Friday, October 20, 2023

WORDS OF WISDOM - A

 

A

 

A bad case of the slows.

 

A ballet of the obvious.

 

A bank is a place where they lend you an umbrella in fair weather and ask for it back when it begins to rain.

 

A banker is a fellow who lends you his umbrella when the sun is shining but wants it back the minute it begins to rain. -- Mark Twain

 

A beautiful theory killed by some ugly little facts.

 

A bend in the road is not the end of the road.

 

A bird doesn’t sing because it has an answer; it sings because it has a song. (Maya Angelou)

 

A bird teaches a fish to swim, without hatred, without bitterness.

 

A bond of common laughter.

 

A book isn't a mirror, it's a door. (Fran L)

 

A bore: someone who deprives you of solitude without providing you with companionship.

 

A bovine society in which happy cows are supposed to produce more milk.

 

A bowling alley with lipstick.

 

A boy born with a heart for any fate.

 

A brand is a promise. A good brand is a promise kept.

 

A briefcase with a mouth.

 

A brown condom full of walnuts. (Schwarzenegger)

A bruised reed he will not break, and a faintly burning wick he will not quench. We see the rage, but we miss the pain.

A buffalo of charisma and confidence.

A bull who carries his china closet with him.

A bull who carries his own china shop along with him.

A bully with the impulse control of a toddler.

A burning platform

A "business" that depends on resources that cannot be brought under its control is actually not a business. 

 

A cabinet full of recipes does not make you a chef.

 

A calvary captain who can’t ride a horse.

 

A candidate who lays out a comprehensive plan on foreign policy will draw less coverage than the one who accidentally falls off the debate stage. (Roger Ailes’ Orchestra Pit Theory)

 

A candle loses nothing by lighting another candle.

 

A career is about taking risks.

 

A career is born in public – talent in private.

 

A chain is easier dragged than pushed.

 

A certain sunny shamelessness.

 

A chain is no stronger than its weakest link.

 

A champion hates to lose even more than he loves to win.

 

A chance to learn everything that money can’t buy.

 

A change of place changes one’s luck.

 

A child does not despise the bubble because it burst; he immediately sets to work to blow another one.

 

A child should never have to wonder if his parents love him.

 

A child who kills his parents and then throws himself upon the mercy of the court as an orphan.

 

A city that never sleeps and a sky that never ends.

 

A civilization is not destroyed by wicked people; it is not necessary that people be wicked but only that they be spineless.

A civilized society tolerates eccentricity to the point of doubtful sanity.

 

A clarity of vision prompted by the purest form of greed.

 

A clean conscience is worth a buck or two.

 

A clear conscience is usually the sign of a bad memory.

 

A clown car that drove into a gold mine.

 

A clown needs less revenge than a monster does.

 

A clown with a flamethrower still has a flamethrower.

 

A coach is someone who can give corrections without causing resentment.

 

A collector’s pleasure is always for reasons which other people don’t grasp. (Proust)

 

A college professor is someone who talks in other people’s sleep.

 

A committee is a dark alley down which ideas are led to be strangled.

 

A company is not a museum. It’s not a religion.

 

A company is stronger if it is bound by love rather than fear.

 

A company is the combined rhythms of intelligent people rather than any one person's particular expertise or brains.

 

A company should stand for something, fulfill a purpose, and contribute something useful-hopefully something special, even wonderful-or it shouldn't bother being a company.

 

A competitive world has two possibilities for you.  You can lose.  Or, if you want to win, you can change.

 

A complicity of needy souls.

 

A computer does not substitute for judgment any more than a pencil substitutes for literacy.  But writing without a pencil is no particular advantage.

 

A computer is a bicycle for the mind. (Steve Jobs)

 

A con artist isn’t a great speaker, he’s a great listener.

 

A conclusion is the place where you got tired of thinking.

 

A confusion of the real with the ideal never goes unpunished.

 

A conscience is what hurts when all your other parts feel so good.

 

A constant battle between sharks and suits.

 

A continual circulation of lies among those who are not much in the way of hearing them contradicted will in time pass for the truth.  (Jefferson)

 

A core competence of successful people is the ability to mourn and move on.

 

A corporate culture has to be built on expectations of performance, not rules of behavior.

 

A critic is a man who knows the way but can't drive the car.

 

A cross between a frat house, a Montessori kindergarten, and a Scientology cult.

 

A crowd is not company.

 

A cult of the average.

 

A culture hollowed out by the imperatives of modern life.

 

A culture is only as great as its dreams, and its dreams are dreamed by artists.

 

A culture of worthless admirations – unjust praise without purpose or end.

 

A customer is anyone who can tell you “no”.

 

A cut-rate offer can induce people to try a brand, but they quickly return to their habits.

 

A cynic is a passionate person who doesn’t want to be disappointed again.

 

A cynic is a person who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing.

 

A dancing nation, fickle and untrue; have oft undone themselves and others too.

 

A danger foreseen is half avoided.

 

A dangerously honest man.

 

A day without sunshine is like, you know, night.

 

A deception that elevates us is dearer than a host of low truths. (Pushkin)

 

A delusional pedigree.

A democracy cannot function effectively when its constituent members believe laws are being bought and sold.

 

A desk is a dangerous place from which to watch your business.

 

A destructive, zero-sum form of competition has been set in motion that confuses the acquisition of customers with the building of profitability.

 

A devaluation is like wetting your pants.  It only feels good for a little while.

 

A device’s beauty is meaningful only if it is also useful.

 

A diamond is a chunk of coal that made good under pressure.

 

A dictatorship at the door and a democracy on the floor.

 

A different world can’t be built by indifferent people. (Isben)

 

A diplomat is a man who always remembers a woman’s birthday but never remembers her age.

 

A diplomat is a man who thinks twice before he says nothing.

 

A disconnect between finance and the real world lies at the heart of all great bubbles.

 

A disease that persists until you learn to spell its name.

 

A display of conscience and a swerve into truth in a time when truth seems lost in the mist.

 

A divorce is like an amputation; you survive, but there’s less of you.

 

A dog is the only thing on earth that loves you more than he loves himself.

 

A doer in a world of doubters.

 

A doer makes mistakes

 

A doubtful friend is worse than a certain enemy.  Let a man be one or the other, and then we know how to meet him.

 

A dream is a soft place to land.

 

A dream is a wish your heart makes.

 

A dream you dream alone may be a dream, but a dream two people dream together is a reality.

 

A dreamer burdened with reality; a sensitive spirit layered in stoicism.

A driving ambition is of little use if you're on the wrong road.

 

A droning hum that conveys both the possibility of political change to inspire and the certainty that, upon closer inspection, it will disappoint.

A drowning man will clutch at a straw.

 

A drunk keeps no secrets.

 

A failure is not always a mistake.  It may simply be the best one can do under the circumstances.  The real mistake is to stop trying.

 

A fair chance at a decent life.

 

A fancy sink with no plumbing.

 

A fatal taste for comfort music.

 

A few things are important; most are not.

 

A firm is never static - it is either growing or stagnating.

 

A firm resolve does not know how to weaken. Res firma mitescere nescit

 

A firm resolve is not easily broken.

 

A fish wouldn’t get in trouble if it kept its mouth shut.

