RIP to the opportunities we missed because of shyness and low self-esteem. #thelionlaw. Walk good. 28all. Eya. *TM, OC, EA, SC, RW*

The Warm-Up: 

“When you tell hard truths people don’t understand you but they respect you. When you avoid the truth they understand you but don’t respect you.” ~Shane Parrish

The Core:

“Work on things that compound.” ~Jack Butcher

“The creation of a thousand forests is in one acorn.” ~Ralph Waldo Emerson

“It is easier to build strong children than to repair broken men.” ~Frederick Douglass

“To be desired means nothing, to be truly understood and deeply loved is everything.” ~Anonymous

“What looks like talent is often careful preparation. What looks like skill is often persistent revision.” ~James Clear

“3 things that separate you from your dreams: a lack of commitment, a lack of production, a lack of patience.” ~Joe Duncan

“Write what disturbs you, what you fear, what you have not been willing to speak about. Be willing to split open.” ~Natalie Goldberg

“I do not want to have you to fill the empty parts of me. I want to be full on my own. I want to be so complete I could light a whole city and then I want to have you cause the two of us combined could set it on fire.” ~Rupi Kaur

“You can’t fake the core. The truth that lives there will eventually win out. It’s a god we must obey, a force that brings us inevitably to our knees. It asks, eternally: Will you do it later or will you do it now?” ~Cheryl Strayed, Brave Enough

“Work out when you don’t need to. Build skills when you don’t need to. Travel around when you don’t need to. Build relationships when you don’t need to. Seek better jobs when you don’t need to. It’s too late if you wait till you need it.” ~Orange Book

“Where justice is denied, where poverty is enforced, where ignorance prevails, and where any one class is made to feel that society is an organized conspiracy to oppress, rob and degrade them, neither persons nor property will be safe.” ~Frederick Douglass

“You’re unlikely to get everything you want. That’s a good thing, because wants are part of what define us. It’s entirely possible that you’ll get most of what you need, though. The trick is in being clear about what you put into each category.” ~Seth Godin, wants and needs

“As stories are told, fears of prowess are embellished, and the mundane reality of the struggle is left out to make the telling more exciting. The heroes of legend did not slay the abomination in an hour, then return to their homes in time for dinner. It was just as difficult for them as it has been for me. This truth is not obvious, but it is important, and it helps to know it.” ~Josh Kaufman, How To Fight A Hydra

Last Set: 

“To dismantle part of the system, it is not about well wishes. It never has been. It’s about intentionally looking at where resources are currently allocated and how they specifically can be allocated differently—or where resources can be built in communities outside of your own. I don’t suggest that what I just said is easy, but if you are a person who says that you would like to engage, that’s what engaging is. It’s not tweeting out ‘Black Lives Matter.’ After you post your black square on Instagram, if you aren’t intentional about making sure that you participate differently in the system, if you aren’t making different decisions, building different relationships, then the system still will be there.” ~Mara Shalhoup, Here’s the single best way to help Black people, according to Ryan Wilson

Food for Thought: 

“When we consider that each of us has only one life to live, isn’t it rather tragic to find men and women, with brains capable of comprehending the stars and the planets, talking about the weather; men and women, with hands capable of creating works of art, using those hands only for routine tasks; men and women, capable of independent thought, using their minds as a bowling-alley for popular ideas; men and women, capable of greatness, wallowing in mediocrity; men and women, capable of self-expression, slowly dying a mental death while they babble the confused monotone of the mob? For you, life can be a succession of glorious adventures. Or it can be a monotonous bore.” ~Niel Gaiman