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| Points to Ponder The Choice is YOURS Philosophical and Artistic Exploration |
| Copyright 2005-2008 K. Mercurio Gotthardt www.luxuriouschoices.net all rights reserved |
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| "The strongest principal of growth lies in human choice." --Mary Ann Evans (a.k.a.George Eliot) |
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| Knowledge without love is dangerous. Knowledge with love is breathtaking. Love without knowledge is tragic. Tragedy without love and knowledge is pain. Tragedy with love and knowledge is meaningful. The use of knowledge without love is war. --David A. Gotthardt |
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| photo by Kathleen Callahan, Concord MA |
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| photo by Jorge DeVillasante, Lowell MA |
| If you spend all your time fighting windmills, what will happen when the real war comes? |
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| Knowledge itself is not enough, but knowledge, love and wisdom together can transcend to the ideal. |
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| How could we possibly, entirely know a person? It would take a lifetime and more, and just when we believed we completely understood, that person would change, grow, or learn, and we would have to as well. How can we know ourselves? It takes a lifetime and more, and often, what we really need is someone to help us. Herein lie the solitude and isolation of the human condition. And, herein lie the potential and basis of love, in all its mysterious forms. |
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| I have discovered it makes little sense to try to explain who you are or what you stand for because most people naturally tend to see their fellows only through their own perceptions. Better to try on a variety of perspectives and hope to understand even a speck of THEM, as opposed to the other way around. And if you fail, you have not lost, because you have at least experienced a fragment of another life and learned what it means to be human. |
| photo by Kathleen Callahan, Concord MA |
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| Find something you are passionate about, and do it. Learn everything you can, and practice every day. Don't "half" do it. "Half" is an insulting waste of passion. |
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| The need to survive is often the only thing that keeps us clinging to life, even if only by a seemingly frail branch. How we can appreciate that thin line when we have passed through the fear and arrived at the other side intact enough to stand in awe at the beauty and strength of the immortal human spirit! |
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| Ideals may very well be fantasies, but without them, how can our 'reach exceed our grasp' and make us all we can be? |
| People fear tolerance because they believe if we tolerate other beliefs, we compromise our own values and needs. Rather, true tolerance admits all human beings have basic needs that, while we live together as human beings sharing a planet, must preempt belief; these basic needs, the things that all humans have in common, cannot be ignored in the name of tolerance. True tolerance acknowledges basic needs first, without which, there would be no cause to consider the belief. Thus, we don't have to sacrifice our own beliefs or our safety in order to be tolerant. We must respect our fellow human beings and their diverse beliefs while we work together to have all our needs met. This is the way the world will survive. |
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| I have to believe there is a reason for everything, even if we are the ones making up the reasons. Purpose in life makes it possible to get out of bed, to go into the world, to change the world! This is the stuff that faith is made of. |
