Catalyst Quotes

“Your Story, Money, Essentials to Happiness and the Weather”

“Your story about money

Is a story.  About money.

Money isn’t real.  It’s a method of exchange, a unit we exchange for something we actually need or value.  It has worth because we agree it has worth, because we agree what it can be exchanged for.

But there’s something far more powerful going on here.

We don’t actually agree, because each person’s valuation of money is based on the stories we tell ourselves about it.

Our bank balance is merely a number, bits represented on a screen, but it’s also a signal and symptom.  We tell ourselves a story about how we got that money, what it says about us, what we’re going to do with it and how other people judge us.  We tell ourselves a story about how that might grow, and more vividly, how that money might disappear or shrink or be taken away.

And those stories, those very powerful unstated stories, impact the narrative of just about everything else we do.

So yes, there’s money.  But before there’s money, there’s a story.  It turns out that once you change the story, the money changes too.”   (Seth Godin, Seth’s Blog, 3.26.14)

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“The grand essentials to happiness in this life are something to do, something to love, and something to hope for.”   (George Washington Burnap, The Sphere and Duties of Woman:  A Course of Lectures)

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“May Light always surround you;

Hope kindle and rebound you.

May your Hurts turn to Healing;

Your Heart embrace Feeling.

May Wounds become Wisdom;

Every Kindness a Prism.

May Laughter infect you;

Your Passion resurrect you.

May Goodness inspire 

your Deepest Desires.

Through all that you Reach For, 

May your arms Never Tire.”   (D. Simone)

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“How people treat you is their Karma.  How you respond is yours.”   (Wayne Dyer)

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“I don’t believe that people create their own visions.  Rather, I believe that visions are actually God’s way of communicating with us.”   (Russell Simmons, Do You!)

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“Today a young man on acid realized that all matter is merely energy condensed to a slow vibration, that we are all one consciousness experiencing itself subjectively, there is no such thing as death, life is only a dream, and we are the imagination of ourselves. (And now …) here’s Tom with the Weather.”   (Bill Hicks)

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“What Else Would You Like to Know?”

“The most difficult battles in life are those we fight within.”  (Old Chinese Proverb)

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“‘It’s a sin to be poor!’”  He wasn’t referring to moral turpitude, but rather to ‘the frustration of potentiality.’  He believed and taught that, when we establish ourselves in the consciousness of God, the whole universe moves to flow into us with its abundance of life and substance.  This is obviously what Jesus had in mind when he said, ‘But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things shall be yours as well.’”   (Unknown Author)

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“The older I grow, the more I distrust the familiar doctrine that age brings wisdom.”   (H. L. Mencken)

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“It is not true that people stop pursuing dreams because they grow old, they grow old because they stop pursuing dreams.”   (Gabriel García Márquez)

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“I believe sincerely that every man has consummate genius within him.”   (Walter Russell, The Man Who Tapped the Secrets of the Universe)

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“To believe your own thoughts, to believe that what is true for you in your private heart is true for all men — that is genius.”   (Ralph Waldo Emerson, The Selected Writings)

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“You are the Truth from foot to brow.  Now, what else would you like to know?”   (Rumi)

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“If I Had My Live to Live Over / Talk to Your Heart”

“If I had my life to live over

I would have talked less and listened more. 

I would have invited friends over to dinner even if the carpet was stained and the sofa faded.

I would have eaten the popcorn in the “good” living room and worried much less about the dirt when someone wanted to light a fire in the fireplace.

I would have taken the time to listen to my grandfather rambling about his youth.

I would never have insisted the car windows be rolled up on a summer day because my hair had just been teased and sprayed.

I would have burned the pink candle sculpted like a rose before it melted in storage.

I would have sat on the lawn with my children and not worried about grass stains.

I would have cried and laughed less while watching television, and more while watching life.

I would have gone to bed when I was sick, instead of pretending the earth would go into a holding pattern if I weren’t there for the day.

I would never have bought anything just because it was practical, wouldn’t show soil or was guaranteed to last a lifetime.

