Welcome to my Daily Inspiration - Daily Quote. See today's daily inspirational quotes below.
May the world be kind to you, and may your own thoughts be gentle upon yourself. - Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Tuesday, August 31, 2021

The Attempt to Hide Our Emptiness

 


Society is a masked ball,
where everyone hides his real character,
and reveals it by hiding.
- Ralph Waldo Emerson

Our greatest pretenses are built up
not to hide the evil and the ugly in us,
but our emptiness.
The hardest thing to hide is something that is not there.
- Eric Hoffer

We are what we pretend to be,
so we must be careful what we pretend to be.
- Kurt Vonnegut

Whoever you pretend to be, you must face yourself eventually.
- Al Stewart

Man is least himself when he talks in his own person.
Give him a mask, and he will tell you the truth.
- Oscar Wilde

We all have a social mask, right?
We put it on, we go out, put our best foot forward, our best image.
But behind that social mask is a personal truth,
what we really, really believe about who we are and what we're capable of.
- Phil McGraw

What if we like our outrageous side best?
We "know" that the "right" thing to do is to suck it up,
put the costume and the happy face back in storage for another year,
re-dress in our frown and gray flannel suit,
and trudge back to job, chores, "responsibilities," and "duty."
Stop! Maybe TODAY is the day to put the frown and gray flannel
into that dusty storage locker, and start to LIVE.
Not just today, but EVERY DAY for the rest of your life!
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

God has given you one face, and you make yourself another.
- William Shakespeare

Dignity is a mask we wear to hide our ignorance.
- Elbert Hubbard

Society censors our actions,
but our dreams reveal our true character.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Recognize the extent to which you hide your true nature from the world.
Consider revealing more of your true self.

Further reading: How To Not Care What Others Think



    

Monday, August 30, 2021

Beyond the Edge

 


Leap and the net will appear.
- John Burroughs

Just when the caterpillar thought the world was over,
it became a butterfly.
- Anonymous

The only way to discover the limits of the possible
is to go beyond them into the impossible.
- Arthur C. Clarke

Come to the edge
We can't. We're afraid
We can't. We will fall. Come to the edge
And they came. And he pushed them
And they flew
- Guillaume Apollinaire

Today's affirmation:
When I Come To The Edge of the Familiar,
I Spread My Wings and Fly.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Further reading: The Winds of Grace


Live Your Life Fully



Goodness of Humanity

Opportunity for Daily Thanksgiving
       

Sunday, August 29, 2021

There is No Virtue in being Unbending

 


A man who is a master of patience is master of everything else.
- George Savile

A tree that is unbending, is easily broken.
- Lao Tzu

When you encounter difficulties and contradictions,
do not try to break them, but bend them with gentleness and time.
- Saint Francis de Sales

Resistance creates suffering.
Stress happens when your mind resists what is...
The only problem in your life is your mind's resistance to life as it unfolds.
- Dan Millman

Do not attempt to conquer the world with force,
for force only causes resistance.
- Lao Tzu

Read the Aesop fable The Oak and the Reeds

Further reading: The Secret of Happiness


    

Saturday, August 28, 2021

Choose Carefully How You Refer To Yourself and To Others

 


Do not say, 'It is morning,' and dismiss it with a name of yesterday.
See it for the first time as a newborn child that has no name.
- Rabindranath Tagore

Shakespeare says, "What's in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet," but I disagree...
There is great power in naming. 
"Urban wall art" and "graffiti" are very different, even when they are identical. 
Think of other word pairs, like "flower" and "weed" - 
"antique" and "used" - "freedom fighter" and "terrorist" 
that greatly color our perception of the object or person being described.

Call a plant beautiful, and it becomes a flower.
Call it ugly, and it becomes a weed.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Exercise: Consider the words that you and others in your life use to describe you. If the words are not complimentary, take action to change how you refer to yourself, and encourage others to speak differently of you. For example, if you describe yourself as "shy," choose a more positive term, such as "reserved."


