Selected potential quotes

1. According to Buddhism, individuals are masters of their own destiny. And all living beings are believed to possess the nature of the Primordial Buddha Samantabhadra, the potential or seed of enlightenment, within them. So our future is in our own hands. What greater free will do we need?

2. The story of the human race is the story of men and women selling themselves short.

3. If you plan on being anything less than you are capable of being, you will probably be unhappy all the days of your life.

4. That in the soul which is called the mind is, before it thinks, not actually any real thing.

5. Hold on to me: Someday I may be quite valuable.

6. The most exciting place to discover talent is in yourself.

7. Man is a universe within himself.

8. Ever since I was a child I have had this instinctive urge for expansion and growth. To me, the function and duty of a quality human being is the sincere and honest development of one's potential.

9. If you always put limit on everything you do, physical or anything else. It will spread into your work and into your life. There are no limits. There are only plateaus, and you must not stay there, you must go beyond them.

10. Genius is present in every age, but the men carrying it within them remain benumbed unless extraordinary events occur to heat up and melt the mass so that it flows forth.

11. The general interest of the masses might take the place of the insight of genius if it were allowed freedom of action.

12. The hardest thing is to go to sleep at night, when there are so many urgent things needing to be done. A huge gap exists between what we know is possible with today's machines and what we have so far been able to finish.

13. Any human anywhere will blossom in a hundred unexpected talents and capacities simply by being given the opportunity to do so.

14. An unhatched egg is to me the greatest challenge in life.

15. And all may do what has by man been done.

16. The most gifted members of the human species are at their creative best when they cannot have their way, and must compensate for what they miss by realizing and cultivating their capacities and talents.

17. Man's main task in life is to give birth to himself, to become what he potentially is. The most important product of his effort is his own personality.

18. Most people die before they are fully born. Creativeness means to be born before one dies.

19. I never met anyone who didn't have a very smart child. What happens to these children, you wonder, when they reach adulthood?

20. For I think it is the case with genius that it is not when quiescent so very much above mediocrity as the difference between the two might lead us to think, but that it has the power and privilege of rising from that level to a height utterly far from mediocrity: in other words that its greatness is that it can be so great.

21. I dream of a time when the people will retake their airways and use them to achieve a voice to rediscover democracy, and to see the divine potential of man.

22. The infinity of All ever bringing forth anew, and even as infinite space is around us, so is infinite potentiality, capacity, reception, malleability, matter.

23. Treat a child as though he already is the person he's capable of becoming.

24. If men cease to believe that they will one day become gods then they will surely become worms.

25. Every man is a potential genius until he does something.

26. There is great treasure there behind our skull and this is true about all of us. This little treasure has great, great powers, and I would say we only have learnt a very, very small part of what it can do.

27. I saw that my life was a vast glowing empty page and I could do anything I wanted.

28. Anybody can do anything, it's up to themselves. All it takes is the right intentions.

29. The task of leadership is not to put greatness into humanity, but to elicit it, for the greatness is already there.

30. The thing the sixties did was to show us the possibilities and the responsibility that we all had. It wasn't the answer. It just gave us a glimpse of the possibility.

31. I love the whirling of the dervishes. I love the beauty of rare innocence. You don't need no crystal ball, Don't fall for a magic wand. We humans got it all, we perform the miracles.

32. Nothing is unthinkable, nothing impossible to the balanced person, provided it comes out of the needs of life and is dedicated to life's further development.

33. The possible ranks higher than the actual.

34. I am capable of what every other human is capable of. This is one of the great lessons of war and life.

35. I'm the best. I just haven't played yet.

36. If they can make penicillin out of mouldy bread, they can sure make something out of you.

37. The man who has no imagination has no wings.

38. It is our will That thus enchains us to permitted ill. We might be otherwise, we might be all We dream of happy, high, majestical. Where is the love, beauty and truth we seek, But in our mind? and if we were not weak, Should we be less in deed than in desire?

