Quotes & Sayings About Planning The Future

Though it accounts for only 2 percent of the body's mass, it uses up a fifth of all the oxygen we breathe, and it's where a quarter of all our glucose gets burned. The brain is the most energetically expensive piece of equipment in our body, and has been ruthlessly honed by natural selection to be efficient at the tasks for which it evolved. One might say that the whole point of our nervous system, from the sensory organs that feed information to the glob of neurons that interprets it, is to develop a sense of what is happening in the present and what will happen in the future, so that we can respond in the best possible way. Strip away the emotions, the philosophizing, the neuroses, and the dreams, and our brains, in the most reductive sense, are fundamentally prediction and planning machines. — Joshua Foer

There were no Latin people on 'Star Trek,' that this was proof that they weren't planning to have us around for the future. — John Leguizamo

Strategic planning for the future is the most hopeful indication of our increasing social intelligence. — William H. Hastie

The duty of planning tomorrow's work is today's duty; though its material is borrowed from the future, the duty, like all duties, is in the Present. — C.S. Lewis

I'm not good at future planning. I don't plan at all. I don't know what I'm doing tomorrow. I don't have a day planner and I don't have a diary. I completely live in the now, not in the past, not in the future. — Heath Ledger

That's the problem with all of us. We've never time to think about the past, and we're always planning for the future. And since the future's always the future, we never live in the present. — L.E. Modesitt Jr.

ENFPs thrive on the excitement of not knowing what comes next. This wildly imaginative type gains energy through speculating about the future and planning what could and might come next. Consequently, — Heidi Priebe

Changes and new interests, characterize the time periods a head of us unknowingly. — Auliq Ice

Tomorrow is not just a day that can't be seen, it is a day that can only be seen by the decisions we make today. — Auliq Ice

Planning is bringing the future into the present so that you can do something about it now. — Alan Lakein

The object of this edict is to enlighten the present and future citizens of Chandigarh about the basic concepts of planning of the city so that they become its guardians and save it from whims of individuals. — Le Corbusier

Though she had been surprised to find that murder was so thoroughly enjoyable, Mrs Bennet did not believe that this reflected any fault or wickedness in her character. She knew she only committed these acts to
secure the future well-being of her daughters. Naturally, she would be able to stop killing once her daughters had husbands and there was no further use for such bloodthirsty deeds. Indeed, she felt adamant that she only enjoyed the planning and execution of such matters because her daughters had not been so good as to provide her with wedding preparations to occupy her active mind. — Debbie Cowens

Power distance: the degree to which members of a society expect power to be unequally shared. Uncertainty avoidance: a society's reliance on social norms and procedures to alleviate the unpredictability of future events. Assertiveness: the extent to which a society encourages people to be tough, confrontational, assertive, and competitive rather than modest and tender. Humane orientation: the degree to which a society encourages and rewards individuals for being fair, altruistic, generous, caring, and kind to others. Future orientation: the extent to which a society encourages and rewards future-oriented behaviors such as planning, investing in the future, and delaying gratification. national culture The values and attitudes shared — Stephen P. Robbins

If we're following our path, then worrying about what could or should happen is a worse illness than what could or should happen. And it's more likely we're going to be out of balance if we worry. The idea is that the future will take care of itself if we remain in the present. I really don't know what I'll do and I don't think about it that much. — Daniel Suelo

The window of opportunity to plan and prepare for the end of his life had closed gradually. Any cracks left open to talk candidly were tenuous and fleeting. — Lisa J. Shultz

A baby is such a blank slate, like training the understudy fo a role you're planning to leave.You truly hope your replacement will do the play justice, but in secret, you want future critics to say you played the character better. — Chuck Palahniuk

Sometime we forget to value the small things, that inspire us more than the large! We should learn from daily than planning stupid future. — Vikram Roy

I don't have that much forward planning about what I want to do next, or in the future. — Heath Ledger

Whether you are just entering the workforce or nearing retirement age, planning for the future is critical. — Ron Lewis

I'm not planning on giving my kids any of my wealth. They know when their education is over, I'm pushing them out of the nest. The bird you see dead under the nest is the one who didn't think about the future. — Kevin O'Leary

Despite several millennia of building best business practices, despite all the analysis and planning, and forced discipline and structure, what makes us human will never be cleaved from how work gets done. — Bill Jensen

That's why it's important to try to live in the present. The present is the only place we can live. When we live in the present, we are alert to what's actually happening -- to us and in the world at large. We can then act based on that awareness. And financial planning based on reality tends to lead to better results.

