Rules of Thumb/Advice/Words to live by
Some of my personal favorites
"There is no sincerer love than the love of food." (George Bernard Shaw 1856-1950)
"Nothing is so painful to the human mind as a great and sudden change." (Mary Shelley in Frankenstein )
"Indecision is the key to flexibility."
"If I look confused it's because I'm thinking." (Samuel Goldwyn)
More General ones
"Don't ask yourself what the world needs. Ask yourself what makes you come alive, and go do that, because what the world needs is people who have come alive." (unknown quoted by Gil Bailie)
"Beware of the man who won't be bothered with details." (William Feather)
"I don't say embrace trouble. That's as bad as as treating it as an enemy.
But I do say meet it
as a friend, for you'll see a lot of it and had better be on speaking
terms with it." (Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.)
"People are generally better persuaded by the reason which they themselves
discovered than by
those which have come to the minds of others." (Blaise Pascal)
"Have nothing in your houses that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful." (William Morris)
"Don't be punctual all the time, people will suspect you have nothing
better to do." (D. Gordon Rohman)
"In the same light be punctual when
you want people to feel that they are more important than those other things."
(Ben Cacace)
"The best use of one's time is to spend it on something that will outlast it." (paraphrase of William James)
"Unless our reading includes serious thinking, it is wasted time." (J.Oswald Sanders)
"A genius is a talented person who does his homework." (Thomas Edison)
"Lying makes a problem part of the future; truth makes a problem part of the past." (Rick Patino)
"Leadership training cannot be done on a mass scale. It requires patient,
careful instruction
and prayerful, personal guidance over
a considerable time." (J. Oswald Sanders)
"One day in retrospect the years of struggle will strike you as the most beautiful." (Sigmund Freud)
"The man who goes alone can start today; but he who travels with another must wait until the other is ready." (Henry David Thoreau)
"One thought driven home is better than three left on base." (James Liter)
"Today's greatest labor saving device is tomorrow." (Tom Wison)
"The secret of success is to know something nobody else knows." (Aristotle Onassis)
"Plans fail for lack of counsel, but with many advisers they succeed" (Proverbs 15:22)
"If someone offers you a breath mint, take it." (Ann Bevels)
"It's not what you look at that matters. It's what you see." (Henry David Thoreau)
"One falsehood spoils a thousand truths." (African Proverb)
"A heart at peace gives life to the body, but envy rots the bones" (Proverbs 14:30)
"He who makes great demands on himself is naturally inclined to make great
demands on others."
(Andre Gide)
"We must realize that no one prepares for a battle of which he is unaware, and no one wins a battle for which he doesn't prepare." (Randy Alcorn)
"When you get to the end of your rope, tie a knot and hold on." (Franklin D. Roosevelt)
"A cheerful look brings joy to the heart" (Proverbs 15:30)
"He who walks with the wise grows wise, but a companion of fools suffers harm" (Proverbs 13:20)
"Keep an open mind, but not so open that your brains fall out." (James Oberg)
"He who holds his tongue is wise, although he must be careful not to bite his fingers" (Ben Cacace)
"Ill-gotten treasures are of no value" (Proverbs 10:2)
"Never fight ugly people they have nothing to loose"
"As a man begins to live more seriously within; he begins to live more simply without."
"Simplicity of character is the natural result of profound thought." (Fortune Cookie)
"Our lives are frittered away by details. Simplify. Simplify." (Benjamin Franklin)
"Do not wear yourself out to get rich" (Proverbs 23:4)
"Beware the barrenness of a busy life." (Socrates)
"If you're going through hell, keep going." (Winston Churchill)
"If you do the job badly enough, sometimes you don't get asked to do it again." (Calvin)
"It is better to remain silent and thought a fool, than to speak up and remove all doubt." (Abraham Lincoln)
"If you choose not to decide, you still have made a choice." (Rush-Freewill)
"You are not discovering yourself, but creating yourself anew. Seek,
therefore, not to find
out who you are, seek to determine
who you want to be." (Neale Donald Walsch)
"If you were stuck at the top of a mountain, you'd want a prose-person, not a poetry person, helping you down." (David DeLaura)
"Keep away from people who try to belittle your ambitions. Small people
always do that,
but the really great make you feel
that you, too, can become great." (Mark Twain)
"I find that the harder I work, the more luck I seem to have." (Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826))
"Well-timed silence hath more eloquence than speech." (Martin Fraquhar Tupper)
"If you tell the truth you don't have to remember anything." (Mark Twain)
"If you can't be kind, at least be vague." (Judith Martin)
"The best way to predict the future is to create it." (Peter F. Drucker)
"Nobody can complain when their mouth is full." (Ben McLaughlin)
"If your head tells you one thing and your heart tells you another, before you do anything, you should first decide whether you have a better head or a better heart." (Marilyn Vos Savant)
"You have to be first, best or different." (Loretta Lynn)
"Money is what you make it - a master or a servant." (From Mt. Carmel Baptist Church's bulletin)
"Always keep your words soft and sweet, just in case you have to eat them."
"Be careful of your thoughts, they may become words at any moment."
"Keep on the lookout for novel ideas that others have used successfully. Your idea has to be original only in its adaptation to the problem you're working on." (Thomas Edison)
"Never be afraid to try something new. Remember, amateurs built the ark.
Professionals
built the Titanic." (Of course it
helps to be working for a better designer.)
"It's impossible to learn what you think you already know."
"Let him that would move the world first move himself." (Socrates)
"The man who does not read books has no advantage over the man that can not read them." (Mark Twain)
"You can only be young once, but you can be immature forever."
"The secret to being boring is to tell everything." (Voltair)
"We cannot all do great things, but we can do small things with great love." (Mother Teresa)
"If you can't convince them, confuse them." (Harry S. Truman)
"May you live all the days of your life." (Jonathan Swift)
"Never wrestle with a pig. You both get all dirty, and the pig likes it."
"Don't be afraid of opposition; Remember a kite rises against, not with the wind."
"If you want to be well liked never lie about yourself, and be careful when telling the truth about others."
"Treat a man as he is and he will remain as he is. Treat a man as he can and should be and he will become as he can and should be." (Goethe)
"You oughta stop playing God, because you are not good at it and the position is taken."
"Watch your thoughts; they become words. Watch your words; they become
actions. Watch your actions; they become habits. Watch your habits; they
become character. Watch
your character; it becomes your destiny."
"I'd rather be disliked for who I am than liked for who I'm not."
"Never cut what can be untied." (Life's Little Instruction Book)