“Action is the real measure of intelligence.” — Napoleon Hill

I found a definition of intelligence that’s changing how I look at intelligence.  This post is less about the definition of intelligence or what is intelligence, and more about why have a different definition of intelligence in the first place.

To put it simply, I think how we see intelligence and how we see ourselves can be limiting or enabling.  And, I’m a fan of enabling and empowering you … with skill.  My dictionary says that intelligence is, “the ability to learn or understand or to deal with new or trying situations: Reason, also: the skilled use of reason … and the ability to apply knowledge to manipulate one’s environment or to think abstractly as measured by objective criteria.”  In my view, that’s interesting but limited.

I like what’s possible when we look to expanding our notion of intelligence and define it for other areas or aspects of our lives, such as social intelligence, emotional intelligence, spiritual intelligence, and positive intelligence.  Wow, that’s a whole lot of intelligence going on.

I actually like Howard Gardner’s theory of multiple intelligences.  I like Howard’s work for a few key reasons.  Fist, I like the fact that he took a broad, multi-disciplinary view of intelligence.  It goes well beyond the idea of take a test, and your IQ score says how smart or dumb you are.  I especially like the fact that Howard connects intelligence to value, the community, and the greater good.   This creates an interesting reason for having intelligence in the first place, that goes beyond the individual.  I also really like the fact that Howard connects intelligence with the development of skill: “Strictly speaking, every intelligence entails the development of skills.”

In the book, Changing Minds: The Art and Science of Our Own and Other People’s Minds, Howard Gardner does a great job of defining intelligence and helping us see new ways to look at, value, and develop our intelligence.

A Definition of Intelligence

What I like about Howard’s definition of intelligence, aside from the multi-disciplinary view is that he connects it with solving problems and building products.  Howard writes:

“I define intelligence as a biopsychological potential to process specific forms of information in certain kinds of ways.  Human beings have evolved diverse information-processing capacities — I term these ‘intelligences’ — that allow them to solve problems or to fashion products.  To be considered ‘intelligent,’ these products and solutions must be valued in at least on culture or community.”

Intelligence Varies with Time and Place

Value is a key variable with intelligence.  What’s valued varies with time and place.  What’s value in one arena, may not be valued in another.  What’s valued at one point in time, may not be valued in another.  Howard writes:

“The last assertion of ‘being valued’ is important.  Rather than claiming that intelligence is the same in all times and places, I recognize that human beings value different skills and capacities at various times and under various circumstances.  Indeed, inventions like the printing press or the computer can alter, quite radically, the abilities that are deemed of importance (or no longer of importance) in a culture.  And so individuals are not equally “smart” or “dumb” under all circumstances; rather they have different intelligences that may be variously cherished or disregarded under different circumstances.  In terms of the argument put forth here, each intelligence represents a distinct form of mental representation.”

Types of Intelligence

Here are the multiple-intelligences that Howard Gardner has identified through his body of work:

• Linguistic Intelligence
• Logical-Mathematical Intelligence
• Musical Intelligence
• Spatial Intelligence
• Bodily-Kinesthetic Intelligence
• Naturalist Intelligence

You can find out more about these types of intelligence in Howard Gardner’s books: Frames of Mind: The Theory of Multiple Intelligences, Multiple Intelligences: New Horizons in Theory in Practice, and Intelligence Reframed: Multiple Intelligences for the Twenty-First Century.

The Theory of Multiple Intelligences

Howard’s work with Norman Geschwind, a pioneering American behavioral neurologist,  and his colleagues convinced him that the singular view of intelligence was ineffective.  Specifically, Howard no longer believed in the following views of intelligence:

“1) Intelligence is a single entity. 2) People are born with a certain amount of intelligence, 3) It is difficult to alter the amount of our intelligence — it’s ‘in our genes’ so to speak. 4) Psychologists tells you how smart you are by administering IQ tests or similar kinds of instruments.”

In response, Howard developed the theory of multiple intelligence based on his work with Geschwind, brain study research, and his broad  experience teaching across a variety of topics from anthropology to piano, to individuals from kindergarten to college.  Howard writes:

“Spurning an excessive dependence on psychometric instruments, I instead developed a view of intelligence that was deliberately multidisciplinary.  I considered evidence from anthropology — which abilities have been valued and fostered in various millennia in different species; and the study of ‘individual differences’ — particularly evidence from unusual populations such as autistic individuals, prodigies, and youngsters with specific learning disabilities.  Perhaps most crucially, I collated evidence from brain study: what we know about the development and breakdown of the brain and the ways in which different regions of the cortex effects different mental computations.”

Let me leave you with a closing thought on intelligence … actually, a quote, by Alan Alda:

“Be as smart as you can, but remember that it is always better to be wise than to be smart.”

Best Books on Intelligence

• Changing Minds: The Art and Science of Our Own and Other People’s Minds, by Howard Gardner
• Emotional Intelligence: 10th Anniversary Edition; Why It Can Matter More Than IQ , by Daniel Goleman
• Frames of Mind: The Theory of Multiple Intelligences, by Howard Gardner
• Intelligence Reframed: Multiple Intelligences for the Twenty-First Century, by Howard Gardner
• Multiple Intelligences: New Horizons in Theory in Practice, by Howard Gardner
• Positive Intelligence: Why Only 20% of Teams and Individuals Achieve Their True Potential, by Shizrad Chamine
• Social Intelligence: The New Science of Human Relationships, by Daniel Goleman

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List are one of the best ways you can drive clarity and action.  You can use a list for yourself, to help you prioritize items, focus your attention, identify your goals, remember things, etc.  You can use a list with others, such as on a project, to share the work items.

As a project leader, I make lists all the time.  I use lists for myself.  For example, I make a weekly to-do list, and a daily to-do list.  I also use lists for the team.  I make a list of project goals.  I make a list of work items.  Having a list helps everybody see what’s important.  It helps focus.  It helps drive results.  Lists are also a great way to build a sense of progress.  It’s fun to cross-things off, and say, "Done."

With that in mind, let’s explore the power of lists …

3 Key Benefits of Lists

There are many benefits to making lists, but I’ll elaborate on three:

1. Clear Your Mind.   When you dump things to a list, you make it easier to clear your mind.  Instead of trying to remember things, you can simply look at your list.
2. Get the Bird’s-Eye View.   A list can help you step back and see the full picture.   When you write down all the things on your mind, it’s easier to see what’s going on in there.  When you write down all the things you need to do for your project, it’s easier to see the scope of the work.
3. Think On Paper.   The real power of lists is that they help you think on paper.  When you write things down, you give yourself another chance to be more objective.  When you let things swirl around in your head, it’s easy for them to get distorted like a funhouse mirror.   When you write things down, you can also add precision.  You can refine your thoughts and simplify.

Why Use Lists

• Analyze things.    You can use lists to analyze options and choices for decisions.  You can use lists to help you identify priorities.
• Focus.  You can use a list to focus.  Whenever I lose focus, I write down the three wins I wan to achieve, or I make a list of three take aways.  In a team scenario, a list can help everybody keep their eyes on the prize, and the top priorities.
• Forget things.   You can use a list to deliberately “forget” things.   If you have a hard time of letting go of things in your head, you might find it’s easier to let things go if you first write them down.
• Index things.  Lists make it easy to manage large set of information.  You can use lists to collect things.   They are a great way to hunt and gather things.  I’m a fan of creating lists of resources, like Web sites, blogs, books, people, quotes, etc.
• Remember things.   Lists are great for reminders.   You can make a list of things you need to remember to do.
• Prioritize things.  You can use lists to rank things.  You can sort, rank, and rate the items on your list.   This can help you focus your energy and attention on the top things that count.

How To Use Lists More Effectively

1. Make multiple lists. Rather than “one list to rule them all,” create focused lists.  This will help you make your lists more actionable.  It will help you make your lists more specific.  It will help you maintain your lists a lot easier.  It will make it easier to throw away lists that you no longer need.
2. Dump it, then refine it. Remember the rule, “make it work, then make it right.”   Whenever you make a list, just write things down fast.  Once it’s down on paper, you can easily move things around.  You can easily refine things.  Don’t make a bottleneck in your head or fall into analysis paralysis.  Dump first, ask questions later.  Make your first pass always about getting It down.  Make your follow up passes about improving your list.
3. Sort them.   You can always sort a list.  If it’s about priority, then a numbered list helps.  In fact, at work, when somebody presents a long list of items that don’t seem to have any priority, we call it a “laundry list.”  Another way to sort your list is A-Z.  I find that this really helps, especially when you have a long list of work items.  Imagine if the index of a book was not in alphabetical.  When your list is alphabetical, it’s easy to scan and find things.  It also makes it easy to check for items across lists.   I usually have a long list of work items sorted A-Z, and then a short list of priorities in rank order for action.
4. Split them.   You can split your list to simplify it.   For example,  I might bubble up the top-of-mind items in my list, to separate them from everything else.   This gives me both a simple and complete view.  I do this with my quotes lists.  I bubble up the top ten quotes and then I list more quotes.  This way you can read the top ten fast, and if you want more, you can then dive in.
5. Throw them away.   Don’t hang on to a list that becomes a beast of burden.  At some point, you are better off scrapping your list and starting fresh.  I actually create a new to-do list each day.  I might carry things forward, but I always start fresh.  This helps me let things slough off.  This keeps my information fresh, relevant, and timely.  The most important thing is that it helps me avoid feeling like a beast of burden where one more straw will break the camels back.  Creating lists is a fast practice and you get faster with practice.  When a list no longer serves you, let it go.   It’s a tool, not a chore.

My Three Favorite Lists

I use various types of lists in work and life.  My top three favorite types of lists are:

1. Checklist.   A checklist is simply just a list of “checks” to perform.  I use checklists to share and scale expert information.  For example, at work, I’ve used security checklists to help people protect their information assets.  I also use checklists to capture and share project best practices in a simple way. (See The Power of Checklists.)
2. Irritation List.   Jack Canfield recommends dumping all the things that bug you down in to a simple list.  I’ve used this approach for years now and it works like a champ.  It’s powerful because putting your irritation down into a list can help you quickly gain perspective, especially when you are looking across the things that bug you.  The list is also powerful because you can decide to act on things or decide to let them go.  (See The Power of an Irritation List.)
3. To-Do List.   A to-do list is simply a list of things to do.  I make mine more meaningful by bubbling up my top three wins or outcomes to the top.  The list helps me focus and prioritize.  It also helps me check my progress, and it helps remind me of where my time goes or what I’ve achieved.  When days or weeks fly by, and I ask, “Where did the time go?” … I have an answer.

