Massive Attitude Quotes

You better have a massive dick to back up that attitude or else people will be mighty disappointed.

You better have a massive dick to back up that attitude or else people will be mighty disappointed.”  “Care to bring out a ruler and test your theory?”  “I left my magnifying glass at home, so maybe tomorrow.

The sense that card-carrying American evangelicalism now requires acquiescence to attitudes and practices that negate core teachings of Jesus is fueling today’s massive exodus.

A Fierro can concede to a massive ego only so far. I’m too headstrong and outspoken to endure an attitude. From what I’ve read, Tommy Bianchi is nothing but a bad attitude.

Fear will always be a tenant in your mind, but do not make fear the landlord of your mind.

You go out into your world, and try and find the things that will be useful to you. Your weapons. Your tools. Your charms. You find a record, or a poem, or a picture of a girl that you pin to the wall and go, "Her. I'll try and be her. I'll try and be her - but here." You observe the way others walk, and talk, and you steal little bits of them - you collage yourself out of whatever you can get your hands on. You are like the robot Johnny 5 in Short Circuit, crying, "More input! More input for Johnny 5! as you rifle through books and watch films and sit in front of the television, trying to guess which of these things that you are watching - Alexis Carrington Colby walking down a marble staircase; Anne of Green Gables holding her shoddy suitcase; Cathy wailing on the moors; Courtney Love wailing in her petticoat; Dorothy Parker gunning people down; Grace Jones singing "Slave to the Rhythm" - you will need when you get out there. What will be useful. What will be, eventually, you? And you will be quite on your own when you do all this. There is no academy where you can learn to be yourself; there is no line manager slowly urging you toward the correct answer. You are midwife to yourself, and will give birth to yourself, over and over, in dark rooms, alone. And some versions of you will end in dismal failure - many prototypes won't even get out the front door, as you suddenly realize that no, you can't style-out an all-in-one gold bodysuit and a massive attitude problem in Wolverhampton. Others will achieve temporary success - hitting new land-speed records, and amazing all around you, and then suddenly, unexpectedly exploding, like the Bluebird on Coniston Water. But one day you'll find a version of you that will get you kissed, or befriended, or inspired, and you will make your notes accordingly, staying up all night to hone and improvise upon a tiny snatch of melody that worked. Until - slowly, slowly - you make a viable version of you, one you can hum every day. You'll find the tiny, right piece of grit you can pearl around, until nature kicks in, and your shell will just quietly fill with magic, even while you're busy doing other things. What your nature began, nature will take over, and start completing, until you stop having to think about who you'll be entirely - as you're too busy doing, now. And ten years will pass without you even noticing. And later, over a glass of wine - because you drink wine now, because you are grown - you will marvel over what you did. Marvel that, at the time, you kept so many secrets. Tried to keep the secret of yourself. Tried to metamorphose in the dark. The loud, drunken, fucking, eyeliner-smeared, laughing, cutting, panicking, unbearably present secret of yourself. When really you were about as secret as the moon. And as luminous, under all those clothes.

Clint stared down at him. He was wearing what appeared to be a massive, lopsided and jewel-encrusted crown, holding a scepter and surrounded by a floating mass of Roombas. “Welcome to the sovereign nation of Bartonia,” he said, with a straight face. “My subjects, the Roombas, the drones and one random mechanical bird thing that I found, and I welcome you, and ask you what the fuck you think you're doing here, you are seriously a fucking moron.” “I'm here,” Tony gritted out, “to rescue you, and what kind of fucking attitude is that?.” “A little short for a storm trooper, aren't you?” Clint said, arching an eyebrow. He offered Tony a hand. “Are you wearing a crown? Seriously? Where did you get a- Why are you wearing a crown?” Tony asked, taking it and allowing Clint to help lever him back to his feet. “Listen, dude, I have learned something about myself today. Mostly, I have learned that if I end up in some sort of alien rubbish dump surrounded by neurotic robots and without a clue as to if I'm ever going to make it home, if I find a crown, I'm putting that bad boy on. There should never be a time when you do not wear a crown. Find a crown, you wear it and declare sovereignty over the vast mechanical wastes.” Clint waved his scepter around a bit, making the Roombas dodge. “Thus, Bartonia.

One of the plagues of our day is that it's easy to feel overwhelmed and powerless in the face of massive violence, poverty and injustice around the globe...One of the greatest needs in this country is for us to have some hope, and to feel empowered that as ordinary people we can make a difference.

Most Western Christians—and most Western non-Christians, for that matter—in fact suppose that Christianity was committed to at least a soft version of Plato’s position. A good many Christian hymns and poems wander off unthinkingly in the direction of Gnosticism. The “just passing through” spirituality (as in the spiritual “This world is not my home, / I’m just a’passin’ through”), though it has some affinities with classical Christianity, encourages precisely a Gnostic attitude: the created world is at best irrelevant, at worst a dark, evil, gloomy place, and we immortal souls, who existed originally in a different sphere, are looking forward to returning to it as soon as we’re allowed to. A massive assumption has been made in Western Christianity that the purpose of being a Christian is simply, or at least mainly, to “go to heaven when you die,” and texts that don’t say that but that mention heaven are read as if they did say it, and texts that say the opposite, like Romans 8:18–25 and Revelation 21–22, are simply screened out as if they didn’t exist.13

All these assumptions lead to still more implications, ones that shape attitudes, identities, and debates about policy. If slavery was outside of US history, for instance—if indeed it was a drag and not a rocket booster to American economic growth—then slavery was not implicated in US growth, success, power, and wealth. Therefore none of the massive quantities of wealth and treasure piled by that economic growth is owed to African Americans. Ideas about slavery’s history determine the ways in which Americans hope to resolve the long contradiction between the claims of the United States to be a nation of freedom and opportunity, on the one hand, and, on the other, the unfreedom, the unequal treatment, and the opportunity denied that for most of American history have been the reality faced by people of African descent.

