I’m a big quoter, and have been known to quote spontaneously. Here is a tiny list of the one that has influenced me & my comments.

“be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and to try to love the questions themselves […] Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer.” – Rilke

– When we are ready, we will know it. Also reminds me of the attitude of an inquirer of the unknown: Going down on the phenomenon. 

“Do those served grow as persons? Do they, while being served, become healthier, wiser, freer, more autonomous, more likely themselves to become servants? And, what is the effect on the least privileged in society? Will they benefit or at least not be further deprived?”

– Robert Greenleaf and his philosophy of the servant leader has deeply influenced me and SEALNet, a nonprofit I’ve learned so much from.

“The really important kind of freedom involves attention, and awareness, and discipline, and effort, and being able truly to care about other people and to sacrifice for them, over and over, in myriad petty little unsexy ways, every day.” 

 – David Forster Wallace, on what the freedom I’ve always been yearning for and often forget.

“The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function.”

 – Scott Fitzgerald. I keep that in mind whenever I am confused.

“I am enough, and I can be more.”

Myself, a lesson I learned. On a related note, Carl Roger once said “The curious paradox is that when I accept myself just as I am, then I can change.”

“Choose where you pay attention, and never do it alone.”

Peter Senge has so many good quotes. This is one of his advice to young people I learned from Presencing U-lab (join if you too imagine a beautiful world). He also mentioned Mother Teresa’s “There is no great thing. There is only thing done with great love” The spirit that we bring matters more than what we do.

“The effective executive focuses on contribution. He looks up from his work and outward toward his goals. He asks: “What can I contribute that will significantly affect the performance and the results of the institution I serve?”

“Follow effective action with quiet reflection. From the quiet reflection will come even more effective action.”

– Peter Drucker is one of my personal heroes. One of the clearest thinkers and writers I know of.

“We act not to bring about an outcome but about ourselves.”

“The fun only starts when we make the first error.”

– Ellen Langer and her work on mindfulness have been my big inspiration on how to live..