The to-do list is especially important for me at work.  Because I lead projects, I need a simple way to keep track of the state of things over time.  Having the work items in a list make it easier to stay on top of the overall project.

Types of Lists

• Bucket List
• Checklist
• Chores List
• Goals List
• Issues List
• Irritation List
• Priorities List
• Playlist
• Pros and Cons List
• Reminders List
• Resources List
• To-Do List
• Top Ten List
• Wish List
• Work Items List

Now I can cross this post off my to-do list

You Might Also Like

• The Power of Checklists
• The Power of an Irritation List
• Time Management Checklist

Life can hit you hard.  It can feel like a ton of bricks.  Maybe it’s the loss of a job.  Maybe it’s unbelievable news.  Maybe it’s the loss of a loved one.  Maybe it’s a series of unfortunate events.  Maybe it’s your world turned upside down.

Whatever it is, moving on can be tough.  In fact, one of the toughest things in the world, is to move on.  If you’ve ever ever been inconsolable, you know what I mean.

People might tell you, get over it.  They might say, just move on with your life.  You might even want to.  But then you might find yourself stuck.  Or you might find yourself wallowing.  Or you might find yourself numb.

This is where some of the world’s best words come in to play.  Whether you want to make like a phoenix and rise from the ashes, or you want to bounce back after going down for the count, or you simply want to just find a way forward … moving on quotes can be your best friend.

My gift to you is this deep collection of quotes for moving on.  You’ll find insight and inspiration from Bruce Lee, Buddha, Lao Tzu, Gandhi, and more.  Find three quotes from the collection below.  Hold on to them, and play them in your mind, when you need them most.

Top 10 Moving On Quotes

1. “Don’t cry because it’s over, smile because it happened.” — Dr. Seuss
2. “Get mad, then get over it.” — Colin Powell
3. “God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; Courage to change the things I can; And wisdom to know the difference.” — Reinhold Niebuhr
4. “I gather strength from life’s storms.” — Jonathan Lockwood Huie
5. “Life is not about waiting for the storms to pass… It’s about learning how to dance in the rain.” — Vivian Greene
6. “Look at life through the windshield, not the rear-view mirror” — Byrd Baggett
7. “Nobody can go back and start a new beginning, but anyone can start today and make a new ending.” — Maria Robinson
8. “Today is the first day of the rest of your life.” – Author Unknown
9. “Whatever doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.” – Proverb
10. “When I let go of what I am, I become what I might be.” — Lao Tzu

A New Day and Moving On

• “Do not worry if you feel low; the sun has a sinking spell every night, but rises again all right the next morning.” — Author Unknown
• “Don’t let yesterday use up too much of today.” — Cherokee Indian Proverb
• “Goals give you more than a reason to get up in the morning; they are an incentive to keep you going all day.” — Harvey Mackay
• “I have always been delighted at the prospect of a new day, a fresh try, one more start, with perhaps a bit of magic waiting somewhere behind the morning.” –  J. B. Priestley
• “Let every day be the first day of the rest of your life, but especially let today be a new beginning.” — Jonathan Lockwood Huie
• “The darkest night is often the bridge to the brightest tomorrow.” — Jonathan Lockwood Huie
• “Today will never happen again. Don’t waste it with a false start or no start at all.” — Og Mandino
• “Whatever you want in life, start today. Not tomorrow – today. Let it be a small beginning – a tiny beginning. Your happiness depends on starting today – every day.” — Jonathan Lockwood Huie
• “With the new day comes new strength and new thoughts.” — Eleanor Roosevelt

Action and Moving On

• “Achievement seems to be connected with action. Successful men and women keep moving. They make mistakes, but they don’t quit.” — Conrad Hilton
• “Just keep moving forward and don’t give a shit about what anybody thinks. Do what you have to do for you.” — Johnny Depp
• “Life is like riding a bicycle. To keep your balance you must keep moving.” — Albert Einstein
• “Part of being a winner is knowing when enough is enough. Sometimes you have to give up the fight and walk away, and move on to something that’s more productive.” — Donald Trump
• “So what do we do? Anything. Something. So long as we just don’t sit there. If we screw it up, start over. Try something else. If we wait until we’ve satisfied all the uncertainties, it may be too late.” — Lee Iacocca
• “Take the first step in faith. You don’t have to see the whole staircase, just take the first step.” — Martin Luther King Jr.
• “We keep moving forward, opening new doors, and doing new things, because we’re curious and curiosity keeps leading us down new paths.” — Walt Disney
• “What surrounds us we endure better for giving it a name – and moving on.” — Emile M. Cioran
• “When the going gets tough, the tough get going.” — Proverb
• “You got to know when to hold ‘em, know when to fold ‘em, Know when to walk away and know when to run.” – Kenny Rogers

Baggage, Hurts, the Past, and Moving On

• “Get over it – Life isn’t Supposed to be fair.  Get over yourself, and be of service to others.” — Jonathan Lockwood Huie
• “I had to cease to mourn what could never be and make the most of what was possible. And I would begin doing that by trying to mend the hurts of the past.” — Cameron Dokey
• “If you bury the pain deep down it will stay with you indefinitely, but if you open yourself to it, experience it, and deal with it head-on, you’ll find it begins to move on after a while.” — Greg Behrendt
• “Keeping baggage from the past will leave no room for happiness in the future.” — Wayne L. Misner
• “Moving on, is a simple thing, what it leaves behind is hard.” — Dave Mustaine
• “Moving on is easy. It’s staying moved on that’s trickier.” — Katerina Stoykova Klemer
• “My Mama always said you’ve got to put the past behind you before you can move on.” — Forrest Gump
• “Often the thought of pain is actually worse that the pain itself.” — Greg Behrendt
• “People have a hard time letting go of their suffering. Out of a fear of the unknown, they prefer suffering that is familiar.” — Thich Nhat Hanh
• “Sooner or later we’ve all got to let go of our past.” — Dan Brown
• “The secret of joy is the mastery of pain.” — Anaïs Nin
• “Those who do not know how to weep with their whole heart do not know how to laugh either.” — Golda Meir
• “When you are sorrowful look again in your heart, and you shall see that in truth you are weeping for that which has been your delight.” — Kahlil Gibran
• “You can’t look back – you just have to put the past behind you, and find something better in your future.” — Jodi Picoult

Blame, Victim, and Moving On

• “Self-pity is our worst enemy and if we yield to it, we can never do anything wise in this world.” — Helen Keller
• “What’s the point of pointing the finger, other than to stall your own progress in moving on?” — Lisa Steadman
• “You are responsible for your life. You can’t keep blaming somebody else for your dysfunction. Life is really about moving on.” — Oprah Winfrey

Bouncing Back, Resilience, and Moving On

• “Fall down 7 times.  Stand up 8.” – Chinese Proverb
• “He’s a million rubber bands in his resilience.” — Alan K. Simpson
• “Life only demands from you the strength you possess.” — Dag Hammarskjold
• “Man never made any material as resilient as the human spirit.” — Bern Williams
• “The world ain’t all sunshine and rainbows. It’s a very mean and nasty place and I don’t care how tough you are it will beat you to your knees and keep you there permanently if you let it. You, me, or nobody is gonna hit as hard as life. But it ain’t about how hard ya hit. It’s about how hard you can get it and keep moving forward.” — Rocky Balboa
• “Whatever is bringing you down, get rid of it. Because you’ll find that when you’re free . . . your true self comes out.” — Tina Turner
• “You all know that I have been sustained throughout my life by three saving graces – my family, my friends, and a faith in the power of resilience and hope. These graces have carried me through difficult times and they have brought more joy to the good times than I ever could have imagined.” — Elizabeth Edwards
• “You can fall, but you can rise also.” — Angelique Kidjo

Change, Choices, and Moving On

• “Any change, any loss, does not make us victims. Others can shake you, surprise you, disappoint you, but they can’t prevent you from acting, from taking the situation you’re presented with and moving on. No matter where you are in life, no matter what your situation, you can always do something. You always have a choice and the choice can be power.” — Blaine Lee
• “Be miserable. Or motivate yourself. Whatever has to be done, it’s always your choice.” — Wayne Dyer
• “I chose and my world was shaken. So what? The choice may have been mistaken; the choosing was not. You have to move on.” — Stephen Sondheim
• “I choose not to project my past onto my future.” — Jonathan Lockwood Huie
• “I demolish my bridges behind me …then there is no choice but to move forward.” — Fridtjof Nansen
• “I won’t let the sun go down on me.” — Nik Kershaw
• “If you don’t like something, change it.  If you can’t change it, change your attitude.” — Maya Angelou
• “It is our attitude at the beginning of a difficult undertaking which, more than anything else, will determine its successful outcome.” — William James
• “Life is about making the right decisions and moving on.” — Josh Rayburn
• “Notice that the stiffest tree is most easily cracked, while the bamboo or willow survives by bending with the wind.” –  Bruce Lee
• “The only way to change our lives is by changing our minds.” — Author Unknown
• “The world hates change, yet it is the only thing that has brought progress.” — Charles Kettering
• “Things do not change; we change.” – Henry David Thoreau
• “Time heals griefs and quarrels, for we change and are no longer the same persons.” – Pascal
• “We are set in our ways, bound by our perspectives and stuck in our thinking.” — Joel Osteen
• “We can not become what we need to by remaining what we are.” — Oprah Winfrey
• “When you start to abandon your old beliefs or values… you may be stuck at the threshold for two or three years. Before moving on, you have to clear away your cherished beliefs.” — Dick Raymond
• “You must make a decision that you are going to move on. It wont happen automatically. You will have to rise up and say, ‘I don’t care how hard this is, I don’t care how disappointed I am, I’m not going to let this get the best of me. I’m moving on with my life.” — Joel Osteen

