Activity Quotes - Page 29

• Those sciences which govern the morals of mankind, such as Theology and Philosophy, make everything their concern: no activity is so private or so secret as to escape their attention or their jurisdiction.

  Michel de Montaigne

  Philosophy, Secret, Attention

  Michel de Montaigne (1991). “The essays of Michel de Montaigne”, Lane, Allen

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• Climbing is the lazy man's way to enlightenment. It forces you to pay attention, because if you don't, you won't succeed, which is minor - or you may get hurt, which is major. Instead of years of meditation, you have this activity that forces you to relax and monitor your breathing and tread that line between living and dying. When you climb, you always are confronted with the edge. Hey, if it was just like climbing a ladder, we all would have quit a long time ago.

  Duncan Ferguson

  Hurt, Men, Hiking

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• Our emphasis here is based not only on the growing seriousness of drug-related crimes, but also on the belief that relieving our police and our courts from having to fight losing battles against drug use will enable their energies and facilities to be devoted more fully to combating other forms of crime.

  Milton Friedman

  Fighting, Blow, Law

  "Tyranny of the status quo".

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• It would be one of the greatest triumphs of humanity, one of the most tangible liberations from the constraints of nature to which mankind is subject, if we could succeed in raising the responsible act of procreating children to the level of a deliberate and intentional activity and in freeing it from its entanglement with the necessary satisfaction of a natural need.

  Sigmund Freud

  Nature, Children, Humanity

  Sigmund Freud, Carrie Lee Rothgeb (1962). “The Standard Edition of the Complete Psychological Works of Sigmund Freud: Early psycho-analytic publications”

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• Other things equal, a life filled with complex flow activities is more worth living than one spent consuming passive entertainment.

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

  Happiness, Flow, Entertainment

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (1997). “Finding Flow: The Psychology of Engagement with Everyday Life”, Basic Books

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• A panel at a beautiful annual literary festival in Brazil, held in the almost Utopian coastal town of Parati, found me matched with Fernando Gabeira. This comparison reduced my own limited charisma value to something like zero: Gabeira has excelled at every cultural activity in Brazil.

  Christopher Hitchens

  Love, Beautiful, Zero

  "Terrorists Ain't What They Used To Be" by Christopher Hitchens, www.slate.com. August 15, 2006.

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• The three main extra-rational activities in modern life are religion, war, and love. all these are extra-rational, but love is not anti-rational, that is to say, a reasonable man may reasonably rejoice in its existence

  Bertrand Russell

  War, Men, Love Is

  Bertrand Russell (2009). “Marriage and Morals”, p.74, Routledge

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• Life though a short, is a working day. Activity may lead to evil; but inactivity cannot be led to good.

  Hannah More

  Evil, May, Laziness

  Hannah More (1857). “Complete Works”, p.332

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• The Free Market is Mother Nature's way of organizing economic activity.

  David D. Aitken

  Mother, Libertarian, Way

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• ... the place where [adults] pass the most time and submit to the closest control is at work. Thus, without even entering into the question of the world economy's ultimate dictation within narrow limits of everybody's productive activity, it's apparent that the source of the greatest direct duress experienced by the ordinary adult is _not_ the state but rather the business that employs him. Your foreman or supervisor gives you more or-else orders in a week than the police do in a decade.

  Bob Black

  Order, Giving, Police

  Bob Black (1986). “The Abolition of Work and Other Essays”, Loompanics Unltd

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• The consumers suffer when the laws of the country prevent the most efficient entrepreneurs from expanding the sphere of their activities. What made some enterprises develop into "big business" was precisely their success in filling best the demand of the masses.

  Ludwig von Mises

  Country, Law, Entrepreneur

  Ludwig Von Mises (1947). “Planned Chaos”, p.6, Ludwig von Mises Institute

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• There is no use in deceiving ourselves. American public opinion rejects the market economy, the capitalistic free enterprise system that provided the nation with the highest standard of living ever attained. Full government control of all activities of the individual is virtually the goal of both national parties.

  Ludwig von Mises

  Party, Government, Goal

  Ludwig Von Mises (1990). “Economic freedom and interventionism: an anthology of articles and essays”

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• I pay a lot of attention to how things are done and the whole activity of building something is interesting.

