Bill Gates makes $500,000 a year.That's all.
I make more than him.That's all he makes but he's worth 40 billion.
I'm trying to tell you there is a very big difference between income,
money and wealth.So I have spent my life buying assets,businesses,stocks,
real estate,that's what makes you rich,not a job.The reason the rich in
America get richer is they pass this on to their kids.
My poor dad always said,"High paying job,high paying job,
high paying job."And my rich dad said,"Assets,assets,assets."
That's the difference.
In the matter of courage we all have our limits.
There never was a hero who did not have his bounds.
I suppose it may be said of Nelson and all the others
whose courage has been advertised that there came times
in their lives when their bravery knew it had come to its limit.
I have found mine a good many times.Sometimes this was expected—
often it was unexpected.
I know a man who is not afraid to sleep with a rattle-snake,
but you could not get him to sleep with a safety-razor.
I never had the courage to talk across a long,narrow room.
I should be at the end of the room facing all the audience.
If I attempt to talk across a room I find myself turning this way and that,
and thus at alternate periods I have part of the audience behind me.
You ought never to have any part of the audience behind you;
you never can tell what they are going to do.I'll sit down.
It is not difficult to imagine a world short of ambition.
It would probably be a kinder world: without demands,
without abrasions,without disappointments.People abrasion people
would have time for reflection.Such work as they did would not
be for themselves but for the collectivity.Competition would never
enter in.Conflict would be eliminated,tension become a thing of the past.
The stress of creation would be at an end.Art would no longer
be troubling,but purely celebratory in its functions.Longevity
would be increased,for fewer people would die of heart attack or stroke
caused by tumultuous endeavor.Anxiety would be extinct.
Time would stretch on and on,with ambition long departed
from the human heart.
Ah,how unrelievedly boring life would be?
There is a strong view that holds that success is a myth,
and ambition therefore a sham.Does this mean that success
does not really exist? That achievement is at bottom empty?
That efforts of men and women are of no significance alongside
the force of movements and events? Now not all success,obviously,
is worth esteeming,nor all ambition worth cultivating.Which are
and which are not is something one soon enough learns on one's own.
But even the most cynical,secretly admit that success exists;
that achievement counts for a great deal;and that the true myth is
that the actions of men and women are useless.To believe otherwise is
to lake on a point of view that is likely to".It is,in its implications,
to remove all motives for competence,in attainment,and regard for posterity.
We do not choose to be born.We do not choose our parents.
We do not choose our historical epoch,the country of our birth,
or the immediate circumstances of our upbringing.We do not,most of us,
choose to die;nor do choose the time or conditions of our death.
But within all this realm of choicelessness,we do choose how we
shall live,courageously or in cowardice,honorably or dishonorably,
with purpose or in drift.We decide what is important and what is trivial in life.
We decide that what makes us significant is either
what we do or what we refuse to do.But no matter how indifferent the universe
to our choices and decisions,
these choices and decisions are ours to make.We decide.
We choose.And as we decide and choose,so are our lives formed.
In the end,forming our own destiny is what ambition about.
The lack of opportunity is ever the excuse of a weak,vacillating mind.
Opportunities!
Every life is full of them.
Every lesson in school or college is an opportunity.
Every examination is a chance in life.
Every business transaction is an opportunity,an opportunity to be polite,
an opportunity to be manly,an opportunity to be honest,
an opportunity to make friends.
Every proof of confidence in you is a great opportunity.
Every responsibility thrust upon your strength and your honor is priceless.
Existence is the privilege of effort,and when that privilege
is met like a man,opportunities to succeed along the line of your aptitude
will come faster than you can use them.
Young men and women,why do you stand here all the day idle?
Was the land all occupied before you were born?
Has the earth ceased to yield its increase?
Are the seats all taken?
The positions all filled?
The chances all gone?
Are the resources of your country fully developed?
Are the secrets of nature all mastered?
Is there no way in which you can utilize these passing moments to
improve yourself or benefit another?
Don't wait for your opportunity.
Make it-make it as Napoleon made his in a hundred "impossible" situations.
Make it,as all leaders of men,in war and in peace have,
made their chances of success.
Make it,as every man must,who would accomplish anything worth the effort.
Golden opportunities are nothing to laziness,but industry makes
the commonest chances golden.