Do something you're very passionate about, and don't try to chase what is kind of the "hot passion" of the day.

A brand for a company is like a reputation for a person. You earn reputation by trying to do hard things well.

The common question that gets asked in business is, why? That’s a good question, but an equally valid question is, why not?

We can't be in survival mode. We have to be in growth mode.

What we want to be is something completely new. There is no physical analog for what Amazon.com is becoming.

One of the huge mistakes people make is that they try to force an interest on themselves. You don't choose your passions; your passions choose you.

If you do build a great experience, customers tell each other about that. Word of mouth is very powerful.

It's hard to find things that won't sell online.

Everything you are comes from your choices.

A company shouldn't get addicted to being shiny, because shiny doesn't last.

We've had three big ideas at Amazon that we've stuck with for 18 years, and thy're the reason we're successful: Put the customer first. Invent. And be patient.

I am made of poetry and other things that people don't really care about at all.

Haters' don't hate you, they hate self and project the energy outward because there is no courage to confront internal fears. Therefore, ignore hate or else it becomes you, also.

I didn't know the full dimensions of forever, but I knew it was longer than waiting for Christmas to come.

The death of democracy is not likely to be an assassination from ambush. It will be a slow extinction from apathy, indifference, and undernourishment.

The power of the human will to compete and the drive to excel beyond the body's normal capabilities is most beautifully demonstrated in the arena of sport.

I told you we were meant to be," he says, still smiling, still so Finn, who was always here but who I just didn't see and now-- Well, now I kiss him.

The things we see every day are the things we never see at all.

I bought an ideal gift for my mother-in-law - a battery-operated mouth.

One of my principal concerns is the contradiction between appearance and reality - illusion and reality. I try to set up an expectation of sorts and then contradict it.

The Way is to man as rivers and lakes are to fish, the natural condition of life.