         

Friday, August 27, 2021

Stay Adaptable, Stay Flexible

 


Life is not always as it seems.
What you have wished for is not always best.
What you have feared may become a blessing.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

A good traveler has no fixed plans, and is not intent on arriving.
- Lao Tzu

Change always comes bearing gifts.
- Price Pritchett

Zig as Life Zigs and Zag as Life Zags.
Stay Adaptable, Stay Joyful
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Change of any sort requires courage.
- Mary Anne Radmacher

Today's affirmation:
I choose to adapt to the circumstances in which I find myself.
I choose to be flexible in my dealings with those around me.
I understand that my way is not the only way -
that inner peace comes from respecting the ways of others,
and that, if I am open, I may gain great insights and happiness
from the ideas and traditions of others.

Further reading: Go With the Flow



Enjoy the Journey
      

Thursday, August 26, 2021

Selfishness is Neglecting Thy Neighbor

 

A man's pride shall bring him low,
but honor shall uphold the humble in spirit.
- Proverbs 29:23

A man is called selfish not for pursuing his own good,
but for neglecting his neighbor's.
- Richard Whately

Conceit is bragging about yourself.
Confidence means you believe you can get the job done.
- Johnny Unitas

The ego lives by comparisons...
The ego cannot survive without judgment.
- A Course in Miracles

Further reading: Be Humble


      

Wednesday, August 25, 2021

Travel Well, Enjoy the Journey

 


The journey between what you once were
and who you are now becoming
is where the dance of Life really takes place.
- Barbara De Angelis

Life is a Journey - Enjoy the Journey.
Life is not a race to test
who can finish first or who can end up with the most loot.
Rather, life is best enjoyed as a meander -
watching the view to left and right - above and below -
as the days slowly move past in dress review.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

March on. Do not tarry. To go forward
is to move toward perfection.
March on, and fear not the thorns,
or the sharp stones on life's path.
- Khalil Gibran

It is better to travel well than to arrive.
- The Buddha

Further reading: Enjoy Life

Be Flexible

Choose to Love Life

The Secret of Happiness

Simple Pleasures

Love Life
      

Tuesday, August 24, 2021

Stop "Tilting at Windmills"

 

Persistence only takes you so far.
Then you need to try a different approach.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Sometimes success requires persistence and hard work. Sometimes an ingenious new approach is needed. Or it may be time for a whole new beginning. Think, and choose wisely whether to try harder or to try something new.

The very nature of the world is constant change. You set a goal and create a plan to achieve it; then the assumptions on which you based your plan change - they always do. The challenge is to retain your goals while adapting your tactics. Relax and stay flexible in order to reach your goals and maintain your happiness.

The phrase "tilting at windmills" (from the fictional character Don Quixote - shown in today's picture) epitomizes the hopelessness of a determined but inflexible approach. Far better to change your tactics than to fail - however nobly.

Stay committed to your decisions,
but stay flexible in your approach.
- Tony Robbins

Strategy without tactics is the slowest route to victory.
Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat.
- Sun Tzu

Intelligence is the ability to adapt to change.
- Stephen Hawking

Further reading: Stay Adaptable


Begin Anew Today

Multiple Ways to Your Goal
      

Monday, August 23, 2021

Creatures of Emotion

 


We should not pretend to understand the world
only by the intellect.
The judgment of the intellect
is only part of the truth.
- Carl Jung

Feelings are much stronger than thoughts.
We are all led by instinct,
and our intellect catches up later.
- Bono

When dealing with people, remember you are
not dealing with creatures of logic,
but creatures of emotion.
- Dale Carnegie

At the most basic level, the human emotions that drive all our actions
are the emotion of Love, and the emotion of Fear.
Love expresses itself through compassion, kindness, generosity, and understanding.
Fear expresses itself through self-centeredness, greed, jealousy, and exclusion.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Have compassion for those whose actions are driven by fear,
even when those actions cause serious harm to others.

