When we don't throw ourselves completely into it and we hold back our best efforts because of what happened in the past, we are letting the past decide the future.

You think your past defines you, and worse, you think that it is an unchangeable reality, when really, your perception of it changes as you do.

no podemos ser lo que recordamos,
ni nos atrevemos a pensar en lo que somos.

The illusion that we understand the past fosters overconfidence in our ability to predict the future.

Our ego tempts us into thinking we’re more than we are.

What limits individuals as well as nations is the inability to confront reality, to see things for what they are. As we grow older, we become more rooted in the past. Habit takes over. Something that has worked for us before becomes a doctrine, a shell to protect us from reality. Repetition replaces creativity.

No doubt our accepting what we are must always inhibit our being what we ought to be.

Our achievements are generally limited only by the beliefs we impose on ourselves.

We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be.

The danger lies in the possibility that we will not accept the person as he is but try to make him over according to our own ideas.

We are what we imagine ourselves to be.

What we like to think of ourselves and what we really are rarely have much in common....

Belief in limits creates limited people

The bounds of human possibility are not as confining as we think they are; they are made to seem to be tight by our weaknesses, our vices, our prejudices that confine them.