swissmiss

“It’s possible that you were undermined, endangered, cut off or disrespected.

But if we begin with that, then the relationship gets shaky.

Perhaps the other person simply didn’t understand. It might be that they are focused on their issues, not yours. It could be that they’re dealing with something you don’t see. And most likely, they simply might not know what you’re expecting or hoping for.

When we assume misunderstanding, we open the door to better. We can find empathy and connection by giving people the benefit of the doubt.

Clarity, not grievance, is the solution to misunderstanding.

This works for customers, prospects, colleagues, friends, and family too.”

Assume misunderstanding, by Seth Godin

“For years now, I’ve just been bored, bored, bored, with evil,”… “It’s just not interesting.” “Evil wears a top hat and it has tap shoes and a cape and it’s on stage and it’s hollerin’. And goodness is always backstage, sort of waving, but [evil] takes up all the energy because it is nothing.”
– Toni Morrison

“You cannot get through a single day without having an impact on the world around you. What you do makes a difference, and you have to decide what kind of difference you want to make.”

“Hope is not wishful thinking. It’s the dogged determination to do what is in our power to make the better future we wish for actually happen. Without hope, we fall into apathy—and do nothing. And the greatest danger to our future is apathy.”

– Jane Goodall

“The ability to be wrong is one of the most important virtues, and it is extremely difficult. It should be emphasized in families and schools alongside standard virtues like honesty, sharing, and kindness, starting as young as possible.”
– Alan Levinovitz

“We but mirror the world. All the tendencies present in the outer world are to be found in the world of our body. If we could change ourselves, the tendencies in the world would also change. As a man changes his own nature, so does the attitude of the world change towards him. This is the divine mystery supreme. A wonderful thing it is and the source of our happiness. We need not wait to see what others do.”
― Mahatma Gandhi

“The distance between deciding and doing is the single most reliable predictor of whether your life will be extraordinary or ordinary. Not talent, not circumstances, not even the quality of your decisions-but how quickly you collapse the space between intention and reality. Think of this gap as a kind of friction coefficient on your existence: the smaller it is, the more of your internal force actually translates into external motion. When you can move from “I should do this” to physically doing it within hours instead of weeks, you’re not just accomplishing more-you’re operating in a fundamentally different mode of being where your thoughts have immediate consequences in the world, where your inner life and outer life are in a constant, tight, conversation.”
– Derek Sivers

(via)

“I still think the [real] revolution is to make the world safe for poetry, meandering, for the frail and vulnerable, the rare and obscure, the impractical and local and small.”
– Rebecca Solnit

“The market for something to believe in is infinite.”
– Hugh MacLeod,

(Via this Seth Godin post speaking on integrity)

“Next time I’m about to cast a harsh judgement on a stranger who offends me, can I allow myself instead to see them as the flawed and complex human that they are? Full of heartbreak, loss, ambition and disappointment, walking a volatile path of all the things they’ve ever failed at?”
― Kae Tempest, On Connection