Sometimes when you have a wild dream [massive vision]people intend to run away from you but is not that they hate you or jealous of you. Simply they can't see what you see, they can't hear what you hear and they don't know what you know. The best thing is to love them in spite of their silence.

It is the opinion of most thoughtful students of life that happiness in this world depends chiefly on the ability to take things as they come. An instance of one who may be said to have perfected this attitude is to be found in the writings of a certain eminent Arabian author who tells of a traveller who, sinking to sleep one afternoon upon a patch of turf containing an acorn, discovered when he woke that the warmth of his body had caused the acorn to germinate and that he was now some sixty feet above the ground in the upper branches of a massive oak. Unable to descend, he faced the situation equably. ‘I cannot,’ he observed, ‘adapt circumstances to my will: therefore I shall adapt my will to circumstances. I decide to remain here.’ Which he did.

Attitude. People are attracted to other people who “feel good” to them. The people you most likely feel great around are the people who are easy to be with, who make you feel good about yourself, and who encourage you to be your best self. This “beingness” creates a positive environment in which you can excel.

A positive philosophy turns into a positive attitude, which turns into positive actions, which turns into positive results, which turns into a positive lifestyle. A positive life.

You better have a massive dick to back up that attitude or else people will be mighty disappointed.”  “Care to bring out a ruler and test your theory?”  “I left my magnifying glass at home, so maybe tomorrow.” I’m pretty sure the angel on my shoulder has left the building.  Something shifts between us. His eyes darken as they assess me. I’m not sure if he wants to choke me, fire me, or fuck me into submission. “Are you always this impossible?” “I don’t know. Are you always this much of an asshole?”  One second he’s scowling at me and the next his lips are slamming into mine.

External relationships seem to have been emptied by a massive withdrawal of the real libidinal self. Effective mental activity has disappeared into a hidden inner world; the patient's conscious ego is emptied of vital feeling and action, and seems to have become unreal. You may catch glimpses of intense activity going on in the inner world through dreams and fantasies, but the patient's conscious ego merely reports these as if it were a neutral observer not personally involved in the inner drama of which it is a detached spectator. The attitude to the outer world is the same: non-involvement and observation at a distance without any feeling, like that of a press reporter describing a social gathering of which he is not a part, in which he has no personal interest, and by which he is bored. Such activity as is carried on may appear to be mechanical. When a schizoid state supervenes, the conscious ego appears to be in a state of suspended animation in between two worlds, internal and external, and having no real relationships with either of them. It has decreed an emotional and impulsive standstill, on the basis of keeping out of effective range and being unmoved.

Between a monkey and a snake, the one that resists change the most is the snake. You can hardly domesticate a snake and make it your trustworthy friend. And so, taking into consideration that most people refuse to change their attitude, and instead decide to discriminate others and act as enemies to the human race as a whole, in their selfishness, competitiveness and egotistical stubbornness, without empathy or compassion for others, they are acting like reptiles, not mammals. We have too much of reptile-thinking inside the human race; and the distance between our reality and a fiction movie about an alien invasion, in which reptiles walk among us disguised as humans isn't that much. We have been corrupted already. Humanity is nearly extinct due to a massive invasion of a reptilian belief-system.

You better have a massive dick to back up that attitude or else people will be mighty disappointed.”  “Care to bring out a ruler and test your theory?”  “I left my magnifying glass at home, so maybe tomorrow.” I’m pretty sure the angel on my shoulder has left the building.

Do we ever stop dreaming? I know I haven't. I must have been at least twenty-five when the Spice Girls happened, and I distinctly remember imagining my way into the group. I was going to be the sixth Spice, 'Massive Spice', who, against all the odds, would become the most popular and lusted-after Spice. The Spice who sang the vast majority of solo numbers in the up-tempo tracks. The Spice who really went the distance. And I still haven't quite given up on the Wimbledon Ladies' Singles Championship. I mean, it can't be too late, can it? I've got a lovely clean T-shirt, and I've figured out exactly how I'd respond to winning the final point (lie on floor wailing, get up, do triumphant lap of the ring slapping crowd members' box). It can't be just me who does this. I'm convinced that most adults, when travelling alone in a car, have a favourite driving CD of choice and sing along to it quite seriously, giving it as much attitude and effort as they can, due to believing – in that instant – that they're the latest rock or pop god playing to a packed Wembley stadium. And there must be at least one man, one poor beleaguered City worker, who likes to pop into a phone box then come out pretending he's Superman. Is there someone who does this? Anyone? If so, I'd like to meet you and we shall marry in the spring (unless you're really, really weird and the Superman thing is all you do, in which case BACK OFF).

