In America you’re conditioned to regard everything as a contest. You have to make the Ten Best Dressed List, win this, win that. It drives me nuts sometimes. Who cares, for Christ’s sake?
ARTHUR ASHEDrummed into me, above all, by my dad, by the whole family, was that without your good name, you would be nothing.
More Arthur Ashe Quotes
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Wherever I am when you feel sick at heart and weary of life, or when you stumble and fall and don’t know if you can get up again, think of me. I will be watching and smiling and cheering you on.
ARTHUR ASHE -
I know I could never forgive myself if I elected to live without humane purpose, without trying to help the poor and unfortunate, without recognizing that perhaps the purest joy in life comes with trying to help others.
ARTHUR ASHE -
A wise person decides slowly but abides by these decisions.
ARTHUR ASHE -
Every time you win, it diminishes the fear a little bit. You never really cancel the fear of losing; you keep challenging it.
ARTHUR ASHE -
I have always tried to be true to myself, to pick those battles I felt were important. My ultimate responsibility is to myself. I could never be anything else.
ARTHUR ASHE -
I don’t care who you are, you’re going to choke in certain matches. You get to a point where your legs don’t move and you can’t take a deep breath. You start to hit the ball about a yard wide, instead of inches.
ARTHUR ASHE -
If you’re paid before you walk on the court, what’s the point in playing as if your life depended on it?
ARTHUR ASHE -
Do not feel sorry for me if I am gone.
ARTHUR ASHE -
You come to realize that life is short, and you have to step up. Don’t feel sorry for me. Much is expected of those who are strong.
ARTHUR ASHE -
We must believe in the power of education. We must respect just laws. We must love ourselves, our old and or young, our women as well as our men.
ARTHUR ASHE -
If I were to say, ‘God, why me?’ about the bad things, then I should have said, ‘God, why me?’ about the good things that happened in my life.
ARTHUR ASHE -
I strongly believe the black culture spends too much time, energy and effort raising, praising, and teasing our black children about the dubious glories of professional sports.
ARTHUR ASHE -
Later, I discovered there was a lot of work to being good in tennis.
ARTHUR ASHE -
You’ve got to get to the stage in life where going for it is more important than winning or losing.
ARTHUR ASHE -
I keep sailing on in this middle passage. I am sailing into the wind and the dark. But I am doing my best to keep my boat steady and my sails full.
ARTHUR ASHE