 

A 5-year-old boy needs a father. If he has to live without one, he has been cheated.

 

A fog of protection and rumination instead of focusing on right now. (Mindfulness)

 

A fool and his money are soon parted.

 

A fool is his own informer.

 

A fool will lose tomorrow reaching back for yesterday.

 

A fool throws a stone in a pond and ten sages knock themselves out trying to find it.

 

A football team made up of retired jockeys.

 

A friend has the responsibility to be a witness.

 

A friend’s job in these circumstances is not to cheer the person up. It’s to acknowledge the reality of the situation; it’s to hear, respect and love the person; it’s to show that you haven’t given up on him or her, that you haven’t walked away.

 

A funeral in the brain.

 

A gaffe is when a politician tells the truth.

 

A gambler is capable of watching and fasting, almost like a saint.

 

A general may be sincere, if it serves his purpose, but his purpose is never sincerity.

 

A goal is a dream with a deadline.

 

A goal without a plan is just a daydream.

 

A good action appears inevitable in retrospect.

 

A good day ain't got no rain.  A bad day is when I lie in bed and think of what might have been.

 

A good deed never goes unpunished.

 

A good hat can make the difference between a bimbo and a princess.

 

A good idea and some hard work can make a difference.

 

A good leader knows himself and his times.

 

A good leader never blames his people for his failings.

 

A good mentor will teach you how to think, not what to think.

 

A good mother doesn’t burden her children with her pain. She waits until it becomes so heavy, it either breaks her or kills her, whichever comes first.

 

A good plan, violently executed right now, is a lot better than a perfect plan executed next week.

 

A good scare is worth more to a man than good advice.

 

A good song takes on more meaning as the years pass by.

 

A good speech – has a purpose (to inspire, to explain, to persuade or to exhort) and needs an issue, context, something to overcome. Delivery and structure only matter if they relate to purpose. A good speaker has to be believable – the speech must be consistent with who they are – authentic.

 

A good strategy is sometimes born of an unwanted reality.

 

A good toupee looks like a good toupee.

 

A good traveler has no fixed plans, and is not intent on arriving. (Lao Tzu)

 

A great bulimic consuming engine.

 

A great company begins as art and ends as science.

 

A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep.

 

A great leader doesn't treat problems as special.  He treats them as normal.

 

A great product is deep, indulgent, complete and elegant.  (Dice)

 

A great soup. The more it contains, the better it tastes.

 

A great speech is like a great mini-skirt – as short as possible while covering all of the essentials.

 

grudge is not a resentment. Sure, they’re made of the same material — poison — but while resentment is concentrated, a grudge is watered down, drinkable and refreshingly effervescent, the low-calorie lager to resentment’s bootleg grain alcohol.

 

A guest for a while sees a mile.

 

A guilty conscience needs no accuser.

 

A habit of divine and constant discontent with our performance.

 

A half-truth is a whole lie.

 

A happy shrewdness

 

A hard head makes a soft behind.

 

A heartwarming confection sunk in platitudes.

 

A heightened sense of enlightenment based on experience.

 

A high “do” to “say” ratio

 

A hit dog will holler.

 

A horrible relief

A hospital is no place to be sick.

 

A hospital is not a place where you go to get well.

 

A house divided cannot stand.

 

A household should be of the hill, not on the hill.

 

A journey brings us face to face with ourselves.

 

A jury consists of twelve persons chosen to decide who has the better lawyer.

 

A key has no logic to its shape. Its logic is: it turns the lock.”

 

A kind of one-man walking anthology of resentment.

 

A kindness that was also an assertion of power.  It was so reassuring to him to be able to use it.

 

A knife fight in a phone book.

 

A lack of talent no longer need be a detriment to advancement.

 

A lapsed agnostic

 

A large brain does not guarantee large intellect.

 

A large man has difficulty exercising his wits fully.

 

A leader does not need faith in himself, but he must have faith in the people he is to lead.

 

A leader is a dealer of hope.

 

A leader is the one who gets followed.

 

A leader must be a dealer in hope.

 

A lesson taught with humor is retained.

 

A liar ought to have a good memory.

 

A liberal is a man too broadminded to take his own side in a quarrel.

 

A lie can be halfway around the world before the truth gets its boots on.

 

A lie is as good as the truth if it gets the job done.

 

A lie is not a lie if the truth should not be expected.

A lie may fool someone else, but it tells you the truth about yourself.

 

A lie repeated often enough becomes the truth.

 

A lie told a million times is truth.

 

A life crowded with incident.

 

A life lived in fear is a life half-lived.

 

A life spent in making mistakes is not only more honorable but more useful than a life spent doing nothing.

 

A life that overflows with immense possibility, improbable beauty, and relentless truth.

 

A life which includes deep resentment leads only to futility and unhappiness.

 

A life’s ruin of dreams.

 

A lifetime spent on the border between chutzpah and hubris.

 

A light had gone out; there was an uncharacteristic flatness in his voice and a stillness in his eyes.

 

A lighthouse doesn’t tell you which way to go, it’s just a signal to keep you off the rocks.

 

A lighthouse provides illumination and warning, but not guidance or direction.

 

A lion at the gate.

 

A little beauty is preferable to much wealth.

 

A little bit better every day can make a big difference.

 

A little inaccuracy sometimes saves tons of explanation.

 

A little knowledge is a dangerous thing.

 

A little sincerity is a dangerous thing, and a great deal of it is absolutely fatal.

 

A little thing in the hand is worth more than a great thing in prospect. (Aesop)

A live plow horse is still better than a dead thoroughbred.

 

A loaded dealer is a loyal dealer.

 

A lonely train on a lonely track. 

 

A longing to wander tears my heart when I hear trees rustling in the wind at evening.

 

A lost ball in tall grass.

 

A lot of people try to think up ideas.  I'm not one.  I'd rather accept the irresistible possibilities of what I can't ignore.

 

A lot of professionals are crackpots.

 

A loveless world is a dead world, and always there comes an hour when one is weary of prisons, of one’s work, and of devotion to duty, and all one craves for is a loved face, the warmth and wonder of a loving heart.

 

A magician is an actor impersonating a magician.

A man begins cutting his wisdom teeth the first time he bites off more than he can chew. (Herb Caen)

A man can’t know what it’s like to be a mother.

 

A man difficult to like and impossible not to admire.

 

A man forever voyaging through strange seas of thought, alone.

 

A man hears what he wants to hear and disregards the rest.

 

A man is known by the company he keeps.

 

A man is never more on trial than in a moment of excessive good fortune.

 

A man is not finished when he is defeated.  He is defeated when he quits.

 

A man is not old until regrets take the place of dreams.

 

A man must descend very low to find the force to rise again.

 

A man nearly always loves for other reasons than he thinks. A lover is apt to be as full of secrets from himself as is the object of his love from him.

 

A man of good enough.

 

A man who carries a cat by the tail learns something he can learn in no other way.  Mark Twain

 

A man who is lucky in his enemies.

 

A man who knows a subject thoroughly, a man so soaked in it that he eats it, sleeps it and dreams it - this man can always teach it with success, no matter how little he knows of technical pedagogy.

 

A man who runs after two rabbits may not catch any.

 

A man who strives after an effect not infrequently achieves it.

