Quote #60

“The greatest minds are capable of the greatest vices as well as the greatest virtues.”
– Rene Descartes

We are quick to judge. The moment we notice something about a person that doesn’t sit well with us we tend to make that person into the thing we don’t like. Sure, it doesn’t always happen exactly like that, but it’s common on one level or another.

Have you ever met someone who is especially hard to be around? Have you ever found yourself to be difficult for others to work with?

Is it possible that those difficulties are hiding a truly wonderful person?

Remind yourself that someone with a great capacity for bad has an equally great capacity for good. We can help draw that out of people by the way we treat them. Do not be quick to judge, but always look for the good in people.

Quote #59

“There is nothing noble in being superior to your fellow man; true nobility is being superior to your former self.”
– Ernest Hemingway

I’m doing two today because I feel like this one goes nicely with the previous one. Well, and the one before that. And several others.

As humans, we often compare ourselves to others. The problem is when that behavior results in someone concluding that they are better (or more important) than someone else.

Even if you were to achieve actual superiority over someone else (not sure this is possible), there is nothing noble in doing so. It is a selfish, immature endeavor that cannot make you an inherently better person. The sum of your efforts, all revolving around another person, will be that you are better than someone that you had no need (or ability, really) to compare yourself with.

It may seem like a more self-centered view, but the only person that matters in the race for superiority is you. The only person you can truly measure is yourself.

You may be comparing yourself with your neighbor and you may one day declare yourself to be superior to him. But his life is different from yours. He may be up against challenges that you know nothing about. Without his unique situation to accompany your efforts, what have you gained from feeling superior to him? All you’ve managed to do is belittle him in your own view, judging him without the full picture.

But you can judge your own self. You have the full picture of your own life. Use that to your advantage. Take a hard look at the you of the past and challenge yourself to being superior to that person. And do it again tomorrow. Do it every day.

Quote #58

“The fool doth think he is wise, but the wise man knows himself to be a fool.”
– William Shakespeare

I have a few quotes that run along these lines.

I used to act like a know-it-all. In fact, I’d say that sometimes I still fall into that trap.

It’s easy to feel like you know a lot, or you know more than someone else. But it is important to remember how much there is to learn, no matter how much we may have already learned.

Quote #57

“The keenest sorrow is to recognize ourselves as the sole cause of all our adversities.”
– Sophocles

Sometimes I let things bother me when I shouldn’t. Other times, the bother that I experience is justified.

I am a little concerned for a lot of people. There seems to be a culture of disassociation from responsibility.

One of the key elements of happiness is to be able to clearly see and understand how we relate to the world. There are tons of ways to run from a problem, but when it comes to finding happiness, we must start within our selves.

It is easy to blame outside forces on our problems. The challenge is to accept what we cannot change and to change what we can.

Of course, to accept what we can change as our own responsibility (without blaming it on external factors) is a painful process. But once accepted, this great truth bestows a multitude of freedoms and happiness.

Quote #56

“Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.”
– Viktor Frankl

This has been one of my favorite quotes lately. Between the principle taught in Quote #54 and the idea behind today’s quote, I think you’ve got a pretty good recipe for success.

We live in a very reactive culture. Our government reacts to things. Our parent style is becoming (as a society) more and more reactive. People take a reactive stance with relationships. Rarely do people go with the long, hard path through growth and personal improvement. Instead they react to things and live trapped in whatever moment is being presented to them. It’s like living life in the passenger seat.

I think everyone has experienced the space between stimulus and response. I still remember some of my earliest encounters with it.

When I was young my brother and I got on each other’s nerves a lot. We would often antagonize the other until he did something that would get him in trouble. I still remember one of the first times I decided I didn’t have to react in the way my brother intended me to. For a moment I was in control of what would come next. I felt the urge of the reaction setting in, but I made a choice instead of letting the reaction happen. I was free.

Surely most people have had an experience or two like mine. Yet we seem to forget that the choice is there. How often do we hear “I didn’t have a choice,” or , “I don’t know, I just reacted,” along with the telling of a story that didn’t go as well as it could have?

Of course, there are situations where reactions cannot be avoided. It is in those situations that preparedness and training become important. In an emergency it can be important to simply react, and as long as you have prepared yourself and received the proper training you can be sure that your reaction can save lives. But without preparing yourself first, an emergency could lead you to react in a way that could get you or other people killed. Fight, flight, or freeze. Those are the natural reactions of a human being in the face of intense stress, danger, or fright. But if you’ve trained for it the training can become instinctual.

