ON PROBLEMS AND SOLUTIONS

ON PROBLEMS AND SOLUTIONS

I have not failed. I've just found 10,000 ways that won't work.
- Thomas A. Edison


The only people who find what they are looking for in life are the fault finders.
- Foster's Law


We are confronted with insurmountable opportunities.
- Walt Kelly


We are continually faced with a series of great opportunities brilliantly disguised as insoluble problems.
- John W. Gardner


Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work.
- Thomas A. Edison


Men are generally idle, and ready to satisfy themselves, and intimidate the industry of others, by calling that impossible which
is only difficult.
- Samuel Johnson


Things are only impossible until they're not.
- Jean-Luc Picard


The best way out is always through.
- Robert Frost


You can't wait for inspiration. You have to go after it with a club.
- Jack London


If the only tool you have is a hammer, you tend to see every problem as a nail.
- Abraham Maslow


Lack of money is no obstacle. Lack of an idea is an obstacle.
- Ken Hakuta


The more original a discovery, the more obvious it seems afterwards.
- Arthur Koestler


Do not fear to be eccentric in opinion, for every opinion now accepted was once eccentric.
- Bertrand Russell


All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being selfevident.
- Arthur Schopenhauer


The significant problems we have cannot be solved at the same level of thinking with which we created them.
- Albert Einstein


I'll be more enthusiastic about encouraging thinking outside the box when there's evidence of any thinking going on inside it.
- Terry Pratchett


To see what is in front of one's nose needs a constant struggle.
- George Orwell


If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.
- Isaac Newton


Reality is the leading cause of stress amongst those in touch with it.
- Jane Wagner


No one has ever had an idea in a dress suit.
- Sir Frederick G. Banting


It is amazing what you can accomplish if you do not care who gets the credit.
- Harry S. Truman


Man's mind, once stretched by a new idea, never regains its original dimensions.
-Oliver Wendell Holmes


If you would be a real seeker after truth, it is necessary that at least once in your life you doubt, as far as possible, all things.
- Rene Descartes


If a man will begin with certainties, he shall end in doubts; but if he will be content to begin with doubts he shall end in
certainties.
- Sir Francis Bacon


There are two ways to slide easily through life; to believe everything or to doubt everything. Both ways save us from thinking.
- Alfred Korzybski


In every work of genius we recognize our own rejected thoughts; they come back to us with a certain alienated majesty.
- Ralph Waldo Emerson


In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice; in practice, there is.
- Chuck Reid


Invention is the mother of necessity.
- Thorstein Veblen


The best way to predict the future is to invent it.
- Alan Kay


You know you’ve achieved perfection in design not when you have nothing more to add, but when you have nothing more to
take away.
- Antoine de Saint-Exupery


Plans are useless, but planning is indispensable.
- Dwight D. Eisenhower


The shortest distance between two points is under construction.
- Noelie Altito


Get the facts, or the facts will get you.
- Thomas Fuller


The truth is more important than the facts.
- Frank Lloyd Wright


Seek simplicity, and distrust it.
- Alfred North Whitehead


Believe those who are seeking the truth. Doubt those who find it.
- Andre Gide


There is always a well-known solution to every human problem - neat, plausible, and wrong.
- H. L. Mencken


It's so much easier to suggest solutions when you don't know too much about the problem.
- Malcolm Forbes


If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate.
- Henry J. Tillman

ON FAITH AND RELIGION

ON FAITH AND RELIGION

Man is a credulous animal, and must believe something; in the absence of good grounds for belief, he will be satisfied with
bad ones.
- Bertrand Russell


Rational arguments don't usually work on religious people. Otherwise, there wouldn't be religious people.
- Doris Egan


If the only way you can accept an assertion is by faith, then you are conceding that it can’t be taken on its own merits.
- Dan Barker


You talk to God, you're religious. God talks to you, you're psychotic.
- Doris Egan


I have too much respect for the idea of God to make it responsible for such an absurd world.
- Georges Duhamel


I don't know if God exists, but it would be better for His reputation if He didn't.
- Jules Renard


God made everything out of nothing, but the nothingness shows through.
- Paul Valery


Not only is there no God, but try getting a plumber on weekends.
- Woody Allen


If God did not exist, it would be necessary to invent him.
- Voltaire


If there were no God, there would be no Atheists.
- G. K. Chesterton


I'm a born-again atheist.
- Gore Vidal


Say what you will about the Ten Commandments, you must always come back to the pleasant fact that there are only ten of
them.
- H. L. Mencken


A cult is a religion with no political power.
- Tom Wolfe


When the gods wish to punish us, they answer our prayers.
- Oscar Wilde


Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from a religious conviction.
- Blaise Pascal


We’re not playing.
- Craig Venter [On accusations that he was playing God when trying to create the first artificial bacterium. - KKL]