We think with our culture. That is, we rarely think from first principles, even first principles we ourselves sincerely endorse, but rather from sentiments instilled in us by our culture. Nowhere is this more obvious than in the case of humanity’s moral attitudes toward non-human animals. Even most utilitarians, who by their own ideals ought to consider the suffering of all beings important, are still in fact exceptionally anthropocentric in their attitudes. The insights of Darwin have not yet trickled fully into our moral consciousness, not even among those whose moral views demand it. Such is the heavy momentum of culture, which is reflected in every facet of modern politics and political thought. The anthropocentrism of most political philosophy is, to put it mildly, a massive failure.

The key to success in selling/recruiting lies in your ability to go from no to no without losing your enthusiasm. Remember that we are in the people attraction business. So we must keep our level of passion and excitement high as we sort through the prospects because part of what they are buying into is our “music” — our conviction and attitude about what we are a part of. It’s not what you say; it’s how it sounds that is most important. Don’t worry about having the right words … that is secondary.

Now come on, we’re off.” He marched out of the room. They heard the front door open, but Dudley did not move and after a few faltering steps Aunt Petunia stopped too. “What now?” barked Uncle Vernon, reappearing in the doorway. It seemed that Dudley was struggling with concepts too difficult to put into words. After several moments of apparently painful internal struggle he said, “But where’s he going to go?” Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon looked at each other. It was clear that Dudley was frightening them. Hestia Jones broke the silence. “But…surely you know where your nephew is going?” she asked, looking bewildered. “Certainly we know,” said Vernon Dursley. “He’s off with some of your lot, isn’t he? Right, Dudley, let’s get in the car, you heard the man, we’re in a hurry.” Again, Vernon Dursley marched as far as the front door, but Dudley did not follow. “Off with some of our lot?” Hestia looked outraged. Harry had met this attitude before: Witches and wizards seemed stunned that his closest living relatives took so little interest in the famous Harry Potter. “It’s fine,” Harry assured her. “It doesn’t matter, honestly.” “Doesn’t matter?” repeated Hestia, her voice rising ominously. “Don’t these people realize what you’ve been through? What danger you are in? The unique position you hold in the hearts of the anti-Voldemort movement?” “Er--no, they don’t,” said Harry. “They think I’m a waste of space, actually, but I’m used to--” “I don’t think you’re a waste of space.” If Harry had not seen Dudley’s lips move, he might not have believed it. As it was, he stared at Dudley for several seconds before accepting that it must have been his cousin who had spoken; for one thing, Dudley had turned red. Harry was embarrassed and astonished himself. “Well…er…thanks, Dudley.” Again, Dudley appeared to grapple with thoughts too unwieldy for expression before mumbling, “You saved my life.” “Not really,” said Harry. “It was your soul the dementor would have taken…” He looked curiously at his cousin. They had had virtually no contact during this summer or last, as Harry had come back to Privet Drive so briefly and kept to his room so much. It now dawned on Harry, however, that the cup of cold tea on which he had trodden that morning might not have been a booby trap at all. Although rather touched, he was nevertheless quite relieved that Dudley appeared to have exhausted his ability to express his feelings. After opening his mouth once or twice more, Dudley subsided into scarlet-faced silence. Aunt Petunia burst into tears. Hestia Jones gave her an approving look that changed to outrage as Aunt Petunia ran forward and embraced Dudley rather than Harry. “S-so sweet, Dudders…” she sobbed into his massive chest. “S-such a lovely b-boy…s-saying thank you…” “But he hasn’t said thank you at all!” said Hestia indignantly. “He only said he didn’t think Harry was a waste of space!” “Yeah, but coming from Dudley that’s like ‘I love you,’” said Harry, torn between annoyance and a desire to laugh as Aunt Petunia continued to clutch at Dudley as if he had just saved Harry from a burning building.

The proper attitude toward human activity and climate is expressed in the 1957 novel Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand. Consider the following passage, where industrialist-philosopher Francisco d’Anconia remarks to steel magnate Hank Rearden how dangerous the climate is, absent massive industrial development. The conversation takes place indoors at an elegant party during a severe storm (in the era before all severe storms were blamed on fossil fuels). There was only a faint tinge of red left on the edge of the earth, just enough to outline the scraps of clouds ripped by the tortured battle of the storm in the sky. Dim shapes kept sweeping through space and vanishing, shapes which were branches, but looked as if they were the fury of the wind made visible. “It’s a terrible night for any animal caught unprotected on that plain,” said Francisco d’Anconia. “This is when one should appreciate the meaning of being a man.” Rearden did not answer for a moment; then he said, as if in answer to himself, a tone of wonder in his voice, “Funny . . .” “What?” “You told me what I was thinking just a while ago . . .” “You were?” “. . . only I didn’t have the words for it.” “Shall I tell you the rest of the words?” “Go ahead.” “You stood here and watched the storm with the greatest pride one can ever feel—because you are able to have summer flowers and half-naked women in your house on a night like this, in demonstration of your victory over that storm. And if it weren’t for you, most of those who are here would be left helpless at the mercy of that wind in the middle of some such plain.

