Be not afraid of growing slowly, be afraid only of standing still. -Chinese Proverb Real courage is when you know you're licked before you begin, but you begin anyway and see it through no matter what. -Harper Lee When we are unable to find tranquility within ourselves, it is useless to seek it elsewhere. -La Rochefoucauld Faith is the pencil of the soul that pictures heavenly things. -Thomas Burbridge Have thy tools ready; God will find thee work. -Charles Kingsley All the strength and force of man comes from his faith in things unseen. -J. F. Clarke He is happiest, be he king or peasant, who finds his peace at home. - Johann W. Goethe God has two dwellings: one in heaven and the other in a meek and thankful heart. Isaak Walton It is always sunrise somewhere. -John Muir Happiness grows at our own firesides and is not to be picked in strangers' gardens. -Douglas Jerrold If you can't see the bright side of something, then polish the dull side! -Anon Testing software is like measuring the length of a coastline: the more closely you look, the longer it takes. -Peter Coffee The secret of man's being is not only to live but to have something to live for. -Dostoyevsky It is not God's will merely that we should be happy, but that we should make ourselves happy. -Immanuel Kant You may have a fresh start any moment you choose, for this thing we call failure is not the falling down, but the staying down. -Mary Pickford No man, however, who is endowed with a fair share of common sense, and not more than a fair share of vanity, will identify either contemporary or posthumous fame with the highest good. -Thomas Henry Huxley Our church buildings are not the only places where we can worship. Our homes should also be places of devotion. It would be well if each day we could "go home to church." There should be no other place where the Spirit of the Lord is more welcome and more easily accessible than in our own homes. -Dean L. Larsen You cannot lift another soul until you are standing on higher ground than he is. You must be sure if you would rescue the man, that you yourself are setting the example of what you would have him be. You cannot light a fire in another soul unless it is burning in your own soul. -Harold B. Lee Each one of us is the architect of his own fate, and he is unfortunate indeed who will try to build himself without the Inspiration of God; without realizing that he grows from within, not from without. -David O. McKay All happiness, all success, all glorious achievements rest with the individual. He can make a heaven or hell upon the earth. -Ezra Taft Benson Every world problem may be solved by obedience to the principles of the gospel of Jesus Christ. -David O. McKay It is selfishness which is the cause of most of our misery. -Gordon B. Hinckley Sometimes people let their hearts get so set upon things and the honors of this world that they cannot learn the lessons they most need to learn. Simple truths are often rejected in favor of the much less demanding philosophies of men. -Spencer W. Kimball *** I love the man who can smile in trouble, who can gather strength from distress, and grows brave by reaction. 'Tis the business of little minds to shrink, but he whose heart is firm, and whose conscience approves his conduct, will pursue his principles unto death. -Thomas Paine My mother drew a distinction between achievement and success. She said that achievement is the knowledge that you have studied and worked hard and done the best that is in you. Success is being praised by others. That is nice but not as important or satisfying. Always aim for achievement and forget about success. -Helen Hayes Realize that the reason most people fail isn't because of the competition but because of the limits they place upon themselves, allowing defeat to take over. Take responsibility for your destiny. You can come up with a performance, if you can reach down and dig deep enough into your competitive soul. You can overcome tremendous obstacles. -Bruce Jenner You learn to speak by speaking, to study by studying, to run by running, to work by working; in just the same way, you learn to love by loving. -St. Francis De Sales Somehow I can't believe that there are any heights that can't be scaled by a man who knows the secrets of making dreams come true. This special secret, it seems to me, can be summarized in four C s. They are curiosity, confidence, courage, and constancy, and the greatest of all is confidence. When you believe in a thing, believe in it all the way, implicitly and unquestionable. -Walt Disney Learning is the beginning of wealth. Learning is the beginning of health. Learning is the beginning of spirituality. Searching and learning is where the miracle process all begins. -Jim Rohn The harder I work the luckier I get. -Samuel Goldwyn Most of our obstacles would melt away if, instead of cowering before them, we should make up our minds to walk boldly through them. -Orison Swett Marden Few men during their lifetime comes