Fun Friday: Quotes

I love quotes. Back in the early days of Twitter, we used to tweet a quote of the day. And I tumbl a lot of quotes I find on the web. So when Max Yoder suggested to me a week or so ago that we do a fun friday on quotes, I was sold before even fininshing his short email.

The idea is you comment on this fun friday post with a favorite quote of yours.

I will start with this gem from my all time favorite person to quote, Winston Churchill:

It is a good thing for an educated man to read books of quotations.

Now it's your turn.

#Random Posts

Comments (Archived):

  1. sgerstenzang

    “History does not repeat itself but it does rhyme” – Mark Twain

    1. fredwilson

      one of my all time favorites!

    2. Anne Libby

      I also like the quote about history repeating itself, the first time as tragedy, the second time as farce. (Marx? Karl, not Groucho.)

  2. mcenedella

    “Our doubts are traitors, and make us lose the good we oft might win, by fearing to attempt.” – William Shakespeare

    1. fredwilson

      good one marc. it was nice bumping into you yesterday. that quote reminds me of this one:The 3 most harmful addictions are heroin, carbohydrates and a monthly salary.that is often attributed to me on twitter but i just took it from Nassim Taleb who coined it

  3. Ivan Vecchiato

    “You Can’t Believe Most of the Quotes You Read On the Internet” -Abraham Lincoln:-)

    1. fredwilson

      ha!

  4. Riaz Kanani

    Liked this one recently from Reid Hoffman:Entrepreneurs Need Optimism, Even When “Assembling the Plane on the Way Down”

    1. fredwilson

      that is when they need it the most. i am witnessing this right now with one of the best entrepreneurs i have ever worked for.

      1. JimHirshfield

        “…worked FOR.” <—love it.

    2. Wavelengths

      To repeat my ownself,even false hope is better than no hope.

  5. kidmercury

    “9/11 was an inside job” — 9/11 truth movement”i’m too scared of 9/11 truth and just want to fit in, so i’m going to ignore the whole 9/11 issue and act like it doesn’t matter while i keep voting for the two party system — or, better yet, expressing passion only towards the cause of apathy — while wondering why government keeps accidentally stealing money and giving it to bankers while accidentally passing laws that revoke our civil liberties. but then again i still have tv so civil liberties don’t matter anyway” — people outside the 9/11 truth movement

    1. fredwilson

      you remind me of the eight track tape that got stuck in my car in the late 70s. i listened to Bruce Springsteen Born To Run for a month!and that is a compliment Kid

  6. Jeffrey K. Rohrs

    “Some of my worst mistakes in life have been haircuts.” – Jim Morrison

  7. jmcaddell

    Failure is not the opposite of success. Failure at specific projects occurs on the way to overall success – success in kindergarten, school, career, and life. The key is to learn and keep trying. – Dean Shepherd, “From Lemons to Lemonade”

    1. fredwilson

      word

  8. Dan T

    “I swear, by my life and my love of it, that I will never live for the sake of another man, nor ask another man to live for mine.”

  9. Max Yoder

    “It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it.”—Upton Sinclair

    1. fredwilson

      send this to the RIAA and the MPAA

      1. Max Yoder

        word

      2. kidmercury

        #ohsnap

      3. Prokofy

        What do artists’ and musicians’ and digital creators’ salaries depend on then, Fred?!

    2. Cam MacRae

      One of my favourites. Have you read The Jungle?

      1. ShanaC

        I finished that book over lunches. I don’t know how I did that.

        1. Cam MacRae

          You’re a machine.

      2. Max Yoder

        I read excerpts in high school, but haven’t dug into the whole thing. If this life gives me time, I’ll get to it!

    3. hypermark

      This is the nut of how and why companies get disrupted and fall from greatness. More often than not, a company is less of a composite “team” than a bunch of individuals generally wanting to do the right thing, but underlying it all, focused on their own self-interest.When incentives and desired outcomes are in line, that is a magical thing. When they are out of whack, however…

    4. Techman

      I really love that quote. Sounds like someone in this world is getting paid to NOT know something.

      1. Max Yoder

        There are more real-world examples than there are words in the world.

        1. Techman

          Yep.

    5. Max Yoder

      Here’s a business-oriented quote that I cherish.If you invent frequently and are willing to fail, then you never get to that point where you really need to bet the whole company. AWS also started about six or seven years ago. We are planting more seeds right now, and it is too early to talk about them, but we are going to continue to plant seeds. And I can guarantee you that everything we do will not work. And, I am never concerned about that… We are stubborn on vision. We are flexible on details… We don’t give up on things easily. Our third-party seller business is an example of that. It took us three tries to get the third-party seller business to work. We didn’t give up.That’s from Jeff Bezos. I hear he is über intense in meetings. I’d love to experience that.

  10. Matt A. Myers

    “Think left and think right and think low and think high. Oh, the things you can think up if only you try!” – Dr. Seuss http://mattamyers.tumblr.co…”I have a million places that weave together to make this whole city a festival with me in the center” – Arnold Waldstein”NO ONE GOING TO EAT THIS CHICKEN” – FAKEGRIMLOCK http://www.avc.com/.a/6a00d

    1. fredwilson

      well played matt.

      1. Matt A. Myers

        They all inspire great feeling within. I hope they do the same for others.

    2. William Mougayar

      Excellent !!! They would make a poster blockbuster. I upvoted it.

      1. Matt A. Myers

        Now if only we could get Dr. Seuss, Arnold, and FAKEGRIMLOCK in the same room together..

        1. William Mougayar

          We’d have to get Arnold and FG to go on Broadway and that’s done.

          1. Matt A. Myers

            Life, complete.

          2. William Mougayar

            Very funny…where are all these drawings? You should publish the whole collection in 1 book…really. In a big coffee table type book.

          3. FAKE GRIMLOCK

            FROM CUSTOM CARTOON SIGNATURES ON KICKSTARTER POSTERS.EACH ONE UNIQUE. NO COPY EXIST.

          4. Techman

            That is a good idea

  11. Tom Labus

    “Philosophy, with the aid of experience, has at length banished the study of alchymy; and the present age, however desirous of riches, is content to seek them by the humbler means of commerce and industry.” Gibbon- Decline and Fall of Roman Empire.

  12. brian trautschold

    ‘It takes 20 years to build a reputation and 5 minutes to ruin it. If you think about that, you’ll do things differently” – Warren Buffet

    1. fredwilson

      damn straight

    2. JLM

      .5 seconds.

    3. Techman

      So true on so many levels.

    4. BSH

      Same can be said about relationships as well.

  13. falicon

    “Life is what happens while you’re busy making other plans” – Beautiful Boy by John Lennon

    1. fredwilson

      ah, john. my favorite beatle, maybe my favorite songwriter of all time. he was a very special man.

    2. kidmercury

      yeah that’s def one of my favorite ones

    3. falicon

      My close 2nd is more dialog than a quote…Sho’nuff: “Alright, Leroy, who is the one and only master?”Leroy Green: “I am.”…from Bary Gordy’s The Last Dragon (quite possibly the best movie ever made) 😉

    4. Rohan

      A John Lennon story I’d posted ages ago. 🙂 Not sure if it’s real or fictional but I love it..–I was reminded of a story from JOHN Lennon’s life this morning as I was reflecting on a post on a friend’s blog. I’m not entirely sure if this is real or fictional but I thought I’d share it anyway. When he was a 2nd grader, they were sent home with assignments to think about what they wanted to be when they grow up. They were supposed to write this on a piece of paper. The entire class did. Many others put in glamorous professions, spoke of wealth and prosperity.John’s answer was simple though – be happy was all his note said. His teacher said he didn’t understand the exercise.He walked away feeling she didn’t understand life..–Searched using Gawk.It – http://gawk.it/search?forum… 🙂

      1. falicon

        Nice!I believe gawk.it is going to get a lot of usage in the future thanks to today’s conversation as well…I suspect many of us will want/need to reach back into this conversation many times…so it’s just cool that we can now easily do that 🙂

  14. $3236

    “Consensus: everyone agrees to say collectively what no one believes individually.” – Abba Eban

    1. fredwilson

      wow. if that is true, democracy is a problem.

      1. FAKE GRIMLOCK

        DEMOCRACY IS LEAST BAD SOLUTION.

        1. thinkdisruptive

          Not measured by results.

  15. Dan

    “Nothing in the world can take the place of Persistence. Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful men with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not; the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent. The slogan ‘Press On’ has solved and always will solve the problems of the human race.” – Calvin Coolidge

    1. JLM

      .My mantra since college in 1969. That and the Kipling poem “If” are all the inspiration I have ever needed.Great minds.Bravo. Well played!.

      1. Dan

        Love “If”. I chose to recite it for a class assignment back in middle school and it’s stuck.The third quote that really stands out from my life (high school yr book stuff, NBD) is the Quaker/Stephen Grellet quote:”I expect to pass through this world but once. Any good, therefore, that I can do or any kindness I can show to any fellow creature, let me do it now. Let me not defer or neglect it for I shall not pass this way again.”Not easy to always live that one, but worth the effort to try.

      2. Rohan

        If you can fill the unforgiving minute with 60 seconds worth of distance run, yours is the earth and everything that’s in it..And which is more.. you’ll be a man, my son.Etched in my memory.

    2. andyidsinga

      Speaking of persistence:” Hello. My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepare to die.”(along with so many others from the Princess Bride : http://www.imdb.com/title/t

      1. Dan

        solid reference.

      2. cheivly

        He is only “mostly dead”

        1. andyidsinga

          Love that one too! – good to remember when things aren’t going our way 🙂

      3. Cam MacRae

        BBS classic:My PID is Inigo Montoya. You kill -9 my parent process. Prepare to vi.

        1. andyidsinga

          that is killer … “ba-dum-bum-CHING”

      4. falicon

        Love it! There are prob. A million good lines worthy of qoutes in thhat movie…

        1. andyidsinga

          yup – i don’t know how many times i’ve watched that movie with my kids over the years.

    3. Scott Barnett

      I made up mousepads with this quote back in 2001 for everyone at my company at the time. I still use it in my home office. My all time favorite quote.

  16. awaldstein

    “Everybody has a plan till they get punched in the face”… Mike Tyson.Equally applicable for the entrepreneur and cage fighter.

    1. William Mougayar

      I thought it was @fakegrimlock that said it 🙂

      1. Matt A. Myers

        Glad I revisited this thread this morning – hilarious! 🙂

      2. FAKE GRIMLOCK

        GRIMLOCK DOES THE PUNCHING.

    2. bsoist

      This was actually the first quote that came to mind. I’ve been saying it almost every day since you posted it here a while back. 🙂

      1. awaldstein

        Every time I think of the big deal that fizzled. The raise that got delayed and I needed to get a bridge. The meeting that took six months to get that go cancelled.This quote speaks to me in life and work. It is just so true.And of course, we keep making those plans cause they matter. They just don’t usually work out as planned.

    3. Yalim K. Gerger

      Man, I just entered the same quote, You beat me to it. Now I have to think of another one.

      1. awaldstein

        You need another plan now!

        1. Wavelengths

          I love it that some of the same great quotes get repeated here. Take THAT, you skimmers!(Great thoughts bear repeating.)

  17. Eliot Pierce

    “Whatever you think you can do or believe you can do, begin it. Action has magic, grace and power in it.” – Goethe

    1. fredwilson

      frame it

      1. Eliot Pierce

        A friend mentioned that quote to me when I was 18 in Lander Wyoming… and it has guided me for the last 19 years, first to the top of Denali… and then I took it from there. A few years later my cousin relayed the following, “If you fall flat on your face, at least you are moving forward.” 🙂

    2. JamesHRH

      This is rarely seen (here in NA) but a classic.

  18. Brian Manning

    Not sure who said it but I’ve always liked this one: “Entrepreneur = someone who will work 24 hrs a day for themselves to avoid working 1 hr a day for someone else.”

  19. johnmccarthy

    “Be the ball” -Ty Webb

  20. William Mougayar

    “DO NOT REASON AWAY YOUR VISION.” – Anonymous

  21. Dan Chung

    “And the attitude is not to withdraw from the world when you realize how horrible it is, but to realize that this horror is simply the foreground of a wonder and to come back and participate in it.”- Joseph Campbell

  22. awaldstein

    “Inspiration is for amateurs” …Chuck Close.

  23. awaldstein

    ‘Theres no success like failure and failure is no success at all.”…Dylan

    1. fredwilson

      whitney and i started a twitter account called @lotd, which stood for lyric of the day. lyrics are quotes with music. i love them. https://twitter.com/lotdit sort of died. but it was fun while it lastedhere’s a blog post i wrote about it http://avc.blogs.com/a_vc/2…and that is a great Dylan line

      1. awaldstein

        Thanks for the link.I distinctly remember walking into a record store and buying that album, taking it home. I’ve never stopped listening to it.

      2. kenberger

        was immediately reminded of that! Aweissman and I were avid users. miss it.”You can’t always get what you want. But if you try sometimes, you might find, you get what you need”– Rolling Stones

        1. fredwilson

          mick. he sure has the turn of the phrase down.

