Finance Myself Quotes

I'm looking for backing for an unauthorized auto-biography that I am writing. Hopefully, this will sell in such huge numbers that I will be able to sue myself for an extraordinary amount of money and finance the film version in which I play everybody.

Impossible to spend sleepless nights and accomplish anything: if, in my youth, my parents had not financed my insomnias, I should surely have killed myself.

teach 120 kids on Tuesday nights in my Brand Strategy course. That’s $720,000, or $60,000 per class, in tuition payments, a lot of it financed with debt. I’m good at what I do, but walking in each night, I remind myself we (NYU) are charging kids $500/minute for me and a projector. This. Is. Fucking. Ridiculous.

The trouble is, I can't find a part of myself where you're not important. I write in order to be worth your while and to finance the way I want to live with you. Not the way you want to live. The way I want to live with you. Without you I wouldn't care. I'd eat tinned spaghetti and put on yesterday's clothes. But as it is I change my socks, and make money, and tart up Brodie's unspeakable drivel into speakable drivel so he can be an author too, like me.

Armies aren’t very good about carrying libraries with them. I can’t imagine why. We’d fight so much less if everyone would just sit down and read.” Gifford’s laugh rumbled through him, loud against her ear. “A question I often ask myself. Imagine how much money the realm would save if the rulers focused their finances on libraries, rather than wars.” “Not if I were allowed to shop for books.” “England would go bankrupt,” he said gravely. “Thank God for wars.

If I were your enemy, I’d disguise myself and manipulate your perspectives so that you’d focus on the wrong culprit—your husband, your friend, your hurt, your finances, anything or anyone except me. Because when you zero in on the most convenient, obvious places to strike back against your problems, you get the impression you’re fighting for something. Even though all you’re really doing is just . . . fighting. For nothing.

He looked at my lips. I suddenly found myself wanting to lick his. 'Yes,' he replied, his eyes going molten. My breath caught in my throat as he reached out and brushed a strand of hair where it had flown across my cheek. 'I believe we do have unfinished business.' 'Good.' I gulped, suddenly one big mass of tingling body parts that wanted an immediate introduction to all of his body parts. I tried to slam down a mental barrier between his mind and mine, but it did no good. The cheerleaders in my groin were setting up fundraising car washes to finance a field trip to his groin.

I make 2+2=5, and I get to keep the remaining 1 that’s not really there. I truly am a Master of the Universe. I don’t just do “God’s work,” as our CEO once put it, it’s more like I’ve actually become a god myself.

Now," he said. "I want to hear about your day. Did you read any new books?" "I've read all the books we have." She wrinkled her nose. "Armies aren't very good about carrying libraries with them. I can't imagine why. We'd fight so much less if everyone would just sit down and read." Gifford's laugh rumbled through him, loud against her ear. "A question I often ask myself. Imagine how much money the realm would save if the rulers focused their finances on libraries, rather than wars." "Not if I were allowed to shop for books." "England would go bankrupt," he said gravely. "Thank God for wars." She pushed him away, playful. "You can't switch sides like that." The corner of his mouth quirked up. "It's too late. I've switched already, and since you've forbidden switching that quickly again, I'm stuck opposing you." "Congratulations," she said. "You've just described our entire relationship.

As soon as I had believed that financial security purchased emotional security, I'd lived a dependent, conditional life. Now I realize that rather than mortgage myself for a dream life on a layaway plan, I prefer the rather nice kind of life I've stumbled into. My desire for a double oven has less to do with signaling that I belong to a certain class or have reached a type of perfection and more to do with the fact that I haven't figured out how to make a pot roast and an apple pie at the same time. So I make the pie ahead of time and reheat it. I think it was Mark Twain who said, 'Happiness is wanting what you have, not having what you want.' I tell my kids this, hoping they will learn to balance the act of pursuing with the act of savoring.

God has not given me a spirit of fear, so why am I so consumed with worry over my children, my finances, my future? If the fear of man is a snare, why do I still find I am terrified of exposing my true self and then being rejected?

If I were your enemy, I’d disguise myself and manipulate your perspectives so that you’d focus on the wrong culprit—your husband, your friend, your hurt, your finances, anything or anyone except me. Because when you zero in on the most convenient, obvious places to strike back against

armies are not very good about carrying libraries with them. i can’t imagine why. we’d fight so much less if everyone would sit down and read.” “a question i often ask myself. imagine how much money the realm would save if the rulers focused their finances on libraries rather than wars.” “not if i were allowed to shop for books.” “england would go bankrupt. thank god for wars.” - jane & g

Phaethon asked: “Do you think there is something wrong with the Sophotechs? We are Manorials, father! We let Rhadamanthus control our finances and property, umpire our disputes, teach our children, design our thoughtscapes, and even play matchmaker to find us wives and husbands!” “Son, the Sophotechs may be sufficient to advise the Parliament on laws and rules. Laws are a matter of logic and common sense. Specially designed human-thinking versions, like Rhadamanthus, can tell us how to fulfill our desires and balance our account books. Those are questions of strategy, of efficient allocation of resources and time. But the Sophotechs, they cannot choose our desires for us. They cannot guide our culture, our values, our tastes. That is a question of the spirit.” “Then what would you have us do? Would you change our laws?” “Our mores, not our laws. There are many things which are repugnant, deadly to the spirit, and self-destructive, but which law should not forbid. Addiction, self-delusion, self-destruction, slander, perversion, love of ugliness. How can we discourage such things without the use of force? It was in response to this need that the College of Hortators evolved. Peacefully, by means of boycotts, public protests, denouncements, and shunnings, our society can maintain her sanity against the dangers to our spirit, to our humanity, to which such unboundried liberty, and such potent technology, exposes us.” (...) But Phaethon certainly did not want to hear a lecture, not today. “Why are you telling me all this? What is the point?” “Phaethon, I will let you pass through those doors, and, once through, you will have at your command all the powers and perquisites I myself possess. The point of my story is simple. The paradox of liberty of which you spoke before applies to our entire society. We cannot be free without being free to harm ourselves. Advances in technology can remove physical dangers from our lives, but, when they do, the spiritual dangers increase. By spiritual danger I mean a danger to your integrity, your decency, your sense of life. Against those dangers I warn you; you can be invulnerable, if you choose, because no spiritual danger can conquer you without your own consent. But, once they have your consent, those dangers are all-powerful, because no outside force can come to your aid. Spiritual dangers are always faced alone. It is for this reason that the Silver-Gray School was formed; it is for this reason that we practice the exercise of self-discipline. Once you pass those doors, my son, you will be one of us, and there will be nothing to restrain you from corruption and self-destruction except yourself. “You have a bright and fiery soul, Phaethon, a power to do great things; but I fear you may one day unleash such a tempest of fire that you may consume yourself, and all the world around you.

