QOTD sent in by anonymous
Do you have a favorite inspirational poem, bible verse or quote that you refer to over and over again in life?
Mine: A poem I like to think about often is the Don’t You Quit poem. It was given to me on a small card by a friend many years ago when I was going through a rough patch:
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It is my sincere desire to provide readers of this site with the best unbiased information available, and a forum where it can be discussed openly, as our Founders intended. But it is not easy nor inexpensive to do so, especially when those who wish to prevent us from making the truth known, attack us without mercy on all fronts on a daily basis. So each time you visit the site, I would ask that you consider the value that you receive and have received from The Burning Platform and the community of which you are a vital part. I can't do it all alone, and I need your help and support to keep it alive. Please consider contributing an amount commensurate to the value that you receive from this site and community, or even by becoming a sustaining supporter through periodic contributions. [Burning Platform LLC - PO Box 1520 Kulpsville, PA 19443] or Paypal
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I’m nobody, who are you?
Are you nobody too?
Then there’s two of us; don’t tell!
They’ll banish us, you know.
You, me, all of us a TBP are already banned
Badge of Honor!
“Believe 1/10th of what you see and NOTHING that you hear from government and media.”
-Anyone sane.
“The happiness of your life depends upon the quality of your thoughts.”
― Marcus Aurelius,
“Never let the future disturb you. You will meet it, if you have to, with the same weapons of reason which today arm you against the present.”
― Marcus Aurelius,
If you good people haven’t read “Meditations”
(only the Hays translations, all others are academic fluff)
Then you have denied yourselves of one of the greatest of us all.
“The object of life is not to be on the side of the majority, but to escape finding oneself in the ranks of the insane.”
― Marcus Aurelius
“Look well into thyself; there is a source of strength which will always spring up if thou wilt always look.”
― Marcus Aurelius,
It’s hard to go wrong with Sufi Mystic, Rumi …
“I want to see you.
Know your voice.
Recognize you when you first come ’round the corner.
Sense your scent when I come into a room you’ve just left.
Know the lift of your heel, the glide of your foot.
Become familiar with the way you purse your lips then let them part, just the slightest bit, when I lean in to your space and kiss you.
I want to know the joy of how you whisper “more”
― Rumi
Over? Did you say “over”? Nothing is over until we decide it is! Was it over when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor? Hell no!”
-Bluto Blutarsky
Soul softly sings YA HU.
I’ll enter my Father’s favorite.
“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have ever lasing life.”
— John 3:16 KJV
GNL
And, that is mine as well. I carry a pocket coin with a cross punched out in the middle and engraved around it with the John 3:16 verse. And, of course it is the KJV. I don’t need any modern translations.
Very nice.
Donkey,
My tough old Mick Father always taught me to:
“Walk your post from flank to flank…and take no shit from any rank”.
Love it.
Q: what happens if you punch your CO out?
“When I Was One-and-Twenty”……A. E. Housman
When I was one-and-twenty
I heard a wise man say,
“Give crowns and pounds and guineas
But not your heart away;
Give pearls away and rubies
But keep your fancy free.”
But I was one-and-twenty,
No use to talk to me.
When I was one-and-twenty
I heard him say again,
“The heart out of the bosom
Was never given in vain;
’Tis paid with sighs a plenty
And sold for endless rue.”
And I am two-and-twenty,
And oh, ’tis true, ’tis true.
I thought of Houseman too when I read the title.
Here’s my offering:
A Shropshire Lad XL
Into my heart an air that kills
From yon far country blows:
What are those blue remembered hills,
What spires, what farms are those?
That is the land of lost content,
I see it shining plain,
The happy highways where I went
And cannot come again.
Yes…
All we need is some more blow? Damn. We elected the wrong Biden.
My batallion commander had a plaque over his office door that read-
Only the flexible survive
I’ve made it my own personal motto. It has served me well my entire adult life.
The USMC version is “Adapt and overcome” which I have also found useful.
I will go with my Dad’s favorite
“When you are up to your ass in alligators, don’t forget your primary objective is to drain the swamp.”