Further reading: There are Only Fear and Love

Master of My Emotions

Learning To Live Together

Choose the World You Live In
     

Sunday, August 22, 2021

My Religion is Kindness

 


Kindness is perhaps the most essential quality of being fully human.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

A part of kindness consists in loving people more than they deserve.
- Joseph Joubert

My religion is very simple. My religion is kindness.
- Dalai Lama

Kindness in words creates confidence.
Kindness in thinking creates profoundness.
Kindness in giving creates love.
- Lao Tzu

Further reading: The Prayer of St. Francis of Assisi

Albert Pike: What we have done for ourselves alone dies with us.

Aesop: Gentleness and kind persuasion win where force and bluster fail

The Cab Ride
     

Saturday, August 21, 2021

We Owe Everlasting Gratitude

 


Your talent is God's gift to you.
- Leo Buscaglia

None of us got where we are solely by
pulling ourselves up by our bootstraps.
- Thurgood Marshall

Ingratitude often hides behind a mask of independence or self-sufficiency.
An assertion of being "self-made" is a rejection of God, one's ancestors, and society.
Your Genes, Place of Birth, and Upbringing are God's Gift to You.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Those who have succeeded at anything
and don't mention luck
are kidding themselves.
- Larry King

If I have seen further, it is
by standing on the shoulders of giants.
- Isaac Newton

The whole idea of compassion is based on a keen awareness
of the interdependence of all these living beings,
which are all part of one another, and all involved in one another.
- Thomas Merton

Civilization is not a spontaneous generation
with any race or nation known to history,
but the torch to be handed down from race to race from age to age.
- Kelly Millar

Success is a result of hard work,
plus being blessed with good genes, food,
a good country, an opportunity for education,
and much more which we never "earned"
or "deserved," and for which we owe
everlasting gratitude.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Further reading: Debt to Those Who are Kind

Appreciating Our Blessings

Give Thanks

Gratitude for This Food
     

Friday, August 20, 2021

Curiosity and a Desire for Truth

 


Science is a way of thinking
much more than it is a body of knowledge.
- Carl Sagan

The ultimate court of appeal is observation and experiment...
not authority.
- Thomas Huxley

What is a scientist after all?
It is a curious man looking through a keyhole,
the keyhole of nature, trying to know what's going on.
- Jacques Yves Cousteau

The scientist is motivated primarily by curiosity
and a desire for truth.
- Irving Langmuir

All truths are easy to understand
once they are discovered;
the point is to discover them.
- Galileo Galilei

The saddest aspect of life right now
is that science gathers knowledge faster
than society gathers wisdom.
- Isaac Asimov

Further reading: Understand More, Fear Less

Seek the Truth

Analysis AND Emotion

Stroke of Insight - Jill Bolte Taylor
    

Thursday, August 19, 2021

Sanctuary

 


Be completely humble and gentle;
be patient, bearing with one another in love.
Keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace.
There is one body and one Spirit.
- Ephesians 4:2-4

Gentleness, self-sacrifice and generosity
are the exclusive possession of no one race or religion.
- Mohandas (Mahatma) Gandhi

The highest revelation is that God is in every man.
- Ralph Waldo Emerson

When the vast cathedral of our being
becomes a sanctuary for all creation,
we become the face of God.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Further reading: Again Tomorrow

Unity with Spirit and All Creation

Perspective on Diversity

Give Thanks for the Love
       

Wednesday, August 18, 2021

Practice Patience

 


Patience is a form of wisdom.
It demonstrates that we understand and accept
the fact that sometimes things must unfold in their own time.
- Jon Kabat-Zinn

Patience, persistence, and perseverance.
A little more each day, a little better each day.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

When you encounter difficulties and contradictions,
do not try to break them, but bend them with gentleness and time.
- Saint Francis de Sales

The mountain remains unmoved at seeming defeat by the mist.
- Rabindranath Tagore

Patience is a form of wisdom.
It demonstrates that we understand and accept
the fact that sometimes things must unfold in their own time.
- Jon Kabat-Zinn

Patience and fortitude conquer all things.
- Ralph Waldo Emerson

If you would know strength and patience,
welcome the company of trees.
- Hal Borland

