Brandon Sanderson (born December 19, 1975) is an American fantasy and science fiction writer. He is best known for the Cosmere universe, in which most of his fantasy novels (most notably the Mistborn series and The Stormlight Archive) are set. He is also known for finishing Robert Jordan’s high fantasy series The Wheel of Time. Brandon Sanderson quotes will motivate you to achieve success in life.
Best Brandon Sanderson Quotes
- “The purpose of a storyteller is not to tell you how to think, but to give you questions to think upon.” ― Brandon Sanderson, The Way of Kings
- “Life before Death. Strength before Weakness. Journey before Destination.” ― Brandon Sanderson, The Way of Kings
- “You see, that is the sad, sorry, terrible thing about sarcasm. It’s really funny.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Alcatraz Versus the Evil Librarians
- “If you give up what you want most for what you think you should want more, you’ll end up miserable.” ― Brandon Sanderson, The Hero of Ages
- “And so, does the destination matter? Or is it the path we take? I declare that no accomplishment has substance nearly as great as the road used to achieve it. We are not creatures of destinations. It is the journey that shapes us. Our callused feet, our backs strong from carrying the weight of our travels, our eyes open with the fresh delight of experiences lived.” ― Brandon Sanderson, The Way of Kings
- “Mocking a woman is like drinking too much wine. It may be fun for a short time, but the hangover is hell.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Warbreaker
- “Sometimes the prize is not worth the costs. The means by which we achieve victory are as important as the victory itself.” ― Brandon Sanderson, The Way of Kings
- “Expectations were like fine pottery. The harder you held them, the more likely they were to crack.” ― Brandon Sanderson, The Way of Kings, Brandon Sanderson quotes about expectations
- “To love the journey is to accept no such end. I have found, through painful experience, that the most important step a person can take is always the next one.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Oathbringer
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“Somebody has to start. Somebody has to step forward and do what is right, because it is right.” ― Brandon Sanderson, The Way of Kings
- “If you’re always on time, it implies that you never have anything better you should be doing.” ― Brandon Sanderson
- “By now, it is probably very late at night, and you have stayed up to read this book when you should have gone to sleep. If this is the case, then I commend you for falling into my trap. It is a writer’s greatest pleasure to hear that someone was kept up until the unholy hours of the morning reading one of his books. It goes back to authors being terrible people who delight in the suffering of others. Plus, we get a kickback from the caffeine industry…” ― Brandon Sanderson, Alcatraz Versus the Evil Librarians
- “A man can only lead when others accept him as their leader, and he has only as much authority as his subjects give to him. All of the brilliant ideas in the world cannot save your kingdom if no one will listen to them.” ― Brandon Sanderson, The Well of Ascension
- “Sometimes a hypocrite is nothing more than a man in the process of changing.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Oathbringer
- “Our belief is often strongest when it should be weakest. That is the nature of hope.” ― Brandon Sanderson, The Final Empire
- “Lately, I feel like my life is a book written in a language I don’t know how to read.” ― Brandon Sanderson, The Hero of Ages, Brandon Sanderson quotes about life
- “Every man is a hero of his own story.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Warbreaker
- “The most important step a man can take. It’s not the first one, is it? It’s the next one. Always the next step, Dalinar.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Oathbringer
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“A man was defined not by his flaws, but by how he overcame them.” ― Brandon Sanderson, The Well of Ascension
- “Strength does not make one capable of rule; it makes one capable of service.” ― Brandon Sanderson, The Way of Kings
- “Never throw the first punch. If you have to throw the second, try to make sure they don’t get up for a third.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Steelheart
- “One cannot separate truth from actions…Physically inevitable or not, truth stands above all things. It is independent of who has the best army, who can deliver the longest sermons, or even who has the most priests. It can be pushed down, but it will always surface. Truth is the one thing you can never intimidate.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Elantris
- “As I fear not a child with a weapon he cannot lift, I will never fear the mind of a man who does not think.”
― Words of Radiance - “You get to choose who you are. Legacy, memories of the past, can serve us well. But we cannot let them define us. When heritage becomes a box instead of an inspiration, it has gone too far.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Skyward
- “Overcome your guilt. Care, but not too much. Take responsibility, but don’t blame yourself. Protect, save, help- but know when to give up. They’re precarious ledges to walk. How do I do it?” ― Brandon Sanderson, The Way of Kings
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“Yes, I began my journey alone, and I ended it alone. But that does not mean that I walked alone.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Oathbringer
- “The right belief is like a good cloak, I think. If it fits you well, it keeps you warm and safe. The wrong fit however, can suffocate.” ― Brandon Sanderson, The Final Empire
- “Remember, the past need not become our future as well.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Elantris
- “Do not let your assumptions about a culture block your ability to perceive the individual, or you will fail.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Words of Radiance, Brandon Sanderson quotes about failure
- “Accept the pain, but don’t accept that you deserved it.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Oathbringer
- “The mark of a great man is one who knows when to set aside the important things in order to accomplish the vital ones.” ― Brandon Sanderson, The Alloy of Law
- “A woman’s strength should not be in her role, whatever she chooses to be, but in the power to choose that role.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Words of Radiance
- “What is belief – what is faith – if you don’t continue it after failure?” ― Brandon Sanderson, The Final Empire, Brandon Sanderson quotes about faith
- “In the end, all men die. How you lived will be far more important to the Almighty than what you accomplished.”