 

A man will be imprisoned in a room with a door that's unlocked and opens inwards as long as it does not occur to him to pull rather than push it.

 

A man with no means of filling up time is as miserable out of work as a dog on the chain. (Orwell)

 

A man with no soul, no inner convictions, he had the integrity of a hyena and the style of a poison toad.

 

A man who cannot protect his belongings owns nothing.

 

A man who has no office to go to—I don’t care who he is—is a trial of which you can have no conception.

 

A man who is quiet and full and closed like a well in a village that has been abandoned by all its inhabitants.

 

A man who lives fully is prepared to die at any time.

 

A man without paranoia is a man not in full possession of the facts.

 

A man’s worst enemy can’t wish him what he thinks up for himself.

 

A mask tells us more than a face.

 

A mechanic of government.

 

A message often repeated is a message often remembered.

 

A mind that is anxious about the future and unhappy before misfortune even arrives is a disaster.

 

A minor operation is one performed on someone else.

 

A mistake in the making.

 

A mistake is a mistake.  Another mistake is normal.  Only the same mistake twice makes you a fool.

 

A model (or business plan) doesn’t necessarily get you to the truth.  Eventually math stalls out and something more human – intuition, experience, wisdom – has to take over.

 

A moment’s insight is sometimes worth a life’s experience. (Oliver Wendell Holmes)

 

A more honest moniker for the sector is "asocial" media. 

 

A mother understands what a child does not say.

 

A mother who is really a mother is never free.

 

A movie is never any better than the stupidest man connected with it.

 

A multibillion-dollar industry around insecure people needing validation from sadists.

 

A music publishing company run by deaf people.

 

A mystery that holds the promise of an explanation.

 

A narcissist vortex.

 

A nation that forgets its past has no future. (Churchill)

 

A natural is someone who does his homework.

 

A new idea is delicate.  It can be killed by a sneer or a yawn; it can be stabbed to death by a quip and worried to death by a frown on the right man’s brow.

 

A new learning experience from an old familiar friend.

 

A night of memories and of sighs.

 

A nightmare dressed up as a daydream.

 

A noble goal, shared, is an incredible source of power.

 

A nod’s as good as a wink to a blind man.

 

A novelty isn’t necessarily an improvement.

 

A nuisance may merely be a right thing in the wrong place like a pig in the parlor instead of the barnyard.

 

A painter has two choices - he paints the world or he paints himself.

A painting is many little lies that add up to a great truth.

 

A painting should not mean - but be.

 

A past that was no more important to me personally than money is to a rock.

 

A paradox defines writing: The public sees writers mainly in their victories, but their lives are spent mostly in defeat.

 

A penny saved is just a penny.

 

A perception, once fixed in the public imagination, tends to crowd out the possibility of all others.

 

A permanent alternation between excitement and disappointment, doubt and revelation.

 

A person going nowhere can be sure of reaching his destination.

 

A person who feels appreciated will always do more than what is expected.

 

A person will sometimes devote all his life to the development of one part of his body – the wishbone.

 

A person with a new idea is a crank until the idea succeeds.

 

A person’s success in life can usually be measured by the number of uncomfortable conversations he or she is willing to have.

 

A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty.

 

A picket fence in front of a tidal wave.

 

A piece of instruction comes quietly but indelibly across….

 

A place beyond happiness.

 

A place lovelier in theory than in practice.

 

A place where sorrow and salvation exist in a continuum.

 

A place where you’re never crowded and never alone.

 

A player's effectiveness is directly related to his ability to be right there, doing that thing, in the moment.  All the preparation is no good if it can't be put into action at game time.  He must be able to respond in the here and now.

 

A poem begins in delight and ends in wisdom.

 

A poem begins with a lump in the throat, a sense of wrong, homesickness, and lovesickness.

 

A poet is someone with a genius for lying and an adoration of the truth.

 

A poet never takes notes. You never take notes in a love affair.

 

A poor man’s roast and a rich man’s death are sniffed far off.

 

A poor person’s idea of a rich person. (describing Trump)

 

A potent brand becomes a form of identity in shorthand.

 

A prayer for the wild at heart kept in cages.

 

A prediction in a field where prediction is not possible is no more than a prejudice.

 

A principle isn’t really a principle until it costs you money.

 

A prisoner of hope. (Tutu)

 

A problem is something that can be solved. Some things aren’t problems – they are situations. A situation can’t be solved. It just is.

 

A problem shared is a problem halved. 

 

A problem with no solution may not be a problem – it may be a fact – not to be solved – but to be coped with over time.

 

A prodigy is a group enterprise.

 

A product is not a product unless it sells.

 

A product manager can be a shit funnel or a shit umbrella.

 

A profession is a personal thing that man acquires.  It cannot be inherited.  It cannot be bequeathed.  Only he who, having made the acquisition, puts to use that know­ledge and skill with all his ability and complete dedication of purpose can be truly called a professional.

(R.E. Onstad)

 

A professional goes home at night.

A prudent pause moves business forward.

 

A quantification of utility

 

A quantitative expansion resulting in a qualitative contraction.

 

A quiet man with a violent mind.

 

A people beguiled, deluded, and propagandized cannot be trusted to uphold the pillars of the democratic process.

 

A philosophy which conflated telling a story about an idea with its realization, it encouraged boldness of vision, but also denial of reality.

 

A prophet is not without honor, except in his own country and among his own kin, and in his own house.

 

A public servant who goes by the book in an America that has given up reading.

 

A rage funnel. (Trump)

 

A rainfall of tears.

 

A real decision is measured by the fact that you’ve taken a new action. If there’s no action, you haven’t truly decided. (Tony Robbins)

 

A regally bred horse who, they hoped, could run a hole in the wind.

 

A relaxed man is not necessarily a better man.

 

A romantic comedy has to have characters grow to some kind of realization that the world is bigger than their little concerns.

 

A sad soul can kill you quicker, far quicker, than a germ.

 

A sage on the stage becoming a guide on the side

 

A screenplay is essentially a selling tool.  It isn't always the movie that gets made, but it's always what gets the movie made.

 

A secret always has a timetable.

 

A self-parody of political correctness.

 

A sense of failure is one of the most insistent feelings held by successful people.

 

A sense of humor, much less self-awareness, is not a trait found in cults of personality. 

 

A sense of timing is the mark of genius.

 

A service station glaring with wasted light.

 

A sham necklace of bitter brevities or false, hollow eulogy will not do for criticism.

 

A shared goal is an incredible source of power.

 

A sharp edge cuts through the clutter

 

A ship in dry dock is safe and secure, but that’s not why ships were built.

 

A ship is always safe at shore but that is not what it’s built for. (Einstein)

 

A ship is safe in harbor, but that’s not what ships are for.

A ship ought not to be held by one anchor, nor life by a single hope.

 

A shiver is going around members of the cabinet looking for a spine to run down.

 

A sincere effort is all you can ask.

 

A sit-down strike by a bunch of Mexican jumping beans.

 

A slab of meat that could sing.

 

A single person is missing for you, and the whole world is empty.

 

A sinkhole of depraved venality.

 

A small amount of “too much” spoils the whole thing.

 

A small bank account focuses the mind.