From my 6th grade teacher
“Fools names and fools faces are always seen in public places.”
Then there is, If ur up to ur nostrils in shit, its best to keep ur mouth closed.
Fools rush in where angels fear to tread.
Rudyard Kipling – 1865-1936
If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or, being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Or, being hated, don’t give way to hating,
And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise;
If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;
If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with triumph and disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to broken,
And stoop and build ’em up with wornout tools;
If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breathe a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: “Hold on”;
If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings—nor lose the common touch;
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run—
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!
Beautiful.
Parable Of The Madman
Have you not heard of that madman who lit a lantern in the bright morning
hours,
ran to the market place, and cried incessantly:
‘I seek God! I seek God!’
As many of those who did not believe in God
were standing around just then,
he provoked much laughter.
Has he got lost? asked one.
Did he lose his way like a child? asked another.
Or is he hiding?
Is he afraid of us? Has he gone on a voyage? emigrated?
Thus they yelled and laughed.
The madman jumped into their midst and pierced them with his eyes.
‘Whither is God?’ he cried; ‘I will tell you.
We have killed him–you and I.
All of us are his murderers.
But how did we do this?
How could we drink up the sea?
Who gave us the sponge to wipe away the entire horizon?
What were we doing when we unchained this earth from its sun?
Whither is it moving now? Whither are we moving?
Away from all suns?
Are we not plunging continually?
Backward, sideward, forward, in all directions?
Is there still any up or down?
Are we not straying, as through an infinite nothing?
Do we not feel the breath of empty space?
Has it not become colder? Is not night continually closing in on us?
Do we not need to light lanterns in the morning?
Do we hear nothing as yet of the noise of the gravediggers
who are burying God?
Do we smell nothing as yet of the divine decomposition?
Gods, too, decompose.
God is dead.
God remains dead.
And we have killed him.
‘How shall we comfort ourselves, the murderers of all murderers?
What was holiest and mightiest of all that the world has yet owned has bled
to death under our knives: who will wipe this blood off us?
What water is there for us to clean ourselves?
What festivals of atonement, what sacred games shall we have to invent?
Is not the greatness of this deed too great for us?
Must we ourselves not become gods simply to appear worthy of it?
There has never been a greater deed; and whoever is born after us –
For the sake of this deed he will belong to a higher history than all
history hitherto.’
Here the madman fell silent and looked again at his listeners;
and they, too, were silent and stared at him in astonishment.
At last he threw his lantern on the ground,
and it broke into pieces and went out.
‘I have come too early,’ he said then; ‘my time is not yet.
This tremendous event is still on its way, still wandering;
it has not yet reached the ears of men.
Lightning and thunder require time;
the light of the stars requires time;
deeds, though done, still require time to be seen and heard.
This deed is still more distant from them than most distant stars –
and yet they have done it themselves.
It has been related further that on the same day
the madman forced his way into several churches
and there struck up his requiem aeternam deo.
Led out and called to account, he is said always to have replied nothing
but:
‘What after all are these churches now
if they are not the tombs and sepulchers of God?’
-Friedrich Nietzsche
“Those who don’t study history are doomed to repeat it.
Yet those who DO study history are doomed to stand by helplessly while everyone else repeats it.”
To me, that’s many in one: The best cartoon (by Tom Toro), one of the deepest truths, and the best inspirational quote.
“The one thing we learn from history is that we do not learn from history.” – Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
A lot of good examples,for me,was Rime Of The Ancient Mariner which I loved as me parents(now me) have a copy of with wood cut prints.
I will say,then,Iron Maiden wrote a song based on said poem,even better(live version the best).
This post got me to thinking,while times getting more challenging ect. enjoy life,whether the written word/time with friends and family/fulfilling personal goals ect.
I have recently dealt with the death of me mum and my world kind of fell apart,that said,saw Tesla for the last two nights and had the time of me life,good crowd/band/friends ect.!
