-Coach Carter
"Uhhhhhh, about the movie?" I asked, knowing he meant something more but trying to give myself time to think. "No," he responded coolly. "You know what I mean—about you, your life, anything, everything…"
"Uhhhhhh, I know for sure…uhhh…I know for sure I need to think about that question some more, Gene." I was clearly thrown and went home and thought about what he'd asked for two days.
I've since done a lot of thinking about what's certain, what's real, what's true. And Gene Siskel's question has inspired me to ask it of many others. Sometimes people (like me that first time) are caught off guard. But usually—as you'll see here—they rally with thoughtful and profound responses that reveal the essence of who they are.
— Oprah Winfrey
20 things
1. What you put out comes back all the time, no matter what. (This is my creed.)
2. You define your own life. Don't let other people write your script.
3. Whatever someone did to you in the past has no power over the present. Only you give it power.
4. When people show you who they are, believe them the first time. (A lesson from Maya Angelou.)
5. Worrying is wasted time. Use the same energy for doing something about whatever worries you.
6. What you believe has more power than what you dream or wish or hope for. You become what you believe.
7. If the only prayer you ever say is thank you, that will be enough. (From the German theologian and humanist Meister Eckhart.)
8. The happiness you feel is in direct proportion to the love you give.
9. Failure is a signpost to turn you in another direction.
10. If you make a choice that goes against what everyone else thinks, the world will not fall apart.
11. Trust your instincts. Intuition doesn't lie.
12. Love yourself and then learn to extend that love to others in every encounter.
13. Let passion drive your profession.
14. Find a way to get paid for doing what you love. Then every paycheck will be a bonus.
15. Love doesn't hurt. It feels really good.
16. Every day brings a chance to start over.
17. Being a mother is the hardest job on earth. Women everywhere must declare it so.
18. Doubt means don't. Don't move. Don't answer. Don't rush forward.
19. When you don't know what to do, get still. The answer will come.
20. "Trouble don't last always." (A line from a Negro spiritual, which calls to mind another favorite: This, too, shall pass.)
He starts in school, most important thing to him is to be liked by other little boys in school. And so, at this tender age, he begins to follow other little boys his age, who don't know anymore than he knows. and who do not necessarily have any capacity for leadership. And he does this is the first grade, the second and the third, the fourth, the fifth, the sixth and the seventh, year after year after year he forms himself into a composite average of every other little boys his age. Trying to be like them. Trying to do the only thing that is impossible for a human to do-to be like someone else.
Now let's say he goes all the way through school, usually into military service, and again he is caught in a vice-like grip of conformity and let's say he is 25 and out of school and out of school, what is he going to do? As a rule, he'll go back to his hometown, unless he is married he'll go to his wife's hometown.
But let's say he's single and he goes back to his own hometown and he doesn't know quite what to do and he is standing in a corner and one morning a friend he knew at school comes and say "Hi there charlie what are you doing?" He says "nothing" He says "why don't you come down to work where i work, it's a pretty good place, the pay is regular, we got all kinds of benefits and so on." And so he does. The odds are 95-5 that his first job is taken as a random application, on the job, without thinking about it, the most natural thing for him to do is to see how the other guys are doing their job and begins to do his in the same way.
Assuming that whatever is normal for them is normal for him. No reason for this, he doesn't think about it, he just does. Now stretch it infront of him 50 years or more in the golden age, what's he going to do in these 50 years? Well let's take a close look at it.
We know that he works 40 hours a week as a rule, which leaves him 72 hours a week when he is neither working nor sleeping. 72 discretionary hours each week to do as he pleases. Now, at this point of course he is married and has his little house and his little car, and this is what he does with his 72 hours a week, he'll do what the other fellas are doing with theirs-which is virtually nothing at all.
On a typical day, he'll get his car go back to his house, go to his little kitchen, kisses his wife, and tells her "I'm tired" Maybe even figure out why he says that. The experts believe that he used to hear his father say that back home when he gets tired working and he picked it up and simply repeats it every night. He eats his little meal and goes to the living room, and he turns on his escape box. *Click* Takes 15, 20 seconds to load, and in that period of time feels untolerable but he gets through somehow-maybe by tickling his dog, thumbs through the magazine or something.
Then the screen lights up and there infront of him he sees people with all kinds of funny costumes all killing each other. He sits there for about 5 to 6 hours, 25% of all free time is now spent infront of the tool, nothing wrong with this particularly except that he is watching other people who are earning excellent income in the pursuit of their careers, while he doesn't make a nickel.
