Not only do happy people endure pain better and take more health and safety precautions when threatened, but positive emotions undo negative emotions.

Optimism is a tool with a certain clear set of benefits: it fights depression, it promotes achievement and produces better health.

Habits of thinking need not be forever. One of the most significant findings in psychology in the last twenty years is that individuals choose the way they think.

To the scientists of the Renaissance, your critic was really your ally, helping you advance upon reality. Critics in science are not like drama critics, determining flops and successes. Criticism to scientists is just another means of finding out whether they're wrong, like running another experiment to see if it confirms or refutes a theory. Along with the advocacy principle of the courtroom, It is one of the best ways human beings have evolved to get closer to the truth.

What determines how much time and deliberate practice a child is willing to devote to achievement? Nothing less than her character.

The clearer the rules and the limits enforced by parents, the higher the child's self-esteem. The more freedom the child had, the lower his self-esteem.

Optimism generates hope...hope releases dreams...dreams set goals...enthusiasm follows