I remember talking to my friend Ben once about a person who had once lied to me. We’d been working on a project together, and this person lied about some of the finances. Ben is a decade older than me, a cinematographer with a gentle heart, a guy you’d think could easily be taken advantage of. But when I told him about my friend, Ben said, “Don, I’ve learned there are givers and takers in this life. I’ve slowly let the takers go and I’ve had it for the better.” He continued, “God bless them, when they learn to play by the rules they are welcomed back, but my heart is worth protecting.” At first, it was hard to act on what Ben was talking about, about the givers and the takers. I felt like a jerk for letting my friend go. But then I realized I didn’t have a healthy relationship with him in the first place. When there are lies in a relationship, it’s not like you’re actually connecting. And I realized another thing too: it wasn’t me who was walking away from my friend. It was my friend who hadn’t played by the rules and was incompatible in a healthy relationship. And here’s another thing that’s strange. After distancing myself from my friend I loved him more, not less. I protected myself for sure, but my anger went away. Once he wasn’t hurting me anymore, I could finally have compassion and grace. It makes me wonder how many people have damaged their own lives by mistaking enablement for grace?

Fortunately, due to a terrible misunderstanding, I soon found myself working as a consultant to the World Bank. I am not exactly sure what it was that led the World Bank to believe I had any expertise in infrastructure finance. I had never even balanced a checkbook. I hadn’t even tried. There is not much reason to balance a checkbook when your checking account rarely tops the three-figure mark. And so, to the Third World countries who had the misfortune of working with me on their infrastructure projects, I wish to apologize.

The idea of spending money, of buying myself something lovely but unnecessary, has always burdened me. Is it because my father would scrupulously count out his coins, and rub his fingers over every bill before giving me one in case there was another stuck to it? Who hated eating out, who wouldn't order even a cup of tea in a coffee bar because a box of tea bags in the supermarket cost the same? Was it my parents' strict tutelage that prompts me to always choose the least-expensive dress, greeting card, dish on the menu? To look at the tag before the item on the rack, the way people look at the descriptions of paintings in a museum before lifting their eyes to the work?

[A] person's fate is determined by where he is born [...] I was, to be sure, brighter than the other children my age. I picked up reading and writing in no time at all. And I was able to calculate finances without any effort. To stretch myself and expand my knowledge, I wanted to continue my schooling and go on to higher-level classes. But my family was poor. They could only afford to send me to the village elementary school. When I realized that my dreams would never be realized, I suppose -- like a tree whose roots are stymied and twisted and not allowed to grow -- I began to nurture a dark jealousy in my heart, an ugly envy. I believed fate had determined that I would be born into this miserable existence.

Though we’d argued over the drain of his political career on our family for years now, I did love and trust Barack. He was already a man with two families, his attention divided between me and the girls and his 200,000 or so South Side constituents. Would sharing him with the state of Illinois really be all that different? I couldn’t know one way or another, but I also couldn’t bring myself to stand in the way of his aspiration, that thing always tugging at him to try for more. And so that day, we’d made a deal. Valerie agreed to be the finance chair for Barack’s Senate campaign. A number of our friends agreed to donate time and money to the effort. I signed off on all of it, with one important caveat, repeated out loud so that everyone could hear it: If he lost, he’d move on from politics altogether and find a different sort of job. If it didn’t work out on Election Day, this would be the end.

PERSONAL BILL OF RIGHTS FOR MY RELATIONSHIPS 1. I have a right to be treated with courtesy and respect. 2. I have a right to be the only romantic or sexual interest in my partner’s life. 3. I have a right to be informed about our assets, manage my own finances, and choose how I spend my money. 4. I have a right to have a say in decisions that affect myself and my family. 5. I have a right to be wrong and make mistakes without being punished or humiliated. 6. I have the right to live without emotional or physical violence. 7. I have the right to voice my opinion respectfully without retribution. 8. I have the right to have my personal property treated with respect. 9. I have the right to talk to others about matters that affect me. 10. I have the right to choose my own friends. 11. I have the right to enjoy myself. 12. I have the right to live without guns or pornography in my house. 13. My children have the right to be treated with respect and dignity. (Adapted from Cooper & Cooper, 2008)

is a compliment, I think. I just didn’t really understand what people thought was weird about me. It could have something to do with the following, but I’ll let you be the judge of that. Thanks to my two gifts, I have a tendency to be anxious and depressed. I’m completely overtaken by the moods of others. I procrastinate. I can’t pay bills or keep track of finances, and I have no emotional ties to money. I don’t put effort into relationships, except for those with people who have grown to accept me and don’t try to change me. I don’t bond easily with most people. I constantly stress myself out trying to help everyone except myself. I feel a connection with nature in my bones, but almost to the point of pain. I get in a funk where I feel dead inside. I’m easily overwhelmed. I don’t like to be touched. The sound of a telephone makes me want to put my fist through a wall. I have a horrendous temper and can snap but then forget about it five seconds later. I have horrible word recall. I often forget what I’m talking about midsentence and have to ask

MARCH 6 YOU WILL DEFEAT THE ENEMIES OF YOUR FINANCES I HAVE PROMISED that I will defend My people and keep them from harm. I will strike your enemies with great panic, and they will seize each other by the hand and attack one another. The wealth of all your surrounding enemies will be collected—great quantities of silver and gold and material possessions—and will be given to My people. Blessed is the man who fears Me and finds great delight in My commands. Your children will be mighty in the land, and your generations will be blessed. Honor Me with the wealth that I give to you, and your barns will be filled to overflowing. My blessing upon you brings wealth, and I will add no trouble to it. ZECHARIAH 14:13–14; PSALM 112:2–3; JOHN 10:10 Prayer Declaration In the name of Jesus I bind and cast out every thief that would try to steal my finances. The Lord will rebuild the finances of His people and give the treasures of the nations to them. I will not put my hope in my wealth, but I will place my hope in God, who richly has provided me with everything for my enjoyment. I will lay up treasure for myself in heaven and take hold of life eternal.

All my best decisions in life have come when I tuned into what felt like the best moves for me. I’d spent much of my life looking to others for answers, allowing their opinions to drown out my instincts. My default was to substitute others desires for my own. In fact, I’d done that so much that it became a habit, one I’m still unlearning. I’ve needed a lot of practice at putting my own ideas and intuition at the forefront and Oprah was encouraging me to again rehearse. ... That afternoon Oprah articulated the lesson to me in a way that turned on the lights. “You know what a resounding ‘yes’ feels like,” she said, “it’s undeniable. Nothing’s going stop you from doing it. You’re excited. You don’t have to convince yourself to move forward. You simply know this is the right thing.” And that is what I live by. I’ve made a lot of decisions from my head. I’ve chosen to go in this direction or that one based on finances, or because something seems like a great opportunity, or because I don’t want to hurt peoples feelings or disappoint them, or because someone is pushing me toward an agenda that serves them. But when I’ve listened to my heart, when I’ve trusted what my spirit is telling me, that ‘yes’ has always steered my right.

THE DEFENDANT: Thank you, your Honor. I stand before your Honor humbly and painfully aware that we are here today for one reason: Because of my actions that I pled guilty to on August 21, and as well on November 29. I take full responsibility for each act that I pled guilty to, the personal ones to me and those involving the President of the United States of America. Viktor Frankl in his book, "Man's Search for Meaning," he wrote, "There are forces beyond your control that can take away everything you possess except one thing, your freedom to choose how you will respond to the situation." Your Honor, this may seem hard to believe, but today is one of the most meaningful days of my life. The irony is today is the day I am getting my freedom back as you sit at the bench and you contemplate my fate. I have been living in a personal and mental incarceration ever since the fateful day that I accepted the offer to work for a famous real estate mogul whose business acumen I truly admired. In fact, I now know that there is little to be admired. I want to be clear. I blame myself for the conduct which has brought me here today, and it was my own weakness, and a blind loyalty to this man that led me to choose a path of darkness over light. It is for these reasons I chose to participate in the elicit act of the President rather than to listen to my own inner voice which should have warned me that the campaign finance violations that I later pled guilty to were insidious.