And guess the kind of 2 things that you can only get from that kind of schedule is red eyes and a hollow head. Now this is not an indictment of television, i've got a few sets at home too. And i also have a few cars but i don't go around the block for 5-6 hours. If there is someplace i want to go, fine, my car will take me there. If there is a great program, fine, i wanna see it.
But he sits there for 5-6 hours until finally his wife goes there, pats his shoulder and says "Charlie i think you should go to bed, you gotta get up in the morning and go to work" He says " Okay " and he turns off the television and just goes to bed. The next morning he wakes up and he does this all over again. He does this every day, for 40 years. At the end of 40 years he is retired
But it is a terrible tragedy if he lives that way because of a total lack of a decision. If he is living that way simply because, he still doing what he did in the first and second grade, thats going along with the fellas up and down the block, on the unspoken assumption that they know how to live, then there's a real tragedy there-because they've never known how to live, not in all the recorded history of mankind. He never finds out who he is.
He never reaches into the deep depths of his abilities, his talents. He never learns that he can have, just about anything he wants in the world and that he can call his own shots, tell his own fortune-and that is kind of a pity."
"I believe nature's a lot smarter than anybody thinks. During the course of a man's life he develops a lot of pleasures and people he cares about. Then nature takes them away one by one. It's her way of preparing you for death."
Among the advice D'Amato gave Tyson was this oft-cited lesson of the hero and the coward: "The hero and the coward both feel the same thing, but the hero uses his fear, projects it onto his opponent, while the coward runs. It's the same thing, fear, but it's what you do with it that matters."
Both their ego enjoys this insane drama, it's vitamin for it. If you were to ask them if they enjoy arguing, they'd tell you no. But when a situation arises, their ego comes to play. And their arguments, with anything at all, will not stop until the moment they are aware of the existence of ego and that it is not them. They are unable to see one another's existence of ego because they're not aware of their own. Both parties think they're "right" and they make the other "wrong". The imagined but implied moral superiority. And their arguments will keep snowballing because they're defending "themselves".
But the thing is, your Being is never hurt, never felt unloved, never angered, never frustrated, your essence is untouchable, and the Being IS your true self, which means after you brush the ego aside you ARE powerful beyond measure. A core so deep nothing can upset it.
Dillon told me cause and effect in chinese "ying bu li guo, guo bu li". I have no feelings of disappointment, frustration, no nothing. I only wish for them to someday experience the liberation of Being, of acceptance of what is. Their ease of living will spread to others, and so forth. Cause and effect.
Peace or drama? Everyone would say they prefer peace because it's the " logical " answer, but there's a part of them that wants the drama. That good vitamic C for the ego. Here's an example of an obvious mounting anger:
Guy: *obviously pissed off*
Girl: WHY YOU SO ANGRY?!
Guy: I WHERE GOT ANGRY?!
Guy either isn't concious or doesn't want to admit it. Either way, the ego is present.
To make your day better, try feeling love, even right now. Close your eyes and think of someone or a pet that you love. Feel that love in your body. Now feel it spread through your entire self. And now when you open your eyes, feel that love when you look at "inanimate" objects. Feel it towards your chair, table, toilet, and everything else that you're doing. Basically, do with a loving heart. And even in the midst of "rush" and "stress", you'll never feel frustrated, angsty or angry.
You can be doing something that you HAVE TO, but there's the difference, with every fibre of love you can muster or unconciousness that usually results in a snowballing frustration.
A person choosing the latter usually snaps at some point, either in crying or by throwing an anger fit, it's still drama, much more energized this time.
To criticize and condemn another is to make yourself feel more superior. Ego at it's work. From a little smirk or remark you feed more energy to the ego and make things worse than they appear to be. Sometimes the "problem" isn't even there, but even if it is, by focusing on it you tend to amplify it. Don't confuse their unconciousness with their identity. You fail to see the essence of the other, a slingshot through the ego into their sanity. Acceptance that it's not them, their ego appears as their identity. That does not mean to accept lesser of them or to tolerate. It just means to stick to the facts, which is usually neutral and not equate a "me" to it. You resent things about others, the way they're living their lives, the things they said, they way they behave, the ego loves it. Instead of forgiving their unconciousness you make it their identity. Who is doing that? The unconciousness in you, the ego. What you react in another, you strengthen in yourself.
"I never have set goals, in the sense that I expected to be successful or get to a certain place. My idea of success has always been, does it feel right? Does it feel good to me? Do I enjoy doing it? And somehow miraculously, I've been able to follow that path and have a great success at it.
"So this whole career, the life that I have, the opportunities that I've been given—it all comes as unexpected. Every day I pinch myself, you know? I can't believe all this has happened to me."'
every song piece of hers has soul.