The traditional reluctance in this country to confront the real nature of racism is once again illustrated by the manner in which the majority of American whites interpreted what the Kerner Commission had to say about white racism. It seems that they have taken the Kerner Report as a call merely to examine their individual attitudes. The examination of individual attitudes is, of course, an indispensable requirement if the influence of racism is to be neutralized, but it is neither the only nor the basic requirement. The Kerner Report took great pains to make a distinction between racist attitudes and racist behavior. In doing so, it was trying to point out that the fundamental problem lies in the racist behavior of American institutions toward Negroes, and that the behavior of these institutions is influenced more by overt racist actions of people than by their private attitudes. If so, then the basic requirement is for white Americans, while not ignoring the necessity for a revision of their private beliefs, to concentrate on actions that can lead to the ultimate democratization of American institutions. By focusing upon private attitudes alone, white Americans may come to rely on token individual gestures as a way of absolving themselves personally of racism, while ignoring the work that needs to be done within public institutions to eradicate social and economic problems and redistribute wealth and opportunity. I mean by this that there are many whites sitting around in drawing rooms and board rooms discussing their consciences and even donating a few dollars to honor the memory of Dr. King. But they are not prepared to fight politically for the kind of liberal Congress the country needs to eradicate some of the evils of racism, or for the massive programs needed for the social and economic reconstruction of the black and white poor, or for a revision of the tax structure whereby the real burden will be lifted from the shoulders of those who don't have it and placed on the shoulders of those who can afford it. Our time offers enough evidence to show that racism and intolerance are not unique American phenomena. The relationship between the upper and lower classes in India is in some ways more brutal than the operation of racism in America. And in Nigeria black tribes have recently been killing other black tribes in behalf of social and political privilege. But it is the nature of the society which determines whether such conflicts will last, whether racism and intolerance will remain as proper issues to be socially and politically organized. If the society is a just society, if it is one which places a premium on social justice and human rights, then racism and intolerance cannot survive —will, at least, be reduced to a minimum. While working with the NAACP some years ago to integrate the University of Texas, I was assailed with a battery of arguments as to why Negroes should not be let in. They would be raping white girls as soon as they came in; they were dirty and did not wash; they were dumb and could not learn; they were uncouth and ate with their fingers. These attitudes were not destroyed because the NAACP psychoanalyzed white students or held seminars to teach them about black people. They were destroyed because Thurgood Marshall got the Supreme Court to rule against and destroy the institution of segregated education. At that point, the private views of white students became irrelevant. So while there can be no argument that progress depends both on the revision of private attitudes and a change in institutions, the onus must be placed on institutional change. If the institutions of this society are altered to work for black people, to respond to their needs and legitimate aspirations, then it will ultimately be a matter of supreme indifference to them whether white people like them, or what white people whisper about them in the privacy of their drawing rooms.

Daily: Think positive. Read positive. Listen positive. Talk positive. Affirm positive. Watch positive. Practice positive. Make yourself positive. To ensure your beingness and attitude are at their best, I suggest you read The Miracle Morning by Hal Elrod. Hal emphasizes the importance of a morning routine that sets you up for success each and every day. Left to chance, perhaps you will have a good day, perhaps not. By creating a morning routine, you can set the odds heavily in your favor of having an epically fabulous day. Why not increase the odds you will have a fantastic day, full of energy, hope and enthusiasm? Success starts with attitude.

Why Lottery Winners Lose Your philosophy is your view of life, something beyond feelings and attitudes. Your philosophy drives your attitudes and feelings, which drive your actions. By and large, people are looking in the wrong places. They are looking for a big break, that lucky breakthrough, the amazing “quantum leap” everyone keeps talking about. I call it the philosophy of the craps table and roulette wheel, and I don’t believe they’ll ever find it. I’ve seen an awful lot of remarkable successes and colossal failures up close, and in my experience, neither one happens in quantum leaps or “breaks,” whether the lucky or unlucky kind. They happen through the slight edge.

Attitude creates actions create results create destiny. Dan Buettner, author of Blue Zones: Lessons for Living Longer From the People Who’ve Lived the Longest, has traveled the world studying the everyday living habits of people who are healthiest and live the longest of anyone on the planet. Of all the factors possibly influencing health, vitality, and longevity, Buettner and his team compiled a list of nine. These people (1) live an active life, (2) cultivate purpose and a reason to wake up every morning, (3) take time to de-stress (appreciation, prayer, etc.), (4) stop eating when they are 80 percent full, (5) eat a diet emphasizing vegetables, especially beans, (6) have moderate alcohol intake (especially dark red wine), (7) play an active role in a faith-based community, (8) place a strong emphasis on family, and (9) are part of like-minded social circles with similar habits. As Buettner points out, physiological factors like exercise and diet play a role—but not as big a role as you’d expect. A big part of it is factors that have to do with attitude, habits of behavior, and who they associate with. And while we’re talking about positivity, let me clear up a common misconception about positive outlook, right here and now. Cultivating positive outlook does not mean you are always happy. It does not mean life never gets you down. It does not mean you walk around with an idiotic grin on your face even when you’re hurting, and it doesn’t mean living in denial, ignoring the realities of pain and struggle, or checking your brain at the door. People who cultivate a genuinely positive outlook go through tough times, too; when we’re cut, we bleed red blood just like everyone else.

