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Positive Quotes and Quotations
 Beauty to me is being comfortable in your own skin.  Man is what he believes. Believe that life is worth living, and your belief will help create that fact. Dream lofty dreams, and as you dream, so shall you become. Your vision is the promise of what you shall at last unveil. Our belief at the beginning of a doubtful undertaking is the one thing that ensures the successful outcome of our venture. We are what we believe we are. If you constantly think of illness, you eventually become ill; if you believe yourself to be beautiful, you become so. You have to believe in happiness, or happiness never comes. If you keep on saying things are going to be bad, you have a good chance of being a prophet. What one believes to be true either is true or becomes true within limits to be found experientially and experimentally. These limits are beliefs to be transcended. The thing always happens that you really believe in; and the belief in a thing makes it happen. The name we give to something shapes our attitude toward it. This I know. This I believe with all my heart. If we want a free and peaceful world, if we want to make the deserts bloom and man grow to greater dignity as a human being- we can do it! The name we give to something shapes our attitude toward it. This I know. This I believe with all my heart. If we want a free and peaceful world, if we want to make the deserts bloom and man grow to greater dignity as a human being-we can do it! Failure is impossible. If you think you can, you can. And if you think you can't, you're right. When you look at the world in a narrow way, how narrow it seems! When you look at it in a mean way, how mean it is! When you look at it selfishly, how selfish it is! But when you look at it in a broad, generous, friendly spirit, what wonderful people you find in it. Always keep that happy attitude. Pretend that you are holding a beautiful fragrant bouquet. She was one of those happily created beings who please without effort, make friends everywhere, and take life so gracefully and easily that less fortunate souls are tempted to believe that such are born under a lucky star. It was completely fruitless to quarrel with the world, whereas the quarrel with oneself was occasionally fruitful and always, she had to admit, interesting. Each of us makes his own weather, determines the color of the skies in the emotional universe which he inhabits. One of the things I learned the hard way was that it doesn't pay to get discouraged. Keeping busy and making optimism a way of life can restore your faith in yourself. Life is raw material. We are artisans. We can sculpt our existence into something beautiful, or debase it into ugliness. It's in our hands. I invented my life by taking for granted that everything I did not like would have an opposite, which I would like. If you look at life one way, there is always cause for alarm. Being tall is an advantage, especially in business. People will always remember you. And if you're in a crowd, you'll always have some clean air to breathe. It is only in sorrow bad weather masters us; in joy we face the storm and defy it. The pure, the beautiful, the bright, That stirred our hearts in youth, The impulse to a wordless prayer, The dreams of love and truth, The longings after something lost, The spirit's yearning cry, The strivings after better hopes, These things can never die. I actually remember feeling delight, at two o'clock in the morning, when the baby woke for his feed, because I so longed to have another look at him. Teenagers travel in droves, packs, swarms. ... To the librarian, they're a gaggle of geese. To the cook, they're a scourge of locusts. To department stores, they're a big beautiful exaltation of larks ... all lovely and loose and jingly. Both abundance and lack exist simultaneously in our lives, as parallel realities. It is always our conscious choice which secret garden we will tend ... when we choose not to focus on what is missing from our lives but are grateful for the abundance that's present-love, health, family, friends, work, the joys of nature, and personal pursuits that bring us pleasure-the wasteland of illusion falls away and we experience heaven on earth. Exude happiness and you will feel it back a thousand times. I keep my ideals, because in spite of everything I still believe that people are really good at heart. Man's rise or fall, success or failure, happiness or unhappiness depends on his attitude ... a man's attitude will create the situation he imagines. A good heart will help you to a bonny face, my lad ... and a bad one will turn the bonniest into something worse than ugly. The greatest discovery of my generation is that man can alter his life simply by altering his attitude of mind. I think there is a choice possible to us at any moment, as long as we live. But there is no sacrifice. There is a choice, and the rest falls away. Second choice does not exist. Beware of those who talk about sacrifice. Life has, indeed, many ills, but the mind that views every object in its most cheering aspect, and every doubtful dispensation as replete with latent good, bears within itself a powerful and perpetual antidote. Immense power is acquired by assuring yourself in your secret reveries that you were born to control affairs. A woman's hopes are woven of sunbeams; a shadow annihilates them. Keep your face to the sunshine and you cannot see the shadow. Man's real life is happy, chiefly because he is ever expecting that it soon will be so. Some folks never exaggerate-they just remember big. I expect some new phases of life this summer, and shall try to get the honey from each moment. Love is much nicer to be in than an automobile accident, a tight girdle, a higher tax bracket, or a holding pattern over Philadelphia. I am optimistic and confident in all that I do. I affirm only the best for myself and others. I am the creator of my life and my world. I meet daily challenges gracefully and with complete confidence. I fill my mind with positive, nurturing, and healing thoughts. 