 

A smart person knows what to say. A wise person knows whether to say it or not.

 

A snake dies if it can’t slough its old skin. (Nietzsche)

 

A small man trying to walk a large dog.

 

A society hurtling without exact destination from what it had known to something new.

 

A software product takes ten times as much effort as a program written for private use.

 

A Southerner is someone who will do anything for a stranger if asked but will never do so if told.

 

A sparrow of anxiety and neuroticism.

A special kind of obscenity.

A stare without warmth, without illusion.

A story we tell ourselves about what we could have been.

 

A story well told can change the world.

 

A stove doesn’t know what it’s cooking.

 

A stream cannot rise above its source.

 

A strong sense of duty imprisons you.

 

A struggle of hope against history.

 

A stumble may prevent a fall.

 

A stupid man’s report of what a clever man says can never be accurate, because he unconsciously translates what he hears into something he can understand.

 

A stupid person’s idea of what a smart person sounds like.

 

A sunny place for shady people. Key West.

 

A superior aviator uses his superior judgment to avoid situations that would require his superior skill.

 

A surrealist cage: those inside it are free.

 

A system that expects failure doesn’t try very hard to produce anything else. (Gerald Seib)

 

A taste so bland it made cardboard seem flavorful.

 

A team is not a group of people who work together. A team is a group of people who trust each other. (Simon Sinek)

 

A terrible resentment builds when you’ve borrowed money and can’t pay it back.

 

A test case for the brittle link between attention and financial success.

 

A thing about dying is that you can’t consult anyone who has done it.

 

A thing is only worth what someone else will pay for it.

 

A thought to turn the mind to pure Jell-O.

 

A thousand pens are ready to suggest what you should do.

A three-year-old is not half of a six-year-old.

 

A tiger hunts best when he’s hungry

 

A tingle of uneasiness — like hearing a lone mosquito buzzing in a dark room.

 

A tipping point, not just a trend.

 

A tragic farce built on cheap money and propaganda.

 

A transparently false self-cut off from history, from purpose, from even an iota of authenticity.

 

A tree is best measured when it's laid down.

 

A “true” fact.

 

A true friend always stabs you in the front.

 

A true master of politics is able to calculate, down to the smallest fraction, the advantages to which he may put his very faults.  (Napoleon Bonaparte)

 

A truly great business must have an enduring moat. (Buffett)

 

A turtle on a fencepost.

 

A vacation is like love — anticipated with pleasure, experienced with discomfort, and remembered with nostalgia.

 

A valiant heart always trumps sheer talent.

 

A verbal agreement isn't worth the paper it's written on.

 

A villain is the hero of his own myth.

 

A vision without resources is a hallucination.

 

A vision without the ability to execute is probably a hallucination.

 

A waist is a terrible thing to mind.

 

A waste of skin.

 

A weak heart breaks more easily.

 

A wealth of advice is far less instructive than a strong example.

 

A wealth of information creates a poverty of attention. (Herbert Simon).

 

A well-balanced Irishman - a man with chips on both shoulders.

 

A wide screen just makes a bad film twice as bad.

 

A willingness to be held accountable.

 

A winning performance always beats a winning attitude.  Give me action, not motivation.

 

A wise man can see more from the bottom of a well than a fool can from a mountain top. 

 

A wise man will make more opportunities than he finds.

 

A wolf is kept fed by its feet. (Russian proverb)

 

A woman of valour, who can find? For her price is far above rubies. She openeth her mouth with wisdom; and the law of kindness is on her tongue.

 

A woman’s success depends on the shoes she wears.

 

A work of art is good if it has sprung from necessity.

 

A work of autofiction.

A world of screens acting as mirrors rather than windows. 

 

A world of woozy song.

 

A world shot through with contingency.

 

A writer is someone for whom writing is more difficult than it is for other people.

 

A year from now, you’ll wish you had started today

 

A’s hire A’s. B’s hire C’s.

 

AAAA framework: Actionable (here's how); Analytical (here are the numbers); Aspirational (yes, you can); Anthropological (here's why)

 

Abdicate:  give up hope of ever having a flat stomach.

 

Ability has nothing to do with opportunity.

 

Ability is a poor man’s wealth.

 

Ability may get you to the top, but it takes character to keep you there.

 

Absolute submission can be a form of freedom.

 

Absolutely nothing great in the world has been accomplished without passion.

 

Abstraction is a type of decadence.

 

Abuse of power comes as no surprise.

 

Academic battles are so bitter because the stakes are so small. 

 

Accept what is, let go of what was, and have faith in what will be.

 

Accept where you are, figure out where you want to be, then do what you can today and every day to keep moving forward.

 

Acceptable latency

 

Access is replacing ownership.

 

Accidents happen to people who are inadequately prepared.

 

Accommodation to parental needs often (but not always) leads to the “as-if personality”.  This person develops in such a way that he reveals only what is expected of him.  He cannot develop and differentiate his true self, because he is unable to live with it.

 

Accomplishment entails giving up the pleasures of the present moment in favor of anticipated triumphs. (This is an impulse that must be learned.)

 

Accomplishments bring you admiration, not love.

 

Accumulation of power does not provide security.

 

Acquisitions: it’s not what you pay for them; it’s what they cost you. (Tech debt – crap code)

 

Act as if someone just said there’s no reason to be afraid.

 

Act first to desire your own good opinion of yourself.

 

Act in haste, repent in leisure.

 

Act like a crazy dog, wear sashes and other fine clothes, carry a rattle and dance along the roads singing crazy dog songs after everyone else has gone to bed.

 

Acting is the greatest leg-opener in the world.

 

Acting normal is crazy enough.

 

Acting: You get to live other lives without the consequences. (DeNiro)

 

Action causes more trouble than thought.

 

Action conquers fear.

 

Action expresses priorities.

 

Action is the antidote to despair.

 

Activity doesn't necessarily yield achievement.

 

Activity is not productivity.

 

Actors are alcoholics waiting to happen.

 

Actors are idols.  Heroes are those with something at stake.

 

Add little to little and there will be a big pile.

 

Adding imagination to data is how you make meaning from math.

 

Adding manpower to a late software project makes it later. (Brooks Law)

 

Adding years to life is science’s job; adding life to those additional years is education’s task.

 

Addition by subtraction.

 

Admitting you’re an asshole is the first step.

 

Adoption is a strong component of an innovation’s success.

Ads today must be doing the viewer a favor, they cannot be interruptions, they must be interesting.

Advances in the speed of processing (acceleration) aren’t improvements in the underlying intelligence (artificial or otherwise).

 

Adventure is something you seek for pleasure or profit – for the illusion of being more alive than ordinarily, but experience is what really happens to you in the long run; the truth that finally overtakes you.

 

Adventure may hurt you, but monotony will kill you.

 

Adversity is the state in which man most easily becomes acquainted with himself, being especially free of admirers then.

 

Advertising is necessarily a trick, whereas art is not a trick; it’s an illusion that tells the truth.

 

Advertising is like making love to a 500-pound gorilla -- you don't stop when you want to.

 

Advertising is the cost of being boring.

 

Advertising is the plastic surgery of business.

 

Advertising is the rattling of a stick inside a swill bucket.

 

Advertising was the dotcom’s storefront.

