"Affirmation" by Savage Garden

I believe the sun should never set upon an argument
I believe we place our happiness in other people’s hands
I believe that junk food tastes so good because it’s bad for you
I believe your parents did the best job they knew how to do
I believe that beauty magazines promote low self esteem
I believe I’m loved when I’m completely by myself alone

I believe in Karma what you give is what you get returned
I believe you can’t appreciate real love ’til you’ve been burned
I believe the grass is no more greener on the other side
I believe you don’t know what you’ve got until you say goodbye

I believe you can’t control or choose your sexuality
I believe that trust is more important than monogamy
I believe your most attractive features are your heart and soul
I believe that family is worth more than money or gold
I believe the struggle for financial freedom is unfair
I believe the only ones who disagree are millionaires

I believe in Karma what you give is what you get returned
I believe you can’t appreciate real love ’til you’ve been burned
I believe the grass is no more greener on the other side
I believe you don’t know what you’ve got until you say goodbye

I believe forgiveness is the key to your own happiness
I believe that wedded bliss negates the need to be undressed
I believe that God does not endorse tv evangelists
I believe in love surviving death into eternity

I believe in Karma what you give is what you get returned
I believe you can’t appreciate real love ’til you’ve been burned
I believe the grass is no more greener on the other side
I believe you don’t know what you’ve got until you say goodbye
Until you say goodbye

I. Laying Plans in "Art of War" by Sun Zhu

**I believe even though this was primarily written as a treatise on military strategy, this is incredibly applicable to daily life.

1. Sun Tzu said:  The art of war is of vital importance
   to the State.
2. It is a matter of life and death, a road either
   to safety or to ruin.  Hence it is a subject of inquiry
   which can on no account be neglected.
3. The art of war, then, is governed by five constant
   factors, to be taken into account in one’s deliberations,
   when seeking to determine the conditions obtaining in the field.
4. These are:  (1) The Moral Law; (2) Heaven; (3) Earth;
   (4) The Commander; (5) Method and discipline.
5,6. The Moral Law causes the people to be in complete
   accord with their ruler, so that they will follow him
   regardless of their lives, undismayed by any danger.
7. Heaven signifies night and day, cold and heat,
   times and seasons.
8. Earth comprises distances, great and small;
   danger and security; open ground and narrow passes;
   the chances of life and death.
9. The Commander stands for the virtues of wisdom,
   sincerely, benevolence, courage and strictness.
10. By method and discipline are to be understood
   the marshaling of the army in its proper subdivisions,
   the graduations of rank among the officers, the maintenance
   of roads by which supplies may reach the army, and the
   control of military expenditure.
11. These five heads should be familiar to every general:
   he who knows them will be victorious; he who knows them
   not will fail.
12. Therefore, in your deliberations, when seeking
   to determine the military conditions, let them be made
   the basis of a comparison, in this wise:–
13. (1) Which of the two sovereigns is imbued
       with the Moral law?
   (2) Which of the two generals has most ability?
   (3) With whom lie the advantages derived from Heaven
       and Earth?
   (4) On which side is discipline most rigorously enforced?
   (5) Which army is stronger?
   (6) On which side are officers and men more highly trained?
   (7) In which army is there the greater constancy
       both in reward and punishment?
14. By means of these seven considerations I can
   forecast victory or defeat.
15. The general that hearkens to my counsel and acts
   upon it, will conquer:  let such a one be retained in command!
   The general that hearkens not to my counsel nor acts upon it,
   will suffer defeat:–let such a one be dismissed!
16. While heading the profit of my counsel,
   avail yourself also of any helpful circumstances
   over and beyond the ordinary rules.
17. According as circumstances are favorable,
   one should modify one’s plans.
18. All warfare is based on deception.
19. Hence, when able to attack, we must seem unable;
   when using our forces, we must seem inactive; when we
   are near, we must make the enemy believe we are far away;
   when far away, we must make him believe we are near.
20. Hold out baits to entice the enemy.  Feign disorder,
   and crush him.
21. If he is secure at all points, be prepared for him.
   If he is in superior strength, evade him.
22. If your opponent is of choleric temper, seek to
   irritate him.  Pretend to be weak, that he may grow arrogant.
23. If he is taking his ease, give him no rest.
   If his forces are united, separate them.
24. Attack him where he is unprepared, appear where
   you are not expected.
25. These military devices, leading to victory,
   must not be divulged beforehand.
26. Now the general who wins a battle makes many
   calculations in his temple ere the battle is fought.
   The general who loses a battle makes but few
   calculations beforehand.  Thus do many calculations
   lead to victory, and few calculations to defeat:
   how much more no calculation at all!  It is by attention
   to this point that I can foresee who is likely to win or lose.

