Own your extraordinariness and Your ordinariness

It is only through the ordinary that the extraordinary can make itself perceived.

There’s nothing wrong with ordinary. I just prefer to shoot for extraordinary.

Excellence is doing a common thing in an uncommon way.

You enter the extraordinary by way of the ordinary

Excellence is to do a common thing in an uncommon way.

He was ordinary in a world that loved the extraordinary.

Be ordinary, but bring a quality of awareness to your ordinary life. Bring God to your ordinary life introduce God into your ordinary life. Sleep, eat, love, pray, meditate, but don’t think that you are making or doing something special — and then you will be special.

Ordinary people need extraordinary examples.

Ordinary people seek entertainment. Extraordinary people seek education and learning.

Appreciate everything, even the ordinary. Especially the ordinary.

You cannot make yourself exceptional and live a normal life. To make yourself exceptional, you must live an exceptional life.

You must become the exception.

We feel pressured to do something extraordinary with our lives, or to an extraordinary standard of merit, or in a way that's applauded by an extraordinary number of people – even though it's true by definition that only a few people can ever be extraordinary in any given domain. (If we could all stand out from the crowd, there'd be no crowd from which to stand out.) Why shouldn't an anonymous career spent quietly helping a few people get to qualify as a meaningful way to spend one's time? Why shouldn't an absorbing conversation, an act of kindness, or an exhilarating hike get to count? Why adopt a definition that rules such things out?

It is not among extraordinary and fantastic things that excellence is to be found, of whatever kind it may be. We rise to attain it and become removed from it: it is oftenest necessary to stoop for it.