Rock Motivational Quotes

You should date a girl who reads. Date a girl who reads. Date a girl who spends her money on books instead of clothes, who has problems with closet space because she has too many books. Date a girl who has a list of books she wants to read, who has had a library card since she was twelve. Find a girl who reads. You’ll know that she does because she will always have an unread book in her bag. She’s the one lovingly looking over the shelves in the bookstore, the one who quietly cries out when she has found the book she wants. You see that weird chick sniffing the pages of an old book in a secondhand book shop? That’s the reader. They can never resist smelling the pages, especially when they are yellow and worn. She’s the girl reading while waiting in that coffee shop down the street. If you take a peek at her mug, the non-dairy creamer is floating on top because she’s kind of engrossed already. Lost in a world of the author’s making. Sit down. She might give you a glare, as most girls who read do not like to be interrupted. Ask her if she likes the book. Buy her another cup of coffee. Let her know what you really think of Murakami. See if she got through the first chapter of Fellowship. Understand that if she says she understood James Joyce’s Ulysses she’s just saying that to sound intelligent. Ask her if she loves Alice or she would like to be Alice. It’s easy to date a girl who reads. Give her books for her birthday, for Christmas, for anniversaries. Give her the gift of words, in poetry and in song. Give her Neruda, Pound, Sexton, Cummings. Let her know that you understand that words are love. Understand that she knows the difference between books and reality but by god, she’s going to try to make her life a little like her favorite book. It will never be your fault if she does. She has to give it a shot somehow. Lie to her. If she understands syntax, she will understand your need to lie. Behind words are other things: motivation, value, nuance, dialogue. It will not be the end of the world. Fail her. Because a girl who reads knows that failure always leads up to the climax. Because girls who read understand that all things must come to end, but that you can always write a sequel. That you can begin again and again and still be the hero. That life is meant to have a villain or two. Why be frightened of everything that you are not? Girls who read understand that people, like characters, develop. Except in the Twilight series. If you find a girl who reads, keep her close. When you find her up at 2 AM clutching a book to her chest and weeping, make her a cup of tea and hold her. You may lose her for a couple of hours but she will always come back to you. She’ll talk as if the characters in the book are real, because for a while, they always are. You will propose on a hot air balloon. Or during a rock concert. Or very casually next time she’s sick. Over Skype. You will smile so hard you will wonder why your heart hasn’t burst and bled out all over your chest yet. You will write the story of your lives, have kids with strange names and even stranger tastes. She will introduce your children to the Cat in the Hat and Aslan, maybe in the same day. You will walk the winters of your old age together and she will recite Keats under her breath while you shake the snow off your boots. Date a girl who reads because you deserve it. You deserve a girl who can give you the most colorful life imaginable. If you can only give her monotony, and stale hours and half-baked proposals, then you’re better off alone. If you want the world and the worlds beyond it, date a girl who reads. Or better yet, date a girl who writes.

The problem, often not discovered until late in life, is that when you look for things in life like love, meaning, motivation, it implies they are sitting behind a tree or under a rock. The most successful people in life recognize, that in life they create their own love, they manufacture their own meaning, they generate their own motivation. For me, I am driven by two main philosophies, know more today about the world than I knew yesterday. And lessen the suffering of others. You'd be surprised how far that gets you.

Depression weighs you down like a rock in a river. You don't stand a chance. You can fight and pray and hope you have the strength to swim, but sometimes, you have to let yourself sink. Because you'll never know true happiness until someone or something pulls you back out of that river--and you'll never believe it until you realize it was you, yourself who saved you.

Nothing is born into this world without labor.

and half of learning to play is learning what not to play and she's learning the spaces she leaves have their own things to say and she's trying to sing just enough so that the air around her moves and make music like mercy that gives what it is and has nothing to prove she crawls out on a limb and begins to build her home and it's enough just to look around and to know that she's not alone up up up up up up up points the spire of the steeple but god's work isn't done by god it's done by people

You can't truly appreciate the top if you've never hit rock bottom.

After seven experiments with hundreds of children, we had some of the clearest findings I’ve ever seen: Praising children’s intelligence harms their motivation and it harms their performance. How can that be? Don’t children love to be praised? Yes, children love praise. And they especially love to be praised for their intelligence and talent. It really does give them a boost, a special glow—but only for the moment. The minute they hit a snag, their confidence goes out the window and their motivation hits rock bottom. If success means they’re smart, then failure means they’re dumb. That’s the fixed mindset.

Music shouldn't be just a tune, it should be a touch.

Achieving success is a challenge but so is struggling so you may as well choose success. 


Don’t ever perceive other people’s success as your own failure.

When you feel like you have been hit, dig deep and hit back. Rock bottom is not your end; it is your beginning.

Music is the fastest motivator in the world.

If you want to find money, focus on people. If you want to lose people, focus on money.

Leaders must get across the why as well as the what. Their people need more than milestones for motivation. They are thirsting for meaning, to understand how their goals relate to the mission.

You can perhaps, in a number of circumstances, tell yourself that you can't have more than you have until you do better than you're doing, but by all means steer clear of its reverse, the creed of defeat, in saying that you can't do better than you're doing until you can have more than you have.

It is good to look to the past to gain appreciation for the present and perspective for the future. It is good to look upon the virtues of those who have gone before, to gain strength for whatever lies ahead. It is good to reflect upon thw work of those who labored so hard and gained so little in this worls, but out of whose dreams and early plans, so well nurtured, has come a great harvest of which we are the beneficiaries. Their tremendous example can become a compelling motivation for us all. Gordon B. Hinckley

Life is a journey with big rocks to climb, little ones to trip over, and milestones to mark where we have been.

What my mom failed to understand was that I didn't even want long hair -- I needed long hair. And my desire for protracted, flowing locks had virtually nothing to do with fashion, nor was it a form of protest against the constructions of mainstream society. My motivation was far more philosophical. I wanted to rock.