By contrast, when we live in the future, we are lost in fantasy or fear. When we live in the past, we are lost in regret or nostalgia. Financial planning based on fantasy, fear, regret, and nostalgia is likely to lead to more of the same. — Carl Richards

The stress of it all. How the hell are we expected at the age of sixteen (and seventeen, in your case) to decide what we want to do for the rest of our lives? Right now all I want to do is get out of school, not start planning to get into another one. You're lucky you've always known what you want to do. — Cecelia Ahern

What I miss is the feeling that nothing has started yet, that the future towers over the past, that the present is merely a planning phase for the gleaming architecture that will make up the skyline of the rest of my life. But what I forget is the loneliness of all that. If everything is ahead then nothing is behind. You have no ballast. You have no tailwinds either. You hardly ever know what to do, because you've hardly done anything. I guess this is why wisdom is supposed to be the consolation prize of aging. It's supposed to give us better things to do than stand around and watch in disbelief as the past casts long shadows over the future. — Meghan Daum

In life's journey, having the ability to predict the future gives us an unfair advantage. If we can understand the laws of cause and effect, anyone can predict the future. What we do today leads us to tomorrow's destination.
Why does this simple truth seem to be difficult for most people to understand? — Celso Cukierkorn

An older generation of free market economists used to point out that what is wrong with socialist planning is that it requires the sort of perfect knowledge (of present and future alike) that is never vouchsafed to ordinary mortals. They were right. But it transpires that the same is true for market theorists: — Tony Judt

We will have to decide today whether we will design the future or resign ourselves to it. — Hubert H. Humphrey

What is the conceptual tie that binds anxiety and planning? Both, of course, are intimately connected to thinking about the future. — Daniel M. Gilbert

I have been in relatively high-risk businesses all of my adult life. Few of the others, however, had the possibility of direct gains in knowledge which this one had. I have confidence in the equipment, the planning, the training. I suspect that on a risk-gain ratio, this project would compare very, very favorably with those to which I've been accustomed on the past 20 years. — Neil Armstrong

Quite pure, quite free of future planning, I mounted
the tangled funeral pyre built for my suffering,
so sure of nothing more to buy for future needs,
while in my heart the stored reserves kept silent. — Rainer Maria Rilke

As for the future, your task is not to foresee it, but to enable it. — Antoine De Saint-Exupery

There are some plain common-sense considerations applicable to all these attempts at world planning. They can be briefly stated: 1. To talk of blueprints for the future or building a world order is, if properly understood, suggestive, but it is also dangerous. Societies grow far more truly than they are built. A constitution for a new world order is never like a blueprint for a skyscraper. — Norman Thomas

The reality about transportation is that it's future-oriented. If we're planning for what we have, we're behind the curve. — Anthony Foxx

We're not planning for the future. If we continue to spend ourselves into oblivion, we are going to destroy this nation. — Ben Carson

The journey of the mind always has longer to travel than the heart because dreams carry weight, while love makes you float. — Shannon L. Alder

Of the Phoenix kids, the one Derek got along best with was Daniel. In him, Daniel had found a good sparring partner. And a plotting partner, too. Derek wasn't just the biggest and strongest in our group. He was also the smartest. Scary, off-the-charts smart. That intimidated Daniel a little at first - he's bright, but he needs to work for his grades. But Derek wasn't a show-off or a know-it-all, so they got past that and we would hang out together, the two guys, Chloe, and I planning and plotting our future, bouncing ideas off one another. — Kelley Armstrong

It's only when you're forbidden to talk about the future that you suddenly realize how much the future normally occupies the present, how much of daily life is usually spent making plans and attempting to control the future. Never mind that you have no control over it. The idea of the future is our greatest entertainment, amusement, and time-killer. — Erica Jong

When you do the things in the present that you can see, you are shaping the future that you are yet to see. — Idowu Koyenikan

