Self Inventory Quotes

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Mathematics catalogues everything that is not self-contradictory; within that vast inventory, physics is an island of structures rich enough to contain their own beholders.
Greg Egan (Oceanic)
There will be times in your life when things simply have to be replaced because they are tired, broken, worn out, harmful, outdated, or irrelevant. Take an inventory of the things that no longer serve your best and highest good so you can replace them with things which do.
Susan C. Young
Don't kid yourself.Be honest with yourself.Take your own inventory".
Jack Canfield
Once I began taking inventory of ALL I was Grateful for, the warehouse I had packed with notebooks listing all I lacked became obsolete.
Raymond D. Longoria Jr.
life can be organized like a business plan. First you take an inventory of your gifts and passions. Then you set goals and come up with some metrics to organize your progress toward those goals. Then you map out a strategy to achieve your purpose, which will help you distinguish those things that move you toward your goals from those things that seem urgent but are really just distractions. If you define a realistic purpose early on and execute your strategy flexibly, you will wind up leading a purposeful life. You will have achieved self-determination, of the sort captured in the oft-quoted lines from William Ernest Henley’s poem “Invictus”: “I am the master of my fate / I am the captain of my soul.
David Brooks (The Road to Character)
When I was a young philosopher, I asked a senior colleague, Pat Suppes (then and now a famous philosopher of science and an astute student of human nature), what the secret of happiness was. Instead of giving me advice, he made a rather droll observation about what a lot of people who were happy with themselves seem to have done, namely: 1. Take a careful inventory of their shortcomings and flaws 2. Adopt a code of values that treats these things as virtues 3. Admire themselves for living up to it Brutal people admire themselves for being manly; compulsive pedants admire themselves for their attention to detail; naturally selfish and mean people admire themselves for their dedication to helping the market reward talent and punish failure, and so on.
John R. Perry (The Art of Procrastination: A Guide to Effective Dawdling, Lollygagging and Postponing)
Imagine a society entirely absorbed in its own historicity. It would be incapable of producing historians. Living entirely under the sign of the future, it would satisfy itself with automatic self-recording processes and auto-inventory machines, postponing indefinitely the task of understanding itself
Pierre Nora (Les Lieux De Mémoire)
Taking an inventory of mental assets and liabilities, you will discover that your greatest weakness is lack of self-confidence. This handicap can be surmounted - and timidity translated into courage - through the aid of the principle of autosuggestion.
Napoleon Hill (Think and Grow Rich)
Wasn't this rugged business of taking your life apart, looking at all of it and admitting and remembering and reminding yourself of all the bad - wasn't the big result of it your getting to be honest? "Exactly that," said Ferguson.
Paul de Kruif (A Man Against Insanity: The Birth of Drug Therapy in a Northern Michigan Asylum)
Our mind takes an inventory of past events and uses them to project the probability of success in the future. Depending on the information it gathers, we either move forward—or the fear response is triggered and forward progress is circumvented. Page 48
Nick Ortner (The Tapping Solution: A Revolutionaly System for Stress-Free Living)
A truthful self-inventory leads not only to a better understanding of our own shortcomings. It also allows us to more objectively appraise and respond to the shortcomings of others. When we're accountable to ourselves, we're able to hold others accountable. We can leverage shame without shaming. The key here is accountability with compassion. These lessons apply to all of us, addicted or not, and translate to every type of relationship in our everyday lives.
Anna Lembke (Dopamine Nation: Finding Balance in the Age of Indulgence)
Narcissists like watching themselves on videotape, and report gaining self-confidence from gazing at their reflection in a mirror. The Narcissistic Personality Inventory contains items such as “I like to look at myself in the mirror,” “I get upset when people don’t notice how I look when I go out in public,” and “I like to show off my body.” Vanity seems harmless and often is, but vanity often occurs with self-centeredness, which causes so many of the negative behaviors associated with narcissism.
Jean M. Twenge (The Narcissism Epidemic: Living in the Age of Entitlement)
Life in the Church means experiencing leaders who are not always wise, mature, and deft. In fact, some of us are as bumpy and uneven as a sackful of old doorknobs. Some of the polishing we experience is a result of grinding against each other. How vital submissiveness is in such circumstances, especially if the lubrication of love is not amply present. In a church established, among other reasons, for the perfecting of the Saints--an ongoing process--it is naive to expect, and certainly unfair to demand, perfection in our peers. A brief self-inventory is wise before we "cast the first stone." Possessing a few rocks in our own heads, it is especially dangerous to have rocks too ready in our hands.
Neil A. Maxwell
The best things occur when you challenge yourself and face your fears. If you think of your greatest achievements and take an inventory of the times you have demonstrated to yourself (and others) just how strong you are, you will notice it has never been while remaining within your comfort zone doing things that are easy and familiar to you.
Miya Yamanouchi (Embrace Your Sexual Self: A Practical Guide for Women)
The very process of wrestling through the inventory’s questions forces people into a useful posture of self-awareness and self-examination. It’s helpful on a personal level too. So many young people may feel they’re a mess, especially if they’re one of the rarer types. When a person identifies and learns about their type, they discover it’s okay to be themselves.
Anne Bogel (Reading People: How Seeing the World through the Lens of Personality Changes Everything)
Psychologists measure personality through what is called the Five Factor Model, or “Big Five” inventory, which assesses who we are across the following dimensions.5 • Neuroticism (sensitive/nervous versus secure/confident) • Extraversion (energetic/gregarious versus solitary/reserved) • Openness (inventive/curious versus consistent/cautious) • Conscientiousness (orderly/industrious versus easygoing/careless) • Agreeableness (cooperative/empathic versus self-interested/antagonistic)
Malcolm Gladwell (David and Goliath: Underdogs, Misfits, and the Art of Battling Giants)
Taking inventory of mental assets and liabilities, you will discover that your greatest weakness is lack of self-confidence. This handicap can be surmounted, and timidity translated into courage, through the aid of the principle of auto-suggestion. The application of this principle may be made through a simple arrangement of positive thought impulses stated in writing, memorized, and repeated, until they become a part of the working equipment of the subconscious faculty of your mind.
Napoleon Hill (Think and Grow Rich)
Dr Bone was over sixty when she was arrested in Hungary in 1949. A notable linguist, she had been invited to Hungary to translate English scientific books into Hungarian. She herself had joined the Communist Party in 1919. She was accused of being a British agent, but refused to make a false confession or in any way to collaborate with her interrogators. This elderly lady spent seven years in prison before she was finally released in November 1956. For three of those years she was denied access to books or writing materials. The cell in which she was first confined was bitterly cold and had no window. Worse was to come. For five months she was kept in a cellar in total darkness. The walls ran with water or were covered with fungus; the floor was deep in excrement. There was no ventilation. Dr Bone invented various techniques for keeping herself sane. She recited and translated poetry, and herself composed verses. She completed a mental inventory of her vocabulary in the six languages in which she was fluent, and went for imaginary walks through the streets of the many cities which she knew well. Throughout these and other ordeals, Dr Bone treated her captors with contempt, and never ceased to protest her innocence. She is not only a shining example of courage which few could match, but also illustrates the point that a well-stocked, disciplined mind can prevent its own disruption.