      3. John Revay

        Clicked through to the @lotd post – found this comment – good quote posted by that jackson guyjackson • 4 years ago−I like the idea of a lyric of the day, but I’m not down with the twittering and tumblring and whatnot. Why do you guys neeed to complicate everything – oh yeah you want to justify all the gadjets and widgets and nonsense you make money developing.Have fun.”I know that it’s evilI know that it’s got to beI know I ain’t doing muchDoing nothing means a lot to me”- Down Payment Blues, AC/DC, Powerage

        1. fredwilson

          i told you that’s what jackson thinks about social media

  24. awaldstein

    “Just do it’…truth in marketing.

  25. Mikology

    “Never, ever, confuse effort with results” – Mark Concannon Sr. (my father)

  26. William Mougayar

    “If all else fails, immortality can always be assured by spectacular error!” – John Kenneth Galbraith

    1. fredwilson

      good one

      1. William Mougayar

        then upvote it 🙂

        1. fredwilson

          right. i need to start doing that.

          1. William Mougayar

            “It’s never too late as long as it’s no too little.” – William Mougayar

  27. Bruce Warila

    I remember reading this quote from Jacob Javits… He believe he was talking about his time spent in the boxing ring and learning how to win a fist fight. “Hit’em from where you are…. there is nothing to be gained by wishing you were someplace else or waiting for a better situation. You see where you are and you do what you can with that.” I never forgot the metaphor.

  28. Bill DeMuro

    I am putting myself to the fullest possible use, which is all I think that any conscious entity can ever hope to do. HAL9000

  29. Tracey Grady

    “Who would call a day spent reading a good day? But a life spent reading, that is a good life.”—Annie Dillard

    1. Roger Ellman

      Refreshing! Both the quote and time spent reading! I like things of Annie Dillard.

  30. Joe F

    “It ain’t what you know that will hurt you. It’s what you think you know that just ain’t so.” Satchell Paige

    1. fredwilson

      truth

  31. Return Path

    You can’t steal second base and keep one foot on first. – Frederick B. Wilcox

    1. fredwilson

      lot’s of “burn the boats” quotes in this thread. i love it.

  32. Joseph Zaccardi

    This was always my favorite.”The only ones for me are the mad ones. The ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time…” – Jack Kerouac

    1. fredwilson

      oh god yes

    2. Donna Brewington White

      wow

  33. howardlindzon

    If you catch it, see a doctor and get rid of it – Steve Martin – The Jerk

    1. fredwilson

      i read steve martin’s autobiography recently. i really liked it.

      1. aweissman

        A good one from Steve Martin’s book: “There is no harm in charging oneself up with delusions between moments of valid inspiration”

  34. Rick Bashkoff

    “The harder I work, the luckier I get.” – Samuel Goldwyn

    1. sdefor01

      And the related “Luck is the residue of design” Milton

    2. Druce

      also…I don’t want any yes-men around me. I want everybody to tell me the truth even if it costs them their job.If I could drop dead right now, I’d be the happiest man alive.A verbal contract isn’t worth the paper it’s written on.Anyone who goes to a psychiatrist ought to have his head examined.Pictures are for entertainment, messages should be delivered by Western Union.We’re overpaying him, but he’s worth it.It’s an impossible situation, but it has possibilities.

  35. Cam MacRae

    I didn’t have time to write a short letter, so I wrote a long one instead – Twain, Pascal, Cicero etc.

  36. Tami Forman

    You can’t steal second base and keep one foot on first. – Frederick B. Wilcox

  37. kybammer

    “An army of lions led by a sheep is no match for an army of sheep led by a lion.” – Winston Churchill

    1. fredwilson

      and winston was a lion

    2. JLM

      .+10Leadership is everything..

    3. SallyBroom

      SO many great quotes from this great man, including a rather entrepreneurial one: “Success is the ability to go from one failure to another with no loss of enthusiasm”!

  38. Ian Hogarth

    “Scared money don’t make no money” – Young Jeezy

    1. fredwilson

      oh fuck yeah. that is so true in the VC business. i saw it in action this week and it is so damn annoying.

    2. Guest

      Neither of them came up with it originally, I’m sure, but for rap usage, Q-Tip definitely got there before Jeezy:”Scared money don’t make none” ATCQ – Midnight (1993)

      1. Brandon Marker

        well played

  39. Rohan

    ‘Often we spend all our time thinking how we can change situations instead of letting them change us.’

    1. John Revay

      Rohan,When I first the post topic, you name came first to mind – you always have great quotes that you share w/ us.Thank you my friend.

      1. Rohan

        Thanks to you too! 🙂 Turned out to be one heck of a comment thread.. 🙂

  40. Brian Manning

    “Today is the youngest you’ll ever be. Act like it.”

    1. fredwilson

      sadly true

    2. Rohan

      ‘You are the result of millions of years of evolution. Act like it.’ 😉

      1. Brian Manning

        Ha! Hope all is well, Rohan.

        1. Rohan

          Heh. Going through a bit of a mad period. Nice fun friday topic, as you can imagine.. this hit a sweet spot! 🙂 Happy weekend, Brian!

          1. John Revay

            “Mad period” – I hope it is good mad

  41. Jon Ellenthal

    Great idea, Fred. I love great quotes. Here’s my favorite: “The single biggest problem with communication is the illusion it has taken place.” – George Bernard Shaw

    1. fredwilson

      that’s why my number one advice to entrepreneurs and CEOs is to overcommunicate. by getting them to think they are overcommunicating, they might actually be communicating just enough

      1. Matt A. Myers

        I try that, pretty sure I overwhelm most people (at least if they don’t have time to grasp it).. Getting better at the short-form; I do have more ambitious plans than most though – not to say everyone’s efforts aren’t just as valiant.

  42. Michaela

    “Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not his own facts.” Daniel Patrick Moynihan

    1. fredwilson

      that’s a lot like the Barksdale quote i posted a few weeks ago*”If we have data, let’s look at data. If all we have are opinions, let’s go with mine.”*

  43. johnpisciotta

    An entrepreneur hasthe elegance of a poet,the precision of a mathematician,vision of a mystic,and the drive of a soldier.

    1. Dan

      wow. And the humility of a…

    2. fredwilson

      who said that?

  44. William Mougayar

    “The difference between a smart and a brilliant person is that the smart person only believes half of what others say. The brilliant person knows which half to believe.” – William Mougayar

    1. bsoist

      brilliant!

      1. William Mougayar

        🙂

    2. Techman

      Let your name go down in history! That was good.

    3. John Revay

      William – Did you just come up w/ that?

  45. ashyadav

    Don’t let the per­fect be the enemy of the good. – Voltaire.

    1. fredwilson

      i use that one all the time

    2. Matt A. Myers

      This is great, I hadn’t hear it before. Thanks for sharing

    3. William Mougayar

      I had no idea that Voltaire said this.

      1. Andrew

        no, me neither

    4. John Rorick

      Reminded of a Professor who once said “most things are rarely finished, they simply come due”

    5. John Revay

      Other than Apple – I don’t know who has the time to make it perfect

      1. FAKE GRIMLOCK

        ANYONE THAT WANTS TO WIN.

  46. Sean Seton-Rogers

    “I am a great believer in luck. The harder I work, the more of it I seem to have.” – Coleman Cox (Not Thomas Jefferson)

  47. Seenator

    Randolph Churchill, father of Winston, once summarized Disraeli’s life as “Failure, failure, failure, partial success, renewed failure, ultimate and complete triumph.”

    1. fredwilson

      that reminds me of the dennis crowley line summarized by andy weissman at the start of this videohttp://vimeo.com/41871291

  48. Sam Birmingham

    The unexamined life is not worth living and the unlived life is not worth examining.

    1. Andrew

      i had that taped to my wall throughout university

  49. Michael Gardon

    “men don’t follow titles. They follow courage.” – William Wallace (Braveheart)

  50. silvasonic

    “It ain’t about how hard you hit, it is about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward, how much can you take and keep moving forward.” — Rocky Balboa.

    1. fredwilson

      that’s entrepreneurship right there

    2. Rohan

      One of my favorite movie quotes. As JLM would say, well played!

  51. Henry Glover

    “Creation is a better means of self-expression and possession; it is through creating, not possessing, that life is revealed.” – Vida D. Scudder – The Life of the Spirit in the Modern English Poets

  52. Michael K.

    “You can never solve a problem on the level it was created” Einstein

  53. Raj

    “Trust no future, however pleasant! Let the dead past bury its dead! Act, – act in the living Present! Heart within and God overhead.”- Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

  54. Abdallah Al-Hakim

    I am awful at remembering quotes but I enjoy books with great quotes. One of my favourites is Khalil Gibran from his famous book the prophet. Here is one quote from Khalil”To be able to look back upon ones life in satisfaction, is to live twice.” – Kahlil Gibran

    1. William Mougayar

      So many more priceless ones from Gibran. “Ask not what your country can do for you – ask what you can do for your country” often attributed to Kennedy is actually from Gibran where he said:”Are you a politician asking what your country can do for you or a zealous one asking what you can do for your country? If you are the first, then you are a parasite; if the second, then you are an oasis in a desert.” Khalil Gibran

      1. Abdallah Al-Hakim

        Exactly. I always enjoy my American friend about this particular and watch their surprise

      2. Druce

        “We choose our joys and sorrows long before we experience them.””Work is love made visible.”

        1. William Mougayar

          Cool…all Gibran?

        2. Abdallah Al-Hakim

          nice ones!!

  55. Cam MacRae

    “The empires of the future are the empires of the mind” — Churchill. Prescient as ever (1943).

    1. fredwilson

      wow

    2. Jim Parker

      Thoughts are Things.

    3. Donna Brewington White

      unreal…what brilliance

    4. JamesHRH

      Love Churchill quotes……voluminous and valuable.A tribute to his durability and adaptability.A personal fave – ‘Never speak to the monkey if the organ grinder is in the room.”

  56. Lee Blaylock

    Here are a few:5 for entrepreneurs:”Never give in. Never give in. Never, never, never, never—in nothing, great or small, large or petty—never give in, except to convictions of honour and good sense. Never yield to force. Never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy.” – Churchhill As the 18th century German philosopher ArthurSchopenhauer observed: “Talent hits a target no else can hit. Genius hitsa target no one else can see.”“Peoplesay you need a lot of passion for what you’re doing, and it’s totally true, andthe reason is that it’s so hard, that if you don’t, any rational person wouldgive up” – Steve JobsIt must beremembered that there is nothing more difficult to plan, moredoubtful ofsuccess, nor more dangerous to manage, than the creation ofa newsystem. For the initiator has the enmityof all who would profitby thepreservation of the old institutions and merely lukewarm defendersin those whowould gain by the new ones. — Niccolo Machiavelli, 1513 It is not thestrongest of the species that survive, nor the most intelligent, but the onemost responsive to change. -charles darwin2 for golfersInside every sand wedge is a 2 iron itching to come out – Lee BlaylockIt is not how good your good ones are, it is how good your bad ones are – Harvey Penick2 for politics:It’s not that liberals arestupid. It’s that they know so much that isn’t true – Ronald Reagan In America, if it moves we tax it, if it keeps moving we regulate it and if it stops moving we subsidize it – Ronald Reagananother 2 I love Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who minddon’t matter and those who matter don’t mind. – Dr. Seuss There are no traffic jams alongthe extra mile.” Roger Staubach

    1. fredwilson

      all of them are great. the Jobs quote is so interesting to me because it speaks to the entrepreneur/VC relationship. VCs are rational and that is often the problem.

      1. William Mougayar

        It concurs with the one I wrote “Do not reason away your vision.” I had it as my Gmail signature for a good 3-4 years.

      2. LE

        “VCs are rational and that is often the problem.”By the standards of traditional business I would say, that from my experience, VC’s are actually irrational by comparison.Traditional business has to succeed way more than the rate at which VC investing or angel investing is able to succeed. You don’t get do overs and second chances anywhere nearly as easily. And failure is not seen as a positive at all. And you have to pay close attention and manage the downside which is what people don’t do. If they don’t they are gambling (which is what the big winners often do …)Only one example. I had a guy work for me at my first business. He had some idea to extract coal from the ground somewhere. He invested all his money and put his parent’s (who were reasonably well to do from business) assets on the line to pull this idea off. The machine that he was supposed to use to process the coal didn’t perform up to spec and the company went bust. He filed a lawsuit and got offered 100,000 to settle and turned it down. Then lost on appeal.He lost everything and his parents had to file Ch 7 I believe. He ended up having to buy a used car w/o air conditioning (girls made fun of him) and his parents had to sell their house.Working for me he learned a new business and when I sold he ended up going out on his own and starting the same business and is doing quite well now. But it was a tough 15 years until he recovered. Not to mention the stress on his family.His father was street smart, also as was his brother and mother who were all involved in the idea. But over the lack of the ability to manage the downside they lost everything.This doesn’t really exist in VC.

      3. JamesHRH

        The Machiavelli quote applies to your post from today – Sunday.

    2. fredwilson

      that staubach quote is genius too. i spent time with one of the entrepreneurs we have backed yesterday and he was talking about how productive he is from 11pm to 4am. that is the extra mile where there are no traffic jams.

