“I expect to pass through this world but once. Any good thing therefore that I can do,
or any kindness I can show to any fellow creature, let me do it now; let me not defer or
neglect it for I shall not pass this way again.”
(Precise origin unknown. Variously attributed to Quakers Stephen Grellet, 1773-1855, and William Penn, 1644-1718, and to Mahatma Gandhi, 1869-1948, Indian leader.)
“The great use of life is to spend it for something that will outlast it.”
(William James, 1842-1910, US psychologist and philosopher.)
“In one of my classes I ask my students to write on the subject, ‘If I were to die tomorrow, how would I live tonight?’ Answering this question always brings great insight.”
(Leo F Buscaglia, 1924-1998, teacher, writer and humanitarian, from his remarkable 1972 book, Love.)
“It is amazing what you can accomplish if you do not care who gets the credit.”
(Harry S Truman, 1884-1972, US President.)
“There is no greater happiness than freedom from worry, and there is no greater wealth than contentment.”
(Attributed to Lao Tsu, aka Lao Zi, legendary Chinese Taoist philosopher, supposed to have lived between 600-400BC.)
Thursday, September 23, 2010
Thursday, July 29, 2010
3 New Haiku Poems: Hidden Fear, Mask of Lies and Pleasant Water by Erica M. Kadrmas
Hidden Fear (7/29/10)
A silent killer
Hides in the darkness, waiting
For his next victim.
Mask of Lies (7/29/10)
Smiles are just a
Mask of disguise that hides the
Truth and so much pain.
A silent killer
Hides in the darkness, waiting
For his next victim.
Mask of Lies (7/29/10)
Smiles are just a
Mask of disguise that hides the
Truth and so much pain.
Pleasant Water (7/29/10)
Looking out across the
Lake, dreams of a better time
Play on my heartstrings.
Written by: Erica M. Kadrmas
Friday, July 2, 2010
Lies in Quotes
- Round numbers are always false.- Dr. Samuel Johnson (1709-1784)
- A lie can travel halfway round the world while the truth is putting on its shoes. -Mark Twain (1835-1910)
- Of course I lie to people, but I lie altruistically-for our mutual good. The lie is the basic building block of good manners.- Quentin Crisp (1908-1999)
- Any fool can tell the truth, but it requires a man of some sense to know how to lie well.-Samuel Butler (1835-1902)
- I have been thinking that I would make a proposition to my Republican friends...That if they will stop telling lies about the Democrats, we will stop telling the truth about them.- Adlai Stevenson (1900-1965)
- A little inaccuracy sometimes saves tons of explanation.- Saki (1870-1916)
- White lies always introduce others of a darker complexion.- William Paley (1743-1805)
- O, what a tangled web we weave when first we practice to deceive!- Sir Walter Scott (1771-1832)
- A lie is an abomination unto the Lord and a very present help in trouble. -Adlai Stevenson (1900-1965)
- No man has a good enough memory to make a successful liar. -Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865)
- The liar's punishment is not in the least that he is not believed, but that he cannot believe anyone else. -George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950)
- In human relationships, kindness and lies are worth a thousand truths. -Graham Greene(1904-1991)
- Repetition does not turn a lie into a truth.-Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882-1945)
Lies We Tell the Doctor #1
Nobody wants to be told that they are living an incorrect lifestyle by our medical doctor. And so we make things up to tell them in answer to their queries.
*********************************************************************************
"I don't drink much. Maybe a glass or two a week."- You always lie about your drinking to anyone who asks. Whether it is your mother, your girlfriend, your best friend, or your doctor, the amount you drink isn't pertinent to your health. It is more of a judgement call of your character. If you drink, you're seen as a drunk, unless you are a wine connoisseur. If you drink hard liquor, which has no health-supporting properties, you are seen as a lush. Drinking beer means you a lazy slob. Is it any wonder that you lie when it comes to your personal relationship with booze?
*******
"No, I never do drugs."- Not that you like to lie about drugs, but they are illegal for heaven's sake. What you take for fun isn't the sort of thing you want written down on your records. Nor do you want your doctor to know that you like doing drugs or that you might possibly have a tendency to do too many too often and against your better judgment. Lying about your illegal intake is all part and parcel of what you go to a doctor for: to have your ailments taken care of without having to change your habits. A good doctor would know you do drugs without asking anyway, wouldn't they?