Are his letters to Diana downstairs?" She sighed. "What is it about girls and letters? My husband left me messages in soap on the bathroom mirror. Utterly impermanent.Really wonderful-" She broke off and scowled. I would have thought she looked a little embarrassed, but I didn't think embarrassment was in her repertoire. "Anyway. Most of the correspondence between the Willings is in private collections. He had their letters with him in Paris when he died. In a noble but ultimately misguided act, his attorney sent them to his neice. Who put them all in a ghastly book that she illustrated. Her son sold them to finance the publication of six even more ghastly books of poetry. I trust there is a circle of hell for terrible poets who desecrate art." "I've seen the poetry books in the library," I told her. "The ones with Edward's paintings on the covers. I couldn't bring myself to read them." "Smart girl. I suppose worse things have been done, but not many.Of course, there was that god-awful children's television show that made one of his landscapes move.They put kangaroos in it. Kangaroos. In eastern Pennsylvania." "I've seen that,too," I admitted. I'd hated it. "Hated it.Not quite as much as the still life where Tastykakes replaced one orange with a cupcake, or the portrait of Diana dressed in a Playtex sports bra, but close." "Oh,God. I try to forget about the bra." Dr. Rothaus shuddered. "Well, I suppose they do far worse to the really famous painters.Poor van Gogh. All those hearing-aid ads." "Yeah." We shared a moment of quiet respect for van Gogh's ear.

It's hard to form a lasting connection when your permanent address is an eight-inch mailbox in the UPS store. Still,as I inch my way closer, I can't help the way my breath hitches, the way my insides thrum and swirl. And when he turns,flashing me that slow, languorous smile that's about to make him world famous,his eyes meeting mine when he says, "Hey,Daire-Happy Sweet Sixteen," I can't help but think of the millions of girls who would do just about anything to stand in my pointy blue babouches. I return the smile, flick a little wave of my hand, then bury it in the side pocket of the olive-green army jacket I always wear. Pretending not to notice the way his gaze roams over me, straying from my waist-length brown hair peeking out from my scarf, to the tie-dyed tank top that clings under my jacket,to the skinny dark denim jeans,all the way down to the brand-new slippers I wear on my feet. "Nice." He places his foot beside mine, providing me with a view of the his-and-hers version of the very same shoe. Laughing when he adds, "Maybe we can start a trend when we head back to the States.What do you think?" We. There is no we. I know it.He knows it.And it bugs me that he tries to pretend otherwise. The cameras stopped rolling hours ago, and yet here he is,still playing a role. Acting as though our brief, on-location hookup means something more. Acting like we won't really end long before our passports are stamped RETURN. And that's all it takes for those annoyingly soft girly feelings to vanish as quickly as a flame in the rain. Allowing the Daire I know,the Daire I've honed myself to be, to stand in her palce. "Doubtful." I smirk,kicking his shoe with mine.A little harder then necessary, but then again,he deserves it for thinking I'm lame enough to fall for his act. "So,what do you say-food? I'm dying for one of those beef brochettes,maybe even a sausage one too.Oh-and some fries would be good!" I make for the food stalls,but Vane has another idea. His hand reaches for mine,fingers entwining until they're laced nice and tight. "In a minute," he says,pulling me so close my hip bumps against his. "I thought we might do something special-in honor of your birthday and all.What do you think about matching tattoos?" I gape.Surely he's joking. "Yeah,you know,mehndi. Nothing permanent.Still,I thought it could be kinda cool." He arcs his left brow in his trademark Vane Wick wau,and I have to fight not to frown in return. Nothing permanent. That's my theme song-my mission statement,if you will. Still,mehndi's not quite the same as a press-on. It has its own life span. One that will linger long after Vane's studio-financed, private jet lifts him high into the sky and right out of my life. Though I don't mention any of that, instead I just say, "You know the director will kill you if you show up on set tomorrow covered in henna." Vane shrugs. Shrugs in a way I've seen too many times, on too many young actors before him.He's in full-on star-power mode.Think he's indispensable. That he's the only seventeen-year-old guy with a hint of talent,golden skin, wavy blond hair, and piercing blue eyes that can light up a screen and make the girls (and most of their moms) swoon. It's a dangerous way to see yourself-especially when you make your living in Hollywood. It's the kind of thinking that leads straight to multiple rehab stints, trashy reality TV shows, desperate ghostwritten memoirs, and low-budget movies that go straight to DVD.

Where should we be if every one had his rights? Fancy every one's having a hand in the government? Can you imagine a city ruled by its citizens? Why, the citizens are the team, and the team cannot be driver. To put to the vote is to throw to the winds. Would you have states driven like clouds? Disorder cannot build up order. With chaos for an architect, the edifice would be a Babel. And, besides, what tyranny is this pretended liberty! As for me, I wish to enjoy myself; not to govern. It is a bore to have to vote; I want to dance. A prince is a providence, and takes care of us all. Truly the king is generous to take so much trouble for our sakes. Besides, he is to the manner born. He knows what it is. It's his business. Peace, War, Legislation, Finance--what have the people to do with such things? Of course the people have to pay; of course the people have to serve; but that should suffice them. They have a place in policy; from them come two essential things, the army and the budget. To be liable to contribute, and to be liable to serve; is not that enough? What more should they want? They are the military and the financial arm. A magnificent rôle. The king reigns for them, and they must reward him accordingly. Taxation and the civil list are the salaries paid by the peoples and earned by the prince. The people give their blood and their money, in return for which they are led. To wish to lead themselves! what an absurd idea! They require a guide; being ignorant, they are blind. Has not the blind man his dog? Only the people have a lion, the king, who consents to act the dog. How kind of him! But why are the people ignorant? because it is good for them. Ignorance is the guardian of Virtue. Where there is no perspective there is no ambition. The ignorant man is in useful darkness, which, suppressing sight, suppresses covetousness: whence innocence. He who reads, thinks; who thinks, reasons. But not to reason is duty; and happiness as well. These truths are incontestable; society is based on them.

