β
Surround Yourself with People Who Believe in Your Dreams:
Surround yourself with people who believe in your dreams, encourage your ideas, support your ambitions, and bring out the best in you.
β
β
Roy T. Bennett (The Light in the Heart)
β
Without ambition one starts nothing. Without work one finishes nothing. The prize will not be sent to you. You have to win it.
β
β
Ralph Waldo Emerson
β
Get going. Move forward. Aim High. Plan a takeoff. Don't just sit on the runway and hope someone will come along and push the airplane. It simply won't happen. Change your attitude and gain some altitude. Believe me, you'll love it up here.
β
β
Donald J. Trump
β
Find a purpose to serve, not a lifestyle to live.
β
β
Criss Jami (Venus in Arms)
β
Surround Yourself with Positive People Who Believe in Your Dreams
Distance yourself from negative people who try to lower your motivation and decrease your ambition. Create space for positive people to come into your life.
Surround yourself with positive people who believe in your dreams, encourage your ideas, support your ambitions, and bring out the best in you.
β
β
Roy T. Bennett (The Light in the Heart)
β
If you're waiting until you feel talented enough to make it, you'll never make it.
β
β
Criss Jami (Healology)
β
Become the leader of your life. Lead yourself to where you want to be. Breathe life back into your ambitions, your desires, your goals, your relationships.
β
β
Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
β
Listen to what is being preached today. Look at everyone around us. You've wondered why they suffer, why they seek happiness and never find it. If any man stopped and asked himself whether he's ever held a truly personal desire, he'd find the answer. He'd see that all his wishes, his efforts, his dreams, his ambitions are motivated by other men. He's not really struggling even for material wealth, but for the second-hander's delusion - prestige. A stamp of approval, not his own. He can find no joy in the struggle and no joy when he has succeeded. He can't say about a single thing: 'This is what I wanted because I wanted it, not because it made my neighbors gape at me'. Then he wonders why he's unhappy.
β
β
Ayn Rand (The Fountainhead)
β
Sometimes we have to soak ourselves in the tears and fears of the past to water our future gardens.
β
β
Suzy Kassem (Rise Up and Salute the Sun: The Writings of Suzy Kassem)
β
It is not as much about who you used to be, as it is about who you choose to be.
β
β
Sanhita Baruah
β
There is a twilight zone in our hearts that we ourselves cannot see. Even when we know quite a lot about ourselves-our gifts and weaknesses, our ambitions and aspirations, our motives and our drives-large parts of ourselves remain in the shadow of consciousness. This is a very good thing. We will always remain partially hidden to ourselves. Other people, especially those who love us, can often see our twilight zones better than we ourselves can. The way we are seen and understood by others is different from the way we see and understand ourselves. We will never fully know the significance of our presence in the lives of our friends. That's a grace, a grace that calls us not only to humility, but to a deep trust in those who love us. It is the twilight zones of our hearts where true friendships are born.
β
β
Henri J.M. Nouwen
β
The difference between greed and ambition is a greedy person desires things he isn't prepared to work for.
β
β
Habeeb Akande
β
The drive, the ambition, the art; it all comes to me when I close my eyes and think about the sacrifices my Mom made for me.
β
β
Forrest Curran (Purple Buddha Project: Purple Book of Self-Love)
β
Fear motivates, more than love or ambition or joy. Fear is more powerful than anything else in the world. I have spent so long yearning for thingsβfor love, for acceptanceβthat I do not really need. I need nothing except the submission that comes with fear. I do not know why it took me so long to learn this.
β
β
Marie Lu (The Rose Society (The Young Elites, #2))
β
I hope you find true meaning, contentment, and passion in your life. I hope you navigate the difficult times and come out with greater strength and resolve. I hope you find whatever balance you seek with your eyes wide open. And I hope that you - yes, you - have the ambition to lean in to your career and run the world. Because the world needs you to change it.
β
β
Sheryl Sandberg (Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead)
β
Whatever your passion is, keep doing it. Don't waste time chasing after success or comparing yourself to others. Every flower blooms at a different pace. Excel at doing what your passion is and only focus on perfecting it. Eventually people will see what you are great at doing, and if you are truly great, success will come chasing after you.
β
β
Suzy Kassem (Rise Up and Salute the Sun: The Writings of Suzy Kassem)
β
If the fire in your heart is strong enough, it will burn away any obstacles that come your way.
