The Oak Stone Forum

2011-08-02T19:01:00.002-05:00

"Reach high, for stars lie hidden in your soul. Dream deep, for every dream precedes the goal." - Pamela Vaull Starr

2011-08-02T18:57:00.000-05:00

"The feeling is often the deeper truth."
Augustus William Hare and Julius Charles Hare in
Guesses of Truth, by Two Brothers

2011-08-02T18:53:00.001-05:00

"The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is now." - Chinese proverb

2011-08-02T18:47:00.001-05:00

"Trends, like horses, are easier to ride in the direction they are going." - John Naisbitt

2011-08-02T18:39:00.001-05:00

"Hell, there are no rules here -- we're trying to accomplish something!" - Thomas Edison

2011-08-02T18:37:00.002-05:00

"A lot of fellows nowadays have a B.A., M.D., or Ph.D. Unfortunately, they don't have a J.O.B." - Fats Domino

2011-08-02T18:34:00.001-05:00

"It requires a great deal of boldness and a great deal of caution to make a great fortune." - Ralph Waldo Emerson

2011-08-02T18:18:00.001-05:00

"Entrepreneurship is neither a science nor an art. It is a practice." - Peter Drucker

2011-08-02T18:11:00.000-05:00

"Genius without education is like silver in the mine."
Benjamin Franklin

2011-08-02T18:04:00.008-05:00

"Exploration is really the essence of the human spirit."
- Frank Borman

2011-08-02T18:01:00.001-05:00

"All journeys have secret destinations of which the traveler is unaware." - Martin Buber

2011-08-02T17:58:00.001-05:00

"At least 80% of millionaires are self-made. That is, they started with nothing but ambition and energy." - Brian Tracy

2011-08-02T17:55:00.001-05:00

"Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans." - John Lennon

2011-08-02T17:53:00.002-05:00

"I'd put my money on the sun and solar energy. What a source of power! I hope we don't have to wait till oil and coal run out before we tackle that." - Thomas Edison

2011-08-02T17:51:00.000-05:00

"Inflation is when you pay fifteen dollars for the ten dollar haircut you used to get for five dollars when you had hair."
Sam Ewing

2011-08-02T17:49:00.001-05:00

"America has the best doctors, the best nurses, the best hospitals, the best medical technology, the best medical breakthrough medicines in the world. There is absolutely no reason we should not have in this country the best health care in the world."
Bill Frist

2011-08-02T17:46:00.000-05:00

"Oil is like a wild animal. Whoever captures it has it."
John Paul Getty

2011-08-02T17:44:00.000-05:00

"Most barriers to your success are man-made. And most often, you're the man who made them."
Frank Tyger

2011-08-02T17:43:00.001-05:00

"It's choice - not chance - that determines your destiny."
Jean Nidetch

2011-08-02T17:40:00.000-05:00

"Give me a lever long enough and a fulcrum on which to place it, and I shall move the world."
Archimedes

2011-08-02T17:38:00.002-05:00

"In all science, error precedes the truth, and it is better it should go first than last." - Hugh Walpole

2011-08-02T17:35:00.000-05:00

"When something can be read without effort, great effort has gone into its writing."

Enrique Jardiel Poncela

2011-08-02T17:33:00.002-05:00

"Travel and change of place impart new vigor to the mind."
Archimedes

2011-08-02T17:16:00.006-05:00

"If you have integrity, nothing else matters. If you don't have integrity, nothing else matters." - Alan Simpson

"Sometimes we stare so long at a door that is closing that we see too late the one that is open." - Alexander Graham Bell

"In business, you get what you want by giving other people what they want." - Alice Macdougall

2011-07-13T17:23:00.001-05:00

"There is great comfort and inspiration in the feeling of close human relationships and its bearing on our mutual fortunes - a powerful force to overcome the 'tough breaks' which are certain to come to most of us from time to time."
Walt Disney

2011-07-13T17:22:00.001-05:00

"Simplicity, clarity, singleness: These are the attributes that give our lives power and vividness and joy...."
Richard Holloway

2011-07-13T17:19:00.000-05:00

"Trust yourself. Create the kind of self that you will be happy to live with all your life. Make the most of yourself by fanning the tiny, inner sparks of possibility into flames of achievement."
Foster C. McClellan

2011-07-13T17:17:00.000-05:00

"Simplicity, simplicity, simplicity! I say, let your affairs be as two or three, and not a hundred or a thousand; instead of a million count half a dozen, and keep your accounts on your thumb-nail."
Henry David Thoreau

2011-07-13T17:15:00.001-05:00

"Knowing is not enough; we must apply. Willing is not enough; we must do." - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

2011-07-13T17:13:00.000-05:00

"When dealing with people, remember you are not dealing with creatures of logic, but creatures of emotion."
Dale Carnegie

2011-07-13T17:11:00.002-05:00

"Reality is the leading cause of stress amongst those in touch with it." - Lily Tomlin

2011-07-13T17:09:00.001-05:00

"The state of your life is nothing more than a reflection of your state of mind."~ Wayne Dyer

