter how much or how little I knew technically, I was able to get the best out of people I worked with.

Those who create are rare; those who cannot are numerous. Therefore, the latter are stronger.

In a higher phase of communist society… only then can the narrow horizon of bourgeois right be fully left behind and society inscribe on its banners: from each according to his ability, to each according to his needs.

I fear that there are too many priesthood bearers who have done little or nothing to develop their ability to access the powers of Heaven.

Basically, I’m one of the greatest producers ever. And I’m also one of the greatest DJs ever. And I’m also one of the best executives ever.

The aim of life is appreciation; there is no sense in not appreciating things; and there is no sense in having more of them if you have less appreciation of them.

Friends applaud, the comedy is over.

To appreciate the noble is a gain which can never be torn from us.

Does anybody really think that they didn’t get what they had because they didn’t have the talent or the strength or the endurance or the commitment?

When the well is dry, they know the worth of water.

In my entire life, any time I’ve ever lost something, I’ve gotten something even better going around the next corner. It’s like one door closes and another door opens. As long as I can walk through the produce section in every grocery store in this country and eat the grapes that they’re going to throw away, I know I can be fine.

I believe that every person is born with talent.

Sometimes I’m fascinated with how famous my work could be while I’m not so famous.

Fear keeps us focused on the past or worried about the future. If we can acknowledge our fear, we can realize that right now we are okay. Right now, today, we are still alive, and our bodies are working marvelously. Our eyes can still see the beautiful sky. Our ears can still hear the voices of our loved ones.

Being ‚contented‘ ought to mean in English, as it does in French, being pleased. Being content with an attic ought not to mean being unable to move from it and resigned to living in it; it ought to mean appreciating all there is in such a position.

I want to thank my Eritrean fans for feeling connected to me and for supporting me. I feel extremely grateful.

But I think there are a set of experiences that turn a potential writer into a working writer, and then there are places in your life were you start to recognize what you want to do.

There’s Madeleine, and then there’s ‚Madeleine Albright‘. And I sometimes kind of think, who is this person? Once you become ‚Madeleine Albright‘ it doesn’t go away.

Next to excellence is the appreciation of it.

Before ever meeting Priyanka Chopra, I had heard her name coming out of Bollywood and was impressed: she was beautiful, talented, had made nearly 50 movies, earned multiple awards – a massive star.

We believe that if men have the talent to invent new machines that put men out of work, they have the talent to put those men back to work.

In the past when I was in Hollywood, I was like a dog. I felt humiliated. My English was not good. People would even ask me ‚Jackie Who?‘.

Someone has to die in order that the rest of us should value life more.

Human beings love poetry. They don’t even know it sometimes… whether they’re the songs of Bono, or the songs of Justin Bieber… they’re listening to poetry.

What every genuine philosopher (every genuine man, in fact) craves most is praise although the philosophers generally call it recognition!