If I wanted to write, I had to be willing to develop a kind of concentration found mostly in people awaiting execution. I had to learn technique and surrender my ignorance.

Nothing will work unless you do.

A bird doesn’t sing because it has an answer, it sings because it has a song.

Try to be a rainbow in someone's cloud.

We may encounter many defeats but we must not be defeated.

Nothing can dim the light which shines from within.

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.

You may encounter many defeats, but you must not be defeated. Please remember that your difficulties do not define you. They simply strengthen your ability to overcome.

My mission in life is not merely to survive, but to thrive; and to do so with some passion, some compassion, some humor, and some style

If you are always trying to be normal you will never know how amazing you can be.

You may shoot me with your words, you may cut me with your eyes, you may kill me with your hatefulness, but still, like air, I'll rise!

The atheist staring from his attic window is often nearer to God than the believer caught up in his own false image of God.

There is no one as strong as a person whose heart is always filled with gratitude.

We grow up being told, "Be a good girl." When you're told to be good, you have to get rid of whatever is bad.

I like Frenchmen very much, because even when they insult you they do it so nicely.

Beijing would indeed consider vetoing any American effort to sanction Iran at the Security Council.

Fighter pilots rove in the area allotted to them in any way they like, and when they spot an enemy they attack and shoot them down.... Everything else is rubbish.

I always say the next book is my favorite, because without a "next" book, you don't really have a career as a book author.

Without investment there will not be growth, and without growth there will not be employment.

And red is not the color of apples or roses or the dresses that pretty girls wear in the summertime. That is not the color of red at all.

I never could stand losing. Second place didn't interest me. I had a fire in my belly.