      1. Volnado

        its true the late nights I feel get underappreciated but its really just working through into other times zones business days

        1. Donna Brewington White

          night is relative

    3. kirklove

      Wow, that Staubach quote is so money.

    4. JLM

      .Harvey Penick, a golf legend, an Austin legend, the coach to Tom Kite and Ben Crenshaw — was a genius.”Take dead aim.”Harvey Penick.

      1. RichardF

        I didn’t know he was from Austin, I have my Dad’s copy of the Little Red Book

        1. JLM

          .He was the pro at Austin CC for years. His son is now the pro.He was a philosopher golf pro..

          1. JamesHRH

            Texas speak in spades. Great stuff.

    5. matthughes

      Love the Staubach quote.

    6. muratcannoyan

      Love the Schopenhauer quote.

  57. jacobstiglitz

    I never let my schooling get in the way of my education.— Mark Twain

    1. fredwilson

      #hackingeducation

  58. Lee Blaylock

    another of my favoritesLight travels faster than sound. This is whysome people appear intelligent until you hear them speak.

  59. johnpisciotta

    My close 2nd.”Men lie, women lie, numbers don’t lie” Jay Z

    1. fredwilson

      sean corey carter has a way with words

      1. johnpisciotta

        indeed.

      2. Shawn Cohen

        so does ludacris: “‘move bitch, get out da way!” 🙂

    2. Brandon Marker

      “I will not lose, for even in defeat, there’s a valuable lesson learned, so it evens up for me” -HOVA

    3. Shawn Cohen

      similar to deming: “In God we trust. Everyone else, bring numbers.”

  60. Tony Ratliff

    “When people are financially invested they want a return. When people are emotionally invested they want to contribute.”  – Simon Sinek

  61. Kirsten Lambertsen

    Life is what happens to you when you’re busy making other plans.- John Lennon

  62. Barry Nolan

    “We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.” Oscar Wilde.A mantra for all early startups.

    1. Cam MacRae

      Ha! Me, last Friday night. *Hic*.

    2. Mike Zamansky

      De Guiche: Remember, when tilting at windmills that a swirl of the sails on their huge arms can hurl you down into the mire!Cyrano: Or up among the stars!– Edmond Rostand

  63. Anne Libby

    “90% of the game is half mental.” Yogi Berra

    1. fredwilson

      he mangled phrases better than anyone. i wonder if he tried to do that.

      1. Anne Libby

        After a point, I think he must have. And a lot of them hold, dare I say yogic, wisdom. Another good one: “When you come to a fork in the road, take it.”

        1. matthughes

          Yogi is the man.Some more of my favorites:”Nobody goes there anymore. It’s too crowded.””You can observe a lot by watching.”

          1. Anne Libby

            Yes! (Confession: I own a book of his quotes…)

          2. matthughes

            Me too – it’s probably the same book. 🙂

      2. matthughes

        He did say:”I really didn’t say everything I said.”I love Yogi – one of my all-time favorites.

      3. Jim Parker

        Either way, it was a gift. He had a way of getting to the essence of stuff – twice – in one quote. 😉

    2. mikenolan99

      That place is so busy no one goes there anymore…

      1. Druce

        “The future ain’t what it used to be.””There are some people who, if they don’t already know, you can’t tell ’em.””You should always go to other people’s funerals, otherwise, they won’t come to yours.”

  64. Dan Lewis

    Today is gone. Today was fun. Tomorrow is another one. Every day, from here to there, funny things are everywhere.

    1. Kirsten Lambertsen

      Dr Seuss?

      1. Dan Lewis

        Yep.

        1. Anne Libby

          So much wisdom!

  65. fredwilson

    a reader sent me an email with the quote below. i loved it and asked him to post it. he said “i am too old for technology” and asked me to post it for him. so here it is:Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards. — Soren Kierkegaard

    1. johnpisciotta

      A great thinker.

    2. danielle

      Oh that reminded me of a good one!Poets and artists live on frontiers. They have no feedback, only feedforward. They have no identities. They are probes.— Marshall McLuhan

    3. baba12

      That is appropriate and goes along with “Wise men talk because they have something to say; fools, because they have to say something.” Plato

    4. Colm Brophy

      The I’m too old for technology reminded me of a favourite which is in my friend’s (a Computer Science post doctorate) email signature:”I have always wished that my computer would be as easy to use as mytelephone. My wish has come true. I no longer know how to use mytelephone.” – Bjarne Stroustrup

    5. Michael Zaro

      haha, My grandpa is 78 and we just skyped and screenshared yesterday so that I could walk him through how to use Dropbox to share pictures with the family. You’d have to be pretty dang old to not be able to post a comment, at least with a little help from us young folk ;)Great quote he shared

      1. JLM

        .I am a total Skype addict. Total.Is this a great world and a great time to be alive or what?.

    6. ShanaC

      Brilliant. Go Kiekegaard!

    7. Wells Baum

      That’s why I mind-map, by seeing the end you can easily make the first steps to propel yourself forward. Assuming hard work and persistent action of course.

    8. Matt A. Myers

      So exists the struggle

    9. jkglei

      Amazing riff on pop culture if you haven’t seen. Kim Kardashian does Kierkegaard: https://twitter.com/KimKier

    10. leigh

      over 500 quotes — won’t bother giving mine but i did start to save some of my favorite quotes from AVC a while back. Don’t remember to do it often and of course half of them are from @JLM:disqushttp://snackableavc.tumblr….

      1. Donna Brewington White

        Yeah, I’m with you on this one Leigh. I just opened up AVC for the first time today at just before 1:00 a.m. PDT. 567 comments and three more since I started reading. I can’t say this is my favorite quote, but when I saw this thread I remembered this one from Fred just yesterday: “… I read every comment left on AVC. That is a true statement and remains true to this day. But I can also tell you that it is a struggle and gets more so every day.”Yikes. Fred. Have fun.Also, re the link: that’s a great collection, Leigh.

        1. leigh

          He’s probably going to have to take some speed reading courses — some of the posts are closer to short novels 🙂

          1. Donna Brewington White

            BTW I did end up sharing a quote. So what if it’s so far down that most people won’t see it. Two thoughts came up: (1) while I was reading comments in the wee hours the Disqus 2012 feature of signaling new comments allowed me to reply to comments that will otherwise probably go to the bottom of the thread (with mine) including the opportunity to interact with a first time commenter and (2) I realized that at least one person would read my quote –Fred! — which leads back to the post from a couple of days ago about his reading every comment. I guess sometimes it does matter.P.S. I hate commenting from my phone –invariably results in accidentally posting while trying to make a correction.

          2. leigh

            lol well then i’ll share my favourite — use it all time (probably bc i work in the world of Marketing & Advertising)”A point of view can be a dangerous luxury when substituted for insight and understanding.”Marshall McLuhan

          3. Donna Brewington White

            Good one.

      2. William Mougayar

        That’s a great collection Leigh. Keep doing it!Do you auto-tweet them too when posting on Tumblr? (you know you can also do that from Engagio in 1 click – share to your tumblr & twitter & you can edit it before you send it)

    11. JamesHRH

      This is, in essence, Nassim Taleb’s main insight.

  66. SallyBroom

    So many to choose from, but this is up there with the best (and oldest, I guess!):”Fortis Fortuna adiuvat” or “Fortune favours the bold”–Terence, Roman Playwright

    1. fredwilson

      thanks for the translation Sally. i somehow managed to get through my childhood without taking latin

  67. James Ferguson @kWIQly

    The reasonable man adapts himself to the world: the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man.GEORGE BERNARD SHAW, Maxims for RevolutionistsAND Start Ups !

  68. Seenator

    “In a bacon-and-egg breakfast, the difference between the Chicken and the Pig, is the Chicken is involved and the Pig is committed” – Old fable but via Jim Barksdale (who btw is a quote machine of Churchillian proportions)

    1. fredwilson

      yeow

    2. Shawn Cohen

      now a hallmark for identifying the stakeholders of a project

  69. Simon de la Rouviere

    “If you are angry now, you will be unhappy in the next moment. If you are at peace now, you will be content in the next moment.”I don’t recall where I found the quote (perhaps r/buddhism) or to whom I should attribute it to (google returns nothing). It so perfectly encapsulates how your thoughts determine your mood. In a way, it is sort of: “fake it till you make it”. Smile long enough and you will smile on the inside.This quote makes me very vigilant about what I choose to expose myself to (when I can choose). For example, I actively choose to listen to music that gives me a feeling of content and happiness (a genre like chillwave).

  70. jimmy5804

    A personal favorite :“I don’t see much sense in that,” said Rabbit.”No,” said Pooh humbly, “there isn’t. But there was going to be when I began it. It’s just that something happened to it along the way.”

    1. fredwilson

      #startups

  71. Marjan Ghara

    Love quotes. I just recently lost my beloved mother and this quote gives me some comfort.”In one of those stars I shall be living. In one of them I shall be laughing. And so it will be as if all the stars were laughing, when you look at the sky at night.” ― Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, The Little Prince

    1. fredwilson

      one of my favorite books of all time

      1. Marjan Ghara

        Mine too.

    2. alberth

      “And now here is my secret, a very simple secret: It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye.” the Fox

    3. Druce

      “If you want to build a ship, don’t drum up people to collect wood and don’t assign them tasks and work, but rather teach them to long for the endless immensity of the sea.””A rock pile ceases to be a rock pile the moment a single man contemplates it, bearing within him the image of a cathedral.”

  72. RichardF

    Vinum et musica laetificant cor

    1. Cam MacRae

      In vino veritas. In libro libertas.I hope there won’t be a test. My schoolboy latin ain’t what it used to be!

      1. RichardF

        mine is restricted to Asterix

        1. Cam MacRae

          Dogmatix was my hero.

          1. RichardF

            Getafix is mine, the original Yoda

      2. Wavelengths

        Semper ubi sub ubi.

        1. Cam MacRae

          Lol!

  73. Nate Kidwell

    The best time to build a tree is 20 years ago. The next best time is right now.

  74. jimmy5804

    One other favorite since I rarely post here :”Sometimes you got to say ‘what the fuck’, make your move …. every now and then, say ‘what the fuck, ‘what the fuck’ gives you freedom, freedom brings opportunity, opportunity makes your future”Miles in Risky Business

    1. johnpisciotta

      nice.

    2. Druce

      The time of your life, huh, kid?

  75. Rohan

    “It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat. “| Teddy Roosevelt

    1. schultzmj

      My favorite. A quote every entrepreneur should keep handy for a little lift on those dark days.

    2. Andy

      Absolutely fantastic

    3. JLM

      TEDDY Roosevelt not Franklin Roosevelt

      1. Rohan

        Apologies! @google-e5c8c91b30416cca6f977b092d0e8454:disqus and JLM.Corrected.

    4. Dan Collin

      Great one… Note, that’s TR, not FDR.

    5. Randy Lariar

      Teddy Roosevelt was the man. There’s currently an awesome banner on his birthplace in Manhattan proclaiming “TR for ’12” (His bull moose campaign was a hundred years ago). One of my favorite quotes of all time comes from his “Strenuous Life” speech:”We do not admire the man of timid peace. We admire the man who embodies victorious effort; the man who never wrongs his neighbor, who is prompt to help a friend, but who has those virile qualities necessary to win in the stern strife of actual life. It is hard to fail, but it is worse never to have tried to succeed. In this life we get nothing save by effort.”

      1. falicon

        Also right next door to his birthplace is one of my favorite bars in all of NYC (called No Idea) 😉

        1. panterosa,

          I am stone’s throw from there.

      2. fredwilson

        my office is right around the corner from Teddy’s birthplace

    6. Dave McLaughlin

      This is one of my favorites. Thanks for posting!

    7. fredwilson

      not short, but very good

  76. Jake Cohen

    “This too shall pass.” – King Solomon, Persian Poets and later Abe Lincoln.

  77. EmilSt

    Never, never, never give up.From Churchill, stays on my wall for 7 years in full page.Build a better mousetrap.Ralph Waldo EmersonBe the change you wish to see in the world.Gandhi

  78. Roger Ellman

    “Speak the affirmative, emphasize your choice byutterly ignoring all that you reject” RalphWaldo Emerson

    1. Roger Ellman

      In this world the optimists have it, not because theyare always right, but because they are positive. Even when they are wrong, theyare positive, and that is the way of achievement, correction, improvement andsuccess. – David Landes

  79. Rohan

    Quotes! Love it! Great suggestion @MaxYoder:disqus :-)If we’re talking short form, then..‘Often we spend all our time thinking how we can change situations instead of letting them change us.’

  80. MJC

    “Things which are different in order simply to be different are seldom better, but that which is made to be better is almost always different.”—Dieter Rams

  81. David

    Fred, this is relevant to your post a few days regarding investing in the stock market….it goes something like this:”Only invest in a stock or a business that is so wonderful that an idiot can run, because sooner or later, one will.”Warren Buffett

    1. fredwilson

      oh snap. that is so good.

  82. andyswan

    “We make a fine bourbon, at a profit if we can, at a loss if we must, but always FINE BOURBON.” — “Pappy” Van Winkle. Attached photo shows him in all of his Southern glory pointing to the sign outside of his distillery.

