Meandering . . .

Today is the birthday of Robert Anson Heinlein (July 7, 1907 – May 8, 1988), writer. He is considered one of the grand masters of science fiction with Isaac Asimov and Arthur C. Clarke.

"Everything is theoretically impossible, until it is done. One could write a history of science in reverse by assembling the solemn pronouncements of highest authority about what could not be done and could never happen." - Robert A. Heinlein

"I will accept the rules that you feel necessary to your freedom. I am free, no matter what rules surround me. If I find them tolerable, I tolerate them; if I find them too obnoxious, I break them. I am free because I know that I alone am morally responsible for everything I do." - Robert A. Heinlein

"Progress doesn't come from early risers — progress is made by lazy men looking for easier ways to do things." - Robert A. Heinlein

"Early rising may not be a vice ... but it is certainly no virtue. The old saw about the early bird just goes to show that the worm should have stayed in bed." - Robert A. Heinlein

"Love is the condition in which the happiness of another person is essential to your own." - Robert A. Heinlein

"Never appeal to a man's better nature. He may not have one. Invoking his self-interest gives you more leverage." - Robert A. Heinlein

"How can I possibly put a new idea into your heads, if I do not first remove your delusions?" - Robert A. Heinlein

"Life is short, but the years are long." - Robert A. Heinlein

"Once you can honestly say, I don't know, then it becomes possible to get at the truth." - Robert A. Heinlein

"If you don't like yourself, you can't like other people." - Robert A. Heinlein

"Never underestimate the power of human stupidity." - Robert A. Heinlein

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Meandering on and on . . .

Today is the birthday of Jetsun Jamphel Ngawang Lobsang Yeshe Tenzin Gyatso (born Lhamo Döndrub (July 6, 1935), the 14th Dalai Lama. He was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1989, Honorary Canadian citizenship in 2006, and the United States Congressional Gold Medal on October 17, 2007

"Because we all share this small planet earth, we have to learn to live in harmony and peace with each other and with nature. That is not just a dream, but a necessity. We are dependent on each other in so many ways, that we can no longer live in isolated communities and ignore what is happening outside those communities, and we must share the good fortune that we enjoy." - Dalai Lama XVI

"The essence of spiritual practice is your attitude toward others. When you have a pure, sincere motivation, then you have right attitude toward others based on kindness, compassion, love and respect." - Dalai Lama XVI

"It is very important to generate a good attitude, a good heart, as much as possible. From this, happiness in both the short term and the long term for both yourself and others will come." - Dalai Lama XVI

"Human happiness and human satisfaction must ultimately come from within oneself." - Dalai Lama XVI

"When you engage in fulfilling the needs of others, your own needs are fulfilled as a by-product." - Dalai Lama XVI

"The root of happiness is altruism — the wish to be of service to others." - Dalai Lama XVI

"We need a little more compassion, and if we cannot have it then no politician or even a magician can save the planet." - Dalai Lama XVI

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Meandering on . . .

Today is the birthday of Hazrat Inayat Khan (July 5, 1882 – February 5, 1927), founder of Universal Sufism and the Sufi Order International.

"Tolerance does not come by learning but by insight. By understanding that each one should be allowed to travel along the path which is suited to their temperament." - Hazrat Inayat Khan

"A person however learned and qualified in his life's work in whom gratitude is absent, is devoid of that beauty of character which makes personality fragrant." - Hazrat Inayat Khan

"Joy and sorrow are the light and shade of life; without light and shade no picture is clear." - Hazrat Inayat Khan

"We start our lives trying to be teachers; it is very hard to learn to be a pupil." - Hazrat Inayat Khan

"Whoever knows the mystery of vibrations indeed knows all things." - Hazrat Inayat Khan

"The words that enlighten the soul are more precious than jewels." - Hazrat Inayat Khan

"Everything in life is speaking in spite of it's apparent silence." - Hazrat Inayat Khan

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Meandering about . . .

Today is the birthday of Nathaniel Hawthorne (July 4, 1804 – May 19, 1864), novelist and short story writer. He is best known for The Scarlet Letter, published in 1850.

"Every individual has a place to fill in the world, and is important, in some respect, whether he chooses to be so or not." - Nathaniel Hawthorne

"There is so much wretchedness in the world, that we may safely take the word of any mortal professing to need our assistance; and, even should we be deceived, still the good to ourselves resulting from a kind act is worth more than the trifle by which we purchase it." - Nathaniel Hawthorne

"Amid the seeming confusion of our mysterious world, individuals are so nicely adjusted to a system, and systems to one another and to a whole, that, by stepping aside for a moment, a man exposes himself to a fearful risk of losing his place forever." - Nathaniel Hawthorne

"Words — so innocent and powerless as they are, as standing in a dictionary, how potent for good and evil they become in the hands of one who knows how to combine them." - Nathaniel Hawthorne

"Happiness in this world, when it comes, comes incidentally. Make it the object of pursuit, and it leads us a wild-goose chase, and is never attained. Follow some other object, and very possibly we may find that we have caught happiness without dreaming of it." - Nathaniel Hawthorne

"Happiness is like a butterfly which, when pursued, is always beyond our grasp, but, if you will sit down quietly, may alight upon you." - Nathaniel Hawthorne

"Time flies over us, but leaves it shadow behind." - Nathaniel Hawthorne

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Meandering in circles . . .

