Quotes About Achievement

You don't know what would have happened if I hadn't pushed. Nobody knows. I did it the way I did it, and it worked. Above all, it worked.

Famous at high school is like being employee of the month at the sanitation department.

Let me tell you about Ender. He's all about beating the other guys. Not just winning-he has to beat the other guy into the ground or he isn't happy.

An interesting side effect of the battle was that Ender emerged at the top of the soldier efficiency list. Since he hadn't fired a shot, he had a perfect record on shooting—no misses at all. And since he had never been eliminated or disabled, his percentage there was excellent. No one else came close. It made a lot of boys laugh, and others were angry, but on the prized efficiency list, Ender was now the leader.

I think we've taken a step toward something truly magnificent. But humankind almost never forgives true greatness.

That's the problem with winning right from the start, though Ender. You lose friends.

Like running the hurdles. Work so hard, jump over every one, fast, high enough but no higher, because you can't afford to hang in the air. And then, when the race is over, you're dripping with sweat, either they beat you or you beat them ... and then a couple of guys come out and move the hurdles out of the way. Turns out they were nothing. All that work to jump over them, but now they're gone.

As a species, we have evolved to survive. And the way we do it is by straining and straining and, at last, every few generations, giving birth to genius. The one who invents the wheel. And light. And flight. The one who builds a city, a nation, an empire.

Focus too closely on the goal you haven't accomplished, and you'll fail to notice the victories you achieve along the way.

What I understand now is this: There is no harder job than parenting. There is no human relationship with such potential for great achievement and awful destructiveness, and despite all the experts who write about it, no one has the slightest idea whether any decision will be right or best or even not-horrible for any particular child. It is a job that simply cannot be done right.

Not at all,' said Dom Cristão. 'I think we've taken a step toward something truly magnificent. But humankind almost never forgives true greatness.

I didn't know how you'd get us out of that last one. But you did. You were good.

There are miracles even reactivity can't pull off, Ender

Take what pleasure you can in the interstices of your work, but your work is first, learning is first, winning is everything because without it there is nothing.

Sólo hay una cosa que hará que dejen de odiarte. Y esa cosa es ser tan bueno en todo lo que hagas que no puedan ignorarte. Les he dicho que eres el mejor. ¡Mejor que lo seas!

Miro, I'm so sorry. I always felt such pity for you humans because you could only think of one thing at a time and your memories were so imperfect and . . . now I realize that just getting through the day without killing somebody can be an achievement.

Maybe not a home. Maybe that won't come until later. But I believe it will come, Mar. With your brains in this operation, how could it not?" Edimar

talent. Potential. Great potential

There's only one thing that will make them stop hating you. And that's being so good at what you do that they can't ignore you

My job isn't to be friends. My job is to produce the best soldiers in the world. In the whole history of the world. We need a Napoleon. An Alexander. Except that Napoleon lost in the end, and Alexander flamed out and died young. We need a Julius Caesar, except that he made himself dictator, and died for it. My job is to produce such a creature, and all the men and women he'll need to help him. Nowhere in that does it say I have to make friends with children.

You consider everything impossible unless you want it, and then it already belongs to you, in which case anyone who stands in your way is a thief.

self-gratulation

On the contrary—there can be no greater honor to a parent than to have a child who is greater.

We suddenly find ourselves afflicted with peace, you see. Always a disaster for those whose careers have not reached their natural apex.