I'm competitive - that's what defines me - and I love it.

Sport fosters many things that are good; teamwork and leadership.

The only limitations are mental. The guy who thinks positively will win.

I don't even have my own computer.

Sometimes you have to resist working on your strengths in favour of your weaknesses. The decathlon requires a wide range of skills.

If you don't want to grow old, then slow down the slowing down process.

I have the mentality of a winner. I first went to the Olympic Games when I was 17, three weeks after my O-levels, and I remember sitting in a dining-hall filled with the world's best athletes.

Being a decathlete is like having ten girlfriends. You have to love them all, and you can't afford losing one.

Having the ambition of becoming Olympic champion is a whole different ambition from wanting to be the greatest.

Los Angeles was great fun because it was the polar opposite of Moscow in 1980. It was sunny and bright, lots of colours around, whereas Moscow was dark and oppressive.

When I lost my decathlon world record I took it like a man. I only cried for ten hours.

those who believed in the Good Lord, for whom death was just a journey, and it didn't make them sad at all

One mood can be replaced by another, but it is impossible to leave attunement altogether. However, profound boredom brings us as close to a state of un-attunement as we can come.

Fear is not a good teacher. The lessons of fear are quickly forgotten.

There are gonna be a core set of values that shouldn't be up for debate. Should be our north star.

Nobody, she felt, understood her-not her mother, not her father, not her sister or brother, none of the girls or boys at school, nadie - except her man.

Everything is explicable in the terms of the behavior of a small child.

He who integrates is lost.

Just as Lincoln got contradictory advice from the extremists of both sides . . . so now I have to guard myself against the extremists of both sides.

When my father ran for the state Assembly, the headline said, 'Kean's Son to Run for Assembly.' When my grandfather first ran for Congress, it was 'Kean's son to run for Congress.'

I have done very little in my life except go to school and work for the CIA. Intellectually I think I did everything I could. Emotionally you always think you should have something more.