John Wooden Quotes

What a leader learns after you've learned it all counts most of all.

Class is an intangible quality which commands, rather than demands, the respect of others.

If we, as coaches, aren't teachers, we are nothing

I'm not going to say I was opposed to the Vietnam War. I'm going to say I'm opposed to war. But I'm also opposed to protests that deny other people their rights.

There is nothing stronger than gentleness.

Goals should be difficult to achieve because those achieved with little effort are seldom appreciated, give little personal satisfaction, and are often not very worthwhile. There is a price to be paid for achieving anything of significance.

A Dominican monk, Father Henri Didon, used it as a watchword for his pupils in sports at Arcueil College in Paris. Baron Pierre De Coubertin, founder of the modern Olympics, made it the Olympic Games ideal adopted at the Antwerp Games in 1920. I never mentioned winning to my players. I mentioned constantly that all I wanted them to do was the best they could. If they're good enough, the score will be to their liking; if they're not, it won't be but that's nothing to hang their head about. Sometimes the other fellow is just better than you are.

The person who is afraid to risk failure seldom has to face success. I expected my players to make mistakes, as long as they were mistakes of commission. A mistake of commission happens when you are doing what should be done but don't get the results you want.

No individual should take the blame for a loss, because no individual should get the credit for a victory.

When you give total effort - everything you have - the score can never make you a loser. And when you do less, it can't somehow magically turn you into a winner.

Talent is God given. Be humble. Fame is man-given. Be grateful. Conceit is self-given. Be careful.

You will never outperform your inner circle.

With the experience to judge, one need not pre-judge.

I am not a strategic coach; I am a practice coach.

If pursuing material things becomes your only goal, you will fail in so many ways. Besides, in time all material things go away.

An effective leader develops the ability to correctly identify the pertinent detail or details - incidentals in a market, industry or sport that might create an incremental advantage.

Every person under your supervision is different. They're all different. They're identical in most ways, but not in all ways. You have to study and analyze every individual under your supervision and try to work with them in a way that will be most productive.

Failure is not the crime. Low aim is.

Enthusiasm brushes off upon those with whom you come in contact.

There are little details in everything you do, and if you get away from any one of the little details, you're not teaching the thing as a whole. For it is little things which, together, make the whole. This, I think, is extremely important.

You never want to confuse activity with accomplishment.

When you see a successful individual, a champion, you can be very sure that you are looking at an individual who pays great attention to the perfection of minor details.

Stay the course. When thwarted try again; harder; smarter. Persevere relentlessly.

Promise yourself to make all your friends know there is something in them that is special and that you value.

Joy makes the longest journey too short.

How many of us have conflicts with someone else- and how many of us pray for that person? We have individuals with whom we are competitive, or whom we dislike or have a quarrel with; but very few of us have true enemies in the martial sense. And yet if Lincoln could pray fervently- and contemporary reports indicate he did- for the people who were opposing him, how much more can we do for someone we just find a little irritating?

Drink deeply from good books.

There is no great fun, satisfaction, or joy derived from doing something that's easy.

All that matters is the pressure you put on yourself. External pressures cause people to choke. While you can't control what happens to you, you can control how you react.

Being a role model is the most powerful form of educating. Youngsters need good models more than they need critics. It's one of a parent's greatest responsibilities and opportunities.

Be quick, but don't hurry.

Opponents are working very hard to defeat us. Let's not do it for them by defeating ourselves from within.

Effective leaders are, first and foremost, good teachers. We're in the education business.

Mix idealism with realism and add hard work. This will often bring much more than you could ever hope for.

I worry that business leaders are more interested in material gain than they are in having the patience to build up a strong organization, and a strong organization starts with caring for their people.

I wanted my players to always be searching, especially for truth. I wanted them to know what they believed and be able to defend it. Truth will always stand the test of scrutiny.

Kindness makes for much better teamwork.

You must be interested in finding the best way, not in having your own way.

It is difficult for young players to learn - because of the great emphasis on records - but, ideally, the joy and frustration of sport should come from the performance itself, not the score. While he is playing, the worst thing a player can think about in terms of concentration - and therefore of success - is losing. The next worst is winning.

Hustle makes up for many a mistake.

The purpose is to help, to prevent, to correct, to improve, rather than to punish. Criticism is not meant to punish, but rather to correct something that is preventing better results. The only goal is improvement.

In 1948, I began coaching basketball at UCLA. Each hour of practice we worked very hard. Each day we worked very hard. Each week we worked very hard. Each season we worked very hard. Four fourteen years we worked very hard and didn't win a national championship. However, a national championship was won in the fifteenth year. Another in the sixteenth. And eight more in the following ten years.

My philosophy of defense is to keep the pressure on an opponent until you get to his emotions

Whatever you do in life, surround yourself with smart people who'll argue with you.

Friendship is two-sided. It isn't a friend just because someone's doing something nice for you. That's a nice person. There's friendship when you do for each other. It's like marriage - it's two-sided.

A mentor must always guide, never push. It was my job to listen to them, offer my perspective, and encourage them to pursue the ideals they believed to be true.

I discovered early on that the player who learned the fundamentals of basketball is going to have a much better chance of succeeding and rising through the levels of competition than the player who was content to do things his own way. A player should be interested in learning why things are done a certain way. The reasons behind the teaching often go a long way to helping develop the skill.

Give me 100 percent. You can't make up for a poor effort today by giving 110 percent tomorrow. You don't have 110 percent. You only have 100 percent, and that's what I want from you right now.