Further reading: The Wisdom of Patience

Try Again Tomorrow

Strength in Silence

Beyond Worry

Emulate the Patience of Nature

Fortitude
    

Tuesday, August 17, 2021

On Who or What can You Truly Depend

 


It is wonderful to have Faith,
but don't confuse trust with being gullible.
Balance trust with conscious thought.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

You may be deceived if you trust too much,
but you will live in torment
if you don't trust enough.
- Frank Crane

Only a fool tests the depth of the water with both feet.
- African Proverb

Trust yourself, then you will know how to live.
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Anyone who doesn't take truth seriously in small matters
cannot be trusted in large ones either.
- Albert Einstein

It takes years to build up trust,
and only seconds to destroy it.
- Anonymous

Further reading: What or who do you trust? 

Trust in the Light

Take Nothing On Authority

Can you trust and if so who?

7 Secrets of Happy Couples
     

Monday, August 16, 2021

Gentleness Surpasses Rigidity

 


Nothing is softer or more flexible than water,
yet nothing can resist it.
- Lao Tzu

Choose your battles wisely.
While your core principles and your life goals are important,
most of what you let upset you is not worth an argument or lost sleep.
Take Lao Tzu's advice and become softer and more flexible.

Patience, persistence, and perseverance.
A little more each day, a little better each day.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

When you encounter difficulties and contradictions,
do not try to break them, but bend them with gentleness and time.
- Saint Francis de Sales

Patience can't be acquired overnight.
It is just like building up a muscle.
Every day you need to work on it.
- Eknath Easwaran

The key to everything is patience.
You get the chicken by hatching the egg,
not by smashing it open.
- Arnold H. Glasgow

Gentleness Surpasses Rigidity.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Further reading: Tread Lightly

Be Gentle with Yourself

Aesop: Gentleness and kind persuasion win where force and bluster fail

The Oak and the Reeds - a fable by Aesop
    

Sunday, August 15, 2021

Becoming Our Greatest Selves

 



Only when life is difficult, are we challenged to become our greatest selves.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Fall seven times, stand up eight.
- Japanese Proverb

It is not because life is difficult
that we do not dare.
Life is difficult
because we do not dare.
- Seneca

All things at first appear difficult.
- Chinese proverb

Difficulties show men what they are.
In case of any difficulty,
remember that God has pitted you
against a rough antagonist
that you may be a conqueror,
and this cannot be without toil.
- Epictetus

Further reading: Choose to be Positive

Difficulties Offer Opportunities

Beyond Failure

Why is This Happening?
      

Saturday, August 14, 2021

Honor Clean Hands, Not Full Ones

 


God looks at the clean hands, not the full ones.
- Publilius Syrus

You can learn a lot from people who view the world differently than you do.
- Anthony J. D'Angelo
 
Better keep yourself clean and bright;
you are the window through which
you must see the world.
- George Bernard Shaw

Today's affirmation:
I approach life with an Open Mind,
Clean Hands, and a Loving Heart.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Further reading: Art of Seeing

Choose the World You See

Each Other's Eyes

Simply Marvelous
    

Friday, August 13, 2021

Life is Full of Contradictions

 


Prepare for the unknown by studying how others in the past
have coped with the unforeseeable and the unpredictable.
- George S. Patton

Life only appears complicated when one is worrying.
Relax, and life becomes simple again.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

The contradictions are what make human behavior
so maddening and yet so fascinating,
all at the same time.
- Joan D. Vinge

The curious paradox is that when I accept myself just as I am,
then I can change.
- Carl Rogers

Actions are always more complex and nuanced than they seem.
We have to be willing to wrestle with paradox in pursuing understanding.
- Harold Evans

I think wholeness is God's design for us;
and that often amounts to embracing contradictions.
- Bono

Further reading: Overflowing Cup of Tea - Zen Koan

Maybe So, Maybe Not. - Ancient Taoist Proverb

Yin-Yang

Balance in All Things
      

Thursday, August 12, 2021

Balance - A Time for Everything

 


To everything there is a season,
and a time to every purpose under heaven:
A time to be born, and a time to die.
- Ecclesiastes 3:1-2