anywhere near exhausting the resources dwelling within them. There are deep wells of strength that are never used. -Richard E. Byrd The way for a young man to rise is to improve himself in every way he can, never suspecting that anybody wishes to hinder him. -Abraham Lincoln Remember, success is not measured by heights attained but by obstacles overcome. We're going to pass through many obstacles in our lives: good days, bad days. But the successful person will overcome those obstacles and constantly move forward. -Bruce Jenner Often we allow ourselves to be upset by small things we should despise and forget. We lose many irreplaceable hours brooding over grievances that, in a year's time, will be forgotten by us and by everybody. No, let us devote our life to worthwhile actions and feelings, to great thoughts, real affections and enduring undertakings. -Andre Maurois *** In matters of conscience, the law of majority has no place. -Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi Nothing can stop the man with the right mental attitude from achieving his goal; nothing on earth can help the man with the wrong mental attitude. -Thomas Jefferson Patience is tied very closely to faith in our Heavenly Father. Actually, when we are unduly impatient, we are suggesting that we know what is best - better than does God. Or, at least, we are asserting that our timetable is better than his. Either way we are questioning the reality of God's omniscience. -Neal A. Maxwell Love is the condition in which the happiness of another person is essential to your own. -Robert Heinlein When shall we cease to learn? Never, never. -Brigham Young To do anything truly worth doing, I must not stand back shivering and thinking of the cold and danger, but jump in with gusto and scramble through as well as I can. -Og Mandino I am always doing things I can't do, that's how I get to do them. -Pablo Picasso If you're still hanging onto a dead dream of yesterday, laying flowers on its grave by the hour, you cannot be planting the seeds for a new dream to grow today. -Joyce Chapman I've had smarter people around me all my life, but I haven't run into one yet that can outwork me. And if they can't outwork you, then smarts aren't going to do them much good. That's just the way it is. And if you believe that and live by it, you'd be surprised at how much fun you can have. -Woody Hayes For every thousand hacking at the leaves of evil, there is one striking at the root. -Henry David Thoreau When we are motivated by goals that have deep meaning, by dreams that need completion, by pure love that needs expressing, then we truly live life. -Greg Anderson Dream lofty dreams, and as you dream, so shall you become. Your vision is the promise of what you shall one day be. -James Allen If I keep a green bough in my heart, the singing bird will come. -Chinese Proverb The great use of life is to spend it on something that will outlast it. -William James We must not, in trying to think about how we can make a big difference, ignore the small daily differences we can make which, over time, add up to big differences that we often cannot foresee. -Marian Wright Edelman One hundred percent of the shots you don't take don't go in. -Wayne Gretzky When you are inspired by some great purpose, some extraordinary project, all of your thoughts break their bonds, your mind transcends limitations, your consciousness expands in every direction and you find yourself in a new great and wonderful world. Dormant forces, faculties and talents become alive, and you discover yourself to be a greater person by far than you ever dreamed yourself to be. -Patanjali One must not be mean with the affections; what is spent of the fund is renewed in the spending itself. -Sigmund Freud The price of success is hard work, dedication to the job at hand, and the determination that whether we win or lose, we have applied the best of ourselves to the task at hand. -Vince Lombardi The progress of the world is the history of men who would not permit defeat to speak the final word. There are depths in the sea which the storms that lash the surface into fury never reach. They who reach down into the depths of life where, in the stillness, the voice of God is heard, have the stabilizing power which carries them poised and serene through the hurricane of difficulties. -Spencer W. Kimball Where the spirit does not work with the hand there is no art. -Leonardo da Vinci We must do more than ask the Lord for excellence; there must be effort before there is excellence. -Spencer W. Kimball I'm not at all contemptuous of comforts, but they have their place and it is not first. -E. F. Schumacher No other success can compensate for failure in the home. The poorest shack in which love prevails over a united family is of greater value to God and future humanity than any other riches. In such a home God can work miracles and will work miracles. -David O. McKay Too many people spend money they haven't earned, to buy