Something greater than wealth, grander even than fame — that manhood, character, stand for success, and that nothing else really does.
Interpretation
True success is defined by a person's character and integrity, more than by wealth or fame.
Orison Swett Marden emphasizes that the essence of success lies not in material wealth or public recognition, but in the strength of one's character and the values one upholds. He suggests that true achievement stems from one's manhood and moral standing, which are far more significant in defining a successful life than external accolades.
In practice
In a motivational speech to encourage young adults to prioritize their character over material success.
Opportunity is latent in the very foundation of human society. Opportunity is everywhere about us. But the preparation to seize upon the opportunity, and to make the most of it, is to be made by every one for himself ... he will be self-made or never made.
We lift ourselves by our thought, we climb upon our vision of ourselves. If you want to enlarge your life, you must first enlarge your thought of it and of yourself. Hold the ideal of yourself as you long to be, always, everywhere - your ideal of what you long to attain - the ideal of health, efficiency, success.
You know from past experiences that whenever you have been driven to the wall, or thought you were, you have extricated yourself in a way which you never would have dreamed possible had you not been put to the test. The trouble is that in your everyday life you don't go deep enough to tap the divine mind within you.
You cannot measure a man by his failures. You must know what use he makes of them. What did they mean to him. What did he get out of them.
Many a man has finally succeeded only because he has failed after repeated efforts. If he had never met defeat he would never have known any great victory.
If our dreams are sincere desires to achieve, not mere pipe-dreams, there is something deep within ourselves which comes out to meet them and helps to make them realities.
By far, the best moment of my big league career was when I caught the last out at the World Series.
It takes sacrifice as well as talent.
The road to success is dotted with many tempting parking spaces.
We don't get paid for activity, just for being right. As to how long we'll wait, we'll wait indefinitely.
There's nothing wrong with raising venture capital. Many lean startups are ambitious and are able to deploy large amounts of capital. What differentiates them is their disciplined approach to determining when to spend money: after the fundamental elements of the business model have been empirically validated.
There's a certain sense of ownership that the fans have over you....The thing is, it's all good. You just have to get used to it. If somebody comes up to you while you're eating dinner or something, it's kind of like, 'Well, I asked for it.' It's much better than the alternative-nobody caring and nobody buying your music. The point is to try to just realize that these people are really excited, and that's a good thing. You want them to be that way.
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