Nationwide thinking, nationwide planning and nationwide action are the three great essentials to prevent nationwide crises for future generations to struggle through. — Franklin D. Roosevelt

Commitment is the foundation of focus. — Shannon L. Alder

The Reestablishment promised a future too perfect to be possible and society was too desperate to disbelieve. They never realized they were signing away their souls to a group planning on taking advantage of their ignorance. Their fear. Most — Tahereh Mafi

Live in the NOW. Live life to its fullest. Don't spend more than 10% of your time learning from the past, and 20% planning for the future. Live in the present, act NOW to fulfill the dreams you plan. — Vikrmn

Planning ahead is a measure of class. The rich and even the middle class plan for future generations, but the poor can plan ahead only a few weeks or days. — Gloria Steinem

I'll keep it," she said. "Then, when you get back, after you and the dark one are done making out and planning a future filled with blond-haired, green-eyed, pigment-challeneged rug rats, I'll bring it over and you can add it to your scrapbook, right before you start cooking me dinner. I like vegetarian lasagna with cottage cheese instead of ricotta."
"Gwen?"
"And don't forget the mushrooms. Garlic bread, too, please. That is, as long as your vampire lover doesn't object."
"I want to say thank you," Isobel said. "For ... everything."
"No," Gwen said. "Thank you for the delicious dinner. I can almost taste the baklava you and Darth Vader will be making for dessert. Something tells me you're gonna have to look that one up, though. — Kelly Creagh

Most people trusted in the future, assuming that their preferred version of it would unfold. Blindly planning for it, envisioning things that weren't the case. This was the working of the will. This was what gave the world purpose and direction. Not what was there but what was not. — Jhumpa Lahiri

Google's entire business model and its planning for the future are banking on an open and free Internet. And it will not succeed if the Internet becomes overly balkanized. — Rebecca MacKinnon

The problem with women was that they were always planning some future that involved you and that you were not aware of, as if you'd signed up for a credit card without knowing it. — Jean Thompson

Sometimes it's not about making a ton of money in one night, just to spend the rest of your life waiting on the next payday. You will fare better investing time, planning, strategic thinking in order to secure a stable, fruitful future. — Carlos Wallace

The future is not about a single mind that sees or predicts - it is about the many. — Daniel Egger

Everyone in America (according to my generalizations) is a potential millionaire waiting for his or her big break. I was astonished lately to realize that Americans are definitely believing in and planning for the future, despite the fact that they elected Ronald Reagan twice. — Roseanne Barr

If the true God is not allowed to lead our lives society will continue to immerse itself into bad decision, poor planning and selfishness on all levels. This will lead to a world-wide revolution that will fuel more meaningless wars, injustice, horrific crimes, lost of life and what really matters the most, hope for the future. A love that could warms hearts. A trust that would never betray a brother or a friend. A peace that the world has never seen. — Delaine Robins

Concentrate on the here and now. The future can take care of itself. — Christopher G. Nuttall

Sometimes, when we pray for miracles what we are really praying for is God to do the work that we are too afraid to take action about. Often, the miracle resides in us and we need to simply "be all in", rather than standing on the fence waiting. — Shannon L. Alder

The thinking that says, 'I will start building my ideal future tomorrow, or next week, or next month,' is fatally flawed. The future you are going to live is the one you are creating right now at this very moment. — Brian P. Moran

In Tom's River, an hour away from Vineland, there's also a large tent city. Increasingly pessimistic, most of us don't dream of any bright future, but are planning for the worst. How many of us are squatting in foreclosed homes? How many are scraping by on just a fraction of what we used to earn just a few years ago? How many are quickly exhausting their scant savings? How many will be fired next week? Meanwhile, this criminal government continues its systematic impoverishment and suppression of us all. Fragmented and confused, we have no plan to combat any of this, but are looking to be saved by the very architects of our ruination. — Linh Dinh

Did you know that for pretty much the entire history of the human species, the average life span was less than thirty years? You could count on ten years or so of real adulthood, right? There was no planning for retirement, There was no planning for a career. There was no planning. No time for plannning. No time for a future. But then the life spans started getting longer, and people started having more and more future. And now life has become the future. Every moment of your life is lived for the future
you go to high school so you can go to college so you can get a good job so you can get a nice house so you can afford to send your kids to college so they can get a good job so they can get a nice house so they can afford to send their kids to college. — John Green

