Joseph Zairo > Joseph's Quotes

“if a man does not master his circumstances then he is bound to be mastered by them.”
― Amor Towles, A Gentleman in Moscow

“Luck is where preparation meets opportunity. ”
― Randy Pausch, The Last Lecture

“It’s human nature to be rigid in your long-held beliefs; it’s scientific to challenge them.”
― Richard P. Jacoby, Sugar Crush: How to Reduce Inflammation, Reverse Nerve Damage, and Reclaim Good Health

“Religion is a culture of faith; science is a culture of doubt.”
― Richard P. Feynman

“Manifest plainness,
Embrace simplicity,
Reduce selfishness,
Have few desires.”
― Lao Tzu

“Embrace short-term discomfort to find a long-term benefit.”
― Michael Easter, Scarcity Brain: Fix Your Craving Mindset and Rewire Your Habits to Thrive with Enough

“It’s OK to be wrong. Just don’t be confident and wrong.”
― Walter Isaacson, Elon Musk

“When hiring, look for people with the right attitude. Skills can be taught. Attitude changes require a brain transplant.”
― Walter Isaacson, Elon Musk

“Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.
When once you have tasted flight, you will forever walk the earth with your eyes turned skyward, for there you have been, and there you will always long to return.
Learning never exhausts the mind.
Art is never finished, only abandoned.
Painting is poetry that is seen rather than felt, and poetry is painting that is felt rather than seen.
The human foot is a masterpiece of engineering and a work of art.
It had long since come to my attention that people of accomplishment rarely sat back and let things happen to them. They went out and happened to things.
I have been impressed with the urgency of doing. Knowing is not enough; we must apply. Being willing is not enough; we must do.
As a well-spent day brings happy sleep, so a life well spent brings happy death.
Water is the driving force of all nature.”
― Leonardo da Vinci

“I skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been.”
― Wayne Gretzky

“You miss one hundred percent of the shots you don't take.”
― Wayne Gretzky

“One of Job's business rules was to never be afraid of cannibalizing yourself. " If you don't cannibalize yourself, someone else will," he said. So even though an Iphone might cannibalize sales of an IPod, or an IPad might cannibalize sales of a laptop, that did not deter him.”
― Walter Isaacson, Steve Jobs

“Three bricklayers are asked: “What are you doing?” The first says, “I am laying bricks.” The second says, “I am building a church.” And the third says, “I am building the house of God.” The first bricklayer has a job. The second has a career. The third has a calling.”
― Angela Duckworth, Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance

“There’s an old Japanese saying: Fall seven, rise eight.”
― Angela Duckworth, Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance

“optimists habitually search for temporary and specific causes of their suffering, whereas pessimists assume permanent and pervasive causes are to blame.”
― Angela Duckworth, Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance

“The challenge of writing is to see your horribleness on page. To see your terribleness, and then to go to bed, and wake up the next day and take that horribleness and that terribleness and refine it, and make it not so terrible and not so horrible, and then to go to bed again. And come the next day, and refine it a little bit more, and make it not so bad, and then to go to bed the next day. And do it again, and make it maybe average. And then one more time, if you're lucky, maybe you get to good. And if you've done that, that's a success.”
― Ta-Nehisi Coates

“Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.”
― Viktor E. Frankl

“The inability to say no is largely about approval-seeking—people imagine that if they say no, they won’t be loved by others. The inability to say yes, however—to intimacy, a job opportunity, an alcohol program—is more about lack of trust in oneself. Will I mess this up? Will this turn out badly? Isn’t it safer to stay where I am?”
― Lori Gottlieb, Maybe You Should Talk to Someone: A Therapist, Her Therapist, and Our Lives Revealed