To find the path to success, you have to back up one more step. It’s the understanding behind the attitudes that are behind the actions. It’s the philosophy. That’s the missing ingredient, the secret ingredient. The first ingredient. Yes, you have to know the winning how-to actions, and you have to possess the winning attitudes—but what generates all that and keeps it all in place is your philosophy. Your philosophy is what you know, how you hold it, and how it affects what you do. How you think about simple, everyday things. That’s what this book is about. A positive philosophy turns into a positive attitude, which turns into positive actions, which turns into positive results, which turns into a positive lifestyle. A positive life. And a negative philosophy turns into a negative attitude, which turns into negative actions, which turns into negative results, which turns into a negative lifestyle.

There are two prevalent types of attitudes: entitled and value-driven. A value-driven attitude says, “What can I do to help you?” An entitled attitude says, “What have you done for me lately?” An entitled attitude says, “Pay me more, and then maybe I’ll work harder.” A value-driven attitude says, “I’ll work harder, and then I expect you’ll pay me more.” Which of these attitudes is driven by Emerson’s philosophy, “Do the thing and you’ll have the power”? Your philosophy is what you know, how you hold what you know, and how it affects what you do. You can look at anyone’s actions and trace back, through the attitudes behind those actions, to their source: the philosophy behind the attitudes. Show me what a man does, and I’ll show you his philosophy.

When you attempt to change, if you’re part of the 92%, this happens: 1. You decide to change. 2. You are scared of the change, but determined to do it. 3. You start. 4. You hit a wall. 5. You stop your new action and fail to achieve change. This almost always happens at the beginning. You don’t really know what to do; you lack skills and/or knowledge. You are destined to struggle at first. After the first failure, your doubts awaken anxiousness. You try again, you fail again. Your doubts get stronger, your resolve weakens. You lose your enthusiasm for the change, and your efforts from this point are half-hearted. Half-hearted attempts have even less likelihood of succeeding, so you fail again and your negative attitude is reinforced. The problem is that you expected significant results too soon. That’s the curse of instant gratification at work. It’s completely unrealistic to expect a visible change in your body shape two weeks after starting a new diet. If it’s a balanced diet, not some Tic-Tac hardcore regime (only two calories), you can reasonably expect to lose maybe four pounds. Two is more realistic. Let’s say three on average. Even if you are a skinny fellow like me, three pounds is just 2% of your body weight. That loss will be almost invisible. That result may not seem enough for the effort you are making. Well, it is actually a great result. If you keep that pace, you would lose 78 pounds in a year. That’s visible even on obese people. However, you’ve set your internal evaluating mechanism to expect much more in a shorter time. You had the picture of your skinny bikini or 6-pack self in your mind, but all you see in the mirror is your same old flabby self. What is more, you’ll usually take intensive action when you begin something. You’re keen! You want results! You use this initial enthusiasm to apply massive effort. A very restrictive diet! A lot of exercises! It’s no wonder that after two weeks of such hard work you decide (at least subconsciously) that it’s not worth it. Do you see what’s happening?

Despite how utterly massive they might be, it is never the size of the arsenal nor the strength of the warrior. Rather, it is a heart bent on sacrifice that is the most potent weapon of all.

I think I have to take issue with you on that,” the Archbishop responded. “The people who go around becoming bullies are people who have a massive sense of insecurity, who want to prove that they are somebody, often because they did not get enough love.” “I think, yes, circumstances, environment, education all matter,” the Dalai Lama replied. “Especially today; there is not much focus on inner values in education. Then, instead of inner values, we become self-centered—always thinking: I, I, I. A self-centered attitude brings a sense of insecurity and fear. Distrust. Too much fear brings frustration. Too much frustration brings anger. So that’s the psychology, the system of mind, of emotion, which creates a chain reaction. With a self-centered attitude, you become distanced from others, then distrust, then feel insecure, then fear, then anxiety, then frustration, then anger, then violence.” It was fascinating to hear the Dalai Lama describe the process of mind that leads to fear, alienation, and ultimately to violence. I pointed out that so often our parenting in the West is too focused on our children, and their needs alone, rather than helping them to learn to care for others. The Dalai Lama responded, “Yes, there is too much self-centeredness also among parents—‘my children, my children.’ That’s biased love. We need unbiased love toward entire humanity, entire sentient beings, irrespective of what their attitude is toward us. So your enemies are still human brothers and sisters, so they also deserve our love, our respect, our affection. That’s unbiased love. You might have to resist your enemies’ actions, but you can love them as brothers and sisters. Only we human beings can do this with our human intelligence. Other animals cannot do this.