A star is just a rock that dreamt for so long it eventually set itself on fire.

but darling you are a river. the rocks will break you the valleys will bend you. but you will never stop because that is what you do. you flow.

Gillette--The best a man can get." I stared at the screen. What happened to me? I was meant to be one of those guys, vigorous and athletic and successful and, most of all, American. I was going to walk on the moon, be a movie star or a rock got or a comedian. I was going to have an amazing life and kids with Helen and die like Chaplin a thousand years from now in my Beverly Hills mansion surrounded by my adoring family, with the grieving world media standing by. Instead, I was just another show-business mediocrity. A drunk who shat his pants and ran for help. My life had been careless and selfish. Pleasure in the moment was my only thought, my solitary motivation. I had disappointed whoever had been foolish enough to love me, and left them scarred. I was a very long way from being the best a man can get.

If it is to be, it's up to thee. You are responsible for your success.

Listen to learn. Learn to earn!

There is genuine Hip Hop; a message that connects, rocks a crowd, and motivates a people and then there is what is left... instead of Hip Hop we have Hip replacement.

If you have never reached rock bottom, you have never attended the school of greatness.

The beauty of adversity is that when we hit bottom, the only way to go is up.

That's the thing about rocks--they don't break easily. When I held them, I wanted to be like them-strong and steady, weathered but not broken.

Sometimes we have to reach rock bottom before we're willing to rise up and overcome our trials.

Wine had to be grapes first. Diamonds had to be rocks first. Butterflies had to be caterpillars first. Rainbows had to be storms first.

She’s an original! She doesn’t need to compete, copy, or envy other women. The confidence that’s within her won’t allow her to stoop that low. She’s a Queen! And jealousy isn’t something that she cares to entertain. Insecurity isn’t in her DNA. She shines! She succeeds! She’s a quality woman with purpose! She empowers, inspires, motivates, and celebrates other women. But depending on how you feel about yourself, you’ll either admire and respect her or hate on her. Listen, it’s okay to acknowledge other Queens! Don’t be an undercover hater. Have self-confidence and allow YOUR light to shine.

Yours is a race whose imagination is limited to its own small appetites. Greed, lust, envy - these are the motivating forces of humankind. What redeems you is that in every man and woman there is a seed that can grow to encompass love, joy and compassion. But this seed is never allowed to prosper in fertile ground. It struggles for life among the rocks of your human soul.

Never mistake movement for action... a rocking horse moves; a race horse charges towards a goal.

These are the people who will encourage you to go after your dreams and will inspire you to succeed. Stick to them like a barnacle to a rock.

Life is like playing a guitar and meditation is like music. Small session of rehearsals daily won’t show much but would make you ROCK in the long run.

You do not know which knock would shatter the rock enveloping your diamond.

Joy. Oh my god. He’s my joy. My laughter. My strength. My challenge. My motivation. My rock. My joy.

I might be fragile like a mirror. You might be the rock. Hit me all you want. But still in the end I’ll be the one shining.

If you keep a rock from pressure, you keep it from becoming a diamond.

I’ve had many doors closed in my face. More, in fact, than I can count. I hit rock bottom, but got back up and continued. I had no other choice; I had people depending on me.

I am a rock in a sea of despair and yearning. Take hold of me and together we may form an island of hope and plenty.

We all hit rock bottom; sometimes, you bounce up fast, sometimes you crawl until you can straighten up and sometimes you have to lay there for a long time until you learn how to rise again.

Friendship is a difficult thing to define. Oscar here is my oldest friend. How would you define friendship, Oscar?" Oscar grunts slightly, as though the answer is obvious. "Friendship is about choice and chemistry. It cannot be defined." "But surely there's something more to it than that." "It is a willingness to overlook faults and to accept them. I would let a friend hurt me without striking back," he says, smiling. "But only once." De Souza laughs. "Bravo, Oscar, I can always rely on you to distill an argument down to its purest form. What do you think, Dayel?" The Indian rocks his head from side to side, proud that he has been asked to speak next. "Friendship is different for each person and it changes throughout our lives. At age six it is about holding hands with your best friend. At sixteen it is about the adventure ahead. At sixty it is about reminiscing." He holds up a finger. "You cannot define it with any one word, although honesty is perhaps the closest word-" "No, not honesty," Farhad interrupts. "On the contrary, we often have to protect our friends from what we truly think. It is like an unspoken agreement. We ignore each other's faults and keep our confidences. Friendship isn't about being honest. The truth is too sharp a weapon to wield around someone we trust and respect. Friendship is about self-awareness. We see ourselves through the eyes of our friends. They are like a mirror that allows us to judge how we are traveling." De Souza clears his throat now. I wonder if he is aware of the awe that he inspires in others. I suspect he is too intelligent and too human to do otherwise. "Friendship cannot be defined," he says sternly. "The moment we begin to give reasons for being friends with someone we begin to undermine the magic of the relationship. Nobody wants to know that they are loved for their money or their generosity or their beauty or their wit. Choose one motive and it allows a person to say, 'is that the only reason?'" The others laugh. De Souza joins in with them. This is a performance. He continues: "Trying to explain why we form particular friendships is like trying to tell someone why we like a certain kind of music or a particular food. We just do.

But sometimes we have to reach rock bottom. Sometimes you have to know what that feels like in order to lift yourself up from it.

Todays rocks are tomorrows diamonds.

When the world throws rocks at you, turn them into diamonds.

I think we had to hit rock-bottom in all facets of the program before we could ever start moving in a positive direction.

Too many people want to have mountaintop experiences at rock-bottom prices and that just doesn't work. Greatness doesn't come at a discount. If you want true greatness, you have to pay the full price for it.

People believe that separation opens their eyes to their self-defeating behaviors and gives them an opportunity to resolve those problems with a new partner. But unless they under- stand the unconscious desires that motivated their dysfunctional behavior in the first relationship and learn how to satisfy those desires with the new partner, the second relationship is destined to run aground on the same submerged rocks.

