YOUR DREAMS
“Do not let your fire go out, spark by irreplaceable spark in the hopeless swaps of the not-quite, the not-yet, and the not-at-all. Do not let the hero in your soul perish in the lonely frustration for the life you deserved and have never been able to reach. The world you desire can be won. It exists…it is real…it is possible…it’s yours.”
– Ayn Rand (via Madame Scherzo)
“Live every day as if it were your last and then some day you’ll be right.” ~ H.H. “Breaker” Morant.
– A Simple Guy, Dan Collins, Balance is Codswallop
ON FORWARD PROGRESS
“Once you have some kind of clarity, the rocky path has begun. The myth we are sold from kindergarten is that it will be easy. In fact it will be hard. Gaining qualifications distracts us as then we think we have a right to that job or career. But sadly we don’t. So, how do we get what we want? Resilience. Ooomph. Get-up-and-go. Time after time after time it does the trick. But where does resilience come from? Bizarrely it comes from clarity. Clarity of mission, of purpose, of task. And which comes first? Clarity or Resilience? Clarity builds resilience. Resilience allows more clarity. It’s the closest thing there is to perpetual motion.”
– Nicolas Bate: Strategies For Success Fifty
ON EXECUTION
Live & Learn 
Sorry, but I can’t let this one go by without reacting. It’s the Collins quote itself that’s horse manure, not the quest for life balance. If everyone followed his concept, we’d have the most advanced, dysfunctional (even more than it is now) society on earth. The fact is, few of us are brilliant and are capable of the stratospheric accomplishments similar to the people he holds up as examples. Should we strive to be the best we can be? Absolutely. Can most of us make a difference? Yes. Does that mean it must be at the abandon of life balance, or at least the constant goal of life balance? Not! So many of the problems we have in our modern society today exist because there’s been a constant attack on the family unit and a diminishing notion of what makes life worth living. We will always have people who are laser focused and who will pursue their target at all costs – family, friends, relationships, personal health. And the rest of us will benefit. But that’s not the formula for the whole. Guess what? The women you noted a few days ago are just as important to the people who matter to them as Jobs is to the kid who’s using his I Phone. And that goes for the people who make time to help out at the food panties, and everyone at Habitat for Humanity, etc. etc etc. Most of all, it applies to the parents who are on the job every day making sure their kids are grounded, healthy of mind and body and spirit, being all they can be – and loved.
It occurs to me that we don’t hear a lot about the parents of Ghandi, Mandela, Edison, Gates, Jobs, Mother Theresa, Newton, Churchill, etc. Is it possible they were just folks striving for life balance?
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