Courage, Confidence, and Moving On

• “80% of people’s problems are about how they feel about themselves.” — Joyce Meyer
• “Courage is not the absence of fear, but simply moving on with dignity despite that fear.” — Pat Riley
• “Courage doesn’t always roar. Sometimes courage is the quiet voice at the end of the day saying, I will try again tomorrow.” — Mary Anne Radmacher
• “It is only through labor and painful effort, by grim energy and resolute courage, that we move on to better things.” — Theodore Roosevelt
• “Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one’s courage.” — Anaïs Nin
• “The great courageous act that we must all do, is to have the courage to step out of our history and past so that we can live our dreams.” — Oprah Winfrey
• “You can never cross the ocean unless you have the courage to lose sight of the shore.” — Christopher Columbus
• “You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself ‘I have lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along.’ You must do the thing you think you cannot do.” — Eleanor Roosevelt

Endings and Beginnings

• “A graduation is a small but significant tradition that I think everyone should take part in. What a great way to symbolize a part of your journey and to represent your thoughts for moving on.” — Martin Stoleman
• “Another sunrise, another new beginning.” — Jonathan Lockwood Huie
• “Celebrate endings – for they precede new beginnings.” — Jonathan Lockwood Huie
• “Every exit is an entry somewhere.” — Tom Stoppard
• “It’s true that we don’t know what we’ve got until we lost it, but it’s also true that we don’t know what we’ve been missing until it arrives.” — Author Unknown
• “Sometimes the hardest part isn’t letting go but rather learning to start over.” — Nicole Sobon
• “There are things that we never want to let go of, people we never want to leave behind. But keep in mind that letting go isn’t the end of the world, it’s the beginning of a new life.” — Author Unknown
• “Vitality shows in not only the ability to persist but the ability to start over.” — F. Scott Fitzgerald
• “When one door closes, another opens; but we often look so long and so regretfully upon the closed door that we do not see the one which has opened for us.” — Alexander Graham Bell

Failures, Setbacks, and Moving On

• “A bend in the road is not the end of the road … unless you fail to make the turn.” — Author Unknown
• “Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried something new.” — Albert Einstein
• “If you’ve fallen down, today is the day you can get back up and try again.” — Amelie Chance
• “Intelligence is not to make no mistakes, but quickly to see how to make them good.” — Bertoit Brecht
• “Keep on beginning and failing. Each time you fail, start all over again, and you will grow stronger until you have accomplished a purpose – not the one you began with perhaps, but one you’ll be glad to remember.” — Anne Sullivan
• “Laughter gives us distance. It allows us to step back from an event, deal with it and then move on.” — Bob Newhart
• “May the world be kind to you, and may your own thoughts be gentle upon yourself.” — Jonathan Lockwood Huie
• “Some things are just never meant to be, no matter how much we wish they were.” — Author Unknown
• “You may encounter many defeats, but you must not be defeated. In fact, it may be necessary to encounter the defeats, so you can know who you are, what you can rise from, how you can still come out of it.” — Maya Angelou

Forgiveness and Moving On

• “By forgiving and choosing to move on, one takes the power back to morph it into positive energy.” — Eugenia Tripputi
• “Cry. Forgive. Learn. Move on. Let your tears water the seeds of your future happiness.” — Steve Maraboli
• “Forgive and forget.” – Proverb
• “Forgive yourself for your faults and your mistakes and move on.” — Les Brown
• “Forgiveness and letting go are steps on our road back to happiness.” — Tina Dayton
• “Forgiving is not a gift to someone else – Forgiving is your gift to yourself — a great gift — the gift of happiness.” — Jonathan Lockwood Huie
• “Forgiveness is the cleansing fire that burns away old regrets and resentments.” — Jonathan Lockwood Huie
• “Hanging onto resentment is letting someone you despise live rent-free in your head.” — Ann Landers
• “Holding on to anger is like grasping a hot coal with the intent of throwing it at someone else; you are the one who gets burned.” – Buddha
• “People can be more forgiving than you can imagine. But you have to forgive yourself. Let go of what’s bitter and move on.” — Bill Cosby
• “The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong.” — Mohandas Gandhi
• “To be able to move on, one has to learn to forgive not only the person (or people) who have done one wrong but also oneself.” — Eugenia Tripputi

Letting Go, Holding On, and Moving On

• “All the art of living lies in a fine mingling of letting go and holding on.” — Havelock Ellis
• “Don’t cry over spilled milk.” – Proverb
• “Even though you may want to move forward in your life, you may have one foot on the brakes. In order to be free, we must learn how to let go. Release the hurt. Release the fear. Refuse to entertain your old pain. The energy it takes to hang onto the past is holding you back from a new life. What is it you would let go of today?” — Mary Manin Morrissey
• “Getting over a painful experience is much like crossing monkey bars. You have to let go at some point in order to move forward.” — Author Unknown
• “How do geese know when to fly to the sun? Who tells them the seasons? How do we, humans know when it is time to move on? As with the migrant birds, so surely with us, there is a voice within if only we would listen to it, that tells us certainly when to go forth into the unknown.” — Elisabeth Kubler-Ross
• “Let go. Why do you cling to pain? There is nothing you can do about the wrongs of yesterday. It is not yours to judge. Why hold on to the very thing which keeps you from hope and love?” — Leo Buscaglia
• “Letting go doesn’t mean giving up, but rather accepting that there are things that cannot be.” — Author Unknown
• “Letting go doesn’t mean that you don’t care about someone anymore. It’s just realizing that the only person you really have control over is yourself.” — Deborah Reber
• “Letting go has never been easy, but holding on can be as difficult. Yet strength is measured not by holding on, but by letting go.” — Len Santos
• “Letting go isn’t a one-time thing, it’s something you have to do everyday, over and over again.” — Dawson’s Creek
• “Some of us think holding on makes us strong; but sometimes it is letting go.” — Hermann Hesse
• “You will find that it is necessary to let things go; simply for the reason that they are heavy. So let them go, let go of them. I tie no weights to my ankles.” — C. JoyBell C.

Life and Moving On

• “A man who does not leave his hut will bring nothing in.” — West African Proverb
• “I have learned that if you must leave a place that you have lived in and loved and where all your yesteryears are buried deep, leave it any way except a slow way, leave it the fastest way you can. Never turn back and never believe that an hour you remember is a better hour because it is dead. Passed years seem safe ones, vanquished ones, while the future lives in a cloud, formidable from a distance.” — Beryl Markham
• “I postpone death by living, by suffering, by error, by risking, by giving, by losing.” — Anais Nin
• “It is better to conquer yourself than to win a thousand battles. Then the victory is yours. It cannot be taken from you, not by angels or by demons, heaven or hell.” – Buddha
• “Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.” – Kierkegaard
• “Life is as easy or as hard as you think it is.” — Jonathan Lockwood Huie
• “Life is lived in the living. Set aside convention, caution, and arbitrary “rules” about how life is supposed to be lived. Choose! Explore! Adventure! Live life to the fullest.” — Jonathan Lockwood Huie
• “Life is unlimited – it expands with the generosity, compassion, inventiveness, and service that you contribute.” — Jonathan Lockwood Huie
• “Life’s burdens are lighter when I laugh at myself.” — Jonathan Lockwood Huie
• “Part of growing up is just taking what you learn from that and moving on and not taking it to heart.” — Beverley Mitchell
• “The final wisdom of life requires not the annulment of incongruity but the achievement of serenity within and above it.” — Reinhold Niebuhr
• “We must be willing to let go of the life we have planned, so as to accept the life that is waiting for us.” — Joseph Campbell
• “Your living is determined not so much by what life brings to you as by the attitude you bring to life; not so much by what happens to you as by the way your mind looks at what happens.” — Kahlil Gibran

Loss, Grievance, and Moving On

• “And perhaps there is a limit to the grieving that the human heart can do. As when one adds salt to a tumbler of water, there comes a point where simply no more will be absorbed.” — Sarah Waters
• “The loss of love is not nearly as painful as our resistance to accepting it is.” — Tigress Luv

Now, The Present, and Moving On

• “Breathe. Let go. And remind yourself that this very moment is the only one you know you have for sure.” — Oprah Winfrey
• “The past always looks better than it was because it isn’t here.” — Finley Peter Dunne

Relationships and Moving On

• “Don’t rush into any kind of relationship. Work on yourself. Feel yourself, experience yourself and love yourself. Do this first and you will soon attract that special loving other.” — Russ Von Hoelsche
• “I don’t want to lose you, but I don’t want to use you just to have someone by my side.” — Patty Smyth
• “I think it happens to everyone as they grow up. You find out who you are and what you want, and then you realize that people you’ve known forever don’t see things the way you do. And so you keep the wonderful memories, but find yourself moving on.” — Nicholas Sparks
• “If you really love something set it free. If it comes back it’s yours, if not it wasn’t meant to be.” – Author Unknown
• “It happens to everyone as they grow up. You find out who you are and what you want, and then you realize that people you’ve known forever don’t see things the way you do. So you keep the wonderful memories, but find yourself moving on.” — Nicholas Sparks
• “Loving someone is setting them free, letting them go.” — Kate Winslet
• “Surround yourself with only people who are going to lift you higher.” — Oprah Winfrey
• “The heart was made to be broken.” — Oscar Wilde
• “You may have buried or repressed your own power for so long a time that you feel incapable of moving on without the strength and support of a lover, even the lover you just left behind.” — Howard Bronson

Regret and Moving On

• “I have no regrets in my life. I think that everything happens to you for a reason. The hard times that you go through build character, making you a much stronger person.” — Rita Mero
• “It’s never too late to be who you might have been.” – George Eliot
• “Make it a rule of life never to regret and never to look back. Regret is an appalling waste of energy; you can’t build on it; it’s only good for wallowing in.” — Katherine Mansfield
• “Make the most of your regrets; never smother your sorrow, but tend and cherish it till it comes to have a separate and integral interest. To regret deeply is to live afresh.” — Henry David Thoreau
• “Many of us crucify ourselves between two thieves – regret for the past and fear of the future.” — Fulton Oursler
• “Never regret. If it’s good, it’s wonderful. If it’s bad, it’s experience.” — Victoria Holt
• “Regret of neglected opportunity is the worst hell that a living soul can inhabit.” — Rafael Sabatini
• “The only conquests that are permanent and leave no regrets are our conquests over ourselves.” — Napolean Bonaparte

