Catalyst Quotes

“Because We Trust, Because We Have Faith”

“Sometimes I can hear my bones straining under the weight of all the lives I’m not living.” (Jonathan Safran Foer, Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close)

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“Most people come equipped by nature with all of the pieces of a puzzle necessary to enjoy life … but by the time they get their career and family underway, most have not only managed to scramble the puzzle … they’ve actually lost some of the pieces”     (Diane McLaren)

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“It’s the possibility of having a dream come true that makes life interesting.”    (Paulo Coelho)

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“Faith is an oasis in the heart which can never be reached by the caravan of thinking.”   (Kahlil Gibran)

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“None of us knows what might happen even the next minute, yet still we go forward.  Because we trust. Because we have Faith.     (Paulo Coelho, Brida)

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“To love means loving the unlovable.  To forgive means pardoning the unpardonable.  Faith means believing the unbelievable.  Hope means hoping when everything seems hopeless.”   (G.K. Chesterton)

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“Can’t Get a Miracle; Then Become One”

“Every day is a new beginning. Treat it that way. Stay away from what might have been, and look at what can be.” (Marsha Petrie Sue)

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“In the course of history, there comes a time when humanity is called to shift to a new level of consciousness, to reach a higher moral ground. A time when we have to shed our fear and give hope to each other. That time is now.” (Wangari Maathai)

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“For attractive lips, speak words of kindness. For lovely eyes, seek the good in people. For a slim figure, share your food with the hungry. For poise, walk with the knowledge that you will never walk alone. People, even more than things have to be restored, renewed, revived, reclaimed, and redeemed. Never throw out anyone.” (Audrey Hepburn)

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“Let us rise up and be thankful, for if we didn’t learn alot today, at least we learned a little, and if we didn’t learn a little, at least we didn’t get sick, and if we got sick, at least we didn’t die; so, let us all be thankful.” (Buddha)

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“If you can’t get a miracle, become one.” (Nick Vujicic, Life Without Limits)

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“Spring Rains Will Come Again”

“Heaven – as you call it – is nowhere. Let’s just put some space between the w and the h in that word and you’ll see that heaven is now … here.” (Conversations with God: An Uncommon Dialogue by Neale Donald Walsch)

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“If we had no winter, the spring would not be so pleasant: if we did not sometimes taste of adversity, prosperity would not be so welcome.” (Anne Bradstreet)

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“Greatness is more than potential. It is the execution of that potential. Beyond the raw talent. You need the appropriate training. You need the discipline. You need the inspiration. You need the drive.” (Eric A. Burns)

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“Expect hope to be rekindled. Expect your prayers to be answered in wondrous ways. The dry seasons in life do not last. The spring rains will come again.” (Sarah Ban Breathnach)

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“Never Fear the Shadows in Life”

“Sometimes life just walks up to you, excuses itself and punches you in the face.”    (Mike Kunda)

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“When we long for life without difficulties, remind us that oaks grow strong in contrary winds and diamonds are made under pressure.”     (Peter Marshall)

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“Difficulties come when you don’t pay attention to life’s whisper.  Life always whispers to you first, but if you ignore the whisper, sooner or later you’ll get a scream.”      (Oprah Winfrey)

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“Never fear the shadows.  They simply mean there’s a light somewhere nearby.”    (Ruth E. Renkee)

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“The universe will reward you for taking risks on its behalf.”    (Shakti Gawain)

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“One day, in retrospect, the years of struggle will strike you as the most beautiful.”   (Sigmund Freud)

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“Life – What and How You Remember It”

“Do you think we choose the times into which we are born?  Or do we fit the times we are born into?”     (Abraham Lincoln, ‘Lincoln’ the movie)

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“Be miserable.  Or motivate yourself.  Whatever has to be done, it’s always your choice.”    (Wayne Dyer)

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“In the long run, we shape our lives, and we shape ourselves.  The process never ends until we die.  And the choices we make are ultimately our own responsibility.”       (Eleanor Roosevelt)

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“The most authentic thing about us is our capacity to create, to overcome, to endure, to transform, to love and to be greater than our suffering.”    (Ben Okri)

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“Life has three rules:  Paradox, Humor, and Change.

*  Paradox:  Life is a mystery; don’t waste your time trying to figure it out.

*  Humor:  Keep a sense of humor, especially about yourself. It is a strength beyond all measure.