Take the time while prepping ect. to make a little time while we can for fun,time whether personally or world wise may be short,lets all use this time wisely!
I realized the last two nights it had been years since I personally just “had fun!”,don’t be me in waiting for so long to do that!
Here are the boys letting it out:
I have always loved the ending,”I on a slick trip, Im always ready to kick ass!”
Seriously,take a moment of your life if you have not to actually enjoy life,for me,was too long but am back and will keep at it!
“It is an ancient mariner, who stoppeth one of three…”
Great song James. These guys are very underrated. Did you hear Scorpions and Whitesnake are going on tour together starting later this year?
From Ayn Rand that shaped my psyche and gave me the strength to say NFW to the Jab:
“Hold nothing above the verdict of your own mind.”
“The smallest minority on earth is the individual. Those who deny individual rights cannot claim to be defenders of minorities.”
― Ayn Rand
I could never fathom how anyone could choose to identify with the mob instead of an individual. It’s like opting to be an ant instead of an eagle.
Most disheartening is when you see eagles trying to be ants, also by choice.
It is to deny one’s own individuality as well.
Isn’t that a false dichotomy you’re constructing here.
Ulysses, by Lord Tennyson…Too long to quote, but our younger son also found inspiration in it….It ends:
We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.
DO YOUR JOB
It’s on my office door. To the left of the door is Ron Swanson’s Pyramid of Greatness.
“Skim milk. Avoid it at all costs.”
Ron Swanson, probably my favorite character of all time. Also making the list would like Burt Gummer from Tremors, Private Hudson from Aliens, and Jayne Cobb from Firefly.
Stop your grinnin’ and drop your linen!
In my corporate career I had some talent, zero genius, no real formal education past vocational HS and two semesters seducing coeds and getting drunk/high not necessarily in that order – both with the coeds and the alcohol/pot…and I was beyond determined to have a successful career not just a job.
(My collage time was after the military where I had been trained to meet exotic people in exotic lands and kill them).
In corporate America I had unrelenting PERSISTENCE no matter how many hours a day, week, month, or year it took. That drive led to 11 pay grade promotions with three companies in 14 years before going out on my own. All because I did whatever it took to relentlessly manage down the individual CONTROLLABLE LINE ITEMS on the Profit & Loss Statement.
Because of my ‘persistence’ on bottom line results the Bean Counters would throw flower petals in front of my feet after budget meetings.
I had this hanging on my wall in every office I ever had.
Charles Bukowski.
‘The Crunch’.
It’s harsh but redeems itself with the concession that despite all of it being so awful, he still cannot give up.
The reason being in his reference to the beautiful, spirited youth he sees as “flowers of chance”.
I see my beautiful daughter and understand why he and we cannot give up. He just finds a better way to say it.
Cheers
The Crunch
too much
too little
too fat
too thin
or nobody.
laughter or
tears
haters
lovers
strangers with faces like
the backs of
thumb tacks
armies running through
streets of blood
waving winebottles
bayoneting and fucking
virgins.
or an old guy in a cheap room
with a photograph of M. Monroe.
there is a loneliness in this world so great
that you can see it in the slow movement of
the hands of a clock.
people so tired
mutilated
either by love or no love.
people just are not good to each other
one on one.
the rich are not good to the rich
the poor are not good to the poor.
we are afraid.
our educational system tells us
that we can all be
big-ass winners.
it hasn’t told us
about the gutters
or the suicides.
or the terror of one person
aching in one place
alone
untouched
unspoken to
watering a plant.
people are not good to each other.
people are not good to each other.
people are not good to each other.
I suppose they never will be.
I don’t ask them to be.
but sometimes I think about
it.
the beads will swing
the clouds will cloud
and the killer will behead the child
like taking a bite out of an ice cream cone.
too much
too little
too fat
too thin
or nobody
more haters than lovers.
people are not good to each other.
perhaps if they were
our deaths would not be so sad.
meanwhile I look at young girls
stems
flowers of chance.
there must be a way.
surely there must be a way we have not yet
thought of.
who put this brain inside of me?
it cries
it demands
it says that there is a chance.
it will not say
“no.”