Just that dwelling and planning is bullshit, you dwell on the past, you can't move forward. Spend too much time planning for the future and you just push yourself backwards, or you stay stagnant in the same place all your life. Live in the moment, where everything is just right, take your time and limit your bad memories and you'll get wherever it is you're going a lot faster and with less bumps in the road along the way. — J.A. Redmerski

Is it dangerous to plan too much? Yes, we all need to plan, to have a plan, but life goes on regardless of our plans and we know only too well what happens to so many of the best laid plans of mice and men! — Leslie W.P. Garland

I am also planning to leave a lot of things undone. Part of life's mystery depends on future possibilities, and mystery is an elusive quality which evaporates when sampled frequently, to be followed by boredom. For example, catching various types of fish is on my list of good things to do, but I would be reluctant to rush into it, even if i had the time. I want no part of destroying fishing as a mysterious sport. — Michael Collins

Our industries, our trade, and our way of life generally have been based first on the exploitation of the earth's surface and then on the oppression of one another--on banditry pure and simple. The inevitable result is now upon us. The unsuccessful bandits are trying to despoil their more successful competitors. The world is divided into two hostile camps: at the root of this vast conflict lies the evil of spoliation which has destroyed the moral integrity of our generation. While this contest marches to its inevitable conclusion, it will not be amiss to draw attention to a forgotten factor which may perhaps help to restore peace and harmony to a tortured world. We must in our future planning pay great attention to food--the product of sun, soil, plant, and livestock--in other words, to farming and gardening. — Albert Howard

Two chimpanzees were observed maltreating a chicken: One would extend some food to the fowl, encouraging it to approach; whereupon the other would thrust at it with a piece of wire it had concealed behind its back. The chicken would retreat but soon allow itself to approach once again
and be beaten once again. Here is a fine combination of behavior sometimes thought to be uniquely human: cooperation, planning a future course of action, deception and cruelty. — Carl Sagan

I realized sometime in the early '80s that if I didn't do something - like planning for the future in a way, a kind of pension or something - that if I didn't do something there and then, I was going to be condemned to forever present my three years as a pop star, condensed, as a stage act for the rest of my life. Because that's normally what happens to people in the pop business. — Nick Lowe

I've already revealed my favorite way to get in touch with my future self: through the Rule of 3. In the Rule of 3, your future self takes center stage. By mentally fast-forwarding to the end of the day and thinking about what you want to accomplish, you activate the planning centers in your prefrontal cortex, while you also step into the shoes of your future self. And you do the same when you plan out your three accomplishments at the start of every week. — Chris Bailey

Technology is permeating every single thing we do ... And to the extent that we can better expose our young people to all the different ways that technology can be used, not just for video games or toys, we're planning for the future. — Marc Morial

We spend our whole lives worrying about the future, planning for the future, trying to predict the future, as if figuring it out will cushion the blow. But the future is always changing. The future is the home of our deepest fears and wildest hopes. But one thing is certain when it finally reveals itself. The future is never the way we imagined it — Shonda Rhimes

I'm not a big believer in long-term planning and far-off goals. In fact, I generally set 3-month and 6-month dreamlines. The variables change too much and in-the-future distance becomes an excuse for postponing action. — Tim Ferriss

Planning is worrying based on facts — Bangambiki Habyarimana

We have to honor our commitments to today's beneficiaries, but we can't solve the growing deficit and debt problems unless we are smart, courageous, and sensible in planning for future. — Nan Hayworth

The optimist is a pessimist with a plan — Bangambiki Habyarimana

Seize the moments that are before you instead of planning for future moments that get lost in the abyss of time. — Orly Wahba

IF YOUR OVERALL SITUATION IS UNSATISFACTORY or unpleasant, separate out this instant and surrender to what is. That's the flashlight cutting through the fog. Your state of consciousness then ceases to be controlled by external conditions. You are no longer coming from reaction and resistance. Then look at the specifics of the situation. Ask yourself, "Is there anything I can do to change the situation, improve it, or remove myself from it?" If so, take appropriate action. Focus not on the hundred things that you will or may have to do at some future time but on the one thing that you can do now. This doesn't mean you should not do any planning. It may well be that planning is the one thing you can do now. But make sure you don't keep running "mental movies" that continually project yourself into the future, and so lose the Now. Any action you take may not bear fruit immediately. Until it does - do not resist what is. — Eckhart Tolle

