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.

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

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.

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

We've all lost something along the way.

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.

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.