The Dalai Lama, when asked what surprised him most about humanity, answered:
Man.... Because he sacrifices his health in order to make money. Then he sacrifices money to recuperate his health. And then he is so anxious about the future that he does not enjoy the present; the result being that he does not live in the present or the future; he lives as if he is never going to die, and then dies having never really lived.
I was just sent this feel-good animal-friends video on Facebook, and decided to share:
A reader of this site, Mike Baker, provided me with a big stash of thoughtful quotes. Included in Mike's offerings is this collection of quotes on "patriotism." A patriot must always be ready to defend his country against his government. ~ Edward Abbey The love of one's country is a splendid thing. But why should love stop at the border? ~Pablo Casals "My country, right or wrong," is a thing that no patriot would think of saying except in a desperate case. It is like saying, "My mother, drunk or sober." ~ G. K. Chesterton (1874 - 1936) "True patriotism hates injustice in its own land more than anywhere else." ~ Clarence S. Darrow "He who joyfully marches to music in rank and file has already earned my contempt. He has been given a large brain by mistake, since for him the spinal cord would fully suffice. This disgrace to civilization should be done away with at once. Heroism at command, senseless brutality, and all the loathsome nonsense that goes by the name of patriotism, how violently I hate all this, how despicable and ignoble war is; I would rather be torn to shreds than be part of so base an action! It is my conviction that killing under the cloak of war is nothing but an act of murder." ~ Albert Einstein Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel. ~ Samuel Johnson (1709 - 1784), quoted in Boswell's Life of Johnson Patriotism is a kind of religion; it is the egg from which wars are hatched. ~ Guy de Maupassant Can anything be stupider than that a man has the right to kill me because he lives on the other side of a river and his ruler has a quarrel with mine, though I have not quarrelled with him? ~ Blaise Pascal Throughout history, it has been the inaction of those who could have acted; the indifference of those who should have known better; the silence of the voice of justice when it mattered most; that has made it possible for evil to triumph: ~ Haile Selassie Patriotism is your conviction that this country is superior to all other countries because you were born in it. ~ George Bernard Shaw "My kind of loyalty was loyalty to one's country, not to its institutions or its office-holders." ~Mark Twain It is lamentable, that to be a good patriot one must become the enemy of the rest of mankind. ~ Voltaire
There are two ways to keep a person from doing X.
A) Make it impossible to do X. Make it illegal or expensive or impractical, for instance; or B) Fill up a person's life with dozens of other obligations such that he or she no longer has any time to do X.I'm dealing with B) at the moment. I have a dozen writing projects I've been working on, but I can't get to them because I'm feeling exhausted with all the other things going on in my life. These "distractions" I've been doing for the past two weeks are important things that I want to do or I need to do (e.g., spending time with my children and tending to crushing duties at work, such as arguing appeals, writing a brief that was just filed with the United States Supreme Court and reconstructing my workstation at the law office after my hard drive died). No one is telling me to stop writing, but the result is the same because of all of these other obligations. There are only so many hours in a week. I have only so much energy and focus, and I find that in order to do original writing I absolutely need blocks of several contiguous hours, at a minimum. Those chunks of quality time have disappeared lately. I'm frustrated, because I very much want to follow up on some articles and write some new ones. On the other hand, my life is full and good. I shouldn't have any complaints, other than I have this urge to try to figure things out, and I do this much better when I write. In moments like these I'm so glad that I decided to make this website a community of writers, an intersection. But there are also other reasons I chose to make this a community, especially the increased interactions with the other authors--an opportunity to learn from each other. Bottom line, I'm sending trackbacks here and there to let readers know that I'm still alive, and I hope to be more active at this site soon.
Media Alley is reporting that the Newspaper Guild is asking unpaid writers at the Huffington Post to stop providing their written work to Huffpo, which recently AOL paid $315 million for Huffpo last month. I'm well aware of Huffpo's policy, which is to "pay" writers with exposure rather than money. It's a deal that I sometimes think of offering to make. Then again, I understand the Guild's position that when others work for free (especially when they do high quality work for free) it hurts the economic position of the 26,000 members of the Newspaper Guild.