β
β
Suzy Kassem (Rise Up and Salute the Sun: The Writings of Suzy Kassem)
β
A life fueled by passions is like riding on the back of a dragon.
β
β
Suzy Kassem (Rise Up and Salute the Sun: The Writings of Suzy Kassem)
β
Keep your standards even when everyone around you is losing theirs.
β
β
Habeeb Akande
β
If life throws you a few bad notes or vibrations, don't let them interrupt or alter your song.
β
β
Suzy Kassem (Rise Up and Salute the Sun: The Writings of Suzy Kassem)
β
Don't hang out with people who are:
Ungrateful
Unhelpful
Unruly
Unkindly
Unloving
Unambitious
Unmotivated
or make you feel...
Uncomfortable
β
β
Germany Kent
β
Stop living within the confines of how others define you! You weren't created to live their life; you were created to live yours - so LIVE it! You can reignite that fire within and bring the passion back into your goals, dreams, ambitions, careers, and relationships by reclaiming control of your own life. Be unapologetically YOU!
β
β
Steve Maraboli (Unapologetically You: Reflections on Life and the Human Experience)
β
You were born a winner, a warrior, one who defied the odds by surviving the most gruesome battle of them all - the race to the egg. And now that you are a giant, why do you even doubt victory against smaller numbers and wider margins? The only walls that exist are those you have placed in your mind. And whatever obstacles you conceive, exist only because you have forgotten what you have already achieved.
β
β
Suzy Kassem (Rise Up and Salute the Sun: The Writings of Suzy Kassem)
β
The possibility of the dream gives strength.
β
β
Lailah Gifty Akita (Pearls of Wisdom: Great mind)
β
When you encounter obstacles, donβt turn your back on them. Face them, confront them and your will see them dissolving in front of your eyes.
β
β
Roopleen (Words to inspire the winner in YOU)
β
Your mind can be your enemy or friend. If you always follow your heart, your mind will feel neglected. If you follow only your mind, your heart will never forgive you. Never ignore your conscience, yet always be conscious of reason. Make your heart and mind friends and you will have peace of mind throughout life's seasons.
β
β
Suzy Kassem (Rise Up and Salute the Sun: The Writings of Suzy Kassem)
β
Γ, the wine of a woman from heaven is sent,
more perfect than all that a man can invent.
β
β
Roman Payne (The Love of Europa: Limited Time Edition (Only the First Chapters))
β
Let some holy ambition invade our souls, so that, dissatisfied with mediocrity, we shall eagerly desire the highest things and shall toil with all our strength to obtain them, since we may if we wish.
β
β
Giovanni Pico della Mirandola (Oration on the Dignity of Man)
β
Those who seize the day become seriously rich.
β
β
Richard Koch (The 80/20 Principle: The Secret to Achieving More with Less)
β
Anyone can fail at something they really donβt want. What really takes courage is going after something you want and then failing. There is more fulfillment in life knowing that you tried, rather than settled without a fight.
β
β
Shannon L. Alder
β
The power of hope! Even a lack of ambition can, for a time, pay off as a necessary facet, as long as hope outweighs it.
β
β
Criss Jami (Killosophy)
β
When you find yourself in the thickness of pursuing a goal or dream, stop only to rest. Momentum builds success.
β
β
Suzy Kassem (Rise Up and Salute the Sun: The Writings of Suzy Kassem)
β
Momentum builds success.
β
β
Suzy Kassem (Rise Up and Salute the Sun: The Writings of Suzy Kassem)
β
As for myself, I have found my perfect pattern in Jesus, who said, βThe Father has not left Me
alone, for I always do those things that please Him.β I am no longer motivated by personal ambition.
I have discovered a sweeter, purer motive: simply to please my Father.
β
β
Derek Prince
β
Happiness is a state of mind and not a state of possession. Be as you are and you will be happy, if you try to be someone else you will be miserable.
β
β
Apoorve Dubey (The Flight Of Ambition)
β
Power and glory make the world go round since they are essential drives shaping ambition and social motivation. Time and again, power, as a model of control or authority, sets the stage for glory and credit that results from success or achievement. ("The Power and the Glory")
β
β
Erik Pevernagie
β
You will miss a normal life while living a successful life, but not as much as the craving for a successful life while you were living a normal life.
β
β
Amit Kalantri
β
At the end of the day let their be no regrets, only a desire to do more tomorrow than you did today.
