Standards Of Excellence Quotes

I don't settle in any other area of my life when it comes to excellence, so why should I lower my standards when it comes to boys?

The train was nearly twenty minutes late, an excellent performance by British Rail standards.

What is so unnerving about the candidacy of Sarah Palin is the degree to which she represents—and her supporters celebrate—the joyful marriage of confidence and ignorance . . . Ask yourself: how has "elitism" become a bad word in American politics? There is simply no other walk of life in which extraordinary talent and rigorous training are denigrated. We want elite pilots to fly our planes, elite troops to undertake our most critical missions, elite athletes to represent us in competition and elite scientists to devote the most productive years of their lives to curing our diseases. And yet, when it comes time to vest people with even greater responsibilities, we consider it a virtue to shun any and all standards of excellence. When it comes to choosing the people whose thoughts and actions will decide the fates of millions, then we suddenly want someone just like us, someone fit to have a beer with, someone down-to-earth—in fact, almost anyone, provided that he or she doesn't seem too intelligent or well educated.

Warriors do not lower themselves to the standards of other people; they live independently according to their own standards and code of honor.

We must be the ones to re-define the world class standards of excellence

recognize certain traits that seem to be in every champion: passion, commitment, confidence, pride in performance, high standards of excellence, relentlessness, perseverance, and the ability to perform in adverse circumstances.

The world as first seen by the child becomes his lifelong standard of excellence, mindless of the fact he is admiring the ruins of his parents.

It's fun working with people who pursue greatness in everything they do. It's fun working with people who hold themselves to high standards.

When you live with dignity no man will ever take it. Live without it and every boy will steal it.

In peace-armies discipline meant the hunt, not of an average but of an absolute; the hundred per cent standard in which the ninety-nine were played down to the level of the weakest man on parade…. The deeper the discipline, the lower was the individual excellence; also the more sure the performance. – T. E. Lawrence Seven Pillars of Wisdom

Excellence comes from an internal standard that asks, “How can I deliver beyond what’s expected?

Excellence is to keep beating your own standards every day. If you don't have a standard for yourself, you have no records to beat; and if you don't have any record to beat, you can't excel. What is your current standard?

Here’s another. Kill man’s sense of values. Kill his capacity to recognise greatness or to achieve it. Great men can’t be ruled. We don’t want any great men. Don’t deny conception of greatness. Destroy it from within. The great is the rare, the difficult, the exceptional. Set up standards of achievement open to all, to the least, to the most inept – and you stop the impetus to effort in men, great or small. You stop all incentive to improvement, to excellence, to perfection. Laugh at Roark and hold Peter Keating as a great architect. You’ve destroyed architecture. Build Lois Cook and you’ve destroyed literature. Hail Ike and you’ve destroyed the theatre. Glorify Lancelot Clankey and you’ve destroyed the press. Don’t set out to raze all shrines – you’ll frighten men, Enshrine mediocrity - and the shrines are razed. Then there’s another way. Kill by laughter. Laughter is an instrument of human joy. Learn to use it as a weapon of destruction. Turn it into a sneer. It’s simple. Tell them to laugh at everything. Tell them that a sense of humour is an unlimited virtue. Don't let anything remain sacred in a man’s soul – and his soul won’t be sacred to him. Kill reverence and you’ve killed the hero in man. One doesn’t reverence with a giggle. He’ll obey and he’ll set no limits to obedience – anything goes – nothing is too serious.

The desire for excellence becomes a reality when an individual sets a standard, reach it and surpass it consistently.

Sensual living is bringing passion in whatever you do. It's being committed to excellence.

A person with low standards will forever be walking. A person with high standard will soon stop walking and start running. Later, they’ll soon stop running and start galloping. The next time you see him, he’s either flying or soaring.

When it comes to leaders we have, if anything, a superabundance—hundreds of Pied Pipers…ready and anxious to lead the population. They are scurrying around, collecting consensus, gathering as wide an acceptance as possible. But what they are not doing, very notably, is standing still and saying, ' This is what I believe. This I will do and that I will not do. This is my code of behavior and that is outside it. This is excellent and that is trash.' There is an abdication of moral leadership in the sense of a general unwillingness to state standards….Of all the ills that our poor…society is heir to, the focal one, it seems to me, from which so much of our uneasiness and confusion derive, is the absence of standards. We are too unsure of ourselves to assert them, to stick by them, if necessary in the case of persons who occupy positions of authority, to impose them. We seem to be afflicted by a widespread and eroding reluctance to take any stand on any values, moral, behavioral or esthetic.

The professional knows when he has fallen short of his own standards. He will murder his darlings without hesitation, if that's what it takes to stay true to the goddess and to his own expectations of excellence.

The “Excellence Standard” is not about Grand Outcomes. In Zenlike terms, all we have is today. If the day’s work cannot be assessed as Excellent, then the oceanic overall goal of Excellence has not been advanced. Period.

Empowering children through the Word of God so excellence is the standard not the exception

Break away from the box confining you. Positive dreamers do not follow the status quo. They keep raising the standard of the bar higher and higher. Raise the bar.

Paganism is the default of most children, since they excel at magical thinking.

The mass-man would never have accepted authority external to himself had not his surroundings violently forced him to do so. As to-day, his surroundings do not so force him, the everlasting mass-man, true to his character, ceases to appeal to other authority and feels himself lord of his own existence. On the contrary the select man, the excellent man is urged, by interior necessity, to appeal from himself to some standard beyond himself, superior to himself, whose service he freely accepts...Contrary to what is usually thought, it is the man of excellence, and not the common man who lives in essential servitude. Life has no savour for him unless he makes it consist in service to something transcendental. Hence he does not look upon the necessity of serving as an oppression. When, by chance, such necessity is lacking, he grows restless and invents some new standard, more difficult, more exigent, with which to coerce himself. This is life lived as a discipline — the noble life.

Does it occur to you that if he set his mind to it, Steve could be a truly excellent supervillain?” Clint said into the comm unit, not bothering with any sort of segue. He knew very well who it was. “We have a contingency plan in place for that,” Coulson said without missing a beat. In the background, Steve said, “Wait, what?” “Oh, c'mon.” Stark sounded seriously insulted. “If anyone here is going to go the black leather and weather control ray route, it's gonna be me, let's not even kid ourselves.” “Every active SHIELD employee has a wallet card instructing them what to do in the event you go supervillain, Stark. It's standard equipment.” A beat of silence. “What?” Tony asked. “I got one,” Bruce said. “Want to see it?” “If you show it to him, it'll defeat the purpose of having a plan,” Natasha said. “And I like this plan, it's a good plan, I do not want to go through them trying to come up with something else.” “Yes, I want to see it,” Tony said. “Thor, did you get a card?” “Verily. Their plan is most sound. I believe we will be able to subdue you with great swiftness, before you have much chance to hurt yourself or others. The damage to property will, of course, be massive, but such things are to be expected.” “What the hell? You will not be able to subdue me quickly. Screw you, I am wily and brilliant.” “I didn't get one,” Steve said, and there was a loud sound of no one being surprised. “It's not a good idea to warn the bait that-” Clint started...

When I neglect the gospel, I'll want nice vacations and nice compliments and nice things to make my life nicer. I'll long to be able to compare myself favorably with others and to know that I am successful. I'll look down on those who don't meet my standards, and I'll idolize those who excel. I'll forget that he is preeminent.