We have an obligation to live in harmony with God's creation.
- Bruce Babbitt

One has to find a balance between
what people need from you
and what you need for yourself.
- Jessye Norman

A time for everything: a time to relax and a time to be busy,
a time to frolic and a time to lay up food for the winter,
a time to receive and a time to give,
a time to begin and a time to finish.
A time for work, a time for play -
balance in all things.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Change must always be balanced with some degree of consistency.
- Ron D. Burton

The ending of a job or a relationship
may appear as the darkest night,
but it is merely the Winter season -
the time of renewal and rebirth
that precedes the new planting -
the beginning of the next great cycle.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Further reading: Balance vs. Moderation: Eight Ways to Balance Your Life

Live in Harmony

Creating Balance

Renew Yourself

A List of Gratitudes

Yin-Yang
   

Wednesday, August 11, 2021

The Dignity of Labor

 


Make your work to be in keeping with your purpose.
- Leonardo da Vinci

All labor that uplifts humanity has dignity and importance
and should be undertaken with painstaking excellence.
- Martin Luther King, Jr.

The world is moved along, not only
by the mighty shoves of its heroes,
but also by the aggregate of tiny pushes
of each honest worker.
- Helen Keller

Everything that is really great and inspiring
is created by the individual who can labor in freedom.
- Albert Einstein

The end of labor is to gain leisure.
- Aristotle

Further reading: A Balanced Life

Take Time For Yourself

Called to be a Street Sweeper
     

Tuesday, August 10, 2021

Live in Harmony

 


He who lives in harmony with himself
lives in harmony with the universe.
- Marcus Aurelius

What is happiness except the simple harmony
between a man and the life he leads?
- Albert Camus

Happiness is not a matter of intensity
but of balance, order, rhythm and harmony.
- Thomas Merton

The ground we walk on, the plants and creatures,
the clouds above constantly dissolving into new formations -
each gift of nature possessing its own radiant energy,
bound together by cosmic harmony.
- Ruth Bernhard

The life of inner peace,
being harmonious and without stress,
is the easiest type of existence.
- Norman Vincent Peale

One must marry one's feelings to one's beliefs and ideas.
That is probably the only way to achieve a measure
of harmony in one's life.
- Napoleon Hill

Harmony (the quality of forming a pleasing and consistent whole)
is one of the qualities of a great life.
Let all the aspects of your nature be in harmony with each other,
and let your existence be in harmony with all of creation.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Further reading: Balance in All Things

Bring peace into moments of chaos

Living in the Present

Break the Cycle of Self-Inflicted Suffering

Balance Your Life
       

Monday, August 9, 2021

Analysis AND Wonder

 


What is my purpose in sending these Daily Quotes and Inspirations, as I have been doing since 2008?
Some of these messages are intended to provide a small measure of comfort, but most of these messages are intended to challenge my readers to deeper thinking.

Short quotations/aphorisms are by their nature incomplete, and almost always present only one side of an issue. Long-time readers will also notice that I often present quotations that contradict each other - for example, some exhort the reader to work harder/smarter while others encourage placing a relatively low priority on work.

My hope is that these daily messages will get you thinking about new ideas. Let's take these aphorisms as a spur for inquiry. Let those ideas with which you disagree start you thinking, talking and questioning, but also let the comfortable, familiar, and inspiring quotes become a source of questioning. Remember that our comfortable inspiring quotes are also never 100% true in all situations. Open Minds - Open Hearts. Thank you for reading these daily messages.
Read more about this at Inspirational/Motivational Quotes - Spur for Inquiry

Beware of false knowledge;
it is more dangerous than ignorance.
- George Bernard Shaw

Look for what is,
and not for what you think should be.
- Albert Einstein [paraphrase]

What is a scientist after all?
It is a curious man looking through a keyhole,
the keyhole of nature, trying to know what's going on.
- Jacques Yves Cousteau

Intense feeling too often obscures the truth.
- Harry S. Truman

All truths are easy to understand
once they are discovered;
the point is to discover them.
- Galileo Galilei

