Seek to learn constantly while you live; Do not wait in the faith that old age by itself will bring wisdom.
~ Solon
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Quotes
A long long time ago I began collecting inspirational quotes and aphorisms which became my collection of quotes.
Listening
When you don’t know what to say, that’s okay. That shows you’re listening.
~ Anna Sale
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Together
Humanity has begun to understand that we will all rise or fall together—that we are bound together, as we live together. People are listening more and more to the voice which speaks this inside of us.
~ Lucy Malory
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Real change
Change—real change—comes from the inside out. It doesn’t come from hacking at the leaves of attitude and behavior with quickfix personality ethic techniques. It comes from striking at the root—the fabric of our thought, the fundamental, essential paradigms, which give definition to our character and create the lens through which we see the world.
~ Stephen Covey
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Virtue
The simplest, quickest and surest means to becoming known as a virtuous person is to work on yourself, to actually be virtuous. Examine each virtue, and you will see that they all were achieved with work and exercise.
~ Socrates
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Drawbacks
The very shortcomings which make others difficult and unbearable mean less in yourself. You do not see them, and when you speak of other people having these drawback, you do not notice that you are describing yourself.
~ Jean de la Bruyère
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Dreams
It is so much simpler to bury reality than it is to dispose of dreams.
~ Don DeLillo
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Options
Wealth is not about having a lot of money; It’s about having a lot of options.
~ Chris Rock
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Mistakes
Do not be embarrassed by your mistakes. Nothing can teach us better than our understanding of them. This is one of the best ways of self-education.
~ Thomas Carlyle
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In the bricks
Self-reliant
Being self-reliant is critical. To make yourself less dependent on others and so-called experts, you need to expand your repertoire of skills. And you need to feel more confident in your own judgement. Understand: We tend to overestimate other people’s abilities—after all, they’re trying hard to make it look as if they knew what they were doing—and we tend to underestimate our own. You must compensate for this by trusting yourself more and others less.
~ Robert Greene
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Clever
If you want to be a clever person, you have to learn how to ask cleverly, how to listen attentively, how to respond quietly, and how to stop talking when there is nothing more to say.
~ Leo Tolstoy
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Foreign currency
Advice is like being handed a large amount of foreign currency. What do you do with it?
~ Rhik Samadder
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Well-employed
Just as a well-filled day brings blessed sleep, so a well-employed life brings blessed death.
~ Leonardo da Vinci
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Just ask
If you’re a pole vaulter, you need a long runway to pick up the speed required to plant the pole and flip over the bar. Odds are you are not a pole vaulter. You don’t need a runway of context, justification, and general flim-flam to be curious. It’s not really about you. Save everyone the time, and just ask the question.
~ Michael Bungay Stanier
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Fleeing
A coward flees backward, away from new things. A man of courage flees forward, in the midst of new things.
~ Jacques Maritain
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Shoes on your feet
A degree on your wall means you’re educated as much as shoes on your feet mean you’re walking. It’s a start, but hardly sufficient. […] Just as you can walk plenty well without shoes, you don’t need to step into a classroom to understand the basic, fundamental reality of nature and of our proper role in it. Begin with awareness and reflection. Not just once, but every single second of every single day.
~ Ryan Holiday
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Thank you
When someone reveals something that they’re struggling with, or something painful that happened to them, I often find myself saying, “I’m so sorry, thank you for sharing that with me.” Let’s acknowledge that you’ve just said something, that there’s nothing I can say that’s gonna lift that pain. By saying that, you’re focusing the conversation on what they’ve disclosed to you. You can also talk about how you’re talking about it. You can say, “I don’t know what to say right now. But I just want to tell you, I’m really sorry to know that.”
~ Anna Sale
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Discipline
To create a meaningful work of art or to make a discovery or invention requires great discipline, self-control, and emotional stability. It requires mastering the forms of your field. […] When you look at the exceptionally creative work of Masters, you must not ignore the years of practice, the endless routines, the hours of doubt, and the tenacious overcoming of obstacles these people endured.
~ Robert Greene
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Lucky
What helps luck is a habit of watching for opportunities, of having a patient, but restless mind, of sacrificing one’s ease or vanity, of uniting a love of detail to foresight, and of passing through hard times bravely and cheerfully.
~ Victor Cherbuliez
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