Translated from Chinese By LIONEL GILES, M.A. (1910)

Excerpt from "From the Dust Returned" by Ray Bradbury

“Are you one of us?”

“Am I one of you, or with you?” the ghastly passenger replied.  “And what are you, or we, or us?  Can it be named?  Is there a shape?  What ambience is there?  Are we kin to autumn rains?  Do we rise in mists from wetland moors?  Do twilight fogs seem similar?  Do we prowl or run or lope?  Are we shadows on a ruined wall?  Are we dusts shaken in sneezes from angel tombstones with broken wings?  Do we hover or fly or writhe in October ectoplasms?  Are we footsteps heard to waken us and bump our skulls on nailed-shut lids?  Are we batwing heartbeats held in claw or hand or teeth?  Do our cousins weave and spell their lives like that creature lassoed to the boy-child’s neck?” He gestured. 

Arach unraveled its spinneret in dark silence.

“Do we snug with that?”  Again the gesture.

Mouse vanished in Timothy’s vest.

“Do we move soundless?  There?”

Anuba combed good Timothy’s foot.

“Are we the mirror glimpses unseen but there?  Do we abide in walls as mortuary beetles telling time?  Is the drafting breath upsucked in chimneys our terrible respiration?  When clouds curdle the moon are we such clouds?  When rainspouts speak from gargoyles’ mouths are we those tongueless sounds?  Do we sleep by day and swarm-glide the splendid night?  When autumn trees shower bullions are we that Midas stuff, a leaf-fall that sounds the air in crisp syllables?  What, what, oh what are we?  And who are you, and I, and all surrounding gasps of dead and undead cries?  Ask not for whom the funeral bell tolls.  It tolls for thee and me and all the ghastly terrible who nameless wander in a Marley death of chains.  Do I speak the truth?”

“Oh yes!” exclaimed Father.  “Come in!”

“Climbing Out” an original poem

I’m tired of this loneliness
This bleeding

I’m tired of this loneliness
This bleeding empty hole
In the deepest parts of my heart
All around me
Walls, so high and dark
Stifling my spirit
If I look over head
And strain my eyes
I see a glimmer, a sparkle
The promise of light

I’m ready to fly
And escape
This darkness in my soul
I’m ready to touch the sky
But my wings have been torn away
So I’m climbing inch by inch
Out of this hole

My fingers slipping
Blood dripping down my wrist
Tears pooling in my eyes
All I see is the wall of darkness
That I’m clinging to
I grit my teeth
The light still so far away
I’m ready to give up
But I hold on
Just one moment more

It feels like a lifetime
And maybe that’s what it is
A lifetime of climbing
Of slipping and straining
But I can feel the warmth of the light
Just brushing my forehead
Maybe I’ll never reach the top
And struggle forever
It’s enough though
To feel sunshine once again

Excerpt of “What is Man” by Mark Twain

Ia. Man the Machine. b. Personal Merit
[The Old Man and the Young Man had been conversing. The Old Man had asserted that the human being is merely a machine, and nothing more. The Young Man objected, and asked him to go into particulars and furnish his reasons for his position.]
Old Man. What are the materials of which a steam-engine is made?
Young Man. Iron, steel, brass, white-metal, and so on.
O.M. Where are these found?
Y.M. In the rocks.
O.M. In a pure state?
Y.M. No–in ores.
O.M. Are the metals suddenly deposited in the ores?
Y.M. No–it is the patient work of countless ages.
O.M. You could make the engine out of the rocks themselves?
Y.M. Yes, a brittle one and not valuable.
O.M. You would not require much, of such an engine as that?
Y.M. No–substantially nothing.
O.M. To make a fine and capable engine, how would you proceed?
Y.M. Drive tunnels and shafts into the hills; blast out the iron ore; crush it, smelt it, reduce it to pig-iron; put some of it through the Bessemer process and make steel of it. Mine and treat and combine several metals of which brass is made.
O.M. Then?
Y.M. Out of the perfected result, build the fine engine.
O.M. You would require much of this one?
Y.M. Oh, indeed yes.
O.M. It could drive lathes, drills, planers, punches, polishers, in a word all the cunning machines of a great factory?
Y.M. It could.
O.M. What could the stone engine do?
Y.M. Drive a sewing-machine, possibly–nothing more, perhaps.
O.M. Men would admire the other engine and rapturously praise it?
Y.M. Yes.
O.M. But not the stone one?
Y.M. No.
O.M. The merits of the metal machine would be far above those of the stone one?
Y.M. Of course.
O.M. Personal merits?
Y.M. PERSONAL merits? How do you mean?

