This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
The realization that everyone perceives things differently, whether greatly or slightly, is a very important principle for dealing effectively with others. The greater your understanding of someone else’s perception of reality, the greater your ability to communicate effectively with him.
Ability | Important | Perception | Reality | Understanding |
C. P. Snow, fully Charles Percy "C.P." Snow
Judgment is the ability to think of many matters at once, in their interdependence, their related importance, and their consequences.
Ability | Consequences | Judgment | Think |
Happiness is a skill that can be learned. To acquire this skill it is necessary to master: the ability to focus on happiness-producing thoughts instead of those which cause unhappiness and the ability to evaluate events and situations as positive instead of negative, or at least lower the degree of negativity... The person with greater control over his thoughts will have greater control over his emotions.
Ability | Cause | Control | Emotions | Events | Focus | Skill | Unhappiness | Will |
Douglas Adams, fully Douglas Noel Adams
Human beings, who are almost unique in having the ability to learn from the experience of others, are also remarkable for their apparent disinclination to do so.
Ability | Experience | Unique | Learn |
Intelligence is the ability to adapt to change.
Ability | Change | Intelligence |
David J. Schwartz, fully David Joseph Schwartz
The test of a successful person is not an ability to eliminate all problems before they arise, but to meet and work out difficulties when they do arise. We must be willing to make an intelligent compromise with perfection lest we wait forever before taking action. It's still good advice to cross bridges as we come to them.
Ability | Action | Advice | Good | Perfection | Problems | Work |
A Jew is a human being in touch with his inner essence and possessed of the ability to unveil it, and bring it forth. How does one connect with one's inner self, one's highest levels of soul, above all, wisdom and comprehension, and then reveal it in a mundane, finite world? This can be accomplished through song.
As light waves carry information to us we respond according to our harmonic evolution in the octaves of time … where the time continuum has existed throughout galactic space, the medium where galaxies are formed and have their being within the electromagnetic wave-form of eternal light … in which we are an integral part … as we attain the ability of positive thinking … which brings us into contact with the cosmic intelligence.
Erich Fromm, fully Erich Seligmann Fromm
Respect is not fear and awe; it...is the ability to see a person as he is, to be aware of his unique individuality. Respect, thus, implies the absence of exploitation. I want the loved person to grow and unfold for his own sake, and in his own ways, and not for the purpose of serving me.
The world is a scene changing so rapidly that it takes every bit of intuitive ability you have, every brain cell each one of you has, to make the sensible decision about what to do next. You cannot rely upon what you have been taught. All you have learned from history is old ways of making mistakes. There is nothing that history can tell you about what we must do tomorrow. Only what we must not do.
In the conservative view human communication and interaction is limited to our sensory channels ... [but] we are linked by more subtle and encompassing connections as well...The connections that bind 'my' consciousness to the consciousness of others... are rediscovered today in controlled experiments with thought and image transference, and the effect of the mind of one individual on the body of another... Native tribes seem able to communicate beyond the range of eye and ear... In the laboratory also, modern people display a capacity for spontaneous transference of impressions and images, especially when they are emotionally close to each other... transpersonal contact includes the ability to transmit thoughts and images, and ... it is given to many if not all people... this is the finding of recent experiments... Reliable evidence is becoming available that the conscious mind of one person can produce repeatable and measurable effects on the body of another... [also] Intercessory prayer and spiritual healing, together with other mind- and intention-based experiments and practices, yield impressive evidence regarding the effectiveness of telepathic and telesomatic information- and energy-transmission. The pertinent practices produce real and measurable effects on people, and they are more and more widespread. But mainstream science has no explanation for them. Could it be that our consciousness is linked with other consciousnesses through an interconnecting Akashic Field, much as galaxies are linked in the cosmos, quanta in the microworld, and organisms in the world of the living?
Ability | Body | Capacity | Consciousness | Display | Evidence | Individual | Mind | People | Prayer | Science | Thought | World | Thought |
Erich Fromm, fully Erich Seligmann Fromm
I believe that freedom is not a constant attribute that "we have" or "we don’t have"; perhaps there is only one reality: the act of liberating ourselves in the process of using choices. Every step in life that heightens the maturity of man heightens his ability to choose the freeing alternative. I believe that "freedom of choice" is not always equal for all men at every moment. The man with an exclusively necrophilic orientation; who is narcissistic; or who is symbiotic-incestuous, can only make a regressive choice. The free man, freed from irrational ties, can no longer make a regressive choice.
Humans have the ability to act consciously, and collectively, [exercising foresight to] choose their own evolutionary path. In our crucial epoch we cannot leave the selection of the next step in the evolution of human society and culture to chance. We must plan for it, consciously and purposefully.
Ability | Culture | Evolution | Foresight | Plan | Society | Society |
Erich Fromm, fully Erich Seligmann Fromm
Respect is not fear and awe; it denotes, in accordance with the root of the word (respicere = to look at), the ability to see a person as he is, to be aware of his unique individuality. Respect, thus, implies the absence of exploitation. I want the loved person to grow and unfold for his own sake, and in his own ways, and not for the purpose of serving me.
Erich Fromm, fully Erich Seligmann Fromm
Care and responsibility are constituent elements of love, but without respect for and knowledge of the beloved person, love deteriorates into domination and possessiveness. Respect is not fear and awe; it denotes, in accordance with the root of the word (respicere = to look at), the ability to see a person as he is, to be aware of his individuality and uniqueness. To respect a person is not possible without knowing him; care and responsibilty would be blind if they were not guided by the knowledge of the person's individuality.
Ability | Care | Fear | Individuality | Knowing | Knowledge | Love | Respect | Responsibility | Respect |
Erich Fromm, fully Erich Seligmann Fromm
Reason is man’s faculty for grasping the world by thought, in contradiction to intelligence, which is man’s ability to manipulate the world with the help of thought. Reason is man's instrument for arriving at the truth, intelligence is man's instrument for manipulating the world more successfully; the former is essentially human, the latter belongs to the animal part of man.
Ability | Contradiction | Intelligence | Reason | World |