It's the romance, not the finance that makes business worth pursuing.

Startups are unique animals. We take them pretty much for granted out here now, but they are still endeavors that require very different skills from the ones needed in established companies.

Anyone can sail with the wind to his back. Startups usually sail into a stiff wind, leaking like a sieve, in high seas, without food or water.

In the world of startups, angels invest in seed or early-stage deals, and with their money they lend a bit of advice. They pay for the privilege of helping the company.

Good entrepreneurs are passionate visionaries, usually with one or more exceptional talents, but rarely have they actually built a company from scratch.

It's not clear that being the first-mover will provide the rash of Internet startups a sustainable competitive advantage. Ultimately being right, or better positioned, may be more important than being first.

Deferred Life Plan: Step one: Do what you have to do. Then, eventually — Step two: Do what you want to do

Most business ideas do not find funding. Even the majority of those that are funded—that is, vetted by very smart people who think enough of the ideas to invest in them — ultimately fail.

Entrepreneurs, in my experience, don't like to be told they're wrong.

The business model can and should change over time, as the world changes.

Business conditions are forever changing. You need to reconsider your strategies and business models constantly and adjust them where necessary.

Business is about nothing if not people.

Silicon Valley veterans share a tacit understanding that what a startup needs isn't one CEO, but three —each at successive stages of the startup's development.

If you turn a visionary startup into an operating company too early, you throw out its birthright. It will never be as big, or as influential as it might otherwise be. It will be much harder, perhaps impossible, to expand the vision later, when performance is being measured, because then there's too much at stake.

Business failures are unfortunate but necessary steps in the search for those few huge successes.

If you're brilliant, 15 to 20 percent of the risk is removed. If you work twenty-four hours a day, another 15 to 20 percent of the risk is removed. The remaining 60 to 70 percent of business risk will be completely out of your control..

Work hard, work passionately, but apply your most precious asset — time — to what is most meaningful to you.

Time is the only resource that matters.

I would love to live in the wilds of nowhere, and when writing 'Chronicles,' I would occasionally rent a cottage in the middle of nowhere that had no mobile reception, but I'm not about to move away from my family.

The greater the difficulty, the more the glory in surmounting it.

Magic is believing in yourself, if you can do that, you can make anything happen.

I was never a fan of cozy mysteries of anything set in the countryside, you know.

Live well. Sing out, sing loud, and sing often. And God bless the child that's got a song.

With short hair you have to get a haircut every two or three weeks. And if you're coloring your hair, you have to color it that often. Every time I did it, I felt fraudulent.

Any excuse will serve a tyrant.

I remember vividly seeing 'Tarzan' and Fred Astaire, the Chaplin films, Fred Astaire musicals, MGM, because of my mother. She was just interested in everything and she took me to opera and ballet, and then ballet got me hooked.

No one looks forward to a recount.

I cannot help feeling I would have been happier with a husband and chidren of my own.

To be awake is to be fully present, no noise, just you and God. Most of us only have seconds of full consciousness. To live in a state of Samadhi - that's what we're here for.

When I am an old woman, I will stop trying to look beautiful. I will quit wearing makeup and buying uncomfortable clothes because they look good. Maybe I will take up nudism.

I realized how far-reaching the effect of hip hop was when I walked by a jewelry store named Bling in a small, rural town in France. Hip hop has made a huge impact on urban culture. Yet many brands still don't speak to young people in a tone and manner that's representative of them.

The more technique you have, the less you have to worry about it. The more technique there is, the less there is.

For many in the modern world, carving out time for both traditional seated meditation and exercise has become close to impossible.

Good things happen when you take action. Bad things happen when you neglect.

I own a Ferrari race team, and we race all over North America.

After I released 'Jesus, Take the Wheel,' people started saying, Oh, it's kind of risky. You're coming out with a religious song. And I was thinking, Really? I grew up in Oklahoma; I always had a close relationship with God. I never thought it was risky in the least. If anything, I thought it was the safest thing I could do.

Water is life's mater and matrix, mother and medium. There is no life without water.

It's not like I love dragons! Only on 'Game of Thrones!' Our dragons are amazing, and they look really real. But I think after 'Game of Thrones,' I won't be a fantasy fan.

People have to eat and it's good to have a last-resort dole they can turn to.

In argument, truth always prevails finally; in politics, falsehood always.

I know that everyone wants to know about 'Downton Abbey,' but the truth is that it was only a few days out of my life. Still, you play a distinctive part on a hit series, and everyone suddenly knows who you are. Isn't it crazy how this business works?

I am sure Mr Heath thinks he is honest but I wish he didn't have to have his friends say it so often.