    1. William Mougayar

      Photo didn’t show.

      1. Cam MacRae

        I see it.

        1. William Mougayar

          I see it now….Priceless…Timeless

          1. Techman

            Probably took a few seconds for a Disqus server to render the image and make a thumbnail.

    2. aweissman

      this is my favorite, to me #1 business mantra

    3. fredwilson

      lead with product not profit and profit will come

      1. PhilipSugar

        You need to put that one in quotes

      2. LE

        It’s so interesting to me that your investing works that way.I simply can’t wrap my hands around an idea without thinking of how it will make money. It’s totally distonic to me. [1]I think this is one of the benefits of the fact that you went into VC right from college (or approximately at that point I believe).This is of course not the same as saying you have to make money right from the start or you have to make a profit right from the start.But like chess, the way I think, you have to have some roadmap whereby you will be able to make money and if, say, by advertising, you need to run some numbers to make sure that’s possible.That said when I started in the Internet business I ran the numbers and the numbers actually didn’t work. (My expenses were projected to be much higher than what I could pull in revenue on a napkin basis over the next few years). But I knew the market was expanding and I understood immediately the potential and that money could be made that I would figure that part out (because I had done that before in a market that was stagnant.) But the difference is that I had a way to make revenue and charge for something just not enough at the start.[1] I think my last paragraph almost proves your point.

        1. fredwilson

          “i ran the numbers and they didn’t work”i love it

      3. johnpisciotta

        great sequence.

      4. Vasudev Ram

        That’s worthy of being a quote itself.Though I might knock off the part starting with “and” – makes it even shorter and implies the rest..

      5. Jim Parker

        Ha! Lead with purpose and profit will come.

      6. Brad Lindenberg

        I’m printing this one out.

    4. Brandon Marker

      one of the bests on the market! And that is DEFINITELY some Southern glory.

  83. Tim Price

    “what you don’t know won’t kill you, it’s what you do know that isn’t so that will” yogi berra

  84. David Semeria

    Dance on moonbeams, slide on rainbowsIn furs or blue jeans,You know what I meanDo the StrandThis is from a Roxy Music song and I hum it all the time: when I’m coding, when I’m thinking, when I’m trying to close a deal.For me it captures the magic of working on something special.

    1. fredwilson

      love that songwhat is the strand?

      1. David Semeria

        The Strand is a famous street in London, but I think in the context of the song it refers to some sort of dance.

        1. fredwilson

          Thanks

  85. Jabinc

    “All America lies at the end of the wilderness road, and our past is not a dead past, but still lives in us. Our forefathers had civilization inside themselves, the wild outside. We live in the civilization they created, but within us the wilderness still lingers. What they dreamed, we live, and what they lived, we dream.” ― T.K. Whipple

  86. Jay A

    The harder you work, the luckier you get.

  87. Bala

    Common sense is never common practise

  88. Andrew

    “Originality is the fine art of remembering what you hear but forgetting where you hear it.” But honestly, I forget where I heard that one.

  89. Aidan Nulman

    “Aut invenium viam aut facium”(“I will either find a way or make one”)–Hannibal

  90. ErikSchwartz

    There are so many good ones.“Socialism never took root in America because the poor see themselves not as an exploited proletariat but as temporarily embarrassed millionaires.”-John Steinbeck

    1. JLM

      .This quote is the fundamental difference between the political poles in America today.Not championing either end of the spectrum but you are either going to hand out fish and make dependents or you are going to teach folks to fish and create taxpayers..

      1. ErikSchwartz

        The point of the quote is that there is no other pole in American politics.

      2. Jabinc

        From Horatio Alger and rags to riches to bling-bling rap lyrics. We re-instill this vision and support the belief in lotteries as a solution to keep hope alive. Perhaps to encourage the poor to learn to fish or perhaps to make ourselves feel better and continue the myth of an America without classes. Maybe both.

  91. Bala

    The best time to plant a tree is 40 years ago the next best time is NOW! you can replace “plant a tree” to invest

  92. Bala

    Bad news never get good with time

  93. ceonyc

    “Well, believe me, Mike, I calculated the odds of this succeeding versus the odds I was doing something incredibly stupid, and…I went ahead anyway.” – Crow T. Robot, MST3000

    1. Kirsten Lambertsen

      Best show ever to air on television.

      1. ceonyc

        My fav line ever… A spy is getting chased in an old movie and while he’s running in the street, a seemingly random car pulls up to let him in.Crow: “Oh look, it’s a Good Samaritan.”[the driver, revealed to be a beautiful woman, kisses the guy]Servo: “No, it’s a GREAT Samaritan.”

        1. Kirsten Lambertsen

          LOL! As soon as I’m out of the startup gutter, I’m buying the entire series on DVD.

    2. ShanaC

      we should totally bring back mst3000

  94. tristannunnally

    “Self-Confidence is the only true motivator”- Me”Ain’t nothing to it but to do it”-Maya Angelou

  95. ceonyc

    “Don’t bite the hook.” – Jerry Colonna

    1. fredwilson

      where does that come from?

      1. ceonyc

        Coaching. 🙂

  96. Nick Grossman

    What a great topic.Someone recently sent me a business plan that had a bunch of money quotes in it, which really inspired me,so I’ll just repost some of them here:“The death-knell of the republic had rung as soon as the active power became lodged in the hands of those who sought,not to do justice to all citizens, rich and poor alike, but to stand for one special class and for its interests as opposed to the interests of others.”— PRESIDENT THEODORE ROOSEVELT, 1903

  97. Nick Grossman

    “only a crisis – actual or perceived – produces real change. When that crisis occurs, the actions that are taken depend on the ideas that are lying around.”— MILTON FRIEDMAN

  98. Bala

    Do or do not there is no try – Yoda

    1. Nick Grossman

      more yoda please!

      1. Bala

        I am looking for a great warrior – LukeWar does not make one great – Yoda

    2. kirklove

      Yoda. Always turn to Yoda.

  99. Nick Grossman

    “In preparing for battle I have always found that plans are useless,but planning is indispensable.” — DWIGHT D. EISENHOWER

    1. Rohan

      One of my favorites! Another related one..’The more you sweat in peacetime, the less you bleed in war.’ 🙂

      1. Nick Grossman

        that is great.kind of reminds me of this idea of “investing vs. getting in debt” that I’ve been thinking about: http://theslowhunch.net/201

      2. JLM

        .I have literally lived this quote. Literally.I have seen men and units so well trained that they could not fail to win when the shit hit the fan.The dark side of that mirror is that gut wrenching phrase when things are fucked up beyond comprehension and everyone looks at the officers and says:”What now, Lieutenant?”Training and sweat allows one to fashion the right answer:”Kill ’em all, let God sort them out.”Bit of melodrama for a Friday afternoon..

        1. Rohan

          Brutal. 🙂

    2. kidmercury

      eisenhower has some good ones. another one of my faves from him: “if at first you cannot solve a problem, expand it.”

    3. fredwilson

      that is such a good one nick

  100. Rob Ganjon

    “The master in the art of living makes little distinction between his work and his play, his labor and his leisure, his mind and his body, his education and his recreation, his love and his religion. He hardly knows which is which. He simply pursues his vision of excellence at whatever he does, leaving others to decide whether he is working or playing. To him he is always doing both.”

    1. Rob Ganjon

      Attribution for this quote is in dispute. I’ve seen a “zen buddhist master” as well as someone named L.P. Jacks

  101. Nick Grossman

    “Fake it ’till you make it”– Unknown (to me)

  102. Markus C

    My close second: ‘Is our world gone? We say “Farewell.” Is a new world coming? We welcome it-and we will bend it to the hopes of man.’ — LBJ

  103. Abdallah Al-Hakim

    Here is one of my favourites “Spend as much time as possible with PEOPLE you love in a PLACE you want to be on a THING you are passionate about.” -@bfeld Brad Feld

    1. William Mougayar

      Corollary: “Every place has its thing, and every thing has its place.”

  104. Andy

    “A lot of people run a race to see who is fastest. I run to see who has the most guts, who can punish himself into exhausting pace, and then at the end, punish himself even more.”-Steve Prefontaine.The guy was a beast, died far to young.

  105. Imran Khan

    We exist to professionally build long-term high-impact sources so that we may endeavor to synergistically leverage existing effective deliverables to stay competitive in tomorrow’s worldDilbert Mission Statement Generator

  106. Tim C

    “If you’re going through hell, keep going” – Winston Churchill. I used this with my team and board during 2008-2009.

    1. Andy

      Thats good reminds me of: “when the going gets tough, the tough get going”

    2. fredwilson

      so good

  107. Markus C

    “But the truth is that for the most important decisions, there can be no certainty” — Malcom Gladwell

  108. Sam

    “We are all agreed that your theory is crazy. The question that divides us is whether it is crazy enough to have a chance of being correct.” – Niels Bohr

    1. fredwilson

      🙂

  109. LIAD

    “You tried your best and failed miserably. The lesson is: never try.”- The American Confucius. Aka Homer Simpson.

    1. BillMcNeely

      “Trying is the lowest form of human commitment” -Used Car Sales Manager @ Local DFW Dodge Dealership

    2. Rohan

      ‘If at first you don’t succeed, call it version 1.0’;-)

    3. maria

      Ha, one of my favorite quotes from Yoda is “Do or do not. There is no try.”

  110. Woody

    I grew up with a note on our refrigerator saying” if you’re going to walk on thin ice, might as well dance”

    1. Rob Ganjon

      Please stop posting under my name. Thanks.

      1. Techman

        If you want to preserve your name, register a Disqus account.

  111. Nick Grossman

    There’s no question that I’ll be revisiting this thread many times in the future

  112. Michael C. Joseph

    I love reading your blog though I’ve never commented before, but quotes are hard to resist. Here is my favorite one.”Twenty Year from now,You will be more disappointed by the things you didn’t doThan by the ones you did.So throw off the bowlines.Sail away from the safe harbor.Catch the trade winds in your sails.Explore. Dream. Discover.”-Mark Twain

    1. Robert Thuston

      Maybe the one that speaks to me most right now. Well played. Hope to see ya around

    2. Donna Brewington White

      Good one, Michael!

    3. fredwilson

      welcome to the community

  113. Michael Makunas

    “It’s not like rock and roll was invented by the people who play it right. Rock and roll was invented by lunatics. It belongs at the end of the day to lunatics. It doesn’t belong to people to prove their muscularity.” – Marc Ribot (http://www.tomajazz.com/per… )I’m a big fan of the guitarist Marc Ribot, and while I’m not sure he’d approve of me co-opting it for entrepreneurship, I’ve always felt it applies.

  114. aweissman

    “Have a good time, all the time” – Viv Savage, Spinal Tap keyboardist

    1. Anne Libby

      “The numbers all go to eleven.” – Nigel Tufnel

    2. fredwilson

      we should do a fun friday just on spinal tap

  115. Jorge M. Torres

    “Gravity cannot be blamed for people falling in love.” — Albert Einstein.

  116. Helena Bouchez

    Money is truthful. If a man speaks of his honor, make him pay cash. – Robert A. Heinlein, The Notebooks of Lazarus Long

  117. sandy

    Don’t be an idiot – unknow to me

  118. Anna

    Always be yourself. Unless you can be a unicorn. Then always be a unicorn.

  119. Dave McLaughlin

    “Your focus determines your reality.” –Jedi Master Qui-Gonn Jinn to young Anakin Skywalker”If you want money, ask for advice. If you want advice, ask for money.”I just googled that to see who said it and couldn’t really find the source. But I did find this old post of Fred’s where he blogged about it! http://avc.blogs.com/a_vc/2

    1. fredwilson

      i hadn’t seen that

  120. kirklove

    “Fall down seven times, get up eight.” – Japanese Proverb.

    1. William Mougayar

      So don’t let anyone see you fall at least once?

      1. kirklove

        Just means no matter how many times you fall down (and you will fall down many times), get up one more than that. Great advice that saved me. Literally.

  121. Manuel Molina

    “Large networks of engaged users disrupting large markets”. I will always remember that quote as a landmark of the fifth revolution.

    1. fredwilson

      ascribe that to brad burnham

  122. Dave McLaughlin

    Better to keep your mouth shut and be thought a fool than to open it and remove all doubt.I don’t know the source.

  123. Kirsten Lambertsen

    You’re young and you got your health, what you want with a job?-Evelle in “Raising Arizona”

  124. Jabinc

    “Don’t Panic” (written in large friendly letters) – Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy

  125. Onn Manelson

    “When you have to shoot, shoot. Don’t talk.” – Tuco, The Good, the Bad and the Ugly

  126. Vivian Moran

    As an entrepreneur, I find this one quite fitting: “Fall down seven times, get up eight!” Japanese Saying.

  127. Hayden Williams

    “In my walks, every man I meet is my superior in some way, and in that I learn from him.”-Ralph Waldo EmersonSo true…Loved this quote so much we changed the path of our startup

  128. theschnaz

    A few good ones…”Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak out and remove all doubt.” Abraham Lincoln”The devil is alive, I feel him breathing,Claiming money is key, so keep on dreaming.” Kanye West”We got arms but won’t reach for the skies.” CommonI could do this all day =)

    1. Kirsten Lambertsen

      Love me some Kanye.