*  Change:  Know that nothing ever stays the same.”      (Dan Millman, Way of the Peaceful Warrior:  A Book That Changes Lives)      

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“What matters in life is not what happens to you but what you remember and how you remember it.”     (Gabriel Garcia Marquez)

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“Anything Can Be”

“All men and women are born, live, suffer and die; what distinguishes us one from another is our dreams, whether they be dreams about worldly or unworldly things, and what we do to make them come about …  We do not choose to be born.  We do not choose our parents.  We do not choose our historical epoch, the country of our birth, or the immediate circumstances of our upbringing.  We do not, most of us, choose to die; nor do we choose the time and conditions of our death.  But within this realm of choicelessness, we do choose how we live.”    (Joseph Epstein)

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“Take time to work, it is the price of success.

Take time to think, it is the source of power.

Take time to play, it is the secret of perpetual youth.

Take time to read, it is the foundation of wisdom.

Take time to be friendly, it is the road to happiness.

Take time to dream, it is hitching your wagon to a star.

Take time to love & be loved, it is the privilege of the gods.

Take time to look around, it is too short a day to be selfish.

Take time to laugh, it is the music of the soul.”     (Old English Prayer)

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“Love cures people  –  both the ones who give it and the ones who receive it.”    (Karl A. Menninger)

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“Listen to the mustn’ts, child.  Listen to the don’ts.  Listen to the shouldn’ts, the impossible, the won’ts.  Listen to the never haves, then listen close to me … Anything can happen, child.  Anything can be.”     (Shel Silverstein)

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“Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one’s courage.”     (Anais Nin)

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“Thermodynamic Miracles — Human Beings, Spiritual Beings”

“Don’t compromise yourself.  You are all you’ve got.”    (Janis Joplin)

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“Thermodynamic miracles … events with odds against so astronomical they’re effectively impossible … I long to observe such a thing.  And yet, in each human coupling, a thousand million sperm vie for a single egg.  Multiply those odds by countless generations, against the odds of your ancestors being alive; meeting; siring this precise son; that exact daughter … Until your mother loves a man she has every reason to hate, and of that union, of the thousand million children competing for fertilization, it was you, only you that emerged.  To distill so specific a form from that chaos of improbability … that is the crowning unlikelihood.  The thermodynamic miracle … But the world is so full of people, so crowded with these miracles that they become commonplace and we forget … I forget.  We gaze continually at the world and it grows dull in our perceptions.  Yet seen from the other’s vantage point.  As if new, it may still take our breath away.”     (Alan Moore, ‘Watchmen’)

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“We are not human beings having a spiritual experience; we are spiritual beings having a human experience.”    (Pierre Teilhard de Chardin)

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“Always new, always exciting, always full of promise, the mornings of our lives, each a personal daily miracle.”     (Gloria Gaither)

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“Miracles start to happen when you give as much energy to your dreams as you do to your fears. “     (Richard Wilkins)

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“Pay Attention”

“There are no ordinary moments.”    (Dan Millman)

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“Faith means living with uncertainty – feeling your way through life, letting your heart guide you like a lantern in the dark.”    (Dan Millman)

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“To achieve the impossible, one must think the absurd; to look where everyone else has looked but to see what no else has seen.”     (Unknown Author)

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“Always be a first-rate version of yourself, instead of a second-rate version of somebody else.”   (Judy Garland)

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“Everything in life comes to you as a teacher.

Pay attention.

Learn quickly.”

(Old Cherokee Woman to Her Grandson)

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“Getting Unstuck”

“Leaders spend considerable effort gazing across the horizon of time, imagining what it will be like when they have arrived at their final destinations.  Some call it vision; others describe it as a purpose, mission, goal, even personal agenda.  Regardless of what we call it, there is a desire to make sure something happens, to change the way things are, to create something that no one else has ever created before.”     (Kouses & Posner, The Leadership Challenge)

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“There are some people who interpret ‘pro-active’ to mean pushy, aggressive, or insensitive; but that isn’t the case at all.  Proactive people aren’t pushy.  They’re smart, they’re value driven, they read reality, and they know what’s needed.  Test the principle of pro-activity for thirty days and see what happens.  Make small commitments and keep them.  Be a light, not a judge.  Be a model, not a critic.  Be part of the solution, not part of the problem.”     (Stephen Covey)

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“Most of us are trained to be logical.  When given a problem or roadblock, we try to dig into the facts.  Determine a path based on data.  Argue our case using data.  And when that isn’t working, pile on more data.  Often motivating teams to take the right action requires first doing something else entirely; spending time building a common identity, or picking a common enemy, or gaining a common understanding.  Getting unstuck involves appealing not just to your team’s rational mind, but also to its soul.”      (Unstuck, Keith Yamashita & Sandra Spataro)

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“Don’t ask yourself what the world needs.  Ask yourself what makes you come alive, and then go do it.  Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.”     (Harold Thurman Whitman)

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