Inspirational thinking

I'm taking a look at the walls near my desk, noticing the little quotes and fortunes I've hung up around me for inspiration. (I'm certain a post like this falls under the category of "total filler", but I'm going to publish it anyway.) Maybe something in here will ring true to you, also.

In the notes posted at my desk at my day job, I think you'll recognize a theme.

• "Time is the coin of your life. It is the only coin you have, and only you can determine how it will be spent. Be careful lest you let other people spend it for you." -- Carl Sandburg

• "Sleep late, dream more." -- from a Dove chocolate wrapper

• "Every moment is an opportunity to change." -- something random I heard and wrote down, Buddhist, I think

• "Your life will be graced with the presence of stardom." -- from a fortune cookie

• "Keep true to the dreams of your youth." -- from a fortune cookie

• "Stop searching forever. Happiness is just next to you." -- from a fortune cookie

• "Boredom is a state of mind. We have a choice. I choose to not be bored. I chose to observe and listen." -- illusionist David Blaine from an October 2003 BBC article after he finished his endurance test in a box suspended over the Thames River in London.

• "Life's journey is not to arrive at the grave safely in a well-preserved body, but rather to skid in sideways, totally worn out, shouting '...Holy shit ... What a ride!' " -- from the signature line of an acquaintance's email, attributed to Mavis Leyrer of Seattle, age 83
  

At home, and again, you'll see a theme:

• "Every great accomplishment starts with a decision to try." -- a post card from Weight Watchers

• "Make no little plans... They have no magic to stir men's blood." -- Daniel H. Burnham, that great Chicago city planner

• "Without friends to commiserate and celebrate with, the journey would be dull indeed."
  -- Kelle Riley, romance author

• "I can fix a bad page, but I can't fix a blank one." -- Nora Roberts, romance author

• "Rejections are the stepping stones to publication." -- inspirational postcard sent to me by romance author Linda Hill

• "Quitting is not an option." -- bookmark distributed by romance author Pat White, aka Patricia Mae

• "Write -- or you'll never see this bear again!" -- Hallmark postcard I bought more than 20 years ago. Features a really cute stuffed bear tied and blindfolded to a chair.

• "Better a witty fool than a foolish wit." -- William Shakespeare, on a magnet I bought at the Globe Theatre in London

• "Set goals you can control." -- a bookmark from Windy City Romance Writers

• "I am a writer. I will finish this book because I have the skill, talent, energy, and courage to do so. And when the demons of self-doubt rear their ugly heads, I will shout them down with words. Because I am a writer." -- a mouse pad sold and copyrighted by the Southern Magic chapter of Romance Writers of America

• "Writers have to simultaneously believe the following two things:
  1. The story I am now working on is the greatest work of genius ever written in English.
  2. The story I am now working on is worthless drivel.
  It's best if you believe both these things simultaneously, so that you can call on Belief 1 when you're deciding whether to mail the story out, Belief 2 when going over the story to revise it, Belief 1 when choosing which market to submit it to, Belief 2 when the story is rejected (of course, I *expected* to get this back), and Belief 1 again when you put it back in an envelope and mail it to the next-best market.
  Of course, believing two contradictory facts at the same time is sometimes referred to as madness -- but that, too, can be an asset to a writer." -- author Orson Scott Card