Editor’s note: This is a guest post from Alan Shelton on Awakened Leadership. Alan is a leadership coach, blogger, speaker, and the author of Awakened Leadership: Beyond Self-Mastery.
The idea behind Awakened Leadership is to transcend beyond trained behaviors to awareness, and lead a life of authentic leadership. In other words, to be a more effective leader, you have to be more of who you already are.
I’ve been reading Alan’s book. It’s entertaining and deeply engaging. The stories really bring Alan’s insight to life, as we follow him along on his journey to enlightenment.
What I really like about Alan’s approach to leadership, is that it reminds me of Bruce Lee’s approach to martial arts. Bruce Lee rose above techniques through awareness. I think of the Bruce Lee quote, “When one has no form, one can be all forms; when one has no style, he can fit in with any style.” Another Bruce Lee quote says, “I do not experience; I am experience. I am not the subject of experience; I am that experience. I am awareness. Nothing else can be I or can exist.” In the movie, Enter the Dragon, Bruce Lee said, “Don’t think. FEEL. It’s like a finger pointing at the moon.” The point is that thinking is assessment, while feeling is awareness. We can respond better in the moment, when we are actually in the moment, embracing the experience in an authentic way.
Without further ado, here is Alan on Awakened Leadership and how we can be better leaders by being more of who we already are …

Often the leadership world is divided into two categories, transactional and transformational. Transactional in how we give and receive from our learning and from one another, and transformational in how we choose to view and grow in our own personal maturity.

The reality is, in order to arrive at the doorway to transformational growth, many transactional concepts will have been learned. That is to say that there is a normal course, or arc, that human beings follow in the journey of life. In my experience this is absolutely true. In the beginning of our life we are exposed to learning which involves concepts, diagrams, and written examinations to measure our learning. All of this learning is in the service of becoming a polished ego or self. The arrival point of this process is normally designated as self-mastery. Self-mastery, however, is just the doorway to a new style of learning. And in order to pass through the doorway we must stand on the shoulders of those who brought us to this point.

Self-Mastery

In the self-mastery approach, we are taught that we are all self-contained entities to which attributes apply. For instance, we say that some people possess humility, intelligence, or even leadership capability. In this kind of learning we are the lump of clay to which all exterior forces are brought into play in which to shape us. Our goal in the end is to stand as though we were a product of Michelangelo himself.

Most of us, however, come to the end of this kind of learning somewhere in the first 10 years of our career. And then what are we supposed to do? Surely you’ve noticed that many executives continue to pursue exactly the same style of learning that they always have. If you ask many of them, you’d be surprised to find that they know that they are simply going through the motions. They can tell because of the tiredness and boredom that arises in the 10th or 20th time that they have heard exactly the same concept.

Internally they know that concepts did not translate into anything else all by themselves. It is no longer effective to onboard content and concept from the outside with the expectation that something will change.

Reactive to Transformation

Many times the frustration of learning less and less from the same activity begins to motivate managers to look for something new. They realize that this external learning of new concepts has exhausted itself yet they’re left longing for more. So, it occurs to many executives that it’s now time to take an internal look at themselves. When this observation takes root they have now entered into the transformational or developmental world.

So what is the difference? Each leader’s behavior is now seen as having the possibility of being either an obstacle or an enhancement to leadership itself. Human beings by nature arrive at adulthood with conditionings known as reactive traits. These reactive traits are unconscious and triggered by events and everyday life. Unfortunately, many times these reactions do not belong in the business process.

How many times have you sat in a meeting and watched while some moment of behavior defies any of your ability to understand it? That is reactive behavior. Dedicated leaders see that their own behavior cannot be allowed to derail leadership outcomes. The frustration of the old style of learning transforms into the challenge of internal development and transformation.

Leadership has now seen an entirely new light. No longer is it the Christmas tree holding the ornaments of personal attributes such as humility and the like. True leadership emerges from the ability of the leader to stand in his own personal authenticity. Leadership is now who you are.

Much like athletes who find that mentally processing their plays make them slow on the field, leaders begin to see that the game slows down for them. They no longer see themselves as an individual attempting to execute an idea. Now, they are part of the game and the authenticity of their leadership capability is the field on which it is played. No longer does the leader take the big space and the followers squeeze into what’s left over. Now, the leader sees himself properly situated as a member of the team and in the situation stands to respond to the action when it comes his way.

In my terms, I call this Awakened Leadership – where all the concepts have been transcended and the leader simply allows his response to occur. It is a felt experience, this new style of leadership. All transformative experiences are. From concept to ‘who you are’ indeed is an awakening.

So, what’s holding you back from embracing Awakened Leadership?

“The world is all gates, all opportunities, strings of tension waiting to be struck.” — Ralph Waldo Emerson

Are you waiting for the economy to change?  Are you waiting for your job to change?  Are you waiting for the weather to change?  Don’t wait.  Work with what you’ve got.

It’s so easy to fall into the trap of playing the waiting game.  Especially if it’s a situation you don’t like.  The problem is, while you wait, the world passes you by. It keeps moving forward.  When you “just wait and see,” it takes your power away.  For example, I fell into the trap of waiting for my weather to turn back to the way it used to be.  It’s a new reality now.  The best way for me to make the most of it, is to embrace the change — rather than ignore it, dismiss it, or wait for it to change back.

Life’s better when you don’t wait for the facts to change.  You improve your effectiveness when you respond to life’s curve balls.  You also improve your resilience and self-reliance.  You also create new opportunities.  One of my favorite metaphors here from sports is, “You play the ball, or the ball plays you.”

In the book, Mojo: How to Get It, How to Keep It, How to Get It Back if You Lose It, Marshall Goldsmith writes about how we should not wait for the facts to change, and should instead play the cards we have in hand, based on the reality of our situation.  If nothing else, it helps us take advantage of whatever situation we are in.

What We Learn from Lawyers

You can’t wait for the facts to change.  You need to work with what you’ve got.  Marshall writes:

“A big part of our training as lawyers,’ Tom said, ‘was to interpret a pattern of facts so that we could advise a client.  Our teacher would give us a hypothetical set of facts and then go around the classroom asking, ‘What would you do?”  Every student would respond with a course of action.  The answers weren’t always correct or even reasonably intelligent.  Sometimes they were desperate.  But the students always came up with some rationale, some idea to act on.  At no point in these classroom exercises did any of my classmates say, ‘I’m going to wait until the classroom changes.’”

Act More, Wait Less

Waiting leads to underacting.  Marshall writes:

“When people wait for discomforting facts to change into something more to their liking, they’re basically engaging in wishful thinking.  It’s the opposite of over-committing because it leads to under-acting (or under-committing and not acting at all).  Instead of doing something, you’re frozen in place while you wait for a more comfortable set of facts to appear.  In s world that’s constantly rushing forward, this is asking to moving backward,.  That’s a Mojo killer.”

Carve a New Path

Assume the facts won’t change.  Find a a way to make the most of your new situation.  Marshall writes:

“When the facts are not to your liking, ask yourself, ‘What path would I take if I knew that the situation would not get better?’  Then get ready to do that.  If the world changes in your favor, you haven’t lost anything.  If the facts do change, you are more ready to face the new world.”

If there’s something you’ve been waiting for, maybe your wait is finally over.  Carpe diem.

Best Books on Taking Action

• Getting Results the Agile Way: A Personal Results System for Work and Life, by J.D. Meier
• Mojo: How to Get It, How to Keep It, How to Get It Back if You Lose It, Marshall Goldsmith
• The Power of Full Engagement: Managing Energy, Not Time, Is the Key to High Performance and Personal Renewal, by Jim Loehr and Tony Schwartz

You Might Also Like

• Action Commitments
• Action Forcing Events
• Action Signals – Use Negative Emotions as a Call to Action
• Motivation or Action First?

This is my collection of Richard Branson quotes.  Richard Branson lives to challenge himself, make a difference, and have fun in the process.

As you read through these Richard Branson quotes, you’ll find some common themes:  adventure, brand, business, entrepreneurism, fun, quality, and purpose.  While putting together my Richard Branson quotes, one pattern that really stood out for me, is how deeply Richard Branson cares about both sides of the equation.  He cares deeply about the people that wok for and with him, just as deeply as he cares about the people he builds his businesses to serve,and a make a difference for.

The other pattern that stood out for me is how much Richard Branson wants to improve the quality of life for people.  I realized this as I read his books, that a lot of this drive comes from the pains and challenges he faced growing up.  He has never lost connection with people, and he has never lost sight of what really matters in life.

Please enjoy this collection of Richard Branson quotes.  Use them to inspire you and consider what we can learn from somebody who lives life with passion, purpose, and the pursuit of fun along the way.

Adventure and Fun

• “A business has to be involving, it has to be fun, and it has to exercise your creative instincts.”
• “Customers shouldn’t just think of your business as a place to buy a product or use a service — it should be a fun place to be.”
• “First and foremost, any business proposal I like must sound fun.”
• “I am prepared to try anything once.”
• “I prefer to have a great time and to keep my wits about me.”
• “I think the most important thing is that in the last seven days we’ve just had the greatest adventure of our lifetimes.”
• “I’m inquisitive … and I love a new challenge… and if I feel that we can do it better than it’s been done by other people, we’ll have a go.”
• “Some 80% of your life is spent working. You want to have fun at home; why shouldn’t you have fun at work?”
• “Throwing yourself into a job you enjoy is one of the life’s greatest pleasures!”
• “We’d love to be involved with the creation of something very special, something quite large and something quite exciting.”
• “We’re going where no one has gone before. There’s no model to follow, nothing to copy. That is what makes this so exciting.”

