“Deciding whether or not to trust a person is like deciding whether or not to climb a tree because you might get a wonderful view from the highest branch or you might simply get covered in sap and for this reason many people choose to spend their time alone and indoors where it is harder to get a splinter.”

“You get to decide where your time goes. You can either spend it moving forward, or you can spend it putting out fires. You decide. And if you don't decide, others will decide for you.”

“Destiny might drop you off somewhere but it’s your job to get where you’re going, to decide your own ending…”

“If you're 50 years old or younger, give every book about 50 pages before you decide to commit yourself to reading it, or give it up.If you're over 50, which is when time gets shorter, subtract your age from 100 - the result is the number of pages you should read before deciding whether or not to quit. If you're 100 or over you get to judge the book by its cover, despite the dangers in doing so.”

“You don't get to decide what's to big a risk for me. You don't decide what's good for me and what isn't. That's my decision, Dylan. If you care about me so much, then how dare you do this all by yourself? I choose not to destroy my present because of the risk of a future that might or might not happen.You should think about that.”

“The thing about the Lexington International Bank ladder was that it was very long, and climbing it was very exhausting, and so Andrew Brown didn't have a lot of time to think about whether he really wanted to get to the top of it—and besides, since so many other people were climbing too, the view from the top must be worth it.So he kept going. He worked hard. He put his heart and mind and soul into it. There was an opening for a position half a rung higher than he already was. With a promotion, he might get two hours a week of a secretary's time. He'd go to more important meetings, with more senior people, and have the opportunity to impress them, and if he did he might be promoted again and then... well, of course eventually he'd be running the whole office. It's important to have a dream: otherwise you might notice where you really are.”