You can sing only what you are. You can paint only what you are. You must be what your experiences, your environment, and your heredity have made you. For better or for worse, you must play your own little instrument in the orchestra of life.

First ask yourself: What is the worst that can happen? Then prepare to accept it. Then proceed to improve on the worst.

When you face a problem, solve it then and there if you have the facts necessary to make a decision. Don't keep putting off decisions.

Don't Criticize, Condemn, Or Complain.

When we hate our enemies, we are giving them power over us: power over our sleep, our appetites, our blood pressure, our health, and our happiness.

Suppose you had inherited the same body and temperament and mind that Al Capone had. Suppose you had had his environment and experiences. You would then be precisely what he was. . . . For it is those things - and only those things - that made him what he was. . . . You deserve very little credit for being what you are - and remember, the people who come to you irritated, bigoted, unreasoning, deserve very little discredit for being what they are.

By criticizing, we do not make lasting changes and often incur resentment.