β
Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.
β
β
Winston S. Churchill
β
I learned this, at least, by my experiment: that if one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life which he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours.
β
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Henry David Thoreau (Walden: Or, Life in the Woods)
β
I can't give you a sure-fire formula for success, but I can give you a formula for failure: try to please everybody all the time.
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β
Herbert Bayard Swope
β
If a book about failures doesn't sell, is it a success?
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β
Jerry Seinfeld
β
If at first you don't succeed, try, try again. Then quit. No use being a damn fool about it.
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β
W.C. Fields
β
Try not to become a man of success. Rather become a man of value.
β
β
Albert Einstein
β
The Paradoxical Commandments
People are illogical, unreasonable, and self-centered.
Love them anyway.
If you do good, people will accuse you of selfish ulterior motives.
Do good anyway.
If you are successful, you will win false friends and true enemies.
Succeed anyway.
The good you do today will be forgotten tomorrow.
Do good anyway.
Honesty and frankness make you vulnerable.
Be honest and frank anyway.
The biggest men and women with the biggest ideas can be shot down by the smallest men and women with the smallest minds.
Think big anyway.
People favor underdogs but follow only top dogs.
Fight for a few underdogs anyway.
What you spend years building may be destroyed overnight.
Build anyway.
People really need help but may attack you if you do help them.
Help people anyway.
Give the world the best you have and you'll get kicked in the teeth.
Give the world the best you have anyway.
β
β
Kent M. Keith (The Silent Revolution: Dynamic Leadership in the Student Council)
β
If A is a success in life, then A equals x plus y plus z. Work is x; y is play; and z is keeping your mouth shut
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β
Albert Einstein
β
I'm a success today because I had a friend who believed in me and I didn't have the heart to let him down.
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β
Abraham Lincoln
β
He has achieved success who has lived well, laughed often, and loved much;
Who has enjoyed the trust of pure women, the respect of intelligent men and the love of little children;
Who has filled his niche and accomplished his task;
Who has never lacked appreciation of Earth's beauty or failed to express it;
Who has left the world better than he found it,
Whether an improved poppy, a perfect poem, or a rescued soul;
Who has always looked for the best in others and given them the best he had;
Whose life was an inspiration;
Whose memory a benediction.
β
β
Bessie Anderson Stanley (More Heart Throbs Volume Two in Prose and Verse Dear to the American People And by them contributed as a Supplement to the original $10,000 Prize Book HEART THROBS)
β
Success is not how high you have climbed, but how you make a positive difference to the world.
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β
Roy T. Bennett (The Light in the Heart)
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It is better to fail in originality than to succeed in imitation.
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β
Herman Melville
β
Success is liking yourself, liking what you do, and liking how you do it.
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β
Maya Angelou
β
Letting go means to come to the realization that some people are a part of your history, but not a part of your destiny.
β
β
Steve Maraboli
β
Success is getting what you want, happiness is wanting what you get
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β
W.P. Kinsella
β
Failure is the condiment that gives success its flavor.
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Truman Capote
β
Have no fear of perfection - you'll never reach it.
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Salvador DalΓ
β
Success is stumbling from failure to failure with no loss of enthusiasm.
β
β
Winston S. Churchill
β
So be sure when you step, Step with care and great tact. And remember that life's A Great Balancing Act. And will you succeed? Yes! You will, indeed! (98 and ΒΎ percent guaranteed) Kid, you'll move mountains.
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β
Dr. Seuss (Oh, the Places You'll Go!)
β
The worst part of success is trying to find someone who is happy for you.
β
β
Bette Midler
β
Success makes so many people hate you. I wish it wasn't that way. It would be wonderful to enjoy success without seeing envy in the eyes of those around you.
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β
Marilyn Monroe
β
A man is a success if he gets up in the morning and gets to bed at night, and in between he does what he wants to do.
β
β
Bob Dylan
β
Don't spend time beating on a wall, hoping to transform it into a door.
β
β
Coco Chanel
β
Cry. Forgive. Learn. Move on. Let your tears water the seeds of your future happiness.
