This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
Erich Fromm, fully Erich Seligmann Fromm
Modern man lives under the illusion that he knows what he wants, while he actually wants what he is supposed to want.
Carolyn Gold Heilbrun, pen name Amanda Cross
Only a marriage with partners strong enough to risk divorce is strong enough to avoid it.
Bruce Jenner, fully William Bruce Jenner
People are either driven to action or complacency, mission or rust. You’re either participating in the Game of Life or you’re watching it from the grandstands. Herein lies a crucial difference. A champion plays the game: a spectator observes, criticizes and never really gets to live. A champion knows what he or she wants and goes after it with carefully calculated goals and no-holds-barred action. A spectator feels that his or her life is not their own. They let others dictate their destiny. They become victims of life instead of masters of it.”
Action | Complacency | Destiny | Goals | Life | Life | Mission | People | Wants |
Anyone who wants to be a leader must be the servant, not the boss, of those he wants to serve.
In the so-called Western secular democracy… a divorce has been effected between politics and religion, and as a result of this secularization, the society and particularly its politically active elements have ceased to attach much or any importance to morality or ethics.
Democracy | Ethics | Morality | Politics | Religion | Society | Society |
A man can make what he wants of himself if he truly believes that he must be ready for hard work and many heartbreaks along the way.
Friedrich Nietzsche, fully Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche
He who wants to set a good example must add a grain of foolishness to his virtue; then others can imitate and, at the same time, rise above the one being imitated – something which people love.
Example | Good | Love | People | Time | Virtue | Virtue | Wants |
Maximilien Robespierre, fully Maximilien François Marie Isidore de Robespierre
If virtue be the spring of popular government in times of peace, the spring of that government during a revolution is virtue combined with terror: virtue, without which terror is destructive; terror, without which virtue is impotent. Terror is the only justice prompt, severe and inflexible; it is then an emanation of virtue; it is less a distinct principle than a natural consequence of the general principle of democracy, applied to the most pressing wants of the country.
Democracy | Government | Justice | Peace | Revolution | Terror | Virtue | Virtue | Wants | Government |
Fred Rogers, "Mister Rogers," born Frederick McFeely Rogers
There are many things children accept as “grown-up things” over which they have no control and for which they have no responsibility – for instance, weddings, having babies, buying houses, and driving cars. Parents who are separating really need to help their children put divorce on that grown-up list, so that children do not see themselves as the cause of their parents’ decision to live apart.
Cause | Children | Control | Decision | Need | Parents | Responsibility |
Menachem Mendel Schneerson, known as the Lubavitcher Rebbe
A true leader does not seek followers, he wants to teach others how to be leaders. He does not want control, he wants the truth. He does not impose his leadership on others, nor does he take away anyone's autonomy. He inspires by love, not coercion. When it comes time to take credit, he makes himself invisible; but he is the first to arrive at the time of need, and he will never shrink away in fear. He is so passionate about your welfare that when you consult him for guidance, it is like coming face to face with yourself for the first time.
Coercion | Control | Credit | Fear | Guidance | Love | Need | Teach | Time | Truth | Wants | Will | Leader | Leadership |
Franz Werfel, fully Franz Viktor Werfel
Life wants to secure itself against the void that is raging within. The risk of eternal void is to be met by the premium of temporal insurance… social security, old age pensions, etc. It springs no less from metaphysical despair than from material misery.
Age | Despair | Eternal | Life | Life | Old age | Risk | Security | Wants | Old |
Attachment is a manufacturer of illusions and whoever wants reality ought to be detached.
The man who really wants to do something finds a way; the other man finds an excuse.