swissmiss

“You can do it like it’s a great weight, or you can do it like it’s part of the dance.”
– Ram Dass

“You have to find your own rainbow to follow. There is no gold at the end of somebody else’s rainbow.”
– Bill Grundfest

(from this epic thread)

“I used to think the top global environmental problems were biodiversity loss, ecosystem collapse and climate change. I thought with 30 years of good science we could address those problems, but I was wrong.

The top environmental problems are selfishness, greed and apathy – and to deal with these we need a spiritual and cultural transformation and we scientists don’t know how to do that.”

– Gus Speth

“Go and love someone exactly as they are. And then watch how quickly they transform into the greatest, truest version of themselves. When one feels seen and appreciated in their own essence, one is instantly empowered.”
– Wes Angelozzi

“Do your little bit of good where you are;
it’s those little bits of good put together
that overwhelm the world.”
– Desmond Tutu

I am running into a new year
and the old years blow back
like a wind
that I catch in my hair
like strong fingers like
all my old promises and
it will be hard to let go
of what I said to myself
about myself
when I was sixteen and
twentysix and thirtysix
even thirtysix but
I am running into a new year
and i beg what I love and
I leave to forgive me

— Lucille Clifton (1936-2010)

“Reading is a basic tool in living of a good life.”
– Joseph Addison

“If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you are a leader.”
– John Quincy Adams

“Fortify yourself with a flock of friends! There is always at least one who will understand, inspire, and give you the lift you may need at the time.”
– George M. Adams

“I’m not telling you to make the world better, because I don’t think that progress is necessarily part of the package. I’m just telling you to live in it. Not just to endure it, not just to suffer it, not just to pass through it, but to live in it. To look at it. To try to get the picture. To live recklessly. To take chances. To make your own work and take pride in it. To seize the moment. And if you ask me why you should bother to do that, I could tell you that the grave’s a fine and private place, but none I think do there embrace. Nor do they sing there, or write, or argue, or see the tidal bore on the Amazon, or touch their children. And that’s what there is to do and get it while you can and good luck at it.”
― Joan Didion

“Nobody tells this to people who are beginners, I wish someone told me. All of us who do creative work, we get into it because we have good taste. But there is this gap. For the first couple years you make stuff, it’s just not that good. It’s trying to be good, it has potential, but it’s not. But your taste, the thing that got you into the game, is still killer. And your taste is why your work disappoints you. A lot of people never get past this phase, they quit. Most people I know who do interesting, creative work went through years of this. We know our work doesn’t have this special thing that we want it to have. We all go through this. And if you are just starting out or you are still in this phase, you gotta know it’s normal and the most important thing you can do is do a lot of work. Put yourself on a deadline so that every week you will finish one story. It is only by going through a volume of work that you will close that gap, and your work will be as good as your ambitions. And I took longer to figure out how to do this than anyone I’ve ever met. It’s gonna take awhile. It’s normal to take awhile. You’ve just gotta fight your way through.”
– Ira Glass

“People are like stained-glass windows. They sparkle and shine when the sun is out, but when the darkness sets in, their true beauty is revealed only if there is a light from within.”
– Elizabeth Kubler-Ross

“The most successful people recognise that in life, they create their own love, they manufacture their own meaning, they generate their own motivation.”
– Neil deGrasse Tyson

(via)

“What you can plan is too small for you to live.”
– David Whyte

(via Casper)

“Ninety-nine percent of who you are is invisible and untouchable.”
– Buckminster Fuller

“Doing small things with love is the atom of bravery.”
—Mark Nepo

“A civilization flourishes when people plant trees under whose shade they will never sit.”
– Greek Proverb

“Recognizing that people’s reactions don’t belong to you is the only sane way to create. If people enjoy what you’ve created, terrific. If people ignore what you’ve created, too bad. If people misunderstand what you’ve created, don’t sweat it. And what if people absolutely hate what you’ve created? What if people attack you with savage vitriol, and insult your intelligence, and malign your motives, and drag your good name through the mud? Just smile sweetly and suggest – as politely as you possibly can – that they go make their own fucking art. Then stubbornly continue making yours.”
― Elizabeth Gilbert

(From the wonderful book Big Magic)

“Survival is insufficient.”

The other day I told my friend Michelle, while speaking about my businesses, that I am not used to being in survival mode. I am used to creating, expanding, building, adding…

And she mentioned the quote “Survival is insufficient”. I feel this. But who is it by?

“Joy does not simply happen to us. We have to choose joy and keep choosing it every day.”
– Henri J.M. Nouwen