      1. theschnaz

        =)”Couldn’t afford a car so she *named her daughter Alexis”*

  129. RichardF

    “Achieving life is not the equivalent of avoiding death” – Ayn Rand

  130. $27180517

    “I don’t think life is absurd. I think we are all here for a huge purpose. I think we shrink from the immensity of the purpose we are here for” – Norman Mailer

  131. JLM

    .”All men dream, but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds, wake in the day to find that it was vanity: but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act on their dreams with open eyes, to make them possible.”Lawrence of ArabiaBeware the open eyed dreamer.

  132. Colm Brophy

    “I’m not young enough to know everything”J.M. Barrie

  133. Jason French

    “True genius resides in the capacity for evaluation of uncertain, hazardous, and conflicting information.”Churchill

  134. Brad

    He who foresees calamities suffers them twice over.

  135. holograham

    “Some men see things as they are and say why. I dream things that never were and say why not.”-George Bernard Shaw

    1. Vasudev Ram

      Another version of that, also attributed to Shaw, is:”The reasonable man adapts himself to the world. The unreasonable man tries to adapt the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the unreasonable man.”

    2. Yalim K. Gerger

      Finally a GBS quote. The man is the Messiah of quotes and this is the first one I saq here today.

  136. bsoist

    “Some of the worst mistakes of my life have been haircuts.” – Jim Morrison

  137. Laura Yecies

    “Decide that you want it more than you are afraid of it.” Bill Cosby

  138. William Mougayar

    I love French quotes. “The most number of lies happens BEFORE elections, DURING war and AFTER hunting.” Georges Clemenceau, famous french general”Le bonheur est quelque chose qui se multiplie quand it se divise.””Happiness is something that multiplies itself when it gets divided.”–> Applies to Venture Capital …Venture capital is something that multiplies itself when it gets divided 🙂

    1. Druce

      also said”War is a series of catastrophes that culminate in victory.””America is the only nation in history which miraculously has gone directly from barbarism to decadence without the usual interval of civilization.”

  139. Wavelengths

    Even false hope is better than no hope.

  140. Kirsten Lambertsen

    Time wounds all heels.- John Lennon (in response to being targeted by Pres. Nixon)

  141. Jabinc

    “Until a man is twenty-five, he still thinks, every so often, that under the right circumstances he could be the baddest motherfucker in the world. If I moved to a martial-arts monastery in China and studied real hard for ten years. If my family was wiped out by Colombian drug dealers and I swore myself to revenge. If I got a fatal disease, had one year to live, and devoted it to wiping out street crime. If I just dropped out and devoted my life to being bad. Hiro used to feel this way, too, but then he ran into Raven. In a way, this was liberating. He no longer has to worry about being the baddest motherfucker in the world. The position is taken.” – Snow Crash – Neal StephensonThis quote resonated so much with me when I read it at 23. It liberated me from my own far reaching visions and grounded me with an idea closer to a quote that was posted here earlier; that “perfect is the enemy of good.” Reading this quote was my meeting Raven.

    1. fredwilson

      dropping snow crash!

    2. Abdallah Al-Hakim

      I am almost done reading this book after a post from Fred about it a few months back. Loved this quote as well !

  142. Dan Collin

    “Orville Wright did not have a pilot’s license.”Gordon MacKenzie, Orbiting The Giant Hairball

  143. Joe Yevoli

    One that’s on the white board in my room, from Rudyard Kipling’s poem – If:”If you can meet with Triumph and DisasterAnd treat those two impostors just the same” Another that’s on the wall next to my desk to remind me the company is nothing without the team, but I bare full responsibility if we fail: “The TEAM wins, or I fail…”

  144. Brandon Burns

    “If you don’t like something, change it. If you can’t change it, change your attitude.” – Maya AngelouIt’s the last part that I always seem to have trouble with.

  145. jer979

    “I’m too legit to quit.” MC Hammer(it is FUN Friday, after all)

  146. Trevor McLeod

    “Desire is the starting point of all achievement, not a hope, not a wish, but a keen pulsating desire which transcends everything.” – Napoleon Hill

  147. Jared Krouss

    “To give anything less than your best is to sacrifice the gift” – Steve Prefontaine

  148. harryh

    For when the challenge seems too hard and you just want to catch a break:”I wish I could tell you it gets better, but it doesn’t get better. You get better.” – Joan Rivers

    1. ShanaC

      I like that one. She’s got a point

    2. fredwilson

      good one harry

  149. Anuj Agarwal

    There is no shame in failing. Founders should be proud that they had the guts to try something new – Kevin Rose

  150. Anuj Agarwal

    User Experience is the Product Experiece – Larry Cornett(Ex Yahoo VP and now im proud that he is our Advisor)

  151. Youssef

    If an idea feels right but you’re hesitant about why it hasn’t been done before, that’s probably why it hasn’t been done before.

  152. BillMcNeely

    How far we have fallen as a nation…”Ask not what your country can do for you- ask what you can do for your country”- The Honorable John F Kennedy

    1. Aviah Laor

      in addition to taxes

  153. Greg Gortz

    “Not all who wander are lost” ~Tolkien

    1. PhilipSugar

      Check out the website. That is my college fraternity roommate. My house is the first stop, and the second to last stop.

  154. Anuj Agarwal

    The only way you are going to have success is to have lots of failures first. – Sergey Brin

  155. Dan Reich

    “Far from a Harvard student, just had the balls to do it” – Jay-Z, What More Can I Say – The Black Album“Turnin’ nothin’ into somethin’ is God work, and you get nothin’ without struggle and hard work” – Nas, Doo Rags – The Lost TapesLove this idea. Did a post similar to this: http://www.danreich.com/201

  156. Anuj Agarwal

    I would like to post all my favorite quotes i have collected over the years in this thread. These golden quotes changed my life. I Hope it will inspire people here in this thread as well

  157. Michael Lewkowitz

    “The web is not tech. It’s humanity linked by tech.” ~ Sir Tim Berners-Lee

    1. fredwilson

      TBL FTW

  158. Cindy Gallop

    ‘In order to predict the future, you have to invent it.’ – Alan Kay

  159. Richard Lau

    “Some people may know more than you. Some people may be stronger than you at certain things. But when it comes down to working, it’s up to you to let someone outwork you”

  160. Anuj Agarwal

    To succeed spectacularly, you must fail spectacularly – Biz Stone

  161. Anuj Agarwal

    Have the courage to follow your heart and intuition – Steve jobs

  162. Anuj Agarwal

    ‘It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.’ – Yossi Vardi

    1. ShanaC

      Yossi Vardi, interesting choice.

  163. Leighton Cusack

    “There are two types of pain you will go through in life, the pain of discipline and the pain of regret. Discipline weighs ounces while regret weighs tones.”- Jim Rohn

    1. JamesHRH

      This is great – who is Jim Rohn?

      1. Leighton Cusack

        Entrepreneur / Motivational speaker who died recently. I’m not 100% sure on the attribution though as I’ve heard it from quite a few people at different times.

  164. Anuj Agarwal

    ‘If You’re Offered a Seat on a Rocket Ship, Just Get On’ – Sheryl Sandberg during a commencement speech at Harvard earlier this year

    1. fredwilson

      yeah, but how do you know its a rocket ship?

      1. Anuj Agarwal

        When companies are growing quickly and they are having a lot of impact.

      2. Anuj Agarwal

        To put it other way, Its not a rocket ship when companies aren’t growing quickly or their missions don’t matter as much, that’s when stagnation and politics come in. #microsoft #nokia #yahoo etc

  165. NowEntrepreneur

    Will not live to verify what Picard said 🙂 Although I trust him coz we all are seeing some early signs of companies following this path!”The economics of the future is somewhat different. You see, money doesn’t exist in the 24th century… The acquisition of wealth is no longer the driving force in our lives. We work to better ourselves and the rest of Humanity.” Picard (Star Trek: First Contact)

    1. fredwilson

      it is possible

      1. NowEntrepreneur

        I going by an assumption that the world will reach a point where the laws of diminishing utility will apply for money for a majority of the people. Its all about calculating the probability of this event. I am sure the dynamics (climate change probably) of earth will force its population to look beyond money for survival and the life ahead. Just a thought 🙂

  166. David Petersen

    Don’t trade what you want most for what you want now.

  167. Deirdre

    I like “You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, ‘I have lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along.’ You must do the thing you think you cannot do.” Eleanor Rooseveltor“A woman is like a tea bag; you never know how strong it is until it’s in hot water.” Also Eleanor Roosevelt Not wild about the tea

  168. Vasudev Ram

    “Nemo malus nisi probetur”. The literal meaning according to Google Translate:http://translate.google.com…is “no evil unless it is demonstrated”, but it actually means “a man is innocent until proven guilty.” – in Latin. I like the ring of it. A high school teacher (Moral Science class) told us about it.

  169. C.J. Bowden

    “…For the government to stimulate consumption by itself is no benefit to commerce; for the difficulty lies in supplying the means, not in stimulating the desire for consumption; and we have seen that production alone, furnishes the means…” – J.B. Say

  170. Matt Parker

    Ah, but a man’s reach should exceed his grasp,Or what’s a heaven for?- Robert Browning

    1. Vasudev Ram

      That’s a really good one – one of my favorites.

      1. Vasudev Ram

        I was surprised to see IBM use it once in a job ad in a newspaper. Had seen it in a book before that, though. IIRC, book was about Browning.

  171. ShanaC

    “The most beautiful thing is the mysterious; It is the source of all true art and science” – Einstein”Crescat Scientia, Vita Excolatur” -let knowledge grow more and more: so human life is enriched – University of Chicago Motto (alumna)”Mind that does not stick” – Zen Koan”Protect Me From What I Want” – Jenny Holzer, Truism series (see here for more: http://mfx.dasburo.com/art/… definitely worth reading through)Omnia Vincit Amor – Love Conquers All – Virgil.

  172. Chris Waldron

    Paradox of effort: While luck may be more appealing than effort, you don’t get to choose luck. Effort, on the other hand, is totally available, all the time.

  173. Elia Freedman

    “Just do it” – Nike slogan. I still don’t know why great slogans are put out to pasture. There was none better than this.

    1. RichardF

      completely agree

    2. muratcannoyan

      They still use it on occasion.

    3. maria

      This so pure, so true.

  174. Session

    “If I was a millionaire, I’d be a billionaire” It was a quote I came up with to describe myself. I would never stop.

  175. Vipin Goyal

    “Live as if you were to die tomorrow. Learn as if you were to live forever.” -Mahatma Gandhi

  176. Lauren Sperber

    A person who never made a mistake never tried anything new. -Einstein

  177. Mark Zohar

    “First they ignore you, then they ridicule you, then they fight you, then you win” – Mahatma Gandhi (and every Disruptor since)

    1. fredwilson

      awesome

  178. umangjaipuria

    Those who were dancing were thought to be insane by the ones who could not hear the music. -Nietzche

  179. Wells Baum

    Discovered these inspirational quotes this morning in my feeds: 1. “Action is the foundational key to all success.” – Pablo Picasso2. “The only rule is work. If you work it will lead to something. It’s the people who do all of the work all of the time who eventually catch on to things.” -John Cage

  180. Adrian Sanders

    “If you want to know what God thinks of money, just look at the people he gave it to.” – Dorothy Parker

    1. Shawn Cohen

      love parker. “They sicken of the calm who know the storm.”

      1. Adrian Sanders

        yeah me too, although seems like the quote i picked doesn’t really resonate here…

        1. Shawn Cohen

          well, there’s stiff competition w/ hundreds of comments today:)

  181. Tim

    “It is not the critic who counts: not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes up short again and again, because there is no effort without error or shortcoming, but who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, who spends himself for a worthy cause; who, at the best, knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement, and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who knew neither victory nor defeat.”Theodore Roosevelt

  182. Douglas Craver

    “Be frank and explicit. That is the right line to take when you wish to conceal your own mind and to confuse the minds of others.”- Benjamin Disraeli

  183. ShanaC

    Also this oneTis the gift to be simple, ’tis the gift to be free,’Tis the gift to come down where we ought to be,And when we find ourselves in the place just right,’Twill be in the valley of love and delight.When true simplicity is gain’d,To bow and to bend we shan’t be asham’d,To turn, turn will be our delight,’Til by turning, turning we come out right.Simple gifts – Shaker Proverb.

  184. ttasterisco

    “People are just people,They shouldn’t make you nervous”Regina Spektor

  185. jheltzer

    If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of giants. — Isaac NewtonIf you will it, it is no dream. — Theodor HerzlHere are a bunch from General Georges Doriot, who many consider to be the founder of modern VC. “A committee is an invitation to do nothing. Very fewcommittees can perform better than the weakest man.” “A grade A man with a grade B idea is better than a grade Bman with a grade A idea.”George used a stopwatch on his desk during meetings.“sometimes I use it to see how long it takes someone in a meeting to tell methe same thing three times.” “there have been many fine scientists desperately trying tobecome poor businessmen.” “Your sophisticated ‘long term’ stockholders make fivepoints and sell out. But we have our hearts in our companies. We are reallydoctors of childhood diseases here. When bankers or brokers tell me I shouldsell an ailing company, I ask them, ‘Would you sell a child running atemperature of 104’”? “always remember that someone, somewhere, is making aproduct that will make your product obsolete.” “Starting a company is like getting married. Most of theproblems are discovered after the honeymoon is over.” “too many bankers and counselors have forgotten the historyof the early years of our industrial giants of today. The first fifteen yearsof companies and of human beings are very much alike- hope, measles, failures,mumps, reorganizations, scarlet fever, executive troubles, whooping cough, etc.are parts of one’s daily life. Hopes, disillusions, hard work, are allnecessary, particularly during the first ten or fifteen years before a stableand healthy body or corporation can begin to exist.”

