Spencer W. Kimball Quotes

All cities are impressive in their way, because they represent the aspiration of men to lead a common life; those people who wish to live agreeable lives, and in constant intercourse with one another, will build a city as beautiful as Paris.

Getting people to like you is merely the other side of liking them.

L.A. can be a tough city, very lonely. A lot of people move here to pursue a dream, and that's understandable. But sometimes it's hard to find genuine friends.

I feel like New Yorkers get stereotyped as, but I feel like they are the most friendly. I feel like you get to know people in a day, where in L.A., I am isolated in my car because I never get to talk to people as much.

New York was the only city I knew in the world where you could be desperately lonely at nine in the morning, crossing the street for a bagel at Gristede's, and find that seven hours later you were drinking Irish coffee at P.J. Clarke's with all the friends you had inherited along the way.

I had a good friend in New York City.

If you make it plain you like people, it's hard for them to resist liking you back.

Try leaving a trail of little sparks of gratitude on your daily trips. You will be surprised how they will set small flames of friendship that will be rose beacons on your next visit.

To sit on the front steps — whether it's a veranda in a small town or a concrete stoop in a big city — and to talk to our neighborhoods is infinitely more important than to huddle on the living-room lounger and watch a make-believe world in not-quite living color.

Even when I lived in Chicago and I didn't have any family there, I would just go like I would be a guest and have dinner with a bunch of friends and do potluck or something. So I think that's it, just finding people that you love that love you and hang out with them.

Do not think little of any good deed, even if it is just greeting your brother with a smile.

I believe in sending a lot of letters and notes to friends.

No, the only way to know what people think is to watch what they do, not what they say. Do they come back for more? Do you cause them to change their behavior? Can you make them smile?

I met Cory Bernardi in Holland. I believe it might be more difficult for him to meet me now. I think he doesn't intend to do that. I understand that this is politics. The friend from yesterday can have an argument not to see you tomorrow. It's sad but true.

Yet friendship, I believe, is essential to intellectuals. It is probably the growth hormone the mind requires as it begins its activity of producing and exchanging ideas. You can date the evolving life of a mind, like the age of a tree, by the rings of friendship formed by the expanding central trunk. In the course of my history, not love or marriage so much as friendship has promoted growth.

If you care for people around you, you must make yourself into a person they enjoy being with.

If you have only one smile in you, give it to the people you love. Don't be surly at home, then go out in the street and start grinning 'Good morning' at total strangers.

I'll come around to see you once in a while, or if I ever need a reason to smile, and spend the night if you think I should.

I’m not a scholar or a psychologist, so I don’t really think about why. But I do think about what it means to sing to and with people, to offer music to them, and to ask them to spend time with me.

I think at its best, sport does bring us together.

There are certain relationships I think I'm great at: I'm the world's greatest daughter. I'm a great relative. I believe I'm a great friend.

I used to be very self-conscious. I used to wish I was pretty. My cousin Georgia always taught me that if you smile, people will like you. Sometimes people will say something you don't like, and you get angry a bit, but you just smile. You let it go by, even if you really would like to choke 'em. By smiling, I think I've made more friends than if I was the other way.

Each day will be triumphant only when your smiles bring forth smiles from others.

eBay had two main things that really spoke to me. It enabled individuals to do things that they could not have done without the Web. The second thing was what Pierre said: "People have met their best friends on eBay. What this has enabled is truly online community."

We often talk too much & listen too little. The surer route to winning a friend isn't to convince them that you're right, but that you care what they think.