Our business in life is not to succeed, but to continue to fail in good spirits.
Robert Louis StevensonRead
To know what you prefer instead of humbly saying Amen to what the world tells you ought to prefer, is to have kept your soul alive.
Interpretation
Valuing personal preferences over societal norms is essential for preserving one's true self.
This quote emphasizes the importance of self-awareness and personal choice, suggesting that to truly understand and embrace one's preferences and desires, rather than passively acquiescing to societal expectations, is vital for maintaining one's individuality and spirit. It underscores the idea that true fulfillment comes from being in touch with one's own values and beliefs.
In practice
In a motivational speech about personal growth.
Our business in life is not to succeed, but to continue to fail in good spirits.
Like a bird singing in the rain, let grateful memories survive in time of sorrow.
That man is a success who has lived well, laughed often and loved much.
His past was fairly blameless; few men could read the rolls of their life with less apprehension; yet he was humbled to the dust by the many ill things he had done, and raised up again into sober and fearful gratitude by the many he had come so near to doing, yet avoided.
The habit of being happy enables one to be freed, or largely freed, from the domination of outward conditions.
It is the history of our kindnesses that alone make this world tolerable. If it were not for that, for the effect of kind words, kind looks, kind letters . . . I should be inclined to think our life a practical jest in the worst possible spirit.
One of the few graces of getting old - and God knows there are few graces - is that if you've worked hard and kept your nose to the grindstone, something happens: The body gets old but the creative mechanism is refreshed, smoothed and oiled and honed. That is the grace. That is what's happening to me.
At the root of all the harm we cause is ignorance.
The greatest mistake you can make in life is continually fearing that you'll make one.
Take the risk of thinking for yourself. Much more happiness, truth, beauty and wisdom will come to you that way.
You are to have implicit confidence in your own ability, knowing that it is the nature of thought to externalize itself in your health and affairs, knowing that you are the thinker.
All we need is a meteorologist who has once been soaked to the skin without ill effect. No one can write knowingly of the weather who walks bent over on wet days.
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.