The blinking message light on the phone screamed at us when we walked into the bedroom of our suite. Marlboro Man audibly exhaled, clearly wishing the world--and his brother and the grain markets and the uncertainties of agriculture--would leave us alone already. I wish they’d leave us alone, too. In light of the recent developments, though, Marlboro Man picked up the phone and dialed Tim to get an update. I excused myself to the bathroom to freshen up and put on a champagne satin negligee in an effort to thwart the external forces that were trying to rob me of my husband’s attention. I brushed my teeth and spritzed myself with Jil Sander perfume before opening the door to the bedroom, where I would seduce my Marlboro Man away from his worries. I knew I could win if only I applied myself. He was just getting off the phone when I entered the room. “Dammit,” I heard him mumble as he plopped down onto the enormous king-size bed. Oh no. Jil Sander had her work cut out for her. I climbed on the bed and lay beside him, resting my head on his arm. He draped his arm across my waist. I draped my leg around his. He sighed. “The markets are totally in the shitter.” I didn’t know the details, but I did know the shitter wasn’t a good place. I wanted to throw out the usual platitudes. Don’t worry about it, try not to think about it, we’ll figure it out, everything will be okay. But I didn’t know enough about it. I knew he and his brother owned a lot of land. I knew they worked hard to pay for it. I knew they weren’t lawyers or physicians by profession and didn’t have a whole separate income to supplement their ranching operation. As full-time ranchers, their livelihoods were completely reliant on so many things outside of their control--weather, market fluctuations, supply, demand, luck. I knew they weren’t home free in terms of finances--Marlboro Man and I had talked about it. But I didn’t understand enough about the ramifications of this current wrinkle to reassure him that everything would be okay, businesswise. And he probably didn’t want me to. So I did the only thing I could think of to do. I assured my new husband everything would be okay between us by leaning over, turning off the lamp, and letting the love between us--which had zero to do with markets or grains--take over.

Yet in 2012, he returned. Plenty of the speechwriters were livid. The club was the embodiment of everything we had promised to change. Was it really necessary to flatter these people, just because they were powerful and rich? In a word, yes. In fact, thanks to the Supreme Court, the rich were more powerful than ever. In 2010, the court’s five conservative justices gutted America’s campaign finance laws in the decision known as Citizens United. With no more limits to the number of attack ads they could purchase, campaigns had become another hobby for the ultrawealthy. Tired of breeding racehorses or bidding on rare wines at auction? Buy a candidate instead! I should make it clear that no one explicitly laid out a strategy regarding the dinner. I never asked point-blank if we hoped to charm billionaires into spending their billions on something other than Mitt Romney’s campaign. That said, I knew it couldn’t hurt. Hoping to mollify the one-percenters in the audience, I kept the script embarrassingly tame. I’ve got about forty-five more minutes on the State of the Union that I’d like to deliver tonight. I am eager to work with members of Congress to be entertaining tonight. But if Congress is unwilling to cooperate, I will be funny without them. Even for a politician, this was weak. But it apparently struck the right tone. POTUS barely edited the speech. A few days later, as a reward for a job well done, Favs invited me to tag along to a speechwriting-team meeting with the president. I had not set foot in the Oval Office since my performance of the Golden Girls theme song. On that occasion, President Obama remained behind his desk. For larger gatherings like this one, however, he crossed the room to a brown leather armchair, and the rest of us filled the two beige sofas on either side. Between the sofas was a coffee table. On the coffee table sat a bowl, which under George W. Bush had contained candy but under Obama was full of apples instead. Hence the ultimate Oval Office power move: grab an apple at the end of a meeting, polish it on your suit, and take a casual chomp on your way out the door. I would have sooner stuck my finger in an electrical socket. Desperate not to call attention to myself, I took the seat farthest away and kept my eyes glued to my laptop. I allowed myself just one indulgence: a quick peek at the Emancipation Proclamation. That’s right, buddy. Look who’s still here. It was only at the very end of the meeting, as we rose from the surprisingly comfy couches, that Favs brought up the Alfalfa dinner. The right-wing radio host Laura Ingraham had been in the audience, and she was struck by the president’s poise. “She was talking about it this morning,” Favs told POTUS. “She said, ‘I don’t know if Mitt Romney can beat him.

When I spoke to you here the last time, my old party comrades, I did so fully conscious of victory as hardly a mortal has been able to do before me. In spite of this, a concern weighed heavily on me. It was clear to me that, ultimately, behind this war was that incendiary who has always lived off the quarrels of nations: the international Jew. I would no longer have been a National Socialist had I ever distanced myself from this realization. We followed his traces over many years. In this Reich, probably for the first time, we scientifically resolved this problem for all time, according to plan, and really understood the words of a great Jew who said that the racial question was the key to world history. Therefore, we knew quite well-above all, I knew-that the driving force behind these occurrences was the Jew. And that, as always in history, there were blockheads ready to stand up for him: partly spineless, paid characters, partly people who want to make deals and, at no time, flinch from having blood spilled for these deals. I have come to know these Jews as the incendiaries of the world. After all, in the previous years, you saw how they slowly poisoned the people via the press, radio, film, and theater. You saw how this poisoning continued. You saw how their finances, their money transactions, had to work in this sense. And, in the first days of the war, certain Englishmen-all of them shareholders in the armament industry-said it openly: “The war must last three years at least. It will not and must not end before three years.”-That is what they said. That was only natural, since their capital was tied up and they could not hope to secure an amortization in less than three years. Certainly, my party comrades, for us National Socialists, this almost defies comprehension. But that is how things are in the democratic world. You can be prime minister or minister of war and, at the same time, own portfolios of countless shares in the armament industry. Interests are explained that way. We once came to know this danger as the driving force in our domestic struggle. We had this black-red-golden coalition in front of us; this mixture of hypocrisy and abuse of religion on the one hand, and financial interests on the other; and, finally, their truly Jewish-Marxist goals. We completely finished off this coalition at home in a hard struggle. Now, we stand facing this enemy abroad. He inspired this international coalition against the German Volk and the German Reich. First, he used Poland as a dummy, and later pressed France, Belgium, Holland, and Norway to serve him. From the start, England was a driving force here. Understandably, the power which would one day confront us is most clearly ruled by this Jewish spirit: the Soviet Union. It happens to be the greatest servant of Jewry. Time meanwhile has proved what we National Socialists maintained for many years: it is truly a state in which the whole national intelligentsia has been slaughtered, and where only spiritless, forcibly proletarianized subhumans remain. Above them, there is the gigantic organization of the Jewish commissars, that is, established slaveowners. Frequently people wondered whether, in the long run, nationalist tendencies would not be victorious there. But they completely forgot that the bearers of a conscious nationalist view no longer existed. That, in the end, the man who temporarily became the ruler of this state, is nothing other than an instrument in the hands of this almighty Jewry. If Stalin is on stage and steps in front of the curtain, then Kaganovich and all those Jews stand behind him, Jews who, in ten-thousandfold ramifications, control this mighty empire. Speech in the Löwenbräukeller Munich, November 8, 1941

Where should we be if every one had his rights? Fancy every one's having a hand in the government? Can you imagine a city ruled by its citizens? Why, the citizens are the team, and the team cannot be driver. To put to the vote is to throw to the winds. Would you have states driven like clouds? Disorder cannot build up order. With chaos for an architect, the edifice would be a Babel. And, besides, what tyranny is this pretended liberty! As for me, I wish to enjoy myself; not to govern. It is a bore to have to vote; I want to dance. A prince is a providence, and takes care of us all. Truly the king is generous to take so much trouble for our sakes. Besides, he is to the manner born. He knows what it is. It's his business. Peace, War, Legislation, Finance--what have the people to do with such things? Of course the people have to pay; of course the people have to serve; but that should suffice them. They have a place in policy; from them come two essential things, the army and the budget. To be liable to contribute, and to be liable to serve; is not that enough? What more should they want? They are the military and the financial arm. A magnificent rôle. The king reigns for them, and they must reward him accordingly. Taxation and the civil list are the salaries paid by the peoples and earned by the prince. The people give their blood and their money, in return for which they are led. To wish to lead themselves! what an absurd idea! They require a guide; being ignorant, they are blind. Has not the blind man his dog? Only the people have a lion, the king, who consents to act the dog. How kind of him! But why are the people ignorant? because it is good for them. Ignorance is the guardian of Virtue. Where there is no perspective there is no ambition. The ignorant man is in useful darkness, which, suppressing sight, suppresses covetousness: whence innocence. He who reads, thinks; who thinks, reasons. But not to reason is duty; and happiness as well. These truths are incontestable; society is based on them.

