George Stillman Hillard Quotes

Vaulting ambition, which o'erleaps itself And falls on the other side

I should have been smart enough to stay happy. But my ambition ruled my life.

Don't keep reaching for the stars because you'll just look like an idiot stretching that way for no reason.

The great proof of madness is the disproportion of one's designs to one's means.

It is by attempting to reach the top in a single leap that so much misery is produced in the world.

When I finally got there, to where I thought was the top, I wasn't doing what I was doing in the beginning. I was not happy.

Even people who despise ego and aspire to humility, who plan to be humble once they are successful, are worried that actually enacting those beliefs would sentence them to a life of obscurity or weakness or failure.

I am disproportionately ambitious.

I don't like setting goals - I don't like to be disappointed.

I'm not one to be satisfied.

No man leaves where he is and seeks a distant place unless he is in some respect a failure.

I was never a man of great ambition I cried too easily I didn't have a head for science Words often failed me While others prayed I only moved my lips

You don't have enough time to be both unhappy & mediocre. It's not just pointless; it's painful.

Still humping the American Dream

Whoever prematurely begins a work that is above his strength receives nothing, but only brings harm upon himself.

If America gave anybody anything it is ambition. Bad things would come out of it because some guys are in a hurry, but that doesn't mean they're evil or anything, it just means they fall into bad grace somehow.

Pride went before, ambition follows him.

We are never content with our lot.

In ways to greatness think on this, That slippery all ambition is

I do want more. I am not content with being happy. I was not made for it. It is not my destiny. My destiny is the opposite.

If you look around the world and I can tell you right now that the majority of the planet is focused on certainty and significance. And those two absolutely guarantee unhappiness. Because if you're driven by significance, it doesn't matter what you achieve, it's never enough.

I believe that Icarus was not failing as he fell, but just coming to the end of his triumph.

You might as well aim high. Why shoot yourself in the foot when you can shoot yourself in the head?

Anyone whose goal is 'something higher' must expect someday to suffer vertigo.

It's risky to talk about one's most secret dreams a bit too early.