“The Intuitive mind is a sacred gift and the rational mind is a faithful servant. We have created a society that honors the servant and has forgotten the gift.”
~ Albert Einstein
Category: Quotes … Thu
Quote Thursdays
Conscious Decision to Do Something
“[S]atisfaction can arise only by the conscious decision to do something.”
Greogory Berns, Satisfaction
Excerpt from fuller sentence, “While you might find pleasure by happenstance–winning the lottery, possessing the genes for a sunny temperament, or having the luck not to live in poverty–satisfaction can arise only by the conscious decision to do something. And this makes all the difference in the world, because it is only your own actions for which you may take responsibility and credit,” as quoted in this Scientific American article (March 2007).
Furthermore, Gregory Burns says, “satisfaction comes less from the attainment of a goal and more in what you must do to get there.” (From Publishers Review quoted here.)
Gregory Berns’ attitude speaks to me a lot about expertise being trainable and about goals.
See or Seem
Quote Thursdays.
“All that we see or seem is but a dream within a dream.”~ Edgar Allen Poe
Happy seeing, happy dreaming!
S.
Habits
“Moral excellence comes about as a result of habit. We become just by doing just acts, temperate by doing temperate acts, brave by doing brave acts.”
~ Aristotle
“We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.”
~ Aristotle
“Watch your thoughts, for they become words.
Watch your words, for they become actions.
Watch your actions, for they become habits.
Watch your habits, for they become character.
Watch your character, for it becomes your destiny.”
~ Anonymous
“The three hardest tasks in the world are neither physical feats nor intellectual achievements, but moral acts: to return love for hate, to include the excluded, and to say, “I was wrong”. ”
~ Sydney J. Harris
“He who controls others may be powerful, but he who has mastered himself is mightier still.”
~ Lao Tzu
“You cannot change your destination overnight, but you can change your direction overnight.”
~ Jim Rohn
“Everyone tries to define this thing called Character. It’s not hard. Character is doing what’s right when nobody’s looking.”
~ Anonymous
Happiness and Morals
“Happiness and moral duty are inseparably connected.”
~ George Washington
“Achievement of your happiness is the only moral purpose of your life, and that happiness, not pain or mindless self-indulgence, is the proof of your moral integrity, since it is the proof and the result of your loyalty to the achievement of your values.”
~ Ayn Rand
“The purpose of morality is to teach you, not to suffer and die, but to enjoy yourself and live.”
~ Ayn Rand
“About morals, I know only that what is moral is what you feel good after and what is immoral is what you feel bad after.”
~ Ernest Hemingway
“As a child I was taught that to tell the truth was often painful. As an adult I have learned that not to tell the truth is more painful, and that the fear of telling the truth—whatever the truth may be—that fear is the most painful sensation of a moral life.”
~ June Jordan
“Goodness is the only investment that never fails.” …and… “Nature is goodness crystallized.”
~ Henry David Thoreau
“If you would convince a man that he does wrong, do right. But do not care to convince him. Men will believe what they see. Let them see.”
~ Henry David Thoreau
“Ethics begins when we are free: it is freedom itself, when that freedom is considered and controlled.”
~ André Comte-Sponville
“How can you be happy unless you have some self-respect? And how can you respect yourself unless you control yourself, master yourself, overcome your failings? … Ethically speaking, it’s pointless wishing you were someone else. You can dream of being rich, healthy, good-looking, happy … But it is absurd to dream of being virtuous. Whether you are a villain or a good person is for you and you alone to decide: you are worth precisely what you want.”
~ André Comte-Sponville
“The essence of morality is a questioning about morality; and the decisive move of human life is to use ceaselessly all light to look for the origin of the opposition between good and evil.”
~ Georges Bataille
“The only immorality … is not to do what one has to do when one has to do it.”
~ Jean Anouilh
“The happiness of your life depends upon the quality of your thoughts: therefore, guard accordingly, and take care that you entertain no notions unsuitable to virtue and reasonable nature.”
~ Marcus Aurelius
“Happiness is inward and not outward; and so it does not depend on what we have, but on what we are.”
~ Henry Van Dyke
“Think of yourself as two people, and one of them is inside of you, and he’s a scorekeeper. And he keeps score of your idea of the world. … And when you have a conflict with your scorekeeper, that’s unhappiness. Happiness is being completely in sync with your own perception of goodness.”
~ Will Smith
“. . . happiness is the highest good, being a realization and perfect practice of virtue, which some can attain, while others have little or none of it. . . .”
~ Aristotle
Note: Posted on 1-26 for 1-25.
On Goals
Last week, I wrote about sleep. Next week, I’ll be writing about goals. Hence, some prelimiary quotes about goals.
A goal without a plan is just a wish.
~ Larry Elder
On setting things in motion …
What is not started today is never finished tomorrow.
~ Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
By losing your goal, you have lost your way.
~ Kahlil Gibran
What we see depends mainly on what we look for.
~ John Lubbock
Things which matter most should never be at the mercy of things which matter least.
~ Goethe (from this page)
More Quotes on Sleep
Here are some earlier quotes about sleep!
Here’s a silly riddle for you from riddlenut:
I weaken all men for hours each day. I show you strange visions while you are away. I take you by night, by day take you back, none suffer to have me, but do from my lack. What am I?
Answer in the comments.
And a couple more:
All that we see or seem is but a dream within a dream.
~ Edgar Allen Poe
Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there, wondering, fearing, doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before.
~ Egdar Allen Poe, “Nevermore”
Sleep is the best meditation.
~ Dalai Lama (1989 Nobel Peace Prize)
That we are not much sicker and much madder than we are is due exclusively to that most blessed and blessing of all natural graces, sleep.
~ Aldous Huxley
I have never taken any exercise except sleeping and resting.
~ Mark Twain
There is a time for many words, and there is also a time for sleep.
~ Homer
Then Providence Moves Too
The moment one definitely commits oneself, then Providence moves too.
All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have
occurred. A whole stream of events issues from the decision, raising in
one’s favor all manner of unforeseen incidents and meetings and material
assistance which no man could have dreamed would have come his way.
Whatever you can do or dream you can, begin it.
Boldness has genius, power and magic in it.
Begin it now.
This is a quote that is often attributed to Goethe. This website attributes this quote to Lord “Johnnie” Fisher – British Admiral. The Goethe Society of North America explains here the controversy and mistaken attribution to Goethe.
In any case, I love this quote. Great quote for entrepreneurship.
On Holiday Stress
We live longer than our forefathers; but we suffer more from a thousand artificial anxieties and cares. They fatigued only the muscles, we exhaust the finer strength of the nerves.
~ Edward George Bulwer-Lytton
No one can get inner peace by pouncing on it.
~ Harry Emerson Fosdick
There’s never enough time to do all the nothing you want.
~ Calvin and Hobbes
The mark of a successful man is one that has spent an entire day on the bank of a river without feeling guilty about it.
~ Anonymous
Half our life is spent trying to find something to do with the time we have rushed through life trying to save.
~ Will Rogers
Take rest; a field that has rested gives a bountiful crop.
~ Ovid
Not-Perfect Quotes
Striving for excellence motivates you; striving for perfection is demoralizing.
~ Harriet Braiker
Once you accept the fact that you’re not perfect, then you develop some confidence.
~ Rosalynn Carter
Sometimes… when you hold out for everything, you walk away with nothing.
~ Ally McBeal TV show
Ring the bells that still can ring
Forget your perfect offering.
There is a crack in everything,
That’s how the light gets in.
~ Leonard Cohen’s “Anthem” lyrics
Posted on 12-15-06 for Thurs, 12-14-06.