Donald Clifton Quotes & Sayings

When you offer a negative thought of action, you open the negative memory-bank and you may lose all your power to persuade. — Napoleon Hill

If you're smart, you keep happiness to yourself. — Charles Baxter

The mental never influences the physical. It is always the physical that modifies the mental, and when we think that the mind is diseased, it is always an illusion. — Claude Bernard

At an early age, you started hearing it: It's a virtue to be "well-rounded." ... They might as well have said : Become as dull as you possibly can be. — Donald O. Clifton

Our definition of a weakness is anything that gets in the way of excellent performance. — Donald O. Clifton

Freedom from fear's consuming control over us hinges upon our honestly dealing with what our overwhelming fears are specifically about and then coming to terms with those tedious, often emotionally driven details. — Connie Kerbs

Collectivism is not inherently democratic, but, on the contrary, gives to a tyrannical minority such powers as the Spanish Inquisitors never dreamed of. ... By bringing the whole of life under the control of the State, Socialism necessarily gives power to an inner ring of bureaucrats, who in almost every case will be men who want power for its own sake and will stick at nothing in order to retain it. — George Orwell

I heartedly approve, in theory," said Ibelius, "but in practice I believe I shall ... absent myself. — Scott Lynch

Our lives are shaped by our interactions with others. Whether we have a long conversation with a friend or simply place an order at a restaurant, every interaction makes a difference. — Donald O. Clifton

If there is any difference between you and me, it may simply be that I get up every day and have a chance to do what I love to do, every day. — Donald O. Clifton

From this point of view, to avoid your strengths and to focus on your weaknesses isn't a sign of diligent humility. It is almost irresponsible. By contrast the most responsible, the most challenging, and, in the sense of being true to yourself, the most honorable thing to do is face up to the strength potential inherent in your talents and then find ways to realize it. — Donald O. Clifton

I really liked watching Bo Jackson run just because of his size and his speed. — Jamal Lewis

Back in the 1930s, Carl Jung, the eminent thinker and psychologist, put it this way: Criticism has 'the power to do good when there is something that must be destroyed, dissolved or reduced, but [it is] capable only of harm when there is something to be built. — Donald O. Clifton

Your weaknesses will never develop, while your strengths will develop infinitely. — Donald O. Clifton

Each of these strategies-get a little better at it, design a support system, use one of your strongest themes to overwhelm your weakness, find a partner, and just stop doing it-can help you as you strive to build your life around your strengths. — Donald O. Clifton

There is one sure way to identify your greatest potential for strength: Step back and watch yourself for a while. Try an activity and see how quickly you pick it up, how quickly you skip steps in the learning and add twists and kinks you haven't been taught yet. See whether you become absorbed in the activity to such an extent that you lose track of time. If none of these has happened after a couple of months, try another activity and watch-and another. Over time your dominant talents will reveal themselves, and you can start to refine them into a powerful strength. — Donald O. Clifton

If your senses are numbed with delusion and denial, you will stop looking for these true strengths and wind up living a second-rate version of someone's life rather than a worldclass version of your own — Donald O. Clifton

Some people live closely guarded lives, fearful of encountering someone or something that might shatter their insecure spiritual foundation. This attitude, however, is not the fault of religion but of their own limited understanding. True Dharma leads in exactly the opposite direction. It enables one to integrate all the many diverse experiences of life into a meaningful and coherent whole, thereby banishing fear and insecurity completely. — Thubten Yeshe

Relationships help us to define who we are and what we can become. Most of us can trace our successes to pivotal relationships. — Donald O. Clifton

It begins to look as though modern man cannot find his heroism in everyday life any more, as men did in traditional societies just by doing their daily duty of raising children, working, and worshiping. He needs revolutions and wars and "continuing" revolutions to last when the revolutions and wars end. That is the price modern man pays for the eclipse of the sacred dimension. When he dethroned the ideas of soul and God he was thrown back hopelessly on his own resources, on himself and those few around him. Even lovers and families trap and disillusion us because they are not substitutes for absolute transcendence. We might say that they are poor illusions in the sense that we have been discussing. — Ernest Becker