Today is the birthday of Franz Kafka (July 3, 1883 – June 3, 1924), author. He is considered one of the major fiction writers of the 20th century.

"A stair not worn hollow by footsteps is, regarded from its own point of view, only a boring something made of wood." - Franz Kafka

"Youth is happy because it has the ability to see beauty. Anyone who keeps the ability to see beauty never grows old." - Franz Kafka

"The relationship to one's fellow man is the relationship of prayer, the relationship to oneself is the relationship of striving; it is from prayer that one draws the strength for one's striving." - Franz Kafka

"One of the first signs of the beginning of understanding is the wish to die." - Franz Kafka

"The mediation by the serpent was necessary. Evil can seduce man, but cannot become man." - Franz Kafka


"You do not need to leave your room. Remain sitting at your table and listen. Do not even listen, simply wait, be quiet still and solitary. The world will freely offer itself to you to be unmasked, it has no choice, it will roll in ecstasy at your feet." - Franz Kafka

"He who seeks does not find, but he who does not seek will be found." - Franz Kafka


"By believing passionately in something that still does not exist, we create it. The nonexistent is whatever we have not sufficiently desired." - Franz Kafka

Trivia bit: "As his dying wish, writer Franz Kafka asked that all his manuscripts be burned. If he were alive today, Kafka would be sorely disappointed. Not only is he widely regarded as one of the greatest authors of the 20th century, but his name has become a part of standard English; the adjective 'Kafkaesque' is used to describe situations and people that are surreal, disorienting, and often menacing." direct quote source (1)

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Meandering . . .

Today is the birthday of Hermann Hesse (July 2, 1877 – August 9, 1962), poet, novelist, and painter. He is best-known for his novels, Steppenwolf and Siddhartha. In 1946, Hermann Hesse received the Nobel Prize in Literature for his work The Glass Bead Game.

Here is another author whose books were banned. In 1939, Hermann Hesse's books were banned in Germany.

"Man's life seems to me like a long, weary night that would be intolerable if there were not occasionally flashes of light, the sudden brightness of which is so comforting and wonderful, that the moments of their appearance cancel out and justify the years of darkness." - Hermann Hesse

"It is not our purpose to become each other; it is to recognize each other, to learn to see the other and honor him for what he is: each the other's opposite and complement." - Hermann Hesse

"It matters little that you suffer, so long as you feel alive with a sense of the close bond that connects all living things, so long as love does not die!" - Hermann Hesse


"Every man is more than just himself; he also represents the unique, the very special and always significant and remarkable point at which the world's phenomena intersect, only once in this way and never again." - Hermann Hesse

"I do not consider myself less ignorant than most people. I have been and still am a seeker, but I have ceased to question stars and books; I have begun to listen to the teachings my blood whispers to me." - Hermann Hesse

"I realize today that nothing in the world is more distasteful to a man than to take the path that leads to himself." - Hermann Hesse

"The bird fights its way out of the egg. The egg is the world. Who would be born must first destroy a world." - Hermann Hesse

"The world, as it is now, wants to die, wants to perish — and it will." - Hermann Hesse

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Meandering on and on . . .

Today is the birthday of Amandine Aurore Lucile Dupin (July 1, 1804 – June 8, 1876), novelist. She best known by her pseudonym George Sand.

"In the stormy days of our youth, we imagine that solitude is a sure refuge from the assaults of life, a certain balm for the wounds of battle. This is a serious mistake, and experience teaches us that, if we cannot live in peace with our fellow-men, neither romantic raptures nor aesthetic enjoyment will ever fill the abyss gaping at the bottom of our hearts." - George Sand

"No one makes a revolution by himself; and there are some revolutions which humanity accomplishes without quite knowing how, because it is everybody who takes them in hand." - George Sand

"Guard well within yourself that treasure, kindness. Know how to give without hesitation, how to lose without regret, how to acquire without meanness." - George Sand

"The beauty that addresses itself to the eyes is only the spell of the moment; the eye of the body is not always that of the soul." - George Sand

"The artist vocation is to send light into the human heart." - George Sand

"Admiration and familiarity are strangers." - George Sand

"The truth is too simple: one must always get there by a complicated route." - George Sand

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