QUOTATIONS

Helen Keller was a remarkable woman.  Struck deaf and blind by childhood illness, she spent her entire life striving and achieving.  She did more in her life than many people without the same disabilities could ever hope to achieve.  She was the first deaf-blind woman to graduate with a bachelor's degree from Harvard, cofounded the ACLU, and met with and influenced Presidents for decades.  Her mes...

It's easy to think that everyone else has it better than we do.  It's tempting to hold others in higher esteem than we hold ourselves.  We always find that, despite these thoughts, that the grass is not always greener on the other side.  But where is it greenest?  Where we water it.  

Marc Chagall was an artist who understood the magic of his work.  He understood that artists fulfill an important role for us.  They maintain our sense of wonder.  They push back against our (and their) tendency to want to sleep (or simply drift through life).  His words are a challenge to us to maintain that wonder.  

Stephanie Hunt is an author and writer whose works have touched numerous publications.  In addition to her writings, she teaches others to write, contributes to a non-profit radio station in South Carolina, and finds time in between all of that to read.  Reading is so important and so powerful and Stephanie's words in today's quote highlight just how vital it is.   You can find Stephanie and her w...

William Faulkner was a Pulitzer Prize winning author and recipient of the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1949.  At that time, the fear of nuclear annihilation was significant and everpresent and would be for decades to come.  Faulkner used his few short moments at the podium to graciously (perhaps begrudgingly) accept his award and then turned his attention to the young authors and writers in the cr...

This week, we revisit one of my favorite episodes about Rapoport's Rules for critical commentary.  I still struggle with this to this very day.  I hope this challenges you as much as it does me.  

Michael J. Fox has been an actor for decades.  He starred in Back to the Future, Spin City, & Family Ties.  He also happens to be an actor with Parkinson's.  Despite that diagnosis, he maintains palpable optimism.  How?  Today he tells us the magic ingredient to sustained optimism...it's gratitude.  

Oliver Warbucks is the fictional multi-millionaire in the classic musical Annie.  Though he is not a real person, he offers us valuable advice as we scramble for evermore success, wealth, and notoriety.  As you might expect, he reminds us that those things are not everything.  Of course, this is easy for him to say...but it doesn't mean there's not truth behind his words.  

Edmund Vance Cooke's poem is full of hardship, difficulty, and challenge.  It's also full of hope and should embolden us to stand still, with stiffened spines, as life's challenges confront us.  Let us have a good answer to the question "How did you die...?"

Chuck Palahniuk is the author of Fight Club, Choke, Invisible Monsters, and many other novels, often with troubled main characters and difficult circumstances.  Today's quote comes from one such character, Brandy, in Invisible Monsters.  We are the amalgamation of the people with whom we most often and closely associate.  Importantly, we can (and should) curate that group carefully.

Augustine of Hippo is a saint in multiple churches and penned a fascinating autobiography entitled Confessions.  In it, he describes his shortcomings as if to a priest and we, the readers, are able to get a unique glimpse into why he did what he did in life.  In today's quote, Augustine cautions us to beware the smooth talker AND the imperfect one as neither is guaranteed to be telling us the trut...

There is trouble all around us.  Society is frustrating and counterproductive and sometimes seems downright impossible to change.  Today's quote by author and public speaker Barbara de Angelis acknowledges that we cannot singlehandedly fix all the injustices we see...but...we can initiate change and it's far easier than it seems.  

Montaigne was a 16th century French philosopher and essayist who wrote short, single-page essay and far longer ones.  Today's quote comes from one such essay and sets the tone, right from the start, that WE control how we respond to the inevitable hardships and torments of life.  We can, with effort, choose not to be victims of circumstance and allow them to perpetually harm us, but instead repurp...

Steven Pressfield has written many amazing books.  His story of the 300 Spartans at Thermopylae, Gates of Fire, is among the finest.  In this week's episode, we explore Dienekes and his officership in the face of certain death at the hands of more 2 million Persian fighters.  He stood strong, steadied his men, and we can all learn something from that.  

Augustine Mandino was a highly successful salesman, author, and public speaker.  He wrote and spoke extensively on success and, in today's quote, shows us how important it is to treat people well.  If we do, then our lives will never be the same again.     Here's a great 10min speech of his that I reference in the episode: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PV0Vmth4kT0&t=924s  

Maya Angelou is one of the most well-known poets from the United States.  She wrote and published for decades and had such an impact that her legacy will live on for centuries to come.  Today, we explore her words about exploring ourselves.  She encourages us to express ourselves through our creations and thus, to show the world both who we are and to show ourselves the same.  

Ryan Holiday, author of The Obstacle is the Way, and other books is a modern stoic and has thought a lot about how we can and should deal with hardship and difficulty, the universal certainty of human existence.  His perspective on objectivity, taken directly from his book, is a great starting point.  

Coolio was a rapper whom many of us remember from our youth.  His song Gangster's Paradise is as well known as any song out there.  In the song, which is catchy and memorable, he talks about death and how near to all of us it is at any moment.  We've talked about death a lot recently and this is another reminder to live and enjoy living every moment that you can because you never can know when you...

Evelyn Waugh was a writer in the early to mid-20th century.  In a book review, of all places, he penned today's quote which highlights for us, once again, the potential creation of beauty from the ugly.  We are equally capable of being both.  

Chief Tecumseh was a Shawnee Chief and a warrior who spent the majority of his life fighting.  As such, he was familiar with and accepted death as a constant companion.  His words on death, both preparation and respect for it are as accurate today as they were more than 100 years ago.  

Today's episode features a quote by Sam Harris from his podcast Making Sense.  In it, Sam talks about the finiteness of life.  We do everything for the last time at some point.  We often don't even realize we're doing a thing for the very last time.  This means that we have the opportunity to savor each moment, even the unpleasant ones, as we may never repeat them again.  This is a perspective cha...

This is our explication of the second half of W.H. Auden's September 1, 1939.  Though the poem depicts a very dark day, it ends in hope and...a lesson to all of us.  

W. H. Auden was a British-American poet who wrote an iconic poem about the day WWII officially began.  In September 1, 1939, he gives us a glimpse into the thoughts and feelings of a speaker living through what was the beginning of a multi-million casualty war.  The poem describes how we got here and, importantly, how we might emerge.  This is the first of a two-part series.  

Thomas Macaulay was a historian, author, and British Secretary of War.  He wrote a massive tome on the history of England from 1685-1702, covering 5 volumes.  He also wrote a collection of essays on various topics, compiled into a book entitled Critical and Historical Essays.  It is from this work that we draw today's quote.   If you've ever felt like the world is coming to an end or that your or...

Joseph Rost was a professor of leadership and published a fantastic book on the topic Leadership for the 21st Century.  From that book, I examine today's quote about leader-follower influence relationships.  They can be difficult to establish and maintain, but well worth the effort when systemic change is needed.