What kind of judgment does one apply, then, to a work of art? I believe that there are four basic standards: (1) technical excellence, (2) validity, (3) intellectual content, the world view which comes through and (4) the integration of content and vehicle.

Champions don’t create the standards of excellence. The standards of excellence create champions.[*]

Working with a master firsthand is the best education; it’s the surest way of raising the bar. Their excellence demands your excellence. But most of us aren’t lucky enough to have that opportunity. Still, not all is lost. If you don’t have the chance to work with a master directly, you can still surround yourself with people who have higher standards by reading about them and their work.

Don't apologize for expressing passion. Don't back down when it comes to your integrity. Don't let anyone undermine your standards for the sake of ease. Be a character of excellence, NOT excuses.

Imperfectionism is NOT laziness, low standards, contentment with failure, disinterest in excellence and improvement, or apathy. At its core, imperfectionism is pursuing and doing good things in life without so much as hoping for (let alone expecting) perfection. It’s prioritizing doing over doing well. This doesn’t rule out doing things well; it only takes away the crippling fear of not doing well.

It is an unimaginatively standardized background, a sluggishness, of speech and manners, a rigid ruling of the spirit by the desire to appear respectable. It is contentment...the contentment of the quiet dead, who are scornful of the living for their restless walking. It is negation canonized as the one positive virtue. It is the prohibition of happiness. It is slavery self-sought and self-defended. It is dullness made God. A savorless people, gulping tasteless food, and sitting afterward, coatless and thoughtless, in rocking chairs prickly with inane decorations, listening to mechanical music, saying mechanical things about the excellence of Ford automobiles, and viewing themselves as the greatest race in the world.

For some reason Miss Jenner had seen fit to come uninvited to Sebastian’s home at a scandalously late hour. To make the situation even more compromising, she was unaccompanied—and spending more than a half minute alone with Sebastian was sufficient to ruin any girl. He was debauched, amoral, and perversely proud of it. He excelled at his chosen occupation—that of degenerate seducer—and he had set a standard few rakes could aspire to.

William Butler Yeats’s “Second Coming” seems perfectly to render our present predicament: “The best lack all conviction, while the worst / Are full of passionate intensity.” This is an excellent description of the current split between anaemic liberals and impassioned fundamentalists. “The best” are no longer able to fully engage, while “the worst” engage in racist, religious, sexist fanaticism. However, are the terrorist fundamentalists, be they Christian or Muslim, really fundamentalists in the authentic sense of the term? Do they really believe? What they lack is a feature that is easy to discern in all authentic fundamentalists, from Tibetan Buddhists to the Amish in the U.S.: the absence of resentment and envy, the deep indifference towards the non-believers’ way of life. If today’s so-called fundamentalists really believe they have their way to truth, why should they feel threatened by non-believers, why should they envy them? When a Buddhist encounters a Western hedonist, he hardly condemns him. He just benevolently notes that the hedonist’s search for happiness is self-defeating. In contrast to true fundamentalists, the terrorist pseudo-fundamentalists are deeply bothered, intrigued, fascinated by the sinful life of the non-believers. One can feel that, in fighting the sinful Other, they are fighting their own temptation. These so-called Christian or Muslim fundamentalists are a disgrace to true fundamentalists. It is here that Yeats’s diagnosis falls short of the present predicament: the passionate intensity of a mob bears witness to a lack of true conviction. Deep in themselves, terrorist fundamentalists also lack true conviction-their violent outbursts are proof of it. How fragile the belief of a Muslim must be, if he feels threatened by a stupid caricature in a low-circulation Danish newspaper. The fundamentalist Islamic terror is not grounded in the terrorists’ conviction of their superiority and in their desire to safeguard their cultural-religious identity from the onslaught of global consumerist civilization. The problem with fundamentalists is not that we consider them inferior to us, but rather that they themselves secretly consider themselves inferior. This is why our condescending, politically correct assurances that we feel no superiority towards them only make them more furious and feeds their resentment. The problem is not cultural difference (their effort to preserve their identity), but the opposite fact that the fundamentalists are already like us, that secretly they have already internalized our standards and measure themselves by them. (This clearly goes for the Dalai Lama, who justifies Tibetan Buddhism in Western terms of the pursuit of happiness and avoidance of pain.) Paradoxically, what the fundamentalists really lack is precisely a dose of that true “racist” conviction of one’s own superiority.

...our low regard for nostalgia often seems not to rest on some substantive standard of excellence, in light of which a preference for the past is seen as missing the mark, but rather expresses idolatry of the present. This kind of “forward-thinking” is at bottom an apologetic species of conservatism, as it defers to and celebrates whatever is currently ascendant.

Whom were these two seeking to please? Not the audiences of Lima. They had long since been satisfied. We come from a world where we have known incredible standards of excellence, and we dimly remember beauties which we have not seized again; and we go back to that world. Uncle Pio and Camila Perichole were tormenting themselves in an effort to establish in Peru the standards of the theatres in some Heaven whither Calderon had preceded them. The public for which masterpieces are intended is not on this earth.

Then I spoke with proven shapers I knew—Bill Gates, Elon Musk, Reed Hastings, Muhammad Yunus, Geoffrey Canada, Jack Dorsey (of Twitter), David Kelley (of IDEO), and more. They had all visualized remarkable concepts and built organizations to actualize them, and done that repeatedly and over long periods of time. I asked them to take an hour’s worth of personality assessments to discover their values, abilities, and approaches. While not perfect, these assessments have been invaluable. (In fact, I have been adapting and refining them to help us in our recruiting and management.) The answers these shapers provided to the standardized questions gave me objective and statistically measurable evidence about their similarities and differences. It turns out they have a lot in common. They are all independent thinkers who do not let anything or anyone stand in the way of achieving their audacious goals. They have very strong mental maps of how things should be done, and at the same time a willingness to test those mental maps in the world of reality and change the ways they do things to make them work better. They are extremely resilient, because their need to achieve what they envision is stronger than the pain they experience as they struggle to achieve it. Perhaps most interesting, they have a wider range of vision than most people, either because they have that vision themselves or because they know how to get it from others who can see what they can’t. All are able to see both big pictures and granular details (and levels in between) and synthesize the perspectives they gain at those different levels, whereas most people see just one or the other. They are simultaneously creative, systematic, and practical. They are assertive and open-minded at the same time. Above all, they are passionate about what they are doing, intolerant of people who work for them who aren’t excellent at what they do, and want to have a big, beneficial impact on the world.

Far from putting doubts and anxieties to rest religion often has the effect of intensifying them. It judges those who profess the faith more harshly than it judges unbelievers. It holds them up to a standard of conduct so demanding that many of them inevitably fall short. It has no patience with those who make excuses for themselves--an art in which Americans have come to excel. If it is ultimately forgiving of human weakness and folly, it is not because it ignores them or attributes them exclusively to unbelievers. For those who take religion seriously, belief is a burden, not a self-righteous claim to some privileged moral status. Self-righteousness, indeed, may well be more prevalent among skeptics than among believers. The spiritual discipline against self-righteousness is the very essence of religion.