 

Advice is a form of nostalgia.

 

Advice is criticism in a cashmere sweater.

 

Aesthetics is for the artist as ornithology is for the birds.

 

Afflict the comfortable, comfort the afflicted.

 

After a first true love, you never love like that again in your life.

 

After learning the tricks of the trade, many of us think we know the trade.

 

After one o’clock in the morning nothing is worth saying or listening to. 

 

After such sweetness beyond memory. He who held me so dear, to yet betray! Oh! I have loved him too much not to hate.

 

After the ship has sunk, everyone knows how she might have been saved.

 

After the third call, assume the rumor is true.

 

After things go from bad to worse, the cycle repeats itself.

 

After you finish being smart in this business, you also have to be lucky.

Against stupidity the gods themselves fight in vain. (Schiller)

 

Age and treachery will overcome youth and skill.  (Triumph Over)

 

Age brings wisdom but from youth comes truth.

 

Age cannot wither her.

 

Age doesn’t matter: an open mind does.

Age is a very high price to pay for maturity.

 

Aging is the process whereby you become the person you should always have been.

 

Aging seems to be the only available way to live a long life. - Kitty O'Neill Collins 

Agoraphobia - too much openness.

 

Ain’t but two kinda people in the wurl.  The ones that gives and the ones that takes, and know’n what ya gonna be is the difference between bein’ a player or suckuh.

 

Algorithm and millennial, hand in hand

 

Algorithms are bias embedded in code.

 

Alive one hour, dead the next

 

All bad poetry is sincere.

 

All believing is essentially betting – since we cannot know what’s right or wrong – we make bets based on experience.

 

All blues singers are great liars.

 

All business success is based on two things: building relationships and patience.

 

All cats are grey in the dark.

 

All change is not growth, as all movement is not forward.  (Glasgow)

 

All charming people have something to conceal, usually their mainstream dependence on the appreciation of others.

 

All cruel people describe themselves as paragons of frankness.

 

All damaged people are dangerous because they have no pity.  They know that others can survive, as they did.

 

All dat glitters ain’t gold.

 

All evolution, cultural as well as biological, is a process of continuous adaptation to unforeseen events, to contingent circumstances which could not have been forecast.

 

All experience is great providing you live through it. If it kills you, you’ve gone too far.

 

All farewells should be sudden.

 

All forms of commerce are adversarial. (B. Diller)

 

All gave some, some gave all.

 

All glory is fleeting.

 

All good things come from detail.

 

All great discoveries are founded in small thefts.

 

All great ideas ultimately degenerate into work.

 

All great wars are lost in the middle.

 

All happy families are alike and every unhappy family is unhappy according to its own ways.

 

All happy families are alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.

 

All hat, no cattle

 

All I have to do is finish the game.  I’ll finish it, maybe not standing up, but I’ll finish it.

 

All I really, really want our love to do is to bring out the best in me and in you, too.

 

All I want is an unfair advantage.

 

All in, all the time.

 

All labor has dignity.

 

All life is a game of power.

 

All living things harbor an impulse to economize, to accomplish more with less.

 

All men mean well.

 

All music is folk music. I never heard a horse sing a song. (Louis Armstrong)

 

All my friendships are becoming hardships.

 

All my possessions for a moment of time.

 

All new ideas pass through three stages.  First, they are ridiculed.  Second, they are violently opposed.  Third, they are accepted as being self-evident.

 

All of life is peaks and valleys. Don’t let the peaks get too high and the valleys too low.

 

All of the moves; none of the courage - afraid to throw a punch that might land.

 

All of these you are

And each is partly you

And none of them is false

And none is wholly true.  (Stephen Vincent Benet)

 

All of this is like tears in the rain.

 

All of us are smarter than any of us. (CRM database)

 

All of us should ponder and factor in the limits of our understanding. All of us should accept that the world doesn’t exist to mirror our preferences or validate our prejudices. 

 

All of us, whether we are in this business or not, have little voices that tell us we’re not good enough, and we don’t deserve it.

 

All our dreams can come true, if we have the courage to pursue them.

 

All our “isms” are “wasms.”

 

All our knowledge has its origins in our perceptions.

 

All our knowledge is about the past and all our decisions are about the future.

 

All progress depends on the unreasonable man.

 

All quarrels are not petty.

 

All relationships are transactional. Even love. Love may be the most transactional relationship of all.

 

All romantics meet the same fate someday, cynical and drunk and boring someone in some dark café.

 

All sink, no plumbing

 

All sorrows can be borne.

 

All strategies are vulnerable to reality, expected and unexpected.

 

All success is a lagging indicator.

 

All that glitters is not gold.

 

All the blessings we enjoy are the fruits of labor, toil, self-denial and study.

 

All the characteristics of a bad stutterer without the stutter itself.

 

All the courage of the last man leaping on the pile at a football game.

 

All the drive and ambition in the world is of little use if you’re on the wrong road.

 

All the hope and idealism in the world will not suffice without a thought-out plan of action.

 

All the knowledge I possess anyone else can acquire, but my heart is all my own.

 

All the magic I have known I’ve had to make myself.

 

All the opportunities in the world are waiting to be grasped by people who are in love with what they're doing.

 

All the passions produce prodigies.  A gambler is capable of watching and fasting, almost like a saint.

 

All the slow rabbits have been caught.

 

All the thoughts of a turtle are turtle.

 

All the wood behind one arrowhead.  (Focus)

 

All the world in your pants.

 

All things being equal, fat people use more soap.

 

All things come to those who wait.

 

All things continue until they stop.

All things excellent are as difficult as they are rare (Faulkner)

All things flourish where you turn your eyes.   (eye of master)

All things with a vengeance.

 

All those who believe in psycho kinesis, raise my hand.

 

All too often, people believe that creativity leads to innovation.  It doesn’t.

All truth passes through three stages. First it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. And third, it is accepted as being self-evident.

All truths are easy to understand once they are discovered; the point is to discover them. (Galileo)

 

All we can do is try.

 

All we ever do is all we ever know. (Head & Heart)

 

All we have to do is be the person we say we are.

 

All wise negotiations mean settling for what you can get right now rather than what you want one day.

 

All women become like their mothers.  That is their tragedy.  No man does.  That’s his.

 

All work is creative work if done by a thinking mind, and no work is creative if done by someone who repeats in uncritical stupor a routine he has learned from others.

 

All writers, I think, are to one extent or another damaged.  Writing is our way of repairing ourselves.  I was filling a hole in myself.

 

All writing is therapy.  To some extent all writers seek their craft to heal a wound in themselves, to make themselves whole.

 

All you really have that matters are feelings.

 

All your knowledge is about the past and all your decisions are about the future. (Wilson GE)

 

Allow children to be happy in their own way, for what better way will they ever find?

 

Alone we can do so little; together we can do so much.

 

Almost better never than this late.

 

Almost everything is easier to get into than out of.

Almost only counts in horseshoes and love.

 

Alter your expectations.

 

Although the wages of sin may be death, it’s nice work if you can get it.

 

Although there is no progress without change, not all change is progress.

 

Although we may all be in trouble, at least we’re not in this mess alone.

 

Always aim to be a better version of yourself.

 

Always assume it will take twice as long and be twice as hard as your worst possible dreams.