Where you see scars I see art Where you see flaws I see incredible beauty Where you see failures I see knowledge and growth Everything is perception You see with your eyes I see with my soul It’s how you rock And how I roll.

Rock bottom is somewhere none of us ever want to be, but sometimes it happens. It's a place that, if we allow it, can destroy us. On the other hand, it can teach us about the deepest, darkest parts of ourselves for our ultimate growth.

I surrender to the predator who has me trapped in his sights. Let him take me. Common sense tries to creep into my sex-saturated brain, but I slam the door in its face. I don’t want to think about what I’m doing. Thinking will spoil everything. I just want to feel. Without reason or motivation or guilt.

The little blue engine looked up at the hill. His light was weak, his whistle was shrill. He was tired and small, and the hill was tall, And his face blushed red as he softly said, “I think I can, I think I can, I think I can.” So he started up with a chug and a strain, And he puffed and pulled with might and main. And slowly he climbed, a foot at a time, And his engine coughed as he whispered soft, “I think I can, I think I can, I think I can.” With a squeak and a creak and a toot and a sigh, With an extra hope and an extra try, He would not stop — now he neared the top — And strong and proud he cried out loud, “I think I can, I think I can, I think I can!” He was almost there, when — CRASH! SMASH! BASH! He slid down and mashed into engine hash On the rocks below... which goes to show If the track is tough and the hill is rough, THINKING you can just ain’t enough!

Life is not tough as rocks, it is as simple as your brain perceives

A diamond is just a rock that refused to break under heat and pressure.

Consistency is key. Pick up one rock a day. One day you'll look back and realize you moved a mountain."-

You can't move a rock by your self. You just need a lever to change the direction of that rock. That is smart work.

Perhaps you are no rock climber, but faced with a big enough rock, you will have to become one.

Great God of wonders; my rock and my redeemer!

A rock that perseveres under heat and pressure soon becomes a diamond.

We are who we know best.

Color, type, and metirial doesn't matter babe you can Rock it with style.

It's about creating a path together, throwing away the rocks on the difficult roads and continuing the journey, It's about building a future together.

Let's Rock!

Daydreaming is like sitting in a rocking chair, and you feel pleasured till you are in the chair, but doesn't take you anywhere. Only your actions make all the difference." - Venu CV

Take the Initiative. Be proactive. If you want to rock your relationship results, it is going to take action, effort, initiative, and choosing to get in the game—so, step up, step out, and show up!

Outside of your relationship with God, the most important relationship you can have is with yourself. I don’t mean that we are to spend all our time focused on me, me, me to the exclusion of others. Instead, I mean that we must be healthy internally—emotionally and spiritually—in order to create healthy relationships with others. Motivational pep talks and techniques for achieving success are useless if a person is weighed down by guilt, shame, depression, rejection, bitterness, or crushed self-esteem. Countless marriages land on the rocks of divorce because unhealthy people marry thinking that marriage, or their spouse, will make them whole. Wrong. If you’re not a healthy single person you won’t be a healthy married person. Part of God’s purpose for every human life is wholeness and health. I love the words of Jesus in John 10:10: “I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly.” God knows we are the walking wounded in this world and He wants the opportunity to remove everything that limits us and heal every wound from which we suffer. Some wonder why God doesn’t just “fix” us automatically so we can get on with life. It’s because He wants our wounds to be our tutors to lead us to Him. Pain is a wonderful motivator and teacher! When the great Russian intellectual Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn was released from the horrible Siberian work camp to which he was sent by Joseph Stalin, he said, “Thank you, prison!” It was the pain and suffering he endured that caused his eyes to be opened to the reality of the God of his childhood, to embrace his God anew in a personal way. When we are able to say thank you to the pain we have endured, we know we are ready to fulfill our purpose in life. When we resist the pain life brings us, all of our energy goes into resistance and we have none left for the pursuit of our purpose. It is the better part of wisdom to let pain do its work and shape us as it will. We will be wiser, deeper, and more productive in the long run. There is a great promise in the New Testament that says God comes to us to comfort us so we can turn around and comfort those who are hurting with the comfort we have received from Him (see 2 Corinthians 1:3–4). Make yourself available to God and to those who suffer. A large part of our own healing comes when we reach out with compassion to others.

We’re not born running up mountains. Most of us don’t even figure out we’re capable of such a feat until later in life. Along the way, we make a lot of mistakes. Some of us even hit rock bottom. And then we pick ourselves up, dust off the dirt, and start climbing — sometimes literally. Running is a transformative experience in mind, body and spirit for so many. It helps us face inner demons and shush the naysayers — especially when those naysayers are ourselves.

Look at a stone cutter hammering away at his rock, perhaps a hundred times without as much as a crack showing in it. Yet at the hundred-and-first blow it will split in two, and I know it was not the last blow that did it, but all that had gone before.

If nothing is more powerful than an idea whose time has come, nothing is more harmful than an idea which is manipulated by motivated men. Rogues and crooks have ideas. So do ordinary folks. But intellectuals are meant to be a breed apart for the same reason rocks aren't gems.

In no particular order, I read what I could, sometimes with Fadiman as my docent, sometimes not: Flaubert, Twain, Kerouac, Brontë, Kafka, Camus, Ibsen, James, Thurber, Shakespeare. But in the course of reading great books, something happened. My reading molded me, the tool hammering its hand into shape. By some miracle—and by miracle, I mean great teachers—I pushed past the shallowness and stupidity of my own motivations. I fell in love with the actual literature and the actual ideas of great literature. As an immigrant, as a Vietnamese kid, as a poor kid, I had collected so many scarlet letters of alienation that I connected profoundly to the great works. As I read, I began to understand that all the great works wrangled with big questions, important questions: our place in the world, the value of our experience, the fairness and meaning of our suffering, our quest for love and belonging. Universal themes bound these great works together, and they bound me to their oaky, yellowed pages like Odysseus lashed to the mast of his ship. I felt a connective and humanizing resonance in books: I wasn’t alone in my aloneness. I wasn’t alone in my longing for love. I wasn’t alone in my fear of being rejected, my fear of never finding my place, my fear of failing. The snarl of my journey was untangled and laid out clearly by books.