things they don't want, to impress people they don't like. -Will Rogers Go often to the house of thy friend, for weeds choke the unused path. -Ralph Waldo Emerson If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where they should be. Now put foundations under them. -Thoreau The ultimate victory in competition is derived from the inner satisfaction of knowing that you have done your best and that you have gotten the most out of what you had to give. -Howard Cosell Charity is injurious unless it helps the recipient to become independent of it. -John D. Rockefeller To dream anything that you want to dream, that is the beauty of the human mind. To do anything that you want to do, that is the strength of the human will. To trust yourself, to test your limits, that is the courage to succeed. -Bernard Edmonds Is it not better to aim your spear at the moon and strike only an eagle, than to aim your spear at the eagle, and strike only a rock? No Pessimist ever discovered the secrets of the stars or sailed to an uncharted land or opened a new heaven to the human spirit. -Helen Keller You can complain because roses have thorns, or you can rejoice because thorns have roses. -Ziggy No one ever attains very eminent success by simply doing what is required of him; it is the amount and excellence of what is over and above the required, that determines the greatness of ultimate distinction. -Charles K. Adams The game of life is a game of boomerangs. Our thoughts, deeds and words return to us sooner or later with astounding accuracy. -Florence Scovel Shinn Education is an admirable thing, but it is well to remember from time to time that nothing that is worth knowing can be taught. Everyone is kneaded out of the same dough but not baked in the same oven. -Yiddish proverb *** Being defeated is often a temporary condition. Giving up is what makes it permanent. -Marilyn vos Savant Live in such a way that you would not be ashamed to sell your parrot to the town gossip. -Will Rogers A musician must make music, an artist must paint, a poet must write, if he is to be ultimately at peace with himself. What one can be, one must be. -Abraham Maslow We do not see things as they are, we see things as we are. -Talmudic Saying First say to yourself what you would be, then do what you have to do. -Epictetus The highest reward for a person's toil is not what they get for it, but what they become by it. -John Ruskin It is not because things are difficult that we do not dare, it is because we do not dare that they are difficult. -Seneca You become a champion by fighting one more round. When things are tough, you fight one more round. -James Corbett (Boxer) All labor that uplifts humanity has dignity and importance and should be undertaken with painstaking excellence. -Martin Luther King, Jr. I shall live badly if I do not write, and I shall write badly if I do not live. -Francoise Sagan A clay pot sitting in the sun will always be a clay pot. It has to go through the white heat of the furnace to become porcelain. -Mildred Stouven Always hold your head up, but be careful to keep your nose at a friendly level. -Max L. Forman The universe is full of magical things, patiently waiting for our wits to grow sharper. -Eden Phillpotts Great works are performed not by strength, but perseverance. -Samuel Johnson Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that. -Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Good advice is always certain to be ignored, but that's no reason not to give it. -Agatha Christie Let us so live that when we come to die even the undertaker will be sorry. -Mark Twain Don't be afraid to go out on a limb. That's where the fruit is. -H. Jackson Browne [P.S. I Love You] There are two kinds of men who never amount to much: those who cannot do what they are told, and those who can do nothing else. -Cyrus Curtis We know what we are, but know not what we may be. -Shakespeare We are always paid for our suspicion by finding what we suspect. -Henry David Thoreau A life spent making mistakes is not only more honorable but more useful than a life spent doing nothing. -George Bernard Shaw When a man is wrapped up in himself he makes a pretty small package. -John Ruskin A pessimist is one who is seasick on the entire voyage of life. Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself. -Leo Tolstoy These are the tries that time men's soles. -Heard at a track and field tryout A man's first care should be to avoid the reproaches of his own heart, his next to escape the censures of the world. -English Proverb Nurture your minds with great thoughts. To believe in the heroic makes heroes. -Benjamin Disraeli We are each of us angels with only one wing, and we can only fly by embracing one another. -Luciano de Crescenzo I want to be thoroughly used up when I die, for the harder I work the more I live. I rejoice in life for its own sake. -George Bernard Shaw No matter how far you've gone down the wrong road, turn back. -Turkish proverb A person determined never to be wrong won't likely accomplish much. -Ken Wisdom The worth of a book is to be measured by what you can carry away from it. -James Bryce The moment of victory is much too short to live for that and nothing else. -Martina Navrtilova Accustom to the veneer of noise, to the shibboleths of promotion, public relations, and market research, society is suspicious of those who value silence. -John Lahr Destiny: A tyrant's authority for crime and a fool's excuse for failure. -Ambrose Bierce A master at the art of living makes no distinction between his work and his play, his labor and his leisure, his mind and his body, his education and his recreation, his love and his religion. He hardly knows which is which. He simply pursues with excellence what he is about and leaves others to determine whether he is working or playing. He himself always knows he is doing both. -Wilferd (sic) Peterson Thought is the blossom; language the bud; action the fruit behind. -Ralph Waldo Emerson I am learning to understand rather than immediately judge or to be judged. I cannot blindly follow the crowd and accept their approach. I will not allow myself to indulge in the usual manipulating game of role creation. Fortunately for me, my self-knowledge has transcended that and I have come to understand that life is best to be lived and not to be conceptualized. I am happy because I am daily growing and I am honestly not knowing where the limit lies. To be certain, every day there can be a revelation or a new discovery. I treasure the memory of the past misfortunes. It has added more to my bank of fortitude. -Bruce Lee Give me a stock clerk with a goal and I'll give you a man who will make history. Give me a man with no goals and I'll give you a stock clerk. -J. C. Penney Never measure the height of a mountain until you have reached the top. Then you'll see how low it was. -Dag H. I have been given so much that I have no time to think about that which I have not been given. -Helen Keller Winners forget they're in a race... they just love to run. -Joe Pesci It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbled or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena; whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly; who errs and comes short again and again; who knows the great devotions and the great enthusiams and spends himself in a worthy cause so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory or defeat. -Theodore Roosevelt Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate; our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, "Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented and fabulous?" Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking, so other people will not feel insecure around you. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It is not just in some of us; it is in everyone. And, as we let our light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our fear, our presence automatically liberates others. -Nelson Mandela The most essential factor is persistence - the determination never to allow your energy or enthusiasm to be dampened by the discouragement that must inevitably come. -James Whitcomb Riley Conceit spoils the finest genius. There is not much danger that real talent or goodness will be overlooked long; even if it is, the consciousness of possessing and using it well should satisfy one, and the great charm of all power is modesty. -Louisa May Alcott Finish each day and be done with it. You have done what you could; some blunders and absurdities have crept in; forget them as soon as you can. Tomorrow is a new day; you shall begin it serenely and with too high a spirit to be encumbered with your old nonsense. -Ralph Waldo Emerson The most splendid achievement of all is the constant striving to surpass yourself and to be worthy of your own approval. - Denis Waitley A professional is a person who can do his best at a time when he doesn't particularly feel like it. -Alistair Cooke What we hope ever to do with ease, we must learn first to do with diligence. -Samuel Johnson Real generosity toward the future lies in giving all to the present. -Albert Camus Leadership is getting someone to do what they don't want to do, to achieve what they want to achieve. -Tom Landry Difficulties strengthen the mind, as labor does the body. -Seneca You can't direct the wind, but you can adjust your sails. The principal mark of genius is not perfection but originality, the opening of new frontiers. -Arthur Koestler The world is changed not by the self-regarding, but by men and women prepared to make fools of themselves. -P. D. James After the game, the king and pawn go into the same box. -Italian Proverb A smooth sea never made a skillful sailor. People are either driven to action or complacency, mission or rust. You're either participating in the Game of Life or you're watching it from the grandstands. Herein lies a crucial difference. A champion plays the game: a spectator