They do well, even excellently, in everything they undertake; they are admired and envied; they are successful whenever they care to be—but behind all this lurks depression, a feeling of emptiness and self-alienation, and a sense that their life has no meaning. These dark feelings will come to the fore as soon as the drug of grandiosity fails, as soon as they are not “on top,” not definitely the “superstar,” or whenever they suddenly get the feeling they have failed to live up to some ideal image or have not measured up to some standard. Then they are plagued by anxiety or deep feelings of guilt and shame. What are the reasons for such disturbances in these competent, accomplished people?

Although it may seem obvious to you, your daughter needs to hear you say that no one can sanely excel at everything they do, nor should they want to. Will a life in which she does everything perfectly be a happy and healthy life for her? Focus on what is sacrificed on the altar of perfection-seeking: Self-worth. Curiosity and exploration. Hobbies. Sleep. Challenge the standards being imposed on her. Let her know you reject them.

All that has been said of the importance of individuality of character, and diversity in opinions and modes of conduct, involves, as of the same unspeakable importance, diversity of education. A general State education is a mere contrivance for moulding people to be exactly like one another: and as the mould in which it casts them is that which pleases the predominant power in the government, whether this be a monarch, a priesthood, an aristocracy, or the majority of the existing generation; in proportion as it is efficient and successful, it establishes a despotism over the mind, leading by natural tendency to one over the body. An education established and controlled by the State should only exist, if it exist at all, as one among many competing experiments, carried on for the purpose of example and stimulus, to keep the others up to a certain standard of excellence.

GREAT WORK IS ABOUT DOING WHAT’S MEANINGFUL. GREAT WORK ISN’T ABOUT DOING IT WELL. Here’s the irony: It’s often easy to deliver Bad Work and Good Work at an excellent level. (Just how many times have you revised that worthless Power Point presentation?) And Great Work? It’s often new work at the edge of your competence, work that tangles you up because it’s different and you haven’t done it a thousand times before. You’re unlikely to be able to do it perfectly. When I say “Great Work,” I’m not talking about a standard of delivery. I’m talking about a standard of impact and meaning.

If you allow yourself to have low standards, how are you supposed to ever achieve excellence? Exhibiting self-control is one of the most powerful demonstrations of having high standards; letting fleeting emotions and urges control your life — as most people do — is a sure-fire path to mediocrity.

A great inferiority of beauty gives pain to a person conversant in the highest excellence of the kind, and is for that reason pronounced a deformity; as the most finished object with which we are acquainted is naturally supposed to have reached the pinnacle of perfection, and to be entitled to the highest applause.

Whom were these two seeking to please? Not the audiences of Lima. They had long since been satisfied. We come from a world where we have known incredible standards of [82] excellence, and we dimly remember beauties which we have not seized again; and we go back to that world. Uncle Pio and Camila Perichole were tormenting themselves in an effort to establish in Peru the standards of the theatres in some Heaven whither Calderon had preceded them. The public for which masterpieces are intended is not on this earth.

Yet, standardization only leads to sameness, not necessarily quality, and rarely to excellence (p. 9).

d An excellent wife is  e the crown of her husband,         but she who  f brings shame is like  g rottenness in his bones.

Aim to be the blue ribbon best. Develop yourself from practice, to become exceptional. Raise your standards and be the best.

Aim to be the blue ribbon best. Have high standards and work to be exceptional. Develop yourself from practice to be a winner at what you do.

We don’t gain anything by lowering the bar so that everyone can clear it.

that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you  eout of darkness into  fhis marvelous

Be the standard of quality in this world where excellence is void and unexpected.

The trouble is, we have up-close access to women who excel in each individual sphere. With social media and its carefully selected messaging, we see career women killing it, craft moms slaying it, chef moms nailing it, Christian leaders working it. We register their beautiful yards, homemade green chile enchiladas, themed birthday parties, eight-week Bible study series, chore charts, ab routines, “10 Tips for a Happy Marriage,” career best practices, volunteer work, and Family Fun Night ideas. We make note of their achievements, cataloging their successes and observing their talents. Then we combine the best of everything we see, every woman we admire in every genre, and conclude: I should be all of that. It is certifiably insane.

Bad managers are volatile in the application of the standards they set. They believe that workers respond to the average application of the standard. Instead, workers remember the extremes.

In these days,” she would say, “all girls are what is called highly educated. Girls and boys alike must go in for competitive examinations, must take out diplomas, and must pass certain standards of excellence. The system is cramming from beginning to end. There is no time for reflection. In short, my dear girls, you swallow a great deal, but you do not digest your intellectual food.

I believe that there are four basic standards: (1) technical excellence, (2) validity, (3) intellectual content, the world view which comes through and (4) the integration of content and vehicle

How careful we must be not to think that God is less holy because others seem to get away with irreverence! We are sometimes tempted to measure our respect for God by the lack of respect surrounding us. The godless, however, are not our standard. God is. Through the pen of King David, God told us to “praise him according to his excellent greatness,” not according to public opinion (Ps. 150:2 KJV).

whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.

Start dream building. Raise your standards to excellence. Imagine yourself at your best and work on self-improvement. Transform yourself to a higher state of being, by concentrating on becoming excellent at what you want.

She was taken to St. Mungo's, where," the Headmistress now sounded slightly perturbed, "a standard diagnostic Charm showed Miss Granger as a healthy unicorn in excellent physical condition except that her mane needs combing.

8Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.

Fortunately, our colleges and universities are fully cognizant of the problems I have been delineating and take concerted action to address them. Curricula are designed to give coherence to the educational experience and to challenge students to develop a strong degree of moral awareness. Professors, deeply involved with the enterprise of undergraduate instruction, are committed to their students' intellectual growth and insist on maintaining the highest standards of academic rigor. Career services keep themselves informed about the broad range of postgraduate options and make a point of steering students away from conventional choices. A policy of noncooperation with U.S. News has taken hold, depriving the magazine of the data requisite to calculate its rankings. Rather than squandering money on luxurious amenities and exorbitant administrative salaries, schools have rededicated themselves to their core missions of teaching and the liberal arts. I'm kidding, of course.

An excellent wife who can find? She is far more precious than jewels. 11 The heart of her husband trusts in her, and he will have no lack of gain. 12 She does him good, and not harm, all the days of her life. 13 She seeks wool and flax, and works with willing hands.

He settled himself with assurance behind the wheel and I climbed in beside him. As he turned the car away from the cathedral, and so out on to Rue Voltaire, he continued to enthuse in schoolboy fashion, murmuring, "Magnificent, excellent!" under his breath, obviously enjoying every moment of what soon turned out to be, from my own rather cautious standard, a hair-raising ride. When we had jumped one set of lights, and sent an old man, leaping for his life, and forced a large Buick driven by an infuriated American into the side of the street, he proceeded to circle the town in order, so he explained to try the car's pace. "You know," he said, "it amuses me enormously to use other people's possessions. It is one of life's great pleasures." I closed my eyes as we took another corner like a bob-sleigh.

Rearing your children with affection and warmth is a form of activism. Honoring your word impeccably is a way to raise your voice. Performing your job with excellence - with your chin high and your standards higher - is as powerful as any protest march. Sowing into the lives of young people is a worthy crusade. That is what it means to leave this world of ours more lit up than we found it. It's also what it means to live a magnificent life, even if an unlikely one. The Father has a way of choosing the flawed to attempt what many deem improbable.

