Right Attitudes

Her new bark is worse than ten times her old bite.
—James Russell Lowell (American Poet, Critic)

If a snake bites your neighbor, you too are in danger.
—African Proverb

The only practical way yet discovered by the world for curing its ills is to forget about them.
—Ben Hecht (American Screenwriter)

The essence of romantic love is that wonderful beginning, after which sadness and impossibility may become the rule.
—Anita Brookner (English Novelist, Art Historian)

Whenever you feel ‘short’ or in ‘need’ of something, give what you want first and it will come back in buckets. That is true for money, a smile, love, friendship. I know it is often the last thing a person may want to do, but it has always worked for me. I just trust that the principle of reciprocity is true, and I give what I want.
—Robert Kiyosaki (American Businessperson)

The bees can abide no drones amongst them; but as soon as they begin to be idle, they kill them.
—Plato (Ancient Greek Philosopher)

Don’t be a slave to style. Don’t take more from the world than you’re willing to give back. And learn to undo the perceptions—so heavily promoted by the media—that shopping is a form of therapy and that a purchase is nothing but a victory or a gain.
—Thanissaro Bhikkhu (American Buddhist Monk)

Just understand your mind: how it works, how attachment and desire arise, how ignorance arises, where emotions come from. It is sufficient to know the nature of all that; just that gives so much happiness and peace.
—Lama Thubten Yeshe (Tibetan Buddhist Teacher)

Strength just comes in one brand – you. Stand up at sunrise and meet what they send you and keep your hair combed.
—Reynolds Price (American Novelist)

If you don’t get a kick out of the job you’re doing you’d better hunt for another one.
—Samuel M. Vauclain (American Industrialist)

Who is so deafe or so blinde as is hee that wilfully will neither heare nor see?
—John Heywood

A man is well equipped for all the real necessities of life if he trusts his senses, and so cultivates them that they remain worthy of being trusted.
—Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (German Poet)

They are able because they think they are able.
—Virgil (Roman Poet)

The difference between guilt and shame is very clear—in theory. We feel guilty for what we do. We feel shame for what we are.
—Lewis B. Smedes (American Christian Theologian)

For those who immerse themselves in what the fairy tale has to communicate, it becomes a deep, quiet pool which at first seems to reflect only our own image; but behind it we soon discover the inner turmoils of our soul – its depth, and ways to gain peace within ourselves and with the world, which is the reward of our struggles.
—Bruno Bettelheim (Austrian-born Psychoanalyst)

If a poor person envies a rich person, he is no better than the rich person.
—Leo Tolstoy (Russian Novelist)

Charity is a calm, severe duty; it must be intellectual, to be advantageous. It is a strange mistake that it should ever be considered a merit; its fulfilment is only what we owe to each other, and is a debt never paid to its full extent.
—Letitia Elizabeth Landon (English Poet, Novelist)

Love doesn’t conquer everything. And whoever thinks it does is a fool.
—Donna Tartt (American Novelist)

Husbands are like fires. They go out when unattended.
—Zsa Zsa Gabor (Hungarian-born Film Actress)

All’s not offence that indiscretion finds.
—William Shakespeare (British Playwright)

Everything that is done in the world is done by hope. No merchant or tradesman would set himself to work if he did not hope to reap benefit thereby.
—Martin Luther (German Protestant Theologian)

Accuracy is the twin brother of honesty; inaccuracy, of dishonesty.
—Charles Simmons (American Editor, Novelist)

Prejudice is the child of ignorance.
—William Hazlitt (English Essayist)

Children find everything in nothing, men find nothing in everything.
—Giacomo Leopardi (Italian Poet)

Globalization is a bottom-up phenomenon with all actions initiated by millions of individuals, the sum total of which is “globalization.” No one is in charge, and no one can anticipate what the sum of all the individual initiatives will be before the result manifest. A global economy can only be the result of “spontaneous order.”
—John Naisbitt (American Trend Analyst)

