“When an apprentice gets hurt, or complains of being tired, the workmen and peasants have this fine expression: ‘It is the trade entering his body.’ Each time that we have some pain to go through, we can say to ourselves quite truly that it is the universe, the order and beauty of the world, and the obedience of God that are entering our body.”
Simone Weil, Waiting For God, via Sunbeams (Page 75)
“I do not like work—no man does—but I like what is in work: the chance to find yourself.”
Joseph Conrad, The Heart Of Darkness, via Sunbeams (Page 75)
“Millions of persons long for immortality who do not know what to do with themselves on a rainy afternoon.”
Susan Ertz, via Sunbeams (Page 75)
“History is merely a list of surprises… It can only prepare us to be surprised yet again.”
Kurt Vonnegut, Jr., via Sunbeams (Page 75)
“…we die to each other daily.
What we know of other people
Is only our memory of the moments
During which we knew them. And they have changed since then.
To pretend that they and we are the same
Is a useful and convenient social convention
which must sometimes be broken. We must also remember
That at every meeting we are meeting a stranger.”
T.S. Eliot, The Cocktail Party, via Sunbeams (Page 74)
“Who wants to do difficult work that doesn’t fulfill us? Who wants to commit to a journey before we know it’s what we were meant to do? The trap is this: only after we do the difficult work does it become our calling. Only after we trust the process does it become our passion. ‘Do what you love’ is for amateurs. ‘Love what you do’ is the mantra for professionals.”
Seth Godin, The Practice (Page 22)
“If you want to change your story, change your actions first. When we choose to act a certain way, our mind can’t help but rework our narrative to make those actions become coherent. We become what we do.”
Seth Godin, The Practice (Page 19) | Read Matt’s Blog On This Quote ➜
“One of the problems with art is that it is self-anointing: Anyone can be an artist by simply pointing to themselves and saying so. The truth is that there are very few artists. [Making the world a better place through art] is the highest attainment of the specialization. It is to recognize that it is not all about you, and that you have a communal function you can serve to help everyone get along. This is important for people to understand, especially in a capitalist society.”
Milton Glaser, via The Practice (Page 17)
“As you think, you travel. As you love, you attract. You are today where your thoughts have brought you; you will be tomorrow where your thoughts take you. You cannot escape the result of your thoughts; but you can endure and learn, accept and be glad. You will realize the vision of your heart, not the idle wish. You will gravitate toward that which you secretly most love. Into your hands will be placed the exact result of your thoughts; you will receive that which you earn; no more, no less. Whatever your present environment may be, you will fall, remain, or rise with your thoughts, your vision—your ideal.”
Unknown, via Sunbeams (Page 74)
“When you first rise in the morning tell yourself: I will encounter busybodies, ingrates, egomaniacs, liars, the jealous and cranks. They are all stricken with these afflictions because they don’t know the difference between good and evil. Because I have understood the beauty of good and the ugliness of evil, I know that these wrong-doers are still akin to me… and that none can do me harm, or implicate me in ugliness—nor can I be angry at my relatives or hate them. For we are made for cooperation.”
Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, via The Daily Stoic (Page 108) | Read Matt’s Blog on this quote ➜
“Success breeds complacency. Complacency breeds failure. Only the paranoid survive.”
Andy Grove | Read Matt’s Blog on this Quote ➜
“It is better to follow your own path, however imperfectly, than to follow someone else’s perfectly.”
The Bhagavad-Gita, via The Practice (Page 8)
“Lost in all the noise around us is the proven truth about creativity: it’s the result of desire—the desire to find a new truth, solve an old problem, or serve someone else. Creativity is a choice, it’s not a bolt of lightning from somewhere else.”
Seth Godin, The Practice (Page 3)
“A genius is the one most like himself.”
Thelonious Monk, via The Practice
“Chains do not hold a marriage together. It is threads, hundreds of tiny threads which sew people together through the years. That is what makes a marriage last—more than passion or even sex.”
Simone Signoret, via Sunbeams (Page 73)
“To marry a woman with any success a man must have a total experience of her, he must come to see her and accept her in time as well as in space. Besides coming to love what she is now, he must also come to realize and love equally the baby and the child she once was, and the middle-aged woman and the old crone she will eventually become.”
James Keyes, Only Two Can Play This Game, via Sunbeams (Page 73)
“If you are afraid of loneliness, don’t marry.”
Anton Chekhov, via Sunbeams (Page 73)
“Trust, but verify.”
Russian Proverb, via The Daily Stoic (Page 107)