Instead of wishing away nine months of pregnancy, I’d have cherished every moment, realizing that the wonderment growing inside me was the only chance in life to assist God in a miracle.

When my kids kissed me impetuously, I would never have said, “Later. Now go get washed up for dinner.”

There would have been more I love you’s and more I’m sorry’s

. . . but mostly, given another shot at life, I would seize every minute . . .  look at it and really see it . . . and never give it back.”   (Erma Bombeck)

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“You have to begin to tell the story of your life as you now want it to be and discontinue the tales of how it has been or of how it is.”   (Esther & Jerry Hicks, Money, and the Law of Attraction: Learning to Attract Wealth, Health and Happiness)

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“When you don’t talk, there’s a lot of stuff that ends up not getting said.”   (Catherine Gilbert Murdock, Dairy Queen)

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“Don’t give in to your fears.  If you do, you won’t be able to talk to your heart.”  (Paulo Coelho, The Alchemist)

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“When You Know Better, Do Better”

“Isn’t it nice to think that tomorrow is a new day with no mistakes in it yet?”   (L. M. Montgomery)

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“We must make the choices that enable us to fulfill the deepest capacities of our real selves.”   (Thomas Merton)

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“Two ways to listen –

You can listen to what people say, sure.

But you will be far more effective if you listen to what people do.   (Seth Godin, Seth’s Blog, 3.21.14)

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“Do the best you can until you know better.  Then when you know better, do better.”   (Maya Angelou)

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“Confidence is going after Moby Dick in a rowboat and taking the tartar sauce with you.”   (Zig Ziglar)

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“Strange as it may seem, I still hope for the best, even though the best, like an interesting piece of mail, so rarely arrives, and even when it does it can be lost so easily.”   (Lemony Snicket, The Beatrice Letters)

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“Believe nothing.

No matter where you read it,

Or who said it, 

Even if I have said it, 

Unless it agrees with your own reason 

And your own common sense.”   (Buddha, The Dhammapada)

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“Don’t believe anything you read on the net.  Except this.  Well, including this, I suppose.”   (Douglas Adams)

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“You Know, Trust The Magic of Beginnings”

“It is one thing to read the Scriptures and affirm their truth.  But until you are in the trenches of trial, until you are faced with life circumstances that test your faith, until you are pressed to the absolute limit of your physical and emotional capacity, until you face the unrelenting stress of ongoing trauma, you never really know how you’ll respond to what you may have embraced so easily during a comfortable Bible study.”   (Kevin Malarkey, The Boy Who Came Back from Heaven: A Remarkable Account of Miracles, Angels and Life beyond This World)

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“My heart is so small

it’s almost invisible.

How can You place 

such big sorrows in it?

“Look,” He answered,

“your eyes are even smaller,

yet they behold the world.”  (Rumi)

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“Do not feel lonely; the entire universe is inside you.”   (Rumi)

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“True happiness is to enjoy the present, without anxious dependence upon the future, not to amuse ourselves with either hopes or fears but to rest satisfied with what we have, which is sufficient, for he that is so wants nothing.  The greatest blessings of mankind are within us and within our reach.  A wise man is content with his lot, whatever it may be, without wishing for what he has not.”   (Seneca)

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“They say a person needs just three things to be truly happy in this world:  someone to love, something to do, and something to hope for.”   (Tom Bodett)

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“When you begin to expect that there is always room for improvement, you put yourself in the driver’s seat.  Why wait for someone else to figure it out or do it?  Expect that you are the one.  Expect great outcomes.  Expect that you are the best candidate and that you will achieve your goals.”   (Lorii Myers, No Excuses, The Fit Mind-Fit Body Strategy Book)

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“And suddenly you know:  It’s time to start something new and trust the magic of beginnings.”   (Meister Eckhart)

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“Life is Short, Break the Rules”

“I can’t stand it to think my life is going so fast and I’m not really living it.”   (Ernest Hemingway, The Sun Also Rises)

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“And every day, the world will drag you by the hand, yelling, ‘This is important!  And this is important!  And this is important!  You need to worry about this!  And this!  And this!”  And each day, it’s up to you to yank your hand back, put it on your heart and say, ‘No.  This is what’s important.’” (Iain S. Thomas, ‘I Wrote This for You’)

