Ken > Ken's Quotes

“E.L. Doctorow said once said that 'Writing a novel is like driving a car at night. You can see only as far as your headlights, but you can make the whole trip that way.' You don't have to see where you're going, you don't have to see your destination or everything you will pass along the way. You just have to see two or three feet ahead of you. This is right up there with the best advice on writing, or life, I have ever heard.”
― Anne Lamott, Bird by Bird

“Satire is tragedy plus time. You give it enough time, the public, the reviewers will allow you to satirize it. Which is rather ridiculous, when you think about it.”
― Lenny Bruce, The Essential Lenny Bruce: his original unexpurgated satirical routines

“How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment before starting to improve the world.”
― Anne Frank, Anne Frank's Tales from the Secret Annex: A Collection of Her Short Stories, Fables, and Lesser-Known Writings

“A dream you dream alone is only a dream. A dream you dream together is reality.”
― John Lennon

“Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a harder battle.”
― Plato

“Reader, suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of Congress. But I repeat myself.”
― Mark Twain

“If you tell the truth, you don't have to remember anything.”
― Mark Twain

“There comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular, but he must take it because conscience tells him it is right.”
― Martin Luther King Jr., A Testament of Hope: The Essential Writings and Speeches

“Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that.”
― Martin Luther King Jr., A Testament of Hope: The Essential Writings and Speeches

“The reason I talk to myself is because I’m the only one whose answers I accept.”
― George Carlin

“I think I am, therefore, I am... I think.”
― George Carlin

“A life is not important except in the impact it has on other lives.”
― Jackie Robinson

“I'm not upset that you lied to me, I'm upset that from now on I can't believe you.”
― Friedrich Nietzsche

“The person who is the star of previous era is often the last one to adapt to change, the last one to yield to logic of a strategic inflection point and tends to fall harder than most.”
― Andrew S. Grove, Only the Paranoid Survive: How to Exploit the Crisis Points that Challenge Every Company and Career

“One way to remember who you are is to remember who your heroes are.”
― Walter Isaacson, Steve Jobs

“Announcing your plans is a good way to hear god laugh”
― David milch

“Some days you must learn a great deal. But you should also have days when you allow what is already in you to swell up and touch everything. If you never let that happen, then you just accumulate facts, and they begin to rattle around inside of you.”
― E. L. Konigsburg

“Not only does God play dice but... he sometimes throws them where they cannot be seen.”
― Stephen Hawking

“Remember to look up at the stars and not down at your feet. Never give up work. Work gives you meaning and purpose and life is empty without it. If you are lucky enough to find love, remember it is there and don't throw it away.”
― Stephen Hawking

“Only that day dawns to which we are awake. There is more day to dawn. The sun is but a morning star.”
― Henry David Thoreau, Walden: Or, Life in the Woods

“When our memories outweigh our dreams, it is then that we become old.”
― Bill Clinton

“The brick walls are there for a reason. The brick walls are not there to keep us out. The brick walls are there to give us a chance to show how badly we want something. Because the brick walls are there to stop the people who don’t want it badly enough. They’re there to stop the other people.”
― Randy Pausch, The Last Lecture

“Even the most talented executives are a blend of strengths and weaknesses, light and dark. One of the most difficult jobs in running a company is to keep people’s energies focused by giving them new challenges. As we looked for the next generation of leaders at Disney, only those who could handle highly varied responsibilities were going to be candidates. The company had become too interdependent to rely on highly specialized managers with narrow sets of skills. I was less drawn to people with perfect credentials for a given job than to those who had strong underlying qualities such as common sense, character, creativity, and passion. With those traits—and the right training and support—people tend to succeed at whatever jobs they’re given.”
― Michael D. Eisner, Work in Progress: Risking Failure, Surviving Success

“Around here, however, we don't look backwards for very long. We keep moving forward, opening up new doors and doing new things, because we're curious...and curiosity keeps leading us down new paths.”
― Walt Disney Company

“Here's to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers. The round pegs in the square holes. The ones who see things differently. They're not fond of rules. And they have no respect for the status quo. You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify or vilify them. About the only thing you can't do is ignore them. Because they change things. They push the human race forward. And while some may see them as the crazy ones, we see genius. Because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do.”
― Steve Jobs

“Probably my worst quality is that I get very passionate about what I think is right. ”
― Hillary Rodham Clinton

“One thing we know for sure is that change is certain. Progress is not. Progress depends on the choices we make today for tomorrow and on whether we meet our challenges and protect our values.”
― Hillary Rodham Clinton, Living History

“Human rights are women’s rights, and women’s rights are human rights. Let us not forget that among those rights are the right to speak freely--and the right to be heard.”
― Hillary Rodham Clinton

“We all owe everyone for everything that happens in our lives. But it's not owing like a debt to one person--it's really that we owe everyone for everything. Our whole lives can change in an instant--so each person that keeps that from happening, no matter how small a role they play, is also responsible for all of it. Just by giving friendship and love, you keep the people around you from giving up--and each expression of friendship or love may be the one that makes all the difference.”
― Will Schwalbe, The End of Your Life Book Club

“People. Products. Profits. In that order.”
― Ken Goldstein