When you left me I was lost. I didn’t know what to do, who I was or what I was going to do. Time froze for me. I woke up every morning with you in my head. That feeling of being lost, not knowing who I was, was terrible. It was so bad that I spent everyday numbing my pain with drugs and alcohol until I passed out. Not because I enjoyed it but because it was the only way I could sleep. When I look back, you had every reason to leave me. I was no good for you. We rotted at my place, didn’t do anything, treated you bad, picked everything over you. I had no motivation to do begin work, debt stacked up higher and higher. Until finally, welcome to rock bottom. Heck im surprised you stayed as long as you did. But when you left and I realized what I did to cause this, I thought to my self that when I look back at this I want to know I tried to get her back. I couldn’t let you go without a fight, I wanted to know that I tried to get you back. And I tried. After I saw you with another person my heart broke in pieces and like pieces of glass it felt stuck in my throat. You told me its what you wanted to do from the beginning and I didn’t want to believe it. But after that I gave up on you and decided to pick up whatever pieces I had left and move on. At least I tried, that’s what I told my self. If I could go back and do it all over again, would I do it differently? Of course, but that’s not reality. I focused on what was. In a way im glad things happened this way. It opened my eyes to a different world, it made me who iam today. It gave me the best motivation possible, to prove to you and my self that I could be better. I used you everyday to get to that extra mile. Waking up every morning at awkward times thinking about you and not being able to fall back asleep. I used that to motivate me to start work everyday at 6am. And now I sit here with my successful career, my new girl friend, debt free and a fat bank account in less then a year and I have no one else to thank but MY SELF! To everyone that has made a mistake, im here to tell you that it always gets worse before its gets better!

Looking at the sky from the bottom of the deep hole, below the visible surface & away from the superior heights once conquered, the traveler realized how he reached the rock-bottom! It all started with avoiding the issues by digging holes & hiding like the ostrich, thinking they would pass, but didn’t realize that issues multiplied and so did the depth of the hole.

One person looks around and see a universe created by a God who watches over its long unfurling, marking the fall of sparrows and listening to the prayers of his finest creation. Another person believes that life, in all its baroque complexity, is a chemical aberration that will briefly decorate the surface of a ball of rock spinning somewhere among a billion galaxies. And the two of them could talk for hours and find no greater difference between each other, for neither set of beliefs makes us kinder or wiser. William the Bastard forcing Harold to swear over the bones of Saint Jerome, the Church of Rome rent asunder by the King's Great Matter, the twin towers folding into smoke. Religion fueling the turns and reverses of human history, or so it seems, but twist them all to catch a different light and those same passionate beliefs seem no more than banners thrown up to hide the usual engines of greed and fear. And in our single lives? Those smaller turns and reverses? Is it religion which trammels and frees, which gives or withholds hope? Or are these, too, those old base motives dressed up for a Sunday morning? Are they reasons or excuses?

I love acronyms, don’t you? They are quick and easy tools for remembering important lessons that are too good to forget. The PEACE acronym goes straight to the heart of the matter for delivering "Service Beyond Self." When you do this one thing, you will increase your opportunities, earn loyalty and respect, and rock your first and last impressions. Persistently Exceed All Customer Expectations

Seriously: Do you want to spend your working life simply being satisfied? When you look back on 50 years spent in business, do you want to be able to say, “Well, I was satisfied"?? No! Make happiness your goal. As in, “Let’s make this a workplace where people are happy to work." As in, “I’ve been working for 50 years now, and it absolutely rocks! To me work is challenging, stimulating and just plain fun.

Definitely, some will doubt you, but don’t doubt yourself. Surely, some will hate your mission, but don’t hate your vision. Truly, some will envy your vision, but don’t change your vision. Surely, some will mock at your direction, but don’t neglect your focus. Surely, you shall meet obstacles, but learn to overcome all obstacles with wit. Frankly, some will say what they want to you, but say what is inspiring to yourself. Obviously, you shall meet fear, but learn to shake your fears. In fact, there shall be moment of drought, but learn to go with tenacity and an indomitable staying power. You may meet the rocks, but climb the rocks with fortitude to the apex, and you shall feel the fresh air! Truly, you shall hear so many things, but know what to listen to. Surely, some will misunderstand you, but learn to understand yourself. You may definitely have so many things to do, but mind what is more important and weightier. There is no great journey without issues, but learn to overcome all issues, and get to the end of the journey with distinctive footprints and a good sense of fulfillment. You were born for a purpose! Live it; achieve it! God is waiting for you at the finishing line; get there with a pleasant story for a glory!

I have this craving to be some ball-buster chick who, when you look at her, think, “She likes her rock hard, her cock hard, and her liquor harder,” yet I know that this striving has everything to do with the what’s lurking behind my softer feminine side. Hard and edgy. I know them well. I sought them out, tried them on and wore them in the many forms so many of us do, from fuck me to fuck you, and everything in between.

People believe that separation opens their eyes to their self-defeating behaviors and gives them an opportunity to resolve those problems with a new partner. But unless they under- stand the unconscious desires that motivated their dysfunctional behavior in the first relationship and learn how to satisfy those desires with the new partner, the second relationship is destined to run aground on the same submerged rocks.

Kintaro was a legendary Japanese hero who’s gone by many names, but mostly he uses the one his witch mother gave him. He made some cooing noises, and a small flock of pigeons suddenly dive bombed me. “Just giving you some motivation.” In addition to having strength in Herc’s class, Kintaro also talked to animals. Now I realize a lot of people in Central Park talk to the pigeons—as well as rocks and lampposts—but when Kintaro speaks, animals listen.

