The person who has overcome greed does not cling to any idol or anything and hence has nothing to lose: he is rich because he is empty, he is strong because he is not the slave of his desires. He can let go of idols, irrational desires, and fantasies, because he is in full touch with reality, inside and outside himself.*
Erich Fromm
*Erich Fromm’s The Revolution Of Hope.
The paradox is that hedonism, the pursuit of pleasure for its own sake, leads to anhedonia, which is the inability to enjoy pleasure of any kind.*
Anna Lembke
The median narcissism score has risen 30 percent in the last two decades.**
David Brooks
Could it be
the pleasure-seeker requires more and more
to feel less and less, yet
the one who shares gains pleasure
in others?
The ancient ways and philosophers
and scriptures and mystics –
And all their children –
Will help us find who we can be,
Will help us remember what we can do.
The Koreans call it nunchi, the ability to be sensitive to other people’s moods and thoughts. The Germans (of course) have a word for it: herzenbildung, training one’s heart to see the full humanity in another.^
*Quoted in Arthur Brooks’ The Meaning Of Your Life;
**David Brooks’ The Road To Character;
^David Brooks’ How To Know A Person.
Compassion is not a relationship between the healer and the wounded. It’s a relationship between equals.*
Brené Brown
Reality does not provide meaning. Stories do.**
Robert McKee
Compassion is a story
we co-create–
Though one may write
the first line and the other
the last,
If written alone
or on behalf of another,
It isn’t compassion.
*Brené Brown’s The Gifts Of Imperfection;
**Robert McKee‘s newsletter: Why Reality Is Not Enough For Writers.
Nonlinearity means that the act of playing the game has a way of changing the rules.*
James Gleick
That’s what changes us. Tension is the feeling we experience just before we grow.**
Seth Godin
If you wonder what you will become,
What others will become,
What the world will become,
You are an apprentice–
Of course you may insulate yourself
and settle for mastery.
*Quoted in Bruce Feiler’s Life Is In The Transitions;
**Seth Godin’s blog: “Please create more tension”.
I have said that man does not care for pleasure and happiness but rather for that which causes these effects.*
Viktor Frankl
We all ultimately yearn to feel that something became better because of our contribution. And that maybe, potentially, hopefully, we helped someone in need.*
gapingvoid
What if we are here to do good,
And in this we find both our meaning and pleasure,
Each of us having something unrepeatable to bring?
*Viktor Frankl’s The Doctor And The Soul;
**gapingvoid’s blog: Ritz-Carlton Was Right. Karl Marx Was Wrong.
SOME RANDOM THIN|SILENCE
THIN|SILENCE FROM A YEAR AGO
When you’re beholding someone, you’re seeing the richness of this particular human consciousness, the full symphony – how they perceive and create their life.*
David Brooks
Goodness isn’t something that going to be delivered in the mail. You have to dig it up inside your own soul. You find it within your own thoughts, and you make it with your own actions.**
Ryan Holiday
Everyone is worthy
of being beheld, including you–
Don’t forget to behold yourself.
You will find deep veins
of your particular and peculiar
goodness to share.
*David Brooks’ How To Know A Person;
**Ryan Holiday’s The Daily Stoic.
When you write something down or create an image of it, that thing becomes real to the mind and body. You are giving it power and attention.*
Jean Houston
Jean Houston’s The Wizard Of Us.
But to be what I am, to live, to want to sound like no one else, to yield the blossoms dictated by my heart: this is what I want and surely this cannot be arrogance.*
Rainer Maria Rilke
*Rainer Maria Rilke’s Letters On Life (w).
Getting it right the first time. How unlikely is this? … Evolution is powerful. It gives us a chance to revise, edit, and do what works while removing what doesn’t. … Got it wrong the first time? Then make it better.*
Seth Godin
Perhaps we think of ourselves
on the human evolution timeline,
A small life lived against a background
of big numbers–
Nothing changes much on a scale such as this,
But our lives are all about evolution–
When we mess up or fall short
or find it hard to learn or struggle
to control our emotions or grow an attitude,
Here’s another day to try
yet another way to better–
Forgiveness is an incredible human power.
*Seth Godin’s blog: Getting it right the first time.
The cause of irritation – or our notion that something is bad – that comes from us, from our labels and expectations.*
Ryan Holiday
Honesty is reached through the doorway of grief and loss. Where we cannot go in our mind, our memory or our body is where we cannot be straight with another, with the world, or with our self.**
David Whyte
I can jump to a conclusion very well
from my many years of training
in blaming something “out there”–
Though sometimes it is,
If I take a moment more
to check “inside here”
I may find a desire to have my own way,
To control the outcome,
For my assumptions to be realised–
Sometimes a moment allows
to see what is and desires to emerge–
And in this moment I am gifted
with growth.
*Ryan Holiday’s The Daily Stoic;
**David Whyte’s Consolations.
You must be logged in to post a comment.