2011-07-13T17:07:00.000-05:00

"Everything put together / Sooner or later falls apart"
Paul Simon

2011-07-13T16:53:00.010-05:00

"Small opportunities are often the beginning of great enterprises."
- Demosthenes

"Success is not a place at which one arrives but rather the spirit with which one undertakes and continues the journey."
- Alex Noble

"Striving for excellence motivates you; striving for perfection is demoralizing." - Harriet Braiker

"Without continual growth and progress, such words as improvement, achievement, and success have no meaning."
- Benjamin Franklin

"Opportunities to find deeper powers within ourselves come when life seems most challenging." - Joseph Campbell

"The ability to learn faster than your competitors may be the only sustainable competitive advantage." - Arie de Geus

2011-07-13T16:49:00.001-05:00

"I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel." - Maya Angelou

2011-07-11T15:57:00.001-05:00

"Act as if what you do makes a difference. It does." ~William James

2011-07-11T15:54:00.001-05:00

"Life is partly what we make it, and partly what it is made by the friends we choose." - Tennessee Williams

2011-07-11T15:48:00.001-05:00

"You can’t cross the sea merely by standing and staring at the water." - Rabindranath Tagore

"All successful people, men and women, are big dreamers. They imagine what their future could be, ideal in every respect, and then they work every day toward their distant vision, that goal or purpose." ~ Brian Tracy

2011-07-11T15:18:00.009-05:00

"I can give you a six-word formula for success: 'Think things through - then follow through." - Sir Walter Scott

"It is more important to know where you are going than to get there quickly." - Mabel Newcomber

"Get over the idea that only children should spend their time in study. Be a student so long as you still have something to learn, and this will mean all your life." - Henry L. Doherty

"Feeling and longing are the motive forces behind all human endeavor and human creations." - Albert Einstein

"Searching is half the fun: Life is much more manageable when thought of as a scavenger hunt as opposed to a surprise party." - Jimmy Buffett

"Here is the basic rule for winning success. Let's mark it in the mind and remember it. The rule is: Success depends on the support of other people." - David Joseph Schwartz

"Creativity comes from trust. Trust your instincts. And never hope more than you work." - Rita Mae Brown

2011-04-05T21:24:00.001-05:00

"Money never starts an idea. It is always the idea that starts the money." - Owen Laughlin

2011-04-05T21:21:00.001-05:00

"Nothing succeeds like the appearance of success." - Christopher Lasch

2011-04-05T21:17:00.000-05:00

"He that hopes to look back hereafter with satisfaction upon past years must learn to know the present value of single minutes." - Samuel Johnson

2011-04-05T21:15:00.002-05:00

"Do you know the only thing that gives me pleasure? It's to see my dividends coming in." - John D. Rockefeller

2011-04-05T21:01:00.004-05:00

"Men are born to succeed, not fail." - Henry David Thoreau

2011-04-05T20:57:00.002-05:00

"I believe that being successful means having a balance of success stories across the many areas of your life. You can't truly be considered successful in your business life if your home life is in shambles." - Zig Ziglar

2011-04-05T20:50:00.008-05:00

"Never make predictions, especially about the future." - Casey Stengel

2011-04-05T20:45:00.001-05:00

"All achievements, all earned riches, have their beginning in an idea." - Napoleon Hill

2011-04-05T15:59:00.003-05:00

"Win as if you were used to it, lose as if you enjoyed it for a change." - Ralph Waldo Emerson

HOME (English with subtitles)

2011-03-29T15:23:00.001-05:00

2011-03-12T17:44:00.000-06:00

"It puzzles me how they know what corners are good for filling stations. Just how did they know gas and oil was under there?"

Dizzy Dean

2011-03-12T17:35:00.000-06:00

"Beware lest you lose the substance by grasping at the shadow."

Aesop

2011-03-09T15:54:00.000-06:00

"In an age when man has forgotten his origins and is blind even to his most essential needs for survival, water along with other resources has become the victim of his indifference."
Rachel Carson

2011-03-08T14:26:00.004-06:00

"Men often become what they believe themselves to be. If I believe I cannot do something, it makes me incapable of doing it. But when I believe I can, then I acquire the ability to do it even if I didn't have it in the beginning." - Mohandas Gandhi

2011-03-05T17:30:00.002-06:00

"We are all faced with a series of great opportunities brilliantly disguised as impossible situations."

Charles R. Swindoll

2011-02-23T14:51:00.001-06:00

"The desire for gold is not for gold. It is for the means of freedom and benefit." - Ralph Waldo Emerson

2010-10-12T15:28:00.001-05:00

"It is not necessary to do extraordinary things to get extraordinary results."

Warren Buffett

2010-10-12T15:22:00.000-05:00

"All truths are easy to understand once they are discovered; the point is to discover them."

Galileo Galilei

2010-10-12T14:55:00.001-05:00

"Those people blessed with the most talent don't necessarily outperform everyone else. It's the people with follow-through who excel."

Mary Kay Ash

2010-10-12T14:50:00.001-05:00

"Whatever we plant in our subconscious mind and nourish with repetition and emotion will one day become a reality."

