Refi Quotes

Realism is for lazy-minded, semi-educated people whose atrophied imagination allows them to appreciate only the most limited and convention subject matter. Re-Fi is a repetitive genre written by unimaginative hacks who rely on mere mimesis. If they had any self-respect they'd be writing memoir, but they're too lazy to fact-check. Of course I never read Re-Fi. But the kids keep bringing home these garish realistic novels and talking about them, so I know that it's an incredibly narrow genre, completely centered on one species, full of worn-out cliches and predictable situations--the quest for the father, mother-bashing, obsessive male lust, dysfunctional suburban families, etc., etc. All it's good for is being made into mass-market movies. Given its old-fashioned means and limited subject matter, realism is quite incapable of describing the complexity of contemporary experience.

Refi Cevad’ın (17 Ekim 1958) Milliyet gazetesinde çıkan yazısındaki tarife göre kısaca terbiye, “yanındakileri rahatsız etmemek”tir. Yani terbiye, nerede olunursa olunsun “eliyle ya da diliyle” başkasına ıstırap vermemek demektir. Nitekim bu anlamda Efendimiz (s.a.v.) “mü’min”i tarif ederken de aynı vurguyu yapmıştır: “Mü’min, elinden ve dilinden başkasına zarar gelmeyendir”. Peki, terbiye buysa, bunun eğitimi nerde başlar? Elbette insanın bir çekirdek gibi filizlenip boy verdiği “ev”de!

Morel is afflicted with too noble a conception of man. He demands too much of human beings, and he refiLses to compromise. You can’t live with that inside you. It becomes almost a question of physiology. What he calls for is not even moral progress; it's really a biological mutation. He can’t accept the very biological limitations which make us what we are — weak, crawling in our mud, and totally devoid of dignity. That's the iron law he’s protesting, the law he refuses to submit to.

I am happy to report that, through the years, Olivia and I held firm and never splurged on extras during our investment journey. This means that we never took excess cash flow, refi money, or other real estate cash to buy a fancy car, upgrade our primary residence, or go on expensive vacations. This was very hard to do, since we had plenty of opportunities to use our profits to reward ourselves, but that was not our goal. Instead, we watched friends and family buy really nice cars, upgrade their houses, and take some pretty spectacular vacations while we were quietly using that cash for down payments, make-ready costs, and other real estate items.