Do not limit yourself to either analysis or emotion.
Look deeply into the DNA of its seeds,
AND appreciate the intoxicating grandeur of the forest.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Further reading: Be a Seeker

Lifelong Learning

Inquiry

Conscious Learning

Discovery
    

Sunday, August 8, 2021

Deep Questions

 


Let no one think that flexibility
and a predisposition to compromise
is a sign of weakness or a sell-out.
- Paul Kagame

The boldness of asking deep questions may require
unforeseen flexibility if we are to accept the answers.
- Brian Greene

Those who can see value only in tradition,...
deny man's ability to adapt to changing circumstances.
- Stephen Bayley

In science the important thing is to modify and change
one's ideas as science advances.
- Herbert Spencer

Be resolute in your goals, but flexible in your tactics.
There are times that call for repetition and perseverance;
and there are times that require new ways of thinking and doing.
The challenge is knowing one from the other.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Further reading: I choose to adapt to the circumstances in which I find myself

New Ideas

Practice makes perfect - sometimes

Be Flexible
       

Saturday, August 7, 2021

Never Diminish Yourself with Self-Applied Labels

 


Willingly accept the complexity and the contradictions of life.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

You didn't get stamped out of a mold. You aren't a "black person" or a "white person," a "fat person" or a "skinny person," a "bad person" or a "good person." You are a highly complex human being with emotions, beliefs, capabilities. Each day you face challenges to your health, relationships, finances, and world-view -- and every day you respond to those challenges in ways which are unique to you.

Honor and love all of your unique self. Never diminish yourself with self-applied labels or categorizations.

Actions are always more complex and nuanced than they seem.
We have to be willing to wrestle with paradox in pursuing understanding.
- Harold Evans

True wisdom comes to each of us when we realize
how little we understand about life,
ourselves, and the world around us.
- Socrates

For every complex problem,
there is a solution that is simple, neat, and wrong.
- H. L. Mencken

I have come to believe that the whole world is an enigma,
a harmless enigma that is made terrible by our own
mad attempt to interpret it as though it had an underlying truth.
- Umberto Eco

Further reading: All Life is Paradox

Lessons from Life

Stand Rapt in Awe
      

Friday, August 6, 2021

Do You Control Your Habits, Or Do They Control You?

 


Is today the day to stop doing what doesn't inspire you, but has become a habit?

Is today the day to begin new projects and a new way of life that truly inspires you?

Are your habits moving you toward your life goals?
Or are they keeping you stuck in place?
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Your life is the sum result of all the choices you make,
both consciously and unconsciously.
If you can control the process of choosing,
you can take control of all aspects of your life.
You can find the freedom that comes from being in charge of yourself.
- Robert Foster Bennett

The freedom we are looking for is the freedom to be ourselves,
to express ourselves. But if we look at our lives we will see that
most of the time we do things just to please others ...
The worst part is that most of us are not even aware that we are not free.
-Don Miguel Ruiz

Bad habits are like a comfortable bed,
easy to get into, but hard to get out of.
- Anonymous

Correcting bad habits cannot be done by forbidding or punishment.
- Robert Baden-Powell (the founder of scouting)

Further reading: Are You a Prisoner?

5 Secrets For Breaking Your Bad Habits

Our Habits

Running in Circles

Self Discipline

Habits - Like Water to a Fish
     

Thursday, August 5, 2021

Serve God by Serving Others

 


Clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience.
Bear with each other and forgive one another.
- Colossians 3:12

The only way you can serve God is by serving other people.
- Rick Warren

Let us touch the dying, the poor,
the lonely and the unwanted
according to the graces we have received
and let us not be ashamed
or slow to do the humble work.
- Mother Teresa

Religion is a blessing when, and only when,
it provides a focus for a compassionate community
to minister to its members and to the world at large.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Further reading: Do God's Work

True Religion is about Helping Others

Love One Another
    

Wednesday, August 4, 2021

CHOOSE Your Own Path, Don't Just Follow Others

 