Earl Nightingale

The Best Way to Lower Your CRP Levels … and Why You Should

2010-08-09T19:21:00.003-05:00

By Jon Herring

Most doctors now understand that inflammation is a major risk factor for heart attack and stroke. Although inflammation itself is very hard to measure, when it is present in the body the liver will secrete a substance called C-reactive protein (CRP).

CRP is a very reliable indicator of a person’s risk of heart disease and stroke. A recent study of men, published in the New England Journal of Medicine, shows that those with higher levels of CRP have a three times greater risk of heart attack than those with normal levels. Research also shows that people with very low CRP levels rarely suffer heart attacks.

So, how do you lower the CRP in your blood? You could do it with statin drugs … as long as you don’t mind increasing your risk of cancer and other dangerous side effects.

Or … you could exercise. Research has proven that exercise lowers CRP rapidly, and by a significant amount. A recent study showed a 41% reduction that was attributed to exercise, significantly greater than the reduction that was achieved using drugs.

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This article appears courtesy of Early to Rise [Issue #JHerring 09-04-05], the Internet's most popular health, wealth, and success e-zine. For a complimentary subscription, visit http://www.earlytorise.com/.

Cocoa: Packed With Cancer Fighters

2010-08-09T18:38:00.003-05:00

By Kelley Herring

Are you a chocolate lover? Good news! Cornell food scientists recently found that cocoa is teeming with antioxidants that help prevent cancer.

In fact, according to their recent research published in the Journal of Agriculture and Food Chemistry, cocoa has nearly twice the antioxidants of red wine and up to three times the amount found in green tea.

But there is a caveat. You'll do more harm than good if you start chowing down on sugar-laden chocolate. You're best bet to benefit from the bean is to use organic, unsweetened, non-alkalized cocoa.

Stir it into coffee, whirl it into berry smoothies, or try delicious chocolate desserts made with the all-natural "Super Sweetener of the Future": erythritol.

The Language Perfectionist: Quotable Metaphors

By Don Hauptman

An incisive quotation can often make your writing or speaking more effective.

But be sure that the one you choose is appropriate to your context and that your audience isn't likely to have read or heard it before. In addition, a quotation should never just be dropped into your text. Explain its relevance to your theme. Or cite a real-life example or story that illustrates its point.

Many fine quotation resources exist. One that I recommend was just published. Mardy Grothe's cleverly titled I Never Metaphor I Didn't Like is a collection of quotations, many unfamiliar, on numerous topics ranging from politics to sports to relationships and beyond. All employ metaphors, similes, and analogies. That makes the book a pleasure for lovers of language, too.

Here are a few quotable samples from the book:

"Living at risk is jumping off the cliff and building your wings on the way down." - Ray Bradbury

"Absence lessens the minor passions and increases the great ones, as the wind douses a candle and kindles a fire." - Francois de La Rochefoucauld

"The highest intellects, like the tops of mountains, are the first to catch and to reflect the dawn." - Thomas Babington Macaulay

"Reading is a means of thinking with another person's mind; it forces you to stretch your own." - Charles Scribner Jr.

Equally valuable are the author's comments, pointing out the significance of key quotations and linking them with others that share their themes.

With almost 2,000 entries at your fingertips, you're bound to find dozens of provocative and inspiring thoughts you'll want to cite - or post on your refrigerator, mirror, or office wall. This remarkable anthology contains so many gems that you may find yourself exclaiming, as I often did, "How did he find that one?"

Here's an appropriate metaphorical quotation with which to conclude, lest this review become too long:

"A man who uses a great many words to express his meaning is like a bad marksman who, instead of aiming a single stone at an object, takes up a handful and throws at it in hopes he may hit." - Samuel Johnson

[Ed Note: For more than three decades, Don Hauptman was an award-winning independent direct-response copywriter and creative consultant.]

It's Fun to Know: The 8 New Natural Wonders of the World

The United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) has added eight new entries to its World Heritage List, which denotes cultural and natural sites that are deemed of value to humanity. The new entries join 878 sites in 145 countries.

1. Joggins Fossil Cliffs (Canada) - site of a plethora of fossilized animal and plant remains

2. Mount Sanqingshan National Park (China) - home of unusual granite formations

3. Lagoons of New Caledonia (France) - a system of reefs with tremendous coral and animal diversity

4. Surtsey (Iceland) - an island created by volcanic eruption in the 1960s

5. Saryarka (Kazakhstan) - a vast grassland that's home to several endangered species

6. Monarch Butterfly Biosphere Reserve (Mexico) - the winter home of this migrating insect

7. Swiss Tectonic Arena Sardona (Switzerland) - valued by scientists for its geologic features

8. Socotra Archipelago (Yemen) - known as the Galapagos Islands of the Indian Ocean for its plant and animal diversity

(Source: LiveScience)

Now's Your Chance to Get Ahead

By Suzanne Richardson

You've heard Michael Masterson's advice to cut TV watching out of your schedule. But most Americans just aren't listening. According to a Nielsen Company survey, the average American watches a staggering 127 hours and 15 minutes of TV each month. That's over five full days of couch-potato-dom.

And that gives you a big advantage...