You don’t have to hide your happiness, your peace, your victory, or your possessions. You don’t have to dress down and look poor and pitiful and depressed to show people you are humble. When you wear your blessings well, giving God all the credit, talking about His goodness, thanking Him for what He has done, that’s what really brings honor to our God. If God has blessed you with financial success or helped you through a challenge in a relationship, a job, your health, or your finances, wear that blessing well. Tell everyone what God has done for you. If they make fun of you like they make fun of me and ask why you are so happy, just tell them, “I’m wearing my blessing well. God has been so good to me I can’t keep it to myself. I’ve got to tell somebody. I once was lost, but now I’m found. I should be dead, but I’m still alive. Look what the Lord has done.” Some critics and doubters may tell you to calm down or chill out on the happiness stuff. Let that go in one ear and out the other. Keep wearing your blessings well, and over time, instead of them affecting you, you will inject them. You will help them come up higher. When you dress your best, you’re wearing your blessings well. When you step up and take that promotion, you’re wearing your blessings well. When God opens the door and you move into that new house you’ve been believing for, others may be critical. But don’t allow those who are negative, jealous, judgmental, bitter, angry, and nonsmiling to bring you down. If you want to please God and live in happiness, don’t drag around broke, defeated, or depressed. Wear your blessings well. Step up to a new level. Enjoy God’s favor. Be proud of who you are and of what God has done in your life.

On a trip to Korea, Thiel’s corporate credit card was declined as he tried to purchase a return ticket home. The investors he had met with were only too happy to furnish a first-class plane ticket—which they did on the spot. “They were excited beyond belief,” Thiel remembered. “The next day, they called up our law firm and asked, ‘What’s the bank account we need to send the money to?’ ” The crazed nature of it all confirmed Thiel’s suspicions about the market. “I remember thinking to myself that it felt like things couldn’t get much crazier, and that we really had to close the money quickly because the window might not last forever,” he said. The final $100 million figure actually disappointed some on the team. Confinity and X.com had secured verbal commitments for double that amount, and some on the team had wanted to hold out for the remaining funding or push for a billion-dollar valuation. Thiel disagreed, urging Selby and others on the financing team to turn handshakes into actual checks, to get term sheets signed, and have deposits confirmed. “Peter kicked everyone’s asses to get that funding round done,” David Sacks remembered. Many Confinity employees—who had seen Thiel at his toughest—rarely remember him this insistent. “If we don’t get this money raised,” Howery recalled Thiel saying, “the whole company could blow up.

Exercise. When I see a set of stairs, I will take them instead of using the elevator. Social skills. When I walk into a party, I will introduce myself to someone I don’t know yet. Finances. When I want to buy something over $100, I will wait twenty-four hours before purchasing. Healthy eating. When I serve myself a meal, I will always put veggies on my plate first. Minimalism. When I buy a new item, I will give something away. (“One in, one out.”) Mood. When the phone rings, I will take one deep breath and smile before answering.

I learned that my thoughts create my feelings; my feelings create my behaviors; and eventually my behaviors create my outcomes in relationships, work, finances, and how healthy I am physically and emotionally. If I could separate myself from my thoughts and look at them dispassionately, then I could feel and act in a more consistently happy way over time.

Pierpont handled the West Shore affair better than I could have done it myself.

I don’t see any harm myself in making a little money, provided that it can be done honestly and reasonably.

I always find that I have to guard myself because of a fear that I will sound soft and foolish,

This may seem harsh, but I come from a family where finances were a struggle. So, you see, this is an issue that specifically stresses me out. Not getting a good night’s sleep because I’m stressed over someone else’s finances, boyfriend or not, was a no-brainer. Especially because I have worked hard to not have any debt myself.

I quickly convinced myself that the true key to material happiness lay in a modest standard of living which could be achieved with little difficulty under almost all economic conditions”—the margin-of-safety idea applied to personal finance.21

Suddenly I’d found myself past thirty, shacked up with a fussy bald man nine years my senior who enjoyed monitoring every facet of our household—finances, thermostat, hot-water heater, water and electricity usage, lawn maintenance, and pest control.

FOR MY SPIRITUAL LIFE... What’s the ONE Thing I can do to help others... ? What’s the ONE Thing I can do to improve my relationship with God... ? FOR MY PHYSICAL HEALTH... What’s the ONE Thing I can do to achieve my diet goals... ? What’s the ONE Thing I can do to ensure that I exercise... ? What’s the ONE Thing I can do to relieve my stress... ? FOR MY PERSONAL LIFE... What’s the ONE Thing I can do to improve my skill at ________... ? What’s the ONE Thing I can do to find time for myself... ? FOR MY KEY RELATIONSHIPS... What’s the ONE Thing I can do to improve my relationship with my spouse/partner... ? What’s the ONE Thing I can do to improve my children’s school performance... ? What’s the ONE Thing I can do to show my appreciation to my parents... ? What’s the ONE Thing I can do to make my family stronger... ? FOR MY JOB... What’s the ONE Thing I can do to ensure that I hit my goals... ? What’s the ONE Thing I can do to improve my skills... ? What’s the ONE Thing I can do to help my team succeed... ? What’s the ONE Thing I can do to further my career... ? FOR MY BUSINESS... What’s the ONE Thing I can do to make us more competitive... ? What’s the ONE Thing I can do to make our product the best... ? What’s the ONE Thing I can do to make us more profitable... ? What’s the ONE Thing I can do to improve our customer experience... ? FOR MY FINANCES... What’s the ONE Thing I can do to increase my net worth... ? What’s the ONE Thing I can do to improve my investment cash flow... ? What’s the ONE Thing I can do to eliminate my credit card debt... ? BIG IDEAS So how do you make The ONE Thing part of your daily routine? How do you make it strong enough to get extraordinary results at work and in the other areas of your life? Here’s a starter list drawn from our experience and our work with others. Understand and believe it. The first step is to understand the concept of the ONE Thing, then to believe that it can make a difference in your life. If you don’t understand and believe, you won’t take action. Use it. Ask yourself the Focusing Question. Start each day by asking, “What’s the ONE Thing I can do today for [whatever you want] such that by doing it everything else will be easier or even unnecessary?” When you do this, your direction will become clear. Your work will be more productive and your personal life more rewarding. Make it a habit. When you make asking the Focusing Question a habit, you fully engage its power to get the extraordinary results you want. It’s a difference maker. Research says this will take about 66 days. Whether it takes you a few weeks or a few months, stick with it until it becomes your routine. If you’re not serious about learning the Success Habit, you’re not serious about getting extraordinary results. Leverage reminders. Set up ways to remind yourself to use the Focusing Question. One of the best ways to do this is to put up a sign at work that says, “Until my ONE Thing is done—everything else is a distraction.” We designed the back cover of this book to be a trigger —set it on the corner of your desk so that it’s the first thing you see when you get to work. Use notes, screen savers, and calendar cues to keep making the connection between the Success Habit and the results you seek. Put up reminders like, “The ONE Thing = Extraordinary Results” or “The Success Habit Will Get Me to My Goal.” Recruit support. Research shows that those around you can influence you tremendously. Starting a success support group with some of your work colleagues can help inspire all of you to practice the Success Habit every day. Get your family involved. Share your ONE Thing. Get them on board. Use the Focusing Question around them to show them how the Success Habit can make a difference in their school work, their personal achievements, or any other part of their lives.

