“Ignoring a temptation is far more effective than fighting.”

“Don’t fight with narrow minded people; be determined to compel them to change their mindsets about who you stand to be, not by arguments, but by focusing on what you do every day. If they change it, fine; if they don’t, fine. The good news is that you are pursuing excellence!”

“Suffering in life can uncover untold depths of character and unknown strength for service. People who go through life  unscathed by sorrow and untouched by pain tend to be shallow in their perspectives on life. Suffering, on the other hand, tends to plow up the surface of our lives to uncover the depths that provide greater strength of purpose and accomplishment. Only deeply plowed earth can yield bountiful harvests.”

“When politics and home life have become one and the same thing, [...] then,[...] it is evident that we will be in a state of total liberty or anarchy.”

“We did live in dire poverty. And one of the things that I hated was poverty. Some people hate spiders. Some people hate snakes. I hated poverty. I couldn't stand it. My mother couldn't stand the fact that we were doing poorly in school, and she prayed and she asked God to give her wisdom. What could she do to get her young sons to understand the importance of developing their minds so that they control their own lives? God gave her the wisdom. At least in her opinion. My brother and I didn't think it was that wise. Turn off the TV, let us watch only two or three TV programs during the week. And with all that spare time read two books a piece from the Detroit Public Libraries and submit to her written book reports, which she couldn't read but we didn't know that. I just hated this. My friends were out having a good time. Her friends would criticize her. My mother didn't care. But after a while I actually began to enjoy reading those books. Because we were very poor, but between the covers of those books I could go anywhere. I could be anybody. I could do anything. I began to read about people of great accomplishment. And as I read those stories, I began to see a connecting thread. I began to see that the person who has the most to do with you, and what happens to you in life, is you. You make decisions. You decide how much energy you want to put behind that decision. And I came to understand that I had control of my own destiny. And at that point I didn't hate poverty anymore, because I knew it was only temporary. I knew I could change that. It was incredibly liberating for me. Made all the difference.” 

“When the author walks onto the stage, the play is over”

“their greatest success came just one step beyond the point at which defeat had overtaken them. Failure is a trickster with a keen sense of irony and cunning. It takes great delight in tripping one up when success is almost within reach.”

“Christianity is not a white man’s religion and don’t let anybody ever tell you that it’s white or black. Christ belongs to all people; he belongs to the whole world.”

“Look at the truth from how it stands, not where it comes from. The truth is still the truth no matter whether it is spoken by an Indian, an American, a Chinese, an European, an African or an Australian!”

“another tradition to politics, a tradition (of politics) that stretched from the days of the country’s founding to the glory of the civil rights movement, a tradition based on the simple idea that we have a stake in one another, and that what binds us together is greater than what drives us apart, and that if enough people believe in the truth of that proposition and act on it, then we might not solve every problem, but we can get something meaningful done.”

“Imperfect, but Perfectly Loved”

“Self-help is no help at all. Self-sacrifice is the way, my way, to finding yourself, your true self.”

“Puddleglum's my name. But it doesn't matter if you forget it. I can always tell you again.”

“Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma—which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and your intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.”

“The laws that forbid the carrying of arms... disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes.”