Everyone has the exact same 24 hours in a day to accomplish their business and professional goals. So by limiting the amount of TV you watch, you can reach your own goals that much faster.

Imagine how much you could accomplish with the equivalent of five extra days a month - a full work week - to hone your business skills, attract new customers, create new products, and make your dreams come true.

What's keeping you from getting started? Flip off the TV and get going.

Word to the Wise: Stasis

"Stasis" (STAY-sis) - from the Greek for "standing still" - is a state of balance, equilibrium, or stagnation.

Example (as used by Jerry L. Mashaw in Greed, Chaos, and Governance): "The reality of governance was not stasis but change; institutions did not operate according to mechanical laws, they evolved organically."

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These articles appear courtesy of Early to Rise [Issue #2430, 08-09-08], the Internet's most popular health, wealth, and success e-zine. For a complimentary subscription, visit http://www.earlytorise.com/.

2010-08-09T18:13:00.001-05:00

"It may be said of men in general that they are ungrateful and fickle, dissemblers, avoiders of danger, and greedy of gain. So long as you shower benefits upon them, they are all yours..."

Niccolo Machiavelli

2010-08-09T18:10:00.001-05:00

"Write something to suit yourself and many people will like it; write something to suit everybody and scarcely anyone will care for it." - Jesse Stuart

2010-08-03T15:37:00.000-05:00

"If one cannot command attention by one's admirable qualities one can at least be a nuisance."

- Margery Allingham

2010-08-03T15:12:00.001-05:00

"When you discover your mission, you will feel its demand. It will fill you with enthusiasm and a burning desire to get to work on it."

W. Clement Stone

2010-08-03T15:09:00.000-05:00

"Whoever undertakes to set himself up as a judge of Truth and Knowledge is shipwrecked by the laughter of the gods."

Albert Einstein

2010-08-03T14:31:00.001-05:00

"Motivation is the art of getting people to do what you want them to do because they want to do it."

Dwight D. Eisenhower

2010-08-03T14:10:00.001-05:00

"I'm tired of Love: I'm still more tired of Rhyme. / But Money gives me pleasure all the time."

Hilaire Belloc

A "Prescription" for Chocolate

2010-07-16T11:28:00.006-05:00

By Jon Herring

Several years ago, I went to visit my brother who was serving in the Peace Corps in the mountains of Panama. Every morning, we began our day with a rich cup of some of Central America’s finest coffee. That is, until we reached the San Blas Islands.

The San Blas are inhabited by the Kuna, a strongly knit tribe of Native Americans. Instead of coffee, the Kuna drink a beverage made with cocoa. And though they’re probably not aware of it, the cocoa is rich in heart-healthy antioxidants and other beneficial nutrients. I was reminded of this when I read a recent study showing that the Kuna Indians who live on the mainland have a high incidence of heart disease and high blood pressure, while those who still live in the Islands (and consume this beverage daily) have an extraordinarily low incidence of those conditions.

Certainly there can be other dietary reasons why the Kuna living in cities have health concerns that the islanders do not. But this study strongly supports the results of other recent studies, including one published in the Journal of Clinical Nutrition which showed that the consumption of cocoa caused a "striking blood flow response" to the brain and improved brain function.

The Journal of Clinical Nutrition study was sponsored by Mars Inc., the company that makes M&Ms, Snickers, and Twix. I have no problem with their research – but don’t get the idea that a Snickers bar is going to do the trick. Besides being full of sugar, milk chocolate has very little cocoa. Instead, choose a high-quality dark chocolate – the more bitter, the better. Or buy a container of organic, unsweetened cocoa powder (NOW Foods makes the brand I buy). Mix it with water or milk and drink it several times a week. If you prefer it sweetened, add a few drops of stevia.

It’s Fun to Know: About the English Language

The 10 most commonly used words in English are: the, of, and, a, to, in, is, you, that, and it. The 10 most commonly used letters are e, t, a, o, i, n, s, r, h, and l.

(Source: Dictionary.com and Letterfrequency.org)

Word to the Wise: Litany

A "litany" (LIT’n-ee) is a form of prayer that consists of a series of invocations recited by a clergyman that alternate with fixed responses by the congregation. By extension, we use the word to refer to any prolonged or tedious account.

Example (as used by Danielle Trussoni in a New York Times review of Sweet by Heather Byer): "Casanova’s memoirs would be nothing more than a pre-Viagra Superman’s litany of conquests if his adventures did not telescope the larger tragedy of committing slow suicide in the guise of love."

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These articles appear courtesy of Early to Rise [Issue #1982, 03-06-07], the Internet's most popular health, wealth, and success e-zine. For a complimentary subscription, visit http://www.earlytorise.com/.

Protection for Your Heart in the Candy Aisle

2010-07-16T10:51:00.000-05:00

By Jon Herring

You've heard the news: "Chocolate is good for you." And it's true. In fact, it could be even more beneficial than first thought.

Researchers in Holland followed 500 men for 15 years. They found that those who ate the most cocoa were 50 percent less likely to die of heart disease. And they discovered that this benefit was conferred with just 4 grams of cocoa per day.