Brand

• “All you have in life is your reputation: you may be very rich, but if you lose your good name, then you’ll never be happy. The thought will always lurk at the back of your mind that people don’t trust you. I had never really focused on what a good name meant before, but that night in prison made me understand.”
• “Branding is everything. A young girl once came up to me and told me I could be famous because I looked just like Richard Branson!”
• “First of all, if you’re setting up a new company, you want to try to find a brand that can work on a global basis.”
• “Good brands reflect the histories of the time and the group of people that made them. They can not be copied. They can not be recycled.”
• “If you get your face and your name out there enough, people will start to recognize you.”
• “In the beginning it was just about the business – now it’s about the brand.”
• “Protect your reputation.  Don’t be afraid of making mistakes.”
• “Quality brands never go bankrupt.”
• “What does the name Virgin mean? We are a company that likes to take on the giants. In too many businesses, these giants have had things their own way. We are going to have fun competing with them.”

Business

• “Above all, you want to create something you’re proud of. This has always been my philosophy of business.”
• “I can honestly say that I have never gone into any business purely to make money. If that is the sole motive, then I believe you are better off not doing it.”
• “Because I don’t see Virgin as a company but as a way of life and I fully enjoy it, I don’t think I’ll ever retire.”
• “Business opportunities are like buses, there`s always another one coming.”
• “Every business, like a painting, operates according to its own rules. There are many ways to run a successful company. What works once may never work again. What everyone tells you never to do may just work, once.”
• “I love stirring the pot.  I love giving big companies a run for their money — especially if they’re offering expensive, poor-quality products.”
• “I never get the accountants in before I start up a business. It’s done on gut feeling, especially if I can see that they are taking the mickey out of the consumer.”
• “Most “necessary evils” are far more evil than necessary.”
• “Our model is to develop each business separately with its own shareholder and management – this way we can concentrate on the job in hand, rather than be part of some enormous and faceless conglomerate.”
• “Perhaps my early problems with dyslexia made me more intuitive: when someone sends me a written proposal, rather than dwelling on detailed facts and figures I find that my imagination grasps and expands on what I read.”
• “We’ve got an engaging, edgy, vibrant, fun product, … It may or may not work, but we’re going to give it our best shot.”
• “When we start a new venture, we base it on hard research and analysis. Typically, we review the industry and put ourselves in our customer’s shoes to see what we could do better.”

Challenges

• “Although my spelling is still sometimes poor, I have managed to overcome the worst of my difficulties through training myself to concentrate.”
• “Complexity is your enemy. Any fool can make something complicated. It is hard to keep things simple.”
• “However tight things are, you still need to have the big picture at the forefront of your mind.”
• “I just like to enjoy life and push myself. Of course, there is method to my madness. When you are entering into a new industry, for example, it helps to do something to get your name on the front pages.”
• “My biggest motivation?  Just to keep challenging myself.  I see life almost like one long university education that I never had.”
• “”My interest in life comes from setting myself huge, apparently unachievable challenges and trying to rise above them.”
• “My mother was determined to make us independent. When I was four years old, she stopped the car a few miles from our house and made me find my own way home across the fields. I got hopelessly lost.”
• “Records are made to be broken. It is in man’s nature to continue to strive to do just that.”

Entrepreneurism

• “I believe that drudgery and clock-watching are a terrible betrayal of that universal, inborn entrepreneurial spirit.”
• “I think a lot of becoming an entrepreneur is something which people have to learn just from getting out there and giving it a go, and having to learn the art of survival.”
• “I wanted to be an editor or a journalist, I wasn’t` really interested in being an entrepreneur, but I soon found I had to become an entrepreneur in order to keep my magazine going.”
• “I was never, ever interested in becoming a businessman or an entrepreneur.  If I was a businessman, or saw myself as a businessman, I would have never gone into the airline business.”
• “The quickest way to become a millionaire in the airline business is to start out as a billionaire.”
• “There are no rules. You don’t learn to walk by following rules. You learn by doing, and by falling over, and it’s because you fall over that you learn to save yourself from falling over. It’s the greatest thrill in the world and it runs away screaming at the first sight of bullet points.”
• “To be successful, you have to be out there, you have to hit the ground running, and if you have a good team around you and more than a fair share of luck, you might make something happen. But you certainly can’t guarantee it just by following someone else’s formula.”
• “What’s the quickest way to become a millionaire? Borrow fivers off everyone you meet.”
• “You never know with these things when you`re trying something new what can happen. This is all experimental.”

Leadership

• “As much as you need a strong personality to build a business from scratch, you also must understand the art of delegation. I have to be good at helping people run the individual businesses, and I have to be willing to step back. The company must be set up so it can continue without me.”
• “I may be a businessman  in that I set up and run companies for profit, but when I try to plan ahead and dream up new products and new companies, I’m an idealist.”
• “Once again, I was the captain of my ship and master of my fate.  I believe in myself. I believe in the hands that work, in the brains that think, and in the hearts that love.”
• “You shouldn’t blindly accept a leader’s advice.  You’ve got to question leaders on occasions.”

Life

• “I am impressed with just the enthusiasm for life and the fact that some of these people are in their 80’s, even 90’s, and they’re absolutely determined to get out there and make a difference.”
• “As we drifted to earth I sat up on the glass roof of the capsule, watching the beauty of the golden dawn as it broke over the desert. This was a day I never thought I’d see and the rising sun and growing warmth of the day seemed very precious. It made me aware that hard-won things are more valuable than those that come too easily. It reminded me to always enjoy the moment. “
• “I don’t think of work as work and play as play. It’s all living.”
• “I love the freedom of movement that my phone gives me. That has definitely transformed my life.”
• “Life can seem rather unreal at times.  Alive and well and loving one day.  No longer there the next.”
• “Life is a helluva lot more fun if you say yes rather than no.”
• “Ridiculous yachts and private planes and big limousines won’t make people enjoy life more, and it sends out terrible messages to the people who work for them. It would be so much better if that money was spent in Africa – and it’s about getting a balance.”
• “You only live once, and I just don’t want to waste a minute of my life.”

People First

• “A company is people … employees want to know … am I being listened to or am I a cog in the wheel? People really need to feel wanted.”
• “Having a personality of caring about people is important. You can’t be a good leader unless you generally like people. That is how you bring out the best in them.”
• “I cannot remember a moment in my life when I have not felt the love of my family. We were a family that would have killed for each other – and we still are.”
• “I know enough to know that no man is an island.”
• “Respect is how to treat everyone, not just those you want to impress.”
• “The companies that look after their people are the companies that do really well. I’m sure we’d like a few other attributes, but that would be the most important one.”

Purpose

• “For a successful entrepreneur it can mean extreme wealth. But with extreme wealth comes extreme responsibility. And the responsibility for me is to invest in creating new businesses, create jobs, employ people, and to put money aside to tackle issues where we can make a difference.”
• “I’ve had to create companies that I believe in 100%. These are companies I feel will make a genuine difference. Then I have to be willing to find the time myself to talk about them, promote them and market them. I don’t want to spend my life doing something that I’m not proud of.”
• “Look, if you can indulge in your passion, life will be far more interesting than if you’re just working.  You’ll work harder at it, and you’ll know more about it. But first you must go out and educate yourself on whatever it is that you’ve decided to do – know more about kite-surfing than anyone else. That’s where the work comes in. But if you’re doing things you’re passionate about, that will come naturally.”
• “People have to decide on priorities if they want to get anywhere.  The best lessons I learned was to just do it.”
• “The important thing is that you’ve got a strong foundation before you start to try to save the world or help other people.”
• “Well, I’m somebody who is just living …living life, and if I get frustrated by something, then I like to try to put it right.”

If you have a favorite Richard Branson quote, please feel free to share it.

Photo by Gulltagen.

“A mom’s hug lasts long after she lets go.” — Author Unknown

One of the best gifts I got my Mom is the Kindle Touch 3G . It’s a gift that keeps on giving.  She uses it all the time, and now I can easily get her books as gifts for the holidays, like Mother’s Day.

I’ll share my Kindle review experience here.  I’ll also share my thought process.  My experience might help you perform your own Kindle review, whether as a gift, or for yourself.

There are a lot of Kindle reviews, but I actually had a hard time figuring out what really mattered until I had a specific scenario to test against.  Buying the Kindle as a gift for my Mom, really put things in perspective, and helped me prioritize and choose which Kindle to go with.

Here’s the surprise — I never imagined getting my Mom a Kindle.  My Mom LOVES to read.  And by love, I mean books are really her thing.  But she’s not a gadget person, and she especially does not like computer screens.  The glare hurts her eyes.  And because she doesn’t like computers, I figured I would never get her a Kindle.

I was wrong.  It turns out, the Kindle is a better experience than printed books, even for my Mom, who has grown up reading paperbacks and hard-covers.

The Kindle Experience vs. Print

My Mom likes the feel of a book in her hands.  She also likes turning the page.  What she doesn’t like about physical books is going to get them.  She doesn’t like when it’s hard to read the book because the font is too small, or not very clear.  She likes to read outside, but not when the Sun glares off the paper.

So the big advantages of the Kindle over paperback books turned out to be getting books at home and the Kindle is easier on the eyes, and in many cases, the Kindle is actually lighter than the physical books my Mom reads.  The other obvious benefit, which didn’t matter as much to her, is that her books are now stored in the cloud.  This means less clutter and her books are available wherever she goes.

Kindle Review at a Glance

How did I walk through choosing the right Kindle for my Mom.  As part of my Kindle review, I walked the scenarios and experiences that my Mom cared about the most.  Basically, I wanted to get my Mom an e-Reader that is optimized for reading books.  And I wanted to get her free 3G, since she doesn’t have Internet at home. This helped me rule out options.

These are the Kindle options I walked through:

• Kindle (Wi-Fi)
• Kindle DX (Free 3G) (A bigger version of the Kindle)
• Kindle Keyboard 3G (Free 3G + Wi-Fi)
• Kindle Touch (Wi-Fi)
• Kindle Touch 3G (Free 3G + Wi-Fi)
• Kindle Fire (WiFi) (Vibrant Color IPS, not E Ink)

Key Choices During My Kindle Review

As you can see, the main choices really come down to the following key choices:

1. Tablet vs. E-Book Reader. Do you want the Kindle Fire, which is more like a tablet, or do you want just an e-book reader (all the other Kindle options.)
2. Connectivity.   Do you want to connect with Wi-Fi or free 3G.  (3G is a brilliant feature if you need it.)
3. Interaction.  Do you want to interact using touch, keyboard, or the original Kindle 5-way controller?
4. Price.   Once you’ve narrowed down what you want, it’s really a game of what you can afford, and whether you want to pay more to avoid ads, and what you are willing to pay for in terms of features.  In my Mom’s case, I really needed to go 3G, since she doesn’t have Internet.