Anthony Storr (Solitude a Return to the Self)
He made a gesture I can't describe: 'Gentlemen, welcome to the world of reality--there is no audience. No one to applaud, to admire. No one to see you. Do you understand? Here is the truth --actual heroism receives no queues up to see it. No one is interested.' He paused again and smiled in a way that was not one bit self-mocking. True heroism is you, alone, in a designated work space. True heroism is minutes, hours, weeks, year upon year of the quiet, precise, judicious exercise of probity and care--with no one there to see or cheer. This is the world. Just you and the job, at your desk. You and the return, you and the cash-flow data, you and the inventory protocol, you and the depreciation schedules, you and the numbers.' His tone was wholly matter-of-fact.
David Foster Wallace (Something to Do with Paying Attention (McNally Editions))
As we age, we become more aware of the rarity and exquisiteness of beauty, and come to admire the flowers blooming amongst rubble. With each advancing decade, nature’s beauty and the magnificence of life increasingly amazes me. Maturation allows a person to appreciate the springtime frolic of youth and to inventory the knowledge garnered from a rigorous summer reflecting upon adulthood’s long pull. Ageing allows people to free themselves from the strife and strivings of their younger self. Reflective contemplation nurtures the cherished milk of wisdom. I shall rejoice in the commonplace acts of being. Today is an apt time to embrace learning at all stages of life. It is also an apt time to commence exercising the principles of good husbandry by beginning to making preparation for the inevitable freeze of winter.
Kilroy J. Oldster (Dead Toad Scrolls)
Come on, Bob, kill it!” “I’m trying, Tom. It won’t stop moving.” I looked at Wolf and whispered, “What do you think they are trying to kill?” Wolf shrugged. “Let’s go check it out.” We snuck forward until we could get a visual on what was happening. We saw that there were two large slimes and one baby slime. Judging by the way the large slimes were protecting the baby, I assumed it was their child rather than a random baby slime. The two players were slashing at the large slimes who were trying to defend themselves but failing. Eventually the players chopped the two large slimes into medium slimes, then into small slimes until they had finally killed all the pieces. That left the baby slime all alone. Bob and Tom looked at each other. “I think we should kill it,” said Tom. “Otherwise, it’s going to grow into an adult slime and try to get its revenge on us.” Where have I heard this story before? Bob laughed. “Slimes are stupid. It won’t be able to get revenge because it will be dead.” The players began to move forward to the baby slime. And that’s when something snapped in me. I was reminded of the night my parents sacrificed their lives for me. I couldn’t let this baby slime be killed. I jumped up and rushed to the players. Wolf shout-whispered, “No! Don’t do it!” I didn’t care. I ran up to the two players and without giving them a chance to surrender, mercilessly assassinated them. The baby slime looked at me with fear in its eyes and backed away, fearful that I would kill it too. But I didn’t. I put my sword back into my inventory and reached down and gently picked up the slime. “Can you talk?” I asked. The slime made cooing and booping noises, but apparently was too young to be able to speak yet. “I wish I could talk to you, Child. I would tell you that everything is going to be alright. I’ll be your new guardian.” Wolf arrived by my side a moment later. “It’s not part of the Way to kill players unless the killing falls under a specific rule or arises from self-defense.” I shot a look at Wolf. “I was defending the life of another. Is that not the same as self-defense?” “I guess, but it’s … hurrr … it’s a slime.” “Are you saying a slime has less right to be alive than us?” “I’m not saying that, but now that you mention it….” “Shut up. I’m taking charge of this child.” Wolf shook his head. “You realize that according to the Way, if you take the life of an orphan into your hands you have to protect it and see that it makes it to adulthood, just as I have with you.
Dr. Block (The Ballad of Winston the Wandering Trader, Book 1 (The Ballad of Winston #1))
The fragmentation of the neoliberal self begins when the agent is brought face to face with the realization that she is not just an employee or student, but also simultaneously a product to be sold, a walking advertisement, a manager of her résumé, a biographer of her rationales, and an entrepreneur of her possibilities. She has to somehow manage to be simultaneously subject, object, and spectator. She is perforce not learning about who she really is, but rather, provisionally buying the person she must soon become. She is all at once the business, the raw material, the product, the clientele, and the customer of her own life. She is a jumble of assets to be invested, nurtured, managed, and developed; but equally an offsetting inventory of liabilities to be pruned, outsourced, shorted, hedged against, and minimized. She is both headline star and enraptured audience of her own performance.
Philip Mirowski (Never Let a Serious Crisis Go to Waste: How Neoliberalism Survived the Financial Meltdown)
marveling, as he always did in the aftermath of his spells, just how much they resembled tropical storms. As they approached, he often could sense the change in barometric pressure, as he had done on the ferry, even though the storm was still far out at sea, churning away, gathering force, bearing down. When it finally came ashore there wasn’t much to do but ride it out, just let it howl and rage and do its worst. At some point his buffeted, terrified psyche simply gave way to a profound sense of calm, there in the storm’s gentle eye. It wasn’t unlike what people coming down from acid trips often described—the self simply dissipating. To Teddy, a breathtaking moment of splendid, weightless drifting away. In another second or two the world and its cares would cease to matter. In their place, blessed oblivion. But then the winds returned, the shard pierced flesh, and he would know the truth—that escape was yet another false narrative. Later, bloodied and chastened and exhausted, he would do what he always did—claw up into the light, blinking, and survey the damage. Make an inventory of what was irretrievably lost, what was merely damaged and in need of mending, and then, most vitally, somehow locate and reestablish that charmless but necessary even keel that allowed for smooth, if unadventurous, sailing. What he called his life.
Richard Russo (Chances Are . . .)
But peace, too, is a living thing and like all life it must wax and wane, accommodate, withstand trials, and undergo changes. Such was the case with the peace Josephus Famulus enjoyed. It was unstable, visible one moment, gone the next, sometimes near as a candle carried in the hand, sometimes as remote as a star in the wintry sky. And in time a new and special kind of sin and temptation more and more often made life difficult for him. It was not a strong, passionate emotion such as indignation or a sudden rush of instinctual urges. Rather, it seemed to be the opposite. It was a feeling very easy to bear in its initial stages, for it was scarcely perceptible; a condition without any real pain or deprivation, a slack, luke-warm, tedious state of the soul which could only be described in negative terms as a vanishing, a waning, and finally a complete absence of joy. There are days when the sun does not shine and the rain does not pour, but the sky sinks quietly into itself, wraps itself up, is gray but not black, sultry, but not with the tension of an imminent thunderstorm. Gradually, Joseph's days became like this as he approached old age. Less and less could he distinguish the mornings from the evenings, feast days from ordinary days, hours of rapture from hours of dejection. Everything ran sluggishly long in limp tedium and joylessness. This is old age, he thought sadly. He was sad because he had expected aging and the gradual extinction of his passions to bring a brightening and easing of his life, to take him a step nearer to harmony and mature peace of soul, and now age seemed to be disappointing and cheating him by offering nothing but this weary, gray, joyless emptiness, this feeling of chronic satiation. Above all he felt sated: by sheer existence, by breathing, by sleep at night, by life in his cave on the edge of the little oasis, by the eternal round of evenings and mornings, by the passing of travelers and pilgrims, camel riders and donkey riders, and most of all by the people who came to visit him, by those foolish, anxious, and childishly credulous people who had this craving to tell him about their lives, their sins and their fears, their temptations and self-accusations. Sometimes it all seemed to him like the small spring of water that collected in its stone basin in the oasis, flowed through grass for a while, forming a small brook, and then flowed on out into the desert sands, where after a brief course it dried up and vanished. Similarly, all these confessions, these inventories of sins, these lives, these torments of conscience, big and small, serious and vain, all of them came pouring into his ear, by the dozens, by the hundreds, more and more of them. But his ear was not dead like the desert sands. His ear was alive and could not drink, swallow, and absorb forever. It felt fatigued, abused, glutted. It longed for the flow and splashing of words, confessions, anxieties, charges, self-condemnations to cease; it longed for peace, death, and stillness to take the place of this endless flow.