To go against the dominant thinking of your friends,
of most of the people you see every day,
is perhaps the most difficult act of heroism you can perform.
- Theodore H. White

The opposite of courage in our society
is not cowardice, it is conformity.
- Rollo May

Life is a sum of all your choices.
- Albert Camus

Today's affirmation
I CHOOSE with Open Mind and Open Heart.
I renounce all assumptions and expectations.
I thoughtfully consider all possibilities.
I CHOOSE with courage, awareness, consciousness, and compassion toward all.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Further reading: The Trouble with Conformity

Make Decisions

Embrace Change

Do What You Know Is Right

Try Being Outrageous
       

Tuesday, August 3, 2021

 


It is an open question whether any behavior
based on fear of eternal punishment
can be regarded as ethical
or should be regarded as merely cowardly.
- Margaret Mead

To be admirable, morality must be its own reward.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Power is of two kinds.
One is obtained by the fear of punishment
and the other by acts of love
Power based on love
is a thousand times more effective and permanent
then the one derived from fear of punishment.
- Mohandas (Mahatma) Gandhi

Punishment cannot heal spirits, can only break them.
- Barbara Deming

If people are good only because they fear punishment,
and hope for reward,
then we are a sorry lot indeed.
- Albert Einstein

Correcting bad habits cannot be done
by forbidding or punishment.
- Robert Baden-Powell (the founder of scouting)

Today's project:
Meaningful and joyful lives are lived by adhering to one's personal value system - one's principles. Today, write your six to eight most important values on an index card, and refer to that card as you go about your life today.

Further reading: Anger is Its Own Punishment

Finding Peace in Forgiveness

Revenge, the Deadliest Sin?
    

Monday, August 2, 2021

Obstacles are the Beginning, Not the End

 


When you get into a tight place
and everything goes against you,
till it seems you cannot hold on a minute longer,
never give up then, for that is just
the place and time the tide will turn.
- Harriet Beecher Stowe

Courage and perseverance have a magical talisman,
before which difficulties disappear and obstacles vanish into air.
- John Quincy Adams

Obstacles are those frightful things you see
when you take your eyes off your goals.
- Henry Ford

Stand up to your obstacles
and do something about them.
You will find that they haven't
half the strength you think they have.
- Norman Vincent Peale

Today's affirmation:
Even when I am afraid or unsure,
I choose to move in the direction of my goal.
Whenever I fall, I stand up,
brush myself off, and keep moving.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Photo: Talking to relatives across the Berlin Wall 1961.

Further reading: Beyond Failure

Keep Moving

Choose to Soar

Wanting is Not Enough
     

Sunday, August 1, 2021

The Riddle of Life


The book of life is filled with incoherent riddles.
Life's true lessons are inscribed in a corner of the margin.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

We learn more by looking for the answer
to a question and not finding it
than we do from learning the answer itself.
- Lloyd Alexander

In the sky, there is no distinction of east and west;
people create distinctions out of their own minds
and then believe them to be true.
- The Buddha

Half of everything you were ever taught is wrong;
the question is which half.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie


Further reading: Perspective on Tradition: An Open Mind

The Nature of Belief

Inspirational Quotes - Spur for Inquiry

Look Closely... See with New Eyes...

 


Look closely... See with new eyes...
Don't just pass by what is familiar without a thought.
Pay attention and look closely.
There is beauty - there is discovery -
there in a whole new world hiding
beneath the face of the familiar.
Your Close Attention Will Be Richly Repaid.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Reason, observation, and experience;
the holy trinity of science.
- Robert Green Ingersoll

The moment one gives close attention to any thing, even a blade of grass,
it becomes a mysterious, awesome, indescribably magnificent world in itself.
- Henry Miller

You can become blind by seeing each day as a similar one.
Each day is a different one, each day brings a miracle of its own.
It's just a matter of paying attention to this miracle.
- Paulo Coelho

The more you look, the more you see.
- Robert M. Pirsig

Further reading: Where Are You Going, and Why?

Have Eyes for Beauty

Stay Alert for Opportunities
      
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