Whenever I got lost among the options during my Kindle review, I came back to the key points that my Mom needs 3G and that she needs E Ink for her best reading experience.

Options I Ruled Out During My Kindle Review

Here is how I ruled out the options during my Kindle review to narrow down my choice for my Mom:

• I did NOT rule out a Kindle just because of ads.  I was originally worried about getting a Kindle with ads, but they are tastefully done.  I asked my Mom if she cared, and she didn’t.  This is a nice way to get a cheaper Kindle.
• I ruled out the Kindle because it didn’t come with free 3G.
• I ruled out the Kindle DX because it was too big and no longer felt like a book.
• I ruled out the Kindle Keyboard options.  This was not a bad option.  But my Mom did not plan to take a bunch of notes, and the touch is actually a nice experience.  I also ruled it out because it wasn’t in the store, and I would have to order it online.  Ordering online would have been fine except I needed it that same day (Long story short, I found out my Mom already had the gift I got her, so I was trying to get the Kindle, since I knew she didn’t have that.)
• I ruled out the Kindle Fire.  It’s not E Ink and it would not be as easy on her eyes.  Also, she just wants to read books, not play movies or songs.

That left the Kindle Touch as the main option.  And what a great option it was.

Why the Kindle Touch

The Kindle Touch 3G turned out to be the perfect experience for my Mon.  It feels good in her hands.  She can turn the page with her finger tips.  She can change the font size to make it easier to read.

She doesn’t take notes in books, otherwise, a keyboard option might have been better.  I liked the idea of getting 3G, since my Mom doesn’t have Internet.

So How Does Mom Like Her Kindle?

My Mom loves her Kindle.  She loves it.  A lot.  I had to ask her again why she loves it so much.  It turns out that the E Ink is a really big deal and so is the ability to change the font size.  I didn’t imagine that she would really use it, but she does, and it’s much easier on her eyes, than her paperbacks.

I really have to thank Amazon here for helping my Mom continue to enjoy her favorite passion — reading books, and taking it to the next level.

Check Out the Kindle Touch on Amazon

Here is the Kindle Touch 3G page on Amazon:

• Kindle Touch 3G on Amazon

The Kindle Touch 3G page on Amazon includes a list of the features at a glance, technical details, a comparison chart of Kindles, E Ink 101 (a quick overview of E Ink), detailed feature descriptions, customer reviews and discussions.

That’s one of my favorite happiness quotes. It reminds me that happiness is a skill.

While some people seem to be born happy, others have to work at it. Some have to work harder than others. Rather than work harder, we can work smarter. Luckily, with all the focus on happiness, we now have a better body of knowledge to draw from. Carlin Flora shares a collection of patterns and practices for skilled happiness from a variety of sources in her article, The Pursuit of Happiness, in Psychology Today.

Key Take Aways

Here are my key take aways:

• We’re lousy at predicting what makes us happy. This is especially true when we try to make predictions from our past experience. Things are almost never as good or bad as we expect them to be. Our memory is a bad recording device. We recall beginning and endings better than the long middles.
• Improve your self-talk. Your can lift yourself up or bring yourself down. Practice a positive internal dialogue. Another way to put it is, be your coach not your critic.
• Find engaging activities. Focus on activities that are dynamic, surprising, and require your full attention. This is a way to find your flow in your day to day activities.
• Feel your full range of emotions. Don’t fear your negative emotions. Just notice them, but don’t let them overwhelm or control you. Remember that what you resist persists.
• Practice mindfulness. Don’t struggle against your negative emotions. Just let them be there without struggling against them. Be open and curious towards your feelings rather than making judgments.
• Work towards goals. Don’t make happiness a goal. Enjoy the pursuit. Progress and pursuit are the key to happiness. Be sure to stop and smell the roses.
• Be generous. Share more of yourself. Whether it’s your time, experience or wealth, giving is the key to getting true joy.
• Be careful who you hang with. Your peer group can have a large influence on how you feel and what your expectations are. The more values you share, the more you’ll enjoy it.
• Limit your choices. While more choices sound good, it can actually lead to frustration. You worry more about making the wrong choices, or you stress over lost opportunities. Enjoy the choices you do make.
• Build your relationships. Make building strong personal relationships a priority. Your relationships can wax or wane. Invest your time and energy in your relationships rather than take them for granted.
• Evaluate your well-being at the macro as well as the micro level. Step back and take a look at your life. What makes you happy day to day, may not be what makes you happy over the last 10 years. Use different time frames to find your personal trends in what makes you happy and to gain perspective.
• Find out whether somebody else liked it. Chances are, you might too. We’re bad at predicting what we’ll enjoy. Rather than try and predict what you’ll like, ask somebody who’s been there and done that. One of the best ways to figure out whether you’ll enjoy something is to ask one of your friends. This goes for jobs or vacations or just about anything. The key here is to ask a friend who has similar values and taste.
• Leverage your natural coping style. If you’re not a shiny, happy person, don’t pretend to be. Instead, leverage your natural style to be more effective. For example, maybe you can turn your stress into better performance.

I think the key themes boil down to how we talk to ourselves, how we respond to things, how we make meaning, who we spend time with, and how we make the most of what we’ve got. The other key thing is that happiness is dynamic and it’s not a static state. It’s about living, learning and growing, and rolling with the punches.

3 More Ways to Grow Your Happiness Muscles

Here are 3 more ways to flex your happiness muscles:

1. Raise your frustration tolerance. What if you knew that the single most significant way to undermine your own happiness is to have a low frustration tolerance? Getting mad at traffic or blowing up when you spill coffee on yourself, or breaking down when the copier decides to mess with you right before your most critical presentation ever are all tests for you. You get tested daily. Things go wrong. Life happens. Practice laughing at yourself and taking life less seriously. Learn to laugh at the situation. More importantly, raise your frustration tolerance so that you don’t die the death of a 1000 paper cuts. If you decide that it’s tougher to frustrate you, then you instantly own and directly control your happiness factor.
2. Ask what’s right with this? If you walk into every situation and start finding the flaws, then your natural tendency is to ask yourself, “What’s wrong with this situation?” Well, flip that around and start asking yourself, “What’s right with this situation?” You’ll quickly find that a lot of wonderful things were right under your nose, but you couldn’t see them through your blinders. Even if you open your blinds just part way at first, that’s a start.
3. Reduce crossed-expectations. Set your expectations better. One of the ways we get disappointed in life is we experience crossed-expectations. You can improve this in two ways. First, you can improve your ability to anticipate. Knowing what to expect can help you reduce crossed-expectations. Second, you can work at your ability to respond to the scenario. In fact, focus on responding over reacting. When you *choose* how to respond, this puts you in control, and this has a direct impact on your happiness and puts you in charge of your thinking, feeling, and doing.

The bottom line is never adopt a victim mentality and don’t let the world get you down. Instead, own your happiness, and use skills to make happiness an integral part of your life. You’re the author of your life and you get to write the story forward. While life may continue to throw curve balls your way, and you’ll still face set backs, drive from happiness, grow happiness right under your feet, and make happiness a path over just a destination or an idealistic happily ever after.

Best Books on Happiness

• Happiness: A Guide to Developing Life’s Most Important Skill, by Matthieu Ricard
• Stumbling on Happiness, by Daniel Gilbert
• The Happiness Project, by Gretchen Rubin
• The How of Happiness: A New Approach to Getting the Life You Want, by Sonja Lyumbomirsky

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Photo by Sabrina Campagna.

“One learns peoples through the heart, not the eyes or the intellect.” — Mark Twain

If you have a mental model for communication, then you can move your way up the communication stack more effectively.   You can also avoid more communication conflict.  You can also work on your communication skills more effectively.  That’s the true power of a simple model.

I was flipping through my old interpersonal skills book from college to find a simple model.  It’s a great book, the research is sound, but I found the model a little more complicated than what I wanted to share.

Instead, I’ll simply share how we tend to practice the different levels of communication in the halls of Microsoft.  I’ll simply call out the five levels that are easy to observe and actually put your finger on.  They are easy to identify because it’s where great leaders poke and prod to figure out where things are in terms of understanding, agreement, and action.

If you can see it, you can change it.  Here is a simple mental model for communication.

The 5 Levels of Communication

Here are the five levels that are easy to observe in practice:

1. Level 1.  Sending.
2. Level 2.  Receiving.
3. Level 3.  Understanding.
4. Level 4.  Agreement.
5. Level 5.  Action.

While there is overlap, and in real-life things are rarely that sequential, you can broadly think of it in terms of moving up the stack from sending and receiving messages, to understanding, then upward toward agreement, and finally action.

Communicating Your Way Up the Communication Stack

If you know the levels, then you can easily start to troubleshoot where things are broken down, or where you need to improve.  Here are some notes and insights for the different levels.

• Level 1.  Sending.  At this level, you simply send, transmit, or share your message.  Whether this is an email, or a  face-to-face conversation, you simply sent our message.  Just because you sent your message, doesn’t mean it was heard, read, or understood.  Where some people fail is they send emails or give our orders and think that was communicating.   If you don’t care about whether your message lands, or whether you have buy in, or if there are any concerns, then stopping here makes perfect sense.  If, on the other hand, you do care that the recipient heard you or read your message, understands what you want or mean, and leads to some sort of agreement or action, and has a level of buy in, then you have more work to do.
• Level 2.  Receiving.  This is where the message is received.  This is where an acknowledgement helps. As the sender, you can ask whether they read your message, or if it’s face-to-face, you can ask them to play back what they heard.
• Level 3.  Understanding.   This is where a lot of communication conflict or breakdowns happen.  You don’t have to agree at this stage.  What’s important is to first make sure the message is understood.  If you are the sender, then this is where you want to really check that your message is understood through playback. You can simply ask the receiver to play back what they heard.  What you said, may not be what they heard.  If you are the receiver and you want to practice your empathic listening skills, this is a great place to say, “What I hear you saying is …”, and check that you heard the message as it was intended.   This is also a great place to get any concerns on the table.  It’s also a great place to hear both sides, if there is more than one side.  Often there might seem like there are multiple sides, but often this is just different perspectives.  This is when people talk past each other.  A simple rule of thumb here from a Covey standpoint is, “Seek first to understand, then to be understood.”
• Level 4.  Agreement.  This is a perfect place to practice everything you’ve learned about playing well with others.  It’s the perfect place to focus on wants, needs, and concerns.  From a Covey standpoint, it’s a perfect place to seek the “win win”, or find “the 3rd alternative.”  From a John Wooden standpoint, it’s the perfect place to “agree to disagree”, if need be, and just because you don’t agree, does not mean you have to be disagreeable.
• Level 5.  Action.  This is a great outcome for great communication.  It leads to some sort of action or decision.   This is a spectrum of action from “now is not the time” to “who does what when” with increasing clarity.   Sometimes the best action simply is a decision that both parties agree to.