Hermann Hesse (The Glass Bead Game)
Auto-Zoomar. Talbert knelt in the a tergo posture, his palms touching the wing-like shoulder blades of the young woman. A conceptual flight. At ten-second intervals the Polaroid projected a photograph on to the screen beside the bed. He watched the auto-zoom close in on the union of their thighs and hips. Details of the face and body of the film actress appeared on the screen, mimetized elements of the planetarium they had visited that morning. Soon the parallax would close, establishing the equivalent geometry of the sexual act with the junctions of this wall and ceiling. ‘Not in the Literal Sense.’Conscious of Catherine Austin’s nervous hips as she stood beside him, Dr Nathan studied the photograph of the young woman. ‘Karen Novotny,’ he read off the caption. ‘Dr Austin, may I assure you that the prognosis is hardly favourable for Miss Novotny. As far as Talbert is concerned the young woman is a mere modulus in his union with the film actress.’ With kindly eyes he looked up at Catherine Austin. ‘Surely it’s self-evident - Talbert’s intention is to have intercourse with Miss Taylor, though needless to say not in the literal sense of that term.’ Action Sequence. Hiding among the traffic in the near-side lane, Koester followed the white Pontiac along the highway. When they turned into the studio entrance he left his car among the pines and climbed through the perimeter fence. In the shooting stage Talbert was staring through a series of colour transparencies. Karen Novotny waited passively beside him, her hands held like limp birds. As they grappled he could feel the exploding musculature of Talbert’s shoulders. A flurry of heavy blows beat him to the floor. Vomiting through his bloodied lips, he saw Talbert run after the young woman as she darted towards the car. The Sex Kit.‘In a sense,’ Dr Nathan explained to Koester, ‘one may regard this as a kit, which Talbert has devised, entitled “Karen Novotny” - it might even be feasible to market it commercially. It contains the following items: (1) Pad of pubic hair, (2) a latex face mask, (3) six detachable mouths, (4) a set of smiles, (5) a pair of breasts, left nipple marked by a small ulcer, (6) a set of non-chafe orifices, (7) photo cut-outs of a number of narrative situations - the girl doing this and that, (8) a list of dialogue samples, of inane chatter, (9) a set of noise levels, (10) descriptive techniques for a variety of sex acts, (11) a torn anal detrusor muscle, (12) a glossary of idioms and catch phrases, (13) an analysis of odour traces (from various vents), mostly purines, etc., (14) a chart of body temperatures (axillary, buccal, rectal), (15) slides of vaginal smears, chiefly Ortho-Gynol jelly, (16) a set of blood pressures, systolic 120, diastolic 70 rising to 200/150 at onset of orgasm . . . ’ Deferring to Koester, Dr Nathan put down the typescript. ‘There are one or two other bits and pieces, but together the inventory is an adequate picture of a woman, who could easily be reconstituted from it. In fact, such a list may well be more stimulating than the real thing. Now that sex is becoming more and more a conceptual act, an intellectualization divorced from affect and physiology alike, one has to bear in mind the positive merits of the sexual perversions. Talbert’s library of cheap photo-pornography is in fact a vital literature, a kindling of the few taste buds left in the jaded palates of our so-called sexuality.
J.G. Ballard (The Atrocity Exhibition)
Network marketing is personal development disguised as a business opportunity. The more you grow as an individual through personal development, self inventory, and new behavioral skill sets, the more your income will grow.
Margie K. Aliprandi (Best Worst First : 75 Network Marketing Experts on Everything You Need to Know to Build the Business of Your Dreams)
Taking inventory of mental assets and liabilities, you will discover that your greatest weakness is lack of self-confidence. This handicap can be surmounted, and timidity translated into courage, through the aid of the principle of autosuggestion. The application of this principle may be made through a simple arrangement of positive thought impulses stated in writing, memorized, and repeated, until they become a part of the working equipment of the subconscious faculty of your mind. SELF-CONFIDENCE FORMULA First. I know that I have the ability to achieve the object of my Definite Purpose in life, therefore, I DEMAND of myself persistent, continuous action toward its attainment, and I here and now promise to render such action. Second. I realize the dominating thoughts of my mind will eventually reproduce themselves in outward, physical action, and gradually transform themselves into physical reality, therefore, I will concentrate my thoughts for thirty minutes daily, upon the task of thinking of the person I intend to become, thereby creating in my mind a clear mental picture of that person. Third. I know through the principle of auto-suggestion, any desire that I persistently hold in my mind will eventually seek expression through some practical means of attaining the object back of it, therefore, I will devote ten minutes daily to demanding of myself the development of SELF-CONFIDENCE. Fourth. I have clearly written down a description of my DEFINITE CHIEF AIM in life, and I will never stop trying, until I shall have developed sufficient self-confidence for its attainment. Fifth. I fully realize that no wealth or position can long endure, unless built upon truth and justice, therefore, I will engage in no transaction which does not benefit all whom it affects. I will succeed by attracting to myself the forces I wish to use, and the cooperation of other people. I will induce others to serve me, because of my willingness to serve others. I will eliminate hatred, envy, jealousy, selfishness, and cynicism, by developing love for all humanity, because I know that a negative attitude toward others can never bring me success. I will cause others to believe in me, because I will believe in them, and in myself.
Napoleon Hill (Think and Grow Rich [Illustrated & Annotated])
SELF-DISCIPLINE: THE ART OF “ME MANAGEMENT” Managing yourself is essentially managing your commitments—with others, indeed, but primarily with yourself. And, keeping track of that inventory these days is no simple task. It requires a system—an “external brain”—to keep yourself oriented to be doing the right thing, at the right time. —David Allen, author of Getting Things Done
Anthony Iannarino (The Only Sales Guide You'll Ever Need)
Inventory Focus: Instead of berating yourself for not knowing something you don’t or can’t see, are you willing to be gentle with yourself while you wait for clarity?
