ambition quotes

I had rather be first in a village than second at Rome.

I’ve had the good fortune and blessing to run for the offices for which I really wanted to do the work.

It is my ambition to say in ten sentences what others say in a whole book.

The thought of being President frightens me and I do not think I want the job.

Stupidity and human incompetence are the great evils, not ambition and glory.

The most pitiful among men is he who turns his dreams into silver and gold.

I knew I was a winner back in the late sixties. I knew I was destined for great things. People will say that kind of thinking is totally immodest. I agree. Modesty is not a word that applies to me in any way – I hope it never will.

He that humbleth himself wishes to be exalted.

Focusing your life solely on making a buck shows a certain poverty of ambition. It asks too little of yourself. Because it’s only when you hitch your wagon to something larger than yourself that you realize your true potential.

In my heart, I’m confident I could make a good president.

If you can build a business up big enough, it’s respectable.

Every driver is different, so I just hope whatever I do is going to be good enough, because it’s not that I just want to be with McLaren. I want to win with McLaren.

So many people have this idea: I want to achieve something great or be somebody great. And they neglect the step that leads to greatness. They don’t honor this step at this moment because they have this idea of some future moment where they are going to be great.

The more nobly a man wills and acts, the more avid he becomes for great and sublime aims to pursue. He will no longer be content with family, country, and the remunerative aspect of his work. He will want wider organisations to create, new paths to blaze, causes to uphold, truths to discover, an ideal to cherish and defend.

I thought it completely absurd to mention my name in the same breath as the presidency.

Ambition never is in a greater hurry than I; it merely keeps pace with circumstances and with my general way of thinking.

Ambition has become a dirty word, and I believe it is a great evolutionary force for the positive. If people fail or go astray in their ambition I can live with it but not with people lowering their expectations, wasting time, slacking off and glorifying failure and stupidity.

I’m hopeful. I know there is a lot of ambition in Washington, obviously. But I hope the ambitious realize that they are more likely to succeed with success as opposed to failure.

A wise man is cured of ambition by ambition itself; his aim is so exalted that riches, office, fortune and favour cannot satisfy him.

Big jobs usually go to the men who prove their ability to outgrow small ones.

Among all kinds of Writing, there is none in which Authors are more apt to miscarry than in Works of Humour, as there is none in which they are more ambitious to excel.

What? You seek something? You wish to multiply yourself tenfold, a hundredfold? You seek followers? Seek zeros!

I always had a repulsive need to be something more than human.

The aphorism in which I am the first master among Germans, are the forms of ‚eternity‘; my ambition is to say in ten sentences what everyone else says in a book – what everyone else does not say in a book.

Great ambition is the passion of a great character. Those endowed with it may perform very good or very bad acts. All depends on the principles which direct them.

I have won this lottery. It’s a gigantic lottery, and it’s called Amazon.com. And I’m using my lottery winnings to push us a little further into space.

I’m not an ambitious person, there is no ambition in my life. I have a mission in my life. And my mission is to serve my country. And when I am working for my state, it means I am working for my country, or my nation.

The true artist is not proud: he unfortunately sees that art has no limits; he feels darkly how far he is from the goal, and though he may be admired by others, he is sad not to have reached that point to which his better genius only appears as a distant, guiding sun.

It’s really annoying for me. That’s not what I’m playing for, to be the face of the NBA or to be this or that or to take LeBron’s throne or whatever.

I loved what I did. I could’ve been secretary of state for ever.

Dream no small dreams for they have no power to move the hearts of men.

Power is my mistress. I have worked too hard at her conquest to allow anyone to take her away from me.

It’s stasis that kills you off in the end, not ambition.

At the age of 6, a teacher full of ambitions, who taught in the small public school of Biran, convinced my family that I should travel to Santiago de Cuba to accompany my older sister who would enter a highly prestigious convent school. Including me was a skill of that very teacher from the little school in Biran.

For me, I don’t want to cheat the game by saying, or kind of doing lip service by saying, I want to be the greatest ever. I want to be able to show it.

Any man who wants to be president is either an egomaniac or crazy.

To be happy at home is the ultimate result of all ambition, the end to which every enterprise and labor tends, and of which every desire prompts the prosecution.

For a true writer, each book should be a new beginning where he tries again for something that is beyond attainment. He should always try for something that has never been done or that others have tried and failed. Then sometimes, with great luck, he will succeed.

While on top of Everest, I looked across the valley towards the great peak Makalu and mentally worked out a route about how it could be climbed. It showed me that even though I was standing on top of the world, it wasn’t the end of everything. I was still looking beyond to other interesting challenges.

I’ve always strived to be successful, not famous.

The universe is not required to be in perfect harmony with human ambition.

Intelligence without ambition is a bird without wings.

However my parents – both of whom came from impoverished backgrounds and neither of whom had been to college, took the view that my overactive imagination was an amusing quirk that would never pay a mortgage or secure a pension.

I would rather be ashes than dust! I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom of me in magnificent glow, than a sleepy and permanent planet.

I hoped to be able to write a novel which would enable me to live on it while I wrote the next.

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.

Gold is a treasure, and he who possesses it does all he wishes to in this world, and succeeds in helping souls into paradise.

People have to understand one thing: at the age of 18, I arrived at a dream club like Manchester United. It was a dream come true. But, even at that moment, I was thinking about playing in England for some years and then going to play in Spain. Even at that time I was thinking that way, and I always gave 100% everything.

Aim for the sky and you’ll reach the ceiling. Aim for the ceiling and you’ll stay on the floor.

My only scheme was to be a rapper.

Big results require big ambitions.

These young guys are playing checkers. I’m out there playing chess.

Aim at heaven and you will get earth thrown in. Aim at earth and you get neither.

My favorite literary heroine is Jo March. It is hard to overstate what she meant to a small, plain girl called Jo, who had a hot temper and a burning ambition to be a writer.

Ambition can creep as well as soar.

The ideal girl is driven, working on something other than modeling or being a singer.

I think, because I started Virgin when I was a teenager, it has become a part of me, like my family, and I am motivated by ambition for it, almost as if it were a child.

You can always amend a big plan, but you can never expand a little one. I don’t believe in little plans. I believe in plans big enough to meet a situation which we can’t possibly foresee now.

Character cannot be developed in ease and quiet. Only through experience of trial and suffering can the soul be strengthened, ambition inspired, and success achieved.

As soon as I accomplish one goal, I replace it with another one. I try not to get too far ahead of myself. I just say to myself, ‚All right, well, I’d like to headline a tour,‘ and then when I get there, we’ll see what my next goal is.