As you interact with others, remember this: anytime a person's response is larger than the issue at hand, the response is almost always about something else.

Generally speaking, there are two kinds of learning: experience, which is gained from your own mistakes, and wisdom, which is learned from the mistakes of others.

I say this in the book [Today Matters], we either spend our day repairing or preparing, and if I haven't taken good care of my today's, they accumulate. So all of a sudden today what I'm doing is I'm going back, I'm repairing bad relationships and wrong decisions, and I'm digging a hole. I'm not making any progress because I'm in a repairing mode, versus if I really make today count that prepares me for tomorrow. Tomorrow really will take care of itself if I do the right thing today.

Leaders who fail to lift others in the long run, fail to lift themselves.

The key to your success, to my success, to everyone's success is determined by our daily agenda. What you and I do every day is either making us or breaking us, we're either preparing or repairing. So when somebody says, 'John, I want to be a success. Where do I start?' I say, It's very simple. Start with today.

Successful people are willing to do things unsuccessful people will not do.

Usually the person who rises within an organization has a good attitude. The promotions did not give that individual an outstanding attitude, but an outstanding attitude resulted in promotions.