― The Way of Kings - “Unknowing ignorance is preferable to informed stupidity.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Warbreaker
- “Somehow, we’ll find it. The balance between whom we wish to be and whom we need to be. But for now, we simply have to be satisfied with who we are.” ― Brandon Sanderson, The Hero of Ages
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“I’ve always been very confident in my immaturity.” ― Brandon Sanderson, The Final Empire
- “It’s easy to believe in something when you win all the time…The losses are what define a man’s faith.” ― Brandon Sanderson, The Well of Ascension
- “Men rarely see their own actions as unjustified.” ― Brandon Sanderson, The Final Empire
- “Belief isn’t simply a thing for fair times and bright days…What is belief – what is faith – if you don’t continue in it after failure?… Anyone can believe in someone or something that always succeeds…But failure…ah, now, that is hard to believe in, certainly and truly. Difficult enough to have value. Sometimes we just have to wait long enough…then we find out why exactly it was that we kept believing…There’s always another secret.” ― Brandon Sanderson, The Final Empire
- “Good men don’t become legends,” he said quietly.
- “A thing of nature. For every Push, there is a Pull. A consequence.” ― Brandon Sanderson, The Hero of Ages
- “Aim for the sun. That way if you miss, at least your arrow will fall far away, and the person it kills will likely be someone you don’t know.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Oathbringerf
- “How do you fight someone smarter than yourself?’ Rand Whispered. ‘The answer is simple. You make her think that you are sitting down across the table from her, ready to play her game. Then you punch her in the face as hard as you can.” ― Brandon Sanderson, The Gathering Storm
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“The hallmark of insecurity is bravado.” ― Brandon Sanderson, The Way of Kings
- “A journey will have pain and failure. It is not only the steps forward that we must accept. It is the stumbles. The trials. The knowledge that we will fail. That we will hurt those around us. But if we stop, if we accept the person we are when we fail, the journey ends. That failure becomes our destination.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Oathbringer
- “The question,’ she replied, ‘is not whether you will love, hurt, dream, and die. It is what you will love, why you will hurt when you will dream, and how you will die. This is your choice. You cannot pick the destination, only the path.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Oathbringer
- “And Vin liked solitude. When you’re alone, no one can betray you” ― Brandon Sanderson, The Final Empire
- “Power is an illusion of perception.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Words of Radiance
- “Expectation wasn’t just about what people expected of you. It was about what you expected of yourself.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Words of Radiance
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“Where there are villains, there will be heroes. Just wait. They will come.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Steelheart
- “You can’t be so frightened of what might happen that you are unwilling to act.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Steelheart
- “Do not dash if you only have the strength to walk, and do not waste your time pushing on the walls that will not give. More importantly, don’t shove where a pat would be sufficient.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Elantris
- “Words are where most change begins.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Words of Radiance
- “This world, it is a tempest sometimes. But remember, the sun always rises again.” ― Brandon Sanderson, The Way of Kings
“Good men don’t need to become legends.” She opened her eyes, looking up at him. “They just do what’s right anyway.”
― The Well of Ascension - “I don’t talk to myself because I’m crazy.”
“No?”
“I do it because I’m awesome.” ― Words of Radiance -
“Better to be the failure who nobly strived than the success who never really had to.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Firstborn
- “To live is to have worries and uncertainties. Keep them inside, and they will destroy you for certain–leaving behind a person so callused that emotion can find no root in his heart.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Elantris
- “Expectation. That is the true soul of art. If you can give a man more than he expects, then he will laud you his entire life. If you can create an air of anticipation and feed it properly, you will succeed.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Words of Radiance
- “Faith means that it doesn’t matter what happens. You can trust that somebody is watching. Trust that somebody will make it all right.” ― Brandon Sanderson, The Hero of Ages
- “He smiled despite the grief he felt at the deaths of his men; he smiled because that was what he did. That was how he proved to the Lord Ruler-and to himself-that he wasn’t beaten.” ― Brandon Sanderson, The Final Empire
- “An excuse is what you make after the deed is done, while a justification is what you offer before.” ― Brandon Sanderson, The Way of Kings
- “Life breaks us, Teft. Then we fill the cracks with something stronger.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Oathbringer
- “For glory lit, and life alive, for goals unreached and aims to strive. All men must try, the wind did see. It is the test, it is the dream.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Words of Radiance
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“The nature of the world is that when we create something, we often destroy something else in the process.” ― Brandon Sanderson, The Hero of Ages
- “The problem with being clever, Serene thought with a sigh, is that everyone assumes you’re always planning something.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Elantris
- “Sometimes we find it hardest to accept in others that which we cling to in ourselves.” ― Brandon Sanderson, The Way of Kings
- “A man is what he has passion about,” Breeze said. “I’ve found that if you give up what you want most for what you think you should want more, you’ll just end up miserable.” ― Brandon Sanderson, The Hero of Ages
- “In the end, I must proclaim that no good can be achieved of false means. For the substance of our existence is not in the achievement, but in the method.” ― Brandon Sanderson, The Way of Kings
- “I hadn’t been a nerd, mind you. I’d just been the type of guy who spent a lot of time by himself, focused entirely on a single consuming interest.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Firefight