Also, the high standard held up to the public mind by the College of which which gave its peculiar sanction to the expensive and highly rarefied medical instruction obtained by graduates of Oxford and Cambridge, did not hinder quackery from having an excellent time of it; for since professional practice chiefly consisted in giving a great many drugs, the public inferred that it might be better off with more drugs still, if they could only be got cheaply, and hence swallowed large cubic measures of physic prescribed by unscrupulous ignorance which had taken no degrees.

9And it is my prayer that your love may abound more and more, with knowledge and all discernment, 10so that you may approve what is excellent, and so be pure and blameless for the day of Christ, 11filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ, to the glory and praise of God.

Capacity for keen observation • Exceptional ability to predict and foresee problems and trends • Special problem-solving resources; extraordinary tolerance for ambiguity; fascination with dichotomous puzzles • Preference for original thinking and creative solutions • Excitability, enthusiasm, expressiveness, and renewable energy • Heightened sensitivity, intense emotion, and compassion • Playful attitude and childlike sense of wonder throughout life • Extra perceptivity, powerful intuition, persistent curiosity, potential for deep insight, early spiritual experiences • Ability to learn rapidly, concentrate for long periods of time, comprehend readily, and retain what is learned; development of more than one area of expertise • Exceptional verbal ability; love of subtleties of written and spoken words, new information, theory, and discussion • Tendency to set own standards and evaluate own efforts • Unusual sense of humor, not always understood by others • Experience of feeling inherently different or odd • History of being misunderstood and undersupported • Deep concerns about universal issues and nature, and reverence for the interconnectedness of all things • Powerful sense of justice and intolerance for unfairness • Strong sense of independence and willingness to challenge authority • Awareness of an inner force that “pulls” for meaning, fulfillment, and excellence • Feelings of urgency about personal destiny and a yearning at a spiritual level for answers to existential puzzles

We’re still a very wealthy country by any reasonable standard, which means that you’ve been presented with a rare and remarkable chance, one that’s far more precious than the opportunity to be rich: the opportunity not to be. To find your purpose and embrace your vocation, and still to live a decent life.

Csikszentmihalyi teamed up with two other leading psychologists—Howard Gardner at Harvard, and William Damon at Stanford—to study these changes, and to see why some professions seemed healthy while others were growing sick. Picking the fields of genetics and journalism as case studies, they conducted dozens of interviews with people in each field. Their conclusion32 is as profound as it is simple: It’s a matter of alignment. When doing good (doing high-quality work that produces something of use to others) matches up with doing well (achieving wealth and professional advancement), a field is healthy. Genetics, for example, is a healthy field because all parties involved respect and reward the very best science. Even though pharmaceutical companies and market forces were beginning to inject vast amounts of money into university research labs in the 1990s, the scientists whom Csikszentmihalyi, Gardner, and Damon interviewed did not believe they were being asked to lower their standards, cheat, lie, or sell their souls. Geneticists believed that their field was in a golden age in which excellent work brought great benefits to the general public, the pharmaceutical companies, the universities, and the scientists themselves.

Jowell fell back on the same justification for funding the arts that the first chairman of the Arts Council, John Maynard Keynes, had deployed in 1945. Art was something produced by people with special skills, who set their own standards of excellence; they needed to be supported to do this, and the audience needed to be encouraged to appreciate this excellence, by being given subsidised access to it. And for all of Jowell’s attempts to transcend instrumentalism, the purpose of culture continued to be to help the government ‘to transform our society into a place of justice, talent and ambition where individuals can fulfil their true potential’.22

8Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. 9What you have learned [5] and received and heard and seen in me—practice these things, and the God of peace will be with you.

8Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. 9What you have learned and  w received and heard and seen  x in me—practice these things, and  y the God of peace will be with you.

The study of economics does not seem to require any specialized gifts of an unusually high order. Is it not, intellectually regarded, a very easy subject compared with the higher branches of philosophy and pure science? Yet good, or even competent, economists are the rarest of birds. An easy subject, at which very few excel! The paradox finds its explanation, perhaps, in that the master-economist must possess a rare combination of gifts. He must reach a high standard in several different directions and must combine talents not often found together. He must be mathematician, historian, statesman, philosopher – in some degree. He must understand symbols and speak in words. He must contemplate the particular in terms of the general, and touch abstract and concrete in the same flight of thought. He must study the present in the light of the past for the purposes of the future. No part of man's nature or his institutions must lie entirely outside his regard. He must be purposeful and disinterested in a simultaneous mood; as aloof and incorruptible as an artist, yet sometimes as near the earth as a politician.

Later on, towards the middle of my life, I grew more and more opposed to alcoholic drinks: I, an opponent of vegetarianism, who have experienced what vegetarianism is, — just as Wagner, who converted me back to meat, experienced it, — cannot with sufficient earnestness advise all more spiritual natures to abstain absolutely from alcohol. Water answers the purpose. . . . I have a predilection in favour of those places where in all directions one has opportunities of drinking from running brooks. In vino Veritas: it seems that here once more I am at variance with the rest of the world about the concept 'Truth' — with me spirit moves on the face of the waters. . . . Here are a few more indications as to my morality. A heavy meal is digested more easily than an inadequate one. The first principle of a good digestion is that the stomach should become active as a whole. A man ought, therefore, to know the size of his stomach. For the same reasons all those interminable meals, which I call interrupted sacrificial feasts, and which are to be had at any table d'hôte, are strongly to be deprecated. Nothing should be eaten between meals, coffee should be given up — coffee makes one gloomy. Tea is beneficial only in the morning. It should be taken in small quantities, but very strong. It may be very harmful, and indispose you for the whole day, if it be taken the least bit too weak. Everybody has his own standard in this matter, often between the narrowest and most delicate limits. In an enervating climate tea is not a good beverage with which to start the day: an hour before taking it an excellent thing is to drink a cup of thick cocoa, feed from oil. Remain seated as little as possible, put no trust in any thought that is not born in the open, to the accompaniment of free bodily motion — nor in one in which even the muscles do not celebrate a feast. All prejudices take their origin in the intestines. A sedentary life, as I have already said elsewhere, is the real sin against the Holy Spirit.

Let this once be clear, that there is nothing good except that which is honourable, and all hardships will have a just title to the name of “goods,” when once virtue has made them honourable. Many think that we Stoics are holding out expectations greater than our human lot admits of; and they have a right to think so. For they have regard to the body only. But let them turn back to the soul, and they will soon measure man by the standard of God. Rouse yourself, most excellent Lucilius, and leave off all this word-play of the philosophers, who reduce a most glorious subject to a matter of syllables, and lower and wear out the soul by teaching fragments; then you will become like the men who discovered these precepts, instead of those who by their teaching do their best to make philosophy seem difficult rather than great.

and the teaching of kindness is on her tongue. 27 She looks well to the ways of her household and does not eat the bread of idleness. 28 Her children rise up and call her blessed; her husband also, and he praises her: 29 “Many women have done excellently, but you surpass them all.” 30 Charm is deceitful, and beauty is vain, but a woman who fears the LORD is to be praised. 31 Give her of the fruit of her hands, and let her works praise her in the gates.