 

Always be in a state of becoming.

 

Always be in beta.

 

Always be nice to your children because they are the ones who will choose your retirement home. - Phyllis Diller 

 

Always be the only person who can sign your check.

 

Always bet on the best in people

 

Always count the change back to the customer

 

Always disappointed, never surprised.

 

Always fall in with what you’re asked to accept. Take what is given and make it over your way.

 

Always fight your battles on familiar ground.

 

Always give wrong directions to a contrarian.

 

Always go to other people's funerals, otherwise they won't come to yours.

 

Always have your bags packed.

 

Always hearing things for the first time.

 

Always improve the average in team building

 

Always leave yourself an out.

 

Always look better than they do.

Always make the call. If you’re disturbed or confused by something somebody did, always pick up the phone.

Always partner up; never partner down.

 

Always suspect a man who affects great softness of manner, an unruffled evenness of temper, and an enunciation studied, slow and deliberate.  These things are all unnatural and bespeak a degree of mental discipline into which he that has no purpose of craft or design to answer cannot submit to drill himself.  The most successful knaves are usually of this description.  They affect the innocence of the dove, which they have not, in order to hide the cunning of the serpent, which they have.

 

Always remember to pillage before you burn.

 

Always striving, never arriving.

 

Always take a job that’s too big for you.

 

Always the years together, always the hours.

 

Always tough; sometimes fair.

 

Always try to see your opponent's cards.

 

Amara’s law: We tend to overestimate the effect of a technology in the short run and underestimate the effect in the long run

Amateurs talk strategy; professionals talk logistics.

Ambient Intelligence – An unseen fog of digital knowingness.

 

Ambition - ambition to do - ambition to be.

 

Ambition is a poor excuse for not having enough sense to be lazy.

 

Ambition is exhausting.  It makes you friends with people for the wrong reasons, just like drugs.

 

Ambition is just as dangerous as complacency.

 

Ambition is like the sea wave which the more you drink, the more you thirst. (Tennyson)

 

Ambition is one of the more ungovernable passions of the human heart.  The love of power is insatiable and uncontrollable.

 

Ambivalence and ambiguity aren’t necessarily signs of weakness or sins of indecision.

 

America can stop bad things from happening abroad, it cannot make good things happen. That has to come from within a country.

 

America is a terrible place to be stupid.

 

America is like a melting pot: the people at the bottom get burned and the scum floats to the top.

 

America’s power in the world comes not from the walls we build, but from the doors we open; and it comes not from tearing down success, but from building up opportunity.  (Bloomberg)

 

American democracy is ultimately not about voting for who you want to vote for. It’s about voting for who is left.

 

American yellow mustard has the same relationship to kasundi that a butter knife has to a chain saw.

 

Americans aren’t going to trust a party to defend America if it can’t defend itself.

 

Americans have all the clocks, but we have all the time. (Taliban)

 

Among the first signs of serious problems is an abandonment of perspective, a feeling that one is unique in his troubles.  Everyone has the same problems.  The only differences are degree and the richness of the mix.

 

Amusing, not doubt, yet hardly moving further below the surface than a paper boat in a bathtub and, like the boat, ever in imminent danger of becoming a shapeless, sodden mess.

 

Amusing ourselves to death.

 

An abundant present blinds them to the future.

 

An antipathy towards all machinery.

 

An entrepreneur is someone who dares to dream the dreams and is foolish enough to try to make the dreams come true.

 

An unseen fog of digital knowingness.

 

Anger usually trumps suspicion.

 

Angergy

 

An actor can’t always act – sometimes he has to work.

 

An actress is something more than a woman and an actor is something less than a man.

 

An administration, like a machine, does not create.  It carries on.

 

An amateur practices until he can do it right – a professional practices until he can’t do it wrong.

 

An apology not accompanied by change is an insult.

 

An artist is his own fault.

 

An artist’s work develops out of need, compassion and commitment.

 

An assessment, not an assignment – an opportunity, not an obligation.

 

An economist is an expert who will know tomorrow why the things he predicted yesterday did not happen today.

 

An economy of attention.

 

An educated mind can entertain a thought without accepting it.

 

An elephant’s tampon.

 

An elevator is a “casket on a string.

 

An elite is inevitable.

 

An endless road to getting to the end.

 

An enemy whose mind is distressed is an uncommonly vulnerable enemy.

 

An entire society ruled by what people want, and what they do to get it.

 

An era ends when its dreams are exhausted.

 

An eternity of sweat, tears - and toil.

 

An evasion of self-awareness.

 

An expert is someone more than 50 miles from home, who has no responsibility for implementing the advice he gives, and shows slides.

 

An explanation of cause is not a justification by reason.

 

An extroverted engineer is one who stares at your shoes instead of his own when he’s talking to you.

 

An idea isn't responsible for the people who believe it.

An idea that isn’t dangerous is hardly worth calling an idea at all.

 

An “if” is a “never was”.

 

An ignorant man will always be the first to be heard.

An illusion can become a half-truth, a mask can alter the expression of a face. Justice, liberty and objective truth are still believed in. They may be illusions, but they are very powerful illusions. The belief in them influences conduct, national life is different because of them. Even hypocrisy is a powerful safeguard. (George Orwell)

An imposer:  one about whom one worries whether his response to one's next remark will be a smile or a snarl.

 

An insatiable curiosity to know everything, except what is worth knowing.

 

An industry not based on a developmental model (we will get better and better), but on radical obsolescence—what you’re doing now will be meaningless tomorrow.

 

An insight is an observation that is retrospectively self-evident

 

An institution is simply the lengthened shadow of a single individual.

 

An institution that stands for nothing will fall for anything.

 

An intellectual in show business is like the smartest bear in the zoo.

 

An intellectual says a simple thing in a hard way. An artist says a hard thing in a simple way.

 

An intoxicating cocktail of facts and factoids

 

An investment in knowledge always pays the best interest.

 

An invisible presence—like a fume or a scent.

 

An iron girder in a house of cards.

 

An oak without wind doesn’t grow strong.

 

An ounce of loyalty is worth a pound of cleverness.

 

An ounce of momentum is worth a pound of acceleration.

 

An oxygen-free environment which doesn’t support life.

 

An uncommon amount of common sense.

Anecdata (facts and factoids)

 

Analepsis – flashbacks.  Prolepsis – flash-forwards.

 

And don’t look back, something might be gaining on you.

 

And how the same inexorable price must still be paid for the same great purchase.  (Whitman)

 

And if we can’t quite get there, at least we can leave another marker along the way

 

And if you gaze at length into the abyss, the abyss will also gaze into you. (Nietzsche)

 

And in the night of death, hope sees a star, and listening to love hears the rustle of a wing.

 

And it took me back to somethin', that I'd lost somehow somewhere along the way.

 

And it was to this city… that I always knew I must return, for it was the mistress of one’s wildest hopes.

 

And, like a dog at a dinner party, he won't go away.

 

And now she's in me / Always with me / Tiny dancer in my hand.

 

And so, he slowly, systematically, and hopelessly sat down and shut up.

 

And sometimes there’ll be sorrow.

 

And the crack in the tea-cup opens. A lane to the land of the dead. (Auden)

 

And the days dwindle down to a precious few – September… November… and these few precious days I’ll spend with you.

