You always want your people to be proud of what you have accomplished.

That service is the noblest which is rendered for its own sake.

I find with most of my readers are kind of like me, sort of people who were a little bit naive in life and then learned the hard way that this is what’s going on, the political games and most of my readers write to me telling me that the book helped them open their eyes to what other people are doing to them.

Whatever your life’s work is, do it well. A man should do his job so well that the living, the dead, and the unborn could do it no better.

All of us are mentors. You’re mentors right here and now. And one of the things I’ve always done throughout my life, I have always found that person, that group of people that I was going to reach my hand out and help bring them along with me.

That is my wish, hope, instruction for all of you: Take your education seriously, okay? Always do that. Because I wouldn’t be here today if it weren’t for my education.

A great thing can only be done by a great person; and they do it without effort.

A great secret of success is to go through life as a man who never gets used up.

Work aside, we come to New York for the possibility of interaction and inspiration.

My protest about the post exchange seating bore some results. More seats were allocated for blacks, but there were still separate sections for blacks and for whites. At least I had made my men realize that something could be accomplished by speaking out, and I hoped they would be less resigned to unjust conditions.

Walking with a friend in the dark is better than walking alone in the light.

Never was anything great achieved without danger.

Quality is not an act, it is a habit.

If you stop struggling, then you stop life.

I cook, I create, I’m incredibly excited by what I do, I’ve still got a lot to achieve.

The desire of gold is not for gold. It is for the means of freedom and benefit.

I love to see a young girl go out and grab the world by the lapels.

Success is often achieved by those who don’t know that failure is inevitable.

It behooves every man to remember that the work of the critic is of altogether secondary importance, and that, in the end, progress is accomplished by the man who does things.

I don’t believe we are supposed to go through life defeated and not having enough money to pay our bills or send our kids to college.

People will try to bring you down, but you gotta go up.

Men are not prisoners of fate, but only prisoners of their own minds.

Faithless is he that says farewell when the road darkens.

You have power over your mind – not outside events. Realize this, and you will find strength.

Never complain and never explain.

Infinite striving to be the best is man’s duty; it is its own reward. Everything else is in God’s hands.

My whole thing is to inspire, to better people, to better myself forever in this thing that we call rap, this thing that we call hip hop.

Satisfaction lies in the effort, not in the attainment, full effort is full victory.

A passionate belief in your business and personal objectives can make all the difference between success and failure. If you aren’t proud of what you’re doing, why should anybody else be?

Idleness is the beginning of all vice, the crown of all virtues.

It is what you read when you don’t have to that determines what you will be when you can’t help it.

There is nothing noble in being superior to your fellow men. True nobility lies in being superior to your former self.

I hope that people around the world will be as inspired as I am to step up and to speak out on behalf of girls around the world who struggle to go to school.

The moment the alarm goes off is the first test; it sets the tone for the rest of the day. The test is not a complex one: when the alarm goes off, do you get up out of bed, or do you lie there in comfort and fall back to sleep? If you have the discipline to get out of bed, you win – you pass the test.

Self-centered leaders manipulate when they move people for personal benefit. Mature leaders motivate by moving people for mutual benefit.

Nothing is particularly hard if you divide it into small jobs.

No one ever told me I was pretty when I was a little girl. All little girls should be told they’re pretty, even if they aren’t.

You may write me down in history with your bitter, twisted lines. You may trod me in the very dirt, but still, like dust, I’ll rise.

Imagine for yourself a character, a model personality, whose example you determine to follow, in private as well as in public.

In my videos, I always want to be a powerful woman. That’s my mission.

If I’d observed all the rules, I’d never have got anywhere.

Is pride, the never-failing vice of fools.

Nothing will ever be attempted if all possible objections must first be overcome.

My experience has been that work is almost the best way to pull oneself out of the depths.

There are old heads in the world who cannot help me by their example or advice to live worthily and satisfactorily to myself; but I believe that it is in my power to elevate myself this very hour above the common level of my life.

It does not matter how slowly you go as long as you do not stop.

I attribute my success to this – I never gave or took any excuse.

I remember when my mother, Shyamala Harris, bought our first home. I was thirteen. She was so proud, and my sister and I were so excited. Millions of Americans know that feeling of walking through the front door of their own home for the first time – the feeling of reaching for opportunity and finding it.

Growing up, I decided, a long time ago, I wouldn’t accept any manmade differences between human beings, differences made at somebody else’s insistence or someone else’s whim or convenience.

Anyone can have a good day, but you have to be able to perform on a bad day.

You have to put in many, many, many tiny efforts that nobody sees or appreciates before you achieve anything worthwhile.

Life is one big road with lots of signs. So when you riding through the ruts, don’t complicate your mind. Flee from hate, mischief and jealousy. Don’t bury your thoughts, put your vision to reality. Wake Up and Live!

Take time to deliberate, but when the time for action has arrived, stop thinking and go in.

There is no failure except in no longer trying.

Every strike brings me closer to the next home run.

I have never been bewildered for long in any fight with our enemies – I was Armed with Insight.

I am really proud that I am one of the artists that has the opportunity to be on magazine covers and to be in the movies.

Remember, if you ever need a helping hand, it’s at the end of your arm, as you get older, remember you have another hand: The first is to help yourself, the second is to help others.

You can change your world by changing your words… Remember, death and life are in the power of the tongue.

My moms always told me, ‚How long you gonna play the victim?‘ I can say I’m mad and I hate everything, but nothing really changes until I change myself.

The cross of the Legion of Honor has been conferred on me. However, few escape that distinction.