- one quote per person - unique and general ideas - no context necessary - worded well - author walked the walk ## Greatness "What are the most important problems in your field? Why aren't you working on them?” — Richard Hamming "Everything around you that you call ‘life’ was made up by people who were no smarter than you.” — Steve Jobs "How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment before starting to improve the world.” — Anne Frank “Unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot, nothings going to change. It's not.” — The Lorax, *The Lorax (Dr. Seuss)* “We all do our duty, when there is no cost to it. How easy it seems then, to walk the path of honor. Yet soon or late in every man’s life comes a day when it is not easy, a day when he must choose.” — Aemon Targaryen, *Game of Thrones (George R. R. Martin)* “We live in a world in which courage is in less supply than genius.” ― Peter Thiel "Strength does not come from physical capacity. It comes from an indomitable will." — Mahatma Gandhi “Critique by creating.” — Michaelangelo Buonarroti "Play the game to change the game." — Mark Pitts "Do, or do not. There is no try." — Yoda "And I took that personally." — Michael Jordan "Never tell me the odds" — Han Solo, *Star Wars* ## Perspective “I took a deep breath and listened to the old brag of my heart. I am, I am, I am.” — Sylvia Plath, *The Bell Jar* "I am very poorly today & very stupid & hate everybody & everything… I have worked as hard and as well as I could, and no man can do more than this.” — Charles Darwin "If you hit a wrong note, it's the next note you play that determines if it's good or bad.” — Miles Davis "Whenever I get that sad, depressed, feeling, I go out and kill a policeman." — P. G. Wodehouse "It suddenly struck me that that tiny pea, pretty and blue, was the Earth. I put up my thumb and shut one eye, and my thumb blotted out the planet Earth. I didn't feel like a giant. I felt very, very small." — Neil Armstrong “Self-esteem is the reputation that you have with yourself.” "Relax for the same result." — Derek Sivers "You're gonna need a bigger boat.” — *Jaws* “The best revenge is living well.” ― Jerry Seinfeld "There are no stupid questions, only stupid people.” "Hakuna Matata! It means no worries.” — *The Lion King* "Just keep swimming.” — *Finding Nemo* “I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past, I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain.” — Paul Atreides, *Dune (Frank Herbert)* ## People "Everyone you meet is fighting a battle you know nothing about." — Robin Williams "The best way to find out if you can trust somebody is to trust them.” — Ernest Hemingway "Integrity needs no rules." — Albert Camus “Be present or be gone.” — Celeste Headlee, *We Need to Talk* “Friendship is a wildly underrated medication.” — Anna Deavere Smith “I think it’s impossible to really understand somebody, what they want, what they believe, and not love them the way they love themselves.” — Ender, *Ender's Game (Orson Scott Card)* “What convinces is conviction” — Lyndon B. Johnson “People will forget what you said. People will forget what you did. But people will never forget how you made them feel.” — Maya Angelou "A man always has two reasons for doing anything: a good reason and the real reason." — John Pierpoint Morgan “A leader is a dealer in hope.” ― Napoleon Bonaparte “Any man who must say, I am the king, is no true king.” — Tywin Lannister, *Game of Thrones (George R. R. Martin)* "Ohana means family. Family means nobody gets left behind or forgotten." — "Lilo & Stitch" "When a woman asks 'Tell me why do you love me?' it's a very good question, because there is no answer to it. The paradox is the moment you can answer it, its is by definition not love." — Slavoj Zizek “Never forget what you are, the rest of the world will not. Wear it like armor and it can never be used to hurt you.” — Tyrion Lannister, *Game of Thrones (George R. R. Martin)* “Power resides where men believe it resides. It is a trick, A shadow on the wall.” — Lord Varys, *Game of Thrones (George R. Martin)* “Science gathers knowledge faster than society gathers wisdom.” — Isaac Asimov ## Life "'The Answer to the Great Question… Of Life, the Universe and Everything… Is… Forty-two,' said Deep Thought, with infinite majesty and calm." — Douglas Adams, *The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy* "Life is great man, you can eat at Denny's or wear a hat, whatever you want." — Norm Macdonald "For every thousand people hacking at the leaves of evil, there is one striking at the roots." — Henry David Thoreau "The only real test of intelligence is if you get what you want out of life." — Naval Ravikant "But I am nothing, and so I am finally free to be myself." — Paul Buchheit, *I am nothing* "If you never did, you should. These things are fun and fun is good." — Dr. Seuss "The ability to play chess well is the sign of a wasted life." — Paul Morphy "The first principle is that you must not fool yourself and you are the easiest person to fool." — Richard P. Feynman "Don't forget to visit your mother." — Rocky Balboa, *Rocky* "Everyone