β
β
Noel DeJesus
β
Ambition is a path, not a destination, and it is essentially the same path for everybody. No matter what the goal is, the path leads through Pilgrimβs Progress regions of motivation, hard work, persistence, stubbornness, and resilience under disappointment. Unconsidered, merely indulged, ambition becomes a vice; it can turn an man into a machine that knows nothing but how to run. Considered, it can be something else β pathway to the stars, maybe. I suspect that what makes hedonists so angry when they think about overachievers is that the overachievers, without benefit of drugs or orgies, have more fun.
β
β
Wallace Stegner (Crossing to Safety)
β
If you are not working towards something, your life will end with nothing.
β
β
Habeeb Akande
β
Some roses grow through concrete. Remember that.
β
β
Brandi L. Bates (Red Flags)
β
Do what ought to be done, here and now, to get you somewhere β anywhere.
β
β
Charlotte Eriksson
β
You have to choose your path.
You have to decide what you wish to do.
You are the only person that can determine your destiny.
β
β
Lailah Gifty Akita (Think Great: Be Great! (Beautiful Quotes, #1))
β
And yet is not mankind itself, pushing on its blind way, driven by a dream of its greatness and its power upon the dark paths of excessive cruelty and of excessive devotion. And what is the pursuit of truth, after all?
β
β
Joseph Conrad (Lord Jim)
β
If you cannot do great things in life, make sure you do the small things in a great way.
β
β
Habeeb Akande
β
We are surrounded by adversity but we shall triumph because we have a greater spirit
β
β
Lailah Gifty Akita (Pearls of Wisdom: Great mind)
β
The successes and failures of yesterday are gone, today is a new day.
β
β
Noel DeJesus
β
People are crazy about food, smoking, drinking, girls but not about their dreams.
β
β
Amit Kalantri
β
Why settle for a lesser vision? When you are destiny for greatness!
β
β
Lailah Gifty Akita (Pearls of Wisdom: Great mind)
β
Don't let your life goals fall victim to the allure of comfortable routines.
β
β
Zero Dean (Lessons Learned from The Path Less Traveled Volume 1: Get motivated & overcome obstacles with courage, confidence & self-discipline)
β
I work so hard for profits because my dreams are expensive.
β
β
Amit Kalantri
β
Distance yourself from negative people who try to lower your motivation and decrease your ambition. Create space for positive people to come into your life. Surround yourself with positive people who believe in your dreams, encourage your ideas, support your ambitions, and bring out the best in you.
β
β
Roy Bennett
β
When I create a masterpiece I feel alive! When my creation is revered I feel immortal.
β
β
Euphoria Godsent
β
Explore the wonders of different shades of colours. It is purely lovely.
β
β
Lailah Gifty Akita (Think Great: Be Great! (Beautiful Quotes, #1))
β
Within you lies your strength.
β
β
Lailah Gifty Akita (Pearls of Wisdom: Great mind)
β
Thoughts are free, talk is cheap, and action is expensive. What's your worth?
β
β
Noel DeJesus
β
Ambition is a funny thing: it creeps in when you least expect it and keeps you moving, even when you think you want to stay put
β
β
Lena Dunham (Not That Kind of Girl: A Young Woman Tells You What She's "Learned")
β
The Nation, which indulges towards another an habitual hatred, or an habitual fondness, is in some degree a slave. It is a slave to its animosity or to its affection, either of which is sufficient to lead it astray from its duty and its interest. ... The Nation, prompted by ill-will and resentment, sometimes impels to war the Government, contrary to the best calculations of policy. The Government sometimes participates in the national propensity, and adopts through passion what reason would reject; at other times, it makes the animosity of the nation subservient to projects of hostility instigated by pride, ambition, and other sinister and pernicious motives. The peace often, sometimes perhaps the liberty, of Nations has been the victim.
β
β
George Washington (George Washington's Farewell Address (Books of American Wisdom))
β
Napoleon, the greatest of the conquerors, is a sufficient proof that great men of action are criminals, and therefore, not geniuses. One can understand him by thinking of the tremendous intensity with which he tried to escape from himself. There is this element in all the conquerors, great or small. Just because he had great gifts, greater than those of any emperor before him, he had greater difficulty in stifling the disapproving voice within him. The motive of his ambition was the craving to stifle his better self.