Google’s trucks would pull up to libraries and quietly walk away with boxes of books to be quickly scanned and returned. “If you don’t have a reason to talk about it, why talk about it?” Larry Page would argue, when confronted with pleas to publicly announce the existence of its program. The company’s lead lawyer on this described bluntly the roughshod attitude of his colleagues: “Google’s leadership doesn’t care terribly much about precedent or law.” In this case precedent was the centuries-old protections of intellectual property, and the consequences were a potential devastation of the publishing industry and all the writers who depend on it. In other words, Google had plotted an intellectual heist of historic proportions. What motivated Google in its pursuit? On one level, the answer is clear: To maintain dominance, Google’s search engine must be definitive. Here was a massive store of human knowledge waiting to be stockpiled and searched. On the other hand, there are less obvious motives: When the historian of technology George Dyson visited the Googleplex to give a talk, an engineer casually admitted, “We are not scanning all those books to be read by people. We are scanning them to be read by an AI.” If that’s true, then it’s easier to understand Google’s secrecy. The world’s greatest collection of knowledge was mere grist to train machines, a sacrifice for the singularity. Google is a company without clear boundaries, or rather, a company with ever-expanding boundaries. That’s why it’s chilling to hear Larry Page denounce competition as a wasteful concept and to hear him celebrate cooperation as the way forward. “Being negative is not how we make progress and most important things are not zero sum,” he says. “How exciting is it to come to work if the best you can do is trounce some other company that does roughly the same thing?” And it’s even more chilling to hear him contemplate how Google will someday employ more than one million people, a company twenty times larger than it is now. That’s not just a boast about dominating an industry where he faces no true rivals, it’s a boast about dominating something far vaster, a statement of Google’s intent to impose its values and theological convictions on the world.

Over and above the nagging pain, Marin had a reaction to that. It was as if he had somehow been hoping all this time, and now, suddenly, there was no hope. He felt the letdown, a kind of apathy of acceptance, a dull conviction that the worst was true, and a great sadness. He looked toward where he remembered having seen Riva that first night, her nude, tanned body half covered by the sheets of the bed. And then he visualized the same body at the instant of the titanic explosion, charred and smoldering, quickly burned to a fine ash. And in the shattered buildings all around him the members of Group 814, who had offered Wade Trask their good will, had died in a flash of dissolving fire. What was immensely disturbing was that they had died because he had discovered a secret. As he walked stiffly over the broken floor, back to where the laboratory had been, he had another thought: Even if he could survive the sentence of death, the Brain would search ceaselessly for the individual—himself—who knew of its existence. And, accordingly, it was time to be logical. “Am I going to try to save myself?” Marin asked himself the question. He had been waiting, he realized tensely, for something to happen that would automatically get him out of his predicament. He thought, Suppose I handled this entire affair as if it were a military campaign—who is the enemy? The Brain? He felt restless and indecisive. He bent down painfully and pushed a charred metal bar out of the way. And then he was able to look at the spot where—if his calculation was correct—his own body had lain. Right here, two days ago, the awareness entity that was Wade Trask inhabiting the body of David Marin had met instant death. Because of that event, the issue was now confused, but not too much. If the enemy were truly the Brain, then he could treat everyone else as if they were but puppets. “They were . . .” He tried to think it with intense conviction. “They are!” How could any competent authority fail to find the Brain? All those who were looking must be agents of the Brain. The entire search for such a massive structure was a farce. It was impossible to fail. He recalled Slater’s words and attitude, the secrecy of the search. Every Control officer who sought with such apparent determination was sworn to silence, and somehow they had managed to create a mental attitude whereby it became dangerous for anyone to remember that the Brain existed.

But tapping into the creative thinking of inventors and others on the outside would require massive operational changes. We needed to move the company’s attitude from resistance to innovations “not invented here” to enthusiasm for those “proudly found elsewhere.

Page 121: We left Xi'an through a fine gateway in the massive walls and plunged at once into a ghastly industrial suburb. I found my mood, my whole attitude towards China often changed as swiftly, so that I sometimes alternated between awestruck admiration and outright disgust. Their past and present attainments are outstanding. The level of culture reached repeatedly during succssive dynasties was so superior and produced so many exquisite objects. Life at court must have represented at many times civilization of a very high order during eras when most of the rest of the world was producing nothing remotely comparable. But we are told, and unquestionably it was true much of the time, that, like many empires, it was based on great cruelty, slavery and the oppression of the vast majority of the people.

The dangers of this ratchet effect to society are multiple. It pits groups one against another in the struggle for protection, it hinders the working of the price system, and it affects our attitude toward risk. At the end of the book, it becomes clear why trying to maintain people at their current level of income was such a bad policy. When the war ended, there was going to be a massive reallocation of resources as the economy shifted from a war foot- ing to peacetime, in the face of which it was important “that we should all be ready to adapt ourselves quickly to a very much changed world, that no considerations for the accustomed standard of particular groups must be allowed to obstruct this adaptation, and that we learn once more to turn all our resources to wherever they contribute most to make us richer . . . Let a uniform minimum be secured to everyone by all means; but let us admit at the same time that with this assurance of a basic minimum all claims for a privileged security of particular classes must lapse” (215). Thus the fear of policies likely to be undertaken after the war was at least in part responsible for Hayek’s distinction between the two types of security. He was willing to grant a basic minimum, but feared the outcome if those who pushed for more were successful.

