“It is generally believed that scientific talent reveals itself in early youth. […] This was certainly not my case. I somehow slid into my scientific profession. My mother wished for me to become a physician, just like my father. […] I myself wanted to be a lawyer, defender of the unjustly accused. But my career is the result of political circumstances, academic possibilities, and lucky accidents.”

— Fred Jelinek

Talking about his life in a 2001 speech
Source: Jelinek, Frederick. " How I Got Here http://www.clsp.jhu.edu/people/jelinek/promoce.html" Charles University, Prague, Czechoslovakia (November 22, 2001). Retrieved on December 17, 2010. Honoris causa degree acceptance speech.

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Fred Jelinek 2

Czech linguist 1932–2010

Mike Murphy (political consultant) (1962) American political consultant

As quoted in "Romney guru thrives in political 'show business'" https://web.archive.org/web/20060307070315/http://www.boston.com:80/news/politics/president/articles/2005/06/12/romney_guru_thrives_in_political_show_business/?page=full (12 June 2005), by Brian C. Mooney, The Boston Globe
2000s

“I view the major features of my own odyssey as a set of mostly fortunate contingencies. I was not destined by inherited mentality or family tradition to become a paleontologist. I can locate no tradition for scientific or intellectual careers anywhere on either side of my eastern European Jewish background. […] I view my serious and lifelong commitment to baseball in entirely the same manner: purely as a contingent circumstance of numerous, albeit not entirely capricious, accidents.”

Stephen Jay Gould (1941–2002) American evolutionary biologist

"Seventh Inning Stretch: Baseball, Father, and Me", p. 29
Triumph and Tragedy in Mudville (2003)

“I resent when they talk about families like mine that I grew up in. I resent the fact that they think we're talking about envy: it's job envy, it's wealthy envy; that we don't dream. My mother believed and my father believed that if I wanted to be president of the United States, that I could be, I could be vice president! My mother and father believed that if my brother or sister wanted to be a millionaire, they could be a millionaire! My mother and father dreamed as much as any rich guy dreams! They don't get us! They don't get who we are!”

Joe Biden (1942) 47th Vice President of the United States (in office from 2009 to 2017)

Criticizing Mitt Romney and the Republican Party, campaign speech http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2012/05/joe-biden-lays-into-romney-gop-they-dont-get-who-we-are/ in Youngstown, Ohio (May 16, 2012)
2010s

“Defend me from my friends; I can defend myself from my enemies.”

Voltaire (1694–1778) French writer, historian, and philosopher

Garantissez-moi de mes amis, écrivait Gourville proscrit et fugitif, je saurai me défendre de mes ennemis. ("Defend me from my friends," wrote Gourville, exile and fugitive, "I can defend myself from my enemies.") — Gabriel Sénac de Meilhan, Considérations sur l'esprit et les moeurs (1788): "De L'Amitié." Sénac de Meilhan was quoting Jean Hérault, sieur de Gourville (1625 - 1703).
The remark has often been attributed to Voltaire and to Claude-Louis-Hector de Villars.
Misattributed

“Weep not for me: suffering, as I do, unjustly, I am in a happier case than my murderers.”

Agis IV (-265–-241 BC) King of Sparta

To one of his executioners, whom he noticed weeping, as quoted in Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology (1844) by WIlliam Smith, p. 73.

“I was raised to be very independent. I was raised to believe I could do anything I wanted with my life. My father said I was lucky to be born a woman because "women can do anything they want" with their lives. Of course, I didn't realize until later that my father was giving me a slightly unrealistic view, but I think that [it] gave me a lot of confidence.”

Michelle Phillips (1944) Singer, actress

On her upbringing, The Arsenio Hall Show (1991)

“My father was frightened of his mother. I was frightened of my father and I am damned well going to see to it that my children are frightened of me.”

George V of the United Kingdom (1865–1936) King of the United Kingdom and the British Dominions, and Emperor of India

Attributed in Randolph Churchill's Lord Derby (1959), but said by Kenneth Rose https://wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenneth_Rose in King George V (1983) to be almost certainly apocryphal.
Attributed

“You can certainly argue that, philosophically, that is not your father. That is a replica, but I can actually make a strong case that it would be more like my father than my father would be, were he to live.”

Ray Kurzweil (1948) Author, scientist, inventor, and futurist

Futurist Ray Kurweil Bring Dead Father Back to Life http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/futurist-ray-kurzweil-bring-dead-father-back-life/story?id14267712 (2011)

“I think where people tend to end up results from a combination of encouragement, accident, and lucky break, etc. etc. Like many others, my career happened like it did because certain doors opened and certain doors closed.”

Alain de Botton (1969) Swiss writer

As quoted in "The Art of Connection – A Conversation with Alain de Botton" by Kim Nagy in Wild River Review (19 November 2007).
Context: I think where people tend to end up results from a combination of encouragement, accident, and lucky break, etc. etc. Like many others, my career happened like it did because certain doors opened and certain doors closed. You know, at a certain point I thought it would be great to make film documentaries. Well, in fact, I found that to be incredibly hard and very expensive to do and I didn’t really have the courage to keep battling away at that. In another age, I might have been an academic in a university, if the university system had been different. So it’s all about trying to find the best fit between your talents and what the world can offer at that point in time.

“I think music is like my only talent, unfortunately. I just utilized it as much as possible.”

Alessia Cara (1996) Canadian singer

Interview with Universal Music Korea https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RI68Ue0sPfo (October 2018)

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