β
β
Otto Weininger (Sex and Character: An Investigation of Fundamental Principles)
β
It may be that you will be happiest in the rat race; perhaps, like me, you are basically a rat.
β
β
Richard Koch (The 80/20 Principle: The Secret to Achieving More with Less)
β
Without ambition, no goal can be met.
β
β
Kya Aliana
β
The world needs great inspires, who will encourage every living soul to reach their highest potential. You can be one.
β
β
Lailah Gifty Akita (Think Great: Be Great! (Beautiful Quotes, #1))
β
With great enthusiasm and determination you will master the art in your field.
β
β
Lailah Gifty Akita (Pearls of Wisdom: Great mind)
β
Not only should we encourage kids to daydream, but also to jump-in and build those dreams. Dreaming is largely lost among adults drowning in self-imposed realities.
β
β
Ryan Lilly
β
Fear motivates, more than love or ambition or joy. Fear is more powerful than anything else in the world.
β
β
Marie Lu (The Rose Society (The Young Elites, #2))
β
Men have selfish motivation, want, and desire tainting their vision; little girls have dreams, ambition, and honesty turning theirs crystal clear
β
β
C.M. Stunich (Havoc at Prescott High (The Havoc Boys, #1))
β
The older I get, the more I see how much motivations matter. The Zune was crappy because the people at Microsoft don't really love music or art the way we do. We won because we personally love music. We made the iPod for ourselves, and when you're doing something for yourself, or your best friend or family, you're not going to cheese out. If you don't love something, you're not going to cheese out. If you don't love something, you're not going to cheese out. If you don't love something, you're not going to go the extra mile, work the extra weekend, challenge the status quo as much.
β
β
Walter Isaacson (Steve Jobs)
β
Fear motivates, more than love or ambition or joy. Fear is more powerful than anything else in the world. I have spent so long yearning for thingsβfor love, for acceptanceβthat I do not really need.
β
β
Marie Lu (The Rose Society (The Young Elites, #2))
β
If you pay attention, when you are seeking something, you will move towards your goal. More importantly, however, you will acquire the information that allows your goal itself to transform. A totalitarian never asks, βWhat if my current ambition is in error?β He treats it, instead, as the Absolute. It becomes his God, for all intents and purposes. It constitutes his highest value. It regulates his emotions and motivational states, and determines his thoughts. All people serve their ambition. In that matter, there are no atheists. There are only people who know, and donβt know, what God they serve.
β
β
Jordan B. Peterson (12 Rules for Life: An Antidote to Chaos)
β
My priority is not about grades. I yearn for knowledge, skills and wisdom.
β
β
Lailah Gifty Akita (Pearls of Wisdom: Great mind)
β
I am neither the mind not the thought, I am its Creator.
β
β
Rajasaraswathii
β
Let them ridicule you, laugh at you, hurt you & ignore you but never let them stop you.
β
β
Apoorve Dubey (The Flight Of Ambition)
β
We are all strangers to our hidden potential until we confront problems that reveal our capabilities.
β
β
Apoorve Dubey (The Flight Of Ambition)
β
When your youth is about to enter in old age it shouldn't wonder, what happened? it must say, well done.
β
β
Amit Kalantri
β
Status quo or grow: You are in control of your future.
β
β
Mary Mihalic (Made to Make It)
β
Yeast is to flour as action is to ambition. Rising to success requires adding and alternating starters.
β
β
Ryan Lilly
β
Do what you have to do... before you do what you want to do.
β
β
Katrina Cureton
β
Walk where your heart leads you and you will reach where you truly belong.
β
β
Apoorve Dubey (The Flight Of Ambition)
β
God holds the right key to every door.
β
β
Lailah Gifty Akita (Pearls of Wisdom: Great mind)
β
The obstacles were intended to be a distraction from the goal.
You must keep a persistence focus to realise the goal.
β
β
Lailah Gifty Akita (Pearls of Wisdom: Great mind)
β
We are all beautiful instruments of God. He created many notes in music so that we would not be stuck playing the same song. Be music always. Keep changing the keys, tones, pitch, and volume of each of the songs you create along your journey and play on. Nobody will ever reach ultimate perfection in this lifetime, but trying to achieve it is a full-time job. Start now and don't stop. Make your book of life a musical. Never abandon obligations, but have fun leaving behind a colorful legacy. Never allow anybody to be the composer of your own destiny. Take control of your life, and never allow limitations implanted by society, tell you how your music is supposed to sound β or how your book is supposed to be written.
