The assault.................................

 

....................................on the status quo.

On thinking..................................

 

.................................................in ink.

story telling.....................

 

Your job is not just to act, but to tell a fascinating story of how you did so, and inspire others to do it.  Make great adventures, but tell greater stories.

-Derek Sivers, How To Live: 27 conflicting answers and one weird conclusion

Thinking on paper........................

 

196.  May a warning light start flashing whenever executives talk about how hard they work.

197.  Pick a different country each year and focus on learning about its history, culture, and government.

198.  New bias comes through more in what is not covered than in what is said.

199.  A major advantage is the ability to attract followers in times of crisis.  A major virtue is deserving those followers.

200.  Have frequent reviews to make sure the "incrementals" are running in the right direction.

201.  At certain points, it is not unusual to find that a good 60 to 80 percent of top management doesn't know what the hell is going on.

-Michael Wade, as snipped from here

If you are not checking out.........................

 

........The Sensory Dispensary's Random Song of the Day, please do so.

a contest of opinion.......................

During the contest of opinion through which we have past, the animation of discussions and of exertions has sometimes worn an aspect which might impose on strangers unused to think freely, and to speak and to write what they think; but this being now decided by the voice of the nation, announced according to the rules of the constitution all will of course arrange themselves under the will of the law, and unite in common efforts for the common good.  All too will bear in mind this sacred principle, that though the will of the majority is in all cases to prevail, that will, to be rightful, must be reasonable; that the minority possess their equal rights, which equal laws must protect, and to violate would be oppression. Let us then, fellow citizens, unite with one heart and one mind, let us restore to social intercourse that harmony and affection without which liberty, and even life itself, are but dreary things.

-Thomas Jefferson, as excerpted from his March 4, 1801 Inaugural Address.  We would do well to remember the nastiness of the 1800 presidential election.  This was not a polite contest between friends.

aid........................

 

No great achievement is possible without the aid of other minds.

-Andrew Carnegie

Rob knows...........................

Here's a bottle and an honest friend!
     What wad ye wish for maire, man?
Wha kens, before his life may end,
    What his share may be of care, man.

Then catch the moments as they fly,

    And use them as ye ought, man:-

Believe me, happiness is shy,

    And comes not aye when sought, man.

-Robert Burns, A Bottle and An Honest Friend

insuring........................

 

Of all the means to insure happiness throughout the whole of life, by far the most important is the acquisition of friends.

-Epicurus

thanks David

creative readjustments......................

 

You don't want to abandon the skills and experience you have gained, but to find a new way to apply them.  Your eye is on the future, not the past.  Often such creative readjustments lead to a superior path.

-Robert Greene, as quoted in The Way of the Champion

Fifty years ago............................

Billboard Hot 100:   Doobie Brothers........Black Water

catalysts.........................

 

“I don’t know” is not an admission of ignorance. It’s an expression of intellectual humility.

“I was wrong” is not a confession of failure. It’s a display of intellectual integrity.

“I don’t understand” is not a sign of stupidity. It’s a catalyst for intellectual curiosity

-Adam Grant, as cut-and-pasted from here

Harder than it looks..............

 

The money I have accumulated I will give away, in due time, through sources that will do the least amount of harm and the greatest possible good; but my real wealth—that portion of it which I wish to donate for the good of mankind—consists of the principles of personal achievement which I am entrusting to you.

-Napoleon Hill, quoting Andrew Carnegie in How to Raise Your Own Salary

ideas.......................

 

To be successful, leaders must consciously work to stay in touch with the best ideas of the people they lead.  . . . This is not just a process of installing a relief valve, and it's not just a way to harvest ideas.  It's also a process of involving people in—and make them take responsibility for—the shaping of their ideas.

-Oren Harari, The Powell Principles: 24 Lessons from Colin Powell

Opening paragraphs (as a sentence).......

 

It was one of those nights for Anthony Carter, forty-two, two years unemployed, two years separated from his wife and stepdaughter, six months into cocaine sobriety and recently moved into his late parents' apartment on Frederick Douglass Boulevard, when to be alone with his thoughts, alone with his losses, was not survivable, so he did what he always did—hit the streets, meaning hit the bars on Lenox, one after the other, finding this one too ghetto, that one to Scandanavian-tourist, this one  too loud, that one too quiet, on and on, taking a few sips of his drink in each one, dropping dollars and heading out for the next establishment like an 80-proof Goldilocks, thinking maybe this next place, this next conversation would be the trigger for some kind of epiphany that would show him a new way to be, but it was all part of a routine that never let him anywhere but back to the apartment, this he knew, this he had learned over and over, but maybe-this time is a drug, you-never-know is a drug, so out the door he went.