observes, criticizes and never really gets to live. A champion knows what he or she wants and goes after it with carefully calculated goals and no-holds-barred action. A spectator feels that his or her life is not their own. They let others dictate their destiny. They become victims of life instead of masters of it. -Bruce Jenner Dreams are renewable. No matter what our age or condition, there are still untapped possibilities within us and new beauty waiting to be born. -Dale E. Turner Our greatest glory is not in never failing, but in rising up every time we fail. -Ralph Waldo Emerson To travel hopefully is a better thing than to arrive, and the true success is to labour. -Robert L. Stevenson If you continually give you will continually have. It is not length of life, but depth of life. -Ralph Waldo Emerson Seek the wisdom of the ages, but look at the world through the eyes of a child. -Ron Wild The miracle, or the power, that elevates the few is to be found in their industry, application, and perseverance under the promptings of a brave, determined spirit. -Mark Twain We pay a heavy price for our fear of failure. It is a powerful obstacle to growth. It assures the progressive narrowing of the personality and prevents exploration and experimentation. There is no learning without some difficulty and fumbling. If you want to keep on learning, you must keep on risking failure -- all your life. -John W. Gardner Whatever games are played with us, we must play no games with ourselves, but deal in our privacy with the last honesty and truth. -Ralph Waldo Emerson Nothing can add more power to your life than concentrating all your energies on a limited set of targets. -Nido Qubein Any fact facing us is not as important as our attitude toward it, for that determines our success or failure. The way you think about a fact may defeat you before you ever do anything about it. You are overcome by the fact because you think you are. -Norman Vincent Peale There are powers inside of you which, if you could discover and use, would make of you everything you ever dreamed or imagined you could become. -Orison Swett Marden The greatest good you can do for another is not just share your riches, but reveal to them their own. -Disraeli Be brave enough to live life creatively. The creative is the place where no one else has ever been. You have to leave the city of your comfort and go into the wilderness of your intuition. You can't get there by bus, only by hard work and risk and by not quite knowing what you're doing. What you'll discover will be wonderful. What you'll discover will be yourself. -Alan Alda Fear is a darkroom for developing negatives. When you discover your mission, you will feel its demand. It will fill you with enthusiasm and a burning desire to get to work on it. -W. Clement Stone It is your work in life that is the ultimate seduction. -Pablo Picasso You can have anything in the world you want, if you just help enough other people get what they want. -Zig Ziglar What this power is I cannot say; all I know is that it exists and it becomes available only when a man is in that state of mind in which he knows exactly what he wants and is fully determined not to quit until he finds it. -Alexander Graham Bell Every production of genius must be the production of enthusiasm. -Benjamin Disraeli Life is too short to be little. Man is never so manly as when he feels deeply, acts boldly, and expresses himself with frankness and with fervor. -Benjamin Disraeli Nurture your mind with great thoughts, for you will never go any higher than you think. -Benjamin Disraeli It is in vain to hope to please all alike. Let a man stand with his face in what direction he will, he must necessarily turn his back on one half of the world. -George Dennison Prentice Genius is eternal patience. -Michaelangelo The rewards for those who persevere far exceed the pain that must precede the victory. -Ted W. Engstrom. Man is not the creature of circumstances, circumstances are the creatures of men. We are free agents, and man is more powerful than matter. -Benjamin Disraeli Nothing can resist the human will that will stake even its existence on its stated purpose. -Benjamin Disraeli I know of no such unquestionable badge and ensign of a sovereign mind as that of tenacity of purpose. -Ralph Waldo Emerson The human spirit is so great a thing that no man can express it; could we rightly comprehend the mind of man nothing would be impossible to us upon the earth. -Paracelsus Peace is a sunset and knowing who to thank. You only say 'never' because no one ever has. -Cary Elwes as Wesley in the Princess Bride. A true knowledge of ourselves is knowledge of our power. -Mark Rutherford The really efficient laborer will be found not to crowd his day with work, but will saunter to his task surrounded by a wide halo of ease and leisure. -Henry David Thoreau Nay, be a Columbus to whole new continents and worlds within you, opening new channels, not of trade, but of thought. Every man is the lord of a realm beside which the earthly empire of the Czar is but a petty state, a hummock left by the ice. -Henry David Thoreau Go placidly amid the noise and haste, and remember what peace there may be in silence. As far as possible without surrender be on good terms with all persons. Speak your truth quietly and clearly; listen to others, even the dull and ignorant; they too have their story. Avoid loud and aggressive persons, they are vexations to the spirit. If you compare yourself with others, you may become vain and bitter; for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself. Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans. Keep interested in your own career, however humble; it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time. Exercise caution in your business affairs; for the world is full of trickery. But let this not to blind you to what virtue there is; many persons strive for high ideals; and everywhere life is full of heroism. Be yourself. Especially, do not feign affection. Neither be cynical about love; for in the face of all aridity and disenchantment it is perennial as the grass. Take kindly the counsel of the years, gracefully surrendering the things of youth. Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune. But do not distress yourself with imaginings. Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness. Beyond a wholesome discipline, be gentle with yourself. You are a child of the universe, no less than the trees and the stars; you have a right to be here. And whether or not it is clear to you, no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should. Therefore, be at peace with God, whatever you conceive Him to be, and whatever your labors and aspirations, in the noisy confusion of life keep peace with your soul. With all its sham, drudgery and broken dreams, it is still a beautiful world. Be careful, strive to be happy. -Max Ehermann Everyone should carefully observe which way his heart draws him, and then choose that way with all his strength. -Hasidic saying If you refuse to accept anything but the best you very often get it. Stand up to crises. Don't let them throw you! Fight to stay calm... even surmount the crisis completely and turn it into an opportunity. Refuse to renounce your self-image. No matter what happens, you must keep your good opinion of yourself. No matter what happens, you must hold your past successes in your imagination, ready for showing in the motion picture screen of your mind. No matter what happens, no matter what you lose, no matter what failures you must endure, you must keep faith in yourself. Then you can stand up to crises, with calm and courage, refusing to buckle; then you will not fall through the floor. You will be able to support yourself. -Maxwell Maltz Work to become, not to acquire. -Elbert Hubbard Self-acceptance comes from meeting life's challenges vigorously. Don't numb yourself to your trials and difficulties, nor build mental walls to exclude pain from your life. You will find peace not by trying to escape your problems, but by confronting them courageously. You will find peace not in denial, but in victory. -J. Donald Walters If fifty million people say a foolish thing, it is still a foolish thing. -Anatole France If you want to take your mission in life to the next level, if you're stuck and you don't know how to rise, don't look outside yourself. Look inside. Don't let your fears keep you mired in the crowd. Abolish your fears and raise your commitment level to the point of no return, and I guarantee you that the Champion Within will burst forth to propel you toward victory. -Bruce Jenner If you chase two rabbits, you will lose them both. With gospel perspective, we can know that when we endure _to the very end_, we are actually enduring _to the very beginning_. Thus, rather than viewing this virtue as delivering us expiring in exhaustion to a finish line, we are brought intact and victorious to a starting line! -Neal A. Maxwell Listen or thy tongue will keep thee deaf. -American Indian Proverb To learn to get along without, to realize that what the world is going to demand of us may be a good deal more important than what we are entitled to demand of it - this is a hard lesson. -Bruce Catton If I care to listen to every criticism, let alone act on them, then this shop may as well be closed for all other businesses. I have learned to do my best, and if the end result is good then I do not care for any criticism, but if the end result is not good, then even the praise of ten angels would not make the difference. -Abraham Lincoln He who has a why can endure any how. -Friedrich Nietzsche Faith is an oasis in the heart which will never be reached by the caravan of thinking. -from Kahlil Gibran's _Sand and Foam_ Be content with your lot-one cannot be first in everything. -Aesop Become aware of internal, subjective, subverbal experiences, so that these experiences can be brought into the world