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The Momentous Conquest
“The honor of the conquest is rated by the difficulty.” (Baron De Montesquieu) Self-control is rather important. Humankind has assumed control enough of atoms that we can destroy an entire city in an instant, but all that power is useless without the self-control of those in charge of the button. Self-control is rather hard. We […]
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Risk More, Regret Less
“Ideas without action aren’t ideas. They’re regrets.” (Jeff Haden, Inc Magazine) I just spent a few days in Las Vegas with my family. We had a great time — without gambling one cent. Don’t get me wrong; my stance against it is not a moral position, and it’s not because I’m not a gambler. It’s actually quite the […]
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Loving Liberty
“The love of liberty is the love of others; the love of power is the love of ourselves.” (William Hazlitt) When people are disrespectful or rude, we can easily lose our cool. We all have the tendency to think the world should bend to our whims, and, when it doesn’t, we can get pretty worked […]
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Keeping Your Word
“Never promise more than you can perform.” (Publilius Syrus) Simple, right? If you promise to take your daughter for ice cream after dinner, you take her for ice cream. She sees that you can be trusted, and all is well in the world. Of course, it’s a lot easier when what you’ve promised is something […]
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Write More, Memorize Less
“The palest ink is better than the best memory.” (Chinese Proverb) My kids have been making fun of me a lot this week. This is not new, for I am frequently their target. What’s new is the subject of their barbs—my fading memory. As I get older, names and events seem to be slipping away […]
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Needy Parents
“Learning to dislike children at an early age saves a lot of expense and aggravation later in life.” (Robert Byrne) This quote is obviously sarcastic, but sarcasm is only funny when it hints at the truth. Mr. Byrne has touched upon the truth that sometimes it’s almost impossible to like your kids. They annoy us, […]
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Smile When You Fail
“Success is the ability to go from one failure to another with no loss of enthusiasm.” (Sir Winston Churchill) I’ll admit it: I don’t trust optimists. Maybe it’s my Gen X cynicism, or my resting jerk face (ask anyone in our office), but I simply have a hard time believing people when they “always look on the […]
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Easy is Hard
“Do not pray for an easy life, pray for the strength to endure a difficult one.” (Bruce Lee) Take this moment, and thank the heavens for all the difficult moments you’ve already gone through this year. Maybe you’ve had a boss redress you in plain view. Maybe you’ve had a child get bullied, and watched […]
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Silence Your Anger
“Anger is the feeling that makes your mouth work faster than your mind.” (Evan Esar) A mind is a hard thing to keep up with. Minds wander. They daydream. They calculate far more quickly than we can even fathom. But when we get angry, our minds have a tendency to check out and take a […]
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Live Right Now
“To see what is in front of one’s nose needs a constant struggle.” (George Orwell) Yes, we are concerned for the future. It is wise and prudent to plan ahead, to save for things in the future, to know where we want to go and how we want to get there. And, yes, we are […]