You can use the five levels of communication to troubleshoot your communication skills.

Best Books on Communication Skills

Here are some relevant book recommendations you can use to help you master your communication skills:

• Crucial Conversations: Tools for Talking When Stakes Are High, by Kerry Patterson, Joseph Grenny, Ron McMillan, and Al Switzler
• Crucial Confrontations, by Kerry Patterson, Joseph Grenny, Ron McMillan, and Al Switzler
• Dealing with People You Can’t Stand: How to Bring Out the Best in People at Their Worst , by Dr. Rick Brinkman and Dr. Rick Kirschner

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This is my deep collection of positive quotes.   It includes insights and positive quotes from Ralph Waldo Emerson, John Milton, Oscar Wilde, and more.  Even Willie Nelson is among the bunch.

What do these positive quotes teach us?  When we scan across the wisdom of the ages, we see that the keys to positivity include letting things go, choosing to focus on the positive, and rolling with the punches.  Whether the glass is half-full or half-empty is often up to you.   Baggage holds you back so let the grudges go.  Life reflects back at us what we put into it and pay backs can be tough, so throw some sunshine Karma’s way.

Maybe the most important lesson from these positive quotes is that it’s a decision, and the choice is yours.  The alternative is much worse.   Related to this is the idea that rather than put positivity on a pedestal, flow it from the inside out.  What you focus on and how you view it, is your reality.  Holding on to bad stuff poisons you, and you’re the one that loses.  Embracing change and adapting is better than worrying about who moved your cheese or dwelling on how things *should* be.    Make like a duck and let things roll off your back.  Remember that the mighty Oak breaks its branches against the wind, while the Willow bends with the breeze.

To make the most of this collection find three new positive quotes that help you in some way, and commit them to memory so they are always at your mental finger tips when you need them most.

Top 10 Positive Quotes

1. “A positive attitude may not solve all your problems, but it will annoy enough people to make it worth the effort.” –  Herm Albright
2. “Attitudes are contagious.  Are yours worth catching?” — Dennis and Wendy Mannering
3. “Be enthusiastic.  Remember the placebo effect – 30% of medicine is showbiz.” — Ronald Spark
4. “I think, what has this day brought me, and what have I given it?” — Henry Moore
5. “I will not let anyone walk through my mind with their dirty feet.” — Mahatma Gandhi
6. “Life is a shipwreck but we must not forget to sing in the lifeboats.” – Voltaire
7. “That which does not kill us makes us stronger.” — Friedrich Nietzsche
8. “Very often a change of self is needed more than a change of scene.” — Arthur Christopher Benson
9. “Wag more.  Bark less.” — Author Unknown
10. “We all live under the same sky, but we don’t all have the same horizon.” — Konrad Adenauer

Actions

• “I always plucked a thistle and planted a flower where I thought a flower would grow.” — Abraham Lincoln
• “If the sky falls, hold up your hands.” — Author Unknown
• “Make your optimism come true.” — Author Unknown
• “People deal too much with the negative, with what is wrong … Why not try and see positive things, to just touch those things and make them bloom?” –  Thich Nhat Hanh
• “Some days there won’t be a song in your heart.  Sing anyway.” — Emory Austin
• “The excursion is the same when you go looking for your sorrow as when you go looking for your joy.” — Eudora Welty
• “The world is full of cactus, but we don’t have to sit on it.” — Will Foley
• “There are souls in this world which have the gift of finding joy everywhere and of leaving it behind them when they go.” — Frederick Faber
• “There is nothing so easy but that it becomes difficult when you do it reluctantly.” — Publius Terentius Afer
• “Turn your face to the sun and the shadows fall behind you.” — Maori Proverb

Adaptability and Flexibility

• “For every day that there is sunshine, there will be days of rain, it’s how we dance within them both that shows our love and pain.” — Joey Tolbert
• “To be interested in the changing seasons is a happier state of mind than to be hopelessly in love with spring.” — George Santayana
• “We cannot direct the wind but we can adjust the sails.” — Author Unknown
• “You can’t stop the waves, but you can learn how to surf.” — Jon Kabat-Zinn
• “You have to learn the rules of the game. And then you have to play better than anyone else.” — Albert Einstein

Anger and Frustration

• “Consider how much more you often suffer from your anger and grief, than from those very things for which you are angry and grieved.” — Marcus Antonius
• “To be upset over what you don’t have is to waste what you do have.” — Ken S. Keyes
• “When you feel dog tired at night, it may be because you’ve growled all day long.” — Author Unknown

Appreciation and Gratitude

• “Enjoy the little things, for one day you may look back and realize they were the big things.” — Robert Brault
• “If you are not enjoying the journey, you probably won’t enjoy the destination.” — Author Unknown
• “If you don’t get everything you want, think of the things you don’t get that you don’t want.” — Oscar Wilde
• “If you don’t think every day is a good day, just try missing one.” — Cavett Robert
• “It is important that you recognize your progress and take pride in your accomplishments. Share your achievements with others. Brag a little. The recognition and support of those around you is nurturing.” — Rosemarie Rossetti
• “Leroy bet me I couldn’t find a pot of gold at the end, and I told him that was a stupid bet because the rainbow was enough.” — Rita Mae Brown
• “Think big thoughts but relish small pleasures.” — H. Jackson Brown, Jr
• “True contentment depends not upon what we have; a tub was large enough for Diogenes, but a world was too little for Alexander.” — Charles Caleb Colton
• “Why not learn to enjoy the little things – there are so many of them.” — Author Unknown

Attitude, Disposition, and Character

• “A cloudy day is no match for a sunny disposition.” — William Arthur Ward
• “A happy person is not a person in a certain set of circumstances, but rather a person with a certain set of attitudes.” — Hugh Downs
• “Attitude is a little thing that makes a big difference.” — Winston Churchill
• “Be the light in the dark, be the calm in the storm and be at peace while at war.” — Mike Dolan
• “Being a sex symbol has to do with an attitude, not looks.  Most men think it’s looks, most women know otherwise.” — Kathleen Turner
• “Could we change our attitude, we should not only see life differently, but life itself would come to be different.” — Katherine Mansfield
• “Excellence is not a skill.  It is an attitude.” — Ralph Marston
• “Happiness is an attitude.  We either make ourselves miserable, or happy and strong.  The amount of work is the same.” — Francesca Reigler
• “He who has so little knowledge of human nature as to seek happiness by changing anything but his own disposition will waste his life in fruitless efforts.” — Samuel Johnson
• “Heaven is under our feet, as well as over our heads.” — Henry David Thoreau
• “I am an optimist.  It does not seem too much use being anything else.” — Winston Churchill
• “If you have the will to win, you have achieved half your success; if you don’t, you have achieved half your failure.” ~David Ambrose
• “If you aren’t fired with enthusiasm, you will be fired with enthusiasm.” — Vince Lombardi
• “It isn’t our position but our disposition which makes us happy.” — Author Unknown
• “No life is so hard that you can’t make it easier by the way you take it.” — Ellen Glasgow
• “Oh, my friend, it’s not what they take away from you that counts.  It’s what you do with what you have left.” — Hubert Humphrey
• “People seem not to see that their opinion of the world is also a confession of character.” — Ralph Waldo Emerson
• “Persons are judged to be great because of the positive qualities they possess, not because of the absence of faults.” — Author Unknown
• “The greatest discovery of my generation is that a human being can alter his life by altering his attitudes.” — William James
• “The only difference between a good day and a bad day is your attitude.” — Dennis S. Brown
• “There are no menial jobs, only menial attitudes.” — William J. Bennett
• “There is little difference in people, but that little difference makes a big difference. The little difference is attitude. The big difference is whether it is positive or negative.” — W. Clement Stone
• “Things turn out best for the people who make the best out of the way things turn out.” — Art Linkletter
• “Toughness is in the soul and spirit, not in muscles.” — Alex Karras
• “Whatever you think the world is withholding from you, you are withholding from the world.” — Eckhart Tolle
• “Wherever you go, no matter what the weather, always bring your own sunshine.” — Anthony J. D’Angelo
• “You must start with a positive attitude or you will surely end without one.” — Carrie Latet
• “You’ve done it before and you can do it now. See the positive possibilities. Redirect the substantial energy of your frustration and turn it into positive, effective, unstoppable determination.” — Ralph Marston

Defeat, Setbacks, and Failures

• “A car can’t operate without the mechanical systems working, but it can operate with a few dents and scratches … you are the same.” — Mike Dolan
• “Defeat is not bitter unless you swallow it.” — Joe Clark
• “If you can wear the hard times of your life as furrows on your brow, you can wear the good times as a twinkle in your eye.” — Robert Brault
• “In the depth of winter I finally learned that there was in me an invincible summer.” — Albert Camu
• “Physical strength is measured by what we can carry; spiritual by what we can bear.” — Author Unknown
• “The block of granite which was an obstacle in the pathway of the weak, became a stepping-stone in the pathway of the strong.” — Thomas Carlyle
• “The human spirit is stronger than anything that can happen to it.” — C.C. Scott
• “Think like a queen. A queen is not afraid to fail. Failure is another steppingstone to greatness.” — Oprah Winfrey
• “To begin to think with purpose is to enter the ranks of those strong ones who only recognize failure as one of the pathways to attainment.” — James Allen
• “When you get into a tight place and everything goes against you, till it seems as though you could not hold on a minute longer, never give up then, for that is just the place and time that the tide will turn.” –  Harriet Beecher Stowe
• “Whenever you fall, pick something up.” — Oswald Avery