Even outside of emergency response a little mental preparation can go a long way. Instead of waiting for your child to do something that shocks you and takes you by surprise, spend a little time preparing yourself for the worst. If you aren’t shocked you don’t have to react. If you choose your response you can prevent making a situation worse.

Regardless of the situation, a controlled response is always better than a knee-jerk reaction. Even with training, a clear mind and calm demeanor go a lot further than an unplanned reaction.

Quote #55

“We should be taught not to wait for inspiration to start a thing. Action always generates inspiration. Inspiration seldom generates action.”
– Frank Tibolt

This one is somewhat related to quote #54, which covered laziness. In that quote we looked at how laziness and impatience generally negative results.

Today I’m going to look at how waiting for inspiration is a form of laziness. Sometimes we lie to ourselves and say that we didn’t do something we needed to do because we didn’t feel like it. Waiting until you feel like doing something important is the same as waiting for inspiration to strike. If it has to get done, you do it. Often, once you spring into action you will feel better about it.

Of course, this extends beyond what must be done and into things that you want to do.

A couple of years ago I wrote a JavaScript application at work to handle the creation of our work center schedule. It automated most of a two to three hour job, allowing one man to create two months’ worth of schedule in less than thirty minutes. It has mostly worked well for the last couple years, generating more than a dozen schedules without a single hitch. However, the code was poorly written and was beginning to show signs of failure (not knowing the JavaScript had a built-in Date handler, I had manually written all of the date code, and it was bad).

For several months now I’ve been telling myself that I should make a new scheduler, but I didn’t feel inspired to do it. Instead, I felt inspired to write several other (completely useless) projects.

Then, one day last week, I decided that I didn’t need inspiration, I just needed to get started. So I did.

Now that I’ve been working on the project for a week (without much inspiration) I am beginning to feel inspired. The act of working on the project has generated the inspiration to keep working on it.

This might be an overly obvious principle to some, but to others it is a crippling obstacle, the inner workings of which they do not understand.

It is usually better to do something without feeling the inspiration than to put it off while you wait for the inspiration.

Quote #54

“There art two cardinal sins from which all others spring: Impatience and Laziness.”
– Franz Kafka

As much as I was dying yesterday to dive into a bunch of quotes about a lot of topics, today’s was much easier to pick.

Sometimes I pick quotes based on how much truth they have and how much I’ve been thinking about that truth recently. This particular truth has been manifesting itself all around me lately, and I wanted to share it with you today.

Though Franz is identifying the root of sins here, I would argue that these two, impatience and laziness, are responsible for most mistakes and errors. People who rush and hurry make more mistakes, and people who are too lazy to do things properly often cause society problems.

So if you’re going to fight any traits today, focus on impatience and laziness.

Quote #53

“I find that a great part of the information I have was acquired by looking up something and finding something else on the way.”
– Franklin Pierce Adams

To be honest, I had completely forgotten that I had this quote in my collection. I found it while browsing through looking for a quote to write about. I found so many quotes I wanted to write about that I couldn’t settle on just one. Several quotes by Carl Jung stood out, along with many others. Pretty soon I was looking at the clock wondering how many I could write about tonight before falling asleep at the computer.

I decided that I needed to pick just one (it’s getting pretty late). After finding so many great quotes this one stood out because of all the nice quotes I had re-discovered while looking for something to write about. I suppose this selection is a little meta.

I really like this quote for a couple reasons though.

First, this quote 100% applies to me, word for word.

Growing up we had an older set of encyclopedias in my house. My younger brother and I mostly used the heaviest books from the set to hold sheets on the table for under-the-table forts and to weigh down the side tabs of Hot-Wheels tracks. Occasionally, however, my father would refer me to the books look something up that I asked about. What I liked best about those times cracking open the encyclopedia was all of the stuff that I wasn’t looking for that caught my eye. I’d often forget what I was looking up to begin with, distracted by something that I didn’t even know I was interested in. More than a few Sunday afternoons were spent following my Father’s example, pulling out one of the many volumes and reading random entries while sprawled out on the floor. Even today I frequently get lost in a dizzying array of browser tabs full of Wikipedia articles and the source articles they link to. I become engrossed in completely random learning sessions, often covering several entirely different subjects, sometimes for hours at a time.

