Martin Svoboda

@quick, member from April 4, 2011
Stephen R. Covey photo

“Retire from your job but never from meaningful projects.”

The 8th Habit : From Effectiveness to Greatness‎ (2004)
Context: Retire from your job but never from meaningful projects. If you want to live a long life, you need eustress, that is, a deep sense of meaning and contribution to worthy projects and causes, particularly your intergenerational family.

The 8th Habit : From Effectiveness to Greatness‎ (2004), p. 63

Stephen R. Covey photo

“Live, love, laugh, leave a legacy.”

Stephen R. Covey (1932–2012) American educator, author, businessman and motivational speaker

“Today is our most precious possession. It is our only sure possession.”

Source: How to Stop Worrying and Start Living

Joseph Campbell photo

“Where you stumble and fall, there you will find gold.”

Joseph Campbell (1904–1987) American mythologist, writer and lecturer
Joseph Campbell photo

“Find a place inside where there's joy, and the joy will burn out the pain.”

Joseph Campbell (1904–1987) American mythologist, writer and lecturer

Variant: Find a place inside where there's joy, and the joy will burn out the pain.

Joseph Campbell photo
Joseph Campbell photo

“If you are falling…. dive.”

Joseph Campbell (1904–1987) American mythologist, writer and lecturer
Joseph Campbell photo
Charles Baudelaire photo

“I can barely conceive of a type of beauty in which there is no Melancholy.”

Charles Baudelaire (1821–1867) French poet

Variant: I can barely conceive a type of beauty in which there is no melancholy.

Walt Whitman photo

“Do anything, but let it produce joy.”

Source: Leaves of Grass

Sigmund Freud photo

“The voice of the intellect is a soft one, but it does not rest until it has gained a hearing.”

Sigmund Freud (1856–1939) Austrian neurologist known as the founding father of psychoanalysis

1920s, The Future of an Illusion (1927)
Context: The voice of the intellect is a soft one, but it does not rest until it has gained a hearing. Ultimately, after endlessly repeated rebuffs, it succeeds. This is one of the few points in which it may be optimistic about the future of mankind, but in itself it signifies not a little.

Timothy Leary photo
Seneca the Younger photo

“Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity.”

Seneca the Younger (-4–65 BC) Roman Stoic philosopher, statesman, and dramatist

Has been attributed to Seneca since the 1990s (eg. Gregory K. Ericksen, (1999), Women entrepreneurs only: 12 women entrepreneurs tell the stories of their success, page ix.). Other books ascribe the saying to either Darrell K. Royal (former American football player, born 1924) or Elmer G. Letterman (Insurance salesman and writer, 1897-1982). However, it is unlikely either man originated the saying. A version that reads "He is lucky who realizes that luck is the point where preparation meets opportunity" can be found (unattributed) in the 1912 The Youth's Companion: Volume 86. The quote might be a distortion of the following passage by Seneca (who makes no mention of "luck" and is in fact quoting his friend Demetrius the Cynic):<blockquote>"The best wrestler," he would say, "is not he who has learned thoroughly all the tricks and twists of the art, which are seldom met with in actual wrestling, but he who has well and carefully trained himself in one or two of them, and watches keenly for an opportunity of practising them." — Seneca, On Benefits, vii. 1 http://thriceholy.net/Texts/Benefits4.html</blockquote>
Disputed

Seneca the Younger photo

“If you are wise, mingle these two elements: do not hope without despair, or despair without hope.”
Si sapis, alterum alteri misce: nec speraveris sine desperatione nec desperaveris sine spe.

Seneca the Younger (-4–65 BC) Roman Stoic philosopher, statesman, and dramatist

Alternate translation: Hope not without despair, despair not without hope. (translated by Zachariah Rush).
Source: Epistulae Morales ad Lucilium (Moral Letters to Lucilius), Letter CIV: On Care of Health and Peace of Mind, Line 12

André Breton photo

“Keep reminding yourself that literature is one of the saddest roads that leads to everything.”

André Breton (1896–1966) French writer

Le Manifeste du Surréalisme, Andre Breton (Manifesto of Surrealism; 1924)
Context: After you have settled yourself in a place as favorable as possible to the concentration of your mind upon itself, have writing materials brought to you. Put yourself in as passive, or receptive, a state of mind as you can. Forget about your genius, your talents, and the talents of everyone else. Keep reminding yourself that literature is one of the saddest roads that lead to everything. Write quickly, without any preconceived subject, fast enough so that you will not remember what you're writing and be tempted to reread what you have written. The first sentence will come spontaneously, so compelling is the truth that with every passing second there is a sentence unknown to our consciousness which is only crying out to be heard.

“A finite game is played for the purpose of winning, an infinite game for the purpose of continuing the play.”

James P. Carse American academic

Source: Finite and Infinite Games: A Vision of Life as Play and Possibility

Naguib Mahfouz photo