Doing Things Differently

If all you're trying to do is essentially the same thing as your rivals, then it's unlikely that you'll be very successful. - Michael Porter

What do your customers need that your competitors don't provide?

Keeping a Secret

Washington, having been asked by an officer on the morning of a battle, what were his plans for the day, replied in a whisper, Can you keep a secret? On being answered in the affirmative, the general added - so can I.

Role Models

People seldom improve, when they have no other model but themselves to copy after. - Oliver Goldsmith

This is why heroes are so important in art, literature and media. To show things just as they are keeps people stagnant.

Second Amendment Sense

A constitutional guarantee subject to future Judges assessments of its usefulness is no constitutional guarantee at all. - Justice Anthony Scalia (June 26, 2008)

  
It's about time someone said this.

Suffering the Consequences

Giving money and power to government is like giving whiskey and car keys to teenage boys. - P. J. O'Rourke

There is a difference though: When we enable the government we are the ones who suffer the consequences.

Corruption

It's not money that corrupts--it's the lure of arbitrary political power. A true crusader against political corruption would not strip American citizens of their right to free speech; he would seek to put an end to the government's power to grant special favors to any group. - Yaron Brook

Any time you give an individual authority over other individuals, corruption is just around the corner.

Skeletal Development

Never grow a wishbone, daughter, where your backbone ought to be. - Clementine Paddleford

(or son)

It's Time

There comes a time in the affairs of man when he must take the bull by the tail and face the situation. - W. C. Fields

Remember that this election season.

Incremental Change

Little changes cost you. Big changes benefit you by changing the game. - Seth Godin

Incremental change will cost you each time.

A Horse Race is Not a Market

The difference between playing the stock market and the horses is that one of the horses must win. - Joey Adams

More correctly put: all but one of the horses must loose. That is the difference between investing and gambling.

Being Taught

Personally I'm always ready to learn, although I do not always like being taught. - Winston Churchill

Perhaps this is why so many are self-educated!

Facts <> Ideas

I'm not afraid of facts, I welcome facts but a congeries of facts is not equivalent to an idea. This is the essential fallacy of the so-called "scientific" mind. People who mistake facts for ideas are incomplete thinkers; they are gossips. - Cynthia Ozick

Just because they have memorized chapter and verse of scripture does not mean they are closer to the truth.

Equal Opportunity

Let's assume that each person has an equal opportunity, not to become equal, but to become different. To realize whatever unique potential of body, mind and spirit he or she possesses. - John Fischer

Equal opportunity to be different; I like that because so often I think folks think it's equal opportunity to be just like me.

Proper Behavior

Education does not mean teaching people what they do not know; it means teaching them to behave as they do not behave. - John Ruskin

We teach children how they should behave. We should teach adults why they should behave that way.

Preparation

Everyone has got the will to win, its only those with the will to prepare that do win. - Bobby Knight

Knowledge prepares.

Stay Interested

The whole secret of life is to be interested in one thing profoundly and in a thousand things well. - Horace Walpole

And when you lose interest in new things you have lost a lot.

The Youngest You Will Ever Be

Today is the youngest you will ever be. Act like it. - Mark Cuban

There are those who are young and try to act old; there are those who are old and try to act young; then there are those who are perpetually young with the wisdom gained only with age.

Conventional Wisdom

Conventional wisdom is often long on convention and short on wisdom. – Warren Buffett

Folks who argue with you may need to be reminded of this from time to time.

What's In a Name?

Naming things is important. He (Arthur C. Clarke) made magic things real by describing them and talking about them in ways that felt real. Once something feels real, making it real is a lot easier. - Seth Godin

A good point to remember when innovating.

Wise Sayings

Write a wise saying and your name will live forever. - Anonymous

Stable Ideas

'Tis plain there is not in nature a point of stability to be found; everything either ascends or declines: when wars are ended abroad, sedition begins at home; and when men are freed from fighting for necessity, they quarrel through ambition. - Goethe

Let's not confuse stability of ideas with lack of change. A building can be remodeled on a strong foundation.

The Origin of Nations

Europe was created by history. America was created by philosophy. - Margaret Thatcher

And both have been molded and, at times, corrupted by crackpot philosophies.

Trust No Man With Your Liberty

There is danger from all men. The only maxim of a free government ought to be to trust no man living with power to endanger the public liberty. - John Adams

Our quest for comfort and security have lead us to where we are.

Vigilance Required

It is philosophy that makes man understandable to man, explains human nobility, and shows man the proper road. The first defect appearing in any nation that is headed toward decline is in the philosophic spirit. After that deficiencies spread into the other sciences, arts, and associations. Philosophy is the escape from the narrow sensations of animality into the wide arena of human feelings…In general, it is man’s becoming man and living the life of sacred rationality. Its aim is human perfection in reason, mind, soul, and way of life….It is the foremost cause of the production of knowledge, the creation of sciences, the invention of industries, and the initiation of the crafts. - Al-Afghani

It's scary when you read this, and Churchill, and Jefferson, and Reagan, and then look at where Islam, England, the United States have ended up. 'Tis proof that one must be ever vigilant in the competition between good and evil; truth and fiction; rational and irrational - more vigilant than we have been.

Eating Humble Pie

It is said Churchill, before his apology to the Allies about the flap between Eisenhower and Montgomery, said that there was no reason when having to swallow humble pie that it shouldn't be washed down with some go old fashioned podium pounding. - Lyle

Public Speaking

There are two things that are more difficult than making an after-dinner speech: climbing a wall which is leaning toward you and kissing a girl who is leaning away from you. - Winston Churchill

Public speaking is the art of diluting a two-minute idea with a two-hour vocabulary. - Evan Esar

Faced with the necessity of a difficult speech look first for the two-minute idea.

Enlightened Enemies

"Lord, enlighten thou our enemies," prayed 19th century British economist and moral philosopher John Stuart Mill in his "Essay on Coleridge." "Sharpen their wits, give acuteness to their perceptions, and consecutiveness and clearness to their reasoning powers. We are in danger from their folly, not from their wisdom: their weakness is what fills us with apprehension, not their strength."

It is far more satisfying to prevail in a battle of wits than brawn.

Better Conditions

The uniform, constant and uninterrupted effort of every man to better his condition, the principle from which public and national, as well as private opulence is originally derived, is frequently powerful enough to maintain the natural progress of things toward improvement, in spite both of the extravagance of government, and of the greatest errors of administration. Like the unknown principle of animal life, it frequently restores health and vigour to the constitution, in spite, not only of the disease, but of the absurd prescriptions of the doctor. - Adam Smith

May we all keep trying to better our condition; stave off disease; and make sense of the doctor's prescriptions before heeding them.

Business = Life

Invest money in customer retention, because it's a small fraction of the cost of customer acquisition. - Seth Godin

Replace the word "money" with any of these: time, attention, enthusiasm.
Replace the word "customer" with any of these: friend, lover, wife, kid.

See how life and business are the same? Just different words.

Published Opinion

There is no such thing as public opinion. There is only published opinion. - Winston Churchill

This is why you should publish.