This is the thing with any painful circumstance We keep trying to be the person we were before it, Denying that painful experience, But all this does is stunt the person we are growing into. Hurtful events always transform us in some way. A far stronger, compassionate being is born from every blade That cut to our heart… this is what we gain when we accept our pain. We regenerate with a brighter inner flame As we seek our light through the shadows.

Doing it all the time, whether or not we are in the mood, gives us ownership of our writing ability. It takes it out of the realm of conjuring where we stand on the rock of isolation, begging the winds for inspiration, and it makes it something as do-able as picking up a hammer and pounding a nail. Writing may be an art, but it is certainly a craft. It is a simple and workable thing that can be as steady and reliable as a chore—does that ruin the romance?

Others are more knowledgeable about the situation than I am. I must go along with their decisions. It is my place to be supportive, not to confront. My faith demands that I be obedient and loyal. These people are so nice, especially to me. Their motives must be pure. Perhaps I don’t really know the pastor well enough to discern whether he is right or wrong. Since they are closer to the situation, I will go along with them. He must be “special” with special needs. Who am I to rock the boat? I must be a faithful follower and not allow others to hurt the ministry.

Steve Jobs was famous for what observers called his “reality distortion field.” Part motivational tactic, part sheer drive and ambition, this field made him notoriously dismissive of phrases such as “It can’t be done” or “We need more time.” Having learned early in life that reality was falsely hemmed in by rules and compromises that people had been taught as children, Jobs had a much more aggressive idea of what was or wasn’t possible. To him, when you factored in vision and work ethic, much of life was malleable. For instance, in the design stages for a new mouse for an early Apple product, Jobs had high expectations. He wanted it to move fluidly in any direction—a new development for any mouse at that time—but a lead engineer was told by one of his designers that this would be commercially impossible. What Jobs wanted wasn’t realistic and wouldn’t work. The next day, the lead engineer arrived at work to find that Steve Jobs had fired the employee who’d said that. When the replacement came in, his first words were: “I can build the mouse.” This was Jobs’s view of reality at work. Malleable, adamant, self-confident. Not in the delusional sense, but for the purposes of accomplishing something. He knew that to aim low meant to accept mediocre accomplishment. But a high aim could, if things went right, create something extraordinary. He was Napoleon shouting to his soldiers: “There shall be no Alps!” For most of us, such confidence does not come easy. It’s understandable. So many people in our lives have preached the need to be realistic or conservative or worse—to not rock the boat. This is an enormous disadvantage when it comes to trying big things. Because though our doubts (and self-doubts) feel real, they have very little bearing on what is and isn’t possible. Our

I hoped to offer U.S. intelligence agencies the opportunity to even place CIA officers in NOC (non-official cover) jobs in our company working under our Libyan contract. With agency officers in place with rock-solid “cover for status”—that’s the lie that explains who you are pretending to be—and “cover for action”—that’s the lie that explains what you’re doing while you’re there—the United States would have direct access to people in the seedy, murky underside of Libya, people whose motives and alliances were now unclear. The goals were a tall order, but don’t tell me the sky’s the limit when there are footprints on the moon, because as my dad would say, you never hit high aiming low.” Excerpt From: Jamie Smith. “Gray Work

Such apparently illogical actions are almost never inspired by a single motive. They spring from an unknown number of threads, perhaps thousands of them, some forgotten, some unconscious, some conspicuously suppressed or not admitted, which when collected and spun together have formed a conclusion, however considered or unconsidered it may ultimately seem. It is like the myriad tiny wells and springs, underground streams and significant little rivulets of water emerging from far and wide, seeping out from swamps or caverns of rock crystal, surging forth from dark underground or oozing through rotting vegetation until, bursting from a cleft in the rocks, they all unite and merge imperceptibly together then, tumbling down to the valley, they achieved their ultimate purpose and are transformed into a mighty river.

I have learned this for certain: if discontent is your disease, travel is medicine. It resensitizes. It open you up to see outside the patterns you follow. Because new places require new learning. It forces your childlike self back into action. When you are a kid, everything is new. You don't know what's under each rock, or up the creek. So, you look. You notice because you need to. The world is new. This, I believe, is why time moves so slowly as a child - why school days creep by and summer breaks stretch on. Your brain is paying attention to every second. It must as it learns that patters of living. Ever second has value. But as you get older, and the patterns become more obvious, time speeds up. Especially once you find your groove in the working world. The layout of your days becomes predictable, a routine, and once your brain reliably knows what's next, it reclines and closes its eyes. Time pours through your hands like sand. But travel has a way of shaking the brain awake. When I'm in a new place, I don't know what's next, even if I've read all the guidebooks and followed the instructions of my friends. I can't know a smell until I've smelled it. I can't know the feeling of a New York street until I've walked it. I can't feel the hot exhaust of the bus by reading about it. I can't smell the food stands and the cologne and the spilled coffee. Not until I go and know it in its wholeness. But once I do, that awakened brain I had as a kid, with wide eyes and hands touching everything, comes right back. This brain absorbs the new world with gusto. And on top of that, it observes itself. It watches the self and parses out old reasons and motives. The observation is wide. Healing is mixed in.

