Month: July 2018

“The business of the wise man is to be happy….in whatever condition life happens to offer.” – Samuel Johnson

“Just because something is fun for someone else doesn’t make it fun for you.” – Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project

“Knowing what you admire in others is a wonderful mirror into your deepest, as yet unborn, self.” – Gretchen Rubin, The Happiness Project

“Throw a seed in the seemingly empty earth and watch life spring forth from the emptiness. Think of the creative artist. She knows that for all her searching, concentrating, and disciplined effort, the really exciting breakthroughs will come as inspirations from the emptiness.” – Laurence Boldt, Zen and the Art of Making a Living

“As you go through life, Falk, there will be no shortage of people who will tell you how to live. They’ll have all the answers for you, what you should do, what you shouldn’t do. Don’t argue with them. You know, say “Yes, that’s a brilliant, brilliant idea,” and then do what you want. And whenever you’re right, strive for originality. But if you have to steal, steal from the best. Oh, oh, and if you take very good care of your styptic pencil and dry it after every shave, it will last longer than most relationships that you’re in.” – Anything Else, 2003

“I know gay men, I practically invented them!” – All Over The Guy, 2001

“If only my life could be more like the movies. I want an angel to sweep down to me like it does to Jimmy Stewart in It’s A Wonderful Life and talk me out of suicide, I’ve always waited for that one moment of truth to set me free and change my life forever, but he wont come, it doesnt happen that way. All the drugs, all the therapy, fights, anger, guilt, rave, suicidal thoughts, all of that was part of some slow recovery process, the same way I went down I came back up, gradually… and then suddenly. The pills weren’t the cure at all, God knows, but they gave me breathing space which allowed me to start writing again only this time it was not as if my life depended on it.” – Prozac Nation, 2001

“Reed Richards had to use his anti-matter weapon on his own son, who Aannihilus has turn into the Human Atom Bomb. It was a typical predicament for the Fantastic Four, because they weren’t like other superheroes. They were more like a family. And the more power they had, the more harm they could do to each other without even knowing it. That was the meaning of the Fantastic Four: that a family is like your own personal anti-matter. Your family is the void you emerge from, and the place you return to when you die. And that’s the paradox – the closer you’re drawn back in, the deeper into the void you go.” – The Ice Storm, 1997, based on the novel by Rick Moody

“Make the most of the time you have. Be deliberate. Take it step by step. Control what you can; forget the rest.” – Laurence Boldt, Zen and the Art of Making a Living

“Life is like a dance and we’re partners. Setbacks, delays, and detours? Heck, they’re just like some of the steps in the mambo, tango, and cha-cha. If you dissected the movements and saw them without regard to the rest of the dance, everyone would look like total dorks. But when you see the big picture…..poetry in motion.

In life, setbacks, delays, and detours are often just my way of keeping you for something way better. Don’t let them discourage you, don’t lose faith, and whatever you do, don’t stop dancing.”  – Mike Dooley, Notes From The Universe