Kill me all, let GOD sort me out…..
I think your device “corrected” your spelling & changed the whole meaning of the quote.
Darkness cannot drive out darkness, only light can do that.
Hate cannot drive out hate, only love can do that.
-MLK
https://www.google.com/search?q=far+better+it+is+to+dare+mighty+things&oq=far+better+it+is&aqs=chrome.0.0i512j69i57j0i512l2j0i22i30.10057j0j7&sourceid=chrome-mobile&ie=UTF-8#imgrc=bgx9VxzPt4O5FM
Stolen Elections Have Consequences.
Desiderata: Original Text
This is the original text from the book where Desiderata was first published.
Go placidly amid the noise and the haste, and remember what peace there may be in silence. As far as possible, without surrender, be on good terms with all persons.
Speak your truth quietly and clearly; and listen to others, even to the dull and the ignorant; they too have their story.
Avoid loud and aggressive persons; they are vexatious to the spirit. If you compare yourself with others, you may become vain or bitter, for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.
Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans. Keep interested in your own career, however humble; it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time.
Exercise caution in your business affairs, for the world is full of trickery. But let this not blind you to what virtue there is; many persons strive for high ideals, and everywhere life is full of heroism.
Be yourself. Especially do not feign affection. Neither be cynical about love; for in the face of all aridity and disenchantment, it is as perennial as the grass.
Take kindly the counsel of the years, gracefully surrendering the things of youth.
Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune. But do not distress yourself with dark imaginings. Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness.
Beyond a wholesome discipline, be gentle with yourself. You are a child of the universe no less than the trees and the stars; you have a right to be here.
And whether or not it is clear to you, no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should. Therefore be at peace with God, whatever you conceive Him to be. And whatever your labors and aspirations, in the noisy confusion of life, keep peace in your soul. With all its sham, drudgery and broken dreams, it is still a beautiful world. Be cheerful. Strive to be happy.
by Max Ehrmann ©1927
This
I quote some part of it to myself everyday.
“If”.
Rudyard Kipling
The Wrath of the Awakened American
by VANDERLEUN on OCTOBER 11, 2019
You want “woke?” You’ll get “woke.”
[Apologies to Rudyard Kipling]
It was not part of their blood,
It came to them very late,
With long arrears to make good,
When the American began to hate.
They were not easily moved,
They were icy — willing to wait
Till every count should be proved,
Ere the American began to hate.
Their voices were even and low.
Their eyes were level and straight.
There was neither sign nor show
When the American began to hate.
It was not preached to the crowd.
It was not taught by the state.
No man spoke it aloud
When the American began to hate.
It was not suddently bred.
It will not swiftly abate.
Through the chilled years ahead,
When Time shall count from the date
That the American began to hate.
Interesting.
To me, it was not the moment I realized the begin of hate, but when it dawned on me Americans were becoming like Asians and Arabs: ‘save face’ above all.
Psalms 23:4
1(A Psalm of David.) The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want. 2He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me beside the still waters. 3He restoreth my soul: he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name’s sake. 4Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me. 5Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies: thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over. 6Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life: and I will dwell in the house of the LORD for ever.
My dad always had words of inspiration. One of my favorites:
“Get your ass out of bed before I take my belt to it”.
Man, that always inspired me to hop out of bed and get moving.
And that Llpoh is why you are the success you are today. 🙂
One never knows. One thing about my old man is he wasn’t one to make idle threats. Unlike Obama, if he said there was a red line, best not cross it. None of this you have until the count of three stuff some parents use.
No sir. With him, if he ever said such a thing you wouldn’t trust him not to give you a backhander on the count of one, like he used to do when yanking baby teeth. “I will yank it out on three – ok, you ready?” The yanking happened somewhere between the ok and the you ready. He had this really strange and foreign idea that children were to mind their parents.
