Eubie Blake

Listen to the birds and don’t hate nobody.

Never trust anyone who wants what you’ve got. Friend or no, envy is an overwhelming emotion.

If I’d known I’d live to be a 100 I’d have taken much better care of myself.

I don’t have any bad habbits. They might be bad habits for other people, but they’re all right for me.

Do not seek to follow in the footsteps of the men of old; seek what they sought.

A human being has a natural desire to have more of a good thing than he needs.

Be your authentic self. Your authentic self is who you are when you have no fear of judgment, or before the world starts pushing you around and telling you who you’re supposed to be. Your fictional self is who you are when you have a social mask on to please everyone else. Give yourself permission to be your authentic self.

Life, as I see it, is not a location, but a journey. Life flows.

It takes years to find your voice and seize your real estate.

Love is knowing every goodbye has a hello on the horizon.

Honest criticism is hard to take, particularly from a relative, a friend, an acquaintance, or a stranger.

There ain’t no freedom when you’ve got a worrying mind.

There are people who strictly deprive themselves of each and every eatable, drinkable, and smokable which has in any way acquired a shady reputation. They pay this price for health. And health is all they get for it. How strange it is. It is like paying out your whole fortune for a cow that has gone dry.

I can visualize the time when almost every family will have a small plane in their back yard.

Everything human is pathetic. The secret source of humor itself is not joy but sorrow. There is no humor in heaven.

If there is any one secret of success, it lies in the ability to get the other person’s point of view and see things from that person’s angle as well as from your own.

A great wind is blowing, and that gives you either imagination or a headache.

It is bad luck to be superstitious.

There is always one moment in childhood when the door opens and lets the future in.