Dealing with complexity is an inefficient and unnecessary waste of time, attention and mental energy. There is never any justification for things being complex when they could be simple.
To praise is an investment in happiness.
The secret of successfully giving yourself away lies not so much in calculated actions as in cultivating friendly, warm-hearted impulses. You have to train yourself to obey giving impulses on the instant -- before they get a chance to cool. When you give impulsively, something happens inside of you that makes you glow, sometimes for hours.
Here is good news to those to whom enthusiasm does not come naturally: It can be cultivated. At first, you must consciously put your eyes, your voice, your spirit-in a word, yourself-into your appreciation of people and events and things. Do this around your home, at your work, and in your social contacts, and you will be surprised at how quickly it will become second nature. You will find yourself living in a more gracious and enthusiastic world, for your enthusiasm will be reflected back to you from the people to whom you give it.
The enjoyment that comes from our acts of kindness give us a glimpse of the world that might be, hopefully our future world. Good natured, friendly, human.
If you start to give of yourself, be it ever so simple a fashion, the world will observe your spirit and show you many needs that you can supply. There are a hundred ways of giving away little margins of time you will never miss, which could be riches to someone.
Opportunities for kindness are flowing past us continuously, during the hours we spend at home, in the office or store or shop or laboratory where we work, as we walk along the street, as we drive hither and yon, as we travel by train or plane or bus - in short, wherever we are and whatever we are doing.
If you're going thru hell, keep going.
[Friendship] is a relationship that has no formal shape, there are no rules or obligations or bonds as in marriage or the family, it is held together by neither law nor property nor blood, there is no glue in it but mutual liking. It is therefore rare.
It's what I love about what I do and the life that I'm able to have and be able to just be so normal one day and be here the next. . . I feel so lucky to be able to do what I do.
As a person, I have never been discourteous or nasty to anybody. I may have stood my ground a bit too directly, a bit too firmly, and I believe I have, over a number of years, learned to be a little less direct.