Secondly, I think this is a fantastic way to live. I pity anyone with such razor-sharp focus and rigorous discipline that they never allow themselves to wander their way through the process of looking up some bit of knowledge. The things we discover along the way will often make us who we are much more so than the things we originally set out to learn.

My main thoughts on this quote are these: learning is wonderful and it’s usually the journey, not the destination, that we should cherish.

Quote #52

“Better to write for yourself and have no public, than to write for the public and have no self.”
– Cyril Connolly

In preparing a post for my other blog (the one I don’t like as much as I like this one) I remembered that in my college communication and speech class we learned that it is imperative that you know your audience.

I think, though, that too many entertainers, writers, and producers are not doing what they love as much as they are doing what their audience loves in order to get more money. They aren’t just knowing their audience, they are trying to cater to their audience without starting with what drives themselves first.

It’s the reason that many bands lose their original fan base when they sign big record deals. It’s the reason that small business that grow into large corporations often fail to maintain a human touch in their customer relations.

If you are doing what you do for your own personal, non-financial reasons, then you’ll be happy and anyone who also loves what you do will continue to love you. If you try too hard to make people love you and spend money on you then you lose touch with yourself and you lose big in the end.

Though I don’t usually put links or other fancy doodads in this blog, I’m going to make an exception for this excellent TED talk about inspiring others by starting with “why” you do what you do. It’s almost twenty minutes long, but well worth it for anyone interested in leadership, business, or doing what you love for yourself and expanding a business around that idea.

Quote #51

“The important thing is this: to be able at any moment to sacrifice what we are for what we could become.”
– Charles Du Bos

I watched a movie recently that got me thinking about this quote again.

Like most people, I don’t like to be preached at. However, my definition of being preached at is probably a little different from yours. A lot of people felt preached at when they saw Wall-E. I did not. But I’m not setting out to discuss what I thought of that movie, I’m going to touch briefly on a different movie.

I’ve heard more than a few people criticize the new Man of Steel movie for drawing too many religious parallels. In fact, it seems the filmmakers may have been intentionally marketing the film at Christians. So it’s easy to see how non-religious moviegoers may have felt a little preached at.

The movie didn’t have too much of a preachy tone for me, but it did have a strong moral message, which (in this case) I appreciated. The theme is to decide what kind of man you will become.

Religious themes and parallels aside, this is a great lesson. Superman (Clark Kent), even as a boy, had great power and immense potential for good. As a child he could have easily shown bullies who was boss and they never would have bothered him again. But his father taught him to restrain his power and use it with discernment and caution for fear that he would be rejected and outcast as a freak.

He also taught his son to focus on the long term consequences of his actions and choices (sure, you could beat that little boy up, but there are many reasons why you should not). The statement (as posed in the film), “You have to decide what kind of man you want to grow up to be,” provided Clark with a strong moral foundation. Also, the idea of not going around showing everyone his power indiscriminately taught him a valuable lesson about discretion which eventually led to the adoption of a secret identity.

There is another side to this though.

Clark could have become comfortable with backing away from fights. After spending his childhood shying away from confrontation due to the lessons he was learning, what if Clark Kent had decided that violence was, without exception, wrong?

Sure, he loved rescuing people. He did that all the time. But he didn’t do any fighting. I think the movie kind of glanced over a monumental internal battle that could have taken place inside of Clark’s head.

What happened in his head when he first realized that General Zod would have to be dealt with violently? Did he simply deny every ounce of restraint in his mind and lash out violently? Was it a calculated decision to adopt violence as the solution to the problem?

The reality is that we don’t know. But what we do know is that he made a choice and became Superman. In fact (if you haven’t seen the movie yet you might want to skip to the next paragraph to avoid a spoiler) the final battle scene of the movie did show, through acting, a bit of an internal battle when he was faced with the choice of ending the conflict at the risk of killing a few of the people he was trying to save. This was resolved based on the scene with the tornado in which his father taught him that some things (discretion about the use of his powers) outweigh a single human life (or the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, as Superman’s father knew that Clark would go on to be a great benefit to the human race).

Superman, as far as I know, does not use violence unless he needs to. But young Clark Kent was taught a high moral standard that may not have seemed to allow any room for violence. That non-violent Kent had to sacrifice a part of himself that he was comfortable with in order to become Superman, a hero dedicated to using whatever force is necessary in order to attain the best possible outcome in a given situation according to his values.