I saw was the same: alcohol, women, pretending to be god, family, the king, dreams, children, power… They all had something they were drunk on. They were all slaves to something." — Kenny Ackerman, *Attack on Titan (Hajime Isayama)* “The only difference between medicine and poison is the dosage.” “Can it be that I have not lived as one ought?" suddenly came into his head. "But how not so, when I've done everything as it should be done?” — Ivan Ilyich, *The Death of Ivan Ilych (Leo Tolstoy)* “All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.” — Leo Tolstoy, *Anna Karenina* "There's never enough time to do all the nothing you want" — Calvin, *Calvin and Hobbes (Bill Watterson)* "He who fights with monsters should be careful lest he thereby becomes a monster. And if thou gaze long into an abyss, the abyss will also gaze into thee." ― Friedrich Nietzsche "The world is full of people suffering from the effects of their own unlived life… And yet, all of them suffer, because deep down they know: the life they mock is the life they were meant to live." ― Carl Jung "Real education is about getting people involved in thinking for themselves." — Noam Chomsky, *Understanding Power* “Time you enjoy wasting is not wasted time.” ― Marthe Troly-Curtin “You don't stop running because you get old, you get old because you stop running.” ― Christopher McDougall, *Born to Run* ## Science "The mathematician does not study pure mathematics because it is useful; he studies it because he delights in it and he delights in it because it is beautiful." — Henri Poincaré "Beauty is the first test: there is no permanent place in the world for ugly mathematics." — G. H. Hardy, *A Mathematician's Apology* "Politics is for the present, but an equation is for eternity." ― Albert Einstein "In mathematics, you don't understand things. You just get used to them." — John von Neumann ## Work "I love my films, I make them for me; Everyone else is invited." — Quentin Tarantino "Make every detail perfect and limit the number of details." — Jack Dorsey “There are no two words in the English language more harmful than ‘good job.’” — Fletcher, *Whiplash* "The best writing is rewriting." — E. B. White "Work with their garage door up" — Robin Sloan "Do what you need to do first" — Dad "Learning more is a smart person’s favorite form of procrastination.” — Mark Manson “Grumpy. Angry. Stupid. How long since last sleep, question?” — Rocky, *Project Hail Mary (Andy Weir)* "If you need a machine and don’t buy it, then you will ultimately find that you have paid for it and don’t have it." — Henry Ford “It's the job that's never started as takes longest to finish.” ― Sam Gamgee, *The Lord of the Rings (J.R.R. Tolkien)* "It is easier, I think, to paint a good picture than it is to paint a bad one. The difficulty is to have the will for it." — Robert Henri, *Art Spirit* ## Morality “Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that.” — Martin Luther King Jr. “The idea that some lives matter less is the root of all that is wrong with the world.” ― Paul Farmer “A ruler who hides behind paid executioners soon forgets what death is.” — Eddard Stark, *Game of Thrones (George R. R. Martin)* “You fucking doughnut of course you don't microwave a salad.” — Gordon Ramsay “I have heard it said that evil is simply a point of view. The villain is always the hero in his own story. And the definitions of wrong and right ever shift on the inconstant tides of human morality. But can such measures be said to apply to me? I am clarity. I am necessity. I am inevitability. But am I evil? But say then, for a moment, that this is also evil. And say that I choose this evil to spare others that same choice. This must be done. Does that not make me good?” — AIDAN, *The Illuminae Files (Amie Kaufman and Jay Kristoff)* “You are precisely right. It's all meaningless. No matter what dreams and hopes you had… no matter how blessed a life you've lived… it's all the same if you're shredded by rocks. Everyone will die someday. Does that mean life is meaningless? Was there even any meaning in being born? Would you say that of our fallen comrades? Their lives… were they meaningless?” — Erwin Smith, *Attack on Titan (Hajime Isayama)* "Public services are never better performed than when their reward comes in consequence of their being performed, and is proportioned to the diligence employed in performing them." — Adam Smith, *The Wealth of Nations* "It happens that every man in a bank hates what the bank does, and yet the bank does it. The bank is something more than men, I tell you. It’s the monster. Men made it, but they can’t control it." — John Steinbeck, *The Grapes of Wrath* ## Iconic “All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.” — George Orwell, *Animal Farm* "There is freedom of speech, but I cannot guarantee freedom after speech." — Idi Amin “Your mother was programmed by biology to love you the moment she laid her eyes on you. Just because she had no choice doesn't mean her love wasn't real” — AIDAN, Illuminae "I'm sorry, Dave. I'm afraid I can't do that." — HAL 9000, *Space Odyssey* "I'll be back." — *Terminator*