β
β
Steve Maraboli
β
Let the improvement of yourself keep you so busy that you have no time to criticize others.
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β
Roy T. Bennett (The Light in the Heart)
β
Anybody can sympathise with the sufferings of a friend, but it requires a very fine nature to sympathise with a friend's success.
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β
Oscar Wilde
β
We learn from failure, not from success!
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β
Bram Stoker (Dracula)
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The way to get started is to quit talking and begin doing.
β
β
Walt Disney Company
β
Sometimes it takes a good fall to really know where you stand
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Hayley Williams
β
All you need in this life is ignorance and confidence; then success is sure.
β
β
Mark Twain
β
I think you should be a child for as long as you can. I have been successful for 74 years being able to do that.
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β
Bob Newhart
β
Our greatest glory is not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall.
β
β
Oliver Goldsmith (The Citizen of the World, Or, Letters from a Chinese Philosopher, Residing in London, to His Friends in the Country, by Dr. Goldsmith (Vol. 1 of 2))
β
Anyone whose goal is 'something higher' must expect someday to suffer vertigo. What is vertigo? Fear of falling? No, Vertigo is something other than fear of falling. It is the voice of the emptiness below us which tempts and lures us, it is the desire to fall, against which, terrified, we defend ourselves.
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β
Milan Kundera (The Unbearable Lightness of Being)
β
It is hard to fail, but it is worse never to have tried to succeed.
β
β
Theodore Roosevelt
β
I learned this, at least, by my experiment; that if one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life which he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours..
β
β
Henry David Thoreau
β
Sometimes life knocks you on your ass... get up, get up, get up!!! Happiness is not the absence of problems, it's the ability to deal with them.
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β
Steve Maraboli (Life, the Truth, and Being Free)
β
A thinker sees his own actions as experiments and questions--as attempts to find out something. Success and failure are for him answers above all.
β
β
Friedrich Nietzsche
β
The difference between a successful person and others is not a lack of strength, not a lack of knowledge, but rather a lack in will.
β
β
Vince Lombardi
β
It had long since come to my attention that people of accomplishment rarely sat back and let things happen to them. They went out and happened to things.
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β
Leonardo da Vinci
β
Promise Yourself
To be so strong that nothing
can disturb your peace of mind.
To talk health, happiness, and prosperity
to every person you meet.
To make all your friends feel
that there is something in them
To look at the sunny side of everything
and make your optimism come true.
To think only the best, to work only for the best,
and to expect only the best.
To be just as enthusiastic about the success of others
as you are about your own.
To forget the mistakes of the past
and press on to the greater achievements of the future.
To wear a cheerful countenance at all times
and give every living creature you meet a smile.
To give so much time to the improvement of yourself
that you have no time to criticize others.
To be too large for worry, too noble for anger, too strong for fear,
and too happy to permit the presence of trouble.
To think well of yourself and to proclaim this fact to the world,
not in loud words but great deeds.
To live in faith that the whole world is on your side
so long as you are true to the best that is in you.
β
β
Christian D. Larson (Your Forces and How to Use Them)
β
There is nothing more rare, nor more beautiful, than a woman being unapologetically herself; comfortable in her perfect imperfection. To me, that is the true essence of beauty.
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β
Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
β
Develop success from failures. Discouragement and failure are two of the surest stepping stones to success.
β
β
Dale Carnegie
β
A society has no chance of success if its women are uneducated...
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β
Khaled Hosseini (A Thousand Splendid Suns)
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How would your life be different ifβ¦You stopped making negative judgmental assumptions about people you encounter? Let today be the dayβ¦You look for the good in everyone you meet and respect their journey.
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Steve Maraboli (Life, the Truth, and Being Free)
β
Never stop dreaming,
never stop believing,
never give up,
never stop trying, and
never stop learning.
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β
Roy T. Bennett (The Light in the Heart)
β
Many of life's failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.
β
β
Thomas A. Edison
β
There is no secret to success except hard work and getting something indefinable which we call 'the breaks.
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β
Countee Cullen
β
Success is most often achieved by those who don't know that failure is inevitable.