Third, in our addiction to the rational consciousness and its countless props we believe the myth that we are really powerless to do anything about it. Addicts typically feel disempowered. The object to which they are addicted seems to them bigger and more powerful than their will. Similarly, stuck as we are in the lopsided worldview spawned by the rational consciousness, which tends to discredit other forms and states of consciousness, we do not believe that there is anything we can do about our situation. As addicts of the rational consciousness we do not believe in a universe that is inherently benign. We refuse to consider that the world we live in is actually comprised of the kinds of dimensions of reality that religions and spiritual traditions talk about. We disallow ourselves the possibility of inner or spiritual growth, because our view of human potential is limited to the capacities of the rational mind, which is viewed as the finest product of evolution. Fourth, like the typical addict, we tend to weave all kinds of explanatory tales to justify our present condition to ourselves and to each other. In this category belongs the “everybody thinks so” attitude, which is modeled not on the few exceptional men and women who can see farther than the rest, but on the lowest common denominator of understanding and living: a flagrant perversion of the democratic ideal. In other words, through word magic we engage in an act of massive repression by which we deny ourselves the opportunity to grow; we deny ourselves access to those forms and states of consciousness that our rational consciousness forces us to deny and belittle. Thus our experiential repertoire remains limited, even truncated. Fifth, addicts tend to be inflexible, dogmatic, and arrogant about defending their position, and we addicts of the rational consciousness are subject to the same mood. Because we have entrenched ourselves in an untenable position, in which the rational ego rules supreme, we meet any challenge to our unviable approach to life with haughty intransigence. We need to be right, because our entire worldview and life-style are at stake. And yet, sixth, like true addicts, those of us who are transfixed in the rational consciousness are deeply suffering our mood of separation, self-centeredness, and self-fragmentation. All life, observed Gautama the Buddha, is suffering. But there is suffering and then there is suffering. It appears that whenever we take the presumed independence of the human personality too seriously, cutting ourselves off from other beings and regarding the world as an enemy to be conquered, we become our own source of suffering. This suffering is superimposed on any adversity and pain we may experience as part of our human adventure on this planet. It is a psychological malaise from which we can recover only when we stop pinching ourselves. Our addiction to the “normal” rational consciousness is so potent that we cannot easily shake this habit even when we have realized that our habit of egoic self-encapsulation is artificial and self-inflicted and resting on a denial of the essential interconnectedness and interdependence of everything.

There is an invincible fortress that greed, gluttony and all of the other self-centered forces relentlessly assail with great force. Yet this unassailable fortress is such that the torrent may advance against it in a manner both vile and formidable, but the mad rage of this crazed maelstrom born of greed will helplessly fall to an exhausted calm before it ever touches its walls. And it is the simple attitude of thankfulness that builds a massive fortress such as this.

To stop Scum America, the decent majority must arise now and do four things: Vote in huge numbers and hand massive electoral defeats to Asshole Nation and Scum America Call out scummers when they trumpet their base and vile notions Never stop ridiculing “conservative” ideas Get together with other decent Americans to brainstorm ways to spread the attitude of decency

But life goes on without the smallest regard for individual preoccupations. You may take up what attitude you like towards it or, with the majority, you may take up no attitude towards it but immerse yourself in the stupendous importance of your own affairs and disclaim any connection with life. It doesn't matter tuppence to life. The ostrich, on much the same principle, buries its head in the sand; and just as forces outside the sand ultimately get the ostrich, so life, all the time, is massively getting you. You have to go along with it.

Convinced that a persistent negative emotional state had contributed to his illness, he decided it was equally possible that a more positive emotional state could reverse the damage. While continuing to consult with his doctor, Cousins started a regimen of massive doses of vitamin C and Marx Brothers movies (as well as other humorous films and comedy shows). He found that ten minutes of hearty laughter gave him two hours of pain-free sleep. Eventually, he made a complete recovery. Cousins, quite simply, laughed himself to health. How? Although scientists at the time didn’t have a way to understand or explain such a miraculous recovery, research now tells us it’s likely that epigenetic processes were at work. Cousins’s shift of attitude changed his body chemistry, which altered his internal state, enabling him to program new genes in new ways; he simply downregulated (or turned off) the genes that were causing his illness and upregulated (or turned on) the genes responsible for his recovery.

Your philosophy is your view of life, something beyond feelings and attitudes. Your philosophy drives your attitudes and feelings, which drive your actions.

Your attitude is the thing that translates your abstract understanding (philosophy) into your concrete actions.

A positive philosophy turns into a positive attitude, which turns into positive actions, which turns into positive results, which turns into a positive lifestyle. A positive life. And a negative philosophy turns into a negative attitude, which turns into negative actions, which turns into negative results, which turns into a negative lifestyle.

Success starts with attitude. Make sure yours is positive, expectant, upbeat, and infectious … and pretty much at all times. What success in life all boils down to is that it is “who you be” that factors more heavily into your success than “what you do.” Keep a keen eye on your being-ness, and you will find it easier to do the things you know you need to do, and as a result amazing things will show up in your life and business.

You may get inspired by that uplifting story or inspirational pep talk, but you can’t freeze that feeling or glue the emotions of the moment into place. Emotions change like the wind, and you can’t stop them. No one can. They keep moving; that’s why they’re called emotions and not e-standingstills. You can’t dictate how you feel. No matter how much you may tell yourself to feel positive about this how-to step or that how-to step, what if you just don’t? Today, you’re excited about getting fit. You feel like doing your twenty minutes on the treadmill. Great! But what if tomorrow you just don’t feel like doing it? To find the path to success, you have to back up one more step. It’s the understanding behind the attitudes that are behind the actions.