'Tis very certain the desire of life prolongs it. Happiness is the ability to recognize it. The saddest day hath gleams of light, The darkest wave hath bright foam beneath it, The twinkles o'er the cloudiest night, Some solitary star to cheer it. Every thought we think is creating our future. Could we change our attitude, we should not only see life differently, but life itself would come to be different. Life would undergo a change of appearance because we ourselves had undergone a change in attitude. The words "I am ..." are potent words; be careful what you hitch them to. The thing you're claiming has a way of reaching back and claiming you. Self-image sets the boundaries of individual accomplishment. We are not interested in the possibilities of defeat. To think of losing is to lose already. Nothing can stop the man with the right mental attitude from achieving his goal; nothing on earth can help the man with the wrong mental attitude. If you expect nothing, you're apt to be surprised. You'll get it. Life is like a mirror. Smile at it and it smiles back at you. Since the human body tends to move in the direction of its expectations-plus or minus-it is important to know that attitudes of confidence and determination are no less a part of the treatment program than medical science and technology. They can because they think they can. - Virgil I do think that being the second [female Supreme Court Justice] is wonderful, because it is a sign that being a woman in a place of importance is no longer extraordinary. Women forget all the things they don't want to remember, and remember everything they don't want to forget. When you're in love, you put up with things that, when you're out of love you cite. To the timid and hesitating everything is impossible because it seems so. Work is either fun or drudgery. It depends on your attitude. I like fun. What we see depends mainly on what we look for. People only see what they are prepared to see. For years I wanted to be older, and now I am. Look for the ridiculous in everything and you find it. He that seeks trouble always finds it. The more wary you are of danger, the more likely you are to meet it. Lifting as they climb, onward and upward they go, struggling and striving and hoping that the buds and blossoms of their desires may burst into glorious fruition ere long. We are always paid for our suspicion by finding what we suspect. The unthankful heart... discovers no mercies; but the thankful heart... will find, in every hour, some heavenly blessings. If you are possessed by an idea, you find it expressed everywhere, you even smell it. All seems infected that the infected spy, as all looks yellow to the jaundiced eye. The faultfinder will find faults even in paradise. Those see nothing but faults that seek for nothing else. The world is a looking glass and gives back to every man the reflection of his own face. Frown at it and it will in turn look sourly upon you; laugh at it and with it, and it is a jolly, kind companion. Life is a mirror and will reflect back to the thinker what he thinks into it. The world is a great mirror. It reflects back to you what you are. If you are loving, if you are friendly, if you are helpful, the world will prove loving and friendly and helpful to you. The world is what you are. The world is like a mirror; frown at it, and it frowns at you. Smile and it smiles, too. If enough people think of a thing and work hard enough at it, I guess it's pretty nearly bound to happen, wind and weather permitting. If you are going to think black, think positive about it. Don't think down on it, or think it is something in your way. And this way, when you really do want to stretch out and express how beautiful black is, everybody will hear you. Our minds can shape the way a thing will be because we act according to our expectations. I like living. I have sometimes been wildly, despairingly, acutely miserable, racked with sorrow, but through it all I still know quite certainly that just to be alive is a grand thing. A man is literally what he thinks. Although none of the rules for becoming alive is valid, it is healthy to keep on formulating them. The happiness of your life depends upon the quality of your thoughts ... take care that you entertain no notions unsuitable to virtue and reasonable nature. All that a man does outwardly is but the expression and completion of his inward thought. To work effectively, he must think clearly; to act nobly, he must think nobly. You cannot escape the results of your thoughts.... Whatever your present environment may be, you will fall, remain or rise with your thoughts, your vision, your ideal. You will become as small as your controlling desire, as great as your dominant aspiration. The life each of us lives is the life within the limits of our own thinking. To have life more abundant, we must think in limitless terms of abundance. A man's life is what his thoughts make it. Before a painter puts a brush to his canvas he sees his picture mentally.... If you think of yourself in terms of a painting, what do you see? ... Is the picture one you think worth painting? ... You create yourself in the image you hold in your mind. A man is what he thinks about all day long. All that we are is the result of what we have thought. The mind is everything. What we think, we become. - Buddha I believe that if you think about disaster, you will get it. Brood about death and you hasten your demise. Think positively and masterfully with confidence and faith, and life becomes more secure, more fraught with action, richer in achievement and experience. Think you can, think you can't; either way, you'll be right. Our destiny changes with our thoughts; we shall become what we wish to become, do what we