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Coco Chanel (Believing in Ourselves: The Wisdom of Women)
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Only those who dare to fail greatly can ever achieve greatly.
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β
Robert F. Kennedy
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If you try and lose then it isn't your fault. But if you don't try and we lose, then it's all your fault.
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β
Orson Scott Card (Enderβs Game (Ender's Saga, #1))
β
Kites rise highest against the wind, not with it.
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β
Winston S. Churchill
β
Do not let arrogance go to your head and despair to your heart; do not let compliments go to your head and criticisms to your heart; do not let success go to your head and failure to your heart.
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β
Roy T. Bennett (The Light in the Heart)
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At the end of the day, let there be no excuses, no explanations, no regrets.
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β
Steve Maraboli (Life, the Truth, and Being Free)
β
Keep your best wishes, close to your heart and watch what happens
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β
Tony DeLiso (Legacy: The Power Within: The Power Within)
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Whatever the mind can conceive and believe, it can achieve.
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β
Napoleon Hill (Think and Grow Rich: A Black Choice)
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Supreme excellence consists of breaking the enemy's resistance without fighting.
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β
Sun Tzu (The Art of War)
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Life seems but a quick succession of busy nothings.
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β
Jane Austen (Mansfield Park)
β
I don't care if you're black, white, straight, bisexual, gay, lesbian, short, tall, fat, skinny, rich or poor. If you're nice to me, I'll be nice to you. Simple as that.
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β
Robert Michaels
β
Character cannot be developed in ease and quiet. Only through experience of trial and suffering can the soul be strengthened, vision cleared, ambition inspired, and success achieved.
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β
Helen Keller
β
Suicide is a form of murder - premeditated murder. It isn't something you do the first time you think of doing it. It takes getting used to. And you need the means, the opportunity, the motive. A successful suicide demands good organization and a cool head, both of which are usually incompatible with the suicidal state of mind.
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β
Susanna Kaysen (Girl, Interrupted)
β
If you hang out with chickens, you're going to cluck and if you hang out with eagles, you're going to fly.
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β
Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
β
Practice isn't the thing you do once you're good. It's the thing you do that makes you good.
β
β
Malcolm Gladwell (Outliers: The Story of Success)
β
The biggest wall you have to climb is the one you build in your mind: Never let your mind talk you out of your dreams, trick you into giving up. Never let your mind become the greatest obstacle to success. To get your mind on the right track, the rest will follow.
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β
Roy T. Bennett (The Light in the Heart)
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The biggest challenge after success is shutting up about it
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β
Criss Jami (Killosophy)
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When you show yourself to the world and display your talents, you naturally stir all kinds of resentment, envy, and other manifestations of insecurity... you cannot spend your life worrying about the petty feelings of others
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β
Robert Greene (The 48 Laws of Power)
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I find the best way to love someone is not to change them, but instead, help them reveal the greatest version of themselves.
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β
Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
β
Successful people are always looking for opportunities to help others.
Unsuccessful people are always asking, "What's in it for me?
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β
Brian Tracy
β
We are all failures- at least the best of us are.
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β
J.M. Barrie
β
Dare to Be
When a new day begins, dare to smile gratefully.
When there is darkness, dare to be the first to shine a light.
When there is injustice, dare to be the first to condemn it.
When something seems difficult, dare to do it anyway.
When life seems to beat you down, dare to fight back.
When there seems to be no hope, dare to find some.
When youβre feeling tired, dare to keep going.
When times are tough, dare to be tougher.
When love hurts you, dare to love again.
When someone is hurting, dare to help them heal.
When another is lost, dare to help them find the way.
When a friend falls, dare to be the first to extend a hand.
When you cross paths with another, dare to make them smile.
When you feel great, dare to help someone else feel great too.
When the day has ended, dare to feel as youβve done your best.
Dare to be the best you can β
At all times, Dare to be!
β
β
Steve Maraboli (Life, the Truth, and Being Free)
β
Make a pact with yourself today to not be defined by your past. Sometimes the greatest thing to come out of all your hard work isn't what you get for it, but what you become for it. Shake things up today! Be You...Be Free...Share.
