Age is an issue of mind over matter. If you don't mind, it doesn't matter.
Pessimists ‘tend to be right’ but optimists ‘tend to succeed’ and ‘get the most done’
When I was suddenly catapulted into the leadership of the bus protest in Montgomery, Alabama, a few years ago, I felt we would be supported by the white church. I felt that the white ministers, priests and rabbis of the South would be among our strongest allies. Instead, some have been outright opponents, refusing to understand the freedom movement and misrepresenting its leaders; all too many others have been more cautious than courageous and have remained silent behind the anesthetizing security of stained-glass windows.
-Letter from a Birmingham Jail)
live with intention
walk to the edge.
listen hard.
practice wellness.
play with abandon.
laugh.
choose with no regret.
continue to learn.
appreciate your friends.
do what you love.
live as if this is all there is.
Each one of us has to start out with developing his or her own definition of success.
And when we have these specific expectations of ourselves, we are more likely to live up to them.
Ultimately, it is not what you get or even what you give. It's what you become.
still alive
under the slightness of my hat
enjoying the coolness
Give me control over a nation’s currency, and I care not who makes its laws. (1743–1812)
Permit me to issue and control the money of a nation and I care not who makes its laws.
Our willingness to fail gives us the ability and opportunity to succeed where others may fear to tread.
I've missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I've lost almost 300 games. Twenty six times, I've been trusted to take the game-winning shot and missed. I've failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed.
Yet I wonder if it doesn’t make sense to speak in terms of an American paradox—that is, a notably unhealthy people obsessed by the idea of eating healthily.
..you never speak about yourself without a loss.Your self-condemnation is always accredited,your self-praise discredited.
There were many terrible things in my life and most of them never happened.
But as you've seen, in matters of this kind,
Appearances can deceive the keenest mind.
Remember my example, and be wise:
When things look simple, don't believe your eyes.
(Sganarelle, or The Imaginary Cuckold)
The thing that makes tail events easy to under-appreciate is how easy it is to underestimate how things compound. How, for example, 9/11 prompted the Federal Reserve to cut interest rates, which helped drive the housing bubble, which led to the financial crisis, which led to a poor jobs market, which led tens of millions to seek a college education, which led to $1.6 trillion in student loans with a 10.8% default rate. It's not intuitive to link hijackers to the current weight of student loans, but that's what happens in a world driven by a few outlier tail events.
(The Psychology of Money)
To sum up: I shall say to you that the matter is as Themistius puts it: that which exists does not conform to the various opinions, but rather the correct opinions conform to that which exists.
(The Guide of the Perplexed)
More than the glory of flowers and fall leaves that season by season capture everyone’s heart, it is the night sky in winter, with snow aglitter beneath a brilliant moon, that in the absence of all color speaks to me strangely and carries my thoughts beyond this world, there is no higher wonder or delight. Whoever called it dreary understood nothing.
As far as I can see, halfhearted refuge in religion is more likely to get you lost in an evil rebirth than staying on in the mire of this world.
Amid the seeming confusion of our mysterious world, individuals are so nicely adjusted to a system, and systems to one another and to a whole, that, by stepping aside for a moment, a man exposes himself to a fearful risk of losing his place forever. Like Wakefield, he may become, as it were, the Outcast of the Universe.
The people who start the wars don’t fight them, the people who spend the taxes don’t pay them, and the people who forgive the criminals don't live next to them. Of course we’re going to have too many wars, too much spending, and too much crime.
Diax said something that is still very important to us, which is that you should not believe a thing only because you like to believe it. We call that Diax’s Rake and sometimes we repeat it to ourselves as a reminder not to let subjective emotions cloud our judgment. (Anathem)
Any great power that's spending more on debt service than on defense is probably not going to be great for much longer.
And fear not lest Existence closing yourAccount, and mine, should know the like no more;The Eternal Sáki from that Bowl has pour’dMillions of Bubbles like us, and will pour.
Love is so short, forgetting is so long.
You can't see the seer who does the seeing; you can't hear the hearer who does the hearing; you can't think of the thinker who does the thinking; and you can't perceive the perceiver who does the perceiving. The self within all is this self of yours.
Upaniṣads--Bhadâraṇyaka Upaniṣad