wish to do, when our habitual thoughts correspond with our desires. Our best friends and our worst enemies are our thoughts. A thought can do us more good than a doctor or a banker or a faithful friend. It can also do us more harm than a brick. The way a man's mind runs is the way he is sure to go. Nothing befalls us that is not of the nature of ourselves. There comes no adventure but wears to our soul the shape of our everyday thoughts. The mere apprehension of a coming evil has put many into a situation of the utmost danger. - Lucan The soul contains the event that shall befall it, for the event is only the actualization of its thoughts, and what we pray to ourselves for is always granted. If you think it's going to rain, it will. As you think, you travel, and as you love, you attract. You are today where your thoughts have brought you; you will be tomorrow where your thoughts take you. God will help you if you try, and you can if you think you can. To expect defeat is nine-tenths of defeat itself. The quality of our expectations determines the quality of our action. What a man thinks of himself, that is what determines, or rather indicates, his fate. Man, being made reasonable, and so a thinking creature, there is nothing more worthy of his being than the right direction and employment of his thoughts; since upon this depends both his usefulness to the public, and his own present and future benefit in all respects. Great men are they who see that the spiritual is stronger than any material force, that thoughts rule the world. Never think any oldish thoughts. It's oldish thoughts that make a person old. They can because they think they can. - Virgil As a man thinketh, so is he, and as a man chooseth, so is he. Thoughts lead on to purposes; purposes go forth in action; actions form habits; habits decide character; and character fixes our destiny. Keep your thoughts right, for as you think, so are you. Therefore, think only those things that will make the world better, and you unashamed. Every man is free to rise as far as he's able or willing, but the degree to which he thinks determines the degree to which he'll rise. - Ayn Rand What you think means more than anything else in your life. Change your thoughts and you change your world. Baseball is 90 percent mental. The other half is physical. The way in which we think of ourselves has everything to do with how our world sees us. Be careful of your thoughts; they may become words at any moment. The wisdom of all ages and cultures emphasizes the tremendous power our thoughts have over our character and circumstances. There comes no adventure but wears to our soul the shape of our everyday thoughts. We exaggerate misfortune and happiness alike. We are never either so wretched or so happy as we say we are. Think of all the beauty that's still left in and around you and be happy! We are never so happy or so unhappy as we think. Man is only miserable so far as he thinks himself so. A man's as miserable as he thinks he is. The most unhappy of all men is he who believes himself to be so. The mind is its own place, and in itself can make a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven. All happiness is in the mind. Happiness is not a matter of events, it depends upon the tides of the mind. The greater part of our happiness or misery depends on our dispositions, and not our circumstances. I am happy and content because I think I am. A happy life consists in tranquility of mind. - Cicero The happiest person is the person who thinks the most interesting thoughts. Unhappiness indicates wrong thinking, just as ill health indicates a bad regimen. Happiness does not depend on outward things, but on the way we see them. Happiness will never be any greater than the idea we have of it. He is happy that knoweth not himself to be otherwise. Misery is almost always the result of thinking. A great obstacle to happiness is to expect too much happiness. It isn't our position, but our disposition, that makes us happy. God prefers your health, and your obedience, to your penance. After you're older, two things are possibly more important than any others: health and money. The best course was to buy a house across a road from a cemetery and look at it every morning. Reminding yourself where it all ended anyway, you'd never get upset about anything again. Some patients I see are actually draining into their bodies the diseased thoughts of their minds. A sneer is like a flame; it may occasionally be curative because it cauterizes, but it leaves a bitter scar. Hate is like acid. It can damage the vessel in which it is stored as well as destroy the object on which it is poured. The body manifests what the mind harbors. Since the human body tends to move in the direction of its expectations-plus or minus-it is important to know that attitudes of confidence and determination are no less a part of the treatment program than medical science and technology. Tragedy had its compensations. Once the worst misfortune occurred, one never worried about the minor ones. Give me good health and I'll take care of the rest. When people asked, I used to tell them how sick I was. The more I talked about being sick, the worse I got. Finally, I started saying, "I'm getting better." It took a while, but then I started to feel better, too. You can promote your healing by your thinking. Most of the time we think we're sick it's all in the mind. My gift is that I'm not beautiful. My career was never about looks. It's about health and being in good shape. The pessimist is half-licked before he starts. In rejecting secrecy I had also rejected the road to cynicism. An ass may bray a good while before he shakes the stars down. It is healthier to see the good points of others than to analyze our own bad ones. Pessimism is a luxury that a Jew can never afford himself. Never say anything on the phone that you wouldn't want your mother to hear at your