Tuesday, September 19, 2006

Gandhi's wisdom

"Action expresses priorities."

"An ounce of practice is worth more than tons of preaching."

"Find purpose, the means will follow."

"Constant development is the law of life, and a man who always tries to maintain his dogmas in order to appear consistent drives himself into a false position."

“Men often become what they believe themselves to be. If I believe I cannot do something, it makes me incapable of doing it. But when I believe I can, then I acquire the ability to do it even if I didn't have it in the beginning.”

"A man is but the product of his thoughts -- what he thinks, he becomes."

"Always aim at complete harmony of thought and word and deed. Always aim at purifying your thoughts and everything will be well."

"There is more to life than simply increasing its speed."

“An error does not become truth by reason of multiplied propagation, nor does truth become error because nobody sees it.”

"Even if you are a minority of one, the truth is the truth."

"We cannot be speakers who do not listen. But neither can we be listeners who do not speak."

"First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win."

“Whenever you have truth it must be given with love, or the message and the messenger will be rejected.”

“We must always seek to ally ourselves with that part of the enemy that knows what is right.”

“You can chain me, you can torture me, you can even destroy this body, but you will never imprison my mind.”

"An unjust law is itself a species of violence. Arrest for its breach is more so."

“The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the service of others.”

"Capital as such is not evil; it is its wrong use that is evil. Capital in some form or other will always be needed."

"The Rich must live more simply so that the Poor may simply live."

"A small body of determined spirits fired by an unquenchable faith in their mission can alter the course of history."

"As human beings, our greatness lies not so much in being able to remake the world -- that is the myth of the atomic age -- as in being able to remake ourselves."

“Be the change you want to see in the world.”

Thursday, September 14, 2006

Keynes on avoiding a type of fossilization

"When confronted with new information, I reassess and modify my position. What, sir, do you do when confronted with new information?"

-- John Maynard Keynes, economist

Purpose

To those who seek to use the term "do-gooder" as an insult or epithet, I would pose this question: What, exactly, would you do with your life?