Category: Wisdom Quotes

The Law of One’s Metaphor About Life

poker-608745__340The Law of One, Book 2, has a very insightful metaphor of life being like a poker game.  The Questioner asks, “Why must I come into an incarnation and lose conscious memory of what I want to do and then act in a way in which I hope to act?”

Ra answers, “Let us give the example of a man who sees all the poker hands.  He then knows the game. It is but child’s play to gamble, for it is no risk.  The other hands are known.  The possibilities are known and the hand will be played correctly but with no interest.

Let us re-examine this metaphor and multiply it into the longest poker game you can imagine, a lifetime.  The cards are love, dislike, limitation, unhappiness, pleasure, etc.  They are dealt and re-dealt and re-dealt continuously.  You may, during this incarnation begin–and we stress begin– to know your own cards.  You may begin to find the love within you.  You may begin to balance your pleasure, your limitations, etc.  However, your only indication of other -selves’ cards is to look into the eyes.

You cannot remember your hand, their hands, perhaps even the rules of this game.  This game can only be won by those who lose their cards in the melting influence of love, can only be won by those who lay their pleasures, their limitations, their all upon the table face up and say inwardly: ‘All, all of you players, each other-self, whatever your hand, I love you.’

This is the game: to know, to accept, to forgive, to balance, and to open the self in love.  This cannot be done without the forgetting, for it would carry no weight in the life of the mind/body/spirit being-ness totality.”

L/L Research, March 17, 1982

“Man In The Arena” – Roosevelt’s Famous Speech

“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat

and blood, who strives valiantly; who errs and comes short again and again; because there is not effort without error and shortcomings; but who does actually strive to do the deed;

who knows the great enthusiasm, the great devotion, who spends himself in a worthy cause, who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement and who at the worst, if he fails,

at least he fails while daring greatly.

So that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat.”

Theodore Roosevelt, “Man in the Arena” Speech given April 23, 1910
26th president of US (1858 – 1919)

Determination Quotes For Will Power

“I am only one, but I am one. I cannot do everything, but I can do something. And because I cannot do everything, I will not refuse to do the something that I can do.” – Edward Everett Hale

“When obstacles arise, you change your direction to reach your goal, you do not change your decision to get there.” – Zig Ziglar 

“Nothing can stop the man with the right mental attitude from achieving his goal; nothing on earth can help the man with the wrong mental attitude.” – Thomas Jefferson

“You cannot swim for new horizons until you have the courage to lose sight of the shore.” – William Faulkner

“Confidence comes not from always being right, but from not fearing to be wrong.” – Peter T. McIntyre

“Courage is the most important of all the virtues because without courage, you can’t practice any other virtue consistently.” – Maya Angelou 

“One important key to success is self-confidence. An important key to self-confidence is preparation.” – Arthur Ashe

Favorite Aristotle Quotes (384 BC – 322 BC)

Happiness depends upon ourselves.                                                Knowing yourself is the beginning of all wisdom.

I count him braver who overcomes his desires than him who conquers his enemies; for the hardest victory is over self.

It is during our darkest moments that we must focus to see the light.The ideal man bears the accidents of life with dignity and grace, making the best of circumstances.

It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.                                                           

The beauty of the soul shines out when a man bears with composure one heavy mischance after another, not because he does not feel them, but because he is a man of high and heroic temper.       

Anybody can become angry – that is easy, but to be angry with the right person and to the right degree and at the right time and for the right purpose, and in the right way – that is not within everybody’s power and is not easy.

Courage is the first of human qualities because it is the quality which guarantees the others.

 Dignity does not consist in possessing honors, but in deserving them.

My best friend is the man who in wishing me well wishes it for my sake.                        Love is composed of a single soul inhabiting two bodies.

Educating the mind without educating the heart is no education at all.

Excellence is never an accident.  Excellence is an art won by training and habituation.  We do not act rightly because we have virtue or excellence, but we rather have those because we have acted rightly.  

Excellence is always the result of high intention, sincere effort, and intelligent execution; it represents the wise choice of many alternatives – choice, not chance, determines your destiny.

“The ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle observed that pleasure with its instant gratification was not the same as happiness. Building a life of true happiness took patience and time, plus it involved living life with a purpose. Most often, that purpose was not to satisfy our own wants, but to bless the lives of others. We all deserved the kind of happiness that didn’t come cheap, was available for more than a limited time and that lasted for more than an instant – a happiness that came through serving others that lasted forever.”  Judy Byington

Aristotle’s views profoundly shaped medieval scholarship. The influence of physical science extended from Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages into the Renaissance. Aristotle was revered among medieval Muslim scholars as “The First Teacher”, and among medieval Christians as simply “The Philosopher”, while the poet Dante called him “the master of those who know.”

Aristotle has been called “the father of logic,” “the father of biology,” “the father of political science,” and much more.  Wikipedia