No amount of black girl magic, no repeated proclamations of our worth can fully treat the wound – although acknowledging its persistence is a beginning. The ultimate remedy, as I see it is supernatural. I look daily toward heaven for restoration, for spiritual healing. My true identity isn’t rooted in our history, grievous and glorious as it is. It is grounded in my designation as a Child of God, the Daughter of the Great Physician. In His care I find my cure. My hope for you is the same one I carry for myself. I pray that amid the heartache of our ancestry you can grant yourself the grace so seldom extended to us. I pray that you can pass that compassion on to your children and to their children so that it slathers comfort on our sore spots. I pray that, as a people, we can give ourselves a soft place to land. I pray even as we rightly express our fury as being regarded as sub-human, that we don’t dwell in that space. That we don’t allow anger to poison our spirits. That we embrace love as our One True Antidote. I hope, too, that you recognize your specialness, the distinctiveness the Creator has imbued us with. I see you as clearly as history has, and in unison with it, I nod. I know that swivel in your hips, that fervor in your testimony, that ebullience in your stride, that flair in your song. The fact that others are constantly trying to diminish you, ever attempting to dismiss your talents even as they mimic you, is proof of your uniqueness! No one bothers to undermine you unless they recognize your brilliance. More than anything, I pray that you can carve out a purpose for yourself, a calling beyond your own survival, a sweet offering to the world. You gain a life by giving yours away. Not everyone is meant to raise a picket sign, and yet each of us can choose a path of impact. Rearing your children with affection and warmth is a form of activism. Honoring your word impeccably is a way to raise your voice. Performing your job with excellence, with your chin high and your standards higher is as powerful as any protest march. Sowing into the lives of young people is a worthy crusade. That is what it means to leave this world of ours more lit up than we found it. It’s also what it means to lead a magnificent life, even if an unlikely one.

You might wonder why a waitress, bricklayer, or doctor—individuals neither born into a warrior heritage nor involved in the profession of arms—would want to think of themselves as warriors in today’s society. One could have asked Funakoshi the same question. If you recall, the warrior caste in Okinawa and Japan were abolished shortly after his birth. He no longer had any legal status as a warrior. In fact, he was a school teacher by occupation. But that didn’t change his identity. He was still a member of an elite part of society. Warriors are special people. Since they understand the concept of honor, they set their ethical standards above most of the rest of society. Since they pattern their lives around the pursuit of excellence, they tend to achieve in their chosen vocations. Why would people in today’s society want to think of themselves as warriors? Because warriorship is an extraordinary and powerful way to live!

PSALM 150  uPraise the LORD! Praise God in his  msanctuary; praise him in  nhis mighty heavens! [1] 2 Praise him for his  omighty deeds; praise him according to his excellent  pgreatness! 3 Praise him with  qtrumpet sound; praise him with  rlute and  rharp! 4 Praise him with  stambourine and  sdance; praise him with  tstrings and  upipe! 5 Praise him with sounding  vcymbals; praise him with loud clashing cymbals! 6 Let  weverything that has breath praise the LORD! xPraise the LORD!

The function of high school, then, is not so much to communicate knowledge as to oblige children finally to accept the grading system as a measure of their inner excellence. And a function of the self-destructive process in American children is to make them willing to accept not their own, but a variety of other standards, like a grading system, for measuring themselves. It is thus apparent that the way American culture is now integrated it would fall apart if it did not engender feelings of inferiority and worthlessnes.

At a high level, we look for people who think independently, argue open-mindedly and assertively, and above all else value the intense pursuit of truth and excellence, and through it, the rapid improvement of themselves and the organization. Because we treat work as more than just what we do to make a living, we look at every potential hire not just as an employee but as someone we’d want share our lives with. We insist that the people we work with are considerate and have a high sense of personal accountability to do the difficult, right things. We look for people with generous natures and high standards of fairness.

Becoming accomplished at what you do is no easy task, nor is the goal reached in a day. The process is time consuming, requires dedication, innovative ideas, meticulous strategizing and can be quite tedious at times. For many, the ultimate objective is to challenge the status quo, change the game, chart unexplored territory, and set a new standard of excellence. Sometimes hitting those marks is its own reward. Seeing others apply your blueprint to construct their own path to success is even more fulfilling. Leaders are motivated by believers! Bask in the imitation of others. After all, it is the highest form of flattery!

q The Lord is at hand; 6 r do not be anxious about anything,  s but in everything by prayer and supplication  t with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. 7And  u the peace of God,  v which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. 8Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. 9What you have learned and  w received and heard and seen  x in me—practice these things, and  y the God of peace will be with you.

One of the most striking differences between a well-dressed American woman and a well-dressed Parisienne is in the size of their respective wardrobes. The American would probably be astonished by the very limited number of garments hanging in the Frenchwoman’s closet, but she would also be bound to observe that each one is of excellent quality, expensive perhaps by American standards, and perfectly adapted to the life the Frenchwoman leads. She wears them over and over again, discarding them only when they are worn or outmoded, and she considers it a compliment (as it is meant to be) when her best friend says, ‘I’m so glad you decided to wear your red dress – I’ve always loved it!’.

5Let your reasonableness [4] be known to everyone.  qThe Lord is at hand; 6 rdo not be anxious about anything,  sbut in everything by prayer and supplication  twith thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. 7And  uthe peace of God,  vwhich surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. 8Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. 9What you have learned [5] and  wreceived and heard and seen  xin me—practice these things, and  ythe God of peace will be with you.

He found it impossible to believe that a world so full of evil was the work of an Author combining infinite power with perfect goodness and righteousness. His intellect spurned the subtleties by which men attempt to blind themselves to this open contradiction. The Sabæan, or Manichæan theory of a Good and an Evil Principle, struggling against each other for the government of the universe, he would not have usually condemned; and I have heard him express surprise, that no one revived it in our time. He would have regarded it as a mere hypothesis; but he would have ascribed to it no depraving influence. As it was, his aversion to religion, in the sense usually attached to the term, was of same kind with that of Lucretius: he regarded it with the feelings due not to a mere mental delusion, but to a great moral evil. He looked upon it as the greatest enemy of morality: first, by setting up factitious excellencies,—belief in creeds, devotional feelings, and ceremonies, not connected with the good of human kind,—and causing these to be accepted as substitutes for genuine virtues: but above all, by radically vitiating the standard of morals; making it consist in doing the will of a being, on whom it lavishes indeed all the phrases of adulation, but whom in sober truth it depicts as eminently hateful. I have a hundred times heard him say, that all ages and nations have represented their gods as wicked, in a constantly increasing progression; that mankind have gone on adding trait after trait till they reached the most perfect conception of wickedness which the human mind could devise, and have called this God, and prostrated themselves before it.

