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“Son, when you were born, you cried while the world rejoiced. Live your life in such a way that when you die the world cries while you rejoice.”
One of the lessons I have learned in my own life is that if you don’t act on life, life has a habit of acting on you. The days slip into weeks, the weeks slip into months and the months slip into years. Pretty soon it’s all over and you are left with nothing more than a heart filled with regret over a life half lived.
Everyone who enters your life has a lesson to teach and a story to tell.
Kindness, quite simply, is the rent we must pay for the space we occupy on this planet.
The golden thread of a highly successful and meaningful life is self-discipline. Discipline allows you to do all those things you know in your heart you should do but never feel like doing. Without self-discipline, you will not set clear goals, manage your time effectively, treat people well, persist through the tough times, care for your health or think positive thoughts.
the tougher you are on yourself, the easier life will be on you. The quality of your life ultimately is shaped by the quality of your choices and decisions, ones that range from the career you choose to pursue to the books you read, the time that you wake up every morning and the thoughts you think during the hours of your days. When you consistently flex your willpower by making those choices that you know are the right ones (rather than the easy ones), you take back control of your life. Effective, fulfilled people do not spend their time doing what is most convenient and comfortable. They
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A journal is not a diary. A diary is a place where you record events while a journal is a place where you analyze and evaluate them.
Keeping a journal encourages you to consider what you do, why you do it and what you have learned from all you have done. And writing in a journal promotes personal growth and wisdom by giving you a forum to study, and then leverage, your past for greater success in your future.
Remember, if your life is worth thinking about, it is worth writing about.
when you don’t keep your word, you lose credibility. When you lose credibility, you break the bonds of trust. And breaking the bonds of trust ultimately leads to a string of broken relationships.
Be a person of your word rather than being “all talk and no action.” As Mother Teresa said, “there should be less talk; a preaching point is not a meeting point. What do you do then? Take a broom and clean someone’s house. That says enough.”
it makes no sense to worry about past events or mistakes unless you want to experience them for a second time.
Life’s greatest setbacks reveal life’s biggest opportunities.
Remember, happy people have often experienced as much adversity as those who are unhappy.
Booker T. Washington said, “I have learned that success is to be measured not so much by the position that one has reached in life as by the obstacles he has overcome while trying to succeed.”
Meditations by the Roman philosopher Marcus Aurelius, The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin and Walden by Henry David Thoreau.
“if your priorities don’t get scheduled into your planner, other people’s priorities will get put into your planner.”
The most effective people concentrate on their “areas of excellence,” that is, on the things they do best and on those high-impact activities that will advance their life-work. In being so consumed by the important things, they find it easy to say no to the less-than-worthy distractions that clamor for their attention.
Michael Jordan, the best basketball player in the game’s history, did not negotiate his contracts, design his uniforms and prepare his travel schedules. He focused his time and energies on what he did best: playing basketball, and delegated everything else to his handlers.
As a Man Thinketh by James Allen.
As Woodrow Wilson said, “You are not here to merely make a living. You are here in order to enable the world to live more amply, with greater vision, with a finer spirit of hope and achievement. You are here to enrich the world, and you impoverish yourself if you forget the errand.”
If your level of inspiration is lower than you know it should be, read a good self-help book or listen to a motivating audiocassette program. Attend a public lecture by someone you admire or spend a few hours studying the biography of one of your heroes. Start spending time with people who are passionate about what they are doing in their lives and dedicated to making the best out of life. With a healthy dose of inspiration, you will quickly raise your life to a whole new plane of living.
And research has proven that exercise will not only add life to your years, it could add years to your life.
“Those who don’t make time for exercise must eventually make time for illness.”
As William James, the father of modern psychology, observed, “We don’t laugh because we are happy. We are happy because we laugh.”
Remember, there are no real failures in life, only results. There are no true tragedies, only lessons. And there really are no problems, only opportunities waiting to be recognized as solutions by the person of wisdom.
“The hand that gives is the hand that gathers.”
‘the person who tries to do everything ultimately achieves nothing.’
“The person who chases two rabbits catches neither,”
How high you will rise in your life will be determined not by how hard you work but by how well you think.
“There are no great acts. There are only small acts done with great love.”
“A problem well stated is a problem half solved,” said Charles Kettering.
“Wisdom is knowing what to do next, skill is knowing how to do it, and virtue is doing it,”
The smallest of actions is always better than the boldest of intentions.
“Once you learn how to die, you learn how to live.”
“Anyone can become angry — that’s easy. But to be angry with the right person, to the right degree, at the right time, for the right purpose, and in the right way — that is not easy,” taught Aristotle.
“He who asks may be a fool for five minutes. He who doesn’t is a fool for a lifetime,”
“The job of leadership today is not just to make money, it’s to make meaning.”
While almost any reading will improve your mind, in a world where there is too much to do, you must be selective in the books you read. And so, I suggest you spend much of your time reading what Thoreau called “The Heroic Books” — those books that contain “the noblest recorded thoughts of man.” Let your mind drink deeply from the works of the great philosophers, such as Epictetus and Confucius. Study the poems of the wisest poets, such as Alfred Lord Tennyson, Emily Dickinson and John Keats, and the novels of Leo Tolstoy, Hermann Hesse and the Brontës. Read the writings of Mahatma Gandhi,
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Letters from a Stoic, Seneca The Message of a Master, John McDonald Meditations, Marcus Aurelius The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin University of Success, Og Mandino The Magic of Believing, Claude Bristol Siddhartha, Hermann Hesse Psycho-Cybernetics, Maxwell Maltz The Power of Your Subconscious Mind, Joseph Murphy As a Man Thinketh, James Allen Flow, Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi Think and Grow Rich, Napoleon Hill Life Is Tremendous, Charlie Tremendous Jones
Norman Cousins once noted that “The Tragedy of life is not death, but what we let die inside of us while we live.”
In my speeches, I often use the following story drawn from ancient Indian mythology to remind the audience that there is an abundance of potential and ability just waiting to be awakened within us if we will only allow it to see the light of day. Thousands of years ago, it was believed that everyone who walked the earth was a god. But humankind abused its limitless powers so the supreme god decided to hide the godhead, the source of all of this potential, so that no one could find it. The question then became, where could such a thing be hidden? The first adviser suggested it could be placed
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Mahatma Gandhi observed, “When I admire the wonder of a sunset or the beauty of the moon, my soul expands in worship of the Creator.”
author Glenn Bland wrote, “Goals and plans take the worry out of living.” If you set goals, the actions you take will be based on your life’s mission rather than on your day-to-day moods.
As I teach in my life-coaching programs, when you bear a grudge against someone, it is almost as if you carry that person around on your back with you. He drains you of your energy, enthusiasm and peace of mind. But the moment you forgive him, you get him off your back and you can move on with the rest of your life.
The Juiceman’s Power of Juicing by Jay Kordich.
the ancient Persian proverb “I wept because I had no shoes until I saw a man who had no feet.”
“If you follow the crowd, the place you will most likely end up at is the exit.” To live a richer, more rewarding life, it is essential that you run your own race.
Christopher Morley, who said, “Read every day something no one else is reading. Think every day something no one else is thinking. It is bad for the mind to be always part of unanimity.” And perhaps the very best one comes from Emerson: “It is easy in the world to live after the world’s opinion; it is easy in solitude to live after our own; but the great man is he who in the midst of the crowd keeps with perfect sweetness the independence of solitude.”
As Emma Goldman noted, “I’d rather have roses on my table than diamonds on my neck.”
