Po Bronson Quotes

But I'd rather help than watch. I'd rather have a heart than a mind. I'd rather expose too much than too little. I'd rather say hello to strangers than be afraid of them. I would rather know all this about myself than have more money than I need. I'd rather have something to love than a way to impress you.

We've all lost something along the way.

I can push myself and you can push yourself, but competing, we push ourselves a little farther and we bring out our best even if one of us wins and one of us loses. The virtue of competition is that we both get better, not that one does. And that means we have great respect for the opponents, whether we win or whether we lose.

Write first. Worry about getting an agent or publisher later. Write it first. Prove you can do it and then others will listen. Tons of people talk about books they want to write. Far fewer are those who actually complete that vision. Don’t be a talker.

Books have been my classroom and my confidant. Books have widened my horizons. Books have comforted me in my hardest times. Books have changed my life.

If you want to give yourself a fair chance to succeed, never expect too much too soon

I learned that it was in hard times that people usually changed the course of their life; in good times, they frequently only talked about change. Hard times forced them to overcome the doubts that normally gave them pause.It surprised me how often we hold ourselves back until we have no choice.

Success is not measured by bestseller lists. Certain types of great books sell very well; other types of great books don’t sell a lot. But they’re both great.

The tougher the times, the more clarity you gain about the difference between what really matters and what you only pretend to care about.

I think when a reader reads a whole book - which takes six to ten hours - that’s kind of a gift to the author. The gift of close, undivided attention. To who else do we listen so closely for eight straight hours? And when readers give that gift to me, I’m grateful for it.

Women are very good at judging the risk and don't want to waste time with losing. So not that they're not as competitive, and certainly once they're in the race they're every bit as competitive, but they make that choice to compete in a more calculated way sensitive to the odds.

Children key off their parents’ reaction more than the argument or physical discipline itself.

‎It's not easy / It's not supposed to be easy / Most people make mistakes / Most people have to learn the hardest lessons more than once.

Love that has been tested is far more awe-inspiring than love that has never known anything but bliss.

You know, kids need to feel like they're not being drowned out by superior competitors and they'll make that connection that, with a little more effort, I can compete. I can be competitive. I can be successful here with a little more effort and application and they learn that themselves. It's not just us telling them how hard you work matters. They need to feel it on their own.

Testosterone is the hormone of collaboration and competition that, whenever we compete on a team, we collaborate with our teammates. And most of us in our daily life, to the extent that we have to compete with the rat race in the world out there, we're collaborating with other people at the same time. The two are hand in hand.

A conventional ‘success’ story is one where, with each next, the protagonist has more money, more respect, and more possessions. I’d like to suggest an alternative ‘success’ story – one where, with each next, the protagonist is closer to finding that spot where he’s no longer held back by his heart, and he explodes with talent, and his character blossoms, and the gift he has to offer the world is apparent.

Curiosity is a raw and genuine sign from deep inside our tangled psyches, and we'd do well to follow the direction it points us in.

A piece of writing has to seduce the reader; it has to suspend disbelief and earn the reader's trust.

Make sure your characters are worth spending ten hours with. That’s how long it takes to read a book. Reading a book is like being trapped in a room for ten hours with those characters. Think of your main characters as dinner guests. Would your friends want to spend ten hours with the characters you’ve created? Your characters can be loveable, or they can be evil, but they’d better be compelling. If not, your reader will be bored and leave.

Good competitive skills means not just to compete hard, but to selectively compete, to harness your energy for the things that matter and, in some cases, to just realize it doesn't matter whether I win or lose here at all.

Failure is hard, but success is far more dangerous. If you're successful at the wrong thing, the mix of praise and money and opportunity can lock you in forever.

There was a culture that came out of the self-esteem movement which was don't anybody keep track of the goals. The kids keep track, but nobody keep track of the goals because we don't want the kids to have the experience of losing. And in depriving them losing, thinking it scarred them to lose, we made losing so taboo, so unspeakable, that we instead made losing more scary to kids, not less scary.

Who you are is more important than what you do. The goal is to bring what you do in alignment with who you are, so you don’t end up being someone you don’t want to be.

A surgeon might want to be the best surgeon in Manhattan, but out on Long Island on the weekend, not care at all how he is on the tennis courts or on the Ping-Pong table. Even turning your competitiveness off when it's appropriate, when other people are not being competitive, to recognize that social circumstance and, you know, cool it. That's a crucial competitive skill.

The important thing to know about playing to win and playing not to lose is that there are actually different neural networks that are being used. It's not very easy to do both at the same time and, if you are trying to have a playing to win mentality, you're going for it, there's some things that trip you up or trigger the wrong neural network. If you start worrying about your mistakes all of a sudden, if you get too focused on the facts and the details, these are going to shift your neural networks and sort of screw up your strategy.

Allow for many paths to your goal. Do not fixate on one path, because then you are likely to give up when that path is blocked.

We all make mistakes, but we need to learn from them and move on. You can own a mistake, or the mistake will own you.

I used to want to change the world. Now I'm open to letting it change me.

The virtue of losing is we get used to the fact that competing and to lose doesn't kill you. It just makes you stronger. It just helps you get used to it.

There is nothing more genuine than breaking away from the chorus to learn the sound of your own voice.

I used to use business to make money. But I've learned that business is a tool. You can use it to support what you believe in.

Interests evolve into hobbies or volunteer work, which grow into passions. It takes time, more time than anyone imagines.

As I get older, I've learned to listen to people rather than accuse them of things.