Quotes from Ken Robinson

Many people go through their whole lives having no real sense of what their talents may be, or if they have any to speak of. Human resources are like natural resources; they're often buried deep. You have to go looking for them, they're not just lying around on the surface.

The first boy said, "I bring you gold." The second boy said, "I bring you myrrh." The third boy said, "Frank sent this.

Shakespeare's Hamlet: "There is nothing either good or bad but thinking makes it so.

As Joseph Campbell says, if you move in the direction of your passions, opportunities tend to appear that you couldn't have imagined and that weren't otherwise there.

In my experience, most people have a narrow view of intelligence, tending to think of it mainly in terms of academic ability. This is why so many people who are smart in other ways end up thinking that they're not smart at all. There are myths surrounding creativity as well.

Beneath the noisy surface of our minds, there are deep reserves of memory and association, of feelings and perceptions that process and record our life's experiences beyond our conscious awareness. So at times, creativity is a conscious effort. At others, we need to let our ideas ferment for a while and trust the deeper unconscious ruminations of our minds, over which we have less control. Sometimes when we do, the insights we've been searching for will come to us in a rush

Public education puts relentless pressure on its students to conform.

Many of the opportunities you have in your life are generated by the energy you create around you.

what people contribute to the world around them has everything to do with how they engage with the world within them.

When you're in your Element, your sense of time changes. If you're doing something that you love, an hour can feel like five minutes; if you are doing something that you do not, five minutes can feel like an hour.

Dr. Henry Lodge, coauthor of Younger Next Year, makes the point sharply. "It turns out," he says, "that 70% of American aging is not real aging. It's just decay. It's rot from the stuff that we do.

But it also taught me that it is easier to overcome people's judgments than to overcome our own self-judgment, the fear we internalize.

Uno de los enemigos de la creatividad y la innovación, en particular en relación con nuestro propio crecimiento, es el sentido común. El dramaturgo Bertolt Brecht dijo que cuando algo nos parece lo más evidente del mundo no hacemos ningún esfuerzo por entenderlo.

A strong will to be yourself is an indomitable force.

expert teachers fulfill four main roles: they engage, enable, expect, and empower. ENGAGE

He lost his sight and found a vision. He proved dramatically that it's not what happens to us that determines out lives—it's what we make of what happens.

the main role of a school's principal is not command and control, it is climate control.

My life, like yours, is a constant process of improvisation between my interests and personality on the one hand and circumstances and opportunities on the other.

The reason that neither he nor I could predict my life, any more than you can predict yours, is that life is not linear; it is organic.

Compassion is more than empathy; it is the living expression of the Golden Rule, to treat others as you would have them treat you. Compassion is the practice of empathy.

the emphasis on testing comes at the expense of teaching children how to employ their natural creativity and entrepreneurial talents—the precise talents that might insulate them against the unpredictability of the future in all parts of the world.

They have discovered their Element—the place where the things you love to do and the things that you are good at come together. The

If you want to change the world," he said, "who do you begin with, yourself or others? I believe if we begin with ourselves and do the things that we need to do and become the best person we can be, we have a much better chance of changing the world for the better.

The testing and educational support industry is booming. In 2013 it had combined revenues in the United States alone of $16.5 billion.10 To put that in context, the entire U.S. domestic cinema box office gross in 2013 was a little less than $11 billion11 and the National Football League is currently a $9 billion business.