Shirley Chisholm
Politician, Educator
"I ran for the presidency, despite hopeless odds, to demonstrate the sheer will and refusal to accept the status quo."
Odds quotes
Odds
488 quotes on this topic — from poets, philosophers, and thinkers across history.
Cornel West
Philosopher
"Hope and optimism are different. Optimism tends to be based on the notion that there's enough evidence out there to believe things are gonna be better, much more rational, deeply secular, whereas hope looks at the evidence and says, "It doesn't look good at all. Doesn't look good at all. Gonna go beyond the evidence to create new possibilities based on visions that become contagious to allow people to engage in heroic actions always against the odds, no guarantee whatsoever." That's hope. I'm a prisoner of hope, though. Gonna die a prisoner of hope."
Muhammad Ali Jinnah
Politician, Lawyer
"The story of Pakistan, its struggle and its achievement, is the very story of great human ideals, struggling to survive in the face of great odds and difficulties."
J. Cole
Rapper, songwriter
"I've always been an underdog. I feel like I beat the odds."
Ursula K. Le Guin
Author, Poet, Essayist
"Capitalism’s grow-or-die imperative stands radically at odds with ecology’s imperative of interdependence and limit. The two imperatives can no longer coexist with each other; nor can any society founded on the myth that they can be reconciled hope to survive. Either we will establish an ecological society or society will go under for everyone, irrespective of his or her status."
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Odds quotes (page 1 of 25)
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"Believe in yourself and have confidence that you can compete against all odds. Have a vision of what you'd like to accomplish and be able to articulate that vision."
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"Sometimes, a flame can be utterly extinguished. Sometimes, a flame can shrink and waver, but sometimes a flame refuses to go out. It flares up from the faintest ember to illuminate the darkness, to burn in spite of overwhelming odds."
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"I want to put the interests of ordinary working people right up there, center stage. Those people who - you know, they're working all the hours. They're doing their best for their families and sometimes they just feel the odds are stacked against them."
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"I've always considered myself a crunch-time player. I just love having the ball in my hands. Everyone in the arena knows the ball is supposed to be in your hands and you still make it. It's the odds. I love the odds."
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"Homeschooling will certainly produce some socially awkward adults, but the odds are good they would have been just as quirky had they spent twelve years raising their hand for permission to go to the bathroom."
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"If you don’t believe in your product, or if you’re not consistent and regular in the way you promote it, the odds of succeeding go way down. The primary function of the marketing plan is to ensure that you have the resources and the wherewithal to do what it takes to make your product work."
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"We are here to laugh at the odds and live our lives so well that Death will tremble to take us."
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"There are no mistakes or accidents. The present is malleable. Influence the odds. Free will is your pen, write your life."
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"No matter how careful you are, the one risk no investor can ever eliminate is the risk of being wrong. Only by insisting on what Graham called the "margin of safety" - never overpaying, no matter how exciting an investment seems to be - can you minimize your odds of error."
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"Amateurs look for challenges; professionals look for easy trades. Losers get high from the action; the pros look for the best odds."
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"If there is something in nature you don't understand, odds are it makes sense in a deeper way that is beyond your understanding. So there is a logic to natural things that is much superior to our own. Just as there is a dichotomy in law: 'innocent until proven guilty' as opposed to 'guilty until proven innocent', let me express my rule as follows: what Mother Nature does is rigorous until proven otherwise; what humans and science do is flawed until proven otherwise."
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"The idea came like a flash of lightning and in an instant the truth was revealed."
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"You need to be uncomfortable and apprehensive: True strategy is about placing bets and making hard choices. The objective is not to eliminate risk but to increase the odds of success."
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"There is so much about my fate that I cannot control, but other things do fall under my jurisdiction. There are certain lottery tickets I can buy, thereby increasing my odds of finding contentment. I can decide how I spend my time, whom I interact with, whom I share my body and life and money and energy with."
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"In my career as an actor, there is a catchphrase that Scofield always says often in regards to his brother, 'Have a little faith.' In my own career as an actor, there were times when I was the only one who believed in myself in the face of the odds."
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"The act of facing overwhelming odds produces greatness and beauty."
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"Here's a message to the new borns, waiting to breathe: if you believe then you can achieve. Just look at me, against all odds 'though life is hard, we carry on, livin' in the projects, broke with no lights on. To all the seeds that follow me- protect your essence, born with less, but you still precious."
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"If you write one story, it may be bad; if you write a hundred, you have the odds in your favor."
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"I'm trying to look at my blessings and how amazingly well against all odds things have turned out for me."
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"I think if anyone tells you the odds are slim, just keep walking. Just do whatever the hell you want to do, because they don't know what they're talking about. When you love something, and you work really really hard at it, you can do it."
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