Quote

Life and success are about what you choose to believe.

Jon Gordon

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Jon Gordon
Age: 53
Born: 1971
Born: January 20
Businessperson
Consultant
Writer
Motivational
Choose
Success
Believe
Life

More quotes by Jon Gordon

Image
When I heard Charlie Parker the first time on a record, it had seemed like an old, scratchy kind of record and I didn't get it.
Jon Gordon
Image
We had been thrown out of a couple of places that we had lived in when I was a kid and all the family photos and records and toys were long since gone. But I think somebody had given us a couple of records.
Jon Gordon
Image
Phil [Wood] said to me in the car going back, he said, Look man, you better know why you're playing this music. Because I've known too many who lived and died for it. And if you're not trying to change the world, I'm not interested.
Jon Gordon
Image
All we can do is go about our work. But we can have a goal. We can have a dream.
Jon Gordon
Image
I think what frustrated me more than anything else in my formative years was that I just had to work. I had to have a job. Like twenty to thirty hours a week, a lot of times in high school and college. And that was hard.
Jon Gordon
Image
There are a lot of people that impacted me. I remember hearing Oscar Peterson live at the Blue Note, which was very expensive, but... $50 in the '80s... hard to come up with. But it was amazing.
Jon Gordon
Image
I was [ on Thelonious Monk International Saxophone Competition] with Ralph Bowen, and Joel Frahm, Jimmy Greene, John Ellis. You can't play the saxophone better than any of those guys play. So many of those things that those guys could do I wish I could do now, let alone then.
Jon Gordon
Image
When you believe, the impossible becomes possible. What you believe will become what is true. Your optimism today will determine your level of success tomorrow. Don’t look at your challenges look up and look out into the future. Don’t focus on your circumstances. Focus on the right beliefs that will help you build your success.
Jon Gordon
Image
Connection to the music and the history was very powerful to me. I think that's what I feel the most blessed about.
Jon Gordon
Image
Another classical music teacher from Performing Arts that I've stayed in contact with is Jonathan Strasser.
Jon Gordon
Image
Larry [ Laurenzano] said to me one day near the end of junior high, Jon, are you Jewish? I said, No. And he said, Well neither am I. I'm not sure of Caesar DiMauro, but he teaches at the JCC and I got you a scholarship there.
Jon Gordon
Image
I saw a nice interview with Dave Binney recently. He was saying, Man it was never easy. It's not like 'Oh wow, the good old days.' What, when certain people couldn't vote? There was more work for musicians in the '40s, '50s, '60s. But I don't think it was ever easy.
Jon Gordon
Image
Walk down Forest Ave to Joey's Pizza like we used to do after performances, which doesn't exist anymore. We had a sense of community [in the school band].
Jon Gordon
Image
Phil [Wood] was very passionate. Very committed. He felt very blessed that the people that cared about him and took him aside... if he was out of line or drinking too much, being too surly.
Jon Gordon
Image
Definitely I had a lot of times where I was really hard on myself. Really frustrated. But I never felt like I had someplace else to go. Just had to stay here and deal with this.
Jon Gordon
Image
I had a really nice association with Richie DeRosa, a great musician, a great drummer and composer and arranger. And I had a number of classes with him.
Jon Gordon
Image
I'm reaching a certain level [at school] that I had been aspiring to with all these incredibly advanced classical peers around me that I had been trying to be able to hang with them a little bit.
Jon Gordon
Image
I just lucked into a lot of good people man. In my life and through friends, and in the music, that really embraced me and took care of me. I'm a lucky guy.
Jon Gordon
Image
Only through service and sacrifice can you become great.
Jon Gordon
Image
Joe Henderson with Ron Carter and Al Foster at the Vanguard was just wow. And the energy of the three of them.
Jon Gordon