Tuesday, April 24, 2018

2018-17 - Take your best shot...

"Take a look around," the instructor had advised.

"Ask yourself if there's anyone else who is better qualified to do the job. Not in the entire galaxy, but right there, at that point in time."

"If the answer is 'yes', ask them to accept command, and do everything you can to support them."

"If the answer is 'no', which it will be ninety-nine percent of the time, then take your best shot... That's all any of us can do."

~ William C Dietz (Halo: The Flood))



"People differ, not only in their ability to do, but also in their 'will' to do."

~ Dr Paul Hersey

Tuesday, April 17, 2018

2018-16 - How to encourage...


Thirty years ago my older brother, who was ten years old at the time, was trying to get a report written on birds that he'd had three months to write, which was due the next day.

We were out at our family cabin in Bolinas, and he was at the kitchen table close to tears, surrounded by binder paper and pencils and unopened books about birds, immobilized by the hugeness of the task ahead.

Then my father sat down beside him put his arm around my brother's shoulder, and said, "Bird by bird, buddy. Just take it bird by bird."

~ Anne Lamott ((Bird by Bird))



"Correction does much, but encouragement does more."

~ Johann von Goethe

Tuesday, April 10, 2018

2018-15 - Discipline…

I can't think of anything that anyone has ever accomplished without having some sort of self-discipline. Without knowing how to work for it. Without learning how to earn it.

I talk to my friends who are writers. I say, "Well, how do you do it?"

Most all of them will say, "I force myself every day to sit down and write for at least two hours. Whether something comes out of it or doesn't come out of it, whether I finish my fifty pages or two, I sit down and I do that because I have to make myself do it."

That's what a work ethic is.

If you want something, if you want to achieve success in any area of life, you must apply your discipline and your work ethic. Because discipline is what helps you consciously do things in order to reach a desired goal.

~ Cameron Díaz (The Body Book)



"Personal discipline is a most powerful character quality."

~ Elizabeth George

Tuesday, April 3, 2018

2018-14 - Fear...

"Don't be scared," Willa Mae said.

I looked at her. "Aren't you scared?"

Willa Mae looked at me and said, "Shoot. The only thing I'm afraid of is that I'm going to do something I'll regret."

"Being scared is just one more thing to turn into what you want it to be," Willa Mae said. "The thing with fear is, it's like anger. You've got to change it into something else. Make it your weapon. Some can just turn it into smarts. The best of them can turn fear and anger into love."

~  Margaret McMullan (Sources of Light)



“The brave man is not he who does not feel afraid, but he who conquers that fear.”

~ Nelson Mandela