 

And the rest, as they say, was mystery.

 

And the rest, the children, the country kitchen, the domestic bliss, we leave to others, who will have different regrets.

And then the day came, when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom. (Anaïs Nin)

And they, since they were not the ones dead, turned to their affairs.

 

And think not you can direct the course of love, for love, if it finds you worthy directs your course.

 

Angels don’t swim in the sewers.

Any idiot can face a crisis; it’s this day-to-day living that wears you out.

 

Anytime anyone has an idea, five other people elsewhere have the same idea simultaneously.

 

And the days dwindle down to a precious few – September…November…and these few precious days I’ll spend with you.

 

..and then there was no more of me and thee. (Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam)

 

And those who are successful,

Be always on your guard;

Success walks hand in hand with failure,

Along Hollywood Boulevard.

 

And when you have reached the mountain top, then you shall begin to climb.

 

And when your walls come tumbling down, I will always be around.

 

Anger and fear is what gets people to the polls.

 

Anger blinds.

Anger is more motivating than anything else except fear.

Anger is not cathartic, and you won’t break a losing streak by exacting revenge on your perceived enemies.

 

Angergy

 

Another impossibility is to expect another’s heart to accommodate your own desires and needs.

 

Another victory like this, and we are lost.

 

Anti-semantic

 

Anticipation is essential. You can’t wait for opportunities to become obvious.

 

Antisocial behavior increases in proportion to the excuses that intellectuals make for it.

 

Any artist has only one revolution in him.

 

Any clear way, though it lead to death, is preferable to the tangle of uncertainty.

 

Any day above ground is a good day.

 

Any day you're not moving the ball forward, it's moving backwards.

Any event, once it has occurred, can be made to appear inevitable by any competent journalist or historian.

 

Any excuse will serve a tyrant.

 

Any fool can know. The point is to understand. (Einstein)

 

Any group that would gather to hear a politician speak wouldn’t know a good speech if they heard one.

 

Any man who's extremely successful and takes no pleasure in it is a man after my own heart.

 

Any person hired by a bureaucracy to respond to public complaints has no power to remedy them.

 

Any problem you can solve with a check isn’t a problem, it’s an expense.

 

Any rational person would give up.

 

Any repeated actions contain deep psychological truth.

 

Any Sale is Better than A Slow and Painful Expiration

 

Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.

 

Any surplus is immoral.

 

Any way the wind blows doesn't really matter to me, to me.

 

Any worthwhile goal is difficult to accomplish.

 

Anybody who gets away with something will come back to get away with a little bit more.

 

Anybody who has survived his childhood has enough information about life to last him the rest of his days.

 

Anyone can deal with madness - it's reality that's impossible.

 

Anyone can hold the helm when the sea is calm.

 

Anyone can make a mistake. Only an idiot repeats it.

 

Anyone can steer the ship when the seas are calm.

 

Anyone have any questions for my answers? (Henry Kissinger)

 

Anyone in an environment that is not preparing him or her for a tougher future should move out fast.

 

Anyone who angers you conquers you.

 

Anyone who closes his eyes to the past is blind to the present.

 

Anyone who believes that he or she is self-made has a very selective memory.

 

Anyone who finds a path that allows them to grow and stay current has pulled off a very rare feat. 

 

Anyone who finds it easy is stupid. (Munger)

 

Anyone who stays somewhere for someone else ends up alone.

 

Anyone who thinks he’s almost there doesn’t understand how long the journey is.

 

Anyone who tries to make a distinction between education and entertainment doesn't know the first thing about either. (McLuhan)

 

Anything can be a drug if you love it.

 

Anything can happen now that we've slid over the bridge...anything at all.

 

Anything can happen to anybody at any time as long as you find something you’re devoted to.

 

Anything that’s not a clear winner is a loser - no living dead.

 

Anything will fit a naked man.

 

Anything with more than one head is a monster.

 

Anything worth doing at all is worth doing to excess.

 

Anything worth learning is worth learning the hard way.

Anything you say before the word “but” does not count.

Anywhere from soon to shortly after the end of life as we know it.

 

Apathy is a reasonable response to the state of the world.

 

Apart but not alone.

 

Apparently RSVPing to a wedding invitation "Maybe next time" isn't the correct response.

Appeasement of the extremes never works — not in war, not in life and not in politics. You don’t outsmart bullies, or buy them off, or smile them into submission. You have to stand up to them when you have the chance.

 

Apostle of the obvious

 

Apple has plenty of money and no mojo.

 

Appreciated for past service but deemed too toxic for present company.

 

Aquarium story—rocks, stones, gravel, sand, water - can’t put the big things in last.

 

Architects of the future

 

Architecture is a hazardous mixture of omnipotence and impotence. (Koolhas)

 

Are there wounds in the past so strong that they'll pull you back no matter what you do?

 

Are you happy you joined the circus?

 

Are you still important?  Not to myself.

 

Are you tired of living another man's dream?

 

Are you with us or in our way?

 

Arrogance—as a placeholder for confidence—enabled me to brave the world when I was young.

 

Ars est celare artem / It is (true) art to conceal art.

 

Ars longa, vita brevis / Art is long, life is short.

 

Arsonists masquerading as fireman.

 

Art, after all, only embellishes truth.  It is not truth itself.

 

Art begets certainties that biography can’t confirm.

 

Art begins in honesty.

 

Art dealers are like surfboard riders. You can’t make a wave. If there are no waves, you’re dead. But the best dealers know which of the oncoming waves are the right ones.

 

Art does not lie down on the bed that is made for it.  It runs away as soon as one says its name.  It loves to be incognito.  Its best moments are when it forgets what it is called.

 

Art has no other object than to set aside the symbols of practical utility, the generalities that are conventionally and socially accepted, everything in fact which masks reality from us, in order to set us face to face with reality itself.

 

Art is a boy's name.

 

Art is a form of prayer.

 

Art is a language, not just what it is.

 

Art is a lie that enables us to see the truth.

 

Art is a veil, not a mirror. Art is a way of getting in touch with one’s own insanity.

 

Art is about making something out of nothing and selling it.

 

Art is for anyone. It’s just not for everyone.

 

Art is the great democrat, calling forth creative genius from every sector of society, disregarding race or religion or wealth or color. (JFK)

 

Art is like grand music, an eternal act of generosity.

 

Art is not a mirror to hold up to society, but a hammer with which to shape it.

 

Art is not a profession which can be mastered by study.

 

Art is not a thing – it is a way.

 

Art is not an end in itself.  It's a means of addressing humanity.

 

Art is not optional.

 

Art is not truth.  Art is a lie that helps you understand the truth.

 

Art is the only way to run away without leaving home.

 

Art is the signature of civilizations.

 

Art isn’t made in a vacuum, and neither is money.

 

Art, like morality, consists of drawing the line somewhere.

 

Art makes each of us whole through individual expressions of universal human experiences.

 

Art makes singularly unglamorous demands: integrity, sacrifice and discipline.

Art must abide by the brand’s rules, and brands cannot afford to unnerve or offend consumers. What does art become when it can’t, either?

 

Art needs the proper space and support to grow.