β
β
Suzy Kassem (Rise Up and Salute the Sun: The Writings of Suzy Kassem)
β
What dream, what hope, what despair drives us to the things we do, just to desert us when the deed is done? What hollow things are they, motive and reason, born at night to fade so quickly in the sunlight of consequence? What we do in life lives on inside us, long after ambition and fear lie frosted and opaqued on forgotten shores. What we do in life, more than what we think or say, is what we are.
β
β
Gregory David Roberts (The Mountain Shadow)
β
The fullness of life is wrapped in all sacred times: plenty and scarcity; happiness and sadness; planting and harvesting; sunrise and sunset; winter and springtime; summer and autumn; beginning and finishing; birth and deathβ¦!
β
β
Lailah Gifty Akita (Think Great: Be Great! (Beautiful Quotes, #1))
β
In the temple of science are many mansions, and various indeed are they that dwell therein and the motives that have led them thither. Many take to science out of a joyful sense of superior intellectual power; science is their own special sport to which they look for vivid experience and the satisfaction of ambition; many others are to be found in the temple who have offered the products of their brains on this altar for purely utilitarian purposes. Were [someone to] drive all the people belonging to these two categories out of the temple, the assemblage would be seriously depleted, but there would still be some men, of both present and past times, left inside. Our Planck is one of them, and that is why we love him.
β
β
Albert Einstein
β
And a further reason for caution, in this respect, might be drawn from the reflection that we are not always sure that those who advocate the truth are influenced by purer principles than their antagonists. Ambition, avarice, personal animosity, party opposition, and many other motives not more laudable than these, are apt to operate as well upon those who support as those who oppose the right side of a question. Were there not even these inducements to moderation, nothing could be more ill-judged than that intolerant spirit which has, at all times, characterized political parties. For in politics, as in religion, it is equally absurd to aim at making proselytes by fire and sword. Heresies in either can rarely be cured by persecution.
β
β
Alexander Hamilton (Federalist Papers)
β
She had said he had been driven away from her by a dream,--and there was no answer one could make her--there seemed to be no forgiveness for such a transgression.
And yet is not mankind itself, pushing on its blind way, driven by a dream of its greatness and its power upon the dark paths of excessive cruelty and of excessive devotion. And what is the pursuit of truth, after all?
β
β
Joseph Conrad (Lord Jim)
β
The public was like one of those huge Pacific jellyfish; one enormous, pulsating mass of indifference, drifting wherever the current carried it; an organism without a motive, ambition or original sin to call its own, but which somehow believed, in whatever passed for its brain, that it chose its own leaders and had a say in its own destiny.
β
β
Mick Herron (Real Tigers (Slough House, #3))
β
I believe fully that if you want to do something, you just go do it. You can sit around, think about it, waiting until things are perfect, wringing your hands, dithering and hesitating and slowly twisting your panties into a perfect little fishermanβs knot. Or you can get up off your lazy fucking ass and do something. Whatβs the worst that can happen?
β
β
Aisha Tyler (Self-Inflicted Wounds: Heartwarming Tales of Epic Humiliation)
β
Ambition is a path, not a destination, and it is essentially the same path for everybody. No matter what the goal is, the path leads through Pilgrimβs Progress regions of motivation, hard work, persistence, stubbornness, and resilience under disappointment. Unconsidered, merely indulged, ambition becomes a vice; it can turn a man into a machine that knows nothing but how to run. Considered, it can be something elseβpathway to the stars, maybe.
β
β
Wallace Stegner (Crossing to Safety (Modern Library Classics))
β
In hindsight, it is tempting to dismiss every Fascist of this era as a thoroughly bad guy or a lunatic, but that is too easy, and by inducing complacency, also dangerous. Fascism is not an exception to humanity, but part of it. Even people who enlisted in such movements out of ambition, greed, or hatred likely were unaware of, or denied to themselves, their true motives.
β
β
Madeleine K. Albright (Fascism: A Warning)
β
Ambition is a path, not a destination, and it is essentially the same path for everybody. No matter what the goal is, the path leads through Pilgrim's Progress regions of motivation, hard work, persistence, stubbornness, and resilience under disappointment. Unconsidered, merely indulged, ambition becomes a vice; it can turn a man into a machine that knows nothing but how to run. Considered, it can be something else - pathway to the stars, maybe.