39. Though thou loved her as thyself, As a self of purer clay, Tho' her parting dims the day, Stealing grace from all alive, Heartily know, When half-gods go, The gods arrive.

40. Somehow, you need to cling to your optimism. Always look for the silver lining. Always look for the best in people. Try to see things through the eyes of a child. See the wonder in the simplest things. Never stop dreaming. Believe anything is possible.

41. Our chief want in life is somebody who shall make us do what we can.

42. The human being cannot live in a condition of emptiness for very long: if he is not growing toward something, he does not merely stagnate; the pent-up potentialities turn into morbidity and despair, and eventually into destructive activities.

43. It would be as wise to set up an accomplished lawyer to saw wood as a business as to condemn an educated and sensible woman to spend all her time boiling potatoes and patching old garments. Yet this is the lot of many a one who incessantly stitches and boils and bakes, compelled to thrust back out of sight the aspirations which fill her soul.

44. To give anything less than your best is to sacrifice the Gift.

45. Never think there is anything impossible for the soul. It is the greatest heresy to think so. If there is sin, this is the only sin - to say that you are weak, or others are weak.

46. That there should one Man die ignorant who had capacity for Knowledge, this I call a tragedy.

47. But Knowledge to their eyes her ample page Rich with the spoils of time did ne'er unroll; Chill Penury repressed their noble rage, And froze the genial current of the soul.

48. Some village Hampden, that with dauntless breast The little Tyrant of his fields withstood; Some mute inglorious Milton here may rest, Some Cromwell guiltless of his country's blood.

49. You may be whatever you resolve to be.

50. I truly believe greatness is in all of us. Don't let anyone talk us out of our truth.

51. See the kind seed-receiving earth To every grain affords a birth: On her no showers unwelcome fall, Her willing womb retains 'em all, And shall my Caelia be confined? No, live up to thy mighty mind, And be the mistress of Mankind!

52. I am certainly of opinion that genius can be acquired, or, in the alternative, that it is an almost universal possession. Its rarity may be attributed to the crushing influence of a corrupted society. It is rare to meet a youth without high ideals, generous thoughts, a sense of holiness, of his own importance, which, being interpreted, is, of his own identity with God. Three years in the world, and he is a bank clerk or even a government official. Only those who intuitively understand from early boyhood that they must stand out, and who have the incredible courage and endurance to do so in the face of all that tyranny, callousness, and the scorn of inferiors can do; only these arrive at manhood uncontaminated.

53. To me, the function and duty of a quality human is the sincere and honest development of one's potential.

54. We spend January 1 walking through our lives, room by room, drawing up a list of work to be done, cracks to be patched. Maybe this year, to balance the list, we ought to walk through the rooms of our lives . . ., not looking for flaws, but for potential.

55. Education is helping the child realize his potentialities.

56. There is no meaning to life except the meaning man gives to his life by the unfolding of his powers.

57. 'Every human life involves an unfathomable mystery, for man is the riddle of the universe, and the riddle of man is his endowment with personal capacities.'

58. One of the greatest discoveries a man makes, one of his great surprises, is to find he can do what he was afraid he couldn't do.

59. What you see in living systems, and in genetic systems, is that the genes are already there, having arisen in the course of time, and when they are needed they become activated. If they had to be invented, the time would be too late. By the same token, I think that the people who are needed to help guide the future already exist. They simply need to recognize this in themselves, react to the opportunities that prevail, and also be valued and be encouraged. It's that very large, and as yet amorphous, rung that is of interest to me. I hope to articulate this, and see to what extent it makes sense to others as well.

60. Although men are accused of not knowing their own weakness, yet perhaps as few know their own strength. It is in men as in soils, where sometimes there is a vein of gold, which the owner knows not of.

61. I must work on my mind. For now I realise: Everyone of us has a heaven inside.

62. This loving person is a person who abhors waste - waste of time, waste of human potential. How much time we waste. As if we were going to live forever.

