Og Mandino quotes page 1
Augustine "Og" Mandino II (December 12, 1923 – September 3, 1996) was an American
author who wrote the bestseller, The Greatest Salesman in the World. Having sold over 50 million copies in
over twenty-five different languages, he is a must in American literature courses around the globe. Mandino was
also the president at the magazine, Success Unlimited until 1976 and is was also inducted into the National
Speakers Association's Hall of Fame. Born on December 12th, 1923 to Silvio and Margaret Mandino, the author was
named after his paternal grandfather, and given the nickname "Og." At one time he was the editor of his high school
paper and had hoped to study journalism at the University of Missouri. However, in the summer of 1940, before
enrolling at university, his mother passed away due to a heart attack and Mandino therefore chose to seek work in a
paper factory, where he labored for two years. In 1942 he joined the US Army Air Corps and became both a bombardier
as well as an officer. Mandino flew thirty B-24 missions over Germany during the Second World War. Upon the end of
the war, Mandino resigned from the army and took up a job as an insurance salesman. On one cold November morning
when he was extremely down on his luck, he had thoughts of suicide. However, after browsing several library books
regarding self-help, motivation and success, he chose to bring a few of the books home and began to read in
earnest. Mandino began to visit many more libraries across the US, perusing over hundreds of titles that focus on
success. Incredibly, this past-time helped him overcome alcoholism. Mandino soon became both a successful writer
and speaker, sharing his personal success story with tens of thousands, and later millions of readers. He claimed
that his main inspirations were the Bible as well as Clement Stone, Emmet Fox and Napoleon Hill. Having found fame and fortune, as well as peace from his
personal devil of alcoholism, Mandino passed away September 3, 1996 at the age of 75.
Choice! The key is choice. You have options. You need not spend your life wallowing in
failure, ignorance, grief, poverty, shame, and self-pity. There is a better way to live!
Og Mandino
Beginning today, treat everyone you meet, friend or foe, loved one or stranger, as if they
were going to be dead at midnight. Extend to each person, no matter how trivial the contact,
all the care and understanding and love that you can muster, and do it with no thought of
any reward. Your life will never be the same again.
Og Mandino
You will achieve your grand dream, a day at a time, so set goals for each day - not long and
difficult projects, but chores that will take you, step by step, toward your rainbow.
Og Mandino
Weak is he who permits his thoughts to control his actions; strong is he who forces his
actions to control his thoughts.
Og Mandino
Championships, in games and in life, are won by those who have learned to cope with
adversity.
Og Mandino
The best thing we can do for our children is to consciously work at being role models for
them. Teach them by your example, and they'll remember and even try to imitate. Talk to
them one way and then act contrary to your words, and you've lost a kid.
Og Mandino
Our worth is always determined by our deeds, not by our good intentions, however noble.
Og Mandino
The greatest lesson that I have learned in my sixty-plus years of suffering and joy is that life
is a game. It's spiritual, mysterious, and precious, but it's still a game - and you can't play in
that game with any chance at all of winning unless you know the rules!
Og Mandino
I will love the light for it shows me the way, yet I will endure the darkness for it shows me
the stars.
Og Mandino
How's this for a sorry statistic? ... Over five million prescriptions for Valium are dispensed in
this country every month, and we are now treating more than four thousand new cases of
mental illness every twenty-four hours... There must be a better way to live.
Og Mandino
One of the most important and ageless secrets of life that I had to learn, with pain and tears,
is that you cannot even begin to turn a hopelessly bruised and defeated existence around or
jump off that dreary treadmill so far as your job and career are concerned or move off that
financial dead end that seems to have doomed you to failure and low self-esteem until you
appreciate the assets you already possess.
Og Mandino
It's good to have money and the things that money can buy, but it's good, too, to check up
once in a while and make sure you haven't lost the things money can't buy.
Og Mandino
Realize that true happiness lies within you. Waste no time and effort searching for peace and
contentment and joy in the world outside. Remember that there is no happiness in having or in
getting, but only in giving.
Og Mandino
Laugh at the world. Most important, laugh at yourself. If laughter could be dispensed at your
favorite drugstore, your family doctor would have you taking some every day. It's a much
better way to live.
Og Mandino
If the ingredients for happiness are not within a person, no material success or entertainment
or platinum credit cards can make that person smile.
Og Mandino
To be always intending to make a new and better life but never to find time to set about it is
as to put off eating and drinking and sleeping from one day to the next until you're dead.
Og Mandino
Only a habit can subdue another habit.
Og Mandino
It takes just as much energy to fail, you know, as it does to succeed, and that's why we
have so many active, busy people who cannot understand why nothing is happening in their
lives.
Og Mandino
The greatest secret in the world is that you only have to be a small measurable amount better
than mediocrity - and you've got it made.
Og Mandino
Success in life comes not from holding a good hand, but in playing a poor hand well.
Og Mandino
How sad that most of us know more about how and why our automobile functions than we
know about ourselves.
Og Mandino
Whenever you make a mistake or get knocked down by life, don't look back at it too long.
Mistakes are life's way of teaching you. Your capacity for occasional blunders is inseparable
from your capacity to reach your goals. No one wins them all, and your failures, when they
happen, are just part of your growth. Shake off your blunders. How will you know your limits
without an occasional failure? Never quit. Your turn will come.
Og Mandino
The only certain means of success is to render more and better service than is expected of
you, no matter what your task may be.
Og Mandino
Build this day on a foundation of pleasant thoughts. Never fret at any imperfections that you
fear may impede your progress. Remind yourself, as often as necessary, that you are a
creature of God and have the power to achieve any dream by lifting up your thoughts.
Og Mandino
Never allow anyone to rain on your parade and thus cast a pall of gloom and defeat on the
entire day. Remember that no talent, no self-denial, no brains, no character, are required to
set up in the fault-finding business. Nothing external can have any power over you unless you
permit it.
Og Mandino
Always do your best. What you plant now, you will harvest later.
Og Mandino
Search for the seed of good in every adversity. Master that principle and you will own a
precious shield that will guard you well through all the darkest valleys you must traverse.
Og Mandino
|