-Richard Price, Lazarus Man

The joys (and agony) of parenting.............

 Sometimes you provide the most help with the assistance you withhold.

-Morgan Housel

teachings...........................

 The worst lesson that can be taught a man is to rely upon others and to whine over his sufferings. . . .

It is both foolish and wicked to teach the average man who is not well off that some wrong or injustice has been done him, and that he should hope for redress elsewhere than in his own industry, honesty and intelligence.

-Teddy Roosevelt, from this 1897 essay

Umm.................no

 

Often, I’m waiting for the biggest Jackpot of all: the spontaneous remission of all my problems without any required effort. Someone suggests a way out of my predicament and I go, “Hmm, I dunno, do you have any solutions that involve me doing everything 100% exactly like I’m doing it right now, and getting better outcomes?”

-Adam Mastroianni, as quoted here

As a once-upon-a-time history major........

 

.........I am a firm believer in The Great Man Theory.

Spend it wisely.............................

 

......................a wee excerpt from Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway Inc.'s recent annual report to shareholders:

However, as Charlie and I have always acknowledged, Berkshire would not have achieved its results in any locale except America whereas America would have been every bit the success it has been if Berkshire had never existed. 

                                 * * * * * * * * * * * *  

So thank you, Uncle Sam. Someday your nieces and nephews at Berkshire hope to send you even larger payments than we did in 2024. [To be precise, Berkshire last year made four payments to the IRS that totaled $26.8 billion.]  Spend it wisely. Take care of the many who, for no fault of their own, get the short straws in life. They deserve better. And never forget that we need you to maintain a stable currency and that result requires both wisdom and vigilance on your part.

via

In the backgound.........................

Barenaked Ladies.....all their greatest hits...Disc One

  

story telling......................

 

Nature and her secrets must be as stimulating to the imagination as are poetry and fables.  To that end, Bacon advised us to use aphorisms, illustrations, stories, fables, analogies—anything that conveys truth from the discoverer to his readers as clearly as a picture.  The mind, he argues, "is not like a wax tablet.  On a tablet you cannot write the new till you rub out the old; on the mind you cannot rub out the old except by writing in the new."

-Edward O. Wilson, Consilience: The Unity of Knowledge

idols of the mind...............

Through light shed on the mental process, Bacon wished to reform reasoning across all the branches of learning.  Beware, he said, of the idols of the mind, the fallacies into which undisciplined thinkers most easily fall.  They are the real distorting prisms of human nature.

-Edward O. Wilson, Consilience: The Unity of Knowledge 

On moving fast and breaking things............

 But the argument I have heard recently that is more likely to resonate with the Democrat's traditional (read: sane) base is something like "we are all for explorations of government efficiency but think it needs to be done in a much more measured and careful way." Unfortunately, for anyone with any experience in organizational cost cutting, a "measured pace" is another way of saying "let's move slow enough so the antibodies in the system have time to kill us." As a result, if anything, I think DOGE is moving too slow.

-Warren Meyer, at the Coyote Blog

Can I get an Amen.......................?

 

On one thing, the president’s supporters and detractors can agree: Donald Trump is a disruptor. 

-from The Front Page

all too human.......................

 It seems to me scientific thinking about human behavior comes with great difficulty to most people. But moralistic thinking — identifying enemies, choosing sides — comes easily and naturally.

-Jason Manning, as culled from here

In the background...................

             The Band............................Greatest Hits

 

Ah, history............................

 

Look back over the past, with its changing empires that rose and fell, and you can foresee the future, too.

-attributed to Marcus Aurelius

sever........................

 

     The only obstacle to effectual praying, in this world of spiritual fellowship, would be individual selfishness.  To want to get just for one's own self, to ask for something which brings loss and injury to others, would be to sever one's self from the source of blessings, and to lose not only the thing sought but to lose, as well, one's very self.

-Rufus Jones, The Double Search: Studies in Atonement and Prayer

the rebirth of................................

 

.........................................science?

just another day...............

 

Now it sounds like Donald Trump to merge the US Postal Service as a subordinate service to the Commerce Department. This would have been a big deal in any other administration but just another day in Trump world...

-Chris Lynch

Choosing..................

 If you’re trying to choose between two theories and one gives you an excuse for being lazy, the other one is probably right.

-Paul Graham