63. If we are to achieve a richer culture, rich in contrasting values, we must recognize the whole gamut of human potentialities, and so weave a less arbitrary social fabric, one in which each diverse human gift will find a fitting place.

64. One only gets to the top rung of the ladder by steadily climbing up one at a time, and suddenly all sorts of powers, all sorts of abilities which you thought never belonged to you- suddenly become within your own possibility and you think, 'Well, I'll have a go, too.'

65. When we come to it We, this people, on this wayward, floating body Created on this earth, of this earth Have the power to fashion for this earth A climate where every man and every woman Can live freely without sanctimonious piety And without crippling fear When we come to it We must confess that we are the possible We are the miraculous, the true wonders of this world That is when, and only when We come to it.

66. Talent is like electricity. We don't understand electricity. We use it. You can plug into it and light up a lamp, keep a heart pump going, light a cathedral, or you can electrocute a person with it.

67. I seek a form that my style cannot discover, a bud of thought that wants to be a rose.

68. The great law of culture is: Let each become all that he was created capable of being.

69. Full many a gem of purest ray serene, The dark unfathomed caves of ocean bear: Full many a flower is born to blush unseen, And waste its sweetness on the desert air.

70. Buddy Holly was twenty-two. Think of what he might have gone on to achieve. I mean, if Beethoven had been killed in a plane crash at twenty-two, the history of music would have been very different. As would the history of aviation, of course.

71. Most people live, whether physically, intellectually or morally, in a very restricted circle of their potential being. They make use of a very small portion of their possible consciousness, and of their soul's resources in general, much like a man who, out of his whole bodily organism, should get into a habit of using and moving only his little finger. Great emergencies and crises show us how much greater our vital resources are than we had supposed.

72. We feel that we are greater than we know.

73. There is a great difference between one idler and another idler. There is someone who is an idler out of laziness and lack of character, owing to the baseness of his nature. If you like, you may take me for one of those. Then there is the other kind of idler, the idler despite himself, who is inwardly consumed by a great longing for action who does nothing because his hands are tied, because he is, so to speak, imprisoned somewhere, because he lacks what he needs to be productive, because disastrous circumstances have brought him forcibly to this end. Such a one does not always know what he can do, but he nevertheless instinctively feels, I am good for something! My existence is not without reason! I know that I could be a quite a different person! How can I be of use, how can I be of service? There is something inside me, but what can it be? He is quite another idler. If you like you may take me for one of those.

74. The difference between what we do and what we are capable of doing would suffice to solve most of the world's problem.*

75. But such a tide as moving seems asleep, Too full for sound and foam, When that which drew from out the boundless deep Turns again home.

76. You don't have to be a fantastic hero to do certain things - to compete. You can be just an ordinary chap, sufficiently motivated to reach challenging goals. The intense effort, the giving of everything you've got, is a very pleasant bonus.

77. Every man should be capable of all ideas and I understand that in the future this will be the case.

78. However far modern science and technics have fallen short of their inherent possibilities, they have taught mankind at least one lesson: Nothing is impossible.

79. Leisure is the exultation of the possible.

80. When you are inspired by some great purpose, some extraordinary project, all your thoughts break their bonds: Your mind transcends limitations, your consciousness expands in every direction, and you find yourself in a new, great, and wonderful world. Dormant forces, faculties and talents become alive, and your discover yourself to be a greater person by far than you ever dreamed yourself to be.

81. That everything great that has ever happened to humanity since the beginning, has begun with a single thought in someone's mind and if anyone of us is capable of such a great thought then all of us has the same capacity, capability, because we are all the same.

