Shoe Dog

by Phil Knight

So that morning in 1962 I told myself: Let everyone else call your idea crazy… just keep going. Don’t stop. Don’t even think about stopping until you get there, and don’t give much thought to where “there” is. Whatever comes, just don’t stop.

Now, here, you see, it takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place. If you want to get somewhere else, you must run at least twice as fast as that. —Lewis Carroll, Through the Looking-Glass

Front runners always work the hardest, and risk the most.

You cannot travel the path until you have become the path yourself, said the Buddha,

Confucius—The man who moves a mountain begins by carrying away small stones—

You are remembered, he said, prophetically, for the rules you break.

Don’t tell people how to do things, tell them what to do and let them surprise you with their results.

Pre was most famous for saying, “Somebody may beat me—but they’re going to have to bleed to do it.”

If you’re following your calling, the fatigue will be easier to bear, the disappointments will be fuel, the highs will be like nothing you’ve ever felt.