Chris Gardner

Many have forged a path to greatness lit only by a vision in their minds. ”

I chose to embrace the spirit of my mother, who, though she had too many of her own dreams denied, deferred, and destroyed, she still instilled in me, her child, that I could have dreams and that I did have a responsibility and the power. ”

Everybody got a dream. What's the plan? ”

I had never gone to college. I was not from a politically connected family. I had no money of my own. Who is going to do business with you? ”

Finding gainful employment to pay for housing is hard for any veteran experiencing homelessness. It's even more difficult for veterans who've also had encounters with police and stints in jail. ”

The people who care the most about the folks in your community are living in the community. They don't live in Washington, D.C. ”

The hardest thing that I had to do every day as a working single parent was child care, to have to leave my child with people that I did not know and hope everything was OK, that was the most painful part of every day. ”

I didn't grow up in a household where dinner conversation was, 'How did the market do today?' ”

I'm encouraged by what I see of men trying to be there for their children. ”

I went through pain as a child so my children wouldn't have to. ”