"One of the things I love most about our country is that we have such opportunities. There are places in the world where failure is final, and one early misstep will decide your fate forever. But America is still the country of the second chance. Most of us end up needing one. And when we've gone on to accomplish something, that we can be far more grateful -- be that much more grateful for the chance.
"Gratitude, in general, is a good habit. It is usually a correct appraisal of our situation. Most of us are able to succeed and rise in the world because someone helped out along the way -- whether it was a memorable teacher, or a boss who handed us a great opportunity, or the person who took a chance and gave us the first big break in our career. A grateful heart is an honest understanding of all that we have been given, and all that is expected of us in return.
"There is always the temptation to forget this -- to carry ourselves with an air of entitlement, as if good things come to us by right. They rarely do. And life has a way of working out better when we don't take things for granted -- when we have a long memory for what others have given us, when we look for the blessings, great and small, that come with every day that we're alive on this earth."
- Vice President Dick Cheney, to new graduates at the University of Missouri at Columbia
via The White House