Quotes from Shiv Khera

Be courteous to all, but intimate with a few and let those few be well tried before you give them your confidence.

The habit of procrastination fatigues you more than the effort it takes to do the task.

Learn to Like the Things That Need to be Done

Learning is a lot like eating. It is not how much we eat that matters, but what really matters is how much we digest.

People can be your biggest asset or your biggest liability.

Opportunity is always under our feet. We don't have to go anywhere. All we need to do is recognize it. When people don't know how to recognize opportunity, they complain of noise when it knocks. The same opportunity never knocks twice. The next one may be better or worse, but it is never the same one.

Striving for perfection is neurotic; striving for excellence is progress. Excellence is continuous improvement. There is nothing that cannot be done better or improved the next time.

Destiny is not a matter of chance, it is a matter of choice; it is not a thing to be waited for, it is a thing to be achieved. – William Jennings Bryan

One day a partially deaf four years old child came home with a note in his pocket from his teacher, "Your Tommy is too stupid to learn, get him out of school." His mother read the note and answered, "My Tommy is not too stupid to learn, I will teach him myself." And that Tommy grew up to be the great Thomas Edison. Thomas Edison had only three months of formal schooling.

Culture in any place always goes top down, never bottom up. We need to step back and look at what kind of environment we have created for ourselves and those around us. It is tough to expect positive behavior in a negative environment. Where lawlessness becomes the law, honest citizens become cheats, crooks and thieves.

Halfhearted effort does not produce half results; it produces no results.

Success is no mystery, but simply the result of consistently applying some basic principles. The reverse is just as true: Failure is simply a result of making a few mistakes repeatedly. All of this might sound too simplistic, but the fact is that most truths are very simple. I'm not saying they are easy, but they certainly are simple.

We are drowning in information but starving for knowledge and wisdom. Education ought to teach us not only how to make a living but also how to live.

I don't know the key to success, but the key to failure is trying to please everybody. – Bill Cosby Success does not mean being liked and accepted by everyone. There are some groups I would not want to be accepted by, out of choice. I would rather be criticised by fools than appreciated by cheats and crooks. I see success as a manifestation of good luck that results from aspiration, inspiration and perspiration—generally in that sequence.

The question is, do we have to be ten times smarter than the competition? Absolutely not. All we need is the nose and the rewards are ten times bigger. It's a lot easier to improve one per cent in hundred different areas than to improve hundred per cent in any one area. That is the winning edge!

This life is a one-way street.

We are free till we make choices. After that, the choice controls us and we have no more choice.

If a child goes the wrong way, it is not the child who is to be blamed; it is the parents who are responsible.

Research has shown that it takes 31 days of conscious effort to make or break a habit. That means, if one practices something consistently for 31 days, on the 32nd day it does become a habit. Information has been internalised into behavioural change, which is called transformation.

My first objective is to invest, and if I have anything spare, then I spend.

We don't have business problems we have people problems. When we take care of our people problems, most of our business problems are automatically resolved

Have a vision. It is the ability to see the invisible. If you can see the invisible, you can achieve the impossible.

Education turns an empty mind into an open mind. It turns information into behavioural transformation

The erosion of extended family concept and losing out on values are the two things that are primarily responsible for the growing mismatch in the parent-child relationship.