The power of our thoughts may never be measured or appreciated, but it became obvious to me as a young boy that it was important to be aware of my thoughts and how I expressed myself.

While King Ahasuerus has been rotating his guests during these six months, these seven princes have most likely been with him the whole time as well. To Ahasuerus, it may have seemed that these were the right men to go to for advice, but Ahasuerus is not at his sharpest after these six months of celebrating. We can only imagine that these advisors are as bored and as drunk as King Ahasuerus, even though earlier in this chapter (verse 8) the historian makes a point of telling us that the guests were not required to drink. These men may have been “partying” right along with Ahasuerus for these six months, and their judgement may be hindered by the atmosphere as much as the king’s judgement has been hindered. On a more personal note, can you think of any time when you sought out the wrong person for advice or counsel? I sure can! You would not seek advice on your finances from someone who filed bankruptcy yesterday, nor would you seek advice on marriage from a child. When you need wise counsel, you need to find someone who has experienced victory in the same situation in which you are experiencing difficulty. Of course, when I catch myself looking to the wrong people for advice, many times I realize something: I am not really looking for advice, I am looking for support. Sometimes we seek out people that we expect will be sympathetic to our cause. Ahasuerus may have done this very thing in choosing these men. Maybe Ahasuerus has already determined what he wants to do with Vashti, and now he is looking for validation. Big mistake! Here is a lesson we can take from Ahasuerus: there are situations in our lives when we should seek an opinion from an objective party. The Bible encourages us to seek wise counsel. We should use wisdom and choose someone with more experience and wisdom than we have ourselves. If Ahasuerus wanted approval, he found it in these seven advisors. If he merely wanted a decisive opinion on what course of action to take, he has found that. And Memucan answered before the king and the princes: “Queen Vashti has not only wronged the king, but also all the princes, and all the people who are in all the provinces of King Ahasuerus. For the queen’s behavior will become known to all women, so that they will despise their husbands in their eyes, when they report, ‘King Ahasuerus commanded Queen Vashti to be brought in before him, but she did not come.’ Esther 1:16-17 When Ahasuerus asks for advice, one of the advisors speaks out quickly. Memucan answers Ahasuerus, and apparently he has taken Vashti’s refusal pretty personally himself. Perhaps Memucan’s wife is among those women that Vashti is entertaining. Memucan exaggerates this situation to make it seem like a very serious infraction indeed, and he wants the king to see it his way. Memucan says, “Queen Vashti has not only wronged the king, but also all the princes, and all the people who are in all the provinces” (v. 16). He suggests that the queen’s refusal will make all women despise their husbands (v. 17). … Is Memucan taking this situation a little far? This very day the noble ladies of Persia and Media will say to all the king’s officials that they have heard of the behavior of the queen. Thus there will be excessive contempt and wrath. If it pleases the king, let a royal decree go out from him, and let it be recorded in the laws of the Persians and the Medes, so that it will not be altered, that Vashti shall come no more before King Ahasuerus; and let the king give her royal position to

Recently there came a period when I had little to do. This was novel in a life so crammed with busy years, and I decided to amuse myself by writing a novel that was pure science fiction. In the hard-driven times between 1930 and 1950, I was a professional writer not simply because it was my job, but because I wanted to finance more serious researches. In those days there were few agencies pouring out large grants to independent workers. Despite what you might hear about Roosevelt “relief,” those were depression years. One succeeded or one starved.

End of May 2012 The continuation of my email to Andy: …I was delighted to return to London after war-ravaged Belfast. The students in our college had to evacuate several times due to IRA bomb threats. I must have subconsciously selected to be in Northern Ireland because of my unsettling inner upheavals. Much like the riots that went on in the city in 1971, I was unconsciously fighting my inner demons within myself. I needed that year to overcome my sexual additions and to immerse myself in my fashion studies. By the following year, I had compiled an impressive fashion design portfolio for application with various London Art and Design colleges. Foundation students generally required two years to complete their studies. I graduated from the Belfast College of Art with flying colors within a year. By the autumn of 1972, I was accepted into the prestigious Harrow School of Art and Technology. Around that period, my father’s business was waning and my family had financial difficulty sponsoring my graduate studies. Unbeknownst to my family, I had earned sufficient money during my Harem services to comfortably put myself through college. I lied to my parents and told them I was working part-time in London to make ends meet so I could finance my fashion education. They believed my tall tale. For the next three years I put my heart and soul into my fashion projects. I would occasionally work as a waiter at the famous Rainbow Room in Biba, which is now defunct. Working at this dinner dance club was a convenient way of meeting beautiful and trendy patrons, who often visit this capricious establishment.

The primacy of performance dominates their thoughts. To return to Dylan’s Nobel Lecture, we find him musing on the practicalities of ‘putting on a show’: “I began to think about William Shakespeare, the great literary figure. I would reckon he thought of himself as a dramatist. The thought that he was writing literature couldn’t have entered his head. His words were written for the stage. Meant to be spoken not read. When he was writing Hamlet, I’m sure he was thinking about a lot of different things: “Who’re the right actors for these roles?” “How should this be staged?” “Do I really want to set this in Denmark8?” His creative vision and ambitions were no doubt at the forefront of his mind, but there were also more mundane matters to consider and deal with. “Is the financing in place?” “Are there enough good seats for my patrons?” “Where am I going to get a human skull?” I would bet that the farthest thing from Shakespeare’s mind was the question “Is this literature? But, like Shakespeare, I too am often occupied with the pursuit of my creative endeavors and dealing with all aspects of life’s mundane matters. “Who are the best musicians for these songs?” “Am I recording in the right studio?” “Is this song in the right key?” Some things never change, even in 400 years. Not once have I ever had the time to ask myself, “Are my songs literature?

I threw myself into learning everything I could about leadership, marketing, finance, business strategy, and project management. I enrolled in an MBA program, sought out mentors and role models, both within the company and in the broader tech community. And slowly but surely, I began to develop the skills and mindset of a successful CTO.

Let me be clear: if you found a love like that, I would expect you to marry. I would expect it for your own good. But as long as our finances permit it, I could never ask you to yoke yourself to a pale imitation of what your mother and I had. I don’t expect it of myself, either. Certainly not when we could be writing books instead.

