The Irreplaceable

You can throw out every thing that wastes your time. Time is the only thing that's truly irreplaceable. 

The Organ

Organ music has a magical effect on my headaches. I can't really explain it, but the low, vibrating notes seem to expand the blood vessels in my head. Or something.

Anyway, it's one more reason why I love the organ.

Yuletide

May your dreams come true this Yuletide,

May your family be well this Yuletide,

May your best self break through this Yuletide,

May your life excel this Yuletide.

Use and uselessness

A little use is better than a lot of uselessness.

Suffering a loss

“Once, an elderly general practitioner consulted me because of his severe depression. He could not overcome the loss of his wife who had died two years before and whom he had loved above all else. 

Now, how can I help him? What should I tell him? Well, I refrained from telling him anything but instead confronted him with the question, “What would have happened, Doctor, if you had died first, and your wife would have had to survive you?” 

“Oh,” he said, “for her this would have been terrible; how she would have suffered!” 

Whereupon I replied, “You see, Doctor, such a suffering has been spared her, and it was you who have spared her this suffering — to be sure, at the price that now you have to survive and mourn her.” 

He said no word but shook my hand and calmly left my office. In some way, suffering ceases to be suffering at the moment it finds a meaning, such as the meaning of a sacrifice.”

~ Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning

Source

The sting

Emotional pain is a sting of desires that are impossible to fulfill.

Fire of love

Love is like a fire: if it's to keep burning, both lovers need to keep putting firewood into it.

Studying

Time goes by anyway. So why not spend it studying?

Sand castles of stories

I'm writing a first draft and reminding myself that I'm simply shoveling sand into a box so that later I can build castles.

~ Shannon Hale

Photo by Jaime Spaniol on Unsplash

The nets of knowledge

Knowledge is a net that gets denser and stronger as you add new pieces of information to it.

A thin net of knowledge can only catch glittering little fishes of trivial facts. A large and well-developed one captures true whales of wisdom.

Practice

Whatever you do, practice a lot. Practice more, practice excessively and extensively, practice too much and then some. 

Let 'practice' be your mantra, your magic word unlocking the world of mastery.

Photo by Andre Iv on Unsplash

On writing

If you write and edit, you're an author.

If you just write, you're a graphomaniac.

The world of clouds

The world of clouds is so shaky and misty, and yet so real in its unreality. 

But the wind will blow, and the mountains and valleys of clouds will be gone forever.

Photo: Unsplash.com

Sketching

Sketching badly is still better than not sketching at all.

Patience

Patience is like dripping water: it accomplishes really big things in really small steps.

Photo by Grianghraf on Unsplash

Three whales of motivation

• Passion 

• Pleasure 

• Seeing a deeper meaning/usefulness in what you do

Water of care

Caring about children is like watering plants: too little makes them dry, too much makes them rotten.

Photo: Unsplash

Questions and answers

An answer puts everything in its proper place, but in a question those proper places are still uncertain and prone to change. An illusion of freedom.

Life choices

How many times, when I regretted not doing something, I wished so badly to be able to replay the situation or to get a similar chance. 

But on thinking again, could I have really done anything differently under those past circumstances?

And being completely frank, would I really do anything so much differently if I was faced with a similar situation these days?

Well, maybe.

At least, I hope so.

Understanding art

Columbo: Could you explain this? 

Francine: Well you see, we don't explain art, I mean, that's just sort of something you feel. You see, you look at a picture or a piece of sculpture and that either does something for you or it doesn't, you know.

from Columbo, S4E5 Playback
Picture Source

Beauty of people

Photos: Unsplash

Spiders

"Eyes of Jumping spider - Marpissa radiata" by Lukas Jonaitis licensed under CC BY 2.0



"Dew on a spider's web in the morning" by Luc Viatour licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0

Just a saying

What we can't cure, we must endure.

Becoming an adult

Children consume and have no responsibility for what they do.

Adults create and have responsibility for their actions.

Being an adult may be more challenging (and indeed many adults would like to keep a child-like lifestyle), but eventually, it's much more satisfying and empowering.

Ruling your Universe

Each of us is ruling their own little Universe. Many things are possible and doable in your own Universe, as long as they don't violate other people's Universes.

Ulysses and the Sirens

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:John_William_Waterhouse_-_Ulysses_and_the_Sirens_(1891).jpg

Where there's a will...

Those who want find opportunities.

Those who don't want find excuses.