Today’s quote has meant a lot to me in various points of my personal journey. I, like many people, tend to get very comfortable with certain parts of my life, personality, or character. There is always some unrest, some area in which I know I could improve. Those are the uncomfortable bits. But what about the parts of us that we are comfortable with? We tend to take them for granted and overlook them when looking for ways to improve. Is there really no way to improve those parts?

Perhaps you feel that you are good at communicating. You are able to tell stories in a way that people understand, and you are talented at getting messages across even under less than ideal circumstances. You worked hard on your communication skills for years, and now you feel that it is something with which you are comfortable.

Every once in a while you’ll fail to get your message across, but you decide that the other person was just an exceptionally poor listener.

One day someone tells you that they feel you aren’t communicating well with them. Human nature is to react defensively. You justify your defensiveness based on the years you put into improving your communication skills. Besides, they must be a poor communicator since they are failing to recognize your awesome communication skills, right?

I used one example here (one that I’ve seen before), but this idea applies everywhere. The reality is that we are often afraid of sacrificing what we are (and possibly what we’ve invested into what we are), even when there is potential to become something better. This fear, like most fears, stems from the unknown. We are not usually sure of what we will become if we take the leap and make the sacrifice. There is no implicit guarantee that the results will be an improvement. This is used as justification for maintaining our status quo.

I have seen people sacrifice what they are for what they could become. I have seen people sacrifice their comfortable jobs in order to chase after their dreams and better opportunities. I have seen people sacrifice their religious convictions in order to pursue a greater truth. I have seen people sacrifice their beliefs about society, family, and even reality in order to become better, more open, and stronger people. Some of these sacrifices may have been in vain or simply misplaced, and a few of them did not result in a positive change. But none of them were misguided so long as the goal was improvement. It takes a lot of courage and bravery to make these sacrifices. People don’t easily stray from comfort.

It’s not one of my favorite quotes, but Neale Donald Walsch is quoted as saying “Life begins at the end of your comfort zone.” I much prefer the way Charles Du Bos puts it in today’s quote, but the message is the same.

Have courage. Seek improvement. Take calculated risks. Be willing to sacrifice what you are for what you could become.

Quote #50

“In this life we are either kings or pawns, emperors or fools.”
– Napoleon Bonaparte

For the last couple of weeks a single thought has been echoing around in my head: all men are either kings or pawns. After even just a few days I knew I’d want to confirm that it was a quote I was remembering, so I started researching the quote in an attempt to confirm its origins and accuracy. Unfortunately, I could not confirm that Napoleon actually said it (based on a quick Google search), but then I decided it didn’t matter. It’s the idea that I’m writing about, not the fact that a particular French general said it.

As soon as I finish writing this I am going to return to a JavaScript programming project I began this weekend. I don’t have an official title for it, but for now I am referring to it as my battle simulator. It generates a lot of code-based object entities that all make decisions based on sets of rules, all by themselves. They are divided into teams and arranged into a battlefield where they attack enemy teams until one team emerges victorious. Early in the development I ran into a lot problems with the rules by which those little soldiers made their decisions. At one point they would occasionally go to the edge of the battlefield and get stuck. I described those ones as being frozen with fear, but a coworker had another idea. He said they were the only smart ones. They were standing by at the edge of the battle wondering why they had to fight. “Why are we even here?” they were asking.

Well, I couldn’t have my code-warriors stopping to examine their deepest existential questions. So I found the problem and nixed the behavior. Now they just fight to the death, staining the battlefield with pools of their own blood digital. What have I created? A pawn generating system. They are pawns. They don’t do what they want. They don’t make their own decisions. They don’t run their own lives. I do. I am their king. Sure, I’m not leading just one army of pawns into battle (I’m actually setting hundreds of them up in wars for my own entertainment), but I am the one that is in control.

Is life really this way? Kind of. The thing is, things are very rarely as black and white (or as extreme) as my example. Sure, there is the occasional occurrence of a truly polarized situation or issue, but that is rare. Since I love programming I tend to think of A and B situations in two computer related terms. First there are binary terms. Sometimes (very, very rarely) something is truly A or B and it cannot be both. These are switches – on or off, true or false.

Other times things are a little more blurry. In those cases I think of a slider. Maybe the slider is all the way on the A side. Maybe all the way on the B side. But it could be anywhere in between as well. These are percentages.

And so it is in life. Life is not binary. It consists of sliders. We are indeed kings or pawns, but not in a binary sense. We are always somewhere between kings or pawns, and it can change.