“Can practicing meditation help you accept reality? Yeah. But it’s amazing how little it helps. [laughs] You can be a long-time meditator, but if someone says the wrong thing in the wrong way, you go back to your ego-driven self. It’s almost like you’re lifting one-pound weights, but then somebody drops a huge barbell with a stack of plates on your head. It’s absolutely better than doing nothing. But when the actual moment of mental or emotional suffering arrives, it’s still never easy. [8] Real happiness only comes as a side-effect of peace. Most of it is going to come from acceptance, not from changing your external environment. [8] A rational person can find peace by cultivating indifference to things outside of their control. I have lowered my identity. I have lowered the chattering of my mind. I don’t care about things that don’t really matter. I don’t get involved in politics. I don’t hang around unhappy people. I really value my time on this earth. I read philosophy. I meditate. I hang around with happy people. And it works. You can very slowly but steadily and methodically improve your happiness baseline, just like you can improve your fitness. [10]”
― Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness

“Intentions don’t matter. Actions do. That’s why being ethical is hard.”
― Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness

“Desire is a contract you make with yourself to be unhappy until you get what you want.”
― Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness

“I think business networking is a complete waste of time. And I know there are people and companies popularizing this concept because it serves them and their business model well, but the reality is if you’re building something interesting, you will always have more people who will want to know you. Trying to build business relationships well in advance of doing business is a complete waste of time. I have a much more comfortable philosophy: “Be a maker who makes something interesting people want. Show your craft, practice your craft, and the right people will eventually find you.”
― Eric Jorgenson, The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness

“A lot of us surround ourselves with people who speak to our desire for comfort. People who would rather treat the pain of our wounds and prevent further injury than help us callous over them and try again. We need to surround ourselves with people who will tell us what we need to hear, not what we want to hear, but at the same time not make us feel we’re up against the impossible.”
― David Goggins, Can't Hurt Me: Master Your Mind and Defy the Odds

“It read: 'Danger. All structures are unstable.' I said to my friend, 'That's a profound sutra [sacred scripture].' And we stood there in awe. Once you realize and accept that all structures (forms) are unstable, even the seemingly solid material ones, peace arises within you. This is because the recognition of the impermanence of all forms awakens you to the dimension of the formless within yourself, that which is beyond death.”
― Eckhart Tolle, A New Earth: Awakening to Your Life's Purpose

“Try this for a couple of weeks and see how it changes your reality: Whatever you think people are withholding from you—praise, appreciation, assistance, loving care, and so on—give it to them. You don’t have it? Just act as if you had it, and it will come. Then, soon after you start giving, you will start receiving. You cannot receive what you don’t give. Outflow determines inflow. Whatever you think the world is withholding from you, you already have, but unless you allow it to flow out, you won’t even know that you have it. This includes abundance. The law that outflow determines inflow is expressed by Jesus in this powerful image: “Give and it will be given to you. Good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running over, will be put into your lap.”
― Eckhart Tolle, A New Earth: Awakening to Your Life's Purpose

“The primary cause of unhappiness is never the situation but your thoughts about it.”
― Eckhart Tolle, A New Earth: Awakening to Your Life's Purpose

“Abundance comes only to those who already have it. It sounds almost unfair, but of course it isn’t. It is a universal law. Both abundance and scarcity are inner states that manifest as your reality. Jesus puts it like this: “For to the one who has, more will be given, and from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away.”2”
― Eckhart Tolle, A New Earth: Awakening to Your Life's Purpose

“Joy does not come from what you do, it flows into what you do and thus into this world from deep within you.”
― Eckhart Tolle, A New Earth: Awakening to Your Life's Purpose

“Nothing great was ever achieved without enthusiasm.”
― Ralph Waldo Emerson

“Make sure your goal is not focused on having this or that, such as a mansion by the sea, your own company, or ten million dollars in the bank. An enlarged image of yourself or a vision of yourself having this or that are all static goals and therefore don’t empower you. Instead, make sure your goals are dynamic, that is to say, point toward an activity that you are engaged in and through which you are connected to other human beings as well as to the whole. Instead of seeing yourself as a famous actor and writer and so on, see yourself inspiring countless people with your work and enriching their lives. Feel how that activity enriches or deepens not only your life but that of countless others.”
― Eckhart Tolle, A New Earth: Awakening to Your Life's Purpose