Most people are perpetually locked in the present. Their decisions are overly influenced by the most immediate event; they easily become emotional and ascribe greater significance to a problem than it should have in reality.

Grand strategy is the art of looking beyond the present battle and calculating ahead. Focus on your ultimate goal and plot to reach it.

The pyramid would start at the bottom: you don't know who you are or what you're intended to do in life. And so, the X factor - the ingredient that will make you powerful, that will make you successful is your energy and drive and your tenacity. If you've got that, there's nothing in the world that's going to stop you.

Nothing is given to you.

The point of the adversity is to toughen your mind so that you can handle difficult circumstances in life. Your mind, toughen just like you toughen your body. So it really depends on what you need. It really depends on the individual.

Never waste valuable time, or mental peace of mind, on the affairs of others—that is too high a price to pay.

Remember: The best deceivers do everything they can to cloak their roguish qualities. They cultivate an air of honesty in one area to disguise their dishonesty in others. Honesty is merely another decoy in their arsenal of weapons.