If we stay where we are, where we're stuck, where we're comfortable and safe, we die there. We become like mushrooms, living in the dark, with poop up to our chins. If you want to know only what you already know, you're dying. You're saying: Leave me...
When your heart flows broad and full like a river, a blessing and a danger to those living near: there is the origin of your virtue. When you are above praise and blame, and your will wants to command all things, like a lover's will: there is the ori...
If you want to change the way that the world appears to be; you must change the way that you see everything in it. And if you want to change the world; you must change the way everyone else sees everything in it. And when everyone else sees everythin...
Mike: Roz, my tender, oozing blossom, you're looking fabulous today. Is that a new haircut? Come on, tell me it's a new haircut, isn't it? It's got to be a new haircut. New makeup? You had a lift? You had a tuck? You had something? Something has been...
He who wants a new world must first buy the old.
A hand that is ready to hit may cause you great trouble.
The prudent embark when the sea is calm -- the rash when it's stormy.
A new broom sweeps clean, but an old broom knows the corners.
One old friend is better than two new ones.
Much of what is euphemistically known as the middle class, merely because it dresses up to go to work, is now reduced to proletarian conditions of existence. Many white-collar jobs require no more skill and pay even less than blue-collar jobs, confer...
Craft can be practiced by anyone, regardless of the skill or artistry that has come to be demanded by those who preach craft. Like a good meal, a good Crafternoon shouldn't need much - a few quality ingredients, a couple of good friends, and a little...
No, Roger had not seen the funny side. But there had been a moment when, after looking at his watch, he had thought: I can remember when Christmas morning would start at about half past ten with a glass of Buck's Fizz in bed. Now it begins at half pa...
The recognition of his carelessness filled Mr. Lecky with fear and anger. In the dusk his eerie heart could anticipate the hours of terror which he had laid up for himself. Sounds, real or imaginary, the silences and secrets of the night, the working...
My father, for whose skills as a surgeon I have the deepest respect, says, "The operation with the best outcome is the one you decide not to do." Knowing when not to operate, knowing when I am in over my head, knowing when to call for the assistance ...
Was not Hypatia the greatest philosopher of Alexandria, and a true martyr to the old values of learning? She was torn to pieces by a mob of incensed Christians not because she was a woman, but because her learning was so profound, her skills at diale...
If all that one sees is a tiny speck of perspective in the larger scheme of things. And each perspective is made alive by the amalgamation of learning. And learning is a mere accumulation of skill and knowledge : both deriving from Truth. And Truth i...
She had always wanted to do every thing, and had made more progress in both drawing and music than many might have done with so little labour as she ever would submit to... She was not much deceived as to her own skill either as an artist or a musici...
Most intellectual training focuses on analytical skills. Whether in literary criticism or scientific investigation, the academic mind is best at taking things apart. The complementary arts of integration are far less well developed. This problem is a...
ROSA MET ME at the door with a shotgun. Strictly speaking, not aimed at me, but you don’t really have to aim a sawed-off shotgun. She swung it toward me. “You, get in there.” She turned her attention to the crowd. “The rest of you will take a...
The housewife is an unpaid worker in her husband's house in return for the security of being a permanent employee: hers is the reductio ad absurdum of the employee who accepts a lower wage in return for permanence of his employment. But the lowest pa...
But all I could see was her. No skill of mine, no artist anywhere, could’ve immortalized how gorgeous she was. It was impossible to believe she’d ever had any doubts about her body. The firelight shone on her skin, golden and perfect, making her ...