Melody Beattie (52 Weeks of Conscious Contact: Meditations for Connecting with God, Self, and Others (Hazelden Meditation))
With an objective eye, take an inventory of your successes and enlist the honest feedback of a trusted and respected mentor or peer. Chances are they see you in a better light than you see yourself!
Susan C. Young (The Art of Being: 8 Ways to Optimize Your Presence & Essence for Positive Impact (The Art of First Impressions for Positive Impact, #1))
Take a moral inventory of ways you may be self-sabotaging and then take proactive steps to change them.
Susan C. Young (The Art of Preparation: 8 Ways to Plan with Purpose & Intention for Positive Impact (The Art of First Impressions for Positive Impact, #2))
Fresh vegetables there." He leans forward and I lean with him; my knees crack, his don't. He has created an opening under the window and built a larder cupboard of wicker and bamboo. Luxurious cabbages, self-satisfied leeks, arching chard, earthy carrots, ravishing little turnips and all sorts of different squashes, some with markings like an ocelot, some shaped like gourds and others sheltering under impish bonnets of stalk. "Dried vegetables." In wooden pails, raised off the ground by hollow bricks, there are black-eyed beans watching me, lentils sleeping, haricot beans slithering and chickpeas tumbling. "Dairy products." There is now a portable chiller cabinet above my fridge. It is opened by means of a large aluminum handle which you lift then turn. It's a precious old-fashioned kitchen until harboring the cool half-light so beneficial to goat's and ewe's cheese, fresh cream and yogurt in strainers.
Agnès Desarthe (Chez Moi: A Novel)
Objectively hammering out a grim list of chronological facts with a dispassionate voice is a Scribner’s task; writing the story of a person’s own life calls for one to see the icon that lies behind deluge of facts. No raw truths will ever be discerned must less shared by the storyteller to an audience of soul brothers in absence of the author’s resolute effort to shape the pliable clay of human discord, anguish, and incomprehensible wanting into a decipherable fable while aiming to distill moral truths. There can be no story told without psychological investigation. Storytelling includes granting oneself leave to engage in subjective digressions, selection, and prioritizing. We only find important parts of our self, if we engross in thoughtful rumination, explication, and analysis. We cannot make sense of what we discover in absence of attempted identification and positing resolution of conflicts that ongoing quarrels encumbers our conceptual inventory with stabs of guilt and slices of self-loathing. The best told stories lead to therapeutic application of liberal dosages of a healing balm spiced with strokes of thematic juxtapositions and catholic combinations.
Kilroy J. Oldster (Dead Toad Scrolls)
There is as well a two-way interaction between virtue and discipline. As we continue to practice the discipline of self-examination and continue to take inventory, we grow in the virtues of humility and honesty, and, conversely, as we grow in these virtues we become better at looking at ourselves and discerning our shortcomings. Promptly admitting our wrongs to those we have harmed will become a habit with time, disposing us to justice, and, the more just we become, the more readily and openly will we admit to such wrongs.
Ray A. (Practice These Principles : Living the Spiritual Disciplines and Virtues in 12-Step Recovery to Achieve Spiritual Growth, Character Development, and Emotional Sobriety – Steps 1, 2, 3)
Resolve to throw off the influences of any unfortunate environment, and to build your own life to order. Taking inventory of mental assets and liabilities, you will discover that your greatest weakness is lack of self-confidence. This handicap can be surmounted, and timidity translated into courage, through the aid of the principle of autosuggestion. The application of this principle may be made through a simple arrangement of positive thought impulses stated in writing, memorized, and repeated, until they become a part of the working equipment of the subconscious faculty of your mind.
Napoleon Hill (Think and Grow Rich)
Sidney Harman, another highly successful CEO who was largely self-educated (he co-founded Harman Kardon), expressed the point well in his memoir, Mind Your Own Business: “Writing is not the simple transfer of fully formed intellectual inventory from brain to paper… Writing is discovery. It is, as Dylan Thomas said, ‘the blank page on which I read my mind.
David Gergen (Hearts Touched with Fire: How Great Leaders are Made)
He did not think that art should, or could, be sold overnight. He believed in waiting for advantageous moments; he arranged them far in advance, so he was not surprised when they came. In his grand financial strategy, he calculated in terms of his total life span. The final tally would not be in, he figured, until he had made his last sale and died. His strategy proved sound. It was not until 1937, after he put over his last great deal with Mellon, that Duveen liquidated his £1,200,000 debt to his London bank. When he had made his very last sale, he was out of debt, and had £3,000,000 in the bank, an inventory worth £2,000,000, and his self-confidence intact.
S.N. Behrman (Duveen: The story of the most spectacular art dealer of all time)
The information is easily conveyed: any idea, plan, or purpose may be placed in the mind through repetition of thought. This is why you are asked to write out a statement of your major purpose, or Definite Chief Aim, commit it to memory, and repeat it, in audible words, day after day, until these vibrations of sound have reached your subconscious mind. We are what we are, because of the vibrations of thought which we pick up and register, through the stimuli of our daily environment. Resolve to throw off the influences of any unfortunate environment, and to build your own life to order. Taking inventory of mental assets and liabilities, you will discover that your greatest weakness is lack of self-confidence. This handicap can be surmounted, and timidity translated into courage, through the aid of the principle of autosuggestion. The application of this principle may be made through a simple arrangement of positive thought impulses stated in writing, memorized, and repeated, until they become a part of the working equipment of the subconscious faculty of your mind.
Napoleon Hill (Think and Grow Rich)
Self-Analysis Questionnaire for Personal Inventory. 1.   Have I attained the goal which I established as my objective for this year? (You should work with a definite yearly objective to be attained as a part of your major life objective.) 2.   Have I delivered service of the best possible quality of which I was capable, or could I have improved any part of this service? 3. Have I delivered service in the greatest possible quantity of which I was capable? 4. Has the spirit of my conduct been harmonious and cooperative at all times? 5. Have I permitted the habit of procrastination to decrease my efficiency, and if so, to what extent? 6. Have I improved my personality, and if so, in what ways? 7. Have I been persistent in following my plans through to completion? 8. Have I reached decisions promptly and definitely on all occasions? 9. Have I permitted any one or more of the six basic fears to decrease my efficiency? 10. Have I been either over-cautious, or under-cautious? 11. Has my relationship with my associates in work been pleasant, or unpleasant? If it has been unpleasant, has the fault been partly, or wholly mine? 12. Have I dissipated any of my energy through lack of concentration of effort? 13. Have I been open-minded and tolerant in connection with all subjects? 14. In what way have I improved my ability to render service? 15. Have I been intemperate in any of my habits? 16. Have I expressed, either openly or secretly, any form of egotism? 17. Has my conduct toward my associates been such that it has induced them to respect me? 18. Have my opinions and decisions been based upon guesswork, or accuracy of analysis and thought? 19. Have I followed the habit of budgeting my time, my expenses, and my income, and have I been conservative in these budgets? 20. How much time have I devoted to unprofitable effort which I might have used to better advantage? 21. How may I re-budget my time, and change my habits so I will be more efficient during the coming year? 22. Have I been guilty of any conduct which was not approved by my conscience? 23. In what ways have I rendered more service and better service than I was paid to render? 24. Have I been unfair to anyone, and if so, in what way? 25. If I had been the purchaser of my own services for the year, would I be satisfied with my purchase? 26. Am I in the right vocation, and if not, why not? 27. Has the purchaser of my services been satisfied with the service I have rendered, and if not, why not? 28. What is my present rating on the fundamental principles of success? (Make this rating fairly and frankly, and have it checked by someone who is courageous enough to do it accurately.)