There’s another level at which attention operates, this has to do with leadership, I argue that leaders need three kinds of focus, to be really effective, the first is an inner focus, let me tell you about a case that’s actually from the annals of neurology, there was a corporate lawyer, who unfortunately had a small prefrontal brain tumour, it was discovered early, operated successfully, after the surgery though it was a very puzzling picture, because he was absolutely as smart as he had been before, a very high IQ, no problem with attention or memory, but he couldn’t do his job anymore, he couldn’t do any job, in fact he ended up out of work, his wife left him, he lost his home, he’s living in his brother spare bedroom and in despair he went to see a famous neurologist named Antonio Damasio. Damasio specialized in the circuitry between the prefrontal area which is where we consciously pay attention to what matters now, where we make decisions, where we learn and the emotional centers in the midbrain, particularly the amygdala, which is our radar for danger, it triggers our strong emotions. They had cut the connection between the prefrontal area and emotional centers and Damasio at first was puzzled, he realized that this fellow on every neurological test was perfectly fine but something was wrong, then he got a clue, he asked the lawyer when should we have our next appointment and he realized the lawyer could give him the rational pros and cons of every hour for the next two weeks, but he didn’t know which is best. And Damasio says when we’re making a decision any decision, when to have the next appointment, should I leave my job for another one, what strategy should we follow, going into the future, should I marry this fellow compared to all the other fellows, those are decisions that require we draw on our entire life experience and the circuitry that collects that life experience is very base brain, it’s very ancient in the brain, and it has no direct connection to the part of the brain that thinks in words, it has very rich connectivity to the gastro- intestinal tract, to the gut, so we get a gut feeling, feels right, doesn’t feel right. Damasio calls them somatic markers, it’s a language of the body and the ability to tune into this is extremely important because this is valuable data too - they did a study of Californian entrepreneurs and asked them “how do you make your decisions?”, these are people who built a business from nothing to hundreds of millions or billions of dollars, and they more or less said the same strategy “I am a voracious gatherer of information, I want to see the numbers, but if it doesn’t feel right, I won’t go ahead with the deal”. They’re tuning into the gut feeling. I know someone, I grew up in farm region of California, the Central Valley and my high school had a rival high school in the next town and I met someone who went to the other high school, he was not a good student, he almost failed, came close to not graduating high school, he went to a two-year college, a community college, found his way into film, which he loved and got into a film school, in film school his student project caught the eye of a director, who asked him to become an assistant and he did so well at that the director arranged for him to direct his own film, someone else’s script, he did so well at that they let him direct a script that he had written and that film did surprisingly well, so the studio that financed that film said if you want to do another one, we will back you. And he, however, hated the way the studio edited the film, he felt he was a creative artist and they had butchered his art. He said I am gonna do the film on my own, I’m gonna finance it myself, everyone in the film business that he knew said this is a huge mistake, you shouldn’t do this, but he went ahead, then he ran out of money, had to go to eleven banks before he could get a loan, he managed to finish the film, you may have seen

Finances. When I want to buy something over $100, I will wait twenty-four hours before purchasing. Healthy eating. When I serve myself a meal, I will always put veggies on my plate first. Minimalism. When I buy a new item, I will give something away. (“One in, one out.”) Mood. When the phone rings, I will take one deep breath and smile before

I first heard about blockbusting when I decided I wanted to buy and sell property in Dorchester. So I went to local real estate agents. I got friendly with one fellow who worked in a particular office. We went out to lunch a couple of times, and he said, “I like you. You ought to come to work here. You can make a ton of money...” He explained to me that the banks had decided to take a certain area and designate it with a red pen... Mattapan and parts of Dorchester. We’re going to finance minorities in this particular area, so they can get a house with no money down. That’s how it all began. Of course, I personally wasn’t out to help any minorities. I was out to make a buck for myself, and, seeing all those clients lining up out the door, I thought a fortune was certainly there. For a lot of people already in the business, it was a boon to them. And a lot of people who weren’t in the business said, gee, this looks really good...

I walked to the Tube station and got on the train. I was meeting a man for dinner, someone I barely knew. He had got my number from a mutual friend. When I arrived at the restaurant he was already there, waiting. He was reading a book, which he relaxed in his bag before I could see the title. He asked me how I was and I found myself saying that I was very tired, to the extent that I might not have all that much to say for myself. He looked a little disappointed at this news, and asked if I wanted to hang up my coat. I said I would keep it on: I felt cold. There were builders in my house, I added. The doors and windows were constantly open and the heating had been turned off. The house had become like a tomb, a place of dust and chill. It was impossible to eat or sleep or work – there wasn’t even anywhere to sit down. Everywhere I looked I saw skeletons, the skeletons of walls and floors, so that the house felt unshielded, permeable, as though all the things those walls and floors ought normally to keep out were free to enter. I had to go into debt to finance the work – a debt I had no immediate prospect of being able to repay – and so even when it was done I wasn’t sure I would feel entirely comfortable there. My children, I added, were away. I told him the story of the Saluki dogs following the hawk: my current awareness of my children, I said, was similarly acute and gruelling, except that I was trying to keep sight of them on my own. On top of that, I said, there was something in the basement, something that took the form of two people, though I would hesitate to give their names to it. It was more of a force, a power of elemental negativity that seemed somehow related to the power to create. Their hatred of me was so pure, I said, that it almost passed back into love again.

There was a reason I’d always tended to stay away from the financial side of cyber-ops. I wouldn’t call myself irresponsible with my money, but I’d always had a, here’s money, here are things I need or want to spend it on, done sort of approach to finances.

Wouldn’t it be easier to pay all our bills from the same place? Less stressful? It probably was, for some people. And I wished I were one of them, I did, but the thought of combining our finances made me feel like burying myself alive.

BERNARDINE QUINN: We’re calling marriage equality ‘equality’ as if the day that there’s a bill stamped saying lesbian and gay people can get married that we’ll have full equality. Yet in Meath, there isn’t one single support service for a young lesbian or gay person to attend; there isn’t one qualified full-time youth worker to work with young LGBT people; there is absolutely zero trans services, where the trans services in Dublin are mediocre at best. There’s something about ‘marriage equality’ – that we’ll all be equal when marriage comes in, when a kid in west Kerry doesn’t even have a telephone number of a helpline that he can ring for support. This was raised by our young people to Mairead McGuinness and to Mary Lou McDonald when they were here, just to say, thinking that your work around marriage equality – that that’s not all. The allocation of finances to LGBT work in this country is tiny compared to what is given to most other services. There’s something about calling it ‘equality’. It’s another step on the ladder and it’s a hugely important step … But it isn’t all. There’s another battle after that, and that is to get services to west Donegal, to Mayo, into the Midlands, to get real, solid support in these areas so that a young LGBT person has something in every county, trained qualified people to talk to. In some areas where those services aren’t available, where there isn’t training for schools, where there’s nobody that a kid can talk to, to say that they think they’re transgender – I don’t want to sound negative – I think marriage equality is going to be fantastic for a lot of lesbian and gay people. I think if you were 14 and coming out today, your story is going to be so much more different than when I was 14. The prospects of you considering yourself what every other young person considers themselves of 14 when you think about your future and what you’re going to do: you’re going to meet the person that you love, you’re going to get married, going to have kids, going to have the house and the picket fence. That will be an option for a kid. When I came out, those dreams were put very firmly away. I was never going to get married, I was never going to have children, I was never going to make my family proud, my dad was never going to walk me up the aisle. All of those kinds of things were not even an option when I came out. As a matter of fact, there was a better chance that I was going to have to go to London, I was going to bring huge shame on my family, I probably would end up not speaking to half my siblings and my parents, having to go away and fend for myself. That was my option. I think that option has dramatically changed. People can live in their home towns easier now … Anything that makes a young person’s life easier, and gives them more opportunities, is fantastic. I think that a young person, 14, 15, only starting to discover themselves, they’ve got a whole other suite of options. They can talk about, ‘I’ll eventually marry my partner.’ I think I’m only after saying that for the first time in my life, that there will be an option to marry my partner.