The belief in a supernatural source of evil is not necessary; men alone are quite capable of every wickedness.
- Joseph Conrad


It is bad luck to be superstitious.
- Andrew W. Mathis


When I do good, I feel good; when I do bad, I feel bad, and that is my religion.
- Abraham Lincoln

ON SANITY AND MADNESS

ON SANITY AND MADNESS

Part of being sane, is being a little bit crazy.
- Janet Long


In a mad world only the mad are sane.
- Akira Kurosawa


The only normal people are the ones you don't know very well.
- Joe Ancis


The men who really believe in themselves are all in lunatic asylums.
- G. K. Chesterton


Insanity in individuals is something rare - but in groups, parties, nations and epochs, it is the rule.
Friedrich Nietzsche

ON THE WISE AND OTHERWISE

ON THE WISE AND OTHERWISE

The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, but wiser people so full of doubts.- Bertrand Russell

All you need in this life is ignorance and confidence; then success is sure.- Mark Twain

Wise men talk because they have something to say; fools, because they have to say something.- Plato

A wise man gets more use from his enemies than a fool from his friends.- Baltasar Gracian

The greatest fool may ask more than the wisest man can answer.- Charles Caleb Colton

Wisdom is what's left after we've run out of personal opinions.- Cullen Hightower

Talent hits a target no one else can hit; Genius hits a target no one else can see.- Arthur Schopenhauer

Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent. It takes a touch of genius -- and a lot of courage-- to move in the opposite direction.- E. F. Schumacher

There is nobody so irritating as somebody with less intelligence and more sense than we have.- Don Herold

Against stupidity the gods themselves contend in vain.- Friedrich von Schiller

The ability to delude yourself may be an important survival tool.- Jane Wagner

Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing ever happened.- Sir Winston Churchill

If fifty million people say a foolish thing, it is still a foolish thing.- Anatole France

Fallacies do not cease to be fallacies because they become fashions.- G. K. Chesterton

We've heard that a million monkeys at a million keyboards could produce the complete works of Shakespeare; now, thanks tothe Internet, we know that is not true.- Robert Wilensky

Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former.- Albert Einstein

The trouble about trying to make yourself stupider than you really are is that you very often succeed.- C. S. Lewis

We are surprised at our own versatility in being able to fail in so many different ways.- Samuel McChord Crothers

There is nothing worse than aggressive stupidity.- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

The smaller the mind the greater the conceit.- Aesop

Egotism is the anesthetic that dulls the pain of stupidity.- Frank Leahy

There is something that is much more scarce, something rarer than ability. It is the ability to recognize ability.Robert Half

ON QUOTATIONS

ON QUOTATIONS

It is a good thing for an uneducated man to read books of quotations.
- Sir Winston Churchill


A facility for quotation covers the absence of original thought.
- Dorothy L. Sayers


She had a pretty gift for quotation, which is a serviceable substitute for wit.
- W. Somerset Maugham


He wrapped himself in quotations - as a beggar would enfold himself in the purple of Emperors.
- Rudyard Kipling


Some for renown, on scraps of learning dote,
And think they grow immortal as they quote.
- Edward Young


I shall never be ashamed of citing a bad author if the line is good.
- Seneca


The point of quotations is that one can use another's words to be insulting.
- Amanda Cross


Misquotation is the pride and privilege of the learned.
- Hesketh Pearson


Quotation, n: The act of repeating erroneously the words of another.
- Ambrose Bierce


The surest way to make a monkey of a man is to quote him.
- Robert Benchley


There's a difference between a philosophy and a bumper sticker.
- Charles M. Schulz [Yeah, the bumper sticker is readable. – KKL]
A witty saying proves nothing.
- Voltaire

TP’s “Top 41” Quotes

TP’s “Top 41” Quotes

“Do one thing every day that scares you.”—Eleanor Roosevelt

As year’s end approaches, one tends (well, I tend) to think a little bit philosophically. To

do the accounts of the year past—and to imagine the year to come. As I began that not

(for me) very systematic process, I stumbled across the Eleanor Roosevelt remark above.

And it got me thinking—the whole point. To add a little fuel to the fire I mined a few old

presentations for more spurs to both reflection and forethought. What emerged, in ever so

haphazard a fashion, follows. It is not a listing of “business quotes,” though 100% are

applicable to business. It is not a set of “motivational quotes” (perish the thought), though

most are in some sense motivational. I guess it simply is what it is ... some comments that

may help you, if you’re so inclined, to ruminate on where you’ve been and where you

might go in 2006:

“Do one thing every day that scares you.”—Eleanor Roosevelt

“Life is either a daring adventure, or nothing.”—Helen Keller

“Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious

life?”—Mary Oliver

“Dream as if you’ll live forever. Live as if you’ll die today.”—James Dean

“The two most powerful things in existence: a kind word and a thoughtful

gesture.”—Ken Langone, founder, Home Depot

“The deepest human need is the need to be appreciated.”—William James

“Don’t belittle!”—OD Consultant, on the essence of a well-functioning human

community

“If you don’t listen, you don’t sell anything.”—Carolyn Marland/

MD/Guardian Group

“It was much later that I realized Dad’s secret. He gained respect by giving it. He talked

and listened to the fourth-grade kids in Spring Valley who shined shoes the same way he

talked and listened to a bishop or a college president. He was seriously interested in who

you were and what you had to say.”—Sara Lawrence-Lightfoot, Respect

“What creates trust, in the end, is the leader’s manifest respect for the

followers.”—Jim O’Toole, Leading Change

“If you can’t state your position in eight words or less, you don’t have a

position.”—Seth Godin

“Never doubt that a small group of committed people can change the

world. Indeed it is the only thing that ever has.”—Margaret Mead

“Make your life itself a creative work of art.”—Mike Ray, The Highest Goal

“Have you invested as much this year in your career as in your car?”—Molly Sargent,

OD consultant and trainer

“The most successful people are those who are good at plan B.”—James Yorke,

mathematician, on chaos theory in The New Scientist

“Tom, what have you done this year?”—Jessica Sutherland, Director, Institute for

International Research/Middle East (TP: “Yikes!”)

**********

“To live is the rarest

thing in the world.

Most people exist,

that is all.”

—Oscar Wilde

**********

“People want to be part of something larger than themselves. They want to be

part of something they’re really proud of, that they’ll fight for, sacrifice for, that

they trust.”—Howard Schultz, Starbucks

“It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent, but the one

most responsive to change.”—Charles Darwin

“We may not be interested in chaos but chaos is interested in us.”—Robert Cooper,

 The

Breaking of Nations: Order and Chaos in the Twenty-first Century

“If you don’t like change, you’re going to like irrelevance even less.”—General Eric

Shinseki, retired Chief of Staff, U. S. Army

“You must be the change you wish to see in the world.”—Gandhi

“We eat change for breakfast!”—Harry Quadracci, founder, QuadGraphics

“If things seem under control, you’re just not going fast enough.”—Mario Andretti

“You can’t behave in a calm, rational manner. You’ve got to be out there on the lunatic

fringe.”—Jack Welch, retired CEO, GE

“We have a ‘strategic’ plan. It’s called doing things.”—Herb Kelleher, founder,

Southwest Airlines

**********

A man approached JP Morgan, held up an envelope, and said, “Sir, in

my hand I hold a guaranteed formula for success, which I will gladly

sell you for $25,000.” “Sir,” JP Morgan replied, “I do not know what is

in the envelope, however if you show me, and I like it, I give you my

word as a gentleman that I will pay you what you ask.” The man agreed

to the terms, and handed over the envelope. JP Morgan opened it, and

extracted a single sheet of paper. He gave it one look, a mere glance,

then handed the piece of paper back to the gent. And paid him the

agreed-upon $25,000.

The Paper:

1. Every morning, write a list of the things that need to be done that

day.

2. Do them.

**********

“I guess it comes down to a simple choice, really. Get busy living, or get busy

dying.”—The Shawshank Redemption (Tim Robbins)

“Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.”—Steve Jobs, Apple

"Groups become great only when everyone in them, leaders and members alike, is free to

do his or her absolute best.”—Warren Bennis and Patricia Ward Biederman, Organizing

Genius

“The best thing a leader can do for a Great Group is to allow its members to discover

their greatness.”—Warren Bennis and Patricia Ward Biederman, Organizing Genius

“You are the storyteller of your own life, and you can create your own legend

or not.”—Isabel Allende

“Nobody can prevent you from choosing to be exceptional.”—Mark

Sanborn, The Fred Factor

“A leader is a dealer in hope.”—Napoleon

“Nothing is so contagious as enthusiasm.”—Samuel Taylor Coleridge

“If you’re enthusiastic about the things you’re working on, people will come ask you to

do interesting things.”—James Woolsey, former CIA director

“Before you can inspire with emotion, you must be swamped with it yourself. Before

you can move their tears, your own must flow. To convince them, you must yourself

believe.”—Winston Churchill

“A man without a smiling face must not open a shop.”—Chinese

Proverb

“If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you

are a leader."—John Quincy Adams

The greatest danger

for most of us

is not that our aim is

too high

and we miss it,

but that it is

too low

and we reach it.

Michelangelo

“A year from now

you may wish you

had started today.”

—Karen Lamb

*********

Tom Peters*: Leadership is all about love:

Passion,

Enthusiasms,

Appetite for Life,

Engagement,

Great Causes & Determination to Make a Damn Difference,

Commitment to Excellence,

Shared Adventures,

Bizarre Failures,

Growth Beyond Measure,

Insatiable Appetite for Change.