of abstraction, of conversation, of naming, etc. with the consequence that it immediately becomes possible for a certain amount of control to be exerted over these hitherto unconscious and uncontrollable processes. -Abraham H. Maslow If you want to be truly successful invest in yourself to get the knowledge you need to find your unique factor. When you find it and focus on it and persevere your success will blossom. -Sidney Madwed ... he alone is great and happy who requires neither to command nor to obey in order to secure his being of some importance in the world. -Johann Wolfgang von Goethe Conversation enriches the understanding, but solitude is the school of genius. You don't have to fear defeat if you believe it may reveal powers that you didn't know you possessed. -Napoleon Hill People are like stained glass windows. They glow and sparkle when it is sunny and bright; but when the sun goes down their true beauty is revealed only if there is a light from within. You cannot paint "Mona Lisa" by assigning one dab each to a thousand painters. -Willian F. Buckley, Jr. Talent develops in tranquillity, character in the full current of human life. -Goethe The greatness of a man can nearly always be measured by his willingness to be kind. -George W. Young The whole point of getting things done is knowing what to leave undone. -Stella, Lady Reading It sometimes seems that intense desire creates not only its own opportunities, but its own talents. -Eric Hoffer Anyone who imagines that bliss is normal is going to waste a lot of time running around shouting that he's been robbed. The fact is that most putts don't drop, most beef is tough, most children grow up to be just people, most successful marriages require a high degree of mutual toleration, most jobs are often more dull than otherwise. Life is like an old-time rail journey... Delays, side tracks, smoke, dust, cinders, and jolts, interspersed only occasionally by beautiful vistas, and thrilling bursts of speed. The trick is to thank the Lord for letting you have a ride. -Gordon B Hinckley You shouldn't go through life with a catchers mitt on both hands; you need to be able to throw something back. We are poor in character when we think getting by is a substitute for doing our best. -Marvin J. Ashton Life begets life. Energy creates energy. It is by spending oneself that one becomes rich. -Sarah Bernhardt When the student is ready, the Master appears. -Old Buddhist Proverb You won't be happy with more until you're happy with what you've got. -Viki King People in their handlings of affairs often fail when they are about to succeed. If one remains as careful at the end as he was at the beginning, there will be no failure. -Lao-Tzu He who knows others is wise. He who knows himself is enlightened. Education is the power to think clearly, the power to act well in the world's work, and the power to appreciate life. -Brigham Young A designer knows he has achieved perfection not when there is nothing left to add, but when there is nothing left to take away. -Antoine de Saint-Exup'ery Mistakes are the portals of discovery. -James Joyce Faith is to believe what we do not see; and the reward of this faith is to see what we believe. -St. Augustine The most exciting phrase to hear in science, the one that heralds new discoveries, is not 'Eureka!' but 'That's funny...' -Isaac Asimov We need to learn to set our course by the stars, not by the lights of every passing ship. -Omar Nelson Bradley It is the first of all problems for a man to find out what kind of work he is to do in this universe. -Thomas Carlyle You don't need an explanation for everything, Recognize that there are such things as miracles - events for which there are no ready explanations. Later knowledge may explain those events quite easily. -Harry Browne I'm defeated and I know it, if I meet any human being from whom I find myself unable to learn anything. -George Herbert Palmer We lift ourselves by our thought. We climb upon our vision of ourselves. If you want to enlarge your life, you must first enlarge your thought of it and of yourself. Hold the ideal of yourself as you long to be, always everywhere. -Orison Swett Marden A man's dreams are an index to his greatness. -Zadok Rabinwitz Three people were at work on a construction site. All were doing the same job, but when each was asked what the job was, the answers varied. "Breaking rocks," the first replied. "Earning my living," the second said. "Helping to build a cathedral," said the third. -Peter Schultz Curiosity is a lust of the mind. -Thomas Hobbes I was once asked if a big business man ever reached his objective. I replied that if a man ever reached his objective he was not a big business man. -Charles M. Schwab This time, like all times, is a very good one, if we but know what to do with it. -Emerson One receives as reward for much ennui, despondency, boredom--such as a solitude without friends, books, duties, passions must bring with it --those quarter-hours