trial. You can either give in to negative feelings or fight them, and I'm of the belief that you should fight them. A critic is someone who never actually goes to the battle, yet who afterwards comes out shooting the wounded. They never raised a statue to a critic. The weak are the most treacherous of us all. They come to the strong and drain them. They are bottomless. They are insatiable. They are always parched and always bitter. They are everyone's concern and like vampires they suck our life's blood. No one can defeat us unless we first defeat ourselves. Play not with paradoxes. That caustic which you handle in order to scorch others may happen to sear your own fingers and make them dead to the quality of things. Discussing how old you are is the temple of boredom. You can't be pessimistic, because there are so many things that go wrong every day that if you were to be negative or pessimistic, you'd go out of business. We criticize and separate ourselves from the process. We've got to jump right in there with both feet. Wit is the salt of conversation, not the food, and few things in the world are more wearying than a sarcastic attitude towards life. You can't pay attention to your mistakes. I made a mistake today, I made a mistake yesterday. I think it's ... very important to ignore the negative. You just can't complain about being alive. It's self-indulgent to be unhappy. We can destroy ourselves by cynicism and disillusion, just as affectively as by bombs. One of the most devastating experiences in human life is disillusionment. The pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; the optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty. No pessimist ever discovered the secrets of the stars, or sailed to an uncharted land, or opened a new heaven to the human spirit. There are people who have an appetite for grief; pleasure is not strong enough and they crave pain. They have mithridatic stomachs which must be fed on poisoned bread, natures so doomed that no prosperity can sooth their ragged and dishevelled desolation. I don't believe in pessimism. If any has a stone to throw It is not I, ever or now. Cynicism is intellectual dandyism. When one door of happiness closes, another opens; but often we look so long at the closed door that we do not see the one which has been opened for us. Do not sit long with a sad friend. When you go to a garden do you look at the weeds? Spend more time with the roses and jasmines. If we are not responsible for the thoughts that pass our doors, we are at least responsible for those we admit and entertain. Optimism is an intellectual choice. Think of only three things: your God, your family and the Green Bay Packers-in that order. You live with your thoughts-so be careful what they are. We must dare to think unthinkable thoughts. Politeness is the art of choosing among one's real thoughts. Thoughts have power; thoughts are energy. And you can make your world or break it by your own thinking. Your imagination has much to do with your life. ... It is for you to decide how you want your imagination to serve you. A vacant mind invites dangerous inmates, as a deserted mansion tempts wandering outcasts to enter and take up their abode in its desolate apartments. Great things are not something accidental, but must certainly be willed. Cease to be a drudge, seek to be an artist. True revolutions ... restore more than they destroy. There are seeds of self-destruction in all of us that will bear only unhappi-ness if allowed to grow. We have seen too much defeatism, too much pessimism, too much of a negative approach. This is the way of peace-overcome evil with good, and falsehood with truth, and hatred with love. The evil of the world is made possible by nothing but the sanction you give it. - Ayn Rand If you make fun of bad persons you make yourself beneath them. ... Be kind to bad and good, for you don't know your own heart. We have learned that power is a positive force if it is used for positive purposes. The optimism of a healthy mind is indefatigable. If I were to wish for anything, I should not wish for wealth and power, but for the passionate sense of the potential, for the eye which, ever young and ardent, sees the possible . . . what wine is so sparkling, so fragrant, so intoxicating, as possibility! What after all has maintained the human race on this old globe, despite all the calamities of nature and all the tragic failings of mankind, if not the faith in new possibilities and the courage to advocate them? The basic success orientation is having an optimistic attitude. Think positively and masterfully, with confidence and faith, and life becomes more secure, more fraught with action, richer in achievement and experience. Am I like the optimist who, while falling ten stories from a building, says at each story, "I'm all right so far"? It doesn't hurt to be optimistic. You can always cry later. The biggest quality in successful people, I think, is an impatience with negative thinking ... my feeling was, even if it's as bad as I think it is, we'll make it work. Optimism and humor are the grease and glue of life. Without both of them we would never have survived our captivity. Optimism is the faith that leads to achievement. Nothing can be done without hope and confidence. Positive thinking is the key to success in business, education, pro football, anything that you can mention. I go out there thinking that I am going to complete every pass. Positive Thinking Is Practical There is in the worst of fortune the best of chances for a happy change. Every noble work is at first impossible. Optimism is essential to achievement and is also the foundation of courage and of true progress. I cannot discover that anyone knows enough to say definitely what is and what is not possible. I have learned to use the word impossible with the greatest caution. The Wright brothers flew right through the smoke screen of impossibility. |