Expectations

• “Expect nothing.  Live frugally on surprise.” — Alice Walker
• “I am not afraid of tomorrow, for I have seen yesterday and I love today.” — William Allen White
• “I am sure that nothing has such a decisive influence upon a man’s course as his personal appearance, and not so much his appearance as his belief in its attractiveness or unattractiveness.” — Leo Tolstoy
• “I don’t like that man.  I must get to know him better.” — Abraham Lincoln
• “If you keep on saying things are going to be bad, you have a good chance of becoming a prophet.” — Isaac Bashevis Singer
• “If you think about disaster, you will get it. Brood about death and you hasten your demise. Think positively and masterfully, with confidence and faith, and life becomes more secure, more fraught with action, richer in achievement and experience.” –  Swami Vivekananda
• “The best things in life are unexpected – because there were no expectations.” — Eli Khamarov
• “The sun won’t shine until you put the umbrella away.  Be free.” — Author Unknown
• “These then are my last words to you. Be not afraid of life. Believe that life is worth living and your belief will help create the fact.” –  William James
• “Too many people miss the silver lining because they’re expecting gold.” — Maurice Setter
• “Unhappiness is best defined as the difference between our talents and our expectations.” — Edward de Bono
• “We awaken in others the same attitude of mind we hold toward them.” — Elbert Hubbard
• “We must be willing to get rid of the life we’ve planned, so as to have the life that is waiting for us.” — Joseph Campbell

Focus and Perspective

• “Every day may not be good, but there’s something good in every day.” — Author Unknown
• “I don’t think of all the misery but of the beauty that still remains.” — Anne Frank
• “I have never met a man so ignorant that I couldn’t learn something from him.” — Galileo Galilei
• “If we shall take the good we find, asking no questions, we shall have heaping measures.” — Ralph Waldo Emerson
• “If you call a thing bad you do little, if you call a thing good you do much.” — Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
• “If you don’t like something change it; if you can’t change it, change the way you think about it.” — Mary Engelbreit
• “Instead of thinking about what you’re missing, try thinking about what you have that everyone else is missing.” – Unknown
• “It’s so hard when I have to, and so easy when I want to.” — Annie Gottlier
• “Just because you’re miserable doesn’t mean you can’t enjoy your life.” — Annette Goodheart
• “May I never miss a sunset or a rainbow because I am looking down.” — Sara June Parker
• “Nothing is interesting if you’re not interested.” — Helen MacInness
• “People are not disturbed by things, but by the view they take of them.” – Epictetus
• “Swallow a toad in the morning and you will encounter nothing more disgusting the rest of the day.” — Nicholas Chamfort
• “That’s my gift. I let that negativity roll off me like water off a duck’s back. If it’s not positive, I didn’t hear it. If you can overcome that, fights are easy.” — George Foreman
• “The mind is its own place, and in itself can make a Heaven of Hell, a Hell of Heaven.” — John Milton
• “The sun shines and warms and lights us and we have no curiosity to know why this is so; but we ask the reason of all evil, of pain, and hunger, and mosquitoes and silly people.” — Ralph Waldo Emerson
• “There are always flowers for those who want to see them.” –  Henri Matisse
• “There are exactly as many special occasions in life as we choose to celebrate.” — Robert Brault
• “There are two types of people – those who come into a room and say, ‘Well, here I am!’ and those who come in and say, ‘Ah, there you are.’” — Frederick L. Collins
• “There’s a saying among prospectors:  ‘Go out looking for one thing, and that’s all you’ll ever find.’” — Robert Flaherty
• “Two people can have a middling day, but one rounds up and the other rounds down.” — Robert Brault
• “We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.” — Oscar Wilde
• “Whatever my day may have lacked, yet I have tonight’s pearl moon.” — Dr. SunWolf
• “Work is either fun or drudgery.  It depends on your attitude.  I like fun.” — Colleen C. Barrett

Hope and Fear

• “A strong positive mental attitude will create more miracles than any wonder drug.” — Patricia Neal
• “Either way, things are a lot better – either a lot better than they were or a lot better than they’re going to be.” — Robert Brault
• “Fear less, hope more; Eat less, chew more; Whine less, breathe more; Talk less, say more; Love more, and all good things will be yours.” — Swedish Proverb
• “I am a little deaf, a little blind, a little impotent, and on top of this are two or three abominable infirmities, but nothing destroys my hope.” – Voltaire
• “I not only bow to the inevitable; I am fortified by it.” — Thornton Wilder
• “The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function.  One should, for example, be able to see that things are hopeless and yet be determined to make them otherwise.” — F. Scott Fitzgerald
• “My friends, love is better than anger.  Hope is better than fear.  Optimism is better than despair.  So let us be loving, hopeful and optimistic.  And we’ll change the world.” — Jack Layton
• “When you put faith, hope and love together, you can raise positive kids in a negative world.” — Zig Ziglar

Humor

• “A friend will remind you that assumptions born of malice are better dealt with by gleefully sticking your tongue out.” – Dodinsky
• “A person will sometimes devote all his life to the development of one part of his body – the wishbone.” — Robert Frost
• “I was going to buy a copy of ‘The Power of Positive Thinking’, and then I thought: What the hell good would that do?” –  Ronnie Shakes
• “Optimist: someone who isn’t sure whether life is a tragedy or a comedy but is tickled silly just to be in the play.” — Robert Brault
• “Reach for the stars, even if you have to stand on a cactus.” — Susan Longacre
• “Scratch less.  Purr more.” — Author Unknown
• “Sometimes life’s Hell.  But hey!  Whatever gets the marshmallows toasty.” — J. Andrew Helt
• “The basis of optimism is sheer terror.” –  Oscar Wilde
• “The only disability in life is a bad attitude.” — Scott Hamilton
• “The only people who find what they are looking for in life are the fault finders.” — Foster’s Law

Letting Things Go and Forgiveness

• “For my part I believe in the forgiveness of sin and the redemption of ignorance.” — Adlai Stevenson
• “The best thing to give to your enemy is forgiveness; to an opponent, tolerance; to a friend, your heart; to your child, a good example; to a father, deference; to your mother, conduct that will make her proud of you; to yourself, respect; to all men, charity.” — Benjamin Franklin
• “To be wronged is nothing unless you continue to remember it.” — Confucius

Love and Liking

• “A loving person lives in a loving world.  A hostile person lives in a hostile world; everyone you meet is your mirror.” — Ken Keyes, Jr.
• “Anywhere you go liking everyone, everyone will be likeable.” — Mignon McLaughlin
• “I have found that if you love life, life will love you back.” — Arthur Rubinstein
• “Surrounded by people who love life, you love it too; surrounded by people who don’t, you don’t.” — Mignon McLaughlin
• “The sun does not shine for a few trees and flowers, but for the wide world’s joy.” — Henry Ward Beecher

Opportunity and Possibility

• “A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty.” — Winston Churchill
• “Become a possibilitarian.  No matter how dark things seem to be or actually are, raise your sights and see possibilities – always see them, for they’re always there.” — Norman Vincent Peale
• “I have learned to use the word impossible with the greatest caution.” — Wernher von Braun
• “If the skies fall, one may hope to catch larks.” — Francis Rabelais
• “Impossible is a word only to be found in the dictionary of fools.” – Napoleon
• “Keep a green tree in your heart and perhaps a singing bird will come.” — Chinese Proverb
• “Learn to smile at every situation.  See it as an opportunity to prove your strength and ability.” — Joe Brown
• “Nothing is impossible to a willing heart.” — John Heywood
• “The impossible can always be broken down into possibilities.” — Author Unknown
• “Where the loser saw barriers, the winner saw hurdles.” — Robert Brault

Positive Thinking

• “A man is but the product of his thoughts what he thinks, he becomes.” –  Mahatma Gandhi
• “A person who has good thoughts cannot ever be ugly.  You can have a wonky nose and a crooked mouth and a double chin and stick-out teeth, but if you have good thoughts they will shine out of your face like sunbeams and you will always look lovely.” — Roald Dahl
• “Being in a good frame of mind helps keep one in the picture of health.” — Author Unknown
• “Care not what they say about the color of your skin let the brilliant light of your soul blind them.” — Mike Dolan
• “Change your thoughts and you change your world.” — Norman Vincent Peale
• “Clouds come floating into my life, no longer to carry rain or usher storm, but to add color to my sunset sky.” — Rabindranath Tagore
• “Every thought is a seed.  If you plant crab apples, don’t count on harvesting Golden Delicious.” — Bill Meyer
• “Henceforth I ask not good-fortune, I myself am good-fortune.” — Walt Whitman
• “It takes but one positive thought when given a chance to survive and thrive to overpower an entire army of negative thoughts.” –  Robert H. Schuller
• “Look at everything as though you were seeing it either for the first or last time.” — Betty Smith
• “Once you replace negative thoughts with positive ones, you’ll start having positive results.” — Willie Nelson
• “People are zealous for a cause when they are not quite positive that it is true” — Bertrand Russell
• “Positive anything is better than negative thinking.” — Elbert Hubbard
• “Positive thinking will let you do everything better than negative thinking will.” — Zig Ziglar
• “So our human life but dies down to its root, and still puts forth its green blade to eternity.” — Henry David Thoreau
• “Some people are always grumbling because roses have thorns; I am thankful that thorns have roses.” — Alphonse Karr
• “The best way to dispel negative thoughts is to require that they have a purpose.” — Robert Brault
• “The man who has no inner life is a slave to his surroundings.” — Henri Frédéric Amiel
• “The positive thinker sees the invisible, feels the intangible, and achieves the impossible.” — Author Unknown
• “They can betray me, but I choose not to betray my peace of mind.” – Dodinsky
• “When I examine myself and my methods of thought, I come to the conclusion that the gift of fantasy has meant more to me than any talent for abstract, positive thinking.” — Albert Einstein

Enjoy and best wishes for a positive outlook and positive action for your road ahead.

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