That's the amount of cocoa in two Hershey's Kisses – but that doesn't mean you should be eating that kind of candy. It has far too much sugar. If you want to enjoy the health benefits of cocoa, stick to dark chocolate. The darker the better. Most health food stores have an excellent selection of organic dark chocolate to choose from.

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This article appears courtesy of Early to Rise [Issue #1746, 06-03-06], the Internet's most popular health, wealth, and success e-zine. For a complimentary subscription, visit http://www.earlytorise.com/.

2010-07-16T09:47:00.002-05:00

"The way you define yourself as a writer is that you write every time you have a free minute. If you didn't behave that way you would never do anything." - John Irving

2010-07-01T20:43:00.001-05:00

"It is not necessary to do extraordinary things to get extraordinary results." - Warren Buffett

2010-07-01T20:39:00.001-05:00

"The way to get started is to quit talking and begin doing." - Walt Disney

Selected Quotes of L. Ron Hubbard

2010-06-29T18:13:00.021-05:00

"The only thing which can actually alter self-determinism and reduce it is self-determinism itself. One can determine to be used or worked upon by the environ and its people. But until one makes a determination to do so, one is not so affected."

"There is little joy to be found in gloomy, restrained solemnity. When some of old made it seem that to practice virtue required a grim and dismal sort of life, they tended to infer that all pleasure came from being wicked: nothing could be further from the facts. Joy and pleasure do not come from immorality! Quite the reverse! Joy and pleasure arise only in honest hearts: the immoral lead unbelievably tragic lives filled with suffering and pain. The human virtues have little to do with gloominess. They are the bright face of life itself."

"Man is on the high road at last. Because all of the evils of Man come from Man's effort to deny freedom to Man. His lack of culture is most apparent where slavery has the greatest root.
"And where you have men who are free, they can do a lot of things. Work becomes a pleasure. The handling of effort itself becomes a very desirable activity. And things get built, the world becomes more beautiful. Man is able to engage in life as a game rather than as a slavery.
"And so we get another culture."

"But what do you mean, 'True to yourself'? Actually, you're not being true to yourself, you're being true to your basic purpose. If you're not true to your basic purpose, you've had it."

"But it's simply: Living is having and following a purpose. That's all. That's the formula of life - have and follow a purpose. That's it. If you do it, you're living and if you don't do it, you're not living. And that's all there is to it. I've now given you the basic fundamental of existence and that really is it."

"Livingness is going along a certain course, impelled by a purpose and with some place to arrive. It consists mostly of removing the barriers in the channel, holding the edges firm, ignoring the distractions and reinforcing and reimpelling one's progress along the channel. That's life..."

"Fortunately, Man only changes in the direction of the zenith. He only changes in the direction of the stars. And he never changes in the direction of the snake pits. Maybe he's just cussed enough to know this basically, down deep somewhere. Maybe he's just ornery enough to feel that he's gone far enough south at any time he's gone south at all. And maybe the only direction he's left open is the stars."

"If we were just to engage lightly and mildly on bringing better communication across the world, and particularly communication into areas of turbulence, and not care occasionally when you get a little explosion or kickback but keep talking, it just might be that the entire situation might clarify nicely and neatly. Because you're bringing greater freedom to the world."

"To really know life you've got to be part of life. You must get down and look, you must get into the nooks and crannies of existence. You have to rub elbows with all kinds and types of men before you can finally establish what he is."

"A culture is held together solely and only by education. Whether that education is accomplished by experience or by teaching, a culture as a whole is the summation of its education."

"Freedom of truth is something Man has not been noted for. He's not been noted for this at all. He's been noted quite the contrary for a slavery of something somebody said was true. And that is a vastly different thing than freedom of truths."

"These great spiritual leaders have been hanged, reviled, misinterpreted, badly quoted, have not been at all comprehended, but nevertheless, they are the hands through which a torch has been handed forward through the centuries so that we could culminate with a greater ability for Man and some hope for his future."

"What is a game? A game is an activity engaged upon by one or more individuals in order to maintain his interest in communication in life."

"Trying to find out why you tick, why you're as right as you are, why you function at all, why you think at all, would be quite an adventure."

"Let's say that the soul is life, is the spirit, is the thinkingness, is the awareness or any such term which communicates to you the meaning of life and vitality."

"If you were going to put some life back into society, if you were to put the society back together again so that it did have some wish to survive, if you were going to make life a little bit better, really all you'd have to do would be to put Man a little more in control of his actions and reactions."

"If the world around him is bad, then he is unwilling to grant life. If the world around him he conceives to be good, he is willing to grant life to it. A world with life granted to it runs well. A world with no life granted to it goes into chaos and disappears. Now, this is the riddle of the centuries."

"I admit that some man occasionally will become afraid and will become totally gripped by the belief that there is menace in every fellow man. I admit that a human being can become so aberrated as to constitute a menace to the bulk of the society and that in such a case it is necessary to reacquaint him with society. But I will not admit that there is a naturally bad, evil man on Earth."