Napoleon Hill (Think and Grow Rich)
It is undesirable, from the point of view of ordinary morality, that colonists should be allowed to benefit by the large expenditure which has been made for their settlement and yet to escape payment of the amounts spent upon them. Nothing could be worse than that the Jewish immigrants should feel that they have the right to be established in Palestine at the expense of others. There is a danger that this view will prevail and that settlers will look upon what is described as the "inventory," this is, provision for their settlement, as a right. If a strong, healthy and self-respecting peasantry is desired in the Jewish colonies in Palestine, it should be made quite clear to the settlers that they are under the obligation to repay the outlay which has been made on their behalf.
John Hope Simpson (Palestine. Report on immigration, land settlement and development)
To commit one’s life to the Jesus Reality is far more than an intellectual undertaking. While the Reality of Jesus is a perspective, it is not a worldview in the sense of a particular cosmology, or a body of doctrinal knowledge requiring assent. Rather it is a Word that addresses our lives and speaks to our human condition. It demands that we examine our own hearts, take inventory of our human failings, and open our lives to forgiveness and grace. It breaks the illusions of our self-importance and self-reliance, and calls us to recognize the Spirit reality that already exists in our midst and already lives in our hearts.
John F. Baggett (Seeing Through the Eyes of Jesus: His Revolutionary View of Reality and His Transcendent Significance for Faith)
Building character and culture is a function of aligning your beliefs and behaviors with principles that are external, objective, and self-evident. They operate regardless of your awareness of them. What principles guide an authentic leader? Authentic leaders are humble. They are unassuming in the way that they share the glory with their team members and are modest about their accomplishments. Their courage ensures that they have the integrity to make the right choices when necessary. Skills
James M. Kouzes (A Coach's Guide to Developing Exemplary Leaders: Making the Most of The Leadership Challenge and the Leadership Practices Inventory (LPI) (J-B Leadership Challenge: Kouzes/Posner Book 202))
STEP 7  –   Humility We humbly ask a Higher Power and our friends to help us to change. In Step 7 we finally have the knowledge, desire and allies to change. The knowledge we have is the self-knowledge gained from the inventories and lists we made while facing South. Our allies are the sobriety Elders and the Red Road brothers and sisters we’ve been sitting with in our sobriety circles and healing circles. Creator is an ally
White Bison (The Red Road to Welbriety: In The Native American Way)
An utter success,' her stepdaughters confided to Margaret as they prepared to take their leave. 'The handsome king! That spoof!' Still the rain persisted, and the bishop had lost his hat. Maids danced in and out. Where was the bishop's hat? Alone at the window, Margaret didn't hear. The reflection of the parlor was yellow and warm. She watched it empty out. Then, an interruption. A voice came at her side: 'What do you look at with such interest, Lady Cavendish?' What did she see in the glass? She saw the Marchioness of Newcastle. She saw the aging wife of an aged marquess, without even any children to dignify her life.
Danielle Dutton (Margaret the First)
MOUNTAIN VIEW, CA—Following the company’s announcement that it would discontinue public sales of the wearable technology, Google officials confirmed Monday that all unsold units of Google Glass would be donated to underprivileged assholes in Africa. “We are committed to positively impacting the lives of poverty-stricken smug pricks by distributing the surplus inventory of Google Glass to self-important fucks throughout sub-Saharan Africa,” a statement released by the company read in part, adding that the program will provide the optical head-mounted technology, as well as professional training sessions, to destitute communities of conceited dicks from Sierra Leone, to Somalia, to Botswana. “This gesture will help tens of thousands of poor and needy men, women, and children across the continent who have never had the opportunity to walk around looking like a pompous jackass all day long. From the moment they turn on their new Google Glass in clear view of others, they’ll immediately start experiencing the undeserved sense of superiority currently lacking in their lives.” At press time, Google confirmed that the first devices had been presented to an indigent family of complete fucking jerkoffs from the Republic of Guinea.
Anonymous
For example, Dell’s (2006b) Multidimensional Inventory of Dissociation (MID) is a highly regarded psychometric instrument specifically designed to provide a comprehensive, content-valid assessment of the more commonly observed experiences of persons with dissociative identity disorder, many of which represent prototypic descriptions of altered states of consciousness (e.g., depersonalization, derealization, posttraumatic flashbacks, and trance states, collectively described previously by Dell [2001] as instances of “pervasive dissociation”).
Paul Frewen (Healing the Traumatized Self: Consciousness, Neuroscience, Treatment (Norton Series on Interpersonal Neurobiology))
When she can’t sleep at night, she tries to remember the details of all the rooms where she has slept…The objects that appear are always linked to gestures and singular facts…In those rooms, she never sees herself with the clarity of photos, but blurred as in a film on an encrypted TV channel…She doesn’t know what she wants from these inventories, except maybe through the accumulation of memories of objects, to again become the person she was at such and such a time. She would like to assemble these multiple images of herself, separate and discordant, thread them together with the story of her existence, starting with her birth during World War II up until the present day. Therefore, an existence that is singular but also merged with the movements of a generation. Each time she begins, she meets the same obstacles: how to represent the passage of historical time, the changing of things, ideas, and manners, and the private life of this woman? How to make the fresco of forty-five years coincide with the search for a self outside of History, the self of suspended moments transformed into the poems she wrote at twenty (“Solitude,” etc.)? Her main concern is the choice between “I” and “she.” There is something too permanent about “I,” something shrunken and stifling, whereas “she” is too exterior and remote. The image she has of her book in its nonexistent form, of the impression it should leave, is…an image of light and shadow streaming over faces. But she hasn’t yet discovered how to do this. She awaits if not a revelation, then a sign, a happenstance, as the madeleine dipped in tea was for Marcel Proust. Even more than this book, the future is the next man who will make her dream, buy new clothes, and wait: for a letter, a phone call, a message on the answering machine.
Annie Ernaux (The Years)
the Big Five Inventory, a highly respected, multi-item questionnaire that measures people across five dimensions: 1. Extraversion. Are you sociable or retiring? Fun-loving or reserved? 2. Agreeableness. Are you trusting or suspicious? Helpful or uncooperative? 3. Conscientiousness. Are you organized or disorganized? Self-disciplined or weak willed? 4. Emotional stability. Are you worried or calm? Insecure or secure? 5. Openness to new experiences. Are you imaginative or down-to-earth? Independent or conforming?