A man sooner or later discovers that he is the master-gardener of his soul, the director of his life.
—James Allen (British Self-Help Author)

An unquestioned mind is the world of suffering.
—Byron Katie (American Speaker)

Of course, the liar often imagines that he does no harm as long as his lies go undetected. But the one lied to almost never shares this view. The moment we consider our dishonesty from the point of view of those we lie to, we recognize that we would feel betrayed if the roles were reversed.
—Sam Harris (American Neuroscientist, Atheist, Author)

A symphonic conductor should reconcile himself to the realization that, regardless of his approach or temperament, the eventual result is the same — the orchestra will hate him.
—Oscar Levant (American Musician)

There are those who say that when civilization progresses a bit further transportation facilities will move into the skies and under the ground, and that our streets will again be quiet, but I know perfectly well that when that day comes some new device for torturing the old will be invented.
—Tanizaki Jun’ichiro (Japanese Novelist)

Who is rich? He that rejoices in his Portion.
—Benjamin Franklin (American Founding Father, Inventor)

The shy man does have some slight revenge upon society for the torture it inflicts upon him. He is able, to a certain extent, to communicate his misery. He frightens other people as much as they frighten him. He acts like a damper upon the whole room, and the most jovial spirits become, in his presence, depressed and nervous.
—Jerome K. Jerome (English Humorist, Novelist)

The first step to knowledge is to know that we are ignorant.
—Richard Cecil

Of a great spirit is moderation in prosperity.
—Seneca the Elder (Marcus Annaeus Seneca) (Roman Rhetorician)

When death finally comes, you will welcome it like an old friend, aware of how dreamlike and impermanent the whole phenomenal world really is.
—Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche (Tibetan Buddhist Teacher)

Knowledge humanizes mankind, and reason inclines to mildness, but prejudices eradicate every tender disposition.
—Montesquieu (French Political Philosopher)

The sense of unhappiness is so much easier to convey than that of happiness. In misery we seem aware of our own existence, even though it may be in the form of a monstrous egotism: this pain of mine is individual, this nerve that winces belongs to me and to no other. But happiness annihilates us: we lose our identity.
—Graham Greene (British Novelist)

A library card is the start of a lifelong adventure.
—Lilian Jackson Braun (American Mystery Novelist)

Life for a photographer cannot be a matter of indifference and it is important to see what is invisible to others.
—Robert Frank (Swiss-American Photographer)

You can muffle the drum, and you can loosen the strings of the lyre, but who shall command the skylark not to sing?
—Kahlil Gibran (Lebanese-born American Philosopher)

Obviously crime pays, or there’d be no crime.
—G. Gordon Liddy (American Lawyer)

Loving-kindness and compassion are the basis for wise, powerful, sometimes gentle, and sometimes fierce actions that can really make a difference—in our own lives and those of others.
—Sharon Salzberg (Buddhist Teacher)

But there was no need to be ashamed of tears, for tears bore witness that a man had the greatest of courage, the courage to suffer.
—Viktor Frankl (Austrian Psychiatrist)

Great deeds are usually wrought at great risks.
—Herodotus (Ancient Greek Historian)

The day the Lord created hope was probably the same day he created Spring.
—Bert Williams (American Entertainer)

Create all the happiness you are able to create: remove all the misery you are able to remove. Every day will allow you to add something to the pleasure of others, or to diminish something of their pains. And for every grain of enjoyment you sow in the bosom of another, you shall find a harvest in your own bosom; while every sorrow which you pluck out from the thoughts and feelings of a fellow creature shall be replaced by beautiful peace and joy in the sanctuary of your soul.
—Jeremy Bentham (British Philosopher, Economist)

Honesty is the best image.
—Tom Wilson (American Cartoonist)

In youth one has tears without grief; in age, griefs without tears.
—Philibert Joseph Roux (French Surgeon)