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One can have no smaller or greater mastery than mastery of oneself.
~Leonardo da Vinci
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It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.
~Aristotle
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Believe those who are seeking the truth. Doubt those who find it.
~Andre Gide
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Why is this thus? What is the reason for this thusness?
~Artemus Ward
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Do not pursue what is illusory - property and position: all that is gained at the expense of your nerves decade after decade and can be confiscated in one fell night. Live with a steady superiority over life - don't be afraid of misfortune, and do not yearn after happiness; it is after all, all the same: the bitter doesn't last forever, and the sweet never fills the cup to overflowing.
~Alexander Solzhenitsyn
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I adore simple pleasures. They are the last refuge of the complex.
~Oscar Wilde
from The Picture of Dorian Gray, 1891
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If we don't change direction soon, we'll end up where we're going.
~Professor Irwin Corey
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This is how life will be. I must be wholehearted while tentative, fight for my values yet respect others, believe my deepest values right yet be ready to learn. I see that I shall be retracing this whole journey over and over - but, I hope, more wisely.
~William Perry
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A bit of advice given to a young Native American at the time of his initiation: "As you go the way of life, you will see a great chasm. Jump. It’s not as wide as you think."
~Joseph Campbell
from A Joseph Campbell Companion: Reflections on the Art of Living
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Nietzsche was the one who did the job for me. At a certain moment in his life, the idea came to him of what he called “the love of your fate.” Whatever your fate is, whatever the hell happens, you say, “This is what I need.” It may look like a wreck, but go at it as though it were an opportunity, a challenge. If you bring love to that moment–not discouragement–you will find the strength is there. Any disaster that you can survive is an improvement in your character, your stature, and your life. What a privilege! This is when the spontaneity of your own nature will have a chance to flow.
Then, when looking back at your life, you will see that the moments which seemed to be great failures followed by wreckage were the incidents that shaped the life you have now. You’ll see that this is really true. Nothing can happen to you that is not positive. Even though it looks and feels at the moment like a negative crisis, it is not. The crisis throws you back, and when you are required to exhibit strength, it comes.
~Joseph Campbell
from A Joseph Campbell Companion: Reflections on the Art of Living
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What does not destroy me, makes me stronger.
~Friedrich Nietzsche
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Happiness is when what you think, what you say, and what you do are in harmony.
~Gandhi
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All blame is a waste of time. No matter how much fault you find with another, and regardless of how much you blame him, it will not change you. The only thing blame does is to keep the focus off you when you are looking for external reasons to explain your unhappiness or frustration. You may succeed in making another feel guilty about something by blaming him, but you won't succeed in changing whatever it is about you that is making you unhappy.
~Wayne Dyer
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Do the thing we fear, and death of fear is certain.
~Ralph Waldo Emerson
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Speech is conveniently located midway between thought and action, where it often substitutes for both.
~John Andrew Holmes
from "Wisdom in Small Doses"
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First there is a time when we believe everything, then for a little while we believe with discrimination, then we believe nothing whatever, and then we believe everything again - and, moreover, give reasons why we believe.
~Georg Christoph Lichtenberg
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The moment we begin to fear the opinions of others and hesitate to tell the truth that is in us, and from motives of policy are silent when we should speak, the divine floods of light and life no longer flow into our souls.
~Elizabeth Cady Stanton
from 1890
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There is one principle that I wish the people would understand and lay to heart. Just as fast as you will prove before your God that you are worthy to receive the mysteries, if you please to call them so, of the kingdom of heaven-that you are full of confidence in God-that you will never betray a thing that God tells you-that you will never reveal to your neighbor that which ought not to be revealed, as quick as you prepare to be entrusted with the things of God, there is an eternity of them to bestow upon you. Instead of pleading with the Lord to bestow more upon you, plead with yourselves to have confidence in yourselves, to have integrity in yourselves, and know when to speak and what to speak, what to reveal, and how to carry yourselves and walk before the Lord. And just as fast as you prove to Him that you will preserve everything secret that ought to be-that you will deal out to your neighbors all which you ought, and no more, and learn how to dispense your knowledge to your families, friends, neighbors, and brethren, the Lord will bestow upon you, and give to you, and bestow upon you, until finally he will say to you, 'You shall never fall; your salvation is sealed unto you; you are sealed up unto eternal life and salvation, through your integrity'
~Brigham Young
from Journal of Discourses, 4:371-72
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I believe we should doubt some of the things we hear. Doubt has a place if it can stir in one an interest to go out and find the truth for one's self.... We should all exercise our God—given right to think and be unafraid to express our opinions... We must preserve freedom of the mind in the church and resist all efforts to suppress it. The church is not so much concerned with whether the thoughts of its members are orthodox or heterodox as it is that they shall have thoughts.
~Hugh B. Brown
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Knowledge comes, but wisdom lingers.
~Alfred Lord Tennyson
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Living apart and at peace with myself, I came to realize more vividly the meaning of the doctrine of acceptance. To refrain from giving advice, to refrain from meddling in the affairs of others, to refrain, even though the motives be the highest, from tampering with another's way of life - so simple, yet so difficult for an active spirit. Hands off!
~Henry Miller
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This is the manner of noble souls: they do not want to have anything for nothing; least of all, life. Whoever is of the mob wants to live for nothing; we others, however, to whom life gave itself, we always think about what we might best give in return...
~Friedrich Nietzche
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Joy, rather than happiness, is the goal of life, for joy is the emotion which accompanies our fulfilling our natures as human beings. It is based on the experience of one's identity as a being of worth and dignity.
~Rollo May
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It is one of the most beautiful compensations of life, that no man can sincerely try to help another without helping himself.
~Ralph Waldo Emerson
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Beware of dissipating your powers; strive constantly to concentrate them. Genius thinks it can do whatever it sees others doing, but is sure to repent of every ill-judged outlay.
~Johann Wolfgang von Goethe