Malcolm Gladwell (Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking)
On the Thursday after Wallace left, I wandered over to Fifth Avenue after work to see the windows at Bergdorf’s. A few days before, I’d noticed that they’d been curtained for the installation of the new displays. Winter, Spring, Summer, Fall, I always looked forward to the unveiling of the new seasons at Bergdorf’s. Standing before the windows, you felt like a tsarina receiving one of those jeweled eggs in which an elaborate scene in miniature has been painstakingly assembled. With one eye closed you spy inside, losing all sense of time as you marvel at every transporting detail. And transporting was the right word. For the Bergdorf’s windows weren’t advertising unsold inventory at 30 % off. They were designed to change the lives of women up and down the avenue—offering envy to some, self-satisfaction to others, but a glimpse of possibility to all. And for the Fall season of 1938, my Fifth Avenue Fabergé did not disappoint. The theme of the windows was fairy tales, drawing on the well-known works of the Brothers Grimm and Hans Christian Andersen; but in each set piece the “princess” had been replaced with the figure of a man, and the “prince” with one of us.
Amor Towles (Rules of Civility)
If the narcissist is your supervillain, there’s only one way to “defeat” him or her.  His or her ultimate goal is to destroy you, destroy the self-esteem and success you’ve worked hard to build, destroy your ability to trust in future relationships and your self-worth. You must take inventory of your existing “superpowers” as well as his in order to save your own life and that of your kingdom – everything you’ve built from your finances to your relationship with friends to your business.  Every small victory scores a point and gets you ready for the final battle. It’s time.
Shahida Arabi (Becoming the Narcissist’s Nightmare: How to Devalue and Discard the Narcissist While Supplying Yourself)
These include the Self-Compassion Scale (Neff, 2003); White Bear Suppression Inventory (Wegner & Zanakos, 1994); Cognitive-Behavioral Avoidance Scale (Ottenbreit & Dobson, 2004); Thought Control Questionnaire (Wells & Davies, 1994), Distress Tolerance Scale (Simons & Gaher, 2005), the Emotional Nonacceptance subscale of the Difficulties in Emotion Regulation Scale (Gratz & Roemer, 2004), or similar subscales on various mindfulness measures such as the Kentucky Inventory of Mindfulness Skills (Baer, Smith, & Allen, 2004) or the Five Facets of Mindfulness Questionnaire (Baer et al., 2008), among several others. The definitions of acceptance vary in all of these approaches.
Steven C. Hayes (Acceptance and Commitment Therapy: The Process and Practice of Mindful Change)
I shake my head, and she considers me again, top to toe with her cheeks pulled in. I half suspect that, once she’s completed her inventory, she’s going to tell me to stand up straight in that authoritative tone that reminds me of my father, but then she says, “And in case I didn’t say it, I’m very happy to meet you. I’m not sure what circumstances have brought you here, but I’m glad you are.” I smile faintly. “Me too.” She laughs suddenly, a sound so unexpected I jump. “You’ve got the—” She presses her finger to her cheek, and it takes me a moment to realize she’s talking about my dimple. “Oh. Yes.” I brush my face self-consciously, but she smiles and I realize she has the same, but on the opposite cheek. My sister and I, our faces a closed set of parentheses. Then, suddenly, she’s hugging me. It’s a rubbish hug—she pins my arms to my sides and holds me like one might take hold of a sack of heavy flour before hoisting it. She stays there for too long, and when we part, some of the blood from her shirt has blotted onto mine. I wonder how long it’s been since she hugged someone. I wonder if she minds.
Mackenzi Lee (The Nobleman's Guide to Scandal and Shipwrecks (Montague Siblings, #3))
A truthful self-inventory leads not only to a better understanding our own shortcomings. It also allows us to more objectively appraise and respond to the shortcomings of others.
Anna Lembke
Embrace Efficiency, Elevate Flavor: Smart Kitchen Tools for Culinary Adventurers The kitchen, once a realm of necessity, has morphed into a playground of possibility. Gone are the days of clunky appliances and tedious prep work. Enter the age of the smart kitchen tool, a revolution that whispers efficiency and shouts culinary liberation. For the modern gastronome, these tech-infused gadgets are not mere conveniences, but allies in crafting delectable adventures, freeing us to savor the journey as much as the destination. Imagine mornings when your smart coffee maker greets you with the perfect brew, prepped by the whispers of your phone while you dream. Your fridge, stocked like a digital oracle, suggests recipes based on its ever-evolving inventory, and even automatically orders groceries you've run low on. The multi-cooker, your multitasking superhero, whips up a gourmet chili while you conquer emails, and by dinnertime, your smart oven roasts a succulent chicken to golden perfection, its progress monitored remotely as you sip a glass of wine. But efficiency is merely the prologue. Smart kitchen tools unlock a pandora's box of culinary precision. Smart scales, meticulous to the milligram, banish recipe guesswork and ensure perfect balance in every dish. Food processors and blenders, armed with pre-programmed settings and self-cleaning prowess, transform tedious chopping into a mere blip on the culinary radar. And for the aspiring chef, a sous vide machine becomes a magic wand, coaxing impossible tenderness from the toughest cuts of meat. Yet, technology alone is not the recipe for culinary bliss. For those who yearn to paint with flavors, smart kitchen tools are the brushes on their canvas. A connected recipe platform becomes your digital sous chef, guiding you through each step with expert instructions and voice-activated ease. Spice racks, infused with artificial intelligence, suggest unexpected pairings, urging you to venture beyond the familiar. And for the ultimate expression of your inner master chef, a custom knife, forged from heirloom steel and lovingly honed, becomes an extension of your hand, slicing through ingredients with laser focus and lyrical grace. But amidst the symphony of gadgets and apps, let us not forget the heart of the kitchen: the human touch. Smart tools are not meant to replace our intuition but to augment it. They free us from the drudgery, allowing us to focus on the artistry, the love, the joy of creation. Imagine kneading dough, the rhythm of your hands mirroring the gentle whirring of a smart bread machine, then shaping a loaf that holds the warmth of both technology and your own spirit. Or picture yourself plating a dish, using smart portion scales for precision but garnishing with edible flowers chosen simply because they spark joy. This, my friends, is the symphony of the smart kitchen: a harmonious blend of tech and humanity, where efficiency becomes the brushstroke that illuminates the vibrant canvas of culinary passion. Of course, every adventure, even one fueled by smart tools, has its caveats. Interoperability between gadgets can be a tangled web, and data privacy concerns linger like unwanted guests. But these challenges are mere bumps on the culinary road, hurdles to be overcome by informed choices and responsible data management. After all, we wouldn't embark on a mountain trek without checking the weather, would we? So, embrace the smart kitchen, dear foodies! Let technology be your sous chef, your precision tool, your culinary muse. But never forget the magic of your own hands, the wisdom of your palate, and the joy of a meal shared with loved ones. For in the end, it's not about the gadgets, but the memories we create around them, the stories whispered over simmering pots, and the laughter echoing through a kitchen filled with the aroma of possibility.
Daniel Thomas
Not much is truly holy in this world, but precious is the person who does not pass on the pain and the desire for retribution, that self-sustaining spiral; who says, “No more,” not out of resignation or defeat, but out of something that might be called love, if it even needs a name. It became clear to me now what my father had given me. He had broken the cycle.