"Tyrannies are sown at times when nobody is very watchful, where everybody has a full stomach, where everything is calm, nothing much appears on the surface. And then tyrannies show up and become very obvious when individuals, growing a little hungrier, a little less possessed of production, suddenly notice that there is somebody saying they mustn't talk, somebody saying they mustn't have opinions."

"The reason life is life and people are together and grass grows and trees grow and apparently the rain falls and everything else, is because it helps somebody."

"Where a society is composed of people who are capable of bringing order into their affairs and into the society, into their groups, we of course have a stable society. We don't have a chaos."

"The simplicity of observation, the simplicity of communication itself and only itself, is functional and will take Man from the bottom to the top. And the only thing I am trying to teach you is look."

"There is no short stop on the road to truth. That is the only track that you have to go all the way on. Once you have put your feet upon that road, you have to walk to its end. Otherwise, all manner of difficulties and upsets will beset you."

"We're talking about what life does best: it waves its magic wand and says 'be' or 'live' or 'exist' and things do. And that's what life does."

"You can make any marriage stick or you can recover any facet of any marriage or plaster one back together again any way you want to. It takes a little doing and it takes a little guts.
And that's an understatement if I ever made one."

2010-06-29T13:36:00.003-05:00

"Real success is finding your lifework in the work that you love." - David McCullough

Are You Losing Your Soul?

By Alexander Green

I recently bumped into an old acquaintance I hadn't seen in years. "Are you still managing money?" he asked.

"No, I write investment advice now," I said.

"Well, it must not be panning out too well," he said with a wink, "or you wouldn't still be working!"

I've heard variations of this line over the years. And while it's always offered in jest, it hints at a particular mindset: Why would anyone continue to work if he didn't have to?

Yet I'd be bored to death without a job -- and even more of a pain in the neck to everyone around me, I'm sure. (Warren Buffett and Bill Gates -- two gentlemen who have a few dollars -- apparently feel the same way.)

According to more than 40 Gallup studies, three-quarters of us are disengaged from our jobs. The most recent U.S. Job Retention Survey found that more than 60 percent of employees are currently searching for new employment opportunities.

It's odd that we spend most of our waking hours at work -- in occupations often chosen by our younger selves -- and seldom ask ourselves how we got there or what our occupations really mean.

When we meet someone new, the question we most frequently ask -- after discerning where they're from and whether we have any common acquaintances -- is "What do you do?"

Our work, to a great extent, defines us.

It wasn't always this way.

Three hundred years ago, Voltaire argued that work exists to save us from three great evils: boredom, poverty, and vice. But, as a society, we have since put our belief in two great ideas: romantic love and meaningful work.

Historically, our faith in these two ideas grew up together. We started to think that we should marry for love at roughly the same time as we started to think that we should work not only for money but for self-fulfillment.

These are beautiful ideals, but rarely can they be pursued without hitting a rough patch. And the pain can be immense. When we are without work -- as 29 million Americans are today -- we lose more than income; we are cut off from an identity. We can no longer explain what we do -- and, hence, who we are.

It's always a shame to see a person's talents wasted. And that's just as true for those who are employed but disengaged.

Ideally, your work should allow you to take the best of what's in you and express it to the world. It should give your life dignity and meaning, whether you're writing software, fixing teeth, or just raising happy, productive kids.

No matter how you spend your days, you have a clear choice. You can think of your work entirely in terms of responsibilities and obligations. Or you can view it as a contest, a challenge, an opportunity. Because if you don't enjoy what you're doing, there's little chance your work will please or impress anyone else.

I have a sneaking suspicion that a lot of folks who are unhappy at work tend to equate a "good job" entirely with money, benefits, and security, rather than whether it allows them to express their talents.

Big mistake. Yet even those who recognize the dead-end nature of their current position are often reluctant to change. Why? Reasons vary, but some are so caught up in the pursuit of status, display, and material possessions that they've put themselves in a bind.

Choosing meaningful employment often means accepting at least a temporary pay cut. But that isn't always possible if you have a big mortgage, hefty car payments, or a lifestyle that keeps you two payments from the edge. Ironically, giving up the dream of "having it all" is often the first step in the right direction.

The other reason so many remain stuck in unsuitable work -- whether they admit it to themselves or not -- is fear.

Fear whispers that, even if you reduce your overhead, you won't be able to make it work financially. Fear betrays you, insisting that you're being unrealistic, that you don't have the heart, the talent, or the discipline to see it through, that doing work you love is reserved for someone else.

It's not true. One of the best prizes that life offers is the chance to work hard at something worth doing. Think enthusiastically about how you spend your days and you'll put a touch of glory in your life.

This is true for retirees, too. A life of meaning generally comes from finding a way to either increase the pleasure or decrease the suffering of your fellow humans, whether you're compensated for it or not.

Even if you're still in the workforce and -- due to circumstances -- tied to a job that is less than fulfilling, there are ways to use your talents in meaningful ways.

A few years ago, for instance, the AARP asked some attorneys if they would offer basic services to needy retirees at $30 an hour. They said no. But then AARP's program manager had a brilliant idea: He asked the lawyers if they would offer their services to needy retirees for free. Overwhelmingly, they said yes.