82. A man is a god in ruins.

83. Once we overcome our fear of being tiny, we find ourselves on the threshold of a vast and awesome Universe that utterly dwarfs - in time, in space, and in potential - the tidy anthropocentric proscenium of our ancestors. We gaze across billions of light-years of space to view the Universe shortly after the Big Bang, and plumb the fine structure of matter. We peer down into the core of our planet, and the blazing interior of our star. We read the genetic language in which is written the diverse skills and propensities of every being on Earth. We uncover hidden chapters in the record of our origins, and with some anguish better understand our nature and prospects. We invent and refine agriculture, without which almost all of us would starve to death. We create medicines and vaccines that save the lives of billions. We communicate at the speed of light, and whip around the Earth in an hour and a half. We have sent dozens of ships to more than seventy worlds, and four spacecraft to the stars. We are right to rejoice in our accomplishments, to be proud that our species has been able to see so far, and to judge our merit in part by the very science that has so deflated our pretensions.

84. Few men during their lifetime come anywhere near exhausting the resources dwelling within them. There are deep wells of strength that are never used. ~ CH. 7

85. Education is the manifestation of perfection present already in man

86. I believed from the beginning of remembered experience that I was somebody with an incalculable potential for enlargement, somebody who both knew and could find out, upon whom demands could be made with the expectation of having them fulfilled. I felt at the same time, and pretty much constantly, that I was nothing in relation to Enormity, the Unknown, and the Unknowable. I was too vulnerable, too lacking in power, a thing of subtle reality, liable to be blown away without a moment's warning, a migrant with no meaning, no guide, no counsel, an entity in continuous transition, a growing thing whose stages of growth always went unnoticed, a fluid and flawed thing. Thus, there could be no extreme vanity in my recognition of myself, if in fact there could be any at all. I did frequently rejoice in the recognition, but I may have gotten that from some of the Protestant hymns I had heard, and knew, and had sung, such as Joy to the World. The simple fact was that if the song wasn't about me, I couldn't see how it could possibly be about anybody else, including the one I knew it was supposed to be about, and good luck to him, too.

87. This instrument can teach, it can illuminate; yes, and it can even inspire. But it can do so only to the extent that humans are determined to use it to those ends. Otherwise it is merely wires and lights in a box. There is a great and perhaps decisive battle to be fought against ignorance, intolerance and indifference. This weapon of television could be useful. Stonewall Jackson, who knew something about the use of weapons, is reported to have said, 'When war comes, you must draw the sword and throw away the scabbard.' The trouble with television is that it is rusting in the scabbard during a battle for survival.

88. We shall never entirely comprehend ourselves, but we will and can do much more than comprehend ourselves.

89. A youth to whom was given So much of earth-so much of heaven, And such impetuous blood.

90. The dreamer sometimes falls into the doldrums, but is said to emerge from them again. And the absent-minded person also makes up for it with bouts of perspicacity. Sometimes he is a person whose right to exist has a justification that is not always immediately obvious to you, or more usually, you may absent-mindedly allow it to slip from your mind. Someone who has been wandering about for a long time, tossed to and fro on a stormy sea, will in the end reach his destination. Someone who has seemed to be good for nothing, unable to fill any job, any appointment, will find one in the end and, energetic and capable, will prove himself quite different from what he seemed at first.

91. If a man is not bound down, he is sure to succeed.

92. I believe that this team has a great future, and I'm sure we will show it next; if not this season.

93. There's no doubt in my mind that if Bruce Lee had gone into pro boxing, he could easily have ranked in the top three in the lightweight division or junior-welterweight division.

94. Mankind: 'In all known time there has never been a greater monster or miracle than the human being.'

95. Action: 'It is better to have a fair intellect that is well used than a powerful one that is idle.'

96. In each of us are places where we have never gone. Only by pressing the limits do you ever find them.

97. Il faut avoir une haute idee, non pas de ce qu'on fait, mais de ce qu'on pourra faire un jour; sans quoi ce n'est pas la peine de travailler.

98. We are young And we are friends of time.

99. I believe that we are all sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be.

100. If any individual of our time can be said to have changed the world, Elvis Presley is the one. In his wake more than music is different. Nothing and no one looks or sounds the same. His music was the most liberating event of our era because it taught us new possibilities of feeling and perception, new modes of action and appearance, and because it reminded us not only of his greatness, but of our own potential.