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β
Steve Maraboli (Life, the Truth, and Being Free)
β
Forget yesterday - it has already forgotten you. Don't sweat tomorrow - you haven't even met. Instead, open your eyes and your heart to a truly precious gift - today.
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β
Steve Maraboli (Life, the Truth, and Being Free)
β
If personality is an unbroken series of successful gestures, then there was something gorgeous about him
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β
F. Scott Fitzgerald (The Great Gatsby)
β
Judge your success by what you had to give up in order to get it.
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β
Dalai Lama XIV
β
He always accuses me of trying to look'cool', I was like, 'everybody tries to look cool, I just happen to be successful.
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Daniel Clowes (Ghost World)
β
Eighty percent of success is showing up.
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β
Woody Allen
β
Never was anything great achieved without danger.
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β
NiccolΓ² Machiavelli
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Always bear in mind that your own resolution to succeed is more important than any one thing.
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β
Abraham Lincoln
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Renew, release, let go. Yesterdayβs gone. Thereβs nothing you can do to bring it back. You canβt βshouldβveβ done something. You can only DO something. Renew yourself. Release that attachment. Today is a new day!
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β
Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
β
Do not judge me by my successes, judge me by how many times I fell down and got back up again.
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β
Nelson Mandela
β
The only time you fail is when you fall down and stay down.
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β
Stephen Richards (Cosmic Ordering: You can be successful)
β
A kind gesture can reach a wound that only compassion can heal.
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β
Steve Maraboli (Life, the Truth, and Being Free)
β
Our greatest fear should not be of failure but of succeeding at things in life that don't really matter.
β
β
Francis Chan (Crazy Love: Overwhelmed by a Relentless God)
β
An investment in knowledge always pays the best interest.
β
β
Benjamin Franklin (The Way to Wealth: Ben Franklin on Money and Success)
β
In order to succeed, your desire for success should be greater than your fear of failure.
β
β
Bill Cosby
β
The three great essentials to achieve anything worthwhile are, first, hard work; second, stick-to-itiveness; third, common sense.
β
β
Thomas A. Edison
β
Don't aim at success. The more you aim at it and make it a target, the more you are going to miss it. For success, like happiness, cannot be pursued; it must ensue, and it only does so as the unintended side effect of one's personal dedication to a cause greater than oneself or as the by-product of one's surrender to a person other than oneself. Happiness must happen, and the same holds for success: you have to let it happen by not caring about it. I want you to listen to what your conscience commands you to do and go on to carry it out to the best of your knowledge. Then you will live to see that in the long-runβin the long-run, I say!βsuccess will follow you precisely because you had forgotten to think about it
β
β
Viktor E. Frankl (Manβs Search for Meaning)
β
Be careful what you water your dreams with. Water them with worry and fear and you will produce weeds that choke the life from your dream. Water them with optimism and solutions and you will cultivate success. Always be on the lookout for ways to turn a problem into an opportunity for success. Always be on the lookout for ways to nurture your dream.
β
β
Lao Tzu
β
It has always seemed strange to me...The things we admire in men, kindness and generosity, openness, honesty, understanding and feeling, are the concomitants of failure in our system. And those traits we detest, sharpness, greed, acquisitiveness, meanness, egotism and self-interest, are the traits of success. And while men admire the quality of the first they love the produce of the second.
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β
John Steinbeck (Cannery Row (Cannery Row, #1))
β
I've come to believe that each of us has a personal calling that's as unique as a fingerprint - and that the best way to succeed is to discover what you love and then find a way to offer it to others in the form of service, working hard, and also allowing the energy of the universe to lead you.
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β
Oprah Winfrey
β
We teach girls to shrink themselves, to make themselves smaller. We say to girls, you can have ambition, but not too much. You should aim to be successful, but not too successful. Otherwise, you would threaten the man. Because I am female, I am expected to aspire to marriage. I am expected to make my life choices always keeping in mind that marriage is the most important. Now marriage can be a source of joy and love and mutual support but why do we teach girls to aspire to marriage and we donβt teach boys the same? We raise girls to see each other as competitors not for jobs or accomplishments, which I think can be a good thing, but for the attention of men. We teach girls that they cannot be sexual beings in the way that boys are.
