Quotes from Seth Godin

The only choice we have is to begin. And the only place to begin is where we are. Simply begin. But begin.

People settle. They settle for less than they are capable of.

When your art fails, make better art.

All marketers are storytellers. Only the losers are liars.

When our name is on a project, our ego pushes us over the hump and drives us to do even better work.

It's extremely difficult to find smart people willing to start useful projects. Because sometimes what you start doesn't work. The fact that it doesn't work every time should give you confidence, because it means you're doing something that frightens others.

The secret of leadership is simple: Do what you believe in. Paint a picture of the future. Go there.

If a product's future is unlikely to be remarkable – if you can't imagine a future in which people are once again fascinated by your product – it's time to realize that the game has changed. Instead of investing in a dying product, take profits and reinvest them in building something new.

Art has no right answer. The best we can hope for is an interesting answer.

There's a huge difference between being childlike and being childish. When we embrace joy and look at the world with fresh eyes we're being childlike. When we demand instant gratification and a guarantee that everything will be ok, we're only being childish.

If you can bring someone belonging, connection, peace of mind, status, or one of the other most desired emotions, you've done something worthwhile. The thing you sell is simply a road to achieve those emotions, and we let everyone down when we focus on the tactics, not the outcomes. Who's it for and what's it for are the two questions that guide all of our decisions.

The challenge is this: training creative, independent, and innovative artists is new to us.

What most people want in a leader is something that's very difficult to find: we want someone who listens...The secret, Reagan's secret, is to listen, to value what you hear, and then to make a decision even if it contradicts the very people you are listening to. Reagan impressed his advisers, his adversaries, and his voters by actively listening. People want to be sure you hear what they said - they're less focused on whether or not you do what they said.

One of the things that school is for is to teach our children to understand and relish the idea of intellectualism, to develop into something more than a purpose-driven tool for the industrial state.

Passion isn't project-specific. It's people-specific.

You're Astonishing How dare you waste it.

The desire to fail on the way to reaching a bigger goal is the untold secret of success.

Here's a quote from ultramarathoner Dick Collins: Decide before the race the conditions that will cause you to stop and drop out. You don't want to be out there saying, "Well gee, my leg hurts, I'm a little dehydrated, I'm sleepy, I'm tired, and it's cold and windy." And talk yourself into quitting. If you are making a decision based on how you feel at that moment, you will probably make the wrong decision.

Skill and attitude are essential. Authority is not. In fact, authority can get in the way.

One of the talents of the [late] great Steve Jobs is that he [knew] how to design Medusa-like products. While every Macintosh model has had flaws (some more than others), most of them have has a sexiness and a design sensibility that has turned many consumers into instant converts. Macintosh owners upgrade far more often than most computer users for precisely this reason." (p.98)

We've been trained to prefer being right to learning something, to prefer passing the test to making a difference, and most of all, to prefer fitting in with the right people, the people with economic power. Now it's your turn to stand up and stand out.

Creating value through interaction is far more important than solving a consumer's problem in thirty seconds.

in every organization everyone rises to the level at which they become paralyzed with fear.

So great leaders don't try to please everyone. Great leaders don't water down their message in order to make the tribe a bit bigger. Instead, they realize that a motivated, connected tribe in the midst of a movement is far more powerful than a larger group could ever be.