********
"I am not taking any alternative remedies."- Well, not unless you consider snake oil, milk thistle, St. John's Wort, and the pint of my own urine that I drink every morning. When you go to an orthodox doctor, you tend to think they ask the question of alternative therapies much as a girlfriend would ask if you have been seeing anyone else. It isn't your health they are concerned about, it is your loyalty to them. If you are slipping over the road to the Happy Hippie Shop to buy some medicinal hemp, well, they should be able to tell if they are any good at being a physician.."
**********
"There is no outstanding medical problems in my family."- There is no one problem. There are many. But who wants to tell their doctor this information when 1) it may take away all the fun of diagnosis for them, and 2) you may get told the depressing nwes that they know what ailment is going to eventually kill you. Why tell your doctor that your father has a bad heart and that your mother is on dialysis? Doesn't that jeopardize your sense of free will, all genetics aside? One more reason to not tell the truth about your medical history: who wants to stop drinking, smoking, eating fatty foods, and lying around the house because of a silly handful of the wrong DNA?
**********
"Symptoms? I've not had any symptoms," or "Yes, yes, those are the symptoms I've been experiencing!"- Neither of these will be true. This is because 1) if you have had some symptoms, you don't necessarily want to know that they are representative of some recognizable illness, or 2) you really want to believe that the symptoms you have are linked to something and you are not going mad as you feared. When you lie about this question you either want to be sick or don't want to be sick. As it is, we all end up lying about symptoms simply because the body plays tricks on us in memory and sensation. "Is that the pain I felt yesterday? I am not too sure."
**********
"Why, yes, I am feeling better!"- This lie means that you do not intend to go back to the doctor again. The pain isn't getting better but you can't be bothered talking about it anymore....
*********************************************************************************
"I don't drink much. Maybe a glass or two a week."- You always lie about your drinking to anyone who asks. Whether it is your mother, your girlfriend, your best friend, or your doctor, the amount you drink isn't pertinent to your health. It is more of a judgement call of your character. If you drink, you're seen as a drunk, unless you are a wine connoisseur. If you drink hard liquor, which has no health-supporting properties, you are seen as a lush. Drinking beer means you a lazy slob. Is it any wonder that you lie when it comes to your personal relationship with booze?
*******
"No, I never do drugs."- Not that you like to lie about drugs, but they are illegal for heaven's sake. What you take for fun isn't the sort of thing you want written down on your records. Nor do you want your doctor to know that you like doing drugs or that you might possibly have a tendency to do too many too often and against your better judgment. Lying about your illegal intake is all part and parcel of what you go to a doctor for: to have your ailments taken care of without having to change your habits. A good doctor would know you do drugs without asking anyway, wouldn't they?
********
"I am not taking any alternative remedies."- Well, not unless you consider snake oil, milk thistle, St. John's Wort, and the pint of my own urine that I drink every morning. When you go to an orthodox doctor, you tend to think they ask the question of alternative therapies much as a girlfriend would ask if you have been seeing anyone else. It isn't your health they are concerned about, it is your loyalty to them. If you are slipping over the road to the Happy Hippie Shop to buy some medicinal hemp, well, they should be able to tell if they are any good at being a physician.."
**********
"There is no outstanding medical problems in my family."- There is no one problem. There are many. But who wants to tell their doctor this information when 1) it may take away all the fun of diagnosis for them, and 2) you may get told the depressing nwes that they know what ailment is going to eventually kill you. Why tell your doctor that your father has a bad heart and that your mother is on dialysis? Doesn't that jeopardize your sense of free will, all genetics aside? One more reason to not tell the truth about your medical history: who wants to stop drinking, smoking, eating fatty foods, and lying around the house because of a silly handful of the wrong DNA?
**********
"Symptoms? I've not had any symptoms," or "Yes, yes, those are the symptoms I've been experiencing!"- Neither of these will be true. This is because 1) if you have had some symptoms, you don't necessarily want to know that they are representative of some recognizable illness, or 2) you really want to believe that the symptoms you have are linked to something and you are not going mad as you feared. When you lie about this question you either want to be sick or don't want to be sick. As it is, we all end up lying about symptoms simply because the body plays tricks on us in memory and sensation. "Is that the pain I felt yesterday? I am not too sure."
**********
"Why, yes, I am feeling better!"- This lie means that you do not intend to go back to the doctor again. The pain isn't getting better but you can't be bothered talking about it anymore....
Thursday, June 10, 2010
Funny Friendship Quotes from Famous People
Friends may come and go, but enemies accumulate.
-Thomas Jones
***
Money can't buy friends, but you can get a better class of enemy.
-Spike Milligan
***
We English are good at forgiving our enemies; it releases us from the obligation of liking our friends.