My mom was much the same – if you ever gave her lip you wanted to be on her right hand side, so that if the backhander came you didn’t get a mouthful of wedding ring, as that really stung. She was lightning fast and wouldn’t even look up from what she was doing or give any warning. We were generally well behaved, as you might imagine. With my mom, it got to be a bit of a game, to see if you could duck fast enough. Sometimes, not often, if you were quick, you got away.
“My religious belief teaches me to feel as safe in battle as in bed. God has fixed the time for my death. I do not concern myself about that, but to be always ready, no matter when it may overtake me.”
Back when I used to write computer code my error message would display “Sanity is only a state of mind”.
” And I heard another voice from heaven, saying, Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues.”
Revelations 18. referring to the great whore.
I like this one
“Revenge is a dish that is best served cold.”
– Klingon proverb
“But it can be easily reheated in the microwave of evil.”
-from the movie Megamind
The road to hell is paved with good intentions.
Heard it from my mother my entire life.
A reader posted this pic about a year ago. Since then it has been my screensaver. I will probably never change it.
For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. Romans 8:38-39
“… Tho’ much is taken, much abides; and tho’
We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.”
Ulysses Tennyson
Don’t refer to it over and over. None the less it’s true.
Don’t steal – the government hates competition!
One I think of from time to time my dad drilled into me as a kid.
You do not rape women.
You do not steal.
The world owes you nothing.
Swinehood hath no remedy. Sidney Lanier
Death is the mother of beauty. Wallace Stevens
Sex is death. Harold Percival (ask Adam if that is so)
You wanna fat lip? My father
As water judges a swimmer’s rightness in swimming, God judges a man’s rightness in living. Rose Wilder Lane in her book, “The Discovery of Freedom.”
Truth is a pathless land. J. Krishnamurti
The only thing you know for sure is that you are conscious of being conscious. You are not your body any more than your clothing is. Harold Percival
What we are to learn in life is to know what to do and what not to do. Harold Percival
Nobody doesn’t love me. Millions of little boys
“If you’re not free now, it might be because you’ve been preoccupied with people or institutions that have restrained your freedom. I don’t expect you to stop worrying about them, merely because I suggest that you do. I do hope to show you, though, that those people and institutions are relatively powerless to stop you – once you decide how you will achieve your freedom. There are things you can do to be free, and if you turn your attention to those things, no one will stand in your way. But when you become preoccupied with those who are blocking you, you overlook the many alternatives you could use to bypass them. The freedom you seek is already available to you, but it has gone unnoticed.” Harry Browne
These lines come to mind. Quite often.
Faith without works is dead.
Mine is not to reason why, mine is to do or die.
When there are no answers there are still choices.
Plus these two from Ray Bradbury:
“Jump off a cliff and build your wings on the way down.”
and
“Looking back over a lifetime, you see that love was the answer to everything.”
that one about the tree of liberty will always be my favorite
“When the power of love overcomes the love of power, we will know peace.” – Jimi Hendrix
Never gonna happen.
Supposedly by Rudyard Kipling, I’ve been unable to find the following ditty as I memorized it from someone’s typed page. It’s served me well in life.
A Year and a Half Behind
I didn’t begin with askings,
I took my job and stuck.
I took chances the others wouldn’t
and now they’re calling it luck.
They asked me how I did it,
so I showed ’em the scripture text;
‘You keep your light so shining’
a little in front of the next.
They copied me all they could follow,
but they couldn’t copy my mind.
And I left them sweating and stealing
a year-and-half behind.
“Never complain, never explain”
-someone British
As simple as possible, and no simpler.
Has served me well.
If it is to be…
It’s up to me.
College football coach.
Taught it to my high school classes for 43 years.
“It’s what people know about themselves, inside, that make them afraid.”
Marshall Jim Duncan’s ghost.
“The Road Not Taken” by Robert Frost.
Many, many. Stranger by the River is full of wonderful quotes from the Vairagi Eck Master Rebazaar Tarz.
But here is an AKJohn original.
As I dream, my world created.
And a wonderful world it is.
Where lie no death, darkness, and despair.
And love is everywhere the core of myself.