    1. fredwilson

      love the Doriot quotes

  186. Vinay Pai

    “If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of giants” -Isaac Newton (although the phrase has older origins).I think people getting too arrogant about their ideas and innovations would do well to take that phrase to heart. For example, before engaging in stupid lawsuits over who “stole” whose geometric shapes.

  187. John Rorick

    “Can’t knock the hustle” – Jay ZBob Porter: Looks like you’ve been missing a lot of work lately. Peter Gibbons: I wouldn’t say I’ve been *missing* it, Bob ~ Office Space

  188. NowEntrepreneur

    Like Uncle Ben tells Peter Parker in Spiderman (a little modified for entrepreneurs) – “With Huge Investments come Huge Responsibilities!”

    1. William Mougayar

      Good one…there’s a corollary about the captain…paraphrasing:”Anyone can sail a ship when the seas are calm.”

      1. Vasudev Ram

        Hadn’t heard that one, is good too.

  189. Don Sheu 許家豪

    “Isn’t it pleasure to study and practice what you have learned,” Kong Fuzi.

  190. Devang

    “Perfection is not when there is no more to add, but no more to take away.” Antoin De Saint-exupery

  191. RichardF

    and you were worrying about reading all the comments Fred, this thread is going to be a monster and not one that the Disqus upvoting system is going to help sifting through eitherLove Fun Friday’s

    1. fredwilson

      still working my way through it

  192. Vasudev Ram

    “We get too soon old and too late schmart” – the Pennsylvania Dutch. It’s actually “smart”, of course, but someone I know said they say it that way.http://www.theprguy.com/blo

  193. Nick Grossman

    “Anyone who is creative, curious, or passionate loves the internet.”– Nate Jaffee http://theslowhunch.net/201

  194. Ciaran

    “Anything that is in the world when you’re born is normal and ordinary and is just a natural part of the way the world works. Anything that’s invented between when you’re fifteen and thirty- five is new and exciting and revolutionary and you can probably get a career in it. Anything invented after you’re thirty-five is against the natural order of things.”Douglas Adams

  195. Karl Freeman

    “Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening the axe.” – Abraham Lincoln

  196. LE

    “A kiss is not a contract but it’s pretty nice”- Flight of the Conchords

  197. Ciaran

    The future is already here — it’s just not very evenly distributed.William Gibson

  198. Ciaran

    And, last but not least:”I am the walrus”John Lennon

    1. fredwilson

      🙂

  199. Mark Castellino

    Dorothy Parker, when she heard her friend was pregnant – “Good work Mary. We all knew you had it in you.”

  200. DougBend

    “Most folks are about as happy as they make up their minds to be.” — Abraham Lincoln

  201. David Aiello

    “Lady Godiva put everything she had on a horse”William Claude Fields

  202. jimmystone

    You can’t lose what you don’t put in the middle…But you can’t win much either. – Mike McDermott, RoundersSemper Fi!

  203. jheltzer

    “endurance running is 90% mental and 10% mental” – Ray Zahab

  204. LE

    What do we like about quotes?Well, I tend to quote lines in movies and in books because they tend to summarize a point of view or concept succinctly much quicker than taking the time explain.This is like the difference between talking to a friend (who knows the back story on your boss, aunt or ex girlfriend) and having a conversation with someone completely new (where everything has to be explained in detail before you can make your point).That’s actually one of the things I find tiring about socializing. It takes to long to have an interesting conversation as you can’t anchor to concepts. And you don’t know topics to avoid.People do that at AVC as well which is what makes it work. People always reference @JLM:disqus or @fakegrimlock or @kidmercury:disqus because we all know their shtick.Yiddish works the same way.You can convey an entire concept in a word or a short sentence.

    1. fredwilson

      i enjoy yiddish sayings

  205. Max Finder

    “Everyone has a plan – until they get punched in the face.” – Mike Tyson

    1. Max Finder

      Whoops! Already done. Love this quote though. Things change, gotta roll with the punches.

  206. Alex Collmer

    this has always been one of my favorites:”We shall not cease from exploration, and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time.”-TS Eliot

  207. Andrew

    “The ball is round, the game lasts 90 minutes, everything else is pure theory” – Sepp Herberger

  208. AVCoholic

    “We cannot change the cards we are dealt, just how we play the hand” – Dr. Randy Pausch

    1. fredwilson

      awesome

  209. Vasudev Ram

    Not really a quote, but a good one seen in clothes shops in India.(Can’t remember the exact words, but it goes something like this :)”You ask credit, I say no, you get mad. You ask credit, I say yes, you no pay, I get mad. Better you get mad.”

  210. disqus_gadgeteer

    “All men are frauds. The only difference between them is that some admit it. I myself deny it.”― H.L. Mencken

  211. chernevik

    “The trouble with trying to make yourself stupider than you really are is that you generally succeed.” – C.S. Lewis

  212. J Nicholas Gross

    “The sooner you fall behind, the more time you have to catch up”The procrastination special which we used with great frequency in college

  213. ErikSchwartz

    “It is necessary that laws should be passed to prohibit the use of corporate funds directly or indirectly for political purposes; it is still more necessary that such laws should be thoroughly enforced.” –Theodore Roosevelt

  214. takingpitches

    ”Even if you fail at your ambitious thing, it’s very hard to fail completely. That’s the thing that people don’t get.” – Larry Page. (my corollary: you might as well shoot for the sun; even if you fail miserably, at least you will reach the moon.)

  215. LE

    “If you can’t measure it you can’t manage it”Meg Whitman

  216. Fraser Harris

    “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.” – Arthur C. ClarkeI love that we are in a period where anyone can be a magician!

    1. fredwilson

      oh yes

  217. Sebastian Wain

    Gabriel García Márquez quote: “Everyone has three lives: a public life, a private life, and a secret life”

    1. fredwilson

      good one

  218. Aviah Laor

    “Two birds in the bush are worth one in hand”, anon (censored for centuries)

  219. Nate Quigley

    “Conceive an idea. Then stick to it. Those who hang on are the only ones who amount to anything.” – Augustus Saint-Gaudin

  220. Merten Wulfert

    “That’s thirty minutes away. I’ll be there in ten.”- Winston “The Wolf” Wolfe from Pulp Fiction

  221. Russell Himelein

    “To give anything less than your best is to sacrifice the gift” – Steve Prefontaine

    1. fredwilson

      so happy to see ray at the olympics closing ceremony

  222. bijan

    “When you do something noble and beautiful and nobody noticed, do not be sad. For the sun every morning is a beautiful spectacle and yet most of the audience still sleeps.” — John Lennon

    1. fredwilson

      i like to work at sunrise.

  223. Nate Quigley

    “…I had good health, high spirits, and immense pleasure in the progress I felt I was making day by day.” – George Healy, painting in Paris, 1835that’s entrepreneurship for me

  224. Oie Osterkamp

    Ask not what the world needs. Ask what makes you comealive… then go do that. Because what the world needs is more people who have comealive. Howard Thurman

  225. Aaron Nauta

    “People who can focus, get things done. People who can prioritize, get the right things done.” -@johnmaeda

    1. ShanaC

      John Maeda is one of my heros

  226. Vish

    My favorite quote is more about execution than inspiration: All I hear is excuses. Helps me to oversome over any obstacle that might stop me from getting things done. I think Andy Bernard from Office said it.

  227. matthughes

    “It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble. It’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so.” – Mark Twain

  228. matthughes

    Some of you might have seen this in recent days, from Clayton Christensen:”Questions are places in your mind where answers fit. If you haven’t asked the question, the answer has nowhere to go.”

    1. fredwilson

      clay is awesome

  229. matthughes

    “The coldest winter I ever spent was a summer in San Francisco.”- Mark TwainPerhaps not an inspirational quote but certainly rings true for those of us that have spent a lot of time in SF.

    1. mikenolan99

      My dad used to say this about Duluth… but credited Twain…

    2. fredwilson

      i thought of that one when i walked out into the SF morning at 6am last week

  230. hypermark

    “Listen to the technology; find out what it’s telling you.” – Carver Mead

  231. hypermark

    “Holding on to anger is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die” – Bob Dylan (posted by Jonah Peretti earlier this week)

  232. Techman

    A child miseducated is a child lost.-John F. Kennedy

  233. Techman

    For time and the world do not stand still. Change is the law of life. And those who look only to the past or the present are certain to miss the future.-John F Kennedy

  234. Techman

    I am liking this thread a lot. A lot of good content and discussion coming out of this.

    1. fredwilson

      i am still working through it

      1. Techman

        My browser is freezing up trying to display all of these comments.

  235. Stuart Willson

    From Walker Percy’s amazing Moviegoer: “To become aware of the possibility of the search is to beonto something. Not to be onto something is to be in despair.”

  236. FlavioGomes

    “Never give in to security under pressure…never give up on the promise of adventure”

  237. Aviah Laor

    Some funny quotes:- “I spent 90% of my money on women and booze. The rest I wasted”, George Best- “(lack of) Money is the root of all evil”, Mark Twain- “All right, but apart from the sanitation, medicine, education, wine, public order, irrigation, roads, the fresh water system and public health, what have the Romans ever done for us?” Monty Python, Life of Brian-“(Clement Atlee) is a sheep in sheep’s clothing”, Churchill

    1. ShanaC

      I want to meet george best. He could subsidize my maritinis.

  238. Nexus6

    He wrapped himself in quotations — as a beggar would enfold himself in the purple of Emperors. –Kipling

    1. Wavelengths

      Now, now!

    2. Druce

      The ability to quote is a serviceable substitute for wit. – W. S. Maugham

  239. pointsnfigures

    Two favorites, “If the government managed the Sahara desert, in four years we would need to import sand.”-Milton Friedman (he’s right when we look at the corn ($ZC_F) market these days! And, “Be quick but don’t hurry.”-John Wooden

  240. Daman Bahner

    “Seize any opportunity, or anything that looks like opportunity. They are rare, much rarer than you think.” – Nassim Nicholas Taleb from The Black Swan

  241. BrianF

    “The truth does not change according to our ability to stomach it”- Flannery O’Connor

  242. Laurent Courtines

    It’s a bit strong… but it’s from the “The Wire” and it’s awesome:Bunk Moreland: “I’m just a humble motherfucker with a big-ass dick.”

  243. baba12

    Found this and think it is a wonderful

    1. fredwilson

      nice

  244. Dale Allyn

    “If anyone goes to the pay window, everyone goes to the pay window.” — Jeffrey Minch;)

    1. ShanaC

      well played

  245. nipulpatel

    What grows, never grows old!

  246. Dan Munro

    I’ll bite – especially since you picked Winston Churchill to start. He has another one of my all time favorites:” You can always count on Americans to do the right thing – after they’ve tried everything else.”

    1. fredwilson

      that is such a good one

  247. Mike Preuss

    This one comes from China when @MaxYoder:disqus and I were traveling together.”He who invokes a vote regarding the status quo is looking to change the status quo”

  248. George London

    To cheat slightly, here are three of my favorites:On entrepreneurship:”Seek not to follow in the footsteps of men of old; seek what they sought.” — Matsuo Basho”Take calculated risks. That is quite different from being rash.”–George PattonAnd on New York: “…quite simply, I was in love with New York. I do not mean “love” in any colloquial way, I mean that I was in love with the city, the way you love the first person who ever touches you and you never love anyone quite that way again. I remember walking across [Metropolitan Avenue] one twilight that first spring, or the second spring, they were all alike for a while. I was late to meet someone but I stopped at [Graham] Avenue and bought a peach and stood on the corner eating it and knew that I had come out out of the West and reached the mirage.” – Joan Didion

    1. fredwilson

      that’s a great one from Joan Didion

  249. Dale Allyn

    “In a country well governed, poverty is something to be ashamed of. In a country badly governed, wealth is something to be ashamed of.” — Confucius

  250. RocketSpace

    My favorites…”Never interrupt yourenemy when he is making a mistake.”- Napoleon Bonaparte (1769-1821)”I have not failed.I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.”- Thomas Alva Edison (1847-1931)“Whether you think you can or think youcan’t, you’re right.” – Henry Ford

  251. Jake Cohen

    “This too shall pass.” – Persian Poets, King Solomon or Abe Lincoln, depending on your style of attribution.

  252. Guest

    “When art critics get together they talk about Form and Structure and Meaning. When artists get together they talk about where you can buy cheap turpentine.” – PicassoYou can change the context from an artist to whatever, and the message usually holds.