  Donald Judd

  Interesting, Attention, Done

  "Oral history interview with Donald Judd" by Bruce Hooton, www.aaa.si.edu. February 3, 1965.

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• Our struggle to put first things first can be characterized by the contrast between two powerful tools that direct us: the clock and the compass. The clock represents our commitments, appointments, schedules, goals, activities - what we do with, and how we manage our time. The compass represents our vision, values, principles, mission, conscience, direction - what we feel is important and how we lead our lives. In an effort to close the gap between the clock and the compass in our lives, many of us turn to the field of "time management."

  Stephen Covey

  Powerful, Struggle, Commitment

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• The happiest people spend much time in a state of flow - the state in which people are so involved in an activity that nothing else seems to matter; the experience itself is so enjoyable that people will do it even at great cost, for the sheer sake of doing it.

  Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

  Inspirational, People, Cost

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• Youth Liberation has argued for some time that young people should have the right to have sex as well as not to have it, and with whom they choose. The statutory structure of the sex laws has been identified as oppressive and insulting to young people. A range of sexual activities are legally defined as molestation, regardless of the quality of the relationship or the amount of consent involved.

  Gayle Rubin

  Sex, Should Have, Law

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• I have no regret that someone openly identified with terrorist organisations and activities meets his death the same way.

  Sammy Wilson

  Regret, Way, Terrorist

  The Irish Times, September 24, 1988.

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• In this new world, you and I make it up as we go along, not because we lack expertise or planning skills, but because that is the nature of reality. Reality changes shape and meaning because of our activity. And it is constantly new. We are required to be there, as active participants. It can't happen without us and nobody can do it for us.

  Margaret J. Wheatley

  Learning, Knowledge, Reality

  Margaret J. Wheatley (1994). “Leadership and the new science: learning about organization from an orderly universe”, Berrett-Koehler Pub

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• There is no shortage of time. In fact, we are positively awash with it. We only make good use of 20 per cent of our time.... The 80/20 principle says that if we doubled our time on the top 20% of activities, we could work a two-day week and achieve 60 per cent more than now.

  Richard Koch

  Two, Principles, Use

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• Being human is a precious situation, and we shouldn't waste time in useless activities.

  Sakyong Mipham

  Time, Useless, Waste

  Sakyong Mipham (2005). “Ruling Your World: Ancient Strategies For Modern Life”, p.46, Harmony

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• I must try to be alone for part of each year...and part of each day...in order to keep my core, my center...Women must be still as the axis of a wheel in the midst of her activities. She must be the pioneer of achieving this stillness, not only for her own salvation, but for the salvation of family life, of society, perhaps even of our civilization.

  Anne Morrow Lindbergh

  Mom, Order, Years

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• Politics? Boring? Politics is history on the wing! What other sphere of human activity calls forth all that is most noble in men's souls, and all that is most base? Or has such excitement? Or more vividly exposes our strengths and weaknesses? Boring? You might as well say that life itself is boring!

  Robert Harris

  Men, Wings, Soul

  Robert Harris (2006). “Imperium: A Novel of Ancient Rome”, p.167, Simon and Schuster

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• THE TOTALLY AWAKENED warrior can freely utilize all elements contained in heaven and earth. The true warrior learns how to correctly perceive the activity of the universe and how to transform martial techniques into vehicles of purity, goodness, and beauty. A warrior’s mind and body must be permeated with enlightened wisdom and deep calm.

  Morihei Ueshiba

  Warrior, Heaven, Mind

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• The most basic task of any museum must be the protection of works of cultural significance entrusted to its care for the edification and pleasure of future generations. This imperative rightfully takes precedence over acquisition, interpretation, outreach, or any number of other activities now believed to be crucial to the survival of our great art repositories. Sometimes a museum gains its holdings with much strategic forethought, and at other times serendipitously, as when a long-coveted neighbor’s plot suddenly becomes available. Yet the moral responsibility remains the same.

  Martin Filler

  Art, Responsibility, Numbers

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• If a certain activity, such as painting, becomes the habitual mode of expression, it may follow that taking up the painting materials and beginning work with them will act suggestively and so presently evoke a flight into the higher state.

  Robert Henri

  Expression, May, Painting

  Robert Henri (2007). “The Art Spirit”, p.158, Basic Books

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