-P. D. James
***
Between men and women there is no friendship possible. There is passion, enmity, worship, love, but no friendship.
-Oscar Wilde
***
A benevolent man should allow a few faults in himself, to keep his friends in countenance.
-Benjamin Franklin
***
The Bible tells us to love our neighbors, and also to love our enemies; probably because they are generally the same people.
-Gilbert K. Chesterton
***
I got a lotta best friends. Some o' them I don't even hardly know! - Archie Bunker
***
We make our friends; we make our enemies; but God makes our next-door neighbour.
-Gilbert K. Chesterton
***
I hate it in friends when they come too late to help.
-Euripides
***
One loyal friend is worth ten thousand relatives.
-Euripides
***
I have lost friends, some by death, others through sheer inability to cross the street.
-Virginia Woolf
***
I have no trouble with my enemies. I can take care of my enemies all right. But my damn friends—they're the ones that keep me walking the floor nights!
-Warren G. Harding
***
A friend who is near and dear may in time become as useless as a relative.
-George Ade
***
A good friend can tell you what is the matter with you in a minute. He may not seem such a good friend after telling.
-Arthur Brisbane
-Thomas Jones
***
Money can't buy friends, but you can get a better class of enemy.
-Spike Milligan
***
We English are good at forgiving our enemies; it releases us from the obligation of liking our friends.
-P. D. James
***
Between men and women there is no friendship possible. There is passion, enmity, worship, love, but no friendship.
-Oscar Wilde
***
A benevolent man should allow a few faults in himself, to keep his friends in countenance.
-Benjamin Franklin
***
The Bible tells us to love our neighbors, and also to love our enemies; probably because they are generally the same people.
-Gilbert K. Chesterton
***
I got a lotta best friends. Some o' them I don't even hardly know! - Archie Bunker
***
We make our friends; we make our enemies; but God makes our next-door neighbour.
-Gilbert K. Chesterton
***
I hate it in friends when they come too late to help.
-Euripides
***
One loyal friend is worth ten thousand relatives.
-Euripides
***
I have lost friends, some by death, others through sheer inability to cross the street.
-Virginia Woolf
***
I have no trouble with my enemies. I can take care of my enemies all right. But my damn friends—they're the ones that keep me walking the floor nights!
-Warren G. Harding
***
A friend who is near and dear may in time become as useless as a relative.
-George Ade
***
A good friend can tell you what is the matter with you in a minute. He may not seem such a good friend after telling.
-Arthur Brisbane
Funny Life Quotes - Funny Quotes about Life
It may be that your sole purpose in life is simply to serve as a warning to others.
***
Life is like an onion; you peel off one layer at a time and sometimes you weep.
-Carl Sandburg
***
Life is just a phase you're going through...you'll get over it.
- Anonymous
***
There are only two tragedies in life: one is not getting what one wants, and the other is getting it.
-Oscar Wilde
***
Everything has been figured out, except how to live.
-Jean-Paul Sartre
***
An autobiography is the story of how a man thinks he lived.
-Herbert Samuel
***
The trouble with the rat race is that even if you win you're still a rat.
-Lilly Tomlin
***
For most men life is a search for the proper manilla envelope in which to get themselves filed.
-Clifton Fadiman
***
Not a shred of evidence exists in favor of the idea that life is serious.
-Brendan Gill
***
Were it offered to my choice, I should have no objection to a repetition of the same life from its beginning, only asking the advantages authors have in a second edition to correct some faults in the first.
-Benjamin Franklin
***
No matter how bad things get, you got to go on living, even if it kills you.
-Sholom Aleichem
***
There are good days and there are bad days, and this is one of them.
-Lawrence Welk
***
The basic rule of human nature is that powerful people speak slowly and subservient people quickly -- because if they don't speak fast nobody will listen to them.
-Michael Caine
***
It's possible, you can never know, that the universe exists only for me. If so, it's sure going well for me, I must admit.
-Bill Gates
***
Half our life is spent trying to find something to do with the time we have rushed through life trying to save.
-Will Rogers
***
When we remember we are all mad, the mysteries disappear and life stands explained.
-Mark Twain
***
Life is not so bad if you have plenty of luck, a good physique and not too much imagination.
-Christopher Isherwood
***
The cost of living's going up, and the chance of livin's going down.
-Flip Wilson
***
After one look at this planet any visitor from outer space would say "I WANT TO SEE THE MANAGER."
-Willliam S. Burroughs
***
You know the world is going crazy when the best rapper is a white guy, the best golfer is a black guy, the tallest guy in the NBA is Chinese, the Swiss hold the America's Cup, France is accusing the U.S. of arrogance, Germany doesn't want to go to war, and the three most powerful men in America are named 'Bush', 'Dick', and 'Colon'.