  253. Conrad Ross Schulman

    “Taxi drivers told you what to buy. The shoeshine boy could give you a summary of the day’s financial news as he worked with rag and polish. An old beggar who regularly patrolled the street in front of my office now gave me tips and, I suppose, spent the money I and others gave him in the market. My cook had a brokerage account and followed the ticker closely. Her paper profits were quickly blown away in the gale of 1929.” –Bernard Baruch

    1. fredwilson

      words to live by

  254. Ebun Okubanjo

    ” this Caring or Believing or Love Alone Matters” Saul Bellow. To me it sums it all up perfectly, the care for our art (work), the belief in something and love in its many forms

  255. scott schlichter

    If you find your self in a fair fight, your tactics suck. John Steinbeck

  256. Wavelengths

    It’s Friday.”Go get yourself some cheap sunglasses.”

  257. Ankur Jain

    Launching a startup was like jumping off a cliff and building the plane on the way down. — Reid Hoffman

  258. loupaglia

    “If I’d asked customers what they wanted, they would have said ‘a faster horse'”. – Henry Ford. Great quote about innovation, use your customers to understand their needs but not necessarily the solution.

  259. Will

    Emerson on pursuing big ideas (from Self-Reliance):To believe your own thought, to believe that what is true for you in your private heart is true for all men, — that is genius. Speak your latent conviction, and it shall be the universal sense.

    1. muratcannoyan

      My favorite Emerson essay, Thanks!

  260. loupaglia

    “Test in production what is broken in beta.” – Lou Paglia, 1998.

  261. Vlad Berteanu

    “You are the CEO of your life.”

  262. Gregory Brooks

    “Nothing is withheld from us what we have conceived to do. Most people think the opposite – that all things are withheld from them which they have conceived to do and they end up doing nothing.” — Russell Kirsch

  263. DaveGoulden

    “It’s not how much you see that matters. What’s important is the elevation you see from.” –Silas Chou

  264. keithrdennis

    “Thereasonable man adapts himself to the world,the unreasonable one persists intrying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on theunreasonable man.” – GeorgeBernard Shaw

  265. Julia

    All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident. – Schopenhauer

    1. Vasudev Ram

      “First they ignore you. Then they laugh at you. Then they fight you. Then you win.”http://en.wikiquote.org/wik… (Mahatma Gandhi)One of the biggest winners ever.

      1. JamesHRH

        Conversely:Who the hell is George Clooney?Get me George Clooney.Get me a George Clooney type.Whatever happened to George Clooney?Unknown origin, Hollywood USA.

    2. fredwilson

      so good

  266. Ernest Oppetit

    A very powerful and elegant quote for metaphysical discussions, by a late great.”That which can be asserted without evidence, can be dismissed without evidence.”- Christopher Hitchens

  267. Yalim K. Gerger

    I wrote this on a previous blog of yours. One of my favourites recently. It fits perfectly to startup life:”Everybody has a plan until they get punched in the face.” Mike Tyson

    1. fredwilson

      and folks responded by repeating it numerous times in this thread

      1. Yalim K. Gerger

        Yes. I noticed that after I posted it again myself. :-).

  268. Eliot Pierce

    “If you aren’t getting rejected on a daily basis, your goals aren’t ambitious enough.” -Chris Dixon

  269. keithrdennis

    Here is a Prezi I was putting together for a pitch to aspiring Entrepreneurs. “Eight Quotes for Entrepreneurs”. I need to finish this!http://prezi.com/bmyqfaglm1

    1. fredwilson

      i am getting an access denied on that link

  270. Jean-Michel Koenig

    MEN & WOMEN WANTED: FOR HAZARDOUS JOURNEY. SMALL WAGES, BITTER COLD, LONG MONTHS OF COMPLETE DARKNESS, CONSTANT DANGER, SAFE RETURN DOUBTFUL. HONOUR AND RECOGNITION IN CASE OF SUCCESS.” – Shackleton.Shackleton must have worked for a start-up!

    1. fredwilson

      hazardous is an understatement

  271. roushan

    Ah, my beloved, fill the cup that clearsToday of past regrets and future fears Tomorrow? Why tomorrow I may be Myself with yesterday’s seven thousand years.-Rumi

  272. Seth Gold

    “In order to accomplish you dreams, you need to stop living in reality” – unknown

  273. Rick Mason

    Here are a few of my favorites:Faith is taking the first step even when you don’t see the whole staircase.- Martin Luther King, Jr.Don’t worry about people stealing an idea. If it’s original, you will have to ram it down their throats.- Howard AikenIf you want to win in a software business, just take on the hardest problem you can find, use the most powerful language you can get, and wait for your competitors’ pointy-haired bosses to revert to the mean.- Paul Graham”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. The brick walls are there to stop the people who don’t want it badly enough. They are there to stop the other people!”- Randy PaushFinally in honor of our host:The three most harmful addictions are heroin, carbohydrates, and a monthly salary.- Fred Wilson

    1. fredwilson

      i get credit for that quote but it is not mineit is from nassim taleb

  274. Shankar Desai

    “Out beyond ideas of right and wrong, there is a field. I’ll meet you there.” – Rumi”Although you may spend your life killing, you will not exhaust all your foes. But if you quell your anger, your real enemy will be slain” – Nagarjuna

  275. pbjork

    “Everybody considers their life to be as important as you consider yours”

  276. DarkUFO

    “Where the fuck is all this water coming from” – Captain, RMS Titanic 15 April 1912.

    1. fredwilson

      ouch

  277. Stephen Cho

    “When I was a boy of 14, my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be 21, I was astonished at how much the old man had learned in seven years.” -Mark Twain

    1. fredwilson

      love it

    2. JamesHRH

      Heard this is many forms, including a great tale told on a golf course, entitled The Valley of Stupid.

  278. Danny Gilligan

    Flying is learning to throw yourself at the ground and miss – Douglas Adams.Always reminds me to think completely differently about the familiar.

  279. jkglei

    “We shape our tools and then our tools shape us.” -Marshall McLuhan — good one for the tech community to keep in mind! ; )

    1. fredwilson

      so true

  280. sbmiller5

    “I don’t make pictures just to make money. I make money to make more pictures.”- Walt Disney

  281. Wells Baum

    1 – The only rule is work. If you work it will lead to something. It’s the people who do all of the work all of the time who eventually catch on to things. – John Cage2 – “Action is the foundational key to all success.” – Pablo Picasso

    1. fredwilson

      pablo had it right

  282. K_Berger

    Two good ones…Man plans and God laughs.- Yiddish ProverbIf you never did, you should. These things are fun, and fun is good.- Dr. Seuss

  283. Dave W Baldwin

    a supporter back in ’08 said something about “walking the dog”. I replied, “You can walk the dog and have others follow, or you can own the dog, have someone else walk it and the others will still follow.”

  284. MikePLewis

    If A is a success in life, then A equals X plus Y plus Z. Work is X; Y is play; and Z is keeping your mouth shut. – Albert Einstein

  285. MikePLewis

    If there is no opportunity for joy. If we never find some activity that leads us into flow, or if that flow is shut off by spiraling self-doubt – the we’re likely to settle for pleasure instead: the sterile comforts of the television of the bottle or the slot machine, which offer no challenge, no room for growth, but only a kind of vacation from boredom or from worry. – Csikszentmihalyi in his book “Flow”

  286. CJ

    Time waits for no man, can’t turn back the hands once it’s too late, gotta learn to live with regrets. – Jay-Z

  287. @croffe

    “Burn the boats.”-Hernando Cortez

    1. fredwilson

      this whole thread has a “burn the boats” theme to it

  288. Conor O'Phelan

    “I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” – Maya Angelouit has been my mother’s consistent message/sage advice to me since i was a tot

  289. muratcannoyan

    I few that I don’t think are here yet.The highest reward for a person’s toil is not what they get for it, but what they become by it – John RuskinYou’ve got to satisfy you. If you can’t satisfy you you’re a failure – Jack LaLanneWe forfeit three-fourths of ourselves to be like other people – SchopenhauerThe only man that is truly free is one who can turn down an invitation to dinner without giving an excuse – Jules Renard

    1. Druce

      What you are is the price you paid to get what you used to want.Every society honors its live conformists and its dead troublemakers.A car is useless in New York, essential everywhere else. The same with good manners.- Mignon McLaughlin

  290. JLM

    .Killer post — 500+ comments.Salon master and bon vivant — Fred Wilson — moving the needle..

    1. fredwilson

      with a little help from my friends

  291. jstylman

    “don’t get high on your own supply” – Andy Weissman

    1. Wavelengths

      Is that like, “Don’t eat your seed corn”?

    2. fredwilson

      i am counting on andy to enforce that rule at USV

  292. Neal_Patel

    “One can never actually BE perfect, but by chasing perfection, we will catch EXCELLENCE” – Vince Lombardi”A Father’s Prayer” by General Douglas MacArthur has some inspirational quotes as well (full text below)Build me a son, O Lord, who will be strong enough to know when he is weak, and brave enough to face himself when he is afraid; one who will be proud and unbending in honest defeat, and humble and gentle in victory.Build me a son whose wishbone will not be where his backbone should be;a son who will know Thee and that to know himself is the foundation stone of knowledge.Lead him, I pray, not in the path of ease and comfort, but under the stress and spur of difficulties and challenge. Here let him learn to stand up in the storm; here let him learn compassion for those who fail.Build me a son whose heart will be clean, whose goal will be high; a son who will master himself before he seeks to master other men; one who will learn to laugh, yet never forget how to weep; one who will reach into the future, yet never forget the past.And after all these things are his, add, I pray, enough of a sense of humor, so that he may always be serious, yet never take himself too seriously. Give him humility, so that he may always remember the simplicity of greatness, the open mind of true wisdom, the meekness of true strength.Then I, his father, will dare to whisper, “I have not lived in vain.”

  293. David

    Tell me and I forget. Teach me and I remember. Involve me and I learn.Benjamin Franklin

  294. Patrick Keane

    “Kevin, this is Rickey, calling on behalf of Rickey. Rickey wants to play baseball.” — Rickey Henderson, call to San Diego GM Kevin Towers

    1. fredwilson

      i once saw him get a walk, steal second, steal third, and then steal home. it was at yankee stadium in the late 80s in think

  295. Cory

    “As for me, I am tormented with an everlasting itch for things remote. I love to sail forbidden seas and land on barbarous coasts.”- Melville, Moby Dick

  296. Cory

    “I am not afraid to make a mistake, even a great mistake, a lifelong mistake, and perhaps as long as eternity, too.” – James Joyce, Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man

  297. Cory

    “Time past is not believed to have any bearing upon time present or future, out in the golden land where every day the world is born anew.” – Didion

  298. Cory

    “The time is out of joint. O curs’ed spite that ever I was born to set it right.” – Hamlet, Shakespeare

  299. mikenolan99

    “Life moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.” Ferris Bueller

  300. Cory

    “Investors should remember that their scorecard is not computed using Olympic-diving methods: Degree-of-difficulty doesn’t count.” – Buffett

    1. fredwilson

      yeah, so good

  301. mikenolan99

    “If we have data, let’s look at data. If all we have are opinions, let’s go with mine.”Jim Barksdale quote, from this blog. Love it.

  302. mikenolan99

    I can’t resist…”Not that I condone fascism, or any -ism for that matter. -Ism’s in my opinion are not good. A person should not believe in an -ism, he should believe in himself. I quote John Lennon, “I don’t believe in Beatles, I just believe in me.” Good point there. After all, he was the walrus. I could be the walrus. I’d still have to bum rides off people.”Just watched Ferris Bueller with my 79 year old dad, and British Step-Mom – she had never seen it. Classic.

    1. fredwilson

      john was great on the ism thing.

  303. Robert Valdez

    Live for yourself; Be by yourself Live for others; Be loved by others-Robert Valdez

  304. Wavelengths

    Reporter to the Texas Ranger: Sir, why do you carry a .45?Texas Ranger: Because they don’t make a .46.

    1. JLM

      .One riot. One Ranger.Texas. On Earth as it is in Texas..

      1. Wavelengths

        Dinner guest to Texas Ranger, upon noticing the gun on his hip under his dinner jacket: Sir, I see you’re carrying a pistol. Are you expecting trouble?Texas Ranger: No sir. If I was expecting trouble I would have brought my shotgun.

  305. Emily Merkle

    The question isn’t who is going to let me; it’s who is going to stop me.- Ayn Rand.

  306. Nick Grossman

    I had a feeling this would become one of the most commented upon posts ever

    1. fredwilson

      its in the top ten but this is #1http://www.avc.com/a_vc/201…

      1. Nick Grossman

        yep I remember that one well.

  307. Prokofy

    “Although reason is common to all men, most men behave as if they have their own private understanding.” Heroclitus.

  308. Vasudev Ram

    “Well, today I really am getting Wordsworth.” -Me :)(Referring to this A VC post.)

  309. Jason Hirschhorn

    “I’m not a businessman, I’m a business, man” – Jay-Z“I have nothing to declare but my genius.” – Oscar Wilde on entering customs”Yo, the time has come for everyone to clean up their own backyard Before they go knocking on their neighbor’s door” – House of Pain”it’s never about what it’s about” – Meand more like it https://twitter.com/#!/jaso

  310. Ken G

    “I know you think you understand what you thought I said but I’m not sure you realize that what you heard is not what I meant.”Alan GreenspanHow many times in the course of a week do you feel you might need to say this?