REQUIREMENTS TO BE GREAT AT RUNNING HR What kind of person should you look for to comprehensively and continuously understand the quality of your management team? Here are some key requirements:   World-class process design skills Much like the head of quality assurance, the head of HR must be a masterful process designer. One key to accurately measuring critical management processes is excellent process design and control.   A true diplomat Nobody likes a tattletale and there is no way for an HR organization to be effective if the management team doesn’t implicitly trust it. Managers must believe that HR is there to help them improve rather than police them. Great HR leaders genuinely want to help the managers and couldn’t care less about getting credit for identifying problems. They will work directly with the managers to get quality up and only escalate to the CEO when necessary. If an HR leader hoards knowledge, makes power plays, or plays politics, he will be useless.   Industry knowledge Compensation, benefits, best recruiting practices, etc. are all fast-moving targets. The head of HR must be deeply networked in the industry and stay abreast of all the latest developments.   Intellectual heft to be the CEO’s trusted adviser None of the other skills matter if the CEO does not fully back the head of HR in holding the managers to a high quality standard. In order for this to happen, the CEO must trust the HR leader’s thinking and judgment.   Understanding things unspoken When management quality starts to break down in a company, nobody says anything about it, but super-perceptive people can tell that the company is slipping. You need one of those.

The book’s secondary message, more implicit than explicit, is this: It is also time to render unto equality that which is appropriate to equality, and unto excellence that which is appropriate to excellence. Equality is a fine ideal, and should have an honored place. To have understood that each person is unique, that each person must be treated as an end and not a means, that each person should be free to live his life as he sees fit, so long as he accords others the same freedom, that each person should be equal before the law and is equal in God’s sight, and to incorporate these principles into the governance of nations—these are among the greatest of all human accomplishments. But equality has nothing to do with the abilities, persistence, zeal, and vision that produce excellence. Equality and excellence inhabit different domains, and allegiance to one need not compete with allegiance to the other. Excellence is not simply a matter of opinion, though judgment enters into its identification. Excellence has attributes that can be identified, evaluated, and compared across works. The judgments reached by those who are most expert in their fields, and who work from standards of excellence that they are willing to specify and subject to the inspection of logic, are highly consistent—so consistent that eminence in the various domains of accomplishment can be gradated with higher reliability than is achieved by almost any other measure in the social and behavioral sciences. When the rating of eminence is scrutinized against the reasons for that eminence, it also becomes apparent that those who rank highest are those who have achieved at the highest levels of their field.

New bureaucracy takes the form not of a specific, delimited function performed by particular workers but invades all areas of work, with the result that – as Kafka prophesied – workers become their own auditors, forced to assess their own performance. Take, for example, the ‘new system’ that OFSTED (Office for Standards in Education) uses to inspect Further Education colleges. Under the old system, a college would have a ‘heavy’ inspection once every four years or so, i.e. one involving many lesson observations and a large number of inspectors present in the college. Under the new, ‘improved’ system, if a college can demonstrate that its internal assessment systems are effective, it will only have to undergo a ‘light’ inspection. But the downside of this ‘light’ inspection is obvious – surveillance and monitoring are outsourced from OFSTED to the college and ultimately to lecturers themselves, and become a permanent feature of the college structure (and of the psychology of individual lecturers). The difference between the old/heavy and new/light inspection system corresponds precisely to Kafka’s distinction between ostensible acquittal and indefinite postponement, outlined above. With ostensible acquittal, you petition the lower court judges until they grant you a non-binding reprieve. You are then free from the court, until the time when your case is re-opened. Indefinite postponement, meanwhile, keeps your case at the lowest level of the court, but at the cost of an anxiety that has never ends. (The changes in OFSTED inspections are mirrored by in the change from the Research Assessment Exercise to the Research Excellence Framework in higher education: periodic assessment will be superseded by a permanent and ubiquitous measurement which cannot help but generate the same perpetual anxiety.)

Finnish education appears paradoxical to outside observers because it seems to break a lot of the rules. In Finland, “less is more.” Children don’t start academics1 until the year they turn seven. They have a lot of recess (ten to fifteen minutes every forty-five minutes, even through high school), shorter school hours than we do in the United States (Finnish children spend nearly three hundred fewer hours2 in elementary school per year than Americans), and the lightest homework load of any industrialized nation. There are no gifted programs, few private schools, and no high-stakes national standardized tests. Yet over the past decade, Finland has consistently performed at the top on the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA), a standardized test given to fifteen-year-olds in nations around the world. While American children3 usually hover around the middle of the pack on this test, Finland’s excel.

I see bacon, green peppers, mushrooms... those are all found in Napolitan Spaghetti. I guess instead of the standard ketchup, he's used curry roux for the sauce? The noodles look similar to fettuccini." "Hm. I'm not seeing anything else that stands out about it. Given how fun and amusing the calzone a minute ago was... ... the impact of this one's a lot more bland and boring..." W-what the heck? Where did this heavy richness come from? It hits like a shockwave straight to the brain! "Chicken and beef stocks for the base... with fennel and green cardamom for fragrance! What an excellent, tongue-tingling curry sauce! It clings well to the broad fettuccini noodles too!" "For extra flavor is that... soy sauce?" "No, it's tamari soy sauce! Tamari soy sauce is richer and less salty than standard soy sauce, with a more full-bodied sweetness to it. Most tamari is made on Japan's eastern seaboard. " "That's not all either! I'm picking up the mellow hints of cheese! But I'm not seeing a single shred of any kind of cheese in here. Where's it hiding?" "Allow me to tell you, sir. First, look at the short edge of a noodle, please." ?! What on earth?! This noodle's got three layers!" "For the outer layers, I kneaded turmeric into the pasta dough. But for the inner layer, I added Parmesan cheese!" "I see! It's the combination of the tamari soy sauce and the parmesan cheese that gives this dish its incredible richness!" "Yeah, but wait a minute! If you go kneading cheese right into the noodles, wouldn't it just melt back out when you boiled them?" No... that's why they're in three layers! With the cheese in the middle, the outer layers prevented it from melting out! The deep, rich curry sauce, underscored with the flavor of tamari soy sauce... ... and the chewy noodles, which hit you with the mellow, robust taste of parmesan cheese with every bite! Many people are familiar with the idea of coating cream cheese in soy sauce... ... but who would have thought parmesan cheese would match this well with tamari soy sauce!

It is not at all clear to me how a culture gets from here to there, however, because I come to the end of this book convinced that religion is indispensable in igniting great accomplishment in the arts. I use religion at once loosely and stringently. Going to church every Sunday is not the definition I have in mind, nor even a theology in its traditional sense. Confucianism and classical Greek thought were both essentially secular, and look at the cultures they produced. But both schools of thought were tantamount to religion in that they articulated a human place in the cosmos, laid out a clear understanding of the end—the good—toward which humans aim, and set exalted standards of human behavior. And that brings me to the sense in which I use religion stringently. Confucianism and Aristotelianism, along with the great religions of the world, are for grownups, requiring mature contemplation of truth, beauty, and the good. Cultures in which the creative elites are not engaged in that kind of mature contemplation don’t produce great art.