How could zero money be more attractive than $30 an hour? The original offer seemed insulting to some, a request for legal services at below-market wages. But when the request was reframed as volunteer work -- and therefore meaningful -- most were happy to oblige.

In Zen and the Art of Making a Living, Laurence G. Boldt writes, "Without self-expression, life lacks spontaneity and joy. Without service to others, it lacks meaning and purpose.... Conceiving of ourselves as artists in whatever work we do gives us a metaphor for a life of integrity, service, enjoyment, and excellence.... I know of no better nutshell statement of the path to finding one's true calling in life than the simple formula given by Aristotle: 'Where your talents and the needs of the world cross, there lies your vocation.' These two, your talents and the needs of the world, are the great wake-up calls to your true vocation in life. To ignore either is, in some sense, to lose your soul."

You'll find that the happiest, most engaged individuals are those who are deeply involved in their workplace or community (or both), even if their time is unpaid.

Work is the natural outlet for our energy and enthusiasm. What could be more copacetic than to love what you do and feel that it matters?

After all, the highest reward for your work is not what you get, but what you become.

[Ed. Note: Alexander Green, Investment Director of The Oxford Club, has more than 20 years of experience as a research analyst, investment advisor, financial writer, and portfolio manager. He is the author of The Secret of Shelter Island: Money and What Matters, as well as the editor of "Spiritual Wealth," a free e-letter about the pursuit of the good life.

Alex is an expert panelist with the Liberty Street League, ETR's exclusive club based on the principles of self-determination and self-responsibility. The League is dedicated to helping members take advantage of under-the-radar, off Wall Street, wealth-building opportunities, including precious metals, Internet businesses, fine art, commodities, real estate, and much more. As a member, the League will also help you keep your money safe from the prying eyes of the government and financial organizations that don't have your interests at heart.]

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Today's Words That Work: Copacetic
Copacetic (koh-puh-SET-ik) -- a word with obscure origins -- means fine, completely satisfactory.

Example (as used by Alexander Green today): "Work is the natural outlet for our energy and enthusiasm. What could be more copacetic than to love what you do and feel that it matters?"

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These articles appear courtesy of Early to Rise [Issue #3051, 06-29-10], the Internet's most popular health, wealth, and success e-zine. For a complimentary subscription, visit http://www.earlytorise.com/.

2010-06-14T19:59:00.000-05:00

"Books serve to show a man that those original thoughts of his aren't very new at all" - Abraham Lincoln

2010-06-07T20:33:00.000-05:00

"Opportunities multiply as they are seized." - Sun Tzu

2010-06-07T20:27:00.000-05:00

"It is not the magnitude of our actions, but the amount of love that is put into them, that matters."
-- Mother Teresa

2010-06-02T19:16:00.000-05:00

"Life is just a mirror, and what you see out there, you must first see inside of you" - Wally 'Famous' Amos

2010-06-02T19:10:00.000-05:00

"The ability to learn faster than your competitors may be the only sustainable competitive edge." - Arie de Geus

2010-06-02T18:59:00.001-05:00

"If at first the idea is not absurd, then there is no hope for it."

"Look deep into nature, and then you will understand everything better."

- Albert Einstein

2010-05-24T17:28:00.000-05:00

"When the character of a man is not clear to you, look at his friends" - Japanese Proverb

2010-05-24T17:27:00.001-05:00

"Age is an issue of mind over matter. If you don't mind, it doesn't matter" - Mark Twain

2010-05-24T17:22:00.001-05:00

"Hope is the thing with feathers / That perches in the soul, / And sings the tune -- without the words, / And never stops at all."

Emily Dickinson

2010-05-24T17:19:00.000-05:00

"Opportunities multiply as they are seized." - Sun Tzu

2010-05-17T19:50:00.000-05:00

"I find television to be very educating. Every time somebody turns on the set, I go in the other room and read a book." - Groucho Marx