Darran Anderson (Inventory: A Memoir)
Well then, in the context of this issue, of this relationship with one’s own self, I am going to speak about falsif i cations of the self, about self-deception. I have seen, with Heidegger, that my life is essentially possibility. Possibility both as reaction and as horizon. It is reaction inasmuch as I can react to a given situation in one way or another. This is one of the senses of the possible for me. The other sense is my projecting, that which I could be. My plan is to talk about the psychological horizon of the possibility of life, and within that, to raise the problem of self-falsif i cation. Let us see how lack of self-knowledge appears within the context of self-image, and what the relation is between what I am and what I think I am. And all this based on a temporal structure of self-falsif i cation. I am now going to propose an inventory of the ways in which we deceive ourselves, based on the temporal hypostases of the future, the present, and the past.
Alexandru Dragomir
When you make a self-inventory, you’re figuring out all the things that make you drink. And admitting to someone else all the bad things you’ve done is a pretty good way of figuring out the moments where everything spiraled out of control.
Charles Duhigg (The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business)
Step 10 says, We continued to take personal inventory, and when we were wrong, promptly admitted it. Self-knowledge is meant to be an ongoing process that we never stop. We should always be learning about who we are and what we are not. Eventually, something becomes clearer and more specific: as we continue to take inventory and make amends when needed, we are developing a lifestyle of honesty. We are learning to be honest with others and ourselves. This step adds a description of what the change in us will look like. With our willingness to check on our behavior continually, we are now able to READILY admit when we are wrong. This is never easy, but it is an indicator of how honest we have been in our inventory.
Stephen Arterburn (Understanding and Loving a Person with Alcohol or Drug Addiction: Biblical and Practical Wisdom to Build Empathy, Preserve Boundaries, and Show Compassion (The Arterburn Wellness Series))
Recapture the child, the alter ego, the unreflected within myself by a lateral, pre-analytic participation, which is perception, ueberschreiten by definition, intentional transgression. When I perceive the child, he is given precisely in a certain divergence (originating presentation of the unpresentable) and the same for my perceptual lived experience for myself, and the same for my alter ego, and the same for the pre-analytic thing. Here is the common tissue of which we are made: The wild Being. And the perception of this perception (the phenomenological 'reflection') is the inventory of this originating departure whose documents we carry in ourselves, of this Ineinander that awakens to itself, it is the usage of the immer wieder which is the sensible, the carnal itself (for every reflection is after the model of the reflection of the hand touching by the hand touched...), hence reflection is not an identification with oneself but non-difference with self=silent or blind identification...The essential is to describe the vertical or wild Being as that pre-spiritual milieu without which nothing is thinkable, not even the spirit, and by which we pass into one another, and ourselves into ourselves in order to have our own time.
Maurice Merleau-Ponty (The Visible and the Invisible (Studies in Phenomenology and Existential Philosophy))
Finally, it was Evan’s turn. Showtime. He approached the front of the room like the entrance to a party, strutting confidently to show the crowd what he, Reggie, and Bobby had been working on tirelessly for the past six weeks. Confident and comfortable, Evan enthusiastically explained to the other thirty students, two professors, and half a dozen venture capitalists that not every photograph is meant to last forever. He passionately argued that people would have fun messaging via pictures. The response? Less than enthusiastic. Why would anyone use this app? “This is the dumbest thing ever,” seemed to be the sentiment underlying everyone’s tones. One of the venture capitalists suggested that Evan make the photos permanent and work with Best Buy for photos of inventory. The course’s teaching assistant, horrified, pulled Evan aside and asked him if he’d built a sexting app. The scene was reminiscent of another Stanford student’s class presentation half a century earlier. In 1962, a student in Stanford’s Graduate School of Business named Phil Knight presented a final paper to his class titled “Can Japanese Sports Shoes Do to German Sports Shoes What Japanese Cameras Did to German Cameras?” Knight’s classmates were so bored by the thesis that they didn’t even ask him a single question. That paper was the driving idea behind a company Knight founded called Nike. The VCs sitting in Evan’s classroom that day likely passed up at least a billion-dollar investment return. But it’s very easy to look at brilliant ideas with the benefit of hindsight and see that they were destined to succeed. Think about it from their perspective—Picaboo’s pitch was basically, “Send self-destructing photos to your significant other.” Impermanence had a creepy vibe to it, belonging only to government spies and perverts. With the benefit of hindsight, we can see that Facebook developed the conditions that allowed Snapchat to flourish. But it wasn’t at all obvious watching Evan’s pitch in 2011 that this was a natural rebellion against Facebook or that it would grow beyond our small Stanford social circle.
Billy Gallagher (How to Turn Down a Billion Dollars: The Snapchat Story)
Now i have to tell you how foolish I am. . . . (how) I'd always scoffed at stories in which maidens pined for their absent suitors, boys they've hardly known a week and have no business falling for. Didn't they realize their lives were worth more than the dubious affection of one silly young man? That there were things to do in a world that didn't revolve solely around their heartbreak? Then it happens to you. . . . Two days later I made a mental inventory of Rook's unfavorable qualities. . . . He was arrogant, self centered, and obtuse, unworthy of me in every way. (and) Yet . . . I recalled the look on his face exactly. By the end of the exercise I only felt more miserable.
Margaret Rogerson
Now i have to tell you how foolish I am. . . . I'd always scoffed at stories in which maidens pined for their absent suitors, boys they'd hardly known a week and have no business falling for. Didn't they realize their lives were worth more than the dubious affection of one silly young man? That there were things to do in a world that didn't revolve solely around their heartbreak? Then it happens to you. . . . Two days later I made a mental inventory of Rook's unfavorable qualities, prepared to indulge in some vicious criticism. He was arrogant, self centered, and obtuse, unworthy of me in every way. (And) yet. . . . I recalled the look on his face exactly. By the end of the exercise I only felt more miserable.
Margaret Rogerson (An Enchantment of Ravens)
But to change an old habit, you must address an old craving. You have to keep the same cues and rewards as before, and feed the craving by inserting a new routine. Take steps four (to make “a searching and fearless inventory of ourselves”) and five (to admit “to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs”). “It’s not obvious from the way they’re written, but to complete those steps, someone has to create a list of all the triggers for their alcoholic urges,” said J. Scott Tonigan, a researcher at the University of New Mexico who has studied AA for more than a decade. “When you make a self-inventory, you’re figuring out all the things that make you drink. And admitting to someone else all the bad things you’ve done is a pretty good way of figuring out the moments where everything spiraled out of control.” Then, AA asks alcoholics to search for the rewards they get from alcohol. What cravings, the program asks, are driving your habit loop? Often, intoxication itself doesn’t make the list. Alcoholics crave a drink because it offers escape, relaxation, companionship, the blunting of anxieties, and an opportunity for emotional release. They might crave a cocktail to forget their worries. But they don’t necessarily crave feeling drunk. The physical effects of alcohol are often one of the least rewarding parts of drinking for addicts. “There
Charles Duhigg (The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business)
to change an old habit, you must address an old craving. You have to keep the same cues and rewards as before, and feed the craving by inserting a new routine. Take steps four (to make “a searching and fearless inventory of ourselves”) and five (to admit “to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs”). “It’s not obvious from the way they’re written, but to complete those steps, someone has to create a list of all the triggers for their alcoholic urges,” said J. Scott Tonigan, a researcher at the University of New Mexico who has studied AA for more than a decade. “When you make a self-inventory, you’re figuring out all the things that make you drink. And admitting to someone else all the bad things you’ve done is a pretty good way of figuring out the moments where everything spiraled out of control.” Then, AA asks alcoholics to search for the rewards they get from alcohol. What cravings, the program asks, are driving your habit loop? Often, intoxication itself doesn’t make the list. Alcoholics crave a drink because it offers escape, relaxation, companionship, the blunting of anxieties, and an opportunity for emotional release. They might crave a cocktail to forget their worries. But they don’t necessarily crave feeling drunk. The physical effects of alcohol are often one of the least rewarding parts of drinking for addicts.
