Benjamin Banneker Quotes

I really related to that experience of being what we call the 'bridge generation' and always trying to navigate your more traditional growing-up experiences with wanting the latest Air Jordans or whatever it is: Trying to explain to your parents why, and they just, like, don't get it.

Doesn't every generation feel like the one that's coming up behind them doesn't know how to grow up? I'm not sure if we're progressively getting worse or if your perspective shifts.

All I can hope to do is instill great morality in my son and trust him along the way. The music he listens to or how he chooses to wear his hair doesn't define his moral compass, and if he wants to listen to country music and wear a cowboy hat too, that's fine.

Kids are really tougher than adults, but we tend to forget this in an affluent society that lets kids indulge themselves.

After 'X Factor,' I got loads of gigs. Then I went on holiday just after the tour and bought my Rolex in Tenerife. I needed to go through that phase - splurge and see that it's worthless - to get it out of my system.

There is an attitude that we should be able to have everything. No, you shouldn't be able to have anything. I'd like a helicopter, but I can't afford a helicopter, so I don't buy one. People are buying stuff they can't afford on credit. I bought my Ford hybrid with cash.

In my experience, those who make the biggest fuss about not spending much at Christmas are generally the ones who buy what they want and eat where they want 12 months a year.

I don't like expensive things... I just can't help looking in a magazine for the splurge and the save.

Giving kids whatever they ask for is disastrous parenting. There's no sense of something earned. I'm sorry, but when you're 12, you don't need a new cell phone every few months just because a new one comes out.

Shout-out to my dad - he influenced my style when I was 17.

I see my upbringing as a great success story. By disciplining me, my parents inculcated self-discipline. And by restricting my choices as a child, they gave me so many choices in my life as an adult. Because of what they did then, I get to do the work I love now.

My father, who educated his children on worldly principles, gave us much money, considering our age; not in order that we might spend it, but, as he said, to accustom us to possess money without spending it. The result was, that it led me and my brother into many sins.

When my daughter wanted a toy and I had to check the price of it before buying it - that was one of the worst feelings.

The easiest way to convince my kids that they don't really need something is to get it for them.

I had a mother that told me what to do all my life, and I traded that in for a wife. We got married two years out of high school which is not what you tell your kids to do, right?

I just have a problem with youth culture.

I'm not a frugal person, but I find it difficult to be extravagant materially.

Now, like a lot of parents, I have to fight with myself every time I leave the house not to buy my children more stuff.

I used to have Lamborghinis, Ferraris parked up outside the house - just parked there with no one driving them! Now I'm much wiser, and I only have one car that I drive. What's the point of having three cars just parked up when you don't need them?

I do feel kind of guilty sometimes 'cause, like, I could buy myself a $5,000 dress or a $3,000 dress, and I'm buying these things, but I'm knowing that my cousin need money for the rent. And then I gotta tell myself, 'Stop feeling guilty. You worked for this.'

I am not the sort of person who will wake up and go and buy myself a Ferrari.

We live in a culture built on debt, so we are encouraged to have no self control.

They say kids today don't know the value of a dollar. They certainly do know the value of a dollar. That's why they ask for five.

Avoid the philosophy and excuse that yesterday's luxuries have become today's necessities. They aren't necessities unless we ourselves make them such. . . . It is essential for us to live within our means.

All the messages our kids are getting is money-taking, not giving.