-Chris Rock
***
Life is like stepping onto a boat which is about to sail out to sea and sink.
-Shunryu Suzuki Roshi
***
Nothing matters very much, and very few things matter at all.
-Arthur Balfour
***
All the world's a stage and most of us are desperately unrehearsed.
-Sean O'Casey
***
Life is so unlike theory.
-Anthony Trollope
***
There must be more to life than having everything.
-Maurice Sendak
***
Life is like a cobweb, not an organization chart.
-Ross Perot
***
Life is a horizontal fall.
-Jean Cocteau
***
In spite of the cost of living, it's still popular.
-Kathleen Norris
***
Life is like an onion; you peel off one layer at a time and sometimes you weep.
-Carl Sandburg
***
Life is just a phase you're going through...you'll get over it.
- Anonymous
***
There are only two tragedies in life: one is not getting what one wants, and the other is getting it.
-Oscar Wilde
***
Everything has been figured out, except how to live.
-Jean-Paul Sartre
***
An autobiography is the story of how a man thinks he lived.
-Herbert Samuel
***
The trouble with the rat race is that even if you win you're still a rat.
-Lilly Tomlin
***
For most men life is a search for the proper manilla envelope in which to get themselves filed.
-Clifton Fadiman
***
Not a shred of evidence exists in favor of the idea that life is serious.
-Brendan Gill
***
Were it offered to my choice, I should have no objection to a repetition of the same life from its beginning, only asking the advantages authors have in a second edition to correct some faults in the first.
-Benjamin Franklin
***
No matter how bad things get, you got to go on living, even if it kills you.
-Sholom Aleichem
***
There are good days and there are bad days, and this is one of them.
-Lawrence Welk
***
The basic rule of human nature is that powerful people speak slowly and subservient people quickly -- because if they don't speak fast nobody will listen to them.
-Michael Caine
***
It's possible, you can never know, that the universe exists only for me. If so, it's sure going well for me, I must admit.
-Bill Gates
***
Half our life is spent trying to find something to do with the time we have rushed through life trying to save.
-Will Rogers
***
When we remember we are all mad, the mysteries disappear and life stands explained.
-Mark Twain
***
Life is not so bad if you have plenty of luck, a good physique and not too much imagination.
-Christopher Isherwood
***
The cost of living's going up, and the chance of livin's going down.
-Flip Wilson
***
After one look at this planet any visitor from outer space would say "I WANT TO SEE THE MANAGER."
-Willliam S. Burroughs
***
You know the world is going crazy when the best rapper is a white guy, the best golfer is a black guy, the tallest guy in the NBA is Chinese, the Swiss hold the America's Cup, France is accusing the U.S. of arrogance, Germany doesn't want to go to war, and the three most powerful men in America are named 'Bush', 'Dick', and 'Colon'.
-Chris Rock
***
Life is like stepping onto a boat which is about to sail out to sea and sink.
-Shunryu Suzuki Roshi
***
Nothing matters very much, and very few things matter at all.
-Arthur Balfour
***
All the world's a stage and most of us are desperately unrehearsed.
-Sean O'Casey
***
Life is so unlike theory.
-Anthony Trollope
***
There must be more to life than having everything.
-Maurice Sendak
***
Life is like a cobweb, not an organization chart.
-Ross Perot
***
Life is a horizontal fall.
-Jean Cocteau
***
In spite of the cost of living, it's still popular.
-Kathleen Norris
Wednesday, June 2, 2010
Criticism of Society
Last night while walking home,
I struggled with the harsh criticism.
I heard the footsteps behind me,
And the horrendous taste of fear lingered in my mouth.
The voice behind me yelled.
Suspicion of disbelief enveloped me
Like the arms from a mother to her child.
I was the one in disguise.
No one could recognize me.
I was a victim of life.
I wanted to be creative, but the haunting words tormented my soul.
To those who choose to challenge me, I want one more fight.
If you can’t believe my story, then don’t read my writing.
I struggled with the harsh criticism.
I heard the footsteps behind me,
And the horrendous taste of fear lingered in my mouth.
The voice behind me yelled.
Suspicion of disbelief enveloped me
Like the arms from a mother to her child.
I was the one in disguise.
No one could recognize me.
I was a victim of life.
I wanted to be creative, but the haunting words tormented my soul.
To those who choose to challenge me, I want one more fight.
If you can’t believe my story, then don’t read my writing.
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