Catalyst Quotes

“Find the Unspeakable Fear and Speak It.”

“Don’t believe everything you think.”   (Bryon Katie)

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“What if every ‘no’” meant ‘not yet’? 

Every setback meant, ‘there’s something way better’? 

Every loss meant, ‘even more is on the way’? 

And every disappointment meant, ‘pucker up, buttercup’? 

Yeah, precisely.   (signed)  The Universe”   (Notes from the Universe, Mike Dooley, February 17, 2017

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“Your complaints, your drama, your victim mentality, your whining, your blaming, and all of your excuses have NEVER gotten you even a single step closer to your goals or dreams.”   (Steve Maraboli)

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

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“You always do what you want to do.  This is true with every act.  You may say that you had to do something, or that you were forced to, but actually, whatever you do, you do by choice.  Only you have the power to choose for yourself.”   (W. Clement Stone)

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“I’m afraid of that.

If you can say this out loud, when you’ve been holding back, avoiding your confrontation with the truth, you will free yourself to do something important.  Saying it takes away the power of the fear.

On the other hand, if you say it 8 times or 11 times or every time, you’re using the label to reinforce your fear, creating an easy escape hatch to avoid doing something important.  Saying it amplifies the fear.

The brave thing is to find the unspeakable fear and speak it.  And to stop rehearsing the easy fears that have become habits.”   (Seth Godin, Seth’s Blog, 7.11.15)

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“I’m With You Kid. Let’s Go.”

“Life loves to be taken by the lapel and told:

‘I’m with you kid.  Let’s go.’”   (Maya Angelou)

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“There has never been another you.  With no effort on your part you were born to be something very special and set apart.  What you are going to do in appreciation of that gift is a decision only you can make.”    (Dan Zadra)

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“Whatever you can do, or dream you can, begin it.

Boldness has genius, power, and magic in it.”   (Goethe)

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“I can’t believe God put us on this earth to be ordinary.”   (Lou Holtz)

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Kicking and screaming (vs. singing and dancing).

Unfair things happen.  You might be diagnosed with a disease, demoted for a mistake you didn’t make, convicted of a crime you didn’t commit.  The ref might make a bad call, an agreement might be abrogated, a partner might let you down.

Our instinct is to fight these unfairnesses, to succumb if there’s no choice, but to go down kicking and screaming.  We want to make it clear that we won’t accept injustice easily, we want to teach the system a lesson, we want them to know that we’re not a pushover.

But will it change the situation?  Will the diagnosis be changed, the outcome of the call be any different?

What if, instead, we went at it singing and dancing?  What if we walked into our four-year prison sentence determined to learn more, do more and contribute more than anyone had ever dreamed?  What if we saw the derailment of one path as the opportunity to grow or to invent or to find another path?

This is incredibly difficult work, but it seems far better than the alternative.”   (Seth Godin, Seth’s Blog, February 18, 2015)

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“Get Rich Quick – Believe in Yourselves”

Get rich (quick).

Enrich your world by creating value for others.

Enrich your health by walking twenty minutes a day.

Enrich your community by contributing to someone, without keeping score.

Enrich your relationships by saying what needs to be said.

Enrich your standing by trusting someone else.

Enrich your organization by doing more than you’re asked.

Enrich your skills by learning something new, something scary.

Enrich your productivity by rejecting false shortcuts.

Enrich your peace of mind by being trusted.

The connection economy pays dividends in ways that the industrial one rarely did.”   (Seth Godin, Seth’s Blog, 5.1.14)

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“Man surprises me most about humanity.  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.”   (Dalai Lama)

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“Not only are selves conditional but they die.  Each day, we wake slightly altered, and the person we were yesterday is dead.  So why, one could say, be afraid of death, when death comes all the time?”    (John Updike, Self-Consciousness)

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“Perhaps, as we say in America, I wanted to find myself.  This is an interesting phrase, not current as far as I know in the language of any other people, which certainly does not mean what it says but betrays a nagging suspicion that something has been misplaced.  I think now that if I had any intimation that the self I was going to find would turn out to be only the same self from which I had spent so much time in flight, I would have stayed at home.”   (James Baldwin, Giovannie’s Room)

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“Once we believe in ourselves, we can risk curiosity, wonder, spontaneous delight, or any experience that reveals the human spirit.”  (e. e. cummings)

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