Charles Duhigg (The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business)
Taking inventory of mental assets and liabilities, you will discover that your greatest weakness is lack of self-confidence.
Napoleon Hill (Think And Grow Rich)
He [The Northman] has but one view of man; man asserting himself, maintaining his honour, as he calls it. All that moves within a man must be twisted round until it becomes associated with honour, before he can grasp it; and all his passion is thrust back and held, until it finds its way out in that one direction. His friendship of man and love of woman never find expression for the sake of the feeling itself; they are only felt consciously as a heightening of the lover's self-esteem and consequently as an increase of responsibility. This simplicity of character shows in his poetry, which is at heart nothing but lays and tales of great avengers, because revenge is the supreme act that concentrates his inner life and forces it out in the light. His poems of vengeance are always intensely human, because revenge to him is not an empty repetition of a wrong done, but a spiritual self-assertion, a manifestation of strength and value; and thus the anguish of an affront or the triumph of victory is able to open up the sealed depths of his mind and suffuse his words with passion and tenderness. But the limitation which creates the beauty and strength of Teuton poetry is revealed in the fact that only those feelings and thoughts which make man an avenger and furthers the attainment of revenge, are expressed; all else is overshadowed. Woman finds a place in poetry only as a valkyrie or as inciting to strife; for the rest, she is included among the ordinary inventory of life. Friendship, the highest thing on earth among the Teutons, is only mentioned when friend joins hands with friend in the strife for honour and restitution.
Vilhelm Grønbechrønbech
He [The Northman] has but one view of man; man asserting himself, maintaining his honour, as he calls it. All that moves within a man must be twisted round until it becomes associated with honour, before he can grasp it; and all his passion is thrust back and held, until it finds its way out in that one direction. His friendship of man and love of woman never find expression for the sake of the feeling itself; they are only felt consciously as a heightening of the lover's self-esteem and consequently as an increase of responsibility. This simplicity of character shows in his poetry, which is at heart nothing but lays and tales of great avengers, because revenge is the supreme act that concentrates his inner life and forces it out in the light. His poems of vengeance are always intensely human, because revenge to him is not an empty repetition of a wrong done, but a spiritual self-assertion, a manifestation of strength and value; and thus the anguish of an affront or the triumph of victory is able to open up the sealed depths of his mind and suffuse his words with passion and tenderness. But the limitation which creates the beauty and strength of Teuton poetry is revealed in the fact that only those feelings and thoughts which make man an avenger and furthers the attainment of revenge, are expressed; all else is overshadowed. Woman finds a place in poetry only as a valkyrie or as inciting to strife; for the rest, she is included among the ordinary inventory of life. Friendship, the highest thing on earth among the Teutons, is only mentioned when friend joins hands with friend in the strife for honour and restitution.
Vilhelm Grønbech (The Culture of the Teutons: Volumes 1 and 2)
1. Opportunity. What is the best opportunity for a new entrepreneur to build a successful business? Why is now the time to do it? How does the new landscape of e-commerce and social media create an environment of opportunity? And how do you fit into it all? You will discover why now is the perfect time to create your pie, and why there are others who are ready and willing to buy a slice. 2. Mindset. There’s a reason not every wantrepreneur becomes a successful entrepreneur, and psychology is a big piece of the puzzle. I’ll take you through the development of the right mindset to take a business from zero to one million in a year. 3. Getting customers. A million-dollar business doesn’t start with a product; it starts with a person. Your first step in building your business must be identifying your customer, and then answering his or her need. This builds a real brand, not just a revenue stream. If you get this piece right, you will have droves of repeat buyers who will eagerly “overpay” for your products, thank you for it, and tell all of their friends about you. 4. Product. Choosing your first product will be the biggest hurdle you face. It will take research, patience, and determination. Most importantly, it will require listening to what your customer is saying. I’ll take you through the whole process, from ideation to prototyping and refinement, helping you clear this hurdle in no time flat. 5. Funding. Sure, you’ve got a great product, and you know to whom you’re selling—but how do you fund your inventory? Here’s how to bootstrap, borrow, and build your way to a self-sustaining revenue machine, without stressing about money. 6. Stacking the deck. How do you nearly guarantee that your first product is successful, right out of the gate? Once you’ve decided what business you’re in, we will work to ensure that you don’t get stuck holding a product no one wants; this is where you stack the deck so your launch day is set up to blast off. 7. Launch. Your first product is ready to launch. What do you do now? Do you just let it ride? No. Here’s where building relationships and a few strategic marketing tips will take your business from a single product to a world-class brand, as we cover what you need to do to reach the key growth point of twenty-five sales per day.
Ryan Daniel Moran (12 Months to $1 Million: How to Pick a Winning Product, Build a Real Business, and Become a Seven-Figure Entrepreneur)
Well then, in the context of this issue, of this relationship with one’s own self, I am going to speak about falsifications of the self, about self-deception. I have seen, with Heidegger, that my life is essentially possibility. Possibility both as reaction and as horizon. It is reaction inasmuch as I can react to a given situation in one way or another. This is one of the senses of the possible for me. The other sense is my projecting, that which I could be. My plan is to talk about the psychological horizon of the possibility of life, and within that, to raise the problem of self-falsif i cation. Let us see how lack of self-knowledge appears within the context of self-image, and what the relation is between what I am and what I think I am. And all this based on a temporal structure of self-falsification. I am now going to propose an inventory of the ways in which we deceive ourselves, based on the temporal hypostases of the future, the present, and the past.
Alexandru Dragomir
Taking time for a self-inventory is a necessary first step toward making the transition from a religion focused on belief to a spirituality based on behavior.
Kevin Powell (The Black Male Handbook: A Blueprint for Life)
These are the discipline of self-examination and the virtues of willingness, honesty, humility, courage, diligence, and perseverance. They are the principles that enable us to make a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
Ray A. (Practice These Principles: Living the Spiritual Virtues and Disciplines in 12-Step Recovery to Achieve Spiritual Growth, Character Development, and Emotional Sobriety - Step 4)