And thank God, because the world needed changing. I grew up in fifties Britain and, before Elvis, before rock and roll, fifties Britain was a pretty grim place. I didn’t mind living in Pinner – I’ve never been one of those rock stars who was motivated by a burning desire to escape the suburbs, I quite liked it there – but the whole country was in a bad place. It was furtive and fearful and judgemental. It was a world of people peeping around their curtains with sour expressions, of girls being sent away because they’d Got Into Trouble. When I think of fifties Britain, I think of sitting on the stairs of our house, listening to my mum’s brother, Uncle Reg, trying to talk her out of getting divorced from my dad: ‘You can’t get divorced! What will people think?’ At one point, I distinctly remember him using the phrase ‘what will the neighbours say?’ It

And thank God, because the world needed changing. I grew up in fifties Britain and, before Elvis, before rock and roll, fifties Britain was a pretty grim place. I didn’t mind living in Pinner – I’ve never been one of those rock stars who was motivated by a burning desire to escape the suburbs, I quite liked it there – but the whole country was in a bad place. It was furtive and fearful and judgemental. It was a world of people peeping around their curtains with sour expressions, of girls being sent away because they’d Got Into Trouble. When I think of fifties Britain, I think of sitting on the stairs of our house, listening to my mum’s brother, Uncle Reg, trying to talk her out of getting divorced from my dad: ‘You can’t get divorced! What will people think?’ At one point, I distinctly remember him using the phrase ‘what will the neighbours say?’ It wasn’t Uncle Reg’s fault. That was just the mindset of the times: that happiness was somehow less important than keeping up appearances.

He spent the morning at the beach. He had no idea which one, just some open stretch of coastline reaching out to the sea. An unbroken mantle of soft grey clouds was sitting low over the water. Only on the horizon was there a glimmer of light, a faint blue band of promise. The beach was deserted, not another soul on the vast, wide expanse of sand that stretched out in front of him. Having come from the city, it never ceased to amaze Jejeune that you could be that alone in the world. He walked along the beach, feeling the satisfying softness as the sand gave way beneath his slow deliberate strides. He ventured as close to the tide line as he dared, the white noise of the waves breaking on the shingles. A set of paw prints ran along the sand, with an unbroken line in between. A small dog, dragging a stick in its mouth. Always the detective, even if, these days, he wasn’t a very good one. Jejeune’s path became blocked by a narrow tidal creek carrying its silty cargo out to the sea. On each side of it were shallow lagoons and rock pools. When the tide washed in they would teem with new life, but at the moment they looked barren and empty. Jejeune looked inland, back to where the dark smudge of Corsican pines marked the edge of the coast road. He traced the creek’s sinuous course back to where it emerged from a tidal salt flat, and watched the water for a long time as it eddied and churned, meeting the incoming tide in an erotic swirl of water, the fresh intermingling with the salty in a turbulent, roiling dance, until it was no longer possible to tell one from the other. He looked out at the sea, at the motion, the color, the light. A Black-headed Gull swooped in and settled on a piece of driftwood a few feet away. Picture complete, thought Jejeune. For him, a landscape by itself, no matter how beautiful, seemed an empty thing. It needed a flicker of life, a tiny quiver of existence, to validate it, to confirm that other living things found a home here, too. Side by side, they looked out over the sea, the man and the bird, two beating hearts in this otherwise empty landscape, with no connection beyond their desire to be here, at this time. Was it the birds that attracted him to places like this, he wondered, or the solitude, the absence of demands, of expectations? But if Jejeune was unsure of his own motives, he knew this bird would have a purpose in being here. Nature always had her reasons. He chanced a sidelong glance at the bird, now settled to his presence. It had already completed its summer molt, crisp clean feathers having replaced the ones abraded by the harsh demands of eking out a living on this wild, windswept coastline. The gull stayed for a long moment, allowing Jejeune to rest his eyes softly, unthreateningly, upon it. And then, as if deciding it had allowed him enough time to appreciate its beauty, the bird spread its wings and effortlessly lifted off, wheeling on the invisible air currents, drifting away over the sea toward the horizon. p. 282-3

[J.Ivy:] We are all here for a reason on a particular path You don't need a curriculum to know that you are part of the math Cats think I'm delirious, but I'm so damn serious That's why I expose my soul to the globe, the world I'm trying to make it better for these little boys and girls I'm not just another individual, my spirit is a part of this That's why I get spiritual, but I get my hymns from Him So it's not me, it's He that's lyrical I'm not a miracle, I'm a heaven-sent instrument My rhythmatic regimen navigates melodic notes for your soul and your mental That's why I'm instrumental Vibrations is what I'm into Yeah, I need my loot by rent day But that is not what gives me the heart of Kunte Kinte I'm tryina give us "us free" like Cinque I can't stop, that's why I'm hot Determination, dedication, motivation I'm talking to you, my many inspirations When I say I can't, let you or self down If I were of the highest cliff, on the highest riff And you slipped off the side and clinched on to your life in my grip I would never, ever let you down And when these words are found Let it been known that God's penmanship has been signed with a language called love That's why my breath is felt by the deaf And why my words are heard and confined to the ears of the blind I, too, dream in color and in rhyme So I guess I'm one of a kind in a full house Cuz whenever I open my heart, my soul, or my mouth A touch of God reigns out [Chorus] [Jay-Z (Kanye West)] Who else you know been hot this long, (Oh Ya, you know we ain't finished) Started from nothing but he got this strong, (The ROC is in the building) Built the ROC from a pebble, pedalled rock before I met you, Pedalled bikes, got my nephews pedal bikes because they special, Let you tell that man I'm falling, Well somebody must've caught him, Cause every fourth quarter, I like to Mike Jordan 'em, Number one albums, what I got like four of dem, More of dem on the way, The Eight Wonder on the way, Clear the way, I'm here to stay, Y'all can save the chitter chat, this and that, this and Jay, Dissin' Jay 'ill get you mased, When I start spitting them lyrics, niggas get very religious, Six Hail Maries, please Father forgive us, Young, the Archbishop, the Pope John Paul of y'all niggas, The way y'all all follow Jigga, Hov's a living legend and I tell you why, Everybody wanna be Hov and Hov still alive.