of profoundest contemplation within oneself and nature. He who completely entrenches himself against boredom also entrenches himself against himself: he will never get to drink the strongest refreshing draught from his own innermost fountain. -Friedrich Nietzsche From what we get, we can make a living; what we give, however, makes a life. -Arthur Ashe If there is dissatisfaction with the status quo, good. If there is ferment, so much the better. If there is restlessness, I am pleased. Then let there be ideas, and hard thought, and hard work. If man feels small, let man make himself bigger. -Hubert H. Humphrey Happiness is as a butterfly which, when pursued, is always beyond our grasp, but which if you will sit down quietly, may alight upon you. -Nathaniel Hawthorne While one person hesitates because he feels inferior, another is busy making mistakes and becoming superior. -Henry C. Link Keep away from people who try to belittle your ambitions. Small people always do that, but the really great make you feel that you, too, can become great. -Mark Twain I believe the single most significant decision I can make on a day-to-day basis is my choice of attitude. It is more important than my past, my education, my bankroll, my successes or failures, fame or pain, what other people think of me or say about me, my circumstances, or my position. Attitude keeps me going or cripples my progress. It alone fuels my fire or assaults my hope. When my attitudes are right, there is no barrier too high, no valley too deep, no dream too extreme, no challenge too great for me. -Charles Swindoll Life's most urgent question is: what are you doing for others? -Martin Luther King, Jr. Be the master of your will and the slave of your conscience. -Hasidic saying Music is your own experience, your own thoughts, your wisdom. If you don't live it, it won't come out of your horn. They teach you there's a boundary line to music. But, man, there's no boundary line to art. -Charlie Parker It is better to make a piece of music than to perform one, better to perform one than to listen to one, better to listen to one than to misuse it as a means of distraction, entertainment, or acquisition of "culture." -John Cage To be without some of the things you want is an indispensable part of happiness. - Bertrand Russell I never could have done what I have done without the habits of punctuality, order, and diligence, without the determination to concentrate myself on one subject at a time... -Charles Dickens Don't forget until too late that the business of life is not business, but living. -B.C. Forbes All the world is full of suffering. It is also full of overcoming it. -Helen Keller When every physical and mental resource is focused, one's power to solve a problem multiplies tremendously. -Norman Vincent Peale There is no security on this earth. There is only opportunity. Any individual can be, in time, what he earnestly desires to be, if he but set his face steadfastly in the direction of that one thing and bring all his powers to bear upon its attainment. -J. Herman Randall The giants of the race have been men of concentration, who have struck sledge- hammer blows in one place until they have accomplished their purpose. The successful men of today are men of one overmastering idea, one unwavering aim, men of single and intense purpose. -Orison Swett Marden Love does not consist in gazing at each other, but in looking outward together in the same direction. - Antoine de Saint-Exupery Singleness of purpose is one of the chief essentials for success in life, no matter what may be one's aim. -John D. Rockefeller Turn your face to the sun and the shadows fall behind you. -Maori Proverb Character cannot be developed in ease and quiet. Only through experiences of trial and suffering can the soul be strengthened, vision cleared, ambition inspired and success achieved. -Helen Keller Education is not the filling of a pail, but the lighting of a fire. -William Butler Yeats There are many who are living far below their possibilities because they are continually handing over their individualities to others. Do you want to be a power in the world? Then be yourself. Be true to the highest within your soul and then allow yourself to be governed by no customs or conventionalities or arbitrary man-made rules that are not founded on principle. - Ralph Waldo Trine We should consider ourselves as spirits having a human experience, rather than humans having an occasional spiritual experience. Before we set our hearts too much on anything, let us examine how happy are those who already possess it. -La Rochefoucauld All my life I wanted to be someone; I guess I should have been more specific. -Jane Wagner He is happiest, be he king or peasant who finds peace in his home. -Goethe If you continually give you will continually have. The secret of happiness is to admire without desiring. -F.H. Bradley Self-education is, I firmly believe, the only kind of education there is. -Isaac Asimov