  311. Nick Giglia

    Going to have to add a few:”When one man, for whatever reason, has the opportunity to lead an extraordinary life, he has no right to keep it to himself.” -Jacques Cousteau”When I was a child, my mother always said to me: ‘If you become a soldier, you will end up as a general. If you become a priest, you will end up as pope.’ Instead, I became a painter and ended up as Picasso.” -Pablo Picasso”Perfection is achieved, not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away.” -Antoine de Saint-Exupery”Those who do not believe in magic will never find it.” -Roald DahlAnd because we’re all a little regionalistic:”The true New Yorker secretly believes that people living anywhere else have to be, in some sense, kidding.” -John Updike

  312. JLM

    .I have always liked to learn physical skills. I wanted to learn how to weld and sought out this man who was considered the most accomplished welder in Texas.He was.He taught me to weld.He was sun baked, blue eyed, blonde eye browed, leathery skinned, big handed and as gentle as an artist. And he could talk silky and smooth.Squinting at me out of the corner of his with just the least suggestion of a smile maybe a smirk really, his parting wisdom to me was:”I’m done with you. You’re a decent welder, son. Better than a lot. You pay damn good attention. But you are not a great welder.”Says I: “And what would a great welder be?”Says he: “Son, a damn good welder — well, hell, there’s only a handful — there’s only three things a damn good welder CAN’T weld.”Says I: “Do tell.”Says he: “The only things I can’t weld are tissue paper, the crack of dawn and a broken heart.”True story. And every time I think about it I laugh. I am laughing now.Tissue paper, the crack of dawn and a broken heart..

    1. fredwilson

      broken heart. wow.

    2. panterosa,

      I sucked at welding. I was the slag queen. Not so good in Sculpture, but I made up for it using an arc welder on bronze.

  313. Archana Patchirajan

    You can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards – Steve Jobs

  314. goldwerger

    My favorite Churchill’s quote by far:“Never, never, never believe any war will be smooth and easy, or that anyone who embarks on the strange voyage can measure the tides and hurricanes he will encounter. The statesman who yields to war fever must realize that once the signal is given, he is no longer the master of policy but the slave of unforeseeable and uncontrollable events. ”

    1. fredwilson

      good one

  315. Jim Parker

    Courage is what it takes to stand up and speak; courage is also what it takes to sit down and listen. –Winston Churchill

  316. Ela Madej

    I’ll say it again – “But I don’t want to go among mad people,” said Alice. “Oh, you can’t help that,” said the cat. “We’re all mad here.” Lewis Carroll, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland

    1. fredwilson

      nice one Ela

  317. Ori.b

    ” always acknowledge the connectedness of everything ” Dalai Lama

  318. Ori.b

    A very important rabi was asked to summarize the essence of Judaism in one sentence “love your friend / peer as if it was yourself ” (also interpreted as don’t do to others what u don’t want people to do to u )

  319. Brad Lindenberg

    Stay hungry, stay foolish.

  320. hardik

    long time reader first time commentatorLife is like a game of cards. The handyou are dealt is determinism; the way you play it is free will.–jawaharlal nehru

    1. Donna Brewington White

      Welcome to commenting, hardik. I just happened to be online when your comment came through. So, how does it feel?

      1. hardik

        feels a bit like a dwarf among giants

        1. Donna Brewington White

          Well, then you picked good timing. Most of the giants are asleep. 😉

          1. hardik

            thats what a 12-15 time zone diffrential does

    2. fredwilson

      dropping nehru in your first comment!well played

      1. hardik

        Thanks fred

  321. Volnado

    I used your quote today on someone. “Be Your Own Bitch.” It worked 😉

    1. Donna Brewington White

      Forgot about that one. Definitely up there for me!

    2. fredwilson

      phew

  322. Emily Merkle

    Trust buy verify. – Ronald Reagan

    1. Donna Brewington White

      Great motto for parenting teens.

      1. Emily Merkle

        Indeed. In fact I think that quote has nearly universal application.

      2. JamesHRH

        LOL!

  323. hardik

    Life is a song – sing it. Life is a game – play it. Life is a challenge – meet it.Life is a dream – realize it. Life is a sacrifice – offer it. Life is love – enjoy it.-Sai Baba

  324. Donna Brewington White

    Dum spiro spero”While I breathe, I hope”(sometimes attributed to Cicero)

  325. Emily Merkle

    A thought to help us through these difficult times: Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle.Ian MacLaren

  326. JTB

    There is no favorable wind for the sailorman who doesn’t know where to go.- Seneka

  327. Carl Rahn Griffith

    Desiderata.

    1. Emily Merkle

      good call.

  328. Emily Merkle

    I skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been. Wayne Gretsky

  329. Emily Merkle

    Strive not to be a success, but rather to be of value.Albert Einstein

    1. Matt A. Myers

      Another great one. Thanks for sharing

    2. Jim Tousignant

      Love Albert Einstein quotes!

  330. Jurrie Hobers

    “The pessimist complains about the wind. The optimist expects it to change. The leader adjusts the sails.” unknown (at least to me)

    1. Matt A. Myers

      Wow, that’s great.Google search seems to say it’s by John Maxwell.

  331. Vinod

    There is no more efficacious medicine for inner purity than doing one’swork, whatever it be, without any desire for reward and doing it to perfection — Shri Kanchi Shankaracharya –http://www.kamakoti.org/hin…

  332. Jim Tousignant

    “I want to put a ding in the universe.” – Steve Jobs

  333. Jim Tousignant

    “Computers are incredibly fast, accurate, and stupid. Human beings are incredibly slow, inaccurate, and brilliant. Together they are powerful beyond imagination.” – Albert Einstein

  334. The Heasman

    This has probably already been posted but:”Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better.” – “Samuel Beckett

  335. Jan Schultink

    He who can does, he who cannot teaches, George Bernard Shaw writing about social media experts. Greetings from Iceland, sorry for infrequent posting.

    1. fredwilson

      ha!

  336. jmorf

    “Live a good life. If there are gods and they are just, then they will not care how devout you have been, but will welcome you based on the virtues you have lived by. If there are gods, but unjust, then you should not want to worship them. If there are no gods, then you will be gone, but will have lived a noble life that will live on in the memories of your loved ones.”- Marcus Aurelius

  337. lee

    a word to the wise is infuriating..Hunter Thompson

    1. fredwilson

      ah, hunter. one of my all time favorites

  338. amintorres

    Fred, I am a bit late to this one but I’ve always liked this quote:“A diplomat is a person who can tell you to go to hell in such a way that you actually look forward to the trip.” — Caskie Stinnett

  339. Jim Tousignant

    Fred, Here’s another great Winston Churchill quote I love…”We shall not fail or falter we shall not weaken or tire…Give us the tools and we will finish the job.” – Winston Churchill

  340. William Mougayar

    The competitor to fear is one who never bothers about you at all, but goes on making his own business better all the time. – Henry Ford via @ramikantari

  341. Mark Essel

    “in the absence of a system of centralised command, conventions emerge that minimise conflict & organise social activities (including production) in a manner that is most conducive to the Good Life” HumeBetter late than never..just bumped into while reading this posthttp://blogs.valvesoftware….

  342. JamesHRH

    I will bracket my quotes with two from family members:My mother’s mother, Kathleen Martin:’ A vision without a task is a dream; a task without a vision is mere drudgery; a vision with a task is the hope of the world.”A vision without resoruces is a hallucination.’ – US DoD’Think like a man of action; act like a man of thought.’ – Henri Louis Bergson’There is no substitute for desire.’ – Sam Snead’If it matters, measure it.’ – Gwyn Morgan, former CEO of Encana’If is is measured, it is managed.’ – Peter Drucker’Never hold discussion with the monkey, when the organ grinder is in the room.’ – Winston Churchill’To attain knowledge, add things everyday. To attain wisdom, remove things everyday.’ – Lao TseAnd, finally, this last one requires a bit of a preamble.My Uncle Milt, a prominent criminal defence lawyer, while being interviewed on CBC Radio (NPR North) about his life and career, is being questioned about the fact that he was (at the time) one of 7 people in the country (Canada) with a permit to carry a concealed firearm (which he typically had strapped to his lower leg):Interviewer, rather jovially: ‘These death threats you get, do you really get scared when they call?’Uncle Milt: ‘Its not the ones who call that worry me.’

    1. fredwilson

      uncle mitt was a badass

      1. JamesHRH

        He had real presence. Took stuff seriously.The Dead air after his reply is beyond dramatic. Total change in tone from interviewer , after getting tuned.

  343. MG

    “And whether or not it is clear to you,no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.”// everything happens for a reason

  344. William Mougayar

    I forgot about this one which was my favorite many years ago.Vision without action is merely a dream. Action without vision just passes the time. Vision with action can change the world! – Joel Barker

  345. William Mougayar

    I don’t want to be a product of my environment. I want my environment to be a product of me.- Jack Nicholson in The Departed

  346. Satyajeet Salgar

    “Happiness is when … What you think , What you say and What you do are in Harmony”- Mahatma Gandhi

  347. leigh

    omg just read this essay from Stephen King. Brilliant. Just Brilliant. I’m adding the world’s longest quote to the list of 712. (link here for further reading http://www.thedailybeast.co…”Mitt Romney has said, in effect, “I’m rich and I don’t apologize for it.” Nobody wants you to, Mitt. What some of us want—those who aren’t blinded by a lot of bullshit persiflage thrown up to mask the idea that rich folks want to keep their damn money—is for you to acknowledge that you couldn’t have made it in Americawithout America. That you were fortunate enough to be born in a country where upward mobility is possible (a subject upon which Barack Obama can speak with the authority of experience), but where the channels making such upward mobility possible are being increasingly clogged. That it’s not fair to ask the middle class to assume a disproportionate amount of the tax burden. Not fair? It’s un-fucking-American is what it is. I don’t want you to apologize for being rich; I want you to acknowledge that in America, we all should have to pay our fair share. That our civics classes never taught us that being American means that—sorry, kiddies—you’re on your own. That those who have received much must be obligated to pay—not to give, not to “cut a check and shut up,” in Governor Christie’s words, but to pay—in the same proportion. That’s called stepping up and not whining about it. That’s called patriotism

    1. fredwilson

      i went and read the whole thinggreat rant and i agree with him and have said so here on AVC

  348. Steven Kane

    You don’t have to explain what you don’t say. – Sam Rayburn

    1. fredwilson

      nice steve

  349. Anthony Ortenzi

    Can’t believe it wasn’t here, but I scrolled through 719 comments and didn’t see it:”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. 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.” Apple’s Think Different ad.

    1. fredwilson

      good one.

  350. Jim Tousignant

    The greatest lesson in life is to know that even fools are right sometimes. – Winston Churchill

  351. Sander Bijlstra

    From your own Yahoo is no longer dead post:”If we have data, let’s look at data. If all we have are opin­ions, let’s go with mine.”Jim barksdale

  352. Sander Bijlstra

    “If you’regoing to try, go all the way. Otherwise, don’t even start. This could meanlosing girlfriends, wives, relatives and maybe even your mind. It could meannot eating for three or four days. It could mean freezing on a park bench. Itcould mean jail. It could mean derision. It could mean mockery–isolation.Isolation is the gift. All the others are a test of your endurance, of how muchyou really want to do it. And, you’ll do it, despite rejection and the worstodds. And it will be better than anything else you can imagine. If you’re goingto try, go all the way. There is no other feeling like that. You will be alonewith the gods, and the nights will flame with fire. You will ride life straightto perfect laughter. It’s the only good fight there is.”― CharlesBukowski, Factotum

  353. vanogtrop

    The heights by great men reached and kept,were not attained by sudden flight.But they, while their companions slept,were toiling upward in the night

  354. William Mougayar

    “Yesterday is history. Tomorrow is a mystery. Today is a gift. That is why they call it the present.” Master Oogway via @davidcrow

  355. toutsuite

    These (they were printed together in the beginning of a novel about an arctic exploration) made me start my first business at age 25. The next day after reading them, I ordered business cards and that was that! I’m on my third start up today.Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back. Concerning all acts of initiative (and creation), there is one elementary truth that ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans: that the moment one definitely commits oneself, then Providence moves too. All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occurred. A whole stream of events issues from the decision, raising in one’s favor all manner of unforeseen incidents and meetings and material assistance, which no man could have dreamed would have come his way. – Scottish mountaineer William Hutchinson MurrayWhatever you can do, or dream you can do, begin it. Boldness has genius, power, and magic in it. Begin it now. – Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

  356. maria

    “Never give up, never surrender.” Galaxy Quest

  357. fredwilson

    then upvote it!

  358. Dan

    Probably the only lasting thing I got out of my days in a fraternity is that quote. Love it. Live it.

  359. fredwilson

    right on.

  360. Rohan

    A slightly tangential one that came to mind..’The world is a dangerous place, not because of those who do evil, but because of those who look on and do nothing.’ | Albert Einstein