In fact, I like to take it a step further. Not only are we a slider between kings or pawns, but different aspects of our lives can have separate slider values. Maybe at home we behave in more of a pawn way around our spouse (or parent or sibling) but we are a king with our children (or friends, or whatever). Perhaps once we get to work or school that changes again. Maybe it changes based a certain stimulus or circumstances. But most of the time in a given situation that slider is going to be the same each time you get to that particular situation. So the slider isn’t just one slider moving around all the time, it’s actually a collection of sliders with individual settings. These, too, can change over time or with hard work, but they represent the typical setting for that situation.

I believe it goes further than this. Not only are we all kings or pawns, but within those categories there are different kinds of kings and different kinds of pawns. And within those subcategories there are collections of sliders. We humans are very complex creatures. Individuals cannot just be thrown into a particular category. But we can be separated into behavioral categories (like kings or pawns) so long as it is considered situational and specific to circumstances.

We could talk all day about the many different types of pawns in the world. But that’s not what I’ve been thinking about lately. I think the world has and will always have plenty of pawns. It’s the kings that need work and attention in many cases.

I think there are two main categories of kings, and again we should consider that these do not exist in binary within our personalities.

The basic types of kings are the solids and the forces. While both are necessary and important, I think that the world needs more of one than the other.

Solid kings are typically what I would consider unmoving and opaque. There may be times when a solid king is necessary, but I tend to think of them as leaders that get in the way and cause stumbling blocks for others. They are obstacles that often impede the progress of those around them. They are earth because they are coarse and solid, and they are fire because they can be destructive and difficult to be around. If a solid king (or leader) were a mirror and you looked into it you would only see your flaws and shortcomings reflected back at you.

The forces are the kings that influence and help others along. They apply the proper amount of force to guide people along the path to improvement and progress. They are wind because they push gently, and they are water because their force is powerful, flexible, and it gives life. If a force king (or leader) were a mirror and you looked into it you would only see your potential and your strengths reflected back at you.

Now obviously the solid kings do have some traits that leaders should have, and that is why balance is necessary. But balance doesn’t always mean putting your slider at exactly 50% between A and B. If A is more important (carries more weight) a balanced slider lies closer to A than B (think of the lever and its fulcrum).

We are all mirrors to those around us. When they look to us they should have their potential and strengths reflected back at them more strongly than any of their flaws or shortcomings. It is necessary from time to time to point out an area of potential improvement to someone that you lead, but these matters must be handled with tact, care, patience, and strength. Balance.

If men are to sometimes act as kings over other men I hope they can be kings of influence and force rather than kings that cause others to stumble and fall.

Quote #49

“Shallow men believe in luck, believe in circumstances — it was somebody’s name, or he happened to be there at the time, or it was so then, and another day would have been otherwise. Strong men believe in cause and effect.”
– Ralph Waldo Emerson

In my duties as a supervisor at work I have been trying to work at fully accepting these words. I have, in the past, allowed myself to feel victimized by negative situations that I now accept as my own fault. Sometimes, in the face of failure, there may be evidence that you did everything you could, but that doesn’t mean you can’t learn from it and hope to do better next time.

Of course, there are times that you have to accept what you could not control. Disasters, catastrophes, and many unusual health problems come to mind. We can’t blame ourselves for things that are out of our control. I touched on this topic when I wrote about fighting inanimate objects.

But when it’s not an “inanimate object” (or situation) we need to recognize where we went wrong rather than justifying our failures based on loosely related but ultimately irrelevant data. Other people’s successes and our failures are not circumstantial. We must look at ourselves and evaluate our circumstances based on the cause and effect model. We need to take control, own up, and quit leaving our future to chance.

Quote #48

“Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn’t go away.”
– Philip K. Dick

I have a sizable collection of quotes that I pull from for this blog. When I decide to do a post here it’s either because I’ve found a new quote that I love too much not to share with the world, or because I’ve decided I’ve neglected the blog for too long.

In this case I feel that I’ve neglected writing for too long. I’ve been attempting to organize the time that I dedicate to my hobbies and entertainment, and part of that consists of trying to stay regular with my blog posts.

Today I’m writing here. Tomorrow maybe somewhere else.

So what does all of this have to do with the quote I’ve shared?

When I write here out of guilt I often scroll down the long list of quotes that I have, looking for one that “speaks” to me at the moment. I try to find one that sums up my feelings or attitude toward life.