 

Art serves us best precisely at that point where it can shift our sense of what is possible, when we now know more than we knew before, when we feel we have-by some manner of leap- encountered the truth.  That, by the logic of art, is always worth the pain.

 

Art suffers at the hands of reality.

 

Art tells you things you don’t know you need to know until you know them.

 

Artificial intelligence and people are like peanut butter and jelly: better together.

 

Artificial intelligence is no match for natural stupidity.

 

Artists give people something they didn’t know they were missing.

 

As a general rule, I think it’s a good plan to always have more dreams than memories.

 

As a longtime fisherman, I can say with some authority, you never know what is going to wind up on the end of your rod.

 

As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he.

 

As a practical matter, he had no past, only a future.

 

As always, victory finds a hundred fathers, but defeat is an orphan.

 

As close to perfect as necessary, not possible

 

As emotional as algebra.

 

As focused as a bullet in flight.

 

As Hemingway said about going bankrupt, we seem to age very slowly and then all at once. 

 

As I've grown older, I've learned that pleasing everyone is impossible, but pissing everyone off is a piece of cake.

 

As long as I am unforgiven

As far as I am pushed away

As much as life seems less than living

I still try.

 

As long as you act as if you're coming from behind, you have a shot at staying ahead.

 

As much chance as butter against the sun.

 

As new forms of media develop and clutter becomes ever more intense, it’s the asset of permission that will generate profits for marketers.

 

As soon as you start thinking about the beginning, it’s the end.

 

As the camel falls to its knees, more knives are drawn.

 

As the frequency of expression grows, the force of each expression diminishes.

 

As the monkey said (as he was backing away after making love to the skunk): “I’ve enjoyed as much of this as I can stand”.

 

As the number of news outlets expands, it is said, attention spans shrink; only the fast and the pithy will survive.

 

As the turtle said after it was attacked by a gang of snails, it all happened so fast.

 

As the twig is bent, so is the tree inclined.

 

As they say in poker, if you're in the game 30 minutes and don't know who the patsy is, you're the patsy.

 

As tho' to breathe were life.  (Tennyson)

 

As useful as cups of air to a dead man.

 

As we've gotten more open-minded, we've gotten more closed-hearted.

 

As with so much else, its preciousness is twinned with its evanescence. 

 

As you age, you either become your best or worst self. 

 

As you get older, the relationships you have with people you love and who love you overwhelm everything else in your life. 

 

As you get older three things happen. The first is your memory goes, and I can't remember the other two.

 

As you make your bed, so you must lie upon it.

 

Ask for information, get investment. Ask for investment, get advice.

 

Ask for the order. When the customer says “yes”, stop talking.

 

Ask not about things which, if made plain to you, may cause you trouble.

 

Ask questions until you understand the answers.

 

Ask whether you’re working off your “in” basket or whether the organization is working off your “out” basket.  If it’s the former, you’re reacting rather than leading the organization toward its goal.

 

Ask your doctor for a reason to take it.

 

Asked which of his works is his masterpiece, he answered, “my next one.”

 

Asking a writer about critics is like asking a lamppost how it feels about dogs.

 

Asking for advice doesn’t mean you have to take it. 

 

Asking for help isn’t giving up. It’s refusing to give up.

 

Asking me to play golf would be like asking me to drive over to the town dump and separate the garbage.

 

Asking my husband to help me write a song would be like asking him to salt my food to his taste.

 

Asking Republicans to exercise personal restraint is like asking a tiger to go vegan.

 

Asses and elbows.

 

Assets can become anchors.

 

Assets require more scrutiny than liabilities. Liabilities are always 100% good.

 

Assholes are assholes basically forever.

 

Assortative mating: the marriage of the mutually credentialed and ambitious.

 

Assume nothin'.

 

Assume nothing and follow up on everything.

 

At a certain point, you have to suck it up and cope.

 

At a time when courage counted most, I lived among the bravest of men.

 

At age 20, we worry about what others think of us... at age 40, we don't care what they think of us... at age 60, we discover they haven't been thinking of us at all. - Ann Landers 

At 15, it’s all tomorrows. And at 73, it’s a whole lot of yesterdays.

 

At fifty, everyone has the face he deserves. - George Orwell 

At first, dreams seem impossible; then improbable; and then inevitable.

 

At just the right moment, he was always there.

 

At least her tattoos were all spelled right.

 

At my age 'getting lucky' means walking into a room and remembering what I came in for.

 

At present we are combating a trend.  But this trend will die out, superseded by others, and then the way we are arguing against it will no longer be understood; people will not see why all this needed saying.

 

At some point, you need a big building in a bad neighborhood.

 

At some point in his life, he didn’t want to feel, he just wanted to be successful.

 

At the core of true happiness is the wisdom not to ask for too much.

 

At the end of the day, as parents, you are your kids’ audience. They are not meant to be yours. (Bruce Springsteen)

 

At the end of the day, politics is about the ability to inflict pain.

 

At the end of your career, the things you will value the most (apart from family) are those you’ve done for and given to others.

 

At the speed of now

 

At the top, life seeks expression through particular individuals.

 

At this juncture in life, I could probably plan my own surprise party.  (Declining memory)

 

At times inactivity is preferable to mindless functioning.

 

At times, it resembles a form of alchemy, the transformation of a succession of base metals — a smattering of garlanded veterans, a couple of raw hopefuls, a coach with an expressive eyebrow and an easy charm, a team with no recognizable, cogent plan beyond a pervasive sense of its own destiny — into something precious.

 

Athletes must fail and must fail as early as possible.  Because in the beginning, they get by on their talent alone.  But with failure comes thought, and greatness needs the combination of talent and mind.

 

Anfall är bästa försvar .. Attack is the best form of defense. 

 

Attention is a limited resource, so pay attention to where you pay attention. (Rheingold)

Attention is currency, and Twitter is the most important market for attention that there is.

Attention is the hard currency of cyberspace.

 

Attention may be the last resource we have left to withdraw.

 

Attention must be paid.

 

Attention must be paid for.

 

Attention’s sweet center.

 

Attitude can change adversities into assets.

Attitude is more important than facts.

 

Auctions – they applaud the price, not the Picasso.  (Fran L)

 

Augmented Human Intelligence (AHI) versus AI

 

Aurora comes to terms with an unrequited love that cannot penetrate the barriers of self-absorption.

 

Authenticity reads on camera.

 

Autonomy (urge to direct our own lives) – Mastery (the desire to get better and better at something that matters)  – Purpose (the yearning to do what we do in the service of something bigger than ourselves)  (Pink)

 

Average is over.

 

Avoid backing anyone into a corner. No one is more dangerous than someone who cannot retreat.

 

Avoid biting when a simple growl will do.

 

Avoid doing things just to keep busy.

 

Avoid interruptive thinking.

Avoid the belief that dealing is preferable to working.

 

Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than outright exposure.  Life is either a daring adventure or nothing.

 

Avoiding the potholes is cheaper and smarter than buying (getting a good deal) on new tires.

 

Awaken us from our habitual indifference.

 

Awards are merely badges of mediocrity.

 

Awareness is not action. Action is driven by tension, desire, and fear.

 

Awe is a great motivator.

 

Axe enters the woods:  upon seeing it, the trees said, look, the handle is one of us.