β
β
Wallace Stegner (Crossing to Safety)
β
The creatures reproduce by flaking. The young, when shed by a parent, are indistinguishable from dandruff.
There is only one sex.
Every creature simply sheds flakes of his own kind, and his own kind is like everybody else's kind.
There is no childhood as such. Flakes begin flaking three Earthling hours after they themselves have been shed.
They do not reach maturity, then deteriorate and die. They reach maturity and stay in full bloom, so to speak, for as long as Mercury cares to sing.
There is no way in which one creature can harm another, and no motive for oneβs harming another.
Hunger, envy, ambition, fear, indignation, religion, and sexual lust are irrelevant and unknown.
The creatures only have one sense: touch.
They have weak powers of telepathy. The messages they are capable of transmitting and receiving are almost as monotonous as the song of Mercury. They have only two possible messages. The first is an automatic response to the second, and the second is an automatic response to the first.
The first is, "Here I am, here I am, here I am."
The second is, "So glad you are, so glad you are, so glad you are.
β
β
Kurt Vonnegut Jr. (The Sirens of Titan)
β
I had begun to see a new map of the world, one that was frightening in its simplicity, suffocating in its implications. We were always playing on the white man's court, Ray had told me, by the white man's rules. If the principal, or the coach, or a teacher, or Kurt, wanted to spit in your face, he could, because he had power and you didn't. If he decided not to, if he treated you like a man or came to your defense, it was because he knew that the words you spoke, the clothes you wore, the books you read, your ambitions and desires, were already his. Whatever he decided to do, it was his decision to make, not yours, and because of that fundamental power he held over you, because it preceded and would outlast his individual motives and inclinations, any distinction between good and bad whites held negligible meaning.
β
β
Barack Obama (Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance)
β
Schartz would never live in a world so open. His would always be occluded by the fact that his understanding and his ambition outstripped his talent. He'd never be as good as he wanted to be, not at baseball, not at football, not at reading Greek or taking the LSAT. And beyond all that he'd never be as _good_ as he wanted to be. He'd never found anything inside himself that was really good and pure, that wasn't double-edged, that couldn't just as easily become its opposite. He had tried and failed to find that thing and he would continue to try and fail, or else he would leave off trying and keep on failing. He had no art to call his own. He knew how to motivate people, manipulate people, move them around, this was his only skill. He was like a minor Greek god you've barely heard of, who sees through the glamour of the armor and down into the petty complexity of each soldier's soul. And in the end is powerless to bring about anything resembling his vision. The loftier, arbitrary gods intervene.
β
β
Chad Harbach (The Art of Fielding)
β
Reality is based on your perception of the truth.
Think about that statement for a bit, it will blow your mind, and blow the lid of what you perceive to be real and what is an illusion.
You are here to live YOUR life, YOUR way and on YOUR terms, not for the people you work for, not the people in the media, and not to live in the little box that society may have placed you in.
You are a unique individual, with talents, with drive, with passion, with ambition, with love, with laughter, with a soul that could melt the hardest of hearts, and with a mind as creative as Da Vinci.
You chose this life for a reason, and it certainly wasn't to live a reality created by others. Is this the time to stand up, and say I can live my own reality, create what I want for my own life, have the things I want in life without guilt, knowing that you deserve anything you want and are prepared to put the time and effort into getting?
What ifΒ there was a way to bend your reality, a way to use your mind consciously to get whatΒ YOU want in life,Β become wealthy, feel comfortable in your own skin, meet the perfect man or woman, become more spontaneous, feel free, love, be open, be honest, be heartfelt, be grateful, be the one, love life, live, feel it, breathe it.... Welcome to Mind Alchemy Is this the time to Bend Your Reality?
β
β
Steven P. Aitchison
β
he lacked the sort of ambition that JB and Jude had, ...that always made him think a fraction of them was already living in some imagined future, the contours of which were crystallized only to them. JB's ambition was fueled by a lust for that future, for his speedy arrival to it; Jude's , he thought, was motivated more by a fear that if he didn't move forward, he would somehow slip back to his past, the life he had left and about which he would tell none of them. And it wasn't only Jude and JB who possessed this quality: New York was populated by the ambitious. It was often the only thing that everyone here had in common. Ambition and atheism: "Ambition is my only religion," JB had told him... Only here did you feel compelled to somehow justify anything short of rabidity for your career; only here did you have to apologize for having faith in something other than yourself.
