“We create our own destiny by the way we do things. We have to take advantage of opportunities and be responsible for our choices.”
Source: Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story (1990), p. 63
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Ben Carson 191
17th and current United States Secretary of Housing and Urb… 1951Related quotes
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Foreword (January 1960)
You Learn by Living (1960)
Context: One's philosophy is not best expressed in words; it is expressed in the choices one makes. In stopping to think through the meaning of what I have learned, there is much that I believe intensely, much I am unsure of. In the long run, we shape our lives and we shape ourselves. The process never ends until we die. And, the choices we make are ultimately our own responsibility.
“We do not make up history and culture. We simply appear, not by our own choice.”
Great Jewish Short Stories, introduction to the Dell paperback edition (1963)
General sources
Context: We are all such accidents. We do not make up history and culture. We simply appear, not by our own choice. We make what we can of our condition with the means available. We must accept the mixture as we find it — the impurity of it, the tragedy of it, the hope of it.