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“I don’t know if I continue even today, always liking myself.  But what I learned to do many years ago was to forgive myself.  It is very important for every human being to forgive herself or himself because if you live, you will make mistakes – it is inevitable.  But once you do and you see the mistake, then you forgive yourself and say, ‘Well, if I’d known better I’d have done better,’ that’s all.  So you say to people who you think you may have injured, ‘I’m sorry,’ and then you say to yourself, ‘I’m sorry.’ If we all hold on to the mistake, we can’t see our own glory in the mirror because we have the mistake between our faces and the mirror; we can’t see what we’re capable of being.  You can ask forgiveness of others, but in the end the real forgiveness is in one’s own self.  I think that young men and women are so caught by the way they see themselves.  Now mind you.  When a larger society sees them as unattractive, as threats, as too black or too white or too poor or too fat or too thin or too sexual or too asexual, that’s rough.  But you can overcome that.  The real difficulty is to overcome how you think about yourself.  If we don’t have that we never grow, we never learn, and sure as hell we should never teach.”   (Maya Angelou)

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“Do more than belong:  participate.  Do more than care:  help.  Do more than believe:  practice. Do more than be fair:  be kind.  Do more than forgive:  forget.  Do more than dream:  work.”   (William Ward)

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“Life is short, Break the Rules.

Forgive quickly, Kiss SLOWLY.

Love truly.  Laugh uncontrollably

And never regret ANYTHING

That makes you smile.”   (Mark Twain)

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“Life Is All About Discovering”

“Challenges are what make life interesting and overcoming them is what makes life meaningful.”   (Joshua J. Marine)

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“I asked the Zebra,

are you black with white stripes?

Or white with black stripes?

And the zebra asked me,

Are you good with bad habits?

Or are you bad with good habits?

Are you noisy with quiet times?

Or are you quiet with noisy times?

Are you happy with some sad days?

Or are you sad with some happy days?

Are you neat with some sloppy ways?

Or are you sloppy with some neat ways?

And on and on and on and on and on and on he went.

I’ll never ask a zebra about stripes … again.”    (Shel Silverstein)

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“We learn something from everyone who passes through our lives.  Some lessons are painful, some are painless… but, all are priceless.”   (Author Unknown)

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“Life is all about discovering things that do matter in the end.”   (Robert Brault)

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“I don’t regret the things I’ve done; I regret the things I didn’t do when I had the chance.”   (Unknown)

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“It’s hard to wait around for something you know might never happen; but it’s harder to give up when you know it’s everything you want.”   (Unknown)

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“In the end, some of your greatest pains become your greatest strengths.”  (Drew Barrymore)

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“Giving is the Basis of Success”

“Don’t worry about who doesn’t like you, who has more, or who’s doing what.”   (Erma Bombeck)

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“I do not care so much what I am to others as I care what I am to myself.”   (Michel de Montaigne)

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“No matter where you’re from or what you’ve done, you’re never stuck in a particular circumstance, relationship, or cycle unless you say you are.”   (Russell Simmons, Super Rich:  A Guide to Having it All)

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“You think of yourself

as a citizen of the universe.

You think you belong 

to this world of dust and matter.

Out of this dust

you have created a personal image,

and have forgotten

about the essence of your true origin.”   (Rumi, Hush, Don’t Say Anything to God:  Passionate poems of Rumi)

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“Believe that you possess a basic goodness, which is the foundation for the greatness you can ultimately achieve.”   (Les Brown)

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“Since I was young, I have always known this:  Life damages us, every one.  We can’t escape that damage.  But now, I am also learning this:  We can be mended.  We mend each other.”   (Veronica Roth)

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“Giving, not trading or selling, is the basis of success.  The most rewarding thing you can do is just to give the world something good.  And ultimately you will be paid so much more for that gift than if you had tried to trade it for something else.”   (Russell Simmons, Do You!  12 Laws to Access the Power in You to Achieve Happiness and Success)

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