β
β
Hanya Yanagihara (A Little Life)
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Love of power, operating through greed and through personal ambition, was the cause of all these evils. To this must be added the violent fanaticism which came into play once the struggle had broken out. Leaders of parties in the cities had programmes which appeared admirable β on one side political equality for the masses, on the other the safe and sound government of the aristocracy β but in professing to serve the public interest they were seeking to win the prizes for themselves. In their struggles for ascendancy nothing was barred; terrible indeed were the actions to which they committed themselves, and in taking revenge they went farther still. Here they were deterred neither by the claims of justice nor by the interests of the state; their one standard was the pleasure of their own party at that particular moment, and so, either by means of condemning their enemies on an illegal vote or by violently usurping power over them, they were always ready to satisfy the hatreds of the hour. Thus neither side had any use for conscientious motives; more interest was shown in those who could produce attractive arguments to justify some disgraceful action. As for the citizens who held moderate views, they were destroyed by both the extreme parties, either for not taking part in the struggle or in envy at the possibility that they might survive.
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Thucydides (The History of the Peloponnesian War)
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As I developed as a CEO, I found two key techniques to be useful in minimizing politics. 1. Hire people with the right kind of ambition. The cases that I described above might involve people who are ambitious but not necessarily inherently political. All cases are not like this. The surest way to turn your company into the political equivalent of the U.S. Senate is to hire people with the wrong kind of ambition. As defined by Andy Grove, the right kind of ambition is ambition for the companyβs success with the executiveβs own success only coming as a by-product of the companyβs victory. The wrong kind of ambition is ambition for the executiveβs personal success regardless of the companyβs outcome. 2. Build strict processes for potentially political issues and do not deviate. Certain activities attract political behavior. These activities include: Β Performance evaluation and compensation Β Organizational design and territory Β Promotions Letβs examine each case and how you might build and execute a process that insulates the company from bad behavior and politically motivated outcomes.
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Ben Horowitz (The Hard Thing About Hard Things: Building a Business When There Are No Easy Answers)
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There is no doubt, that in this world, there are all sorts of people who look nice, but are empty inside; who do not feel either moral or spiritual aspirations in addition to the physical gifts with which nature blessed them ... But Corneliu Codreanu, his magnificient physique corresponds to an exceptional inner wholeness. Exclamations of admiration from men left him indifferent. Praise angered him. He had only a fighter's greatness and the ambition of great reformers... The characteristic of his soul was goodness. If you want to penetrate the initial motive which prompted Corneliu Codreanu to throw in a fight so hard and almost desperate, the best answer is that he did it out of compassion for suffering people. His heart bled with thousands of injuries to see the misery in which peasants and workers struggled. His love for the people - unlimited! He was sensitive to any suffering the working masses endured. He had a cult for the humble, and showed an infinite attention to their aspirations and their hopes. The smallest window, the most trivial complaint, were examined with the same seriousness with which he addressed grave political problems.
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Horia Sima
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I also find Millβs words to be of use when considering relationships. Often we want our friends, partners and people we love to be like us, because that allows us to feel validated and accepted. It is a powerful thing to find people in this world who share our values and instincts. But it is also important to celebrate the differences between our partners and us. Would we really want to be in a relationship where the other person reminds us every day of ourselves? Wouldnβt it just be like having rich chocolate cake every day? Do we even especially like people who are very much like us? Donβt we find ourselves cynical of their motives, believing we can see right through them? Love seems to come without a template. We may think we know what we want in a partner and then one day find ourselves in love for very different reasons. In the same way that differing, developed individuals contribute to Millβs view of society and make it worth belonging to, so too the differences between people in a relationship can be precisely the substance of what makes it valuable. And then, rather than falling for that old fallacy of entering into a relationship thinking you will βchangeβ the other person to more comfortably reflect your values, you might see the qualities that separate them from you as precisely the features to celebrate. These qualities can complement our own: our laid-back approach to life can be challenged by the more active, dynamic ambition we might see in a partner, or vice versa. When the time comes, it will be useful to have them in mind as a role model. And to echo Mill: as our partners develop their own unique qualities, they can become of more value to themselves and therefore to the relationship as a whole.
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Derren Brown (Happy: Why More or Less Everything is Absolutely Fine)