Vowing, even intense vowing, is often useless. The next day comes and the next day goes. What works is making a vivid, concrete plan.

No matter what your current ability is, effort is what ignites that ability and turns it into accomplishment.

In a growth mindset, challenges are exciting rather than threatening. So rather than thinking, oh, I'm going to reveal my weaknesses, you say, wow, here's a chance to grow.

Effort is one of those things that gives meaning to life. Effort means you care about something, that something is important to you and you are willing to work for it.

The best thing parents can do is to teach their children to love challenges, be intrigued by mistakes, enjoy effort, and keep on learning.

What did you learn today? What mistake did you make that taught you something? What did you try hard at today?

Test scores and measures of achievement tell you where a student is, but they don't tell you where a student could end up.

Failure is information-we label it failure, but it's more like, 'This didn't work, I'm a problem solver, and I'll try something else.'

Why waste time proving over and over how great you are, when you could be getting better?

Important achievements require a clear focus, all-out effort, and a bottomless trunk full of strategies. Plus allies in learning.

The wrong kind of praise creates self-defeating behavior. The right kind motivates students to learn.

...but sometimes mindless entertainment was a release of its own. Most important, mindless entertainment didn’t come with complications.

I can write about all of these bizarre and funny characters in my book, "Diggin' Elroy, " because I know them better than anyone else. I have a little bit of all of them in me.

Gratitude is the experience of our true self.

I think the Mormon Tabernacle Choir is as great as it is because it's become it's a labor of love. They love what they do.

If it doesn't work, at least it will be an interesting train wreck.

Patrick Kenzie asking a bemused waitress for a newspaper in smalltown USA. 'It's like a homepage without a scroll button?'

Most people are taught from an early age on, to conceive of themselves as losers. They are taught that there are a very special few who are eminently successful in life.

You feel the spirit move you. I can be possessed really well.

I've been known to throw watermelons, backstage, at people who are giving me news I don't want to hear. But I never aim for the head.

Who says one instance of writing has anything in common with another instance?