The Dangers of Pain-Drug-Hypnosis

2010-05-15T16:38:00.003-05:00

" There is another form of hypnotism which falls between the surgical operation and straight hypnotism without physical pain. This form of hypnotism has been a carefully guarded secret of certain military and intelligence organizations. It is a vicious war weapon and may be of considerable more use in conquering a society than the atom bomb. This is no exaggeration. The extensiveness of the use of this form of hypnotism in espionage work is so wide today that it is long past the time when people should have become alarmed about it....
" Pain-drug-hypnosis is simply an extension of narcosynthesis, the drug hypnosis used in America only during and since World War II.
" Hypnotism has the virtue, at first at least, of requiring the consent of the hypnotic subject before the hypnotism is done. Further, hypnotism has an additional virtue over drug hypnosis and over pain-drug-hypnosis in that an individual in a hypnotic trance will rarely perform an immoral act, even though commanded to do so by the hypnotist, unless that individual would normally perform such acts.
" Drug hypnotism does not have to be done with the individual's consent. An individual who is drugged can receive and will obey hypnotic commands given to him by the doctor or operator and will continue to obey these commands after waking from the drugged sleep. By using the method of dropping a heavy sedative such as chloral hydrate into an individual's drink, by suddenly muzzling him with a silk scarf from behind and injecting morphine into his arm, or by discovering the individual when he is drunk or shortly after he has been operated upon or during an operation or during the administration of electric shock or sedation in an insane asylum, drug hypnosis can be induced. Thereafter, the operator works much as in ordinary hypnotism. Drug hypnosis can be administered with such wording that the patient will not only forget what he has been told and yet perform it, but will also forget that he has ever been given drug hypnosis if that command is included. And he may even be given data to account for the time during which he was given narcosynthesis. Drug hypnotism, then, can be done without the consent of the subject and is commonly so done even by doctors in the normal course of practice. There is nothing new or strange about drug hypnosis. It occasionally fails to work as the operator intends and it does not usually strike against the individual's normal moral tone, ... It has been discovered that a drugged individual when beaten and given orders would almost invariably obey these orders, regardless of the degree to which they flouted his moral tone or his position or his best interests in life.
"... An individual might be given pain-drug-hypnosis on Tuesday night and wake up Wednesday morning without any knowledge of the fact that he had been slugged when he stepped out of his car, given an injection, painfully beaten (but not so as to leave any marks) and put quietly into his own bed. This individual does not know that anything unusual has occurred to him nor will he suspect it, even when he is confronted with the fact that his conduct is extremely changed along certain lines from former conduct. ...
" The Foundation undertook some tests with regard to the effectiveness of pain-drug-hypnosis and found it so appallingly destructive to the personality and so unfailing in its action, ..."

- Science of Survival, L. Ron Hubbard, c 1951, 2007 edition, pg. 464-466

2010-05-15T16:27:00.001-05:00

"It is not the strongest of the species that survive, nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change." - Charles Darwin

2010-05-15T16:24:00.000-05:00

"Good writing is like a windowpane." - George Orwell

2010-05-13T20:38:00.000-05:00

"Invest in inflation. It's the only thing that's going up." - Will Rogers

2010-05-13T20:36:00.002-05:00

"Ordinary riches can be stolen, real riches cannot." - Oscar Wilde

"No one should be rich except those who understand it." - Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

2010-05-13T17:16:00.001-05:00

"Honor is better than honors." - Abraham Lincoln

2010-05-13T17:14:00.000-05:00

"All successful people have a goal. No one can get anywhere unless he knows where he wants to go and what he wants to be or do." - Norman Vincent Peale

2010-05-08T16:04:00.002-05:00

"Thus, from the war of nature, from famine and death, the most exalted object which we are capable of conceiving, namely, the production of the higher animals directly follows. There is a grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed by the Creator into a few forms or into one...and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved."

- Charles Darwin, from On the Origin of Species

2010-05-08T15:51:00.002-05:00

"Man's greatest motivating force is his desire to please woman!... Men who accumulate large fortunes, and attain to great heights of power and fame, do so, mainly, to satisfy their desire to please women. Take women out of their lives, and great wealth would be useless to most men. It is this inherent desire of man to please woman which gives woman the power to make or break a man." - Think and Grow Rich, 1960 paperback edition, p. 195

2010-05-08T15:24:00.002-05:00

"If you think you are beaten, you are,
If you think you dare not, you don't.
If you like to win, but you think you can't,
It is almost certain you won't.

"If you think you'll lose, you're lost,
For out in the world we find,
Success begins with a fellow's will--
It's all in the state of mind.

"If you think you are outclassed, you are,
You've got to think high to rise,
You've got to be sure of yourself before
You can ever win a prize.

"Life's battles don't always go
To the stronger or faster man,
But soon or late the man who wins
Is the man WHO THINKS HE CAN!"

- from Napoleon Hill's Think and Grow Rich, A Fawcett Crest paperback, revised edition 1960, pg 56-57.

2010-05-08T15:18:00.000-05:00

"Do the thing and you will have the power." - Emerson

2010-05-08T15:08:00.002-05:00

"Our life is a reflection of the thoughts we habitually hold."

"As you think so you shall become."

- Earl Nightingale

The Jinx

2010-05-08T14:10:00.002-05:00

"There are people, then, who seem to be magnets for destruction. Although rarely touched themselves, things happen all around them. One man in a trucking firm was on the scene of seven fatal accidents. As soon as he was removed from the firm the accidents ceased! And yet he had never been a direct or even indirect cause of those accidents so far as physical fact went. His helper, for instance, was in a truck body while this accident-prone stood on the walk. A man fell from the twenty-eighth floor and killed the helper. At another time a motorist ran thirty feet off a road just to strike this accident-prone's truck and kill himself--with no damage to the accident-prone. Seven incidents like that, one after another and the jinx still follows. According to this, then, there is some basis for the maritime Jonah--and in the Navy there is a man who has survived every major sinking in the past twenty years! And was twice the sole survivor."

- from L. Ron Hubbard's letter dated Sep 14, 1939, while staying at the Hotel Knickerbocker, New York City.

2010-05-08T13:51:00.002-05:00

"I walked down the street
Without a cent in my jeans,
And that is the reason
I joined the Marines."

- from Adventure magazine, Oct. 1, 1935 issue, "The Camp-Fire"