Different objects present themselves to consciousness as constituents of different spheres of reality. I recognize the fellowmen I must deal with in the course of everyday life as pertaining to a reality quite different from the disembodied figures that appear in my dreams. The two sets of objects introduce quite different tensions into my consciousness and I am attentive to them in quite different ways. My consciousness, then, is capable of moving through different spheres of reality. Put differently, I am conscious of the world as consisting of multiple realities. As I move from one reality to another, I experience the transition as a kind of shock. This shock is to be understood as caused by the shift in attentiveness that the transition entails. Waking up from a dream illustrates this shift most simply. Among the multiple realities there is one that presents itself as the reality par excellence. This is the reality of everyday life. Its privileged position entitles it to the designation of paramount reality. The tension of consciousness is highest in everyday life, that is, the latter imposes itself upon consciousness in the most massive, urgent and intense manner. It is impossible to ignore, difficult even to weaken in its imperative presence. Consequently, it forces me to be attentive to it in the fullest way. I experience everyday life in the state of being wide-awake. This wide-awake state of existing in and apprehending the reality of everyday life is taken by me to be normal and self-evident, that is, it constitutes my natural attitude. I

may not sound like the most compassionate philosophy in the world, but let me tell you, there’s nothing compassionate about letting yourself get sucked into a vortex of negativity. The best thing I can do to serve the world around me is to keep myself in a state where I can best contribute—and I can’t do that if I’m being dragged down by an environment of cynicism and self-pitying complaint. I want to spend my time with people who have an infectiously positive attitude, who bring energy and vitality to the table, and who brighten the room. There may be some people with whom you’re now spending two days a week where you might decide you need to take that down to two hours. There may also be people with whom you’re spending only two minutes, where you’ll realize you need to spend far more time with them—two hours or two days. And you will find times when what you really need to do is simply disassociate yourself from someone. That’s a part of the Law of Association, too.

Your negative thoughts corrupt your mind and gradually pollute your emotions, behavior, and attitude.

The David Dao incident is a classic example of how a poor articulation of company values can weaken the culture. The employees on the ground believed they needed to bump passengers from the flight so that United could get another flight crew to their plane (i.e., “flying right”) and that meeting metrics such as on-time departures and flight cancellations was more important than treating customers with “respect and dignity” (which most of us would agree does not include breaking their noses and knocking out their teeth). In contrast, Southwest Airlines is not only clear about its company values but makes them the emphasis of hiring and management. The mentality isn’t: “We’ll know it when we see it.” Instead, it is: “Does this person already live the way we do?” The company uses behavioral interview questions to determine whether candidates are a cultural fit. For example, to determine someone’s ability to be a selfless team player, they might ask her to describe a time when she went above and beyond to help a coworker succeed. The airline acknowledges that certain positions call for specific skill sets. As Southwest puts it, “We’re not going to hire a pilot who has a great attitude but can’t fly a plane!” But, when it comes down to two equally qualified candidates, the one who lives Southwest’s values receives the offer. And, even when Southwest finds a qualified candidate who doesn’t have the right values, it will keep looking until it finds someone who does—no matter how long the job has gone unfilled.

I think that's quite true. and in fact the people who understand this the best are those who are carrying out the control and domination in the more free societies. like the U.S. and England, where popular struggles have have won a lot of freedoms over the years and the state has limited capacity to coerce. It is very striking that it's precisely in those societies that elite groups—the business world, state managers and so on—recognized early on that they are going to have to develop massive methods of control of attitude and opinion, because you cannot control people by force anymore and therefore you have to modify their consciousness so that they don't perceive that they are living under conditions of alienation, oppression, subordination and so on. In fact, that's what probably a couple trillion dollars are spent on each year in the U.S., very self-consciously, from the framing of television advertisements for two-year olds to what you are taught in graduate school economics programs. It's designed to create a consciousness of subordination and it's also intended specifically and pretty consciously to suppress normal human emotions. Normal human emotions are sympathy and solidarity, not just for people but for stranded dolphins. It's just a normal reaction for people. If you go back to the classical political economists, people like Adam Smith, this was just taken for granted as the core of human nature and society. One of the main concentrations of advertising and education is to drive that out of your mind. And it's very conscious. In fact, it's conscious in social policy right in front of our eyes today. Take the effort to destroy Social Security. Well, what's the point of that? There's a lot of scam about financial problems, which is all total nonsense. And, of course, they want Wall Street to make a killing. Underlying it all is something much deeper. Social Security is based on a human emotion and it's a natural human emotion which has to be driven out of people minds, namely the emotion that you care about other people. You care. It's a social and community responsibility to care whether a disabled widow across town has enough food to eat, or whether a kid across the street can go to school. You have to get that out of people's heads. You have to make them say, "Look, you are a personal, rational wealth maximizer. If that disabled widow didn't prepare for her own future, it's her problem not your problem. It's not your fault she doesn't have enough to eat so why should you care?