I’m in an odd period of life right now. My work schedule has been changing regularly and it’s affecting my health. Whenever that happens I generally find myself fighting additional pessimism and depression. Life becomes a burden and a struggle. So to lighten the load I attempt to find activities that will make things easier.

This time I’ve been going through various aspects of my life (possessions, time, relationships, philosophies, etc.) trying to organize and sort. I suppose I am trying to define reality and figure things out. Mostly that means throwing out what I don’t need.

It’s good to get rid of things, but you have to be careful that you don’t throw out parts of your reality. If you need the job you have, you shouldn’t quit. If you need a home to live in, you can’t move out until you’ve secured an alternative. Even if you can manage to convince yourself that you don’t need that job, if the need for the job doesn’t go away when you stop believing in it then the job was part of reality.

So I’m going through my life imagining myself without things. I’m ceasing to believe in whatever I might be able to do without. In these mental simulations I am attempting to define what is part of my reality, and what will truly go away if I stop believing in it.

It’s a slow process, but one that I believe has benefits. I’ve practiced a form of this process for as long as I can remember (even back in my childhood). It’s a never-ending process. Even when I eventually move on from this episode the job will be unfinished. I’ll come back to it another time and I’ll start over.

Quote #47

“The roots of education are bitter, but the fruit is sweet.”
– Aristotle

Tomorrow I graduate from class that I was mildly dreading in the beginning. I had heard horror stories about the amount of work involved, the required extra-curricular activities, and the generally strict atmosphere. It didn’t sound like a class I could do well in, and I thought for sure I would be miserable. There was also a lot of doubt in my mind as to whether I could finish the class at all.

Five weeks later and I have completed all of the graded assignments. Not only did I fail to do poorly in any of the assignments, but I seem to have excelled a little. Tomorrow, at the graduation, awards will be given for several achievements, and I know I am in the running for at least two of the three main awards. I never strive for such awards or successes. In fact, I don’t even know exactly what is required for the awards because I wasn’t paying attention when the instructor described the criteria.

What I do know is that I applied myself, learned a lot, and did not enjoy it all. The class was stressful, annoying (at times), hard work, and full of unnecessary drama. The class was bitter, to be sure.

However, I also made some outstanding friends, thoroughly enjoyed my instructor, collected a plethora of useful information, and explored aspects of my personality that had gone largely unused since high school. I grew in character, I grew as a leader, and I gained some confidence in certain social scenarios. The results of taking the class are sweet.

The process of education can  be painful. The fundamentals are painful. But the end result and what you can do with it is sweet enough to make you forget all about the roots.

Quote #46

“If you can’t explain it to a six year old, you don’t understand it yourself.”
– Albert Einstein

This quote came up in a class I am in today. I brought it up, though I was embarrassed by being unable to quote it reliably. I knew the basic idea, but the instructor was interested in the exact quote. So I went and found it, then decided to share it here too since I really do love the quote.

I have found this quote to be absolutely true and endlessly applicable in almost any situation.

For more than ten years I have interacted with and taught children in a variety of situations. There have been times that I have gone into a classroom thinking I would teach all of the children something that I thought I fully understood, only to emerge an hour later feeling frustrated and inept.

It turns out that the level of understanding required to explain things to six-year-olds is much more in-depth than one might initially assume. We might claim to understand a principle, but until we try really explaining it to someone of a lower understanding than our own, we can’t truly claim to fully understand.

Ever since discovering this principle for myself in practice, I have become much more secure in discerning between things that I understand and things that I do not understand. You can know something without fully understanding it – and that’s OK. Just make sure that you know the difference between knowing and understanding, because it can really get frustrating to realize that you didn’t understand something as well as though thought you did; especially when communicating the idea and finding that you just aren’t getting your point across.

Quote #45

“Don’t ever wrestle with a pig. You’ll both get dirty, but the pig will enjoy it.”
– Cale Yarborough

Today’s quote comes from a deep-south tobacco farmer turned NASCAR driver who has been married for over 50 years to the same woman, operates a car dealership, and named one of his three daughters B.J. because… well…

Yeah. I think we can all accept that this may be one of the most incredibly wise men to ever walk the face of the planet.

Regardless of the man’s credentials, this quote is as true as anything I’ve ever posted on here, and it can have serious ramifications for confrontational types.