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β
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie (We Should All Be Feminists)
β
Be of good cheer. Do not think of today's failures, but of the success that may come tomorrow. You have set yourselves a difficult task, but you will succeed if you persevere; and you will find a joy in overcoming obstacles. Remember, no effort that we make to attain something beautiful is ever lost.
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β
Helen Keller
β
TO BE HOPEFUL in bad times is not just foolishly romantic. It is based on the fact that human history is a history not only of cruelty, but also of compassion, sacrifice, courage, kindness.
What we choose to emphasize in this complex history will determine our lives. If we see only the worst, it destroys our capacity to do something. If we remember those times and placesβand there are so manyβwhere people have behaved magnificently, this gives us the energy to act, and at least the possibility of sending this spinning top of a world in a different direction.
And if we do act, in however small a way, we donβt have to wait for some grand utopian future. The future is an infinite succession of presents, and to live now as we think human beings should live, in defiance of all that is bad around us, is itself a marvelous victory.
β
β
Howard Zinn
β
The problem, often not discovered until late in life, is that when you look for things in life like love, meaning, motivation, it implies they are sitting behind a tree or under a rock. The most successful people in life recognize, that in life they create their own love, they manufacture their own meaning, they generate their own motivation. For me, I am driven by two main philosophies, know more today about the world than I knew yesterday. And lessen the suffering of others. You'd be surprised how far that gets you.
β
β
Neil deGrasse Tyson
β
You know the reason The Beatles made it so big?...'I Wanna Hold Your Hand.' First single. Fucking brilliant. Perhaps the most fucking brilliant song ever written. Because they nailed it. That's what everyone wants. Not 24/7 hot wet sex. Not a marriage that lasts a hundred years. Not a Porsche...or a million-dollar crib. No. They wanna hold your hand. They have such a feeling that they can't hide. Every single successful song of the past fifty years can be traced back to 'I Wanna Hold Your Hand.' And every single successful love story has those unbearable and unbearably exciting moments of hand-holding.
β
β
David Levithan (Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist)
β
Sections in the bookstore
- Books You Haven't Read
- Books You Needn't Read
- Books Made for Purposes Other Than Reading
- Books Read Even Before You Open Them Since They Belong to the Category of Books Read Before Being Written
- Books That If You Had More Than One Life You Would Certainly Also Read But Unfortunately Your Days Are Numbered
- Books You Mean to Read But There Are Others You Must Read First
- Books Too Expensive Now and You'll Wait 'Til They're Remaindered
- Books ditto When They Come Out in Paperback
- Books You Can Borrow from Somebody
- Books That Everybody's Read So It's As If You Had Read Them, Too
- Books You've Been Planning to Read for Ages
- Books You've Been Hunting for Years Without Success
- Books Dealing with Something You're Working on at the Moment
- Books You Want to Own So They'll Be Handy Just in Case
- Books You Could Put Aside Maybe to Read This Summer
- Books You Need to Go with Other Books on Your Shelves
- Books That Fill You with Sudden, Inexplicable Curiosity, Not Easily Justified
- Books Read Long Ago Which It's Now Time to Re-read
- Books You've Always Pretended to Have Read and Now It's Time to Sit Down and Really Read Them
β
β
Italo Calvino (If on a Winterβs Night a Traveler)
β
Love is . . . Being happy for the other person when they are happy, Being sad for the person when they are sad, Being together in good times, And being together in bad times.
LOVE IS THE SOURCE OF STRENGTH.
Love is . . . Being honest with yourself at all times, Being honest with the other person at all times, Telling, listening, respecting the truth, And never pretending.
LOVE IS THE SOURCE OF REALITY.
Love is . . . An understanding so complete that you feel as if you are a part of the other person, Accepting the other person just the way they are, And not trying to change them to be something else.
LOVE IS THE SOURCE OF UNITY.
