“People are never able to outperform their self-image.”

“The measure of a leader is not the number of people who serve him but the number of people he serves.”

“people with charisma possess an outward focus instead of an inward one. They pay attention to other people, and they desire to add value to them.”

“Several years ago Dr. Maxwell Maltz’s book, Psycho-Cybernetics, was one of the most popular books on the market. Dr. Maltz was a plastic surgeon who often took disfigured faces and made them more attractive. He observed that in every case, the patient’s self-image rose with his and her physical improvement. In addition to being a successful surgeon, Dr. Maltz was a great psychologist who understood human nature. A wealthy woman was greatly concerned about her son, and she came to Dr. Maltz for advice. She had hoped that the son would assume the family business following her husband’s death, but when the son came of age, he refused to assume that responsibility and chose to enter an entirely different field. She thought Dr. Maltz could help convince the boy that he was making a grave error. The doctor agreed to see him, and he probed into the reasons for the young man’s decision. The son explained, “I would have loved to take over the family business, but you don’t understand the relationship I had with my father. He was a driven man who came up the hard way. His objective was to teach me self-reliance, but he made a drastic mistake. He tried to teach me that principle in a negative way. He thought the best way to teach me self-reliance was to never encourage or praise me. He wanted me to be tough and independent. Every day we played catch in the yard. The object was for me to catch the ball ten straight times. I would catch that ball eight or nine times, but always on that tenth throw he would do everything possible to make me miss it. He would throw it on the ground or over my head but always so I had no chance of catching it.” The young man paused for a moment and then said, “He never let me catch the tenth ball—never! And I guess that’s why I have to get away from his business; I want to catch that tenth ball!”

“One of the most striking scenes of the 1970s was Hubert Humphrey’s funeral. Seated next to Hubert’s beloved wife was former President Richard M. Nixon, a long-time political adversary of Humphrey, and a man disgraced by Watergate. Humphrey himself had asked Nixon to have that place of honor. Three days before Senator Humphrey died, Jesse Jackson visited him in the hospital. Humphrey told Jackson that he had just called Nixon. Reverend Jackson, knowing their past relationship, asked Humphrey why. Here is what Hubert Humphrey had to say, From this vantage point, with the sun setting in my life, all of the speeches, the political conventions, the crowds, and the great fights are behind me. At a time like this you are forced to deal with your irreducible essence, forced to grapple with that which is really important. And what I have concluded about life is that when all is said and done, we must forgive each other, redeem each other, and move on. Do”

“Excellence connects.” 

“If you want to be productive, you should try to learn to get joy from what gives the greatest return and discipline yourself to do those things.”

“walking slowly through the crowd.”

“In general, there are no bad audiences; only bad speakers.”

“successful people make right decisions early and manage those decisions daily.”

“You can't move people to action unless you first move them with emotion.... The heart comes before the head.”

“Never complain about what you allow.”

“It’s a simple thing to offer encouragement, but it can have a tremendous effect on someone’s life.”

“Pain prompts us to face who we are and where we are. What we do with that experience defines who we become.”

“Opportunity is in the eye of the beholder.”