Beauty Void lay the world, in nothingness concealed, Without a trace of light or life revealed, Save one existence which second knew- Unknown the pleasant words of We and You. Then Beauty shone, from stranger glances free, Seen of herself, with naught beside to see, With garments pure of stain, the fairest flower Of virgin loveliness in bridal bower. No combing hand had smoothed a flowing tress, No mirror shown her eyes their loveliness No surma dust those cloudless orbs had known, To the bright rose her cheek no bulbul flown. No heightening hand had decked the rose with green, No patch or spot upon that cheek was seen. No zephyr from her brow had fliched a hair, No eye in thought had seen the splendour there. Her witching snares in solitude she laid, And love's sweet game without a partner played. But when bright Beauty reigns and knows her power She springs indignant from her curtained bower. She scorns seclusion and eludes the guard, And from the window looks if doors be barred. See how the tulip on the mountain grown Soon as the breath of genial Spring has blown, Bursts from the rock, impatient to display Her nascent beauty to the eye of day. When sudden to thy soul reflection brings The precious meaning of mysterious things, Thou canst not drive the thought from out thy brain; Speak, hear thou must, for silence is such pain. So beauty ne'er will quit the urgent claim Whose motive first from heavenly beauty came When from her blessed bower she fondly strayed, And to the world and man her charms displayed. In every mirror then her face was shown, Her praise in every place was heard and known. Touched by her light, the hearts of angels burned, And, like the circling spheres, their heads were turned, While saintly bands, whom purest at the sight of her, And those who bathe them in the ocean sky Cries out enraptured, "Laud to God on high!" Rays of her splendour lit the rose's breast And stirred the bulbul's heart with sweet unrest. From her bright glow its cheek the flambeau fired, And myriad moths around the flame expired. Her glory lent the very sun the ray Which wakes the lotus on the flood to-day. Her loveliness made Laila's face look fair To Majnún, fettered by her every hair. She opened Shírín's sugared lips, and stole From Parvíz' breast and brave Farhád's the soul. Through her his head the Moon of Canaan raised, And fond Zulaikha perished as she gazed. Yes, though she shrinks from earthly lovers' call, Eternal Beauty is the queen of all; In every curtained bower the screen she holds, About each captured heart her bonds enfolds. Through her sweet love the heart its life retains, The soul through love of her its object gains. The heart which maidens' gentle witcheries stir Is, though unconscious, fired with love of her. Refrain from idle speech; mistake no more: She brings her chains and we, her slaves, adore. Fair and approved of Love, thou still must own That gift of beauty comes from her alone. Thou art concealed: she meets all lifted eyes; Thou art the mirror which she beautifies. She is that mirror, if we closely view The truth- the treasure and the treasury too. But thou and I- our serious work is naught; We waste our days unmoved by earnest thought. Cease, or my task will never end, for her Sweet beauties lack a meet interpreter. Then let us still the slaves of love remain For without love we live in vain, in vain. Jámí, "Yúsuf and Zulaikha". trans. Ralph T. H. Griffith. Ballantyne Press 1882. London. p.19-22

...he [Perry Hildebrandt] broached the subject of goodness and its relation to intelligence. He'd come to the reception for selfless reasons, but he now saw that he might get not only a free buzz but free advise from, as it were, two professionals. 'I suppose what I'm asking,' he said, 'is whether goodness can ever truly be its own reward, or whether, consciously or not, it always serves some personal instrumentality.' Reverend Walsh [Trinity Lutheran] and the rabbi [Meyer] exchanged glances in which Perry detected pleasant surprise. It gratified him to upset their expectations of a fifteen-year-old. 'Adam may have a different answer,' the rabbi said, but in the Jewish faith there is really only one measure of righteousness: Do you celebrate God and obey His commandments?' 'That would suggest,' Perry said, 'that goodness and God are essentially synonymous.' 'That's the idea,' the rabbi said. 'In biblical times, when God manifested Himself more directly. He could seem like quite the hard-ass--striking people blind for trivial offenses, telling Abraham to kill his son. But the essence of the Jewish faith is that God does what He does, and we obey Him.' 'So, in other words, it doesn't matter what a righteous person's private thoughts are, so long as he obeys the letter of God's commandments?' 'And worships Him, yes. Of course, at the level of folk wisdom, a man can be righteous without being a -mensch.- I'm sure you see this, too, Adam--the pious man who makes everyone around him miserable. That might be what Perry is asking about.' 'My question,' Perry said, 'is whether we can ever escape our selfishness. Even if you bring in God, and make him the measure of goodness, the person who worships and obeys Him still wants something for himself. He enjoys the feeling of being righteous, or he wants eternal life, or what have you. If you're smart enough to think about it, there's always some selfish angle.' The rabbi smiled. 'There may be no way around it, when you put it like that. But we "bring in God," as you say--for the believer, of course, it's God who brought -us- in--to establish a moral order in which your question becomes irrelevant. When obedience is the defining principle, we don't need to police every little private thought we might have.' 'I think there's more to Perry's question, though,' Reverend Walsh said. 'I think he is pointing to sinfulness, which is our fundamental condition. In Christian faith, only one man has ever exemplified perfect goodness, and he was the Son of God. The rest of us can only hope for glimmers of what it's like to be truly good. When we perform an act of charity, or forgive an enemy, we feel the goodness of Christ in our hearts. We all have an innate capability to recognize true goodness, but we're also full of sin, and those two parts of us are constantly at war.' 'Exactly,' Perry said. 'How do I know if I'm really being good or if I'm just pursuing a sinful advantage?' 'The answer, I would say, is by listening to your heart. Only your heart can tell you what your true motive is--whether it partakes of Christ. I think my position is similar to Rabbi Meyer's. The reason we need faith--in our case, faith in the Lord Jesus Christ--is that it gives us a rock-solid basis for evaluating our actions. Only through faith in the perfection of our Savior, only by comparing our actions to his example, only by experiencing his living presence in our hearts, can we hope to be forgiven for the more selfish thoughts we might have. Only faith in Christ redeems us. Without him, we're lost in a sea of second-guessing our motives.

