This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
Success in life is a matter not so much of talent or opportunity as of concentration and perseverance.
Character | Life | Life | Opportunity | Perseverance | Success | Talent |
That one who does not get fun and enjoyment out of every day in which he lives, needs to reorganize his life. And the sooner the better, for pure enjoyment throughout life has more to do with one's happiness and efficiency than almost any other single element.
Better | Day | Efficiency | Enjoyment | Fun | Life | Life | Wisdom | Happiness |
If you have a positive attitude towards the events of your life, even though to an outside observer your life might seem full of suffering, you nevertheless will live a happy life. What to others might seem misfortunes, you will view as opportunities for spiritual growth.
Character | Events | Growth | Happy | Life | Life | Suffering | Will |
In this life we get only those things for which we hunt, for which we strive, and for which we are willing to sacrifice. It is better to aim for something that you want - even though you miss it - than to get something that you didn't aim to get, and which you don't want! If we look long enough for what we want in life we are almost sure to find it, no matter what that objective may be.
The goal of our intellectual efforts cannot be a static, polished possession; it can only be further, more successful efforts of the same general kind. In science as in life it is the process, not the terminus, that should concern us - if we are wise.
Have I met the hour patiently, without fear, at the portal? Now is my name called, of the lip of my love has spoken: Do I mistake you, O divine Signaler? is it after all some other soul that is hailed. My self is my answer: there’s that in my heart responds, meeting the call with equal voice, establishing forever the unspeakable bond! Bond that does not bind - bond that frees - bond that discovers and bestows. Look! I am flushed with inexhaustible possessions! The old measures vanish, I am expanded to infinite sweep... Before birth, seeing birth, after life seeing life!... This minute grown infinite, the far worlds spread before me, the endless drift of soul...
Birth | Character | Fear | Heart | Life | Life | Love | Mistake | Possessions | Self | Soul | Old |
Ardis Whitman, fully Ardis Rumsey Whitman
Toscanini's eightieth birthday, someone asked his son, Walter, what his father ranked as his most important achievement. The son replied, "For him there can be no such thing. Whatever he happens to be doing at the moment is the biggest thing in his life - whether it is conducting a symphony or peeling an orange."
Achievement | Character | Father | Important | Life | Life |
The most useful piece of learning for the uses of life is to unlearn what is untrue... Three things are necessary for the salvation of man: to know what he ought to believe; to know what he ought to desire; and to know what he ought to do.
Desire | Learning | Life | Life | Man | Salvation | Wisdom |