I've zeroed in on what you would call action and excellence... Everybody who does anything to try to succeed has to give the best of themselves, and art has made me pull the best out of myself.
Having played in the league during the '80s, '90s, and the new millennium (old, I know), I had the chance to see firsthand how the best point guards of our time played the game.
I always wanted to be an actress, but I was embarrassed to say so, and somehow I found myself in the dance track. I'm very competitive, and I wanted to be the best in that field, too, although it didn't really speak to me.
Talent is a complex subject: from the education our kids get in kindergarten and beyond to the re-skilling of some parts of the workforce; from the opportunities available for research to how we attract the best people to work in our companies.
Five of my father's seven siblings made their bones as engineers or technologists, and some of his best buddies - David Woods, Elijah Kent, Weldon Staton - carved out successful engineering careers at Langley.
I'm not one of those people that's like, 'I'm about to serve on this Whitney Houston song at like 2 A.M.' No. Karaoke? I'm just like, 'Live your best life.' We're not worried about those notes, we just living.
If I've gained weight, it's OK. This is life; this is my reality. The weight goes up, it goes down, my skin's not looking great, or whatever it is: it's part of life. I do - I feel pressure to look my best, but I think I do that in just my personal life anyway.
Inarritu's own nomination for Best Director for 'Babel' was the first such honor for a Mexican director.
So the best way to understand poetry, which is made by men, is to imitate, and that goes back to making work as a kind of doorway into new work, as opposed to making work as a mirror of the old work.
Every rookie that thought they was good, I went at them to make sure they knew I was the best point guard in the league, and they had to go through me. That's just the way I was.
I was always at my best when I was learning, when I was curious. When I had yet to see past the next horizon.
Everyone that I'm friends with does not have the same party standing. For the most part, my friends are Democrats, but not everyone is, so a lot of times, we just have candid conversations. Sometimes that's the best way that we can educate each other and come to our own decisions about bills and candidates and policies.
In the best writers, the outward-reaching interest in the 'found subject' leads back at a hairpin to some uncomfortable inner recognition that the writer has journeyed very far to see; he comes home half-dead.
Every day, the humane societies execute thousands of dogs who tried all their lives to do their very best by their owners. These dogs are killed not because they are bad but because they are inconvenient. So as we need God more than he needs us, dogs need us more than we need them, and they know it.