Don’t ask for an easier life;
ask to be a stronger person.
There is only one corner of the universe
you can be certain of improving,
and that’s your own self.
The mind is not a vessel to be filled
but a fire to be kindled.
Simply pushing harder
within the old boundaries
will not do.
Experience is not what happens to you;
it’s what you do with what happens to you.
Don’t bother just to be better
than your contemporaries or predecessors.
Try to be better than yourself.
There is nothing noble
in being superior to your fellow men,
true nobility lies in being superior
to your former self.
You must learn day by day,
year by year to broaden your horizon.
The more things you love,
the more you are interested in,
the more you enjoy,
the more you are indignant about,
the more you have left
when anything happens.
Try to keep your soul young
and quivering right up to old age,
and to imagine right up to the brink
of death that life is only beginning.
I think that is the only way
to keep adding to one’s talent,
and one’s inner happiness.
No man is capable of self-improvement
if he sees no other model but himself.