The barrier to our future is often the very plans that we've created to get there. — Craig D. Lounsbrough

We focus on our goal, anchor on our plan, and neglect relevant base rates, exposing ourselves to the planning fallacy. We focus on what we want to do and can do, neglecting the plans and skills of others. Both in explaining the past and in predicting the future, we focus on the causal role of skill and neglect the role of luck. We are therefore prone to an illusion of control. We focus on what we know and neglect what we do not know, which makes us overly confident in our beliefs. — Daniel Kahneman

The objective, clearly enunciated by the leaders of UNCED, is to bring about a change in the present system of independent nations. The future is to be World Government with central planning by the United Nations. Fear of environmental crises - whether real or not - is expected to lead to - compliance — Dixie Lee Ray

Be sure to keep my ruby choker and the pearl and emerald set for the person you will marry," she said during one of these walks. "I'm not planning on getting married any time soon," I told her, and she said that she wished she could say the same for dying. Ultimately, I disobeyed her. After she was gone I was unable to open up and examine the contents of all those flat red boxes she'd kept hidden in a suitcase on her closet shelf, never mind set something aside for the sake of my future happiness. — Jhumpa Lahiri

Planning for the future is like going fishing in a dry gulch; Nothing ever works out as you wanted, so give up all your schemes and ambitions. If you have got to think about something - Make it the uncertainty of the hour of your death . — Sogyal Rinpoche

In avoiding any situations reminiscent of the past trauma, or any initiative that might involve future planning and risk, traumatized people deprive themselves of those new opportunities for successful coping that might mitigate the effect of the traumatic experience. Thus, constrictive symptoms, though they may represent an attempt to defend against overwhelming emotional states, exact a high price for whatever protection they afford. They narrow and deplete the quality of life and ultimately perpetuate the effects of the traumatic event. — Judith Lewis Herman

If you're planning on dropping out of high school, prepare yourself for the future by repeating aloud each day: I'm looking forward to low-paying jobs for the rest of my life. — Sean Covey

If we are ever in doubt what to do, it is a good rule to ask ourselves what we shall wish on the morrow that we had done. — John Lubbock

My life will be what I make it," he told her. "That is true for all of us all the time. We cannot know what the future will bring or how the events of the future will make us feel. We cannot even plan and feel any certainty that our most carefully contrived plans will be put into effect. Could I have predicted what happened to me in the Peninsula? Could you have predicted what happened to you in Cornwall? But those things happened to us nevertheless. And they changed our plans and our dreams so radically that we both might have been excused for giving up, for never planning or dreaming again, for never living again. That too is a choice we all have to make. — Mary Balogh

For pretty much the entire history of the human species, the average life span was less than thirty years? You could count on ten years or so of real adulthood, right? There was no planning for retirement, There was no planning for a career. There was no planning. No time for planning. No time for a future. But then the life spans started getting longer, and people started having more and more future. And now life has become the future. — John Green

You can't predict the future, but you can plan for it — Saji Ijiyemi

Neuroscience may one day resolve how planning takes place. The first hints are coming from the hippocampus, which has long been known to be vital both for memory and for future orientation. The devastating effects of Alzheimer's typically begin with degeneration of this part of the brain. As with all major brain areas, however, the human hippocampus is far from unique. Rats have a similar structure, which has been intensely studied. After a maze task, these rodents keep replaying their experiences in this brain region, either during sleep or sitting still while awake. Using brain waves to detect what kind of maze paths the rats are rehearsing in their heads, scientists found that more is going on than a consolidation of past experiences. — Frans De Waal

Although routinely criticized, a pessimist attitude enables a person never to be disappointed with the vagrancies of life or frustrated by the outcome of any event. A pessimist prepares for reality by considering every possible contingency. Having reckoned with the worst possible circumstances, and game planned what to do in the event of the most drastic outcome, a pessimist is pleasantly surprised when they achieve a better than expected result. — Kilroy J. Oldster