Love is . . . The freedom to pursue your own desires while sharing your experiences with the other person, The growth of one individual alongside of and together with the growth of another individual.
LOVE IS THE SOURCE OF SUCCESS.
Love is . . . The excitement of planning things together, The excitement of doing things together.
LOVE IS THE SOURCE OF THE FUTURE.
Love is . . . The fury of the storm, The calm in the rainbow.
LOVE IS THE SOURCE OF PASSION.
Love is . . . Giving and taking in a daily situation, Being patient with each other's needs and desires.
LOVE IS THE SOURCE OF SHARING.
Love is . . . Knowing that the other person will always be with you regardless of what happens, Missing the other person when they are away but remaining near in heart at all times.
LOVE IS THE SOURCE OF SECURITY.
LOVE IS . . . THE SOURCE OF LIFE!
β
β
Susan Polis Schutz
β
Over the years, I have come to realize that the greatest trap in our life is not success, popularity, or power, but self-rejection. Success, popularity, and power can indeed present a great temptation, but their seductive quality often comes from the way they are part of the much larger temptation to self-rejection. When we have come to believe in the voices that call us worthless and unlovable, then success, popularity, and power are easily perceived as attractive solutions. The real trap, however, is self-rejection. As soon as someone accuses me or criticizes me, as soon as I am rejected, left alone, or abandoned, I find myself thinking, "Well, that proves once again that I am a nobody." ... [My dark side says,] I am no good... I deserve to be pushed aside, forgotten, rejected, and abandoned. Self-rejection is the greatest enemy of the spiritual life because it contradicts the sacred voice that calls us the "Beloved." Being the Beloved constitutes the core truth of our existence.
β
β
Henri J.M. Nouwen
β
Get Off The Scale!
You are beautiful. Your beauty, just like your capacity for life, happiness, and success, is immeasurable. Day after day, countless people across the globe get on a scale in search of validation of beauty and social acceptance.
Get off the scale! I have yet to see a scale that can tell you how enchanting your eyes are. I have yet to see a scale that can show you how wonderful your hair looks when the sun shines its glorious rays on it. I have yet to see a scale that can thank you for your compassion, sense of humor, and contagious smile. Get off the scale because I have yet to see one that can admire you for your perseverance when challenged in life.
Itβs true, the scale can only give you a numerical reflection of your relationship with gravity. Thatβs it. It cannot measure beauty, talent, purpose, life force, possibility, strength, or love. Donβt give the scale more power than it has earned. Take note of the number, then get off the scale and live your life. You are beautiful!
β
β
Steve Maraboli (Life, the Truth, and Being Free)
β
No matter how old you are now. You are never too young or too old for success or going after what you want. Hereβs a short list of people who accomplished great things at different ages
1) Helen Keller, at the age of 19 months, became deaf and blind. But that didnβt stop her. She was the first deaf and blind person to earn a Bachelor of Arts degree.
2) Mozart was already competent on keyboard and violin; he composed from the age of 5.
3) Shirley Temple was 6 when she became a movie star on βBright Eyes.β
4) Anne Frank was 12 when she wrote the diary of Anne Frank.
5) Magnus Carlsen became a chess Grandmaster at the age of 13.
6) Nadia ComΔneci was a gymnast from Romania that scored seven perfect 10.0 and won three gold medals at the Olympics at age 14.
7) Tenzin Gyatso was formally recognized as the 14th Dalai Lama in November 1950, at the age of 15.
8) Pele, a soccer superstar, was 17 years old when he won the world cup in 1958 with Brazil.
9) Elvis was a superstar by age 19.
10) John Lennon was 20 years and Paul Mcartney was 18 when the Beatles had their first concert in 1961.
11) Jesse Owens was 22 when he won 4 gold medals in Berlin 1936.