We aren’t simply looking at a demographically induced economic breakdown; we are looking at the end of a half millennium of economic history. At present, I see only two preexisting economic models that might work for the world we’re (d)evolving into. Both are very old-school: The first is plain ol’ imperialism. For this to work, the country in question must have a military, especially one with a powerful navy capable of large-scale amphibious assault. That military ventures forth to conquer territories and peoples, and then exploits said territories and peoples in whatever way it wishes: forcing conquered labor to craft products, stripping conquered territories of resources, treating conquered people as a captive market for its own products, etc. The British Empire at its height excelled at this, but to be honest, so did any other post-Columbus political entity that used the word “empire” in its name. If this sounds like mass slavery with some geographic and legal displacement between master and slave, you’re thinking in the right general direction. The second is something called mercantilism, an economic system in which you heavily restrict the ability of anyone to export anything to your consumer base, but in which you also ram whatever of your production you can down the throats of anyone else. Such ramming is often done with a secondary goal of wrecking local production capacity so the target market is dependent upon you in the long term. The imperial-era French engaged in mercantilism as a matter of course, but so too did any up-and-coming industrial power. The British famously product-dumped on the Germans in the early 1800s, while the Germans did the same to anyone they could reach in the late 1800s. One could argue (fairly easily) that mercantilism was more or less the standard national economic operating policy for China in the 2000s and 2010s (under American strategic cover, no less). In essence, both possible models would be implemented with an eye toward sucking other peoples dry, and transferring the pain of general economic dislocation from the invaders to the invaded. Getting a larger slice of a smaller pie, as it were. Both models might theoretically work in a poorer, more violent, more fractured world—particularly if they are married. But even together, some version of imperialist mercantilism faces a singular, overarching, likely condemning problem: Too many guns, not enough boots.

Know What You Believe What are your values today with regard to your work and your career? Do you believe in the values of integrity, hard work, dependability, creativity, cooperation, initiative, ambition, and getting along well with people? People who live these values in their work are vastly more successful and more highly esteemed than people who do not. What are your values with regard to your family? Do you believe in the importance of unconditional love, continuous encouragement and reinforcement, patience, forgiveness, generosity, warmth, and attentiveness? People who practice these values consistently with the important people in their lives are much happier than people who do not. What are your values with regard to money and financial success? Do you believe in the importance of honesty, industry, thrift, frugality, education, excellent performance, quality, and persistence? People who practice these values are far more successful in their financial lives than those who do not, and they achieve their financial goals far faster as well. What about your health? Do you believe in the importance of self-discipline, self-mastery, and self-control with regard to diet, exercise, and rest? Do you set high standards for health and fitness and then work every day to live up to those standards? People who practice these values live longer, healthier lives than people who do not.

The mass-man would never have accepted authority external to himself had not his surroundings violently forced him to do so. As to-day, his surroundings do not so force him, the everlasting mass-man, true to his character, ceases to appeal to other authority and feels himself lord of his own existence. On the contrary the select man, the excellent man is urged, by interior necessity, to appeal from himself to some standard beyond himself, superior to himself, whose service he freely accepts. Let us recall that at the start we distinguished the excellent man from the common man by saying that the former is the one who makes great demands on himself, and the latter the one who makes no demands on himself, but contents himself with what he is, and is delighted with himself. Contrary to what is usually thought, it is the man of excellence, and not the common man who lives in essential servitude. Contrary to what is usually thought, it is the man of excellence, and not the common man who lives in essential servitude. Life has no savour for him unless he makes it consist in service to something transcendental. Hence he does not look upon the necessity of serving as an oppression. When, by chance, such necessity is lacking, he grows restless and invents some new standard, more difficult, more exigent, with which to coerce himself. This is life lived as a discipline- the noble life. Nobility is defined by the demands it makes on us - by obligations, not by rights.

OCCUPATIONAL SAFETY I don’t know of people who do everything from going to school, learning different skills and basically develop themselves so that they stay at home. It’s ingrained in every kid that they should study hard and excel so that they can get good jobs and live well. With that said, working is what makes us build nations and fulfill some our dreams so it’s important to ensure that the work environment is kept safe and comfortable for workers so that they can remain productive for the longest time. However as long as we are living there will SWMS always be greedy employers who will take short cuts or fail to protect their employees and this is where OSHA(occupational safety and health administration)comes in to rectify these issues. Occupational safety is ensuring that employees work in danger free environment. There are many industries of different nature and hence the possible hazards vary. For example in the textile and clothing industry, employees deal with dyes, chemicals and machines that spin , knit and weave to ensure production. In some countries there have been cases of sweatshops where people make clothes in poorly ventilated places for long hours. The tools of trade in all industries are still the ones that cause hazards e.g. machines can cut people, chemicals emit poisonous fumes or burn the skin and clothes etc. Its therefore the mandate of employers to ensure work places are safe for workers and incase the industry uses chemicals or equipments that may harm the workers in any way, they should provide protective gear. Employers can also seek the services of occupational safety specialists who can inspect their companies to ensure they adhere to the set health and safety standards. These specialists can also help formulate programs that will prevent hazards and injuries. Workers should report employers to OSHA if they fail to comply. As a worker you now know it’s partly your duty to hold your employer accountable so do not agree to work in a hazardous environment.

What is certain is that the immutable classes, the nobility, the clergy, the bourgeoisie, the people, had loftier souls at that time. You can prove it: society has done nothing but deteriorate in the four centuries separating us from the Middle Ages. "True, a baron then was usually a formidable brute. He was a drunken and lecherous bandit, a sanguinary and boisterous tyrant, but he was a child in mind and spirit. The Church bullied him, and to deliver the Holy Sepulchre he sacrificed his wealth, abandoned home, wife, and children, and accepted unconscionable fatigues, extraordinary sufferings, unheard-of dangers. "By pious heroism he redeemed the baseness of his morals. The race has since become moderate. It has reduced, sometimes even done away with, its instincts of carnage and rape, but it has replaced them by the monomania of business, the passion for lucre. It has done worse. It has sunk to such a state of abjectness as to be attracted by the doings of the lowest of the low. ...cupidity was repressed by the confessor, and the tradesman, just like the labourer, was maintained by the corporations, which denounced overcharging and fraud, saw that decried merchandise was destroyed, and fixed a fair price and a high standard of excellence for commodities. Trades and professions were handed down from father to son. The corporations assured work and pay. People were not, as now, subject to the fluctuations of the market and the merciless capitalistic exploitation. Great fortunes did not exist and everybody had enough to live on. Sure of the future, unhurried, they created marvels of art, whose secret remains for ever lost. "All the artisans who passed the three degrees of apprentice, journeyman, and master, developed subtlety and became veritable artists. They ennobled the simplest of iron work, the commonest faience, the most ordinary chests and coffers. Those corporations, putting themselves under the patronage of Saints—whose images, frequently besought, figured on their banners—preserved through the centuries the honest existence of the humble and notably raised the spiritual level of the people whom they protected. ...The bourgeoise has taken the place forfeited by a wastrel nobility which now subsists only to set ignoble fashions and whose sole contribution to our 'civilization' is the establishment of gluttonous dining clubs, so-called gymnastic societies, and pari-mutuel associations. Today the business man has but these aims, to exploit the working man, manufacture shoddy, lie about the quality of merchandise, and give short weight. ...There is one word in the mouths of all. Progress. Progress of whom? Progress of what? For this miserable century hasn't invented anything great. "It has constructed nothing and destroyed everything...