“A Dream within a Dream” by Edgar Allen Poe

Take this kiss upon the brow!
And, in parting from you now,
Thus much let me avow-
You are not wrong, who deem
That my days have been a dream;
Yet if hope has flown away
In a night, or in a day,
In a vision, or in none,
Is it therefore the less gone?
All that we see or seem
Is but a dream within a dream.
I stand amid the roar
Of a surf-tormented shore,
And I hold within my hand
Grains of the golden sand-
How few! yet how they creep
Through my fingers to the deep,
While I weep- while I weep!
O God! can I not grasp
Them with a tighter clasp?
O God! can I not save
One from the pitiless wave?
Is all that we see or seem
But a dream within a dream?

Tao Te Ching Verse 17 Leaders

There are four types of leaders:
The best leader is indistinguishable
from the will of those who selected her.
The next best leader enjoys the love
and praise of the people.
The poor leader rules through coercion and fear.
And the worst leader is a tyrant despised
by the multitudes who are the victims of his power.

What a world of difference among these leaders!
In the last two types, what is done
is without sincerity or trust – only coercion
In the second type, there is a harmony
between the leader and the people.
In the first type, whatever is done happens
so naturally that no one presumes to take the credit!

 

**translated by Ralph Alan Dale

Excerpt from The Society from the “The Age of Wire and String” by Ben Marcus

Wire, the:
The only element that is attached, affixed, or otherwise in contact with every other element, object, item, person, or member of the society. It is gray and often golden and glimmers in the morning. Members polish it simply by moving forward or backward or resting in place. The wire is the shortest distance between two bodies. It may be followed to any area or person one desires. It contains on its surface the shredded residue of hands – from members that pulled too hard, held on too long, got there too fast.

“I Found You” by the Fray

I found God on the corner of 1st and Amistad
Where the West was all but won
All alone, smoking his last cigarette
I said, “Where’ve you been?” He said, “Ask anything.”

Where were you, when everything was falling apart.
All my days were spent by the telephone that never rang
And all I needed was a call that never came
To the corner of 1st and Amistad

Lost and insecure, you found me, you found me
Lying on the floor, surrounded, surrounded
Why’d you have to wait? Where were you? Where were you?
Just a little late, you found me, you found me.

But in the end everyone ends up alone
Losing her, the only one who’s ever known
Who I am, who I’m not and who I wanna to be
No way to know how long she will be next to me

Lost and insecure, you found me, you found me
Lying on the floor, surrounded, surrounded
Why’d you have to wait? Where were you? Where were you?
Just a little late, you found me, you found me.

The early morning, the city breaks
And I’ve been calling for years and years and years
And you never left me no messages
You never sent me no letters
You got some kind of nerve taking all I want

Lost and insecure, you found me, you found me
Lying on the floor, Where were you? Where were you?

Lost and insecure, you found me, you found me
Lying on the floor, surrounded, surrounded
Why’d you have to wait? Where were you? Where were you?
Just a little late, you found me, you found me.

Why’d you have to wait, to find me, to find me?

Excerpt from “The Little Prince” by Antoine De Saint-Exupery

The Little Prince went to look at the roses again. 

“You’re not at all like my rose.  You’re nothing at all yet,” he told them.  “No one has tamed you and you haven’t tamed anyone.  You’re the way my fox was.  He was just a fox like a hundred thousand others.  But I’ve made him my friend, and now he’s the only fox in all the world.”

And the roses were humbled.

You’re lovely, but you’re empty,” he went on.  One couldn’t die for you.  Of course, an ordinary passerby would think my rose looked just like you.  But my rose, all on her own, is more important than all of you together, since she’s the one I’ve watered.  Since she’s the one I put under glass.  Since she’s the one I sheltered behind a screen.  Since she’s the one for whom I killed the caterpillars (except the two or three for butterflies).  Since she’s the one I listened to when she complained, or when she boasted, or even sometimes when she said nothing at all.  Since she’s my rose.”

And he went back to the fox. 

“Good-bye,” he said. 

“Goodbye,” said the fox.  Here is my secret.  It’s quite simple: One sees clearly only with the heart.  Anything essential is invisible to the eyes.”

“Anything essential is invisible to the eyes,” the little prince repeated, in order to remember. 

“It’s the time you spend on your rose that makes your rose so important.”

“It’s the time I spent on my rose…,” the little prince repeated, in order to remember.

“People have forgotten this truth,” the fox said.  “But you mustn’t forget it.  You become responsible forever for what you’ve tamed.  You’re responsible for your rose…”

“I’m responsible for my rose…,” the little prince repeated, in order to remember.