12) Beethoven was a piano virtuoso by age 23
13) Issac Newton wrote Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica at age 24
14) Roger Bannister was 25 when he broke the 4 minute mile record
15) Albert Einstein was 26 when he wrote the theory of relativity
16) Lance E. Armstrong was 27 when he won the tour de France
17) Michelangelo created two of the greatest sculptures βDavidβ and βPietaβ by age 28
18) Alexander the Great, by age 29, had created one of the largest empires of the ancient world
19) J.K. Rowling was 30 years old when she finished the first manuscript of Harry Potter
20) Amelia Earhart was 31 years old when she became the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean
21) Oprah was 32 when she started her talk show, which has become the highest-rated program of its kind
22) Edmund Hillary was 33 when he became the first man to reach Mount Everest
23) Martin Luther King Jr. was 34 when he wrote the speech βI Have a Dream."
24) Marie Curie was 35 years old when she got nominated for a Nobel Prize in Physics
25) The Wright brothers, Orville (32) and Wilbur (36) invented and built the world's first successful airplane and making the first controlled, powered and sustained heavier-than-air human flight
26) Vincent Van Gogh was 37 when he died virtually unknown, yet his paintings today are worth millions.
27) Neil Armstrong was 38 when he became the first man to set foot on the moon.
28) Mark Twain was 40 when he wrote "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer", and 49 years old when he wrote "Adventures of Huckleberry Finn"
29) Christopher Columbus was 41 when he discovered the Americas
30) Rosa Parks was 42 when she refused to obey the bus driverβs order to give up her seat to make room for a white passenger
31) John F. Kennedy was 43 years old when he became President of the United States
32) Henry Ford Was 45 when the Ford T came out.
33) Suzanne Collins was 46 when she wrote "The Hunger Games"
34) Charles Darwin was 50 years old when his book On the Origin of Species came out.
35) Leonardo Da Vinci was 51 years old when he painted the Mona Lisa.
36) Abraham Lincoln was 52 when he became president.
37) Ray Kroc Was 53 when he bought the McDonalds Franchise and took it to unprecedented levels.
38) Dr. Seuss was 54 when he wrote "The Cat in the Hat".
40) Chesley "Sully" Sullenberger III was 57 years old when he successfully ditched US Airways Flight 1549 in the Hudson River in 2009. All of the 155 passengers aboard the aircraft survived
41) Colonel Harland Sanders was 61 when he started the KFC Franchise
42) J.R.R Tolkien was 62 when the Lord of the Ring books came out
43) Ronald Reagan was 69 when he became President of the US
44) Jack Lalane at age 70 handcuffed, shackled, towed 70 rowboats
45) Nelson Mandela was 76 when he became President
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Pablo
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Sure, we'd faced some things as children that a lot of kids don't. Sure, Justin had qualified for his Junior de Sade Badge in his teaching methods for dealing with pain. We still hadn't learned, though, that growing up is all about getting hurt. And then getting over it. You hurt. You recover. You move on. Odds are pretty good you're just going to get hurt again. But each time, you learn something.
Each time, you come out of it a little stronger, and at some point you realize that there are more flavors of pain than coffee. There's the little empty pain of leaving something behind - gradutaing, taking the next step forward, walking out of something familiar and safe into the unknown. There's the big, whirling pain of life upending all of your plans and expecations. There's the sharp little pains of failure, and the more obscure aches of successes that didn't give you what you thought they would. There are the vicious, stabbing pains of hopes being torn up. The sweet little pains of finding others, giving them your love, and taking joy in their life they grow and learn. There's the steady pain of empathy that you shrug off so you can stand beside a wounded friend and help them bear their burdens.
And if you're very, very lucky, there are a very few blazing hot little pains you feel when you realized that you are standing in a moment of utter perfection, an instant of triumph, or happiness, or mirth which at the same time cannot possibly last - and yet will remain with you for life.
Everyone is down on pain, because they forget something important about it: Pain is for the living. Only the dead don't feel it.
Pain is a part of life. Sometimes it's a big part, and sometimes it isn't, but either way, it's a part of the big puzzle, the deep music, the great game. Pain does two things: It teaches you, tells you that you're alive. Then it passes away and leaves you changed. It leaves you wiser, sometimes. Sometimes it leaves you stronger. Either way, pain leaves its mark, and everything important that will ever happen to you in life is going to involve it in one degree or another.
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Jim Butcher