Abraham Lincoln Quotes

As I grow older, I have had to discard some ideas and policies because they no longer make sense. This strikes me as entirely healthy. I would invite others to do the same.

[It is] ... a sound maxim that it is better only sometimes to be right than at all times to be wrong, so soon as I discover my opinions to be erroneous, I shall be ready to renounce them.

Don’t follow someone else’s map. You should glean teachings from all directions, keeping true to those that bring progress yet remaining open to changes in yourself.

To hold the same views at forty as we held at twenty is to have been stupefied for a score of years, and take rank, not as a prophet, but as an unteachable brat, well birched and none the wiser. It is as if a ship captain should sail to India from the Port of London; and having brought a chart of the Thames on deck at his first setting out, should obstinately use no other for the whole voyage.

I try my best to learn from other people's mistakes. I have a lot of respect for people who can change.

Upon the subjects of which I have treated, I have spoken as I have thought. I may be wrong in regard to any or all of them; but, holding it a sound maxim that it is better only sometimes to be right than at all times to be wrong, so soon as I discover my opinions to be erroneous, I shall be ready to renounce them.

The willingness to keep learning is, I think, the most important thing about trying to be good at anything. You never want to stop learning.

I hate being wrong, but I love it when I'm set straight.

I never stop making sure that what I say is the best of what could be said about a particular thing. It's a constant evolution. If I planted a tree one way yesterday, and somebody tells me of a better way to plant a tree, I think, 'You know, they're right, that's better.' Then I change my way to accommodate the new way of planting trees.

I will never stop questioning. I will never stop wanting more and discovering other things and wanting to do other things. That will always be a part of me, and it's something I've come to terms with.

He that never changes his opinion never corrects mistakes and will never be wiser on the morrow than he is today.

Changing your mind is probably one of the most beautiful things people can do. And I've changed my mind about a lot of things over the years.

Good-faith re-examination of a position you've held in the past should be seen as a virtue, not a vice.

I always entertain the notion that I'm wrong, or that I'll have to revise my opinion. Most of the time that feels good; sometimes it really hurts and is embarrassing.

I don't mind being wrong, and I don't mind changing my mind.

I'll be the first one to admit that if I have conclusions based on faulty premises, then let me know about that, and I'll be the first one to change it.

Never let your persistence and passion turn into stubbornness and ignorance.

One of the things I like enormously about Bob Weinstein is that that he's the only studio head I have ever known who will change his mind and say he was wrong.

Enjoying success requires the ability to adapt. Only by being open to change will you have a true opportunity to get the most from your talent.

I'm always open for people saying I'm wrong because most of the time I am.

It is not easy for me to accept criticism and reassess my way of doing things.

Sometimes, having laughingly accepted some critical objection, he [Lenin] will alter the wording that he himself has just put forward in all confidence

He will be successful who directs his actions according to the spirit of the times, and that he whose actions do not accord with the times will not be successful

The most important thing is, Do you have the courage to admit that you're wrong? And do you change? The most important thing to me as a CEO is that we keep the courage.

I'm not one of these people who thinks I know all the answers.