While many different animal species have nervous systems that enable anticipation of events - for example, learning that a flashing light is associated with a reward in a conditioned learning experiment - planning for the future seems to be a prefrontal invention. — Daniel J. Siegel

George" she practically squealed, and once again he shushed her.
"You never learn, do you?" he murmured against her skin.
"You're the one who's making me scream."
"That wasn't a scream," he said with a cocktail smile.
she eyed him with alarm. "I didn't mean it as a dare."
He laughed aloud - although more quietly than she'd done - at that. "Merely planning for the future, when volume is not an issue."
"George, there are servants!"
"Who work for me."
"George!"
"When we are married," he said, lacing his fingers through hers, "we shall make as much or as little noise as we wish."
Billie felt her face go crimson.
he dropped a teasing kiss on her cheek. "Did I make you blush?"
"You know you did," she grumbled.
He looked down at her with a cocky smile. "I probably shouldn't take quite so much pride in that."
"But you do."
He brought her hand to his lips. "I do. — Julia Quinn

The taxi driver felt that it was a good observation, and said he was planning to build for the future, too: he had some money on the horses, and if he won, he would buy his own taxicab, and really do well.
I felt very sorry. I told him that betting on the horses was a bad idea, but he insisted it was the only way he could do it. He had such good intentions, but his method was going to be luck.
I wasn't going to go on philosophizing, so he took me to a place where there was a steel band playing some great calypso music, and I had an enjoyable afternoon. — Richard Feynman

... dwelling and planning is bullshit," he says. "You dwell on the past, you can't move forward. Spend too much time planning for the future and you just push yourself backwards, or you say stagnant in the same place all your life." His eyes lock on mine. "Live in the moment. — J.A. Redmerski

Work outside of school hours was a necessity at an early age, and with such time as I had I turned toward interests of my own devising, making things, experimenting, and planning for the future. I had read of Thomas Alva Edison and other successful inventors, and the idea of making an invention appealed to me as one of the few available means to accomplish a change in one's economic status, while at the same time bringing to focus my interest in technical things and making it possible to make a contribution to society as well. — Chester Carlson

Plans can break down. You cannot plan the future. Only presumptuous fools plan. The wise man steers. — Terry Pratchett

Planning is the essence of good management and when it comes to health care we must allow states to plan for future needs. We need to cement this federal commitment to Alaskans so the state has the assurance that money vital for providing Medicaid health care will not just dry up and disappear. — Lisa Murkowski

Remember, planning the future and reflecting on the past are valuable exercises, but doing this throughout your day interferes with what is in front of you - your present. — Travis Bradberry

Managers who extensively plan the future get the timing wrong. — Shona Brown

If tomorrow is promised to no one, why do we spend today building the foundation for tomorrow. The future may not be promised, but it may be filled with promise. — Nikki DiCaro

Long range planning does not deal with future decisions, but with the future of present decisions. — Peter Drucker

Living in the moment" all the time may not be practical if one lives for many years. Planning for the future confers benefits, especially financially. What may be good for a twenty-year plan might not be best for five years. It causes incredible tension . . . the uncertainty just becomes a part of your life. But it is tiring. I've thought, "I wish I could just get sick." I just didn't have the energy to keep living, waiting to get sick. It takes energy to be optimistic: I run out of steam. — Robert Klitzman

I am a person who continually destroys the possibilities of a future because of the numbers of alternative viewpoints I can focus on the present. — Doris Lessing

Major barriers to successful planning are fear of change, ignorance, uncertainty about the future, and lack of imagination. — John C. Maxwell

In conclusion, here's my advice to aspiring writers, journalists, and future lawyers - or anyone planning on working in the communications field: if you want an accurate account of any story, go to the primary sources. They know what really happened. — Simeon Wright

Here in the Great Lakes region, a fourth year in a row of declining water levels has caused millions of dollars in losses for shipping companies, marinas and other businesses and prompted further restrictions on future water withdrawals for expanding suburbs. "A lot of people just can't believe that we may be running out of water, living this close to the Great Lakes," said Sarah Nerenberg, a water engineer with the Northeastern Illinois Planning Commission, which conducted the study on shortages. — Timothy Egan