I was the very first athlete in East Germany allowed to go professional.

It's hard work to make a four-minute program look effortless and elegant.

Figure skating is a mixture of art and sport.

When I go out on the ice, I just think about my skating. I forget it is a competition.

Money was never the motivation. It never should be in sports.

I'm the sort of person who needs a big mountain in front of me to climb.

Almost nothing is presented to you on a silver platter. You have to really work for it.

I can't say, 'It doesn't matter if you win or lose.' It's not true. You go in to win.

When I get up, I have a cup of coffee, surf the Internet, then do a half-hour run.

I learned not to depend on other people. I needed support, but it's you who has to go out and deliver.

It's not like I didn't do anything for 10 years and chose a new profession. I've been on the ice a lot. I'm not an outsider.

Better to lose money in a good company rather than making money in a bad one.

We need leaders who can meet and adapt to new challenges, build strategic partnerships, build and sustain human capital organizations, and have the courage to act and react to the challenges

When relying solely on ego, we are given many messages that are contrary to the achievement of that happy and fulfilling life that most of us actually desire.

It is some compensation for great evils, that they enforce great lessons.

She was a sea: and I had to swim in her.

The only planning I do is about a minute before I play. I desperately try to think of something that will be effective, but I never sit down and work it out note for note.

I made my excuses and left, thinking, really, after a certain age, people are just going to do what they're going to do and you're either going to accept them as they are or you're not.

In light of the Abu Ghraib prison scandal, critics are arguing that abuses of Iraqi prisoners are being produced by a climate of disregard for the laws of war.

An agnostic is a cowardly atheist.

That's what art is, shocking people. Sometimes shocking yourself.