If you don't fail at least 90 percent of the time, you're not aiming high enough. -- Alan Kay

The only way of discovering the limits of the possible is to venture a little way past them into the impossible. -- Arthur C. Clarke

Since programmers create programs out of nothing, imagination is our only limitation. Thus, in the world of programming, the hero is the one who has great vision. Paul Graham is one of our contemporary heroes. He has the ability to embrace the vision, and to express it plainly. His works are my favorites, especially the ones describing language design. He explains secrets of programming, languages, and human nature that can only be learned from the hacker experience. This book shows you his great vision, and tells you the truth about the nature of hacking. -- Yukihiro "Matz" Matsumoto, creator of Ruby

The wonderful and frustrating thing about understanding yourself is that nobody can do it for you. -- BetterExplained.com

Functional programming is like describing your problem to a mathematician. Imperative programming is like giving instructions to an idiot. -- arcus, #scheme on Freenode

Always dive down into a problem and get your hands on the deepest issue behind the problem. All other considerations are to dismissed as "engineering details"; they can be sorted out after the basic problem has been solved. -- Chris Crawford

Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one's courage. –Anais Nin

There are no traffic jams along the extra mile. –Roger Staubach

Success does not consist in never making mistakes but in never making the same one a second time. ~George Bernard Shaw

It is not what you do for your children, but what you have taught them to do for themselves, that will make them successful human beings. –Ann Landers