The minute you get away from fundamentals—whether its proper technique, work ethic or mental preparation—the bottom can fall out of your game, your schoolwork, your job, whatever you're doing.
There are a million excuses for not paying the price.
- Topic: Accountability, Commitment, Dedication, Work
- Location: Hawaii, Maui
- Photo: Jeffrey Benjamin
More Quotes from Michael Jordan
Obstacles don’t have to stop you. If you run into a wall, don’t turn around and give up. Figure out how to climb it, go through it, or work around it.
You have competition every day because you set such high standards for yourself that you have to go out every day and live up to that.
When I was playing before I retired, I never really understood the appreciation and respect that people gave me. People had treated me like a god or something, and that was very embarrassing.
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The man who complains about the way the ball bounces is likely the one who dropped it.
Those who enjoy responsibility usually get it; those who merely enjoy exercising authority usually lose it.
I am a true laborer: I earn that I eat, get that I wear, owe no man hate, envy no man’s happiness, glad of other men’s good, content with my harm.
There are a thousand excuses for failure but never a good reason.
Work out your own salvation. Do not depend on others.
I was in darkness, but I took three steps and found myself in paradise. The first step was a good thought, the second, a good word; and the third, a good deed.
Hold yourself responsible for a higher standard than anybody else expects of you. Never excuse yourself. Never pity yourself. Be a hard master to yourself—and be lenient to everybody else.
The deepest sin against the human mind is to believe things without evidence.
If all our misfortunes were laid in one common heap, whence every one must take an equal portion, most people would be contented to take their own and depart.
The place to improve the world is first in one's own heart and head and hands.
The average person puts only 25% of his energy and ability into his work. The world takes off its hat to those who put in more than 50% of their capacity, and stands on its head for those few and far between souls who devote 100%.
I can't imagine a person becoming a success who doesn’t give this game of life everything he’s got.
I did not seek greatness. I only sought to fulfill my duties.
I hope someday to have so much of what the world calls success, that people will ask me, “What’s your secret?” and I will tell them, “I just get up again when I fall down.
Fourscore and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.
Obstacles don’t have to stop you. If you run into a wall, don’t turn around and give up. Figure out how to climb it, go through it, or work around it.
What this power is I cannot say; all I know is that it exists and it becomes available only when a man is in the state of mind in which he knows exactly what he wants and is fully determined not to quit until he finds it.
Football is like life—it requires perseverance, self-denial, hard work, sacrifice, dedication and respect for authority.
We overestimate the event and underestimate the process. Every fulfilled dream occurred because of dedication to a process.
Be happy with what you have while working for what you want.
Good business leaders create a vision, articulate the vision, passionately own the vision, and relentlessly drive it to completion.
No ascent is too steep for mortals. Heaven itself we seek in our folly.
Do not think that what is hard for you to master is humanly impossible; but if a thing is humanly possible, consider it to be within your reach.