It’s more an affliction than the expression of any high-minded ideals. I watch Mark Bittman enjoy a perfectly and authentically prepared Spanish paella on TV, after which he demonstrates how his viewers can do it at home—in an aluminum saucepot—and I want to shove my head through the glass of my TV screen and take a giant bite out of his skull, scoop the soft, slurry-like material inside into my paw, and then throw it right back into his smug, fireplug face. The notion that anyone would believe Catherine Zeta-Jones as an obsessively perfectionist chef (particularly given the ridiculously clumsy, 1980s-looking food) in the wretched film No Reservations made me want to vomit blood, hunt down the producers, and kick them slowly to death. (Worse was the fact that the damn thing was a remake of the unusually excellent German chef flick Mostly Martha.) On Hell’s Kitchen, when Gordon Ramsay pretends that the criminally inept, desperately unhealthy gland case in front of him could ever stand a chance in hell of surviving even three minutes as “executive chef of the new Gordon Ramsay restaurant” (the putative grand prize for the finalist), I’m inexplicably actually angry on Gordon’s behalf. And he’s the one making a quarter-million dollars an episode—very contentedly, too, from all reports. The eye-searing “Kwanzaa Cake” clip on YouTube, of Sandra Lee doing things with store-bought angel food cake, canned frosting, and corn nuts, instead of being simply the unintentionally hilarious viral video it should be, makes me mad for all humanity. I. Just. Can’t. Help it. I wish, really, that I was so far up my own ass that I could somehow believe myself to be some kind of standard-bearer for good eating—or ombudsman, or even the deliverer of thoughtful critique. But that wouldn’t be true, would it? I’m just a cranky old fuck with what, I guess, could charitably be called “issues.” And I’m still angry. But eat the fucking fish on Monday already. Okay? I wrote those immortal words about not going for the Monday fish, the ones that’ll haunt me long after I’m crumbs in a can, knowing nothing other than New York City. And times, to be fair, have changed. Okay, I still would advise against the fish special at T.G.I. McSweenigan’s, “A Place for Beer,” on a Monday. Fresh fish, I’d guess, is probably not the main thrust of their business. But things are different now for chefs and cooks. The odds are better than ever that the guy slinging fish and chips back there in the kitchen actually gives a shit about what he’s doing. And even if he doesn’t, these days he has to figure that you might actually know the difference. Back when I wrote the book that changed my life, I was angriest—like a lot of chefs and cooks of my middling abilities—at my customers. They’ve changed. I’ve changed. About them, I’m not angry anymore.

The Extraordinary Persons Project In fact, Ekman had been so moved personally—and intrigued scientifically—by his experiments with Öser that he announced at the meeting he was planning on pursuing a systematic program of research studies with others as unusual as Öser. The single criterion for selecting apt subjects was that they be “extraordinary.” This announcement was, for modern psychology, an extraordinary moment in itself. Psychology has almost entirely dwelt on the problematic, the abnormal, and the ordinary in its focus. Very rarely have psychologists—particularly ones as eminent as Paul Ekman—shifted their scientific lens to focus on people who were in some sense (other than intellectually) far above normal. And yet Ekman now was proposing to study people who excel in a range of admirable human qualities. His announcement makes one wonder why psychology hasn't done this before. In fact, only in very recent years has psychology explicitly begun a program to study the positive in human nature. Sparked by Martin Seligman, a psychologist at the University of Pennsylvania long famous for his research on optimism, a budding movement has finally begun in what is being called “positive psychology”—the scientific study of well-being and positive human qualities. But even within positive psychology, Ekman's proposed research would stretch science's vision of human goodness by assaying the limits of human positivity Ever the scientist, Ekman became quite specific about what was meant by “extraordinary.” For one, he expects that such people exist in every culture and religious tradition, perhaps most often as contemplatives. But no matter what religion they practice, they share four qualities. The first is that they emanate a sense of goodness, a palpable quality of being that others notice and agree on. This goodness goes beyond some fuzzy, warm aura and reflects with integrity the true person. On this count Ekman proposed a test to weed out charlatans: In extraordinary people “there is a transparency between their personal and public life, unlike many charismatics, who have wonderful public lives and rather deplorable personal ones.” A second quality: selflessness. Such extraordinary people are inspiring in their lack of concern about status, fame, or ego. They are totally unconcerned with whether their position or importance is recognized. Such a lack of egoism, Ekman added, “from the psychological viewpoint, is remarkable.” Third is a compelling personal presence that others find nourishing. “People want to be around them because it feels good—though they can't explain why,” said Ekman. Indeed, the Dalai Lama himself offers an obvious example (though Ekman did not say so to him); the standard Tibetan title is not “Dalai Lama” but rather “Kundun,” which in Tibetan means “presence.” Finally, such extraordinary individuals have “amazing powers of attentiveness and concentration.

THE INSTRUCTION OF PTAHHOTEP Instruction of the Mayor of the city, the Vizier Ptahhotep, under the Majesty of King Isesi, who lives for all eternity. The mayor of the city, the vizier Ptahhotep, said: O king, my lord! Age is here, old age arrived. Feebleness came, weakness grows, Childtike one sleeps all day. Eyes are dim, ears deaf. Strength is waning through weariness, The mouth, silenced, speaks not, The heart, void, recalls not the past, The bones ache throughout. Good has become evil, all taste is gone, What age does to people is evil in everything. The nose, clogged, breathes not, Painful are standing and sitting. May this servant be ordered to make a staff of old age, So as to teil him the words of those who heard, The ways of the ancestors, Who have listened to the gods. May such be done for you. So that strife may be banned from the people, And the Two Shores may serve you! Said the majesty of this god: Instruct him then in the sayings of the past, May he become a model for the children of the great, May obedience enter him, And the devotion of him who speaks to him, No one is born wise. Beginning of the formulations of excellent discourse spoken by the Prince, Count, God's Father, God's beloved, Eldest Son of the King, of his body, Mayor of the city and Vizier, Ptahhotep, in instructing the ignorant in knowledge and in the standard of excellent discourse, as profit for him who will hear, as woe to him who would neglect them. He spoke to his son: Don’t be proud of your knowledge. Consult the ignorant and the wise; The limits of art are not reached, No artist’s skills are perfect; Good speech is more hidden than greenstone, Yet may be found among maids at the grindstones. If you meet a disputant in action, A powerful man, superior to you. Fold your arms, bend your back, To flout him will not make him agree with you. Make little of the evil speech By not opposing him while he's in action; He will be called an ignoramus, Your self-control will match his pile (of words). If you meet a disputant in action Who is your equal, on your level, You will make your worth exceed his by silence, While he is speaking evilly, There will be much talk by the hearers. Your name will be good in the mind of the magistrates. If you meet a disputant in action, A poor man, not your equal. Do not attack him because he is weak, Let him alone, he will confute himself. Do not answer him to relieve your heart, Do not vent yourself against your opponent, Wretched is he who injures a poor man, One will wish to do what you desire. You will beat him through the magistrates’ reproof. If you are a man who leads, Who controls the affairs of the many, Seek out every beneficent deed, That your conduct may be blameless. Great is justice, lasting in effect, Unchallenged since the time of Osiris. One punishes the transgressor of laws, Though the greedy overlooks this; Baseness may seize riches, Yet crime never lands its wares; In the end it is justice that lasts, Man says: “It is my father's ground.” Do not scheme against people, God punishes accordingly: If a man says: “I shall live by it,” He will lack bread for his mouth. If a man says: “I shall be rich' He will have to say: “My cleverness has snared me.” If he says: “I will snare for myself,” He will be unable to say: “I snared for my profit.” If a man says: "I will rob someone,” He will end being given to a stranger. People’s schemes do not prevail, God’s command is what prevails; Live then in the midst of peace, What they give comes by itself.