Great Throughts Treasury

"How different our lives are when we really know what is deeply important to us, and keeping that picture in mind, we manage ourselves each day to be and to do what really matters most."

"In the last analysis, what we are communicates far more eloquently than anything we say or do. We all know it. There are people we trust absolutely because we know their character."

"Effective people are not problem-minded; they're opportunity-minded. They feed portunities and starve problems."

"Interdependency follows independence."

"Creating the unity to run an effective business or a family or a marriage requires great personal strength and courage. No amount of technical administrative skill in laboring for the masses can make up for lack of nobility of personal character in developing relationships. It is a t a very essential, one-on-one level, that we live the primary laws of love and life."

"An empowered organization is one in which individuals have the knowledge, skill, desire, and opportunity to personally succeed in a way that leads to collective organizational success."

"We simply assume that the way we see things is the way they really are or the way they should be. And our attitudes and behaviors grow out of these assumptions."

"Our ultimate freedom is the right and power to decide how anybody or anything outside ourselves will affect us."

"Habit 1: Be Proactive Habit 2: Begin with the End in Mind Habit 3: Put First Things First Habit 4: Think Win-Win Habit 5: Seek First to Understand Habit 6: Synergize Habit 7: Sharpen the Saw"

"Be a light, not a judge. Be a model, not a critic"

"As long as you think the problem is out there, that very thought is the problem"

"All things are created twice. There's a mental or first creation, and a physical or second creation to all things."

"A cardinal principle of Total Quality escapes too many managers: you cannot continuously improve interdependent systems and processes until you progressively perfect interdependent, interpersonal relationships."

"Always treat your employees exactly as you want them to treat your best customers."

"Accountability breeds response-ability."

"Between stimulus and response, one has the freedom to choose."

"Begin with the end in mind."

"Dependent people need others to get what they want. Independent people can get what they want through their own efforts. Interdependent people combine their own efforts with the efforts of others to achieve their greatest success."

"Courage is not the absence of fear but the awareness that something else is more important."

"Don't argue for other people's weaknesses. Don't argue for your own. When you make a mistake, admit it, correct it, and learn from it -- immediately."

"Each of us tends to think we see things as they are, that we are objective. But this is not the case. We see the world, not as it is, but as we are - or as we are conditioned to see it."

"Effective leadership is putting first things first. Effective management is discipline, carrying it out."

"Free your heart from hatred - forgive. Free your mind from worries - most never happen. Live simply and appreciate what you have. Give more. Expect less."

"Every human has four endowments – self-awareness, conscience, independent will and creative imagination. These give us the ultimate human freedom... The power to choose, to respond, to change."

"I am personally convinced that one person can be a change catalyst, a transformer in any situation, any organization. Such an individual is yeast that can leaven an entire loaf. It requires vision, initiative, patience, respect, persistence, courage, and faith to be a transforming leader."

"Happiness can be defined, in part at least, as the fruit of the desire and ability to sacrifice what we want now for what we want eventually."

"If you're proactive, you don't have to wait for circumstances or other people to create perspective expanding experiences. You can consciously create your own."

"If we keep doing what we're doing, we're going to keep getting what we're getting."

"Leaders are neither born nor made, they are self-made."

"It's a fact that more people watch television and get their information that way than read books. I find new technology and new ways of communication very exciting and would like to do more in this field."

"I'm convinced that we can write and live our own scripts more than most people will acknowledge. I also know the price that must be paid. It's a real struggle to do it. It requires visualization and affirmation. It involves living a life of integrity, starting with making and keeping promises, until the whole human personality the senses, the thinking, the feeling, and the intuition are ultimately integrated and harmonized."

"In the last analysis, what we are communicates far more eloquently than anything we say or do."

"Live out of your imagination, not your history."

"Leadership is communicating to people their worth and potential so clearly that they come to see it in themselves."

"Live, love, laugh, leave a legacy."

"Live the laws of love. We encourage obedience to the laws of life when we live the laws of love."

"Management is efficiency in climbing the ladder of success; leadership determines whether the ladder is leaning against the right wall."

"Management works in the system; Leadership works on the system."

"Love is a verb. Love - the feeling - is a fruit of love, the verb. So love her. Serve her. Sacrifice. Listen to her. Empathize. Appreciate. Affirm her. Love is a value that is actualized through loving actions."

"Motivation is a fire from within. If someone else tries to light that fire under you, chances are it will burn very briefly."

"Most people struggle with life balance simply because they haven't paid the price to decide what is really important to them."

"Many people seem to think that success in one area can compensate for failure in other areas. But can it really?...True effectiveness requires balance."

"No one manages the internet. It is a sea change of global proportion. For the first time in history the pure voice of the human spirit rings out in millions of unedited conversations unfettered by borders. Real-time information drives expectations and social will, which ultimately drive the political will that impacts every person."

"Perform anonymous service. Whenever we do good for others anonymously, our sense of intrinsic worth and self-respect increases. Selfless service has always been one of the most powerful methods of influence."

"One of the best ways to educate our hearts is to look at our interaction with other people, because our relationships with others are fundamentally a reflection of our relationship with ourselves."

"Paradigms are powerful because they create the lens through which we see the world."

"One of the most important ways to manifest integrity is to be loyal to those who are not present. In doing so, we build the trust of those who are present."

"Our character is basically a composite of our habits. Because they are consistent, often unconscious patterns, they constantly, daily, express our character."

"Our greatest joy-and our greatest pain come in our relationships with others."

"Personal leadership is the process of keeping your vision and your values before you and aligning your life to be congruent with them."