Less is more. “A few extremely well-chosen objectives,” Grove wrote, “impart a clear message about what we say ‘yes’ to and what we say ‘no’ to.” A limit of three to five OKRs per cycle leads companies, teams, and individuals to choose what matters most. In general, each objective should be tied to five or fewer key results. (See chapter 4, “Superpower #1: Focus and Commit to Priorities.”) Set goals from the bottom up. To promote engagement, teams and individuals should be encouraged to create roughly half of their own OKRs, in consultation with managers. When all goals are set top-down, motivation is corroded. (See chapter 7, “Superpower #2: Align and Connect for Teamwork.”) No dictating. OKRs are a cooperative social contract to establish priorities and define how progress will be measured. Even after company objectives are closed to debate, their key results continue to be negotiated. Collective agreement is essential to maximum goal achievement. (See chapter 7, “Superpower #2: Align and Connect for Teamwork.”) Stay flexible. If the climate has changed and an objective no longer seems practical or relevant as written, key results can be modified or even discarded mid-cycle. (See chapter 10, “Superpower #3: Track for Accountability.”) Dare to fail. “Output will tend to be greater,” Grove wrote, “when everybody strives for a level of achievement beyond [their] immediate grasp. . . . Such goal-setting is extremely important if what you want is peak performance from yourself and your subordinates.” While certain operational objectives must be met in full, aspirational OKRs should be uncomfortable and possibly unattainable. “Stretched goals,” as Grove called them, push organizations to new heights. (See chapter 12, “Superpower #4: Stretch for Amazing.”) A tool, not a weapon. The OKR system, Grove wrote, “is meant to pace a person—to put a stopwatch in his own hand so he can gauge his own performance. It is not a legal document upon which to base a performance review.” To encourage risk taking and prevent sandbagging, OKRs and bonuses are best kept separate. (See chapter 15, “Continuous Performance Management: OKRs and CFRs.”) Be patient; be resolute. Every process requires trial and error. As Grove told his iOPEC students, Intel “stumbled a lot of times” after adopting OKRs: “We didn’t fully understand the principal purpose of it. And we are kind of doing better with it as time goes on.” An organization may need up to four or five quarterly cycles to fully embrace the system, and even more than that to build mature goal muscle.

You should date a girl who reads. Date a girl who reads. Date a girl who spends her money on books instead of clothes, who has problems with closet space because she has too many books. Date a girl who has a list of books she wants to read, who has had a library card since she was twelve. Find a girl who reads. You’ll know that she does because she will always have an unread book in her bag. She’s the one lovingly looking over the shelves in the bookstore, the one who quietly cries out when she has found the book she wants. You see that weird chick sniffing the pages of an old book in a secondhand book shop? That’s the reader. They can never resist smelling the pages, especially when they are yellow and worn. She’s the girl reading while waiting in that coffee shop down the street. If you take a peek at her mug, the non-dairy creamer is floating on top because she’s kind of engrossed already. Lost in a world of the author’s making. Sit down. She might give you a glare, as most girls who read do not like to be interrupted. Ask her if she likes the book. Buy her another cup of coffee. Let her know what you really think of Murakami. See if she got through the first chapter of Fellowship. Understand that if she says she understood James Joyce’s Ulysses she’s just saying that to sound intelligent. Ask her if she loves Alice or she would like to be Alice. It’s easy to date a girl who reads. Give her books for her birthday, for Christmas, for anniversaries. Give her the gift of words, in poetry and in song. Give her Neruda, Pound, Sexton, Cummings. Let her know that you understand that words are love. Understand that she knows the difference between books and reality but by god, she’s going to try to make her life a little like her favorite book. It will never be your fault if she does. She has to give it a shot somehow. Lie to her. If she understands syntax, she will understand your need to lie. Behind words are other things: motivation, value, nuance, dialogue. It will not be the end of the world. Fail her. Because a girl who reads knows that failure always leads up to the climax. Because girls who read understand that all things must come to end, but that you can always write a sequel. That you can begin again and again and still be the hero. That life is meant to have a villain or two. Why be frightened of everything that you are not? Girls who read understand that people, like characters, develop. Except in the Twilight series. If you find a girl who reads, keep her close. When you find her up at 2 AM clutching a book to her chest and weeping, make her a cup of tea and hold her. You may lose her for a couple of hours but she will always come back to you. She’ll talk as if the characters in the book are real, because for a while, they always are. You will propose on a hot air balloon. Or during a rock concert. Or very casually next time she’s sick. Over Skype. You will smile so hard you will wonder why your heart hasn’t burst and bled out all over your chest yet. You will write the story of your lives, have kids with strange names and even stranger tastes. She will introduce your children to the Cat in the Hat and Aslan, maybe in the same day. You will walk the winters of your old age together and she will recite Keats under her breath while you shake the snow off your boots. Date a girl who reads because you deserve it. You deserve a girl who can give you the most colorful life imaginable. If you can only give her monotony, and stale hours and half-baked proposals, then you’re better off alone. If you want the world and the worlds beyond it, date a girl who reads. Or better yet, date a girl who writes.

Your motivation has to be rock solid. You have to want it so bad that even th threat of death won't take it from you.

Look at a stonecutter hitting at the rock. Nothing happens at first, but after many strikes, the rock eventually cracks. In Life, don't Doubt. Keep at it and it will happen.

It’s only by shopping around and sampling a wide variety of art that we learn to appreciate which skills are common (banging two rocks together) and which are rare (elaborate rhythms). An unrefined palate won’t appreciate a Michelin-starred restaurant. An untrained ear can’t appreciate the genius of Bach. Only the princess, accustomed as she’d become to royal fineries, could feel the pea beneath 20 mattresses and 20 featherbeds. In this way, discernment becomes important not only for differentiating high quality from low quality (and good artists from mediocre ones), but also as a fitness display unto itself. The fact that the princess could feel the pea, even under the mattresses (i.e., when handicapped), is itself an impressive feat, a mark of her high birth.

Sometimes we need to be knocked down in a place so dark that we have no choice but to trust our heart to illuminate the way.

Find something that gets you rock hard, and you'll never have to work another day in your life.

The best stories come from rock-bottom.