For several weeks I racked my brain trying to figure out how I was going to survive at Salomon. But then I noticed something interesting. Nobody was doing anything in Russia, meaning there was no one to fight me over it. I decided to take a chance. I declared myself the

The London offices of BCG were right above the Green Park Tube stop on the Piccadilly Line in the heart of Mayfair. I presented myself at reception and was shown into John Lindquist’s corner office,

armies are not very good about carrying libraries with them. i can’t imagine why. we’d fight so much less if everyone would sit down and read.” gifford’s laugh rumbled through him, loud against jane’s ear. “a question i often ask myself. imagine how much money the realm would save if the rulers focused their finances on libraries rather than wars.” “not if i were allowed to shop for books.” “england would go bankrupt,” he said gravely. “thank god for wars.” - jane & g

armies are not very good about carrying libraries with them. i can’t imagine why. we’d fight so much less if everyone would sit down and read.” “a question i often ask myself. imagine how much money the realm would save if the rulers focused their finances on libraries rather than wars.” “not if i were allowed to shop for books.” “england would go bankrupt,” g said gravely. “thank god for wars.” - jane & g

along the sidewalk fluttered and the branches swayed. My body tensed and my head throbbed as I imagined Carla out there somewhere, ignoring my calls. Because she was with him. What were they doing right now? I wondered irritably. At this very moment? I bowed my head and leaned forward over the white windowsill, bracing my weight on my knuckles and clenched fists, breathing deep and slow. Hell. I needed a cup of coffee. Turning away from the window, I moved into the kitchen to brew a pot, then poured myself a bowl of cereal, which I ate on the sofa while watching the sports channel on television. I checked my phone again for a text from Carla. Still…nothing. A part of me wanted to give her the benefit of the doubt, because I knew I wasn’t the most rational guy in the world when it came to cheating girlfriends. I’d been burned once before, so I had a small problem with jealousy. But what if she’d been in a car accident on her way home yesterday and was in a coma at the hospital and couldn’t get in touch? If that was the case, I was going to feel pretty guilty. But it wasn’t the case, and I knew it. I’d have heard something. No, she hadn’t texted or called because she didn’t know how to tell me it was over. She felt badly about standing me up for dinner the other night and probably wasn’t ready to face me and explain herself. I felt a muscle twitch at my jaw. Setting my empty cereal bowl down, I rested my elbows on my knees and stared at the blue velvet ring box on the coffee table. Thirty-five hundred bucks. That’s how much that gigantic sucker had cost, and I’d had no choice but to set up a financing plan with monthly payments because I didn’t have that

In my experience as a cameraman, it was quite exceptional to have to light up a surface and volumes that were so immense as those in the Berlin library. I was both very impressed and also worried when the decision was made to shoot in that location. My general philosophy is never to argue with the director. I have only done so very rarely. I can't remember ever refusing to shoot any given scene - as certain of my colleagues had. Whatever difficulties were involved, I told myself: "Actually, I'm here to try to effectuate the thought of the director. So let's try to acquiesce to his vision." And Wim wanted this fabulous decor. But with respect to technical matters, it required a lot of equipment. And it was my good fortune to be working for a company that could finance my own needs, which were enormous. Since there was a lot of current needed, a lot of lights, a lot of gaffers to do the installations. Since everything had to be hidden. And in fact, you don't see a single light, despite the fact that there were scores of them set up at the location. And it was difficult because we filmed in the daytime - but since it was winter, at three or four o'clock in the afternoon, it looks light night - we had to take whatever measures we could to prolong the day, even if we continued filming in the same direction as at the start. It was then decided - and this is one of the nice things about working with Wim - that as long as the daylight lasted, we would film in one direction, and when night came, we would change direction, and return a week later (since we could only film there one day a week: on Sunday). So there were in fact immense difficulties. And in the end, I found that these were beneficial constraints, because something good always comes from having constraints. The same is true of painting. Painters who have no constraints don't produce anything extraordinary. I think that in all the arts, these constraints are present. And there are plenty of them in the art of cinema. So I acquiesced to these difficult conditions for shooting, and in the end I was rather happy with the situation.

Every financier ought to be a polymath, because finance is the thread that runs through every aspect of life. It is indeed the knot where all the disparate strands of human existence come together. Business is the common denominator of all activities and enterprises. This, in turn, means there is no affair that does not pertain to the businessman. To him everything is relevant. He is the true Renaissance man. And this is why I gave myself to the pursuit of knowledge in every conceivable realm, from history and geography to chemistry and meteorology.

Salary and bonus expectations? Where in the world did he get the idea that I was here for a job interview? After subjecting myself to the vicious snake pit of Salomon Brothers, the last thing I wanted was to be a servant for a bunch of upper-class amateurs pretending to be businessmen and whose main expletive was the word quite.

But I wasn't working regularly, and Steve had no career at all, so building a fantasy home at that particular moment couldn't have been a completely good idea either. Yet that's what Steve wanted to do: build a house. He was like a kid in a toy store, determined to get what he wanted. And no matter how many reasons I gave as to why we couldn't and shouldn't, he'd come back with reasons why we absolutely could and should: He would build half of it himself, be part of the construction crew, devote his life to it, stressing the point he knew all about finances and was positive it was a good investment. I wouldn't have known a good investment from a hole in the ground, plus I remained frightened of anything financial and therefore had no idea how much money we actually had. Part of me wanted to feel as if Steve knew what he was doing, that he could handle this part of our lives while I concerned myself with taking care of the kids and making a living. Which meant building a career, not a house.

I wanted to succeed, to prove that I could do this. I wanted that more badly than I’d ever wanted anything. The world is shaped by powerful forces—politics, finance, media—from which most people live distantly, feeling the ripple effects but never understanding the origin. In the past year, I had finally crossed a crucial threshold. I was standing on the side of actor, not acted-upon. I sensed myself getting stronger, sharper, better. But I also sensed how desire fed on itself. It ballooned inside of me, until it squeezed out room for anything else. Sometimes I wondered whether it was deforming me. But maybe that was backwards. Maybe you had to be deformed in the first place to be capable of such blistering want. Things weren’t getting pushed out. It was that there’d never been anything else in there. Just a void, waiting to be filled.

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Exercise. When I see a set of stairs, I will take them instead of using the elevator. ■ Social skills. When I walk into a party, I will introduce myself to someone I don’t know yet. ■ Finances. When I want to buy something over $100, I will wait twenty-four hours before purchasing. ■ Healthy eating. When I serve myself a meal, I will always put veggies on my plate first. ■ Minimalism. When I buy a new item, I will give something away. (“One in, one out.”16) ■ Mood. When the phone rings, I will take one deep breath and smile before answering. ■ Forgetfulness. When I leave a public place, I will check the table and chairs to make sure I don’t leave anything behind.

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