A number of you have asked about the little quotation cards I have in front of my desk. They're reminders to myself, which I ignore more than I care to admit.
"The readiness is all" comes from Hamlet. Hamlet tells his friend Horatio that he has a bad feeling about this fencing match he's about to go through. Horatio says that Hamlet should put it off if something's not right. And Hamlet replies "if it be now [and "it" is death] 'tis not to come; if it be not to come it will be now; if it be not now, yet it will come; the readiness is all".
"This is water. This is water" comes from David Foster Wallace's brilliant and beautiful 2005 commencement speech at Kenyon College. Unless it will get you in trouble or cause bodily harm, read it. Right Now.
"Breathe, smile, and go slowly" is advice from Zen master Thich Nhat Hahn. And now that I look it up I see that I have it backward. He actually says "Smile, breathe and go slowly." I don't think Thay will mind.
"Transcend" is just my own single-word advice to myself. Some days one word is all we can handle.
No comments:
Post a Comment