What matters is whether a certain approach gets you to where you want to go. And let’s be clear, using obstacles against themselves is very different from doing nothing. Passive resistance is, in fact, incredibly active. But those actions come in the form of discipline, self-control, fearlessness, determination, and grand strategy.
~ Ryan Holiday
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David Lynch has a variety of notions about what it takes to make art, but suffering is not among them. “This is part of the myth, I think […] the more you suffer, the less you want to create. If you’re truly depressed, they say, you can’t even get out of bed, let alone create.”
~ Colin Marshall, from David Lynch Explains Why Depression Is the Enemy of Creativity–and Why Meditation Is the Solution
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The cure for depression? My experience is that the only thing that works to avoid depression, in the long run, is meditation.
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Four common mistakes that help you hide— Busy is the same as brave. A mentor is going to change your life. Waiting to get picked is the next step. There is a secret, and you will soon learn it.
~ Seth Godin
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This is why utterance is magic. Words do have power. Names have power. Words are events, they do things, change things. They transform both speaker and hearer; they feed energy back and forth and amplify it. They feed understanding or emotion back and forth and amplify it.
~ Ursula K. Le Guin
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We often turn it into something bad: I suck for not being disciplined, I suck for not being able to focus, I’m not strong enough, etc etc. But it’s just a part of being human — we all have fear, uncertainty, doubt, resistance built into our survival instincts.
~ Leo Babauta from, Working with Your Inner Resistance – Zen Habits Website
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My “I suck” dialog has different vocabulary, and I have a penchant for petulance. Nonetheless, it’s always a good reminder to be aware of it. I can sabotage myself, without fail, by setting expectations—any expectations—for anything I’m working on. The only way I can stay balanced on the narrow, mountaintop spine of rock that is sanity is to pay attention to the next steps. There’s not really much option about where the path along the ridge leads. In recent months I’ve been tinkering on a new project creating something I’ve been curious to try for a long time. It’s interesting, but not particularly difficult work. It’s definitely creative, and I’ve repeatedly found interesting little twists in the path. Am I going somewhere in particular with the project? …not really. I have ideas of what might be farther along the path, but that’s more an interesting additional possibility, rather than the reason for doing the work.
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Do what nature demands. Get a move on—if you have it in you—and don’t worry whether anyone will give you credit for it. And don’t go expecting Plato’s Republic; be satisfied with even the smallest progress, and treat the outcome of it all as unimportant.
~ Marcus Aurelius
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Small-minded people habitually reproach others for their own misfortunes. Average people reproach themselves. Those who are dedicated to a life of wisdom understand that the impulse to blame something or someone is foolishness, that there is nothing to be gained in blaming, whether it be others or oneself.
~ Epictetus
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Over the past few years I have been made to see, in sum, that the nature and extent of satire is not nearly as simple a question as I had previously imagined. I am now prepared to agree that some varieties of expression that may have some claim to being satire should indeed be prohibited. I note this not with a plan or proposal for where or how such a prohibition might be enforced, but to acknowledge something I did not fully understand until I experienced it first hand — that even the most cherished and firmly-held values or ideals can change when the world in which those values were first formed changes.
~ Justin E.H. Smith, from Opinion | The End of Satire – The New York Times
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I’m not sure what to say about this, other than: This is an interesting article.
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Just a couple shots I grabbed randomly. parkour, dance, and great people everywhere! #frig17
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Out for dinner in Easton for our 10th wedding anniv. Popped over to the Bank Street Creamery for some dessert!
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Wherein the USPS takes its own ‘press firmly’ printed unstruction VERY seriously… “Neither rain nor sleet nor accidentally wedged packages shall stay these couriers from their appointed rounds.”
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