I am reminded of this quote tonight because on a social network I saw the following (I’d cite the source, but it’s typed into a low-resolution image, and the source part is too small to read):

There are some people who always seem angry and continuously look for conflict. Walk away;  the battle they are fighting isn’t with you, it is with themselves.

My parents taught me that principle, and it has helped me tremendously throughout life. Additionally, through that understanding I have been able to help others recover from rough encounters with various incarnations of “pigs” in our society.

I was taught that it takes two to tango. An argument or fight cannot breathe without two people pumping fuel into it.

I am often criticized for being anti-confrontational. If someone wrongs me, I am sometimes scoffed by onlookers as I walk away. “You going to let that guy do that to you? You should punch his lights out.” “He just called you a(n) _______. You’re just going to walk away?”

Why would I give someone who insults or wrongs me the pleasure of watching as I ruin my own day over their actions? If they are so full of deceit, hate, anger, bitterness, and other bad feelings, then I pity them. But I do not need to pay them any heed.

Choose your battles wisely. Walk away from those who seek conflict with you. Stop yourself from retorting every flawed argument. Cut the oxygen supply off when you see a fight brewing. And seriously, don’t ever wrestle with a pig.

Quote #44

“It’s not hard to make decisions when you know what your values are.”
– Roy Disney

Lately this quote has been crossing my mind with some regularity.

Election years always leave us riddled with political bullets from any issue that might be considered important to anyone anywhere. And everywhere I go I hear discussions about which side of an issue is right, and who is right, and what choice is the best choice.

And I remember my father teaching me this quote by Roy Disney.

I find that most of my decisions are easy. I gather facts, I weigh my choices, and my values always make the wrong choices clear. They don’t always make a single choice jump out as being the only correct way forward (though that does happen on occasion), but the wrong choices are always evident (except when there is no wrong choice).

The hardest decisions are the ones that pit one value against another, in which case we grow and learn more about our values.

Quote #43

“When a place gets crowded enough to require ID’s, social collapse is not far away. It is time to go elsewhere. The best thing about space travel is that it made it possible to go elsewhere.”
– Robert A. Heinlein

This quote sums up all of my thoughts for the last week or so (almost all of them, anyhow).

I’m getting tired of society.

I want to travel.

I love space travel.

I have to agree that some form of social collapse is in progress. Things aren’t looking great. I am aware how pessimistic I sound when I say it. I do have some optimism left, and little bits and pieces of our society continue to remind me that there are plenty of good people and good things happening still.

That doesn’t cover up the signs of a crumbling system, and those pockets of goodness are not enough to steer our society away from disaster.

Space travel though… That might be something, huh? Imagine going to a neighboring solar system to colonize some rocky moon, billions of miles away.

Would it be far enough away? Probably.

A more realistic way to get away though is local travel on Earth. My wife and I have been making preparations to go somewhere. We’ll start small, perhaps taking the kids to stay at a cheap hotel within driving distance for a weekend. Then we’ll take a plane somewhere. Then we’ll get passports (renew mine) and go overseas somewhere (or maybe just Mexico) without going too crazy, eventually we’ll work our way up to going to Disney World, and finally going to some of the more exotic places we’d like to see.

Sigh. To travel would be wonderful. Money. We need some.

Quote #42

“The only thing worse than a man you can’t control is a man you can.”
– Margo Kaufman

Over the years I’ve worked with all sorts of people. I must say, it has been frustrating trying to work with some of them. No matter how hard you try to help, influence, or direct them, they do whatever they want (for better or for worse).

It’s infuriating really, but I suppose it’s better than the alternative.

Sure, being humble, teachable, and a good follower – those are all great traits. I don’t think having those traits makes you a controllable man.

But when I look around me at the way people are living reactive lives – reacting to this, responding to that, and all in the precise manner that was intended by the creator of the media – I see a bunch of sad little people who have no idea they aren’t thinking for themselves.

I am glad that I was taught to think for myself as a child. I am not bound by what the masses feel, think, believe, or wish. I am bound by my own will and my agency.

I hope that I can teach my children similar principles.

Quote #41

“Laughing at our mistakes can lengthen our own life. Laughing at someone else’s can shorten it.”
– Cullen Hightower

Laughter is medicinal, but unfortunately some people don’t take kindly to being laughed at. Take it from a guy who knows.

It’s a shame you can’t go around laughing at people though. It would be healthy if you didn’t have to worry about people knocking your lights out.

Regardless, make sure that the next time you make a mistake you laugh at yourself.