Josh Kaufman

Andre Comte-Sponville, contemporary French philosopher:

“The simple person lives the way he breathes, with no more effort or glory, with no more affectation and without shame… Simplicity is freedom, buoyancy, transparency. As simple as the air, as free as the air… The simple person does not take himself too seriously or too tragically. He goes on his merry way, his heart light, his soul at peace, without a goal, without nostalgia, without impatience. The world is his kingdom, and suffices him. The present is his eternity, and delights him. He has nothing to prove, since he has no appearances to keep up, and nothing to seek, since everything is before him. What is more simple than simplicity? What lighter? It is the virtue of wise men and the wisdom of saints.”

Leonardo da Vinci, Renaissance genius, artist, inventor, and polymath:

“Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.”

Antoine De Saint-Exupery, French aviator and author of The Little Prince:

“Perfection is achieved not when you have nothing more to add, but when you have nothing left to take away… And now here is my secret, a very simple secret; it is only with the heart that one can see rightly, what is essential is invisible to the eye.”

Jason Fried, founder of 37signals:

“You don’t need to outdo the competition. It’s expensive and defensive. Underdo your competition. We need more simplicity and clarity.”

John Gall, systems theorist:

“A complex system that works is invariably found to have evolved from a simple system that worked.”

Johann Joachim Winckelmann, German art historian and archaeologist:

“Unity and simplicity are the two true sources of beauty.”

Thomas Aquinas, theologean:

“If a thing can be done adequately by means of one, it is superfluous to do it by means of several; for we observe that nature does not employ two instruments where one suffices.”

Elaine St. James, author:

“Simplifying is not necessarily about getting rid of everything we’ve worked so hard for… It’s about deciding what’s important to us, and gracefully letting go of the things that aren’t.”

Charlie Munger, master investor and long-time business associate of Warren Buffett:

“The ethos of not fooling yourself is one of the best you could possibly have. It’s powerful because it’s so rare.”

Ovid, Early Roman poet who is considered the greatest literary master of the elegiac couplet:

“We are slow to believe that which, if believed, would hurt our feelings.”

Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche, Tibetian Buddhist monk and teacher:

“Those who seek happiness in pleasure, wealth, glory, power, and heroics are as naive as the child who tries to catch a rainbow and wear it as a coat.”

Jules Barbey d’Aurevilly, French mystery novelist:

“Pleasure is the happiness of madmen, while happiness is the pleasure of sages.”

Luca and Francesco Cavalli-Sforza, geneticists and human diversity experts:

“Happiness does not come automatically. It is not a gift that good fortune bestows upon us and a reversal of fortune takes back. It depends on us alone. One does not become happy overnight, but with patient labor, day after day. Happiness is constructed, and that requires effort and time. In order to become happy, we have to learn how to change ourselves.”

Tibetan proverb:

“Seeking happiness outside ourselves is like waiting for sunshine in a cave facing north.”

Marcus Aurelius, Stoic philosopher and Emperor of Rome from 161 - 180 CE:

“Look within; within is the fountain of all good.”

James Yorke, mathematician and physicist known for his work on chaos theory:

“The most successful people are those who are good at Plan B.”

Charles Darwin, creator of the biological theory of evolution via natural selection:

“It is not the strongest of the species that survices, nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change.”

General Eric Shinseki, retired Chief of Staff of the US Army:

“If you don’t like change, you’re going to like irrelevence even less.”

I am responsible.

I am awareness.
I am creation.
I am consciousness.

I am justice, courage, benevolence, life.
I am injustice, cowardice, malevolence, death.

I alone create the contradictions in myself.
I am the order and I am the void.

I am Mother Theresa.
I am Adolph Hitler.

I am the whitest of the light and the blackest of the dark.
I am the sickness. I am the cure.

I am the child’s first breath and the elderly woman’s last.
I am transition.
I am fate.
I am timeless.

I am the change I wish to see in the world.
I am the world I wish to see changed.

I am responsible. I create the path and I alone walk it.

Who am I?
I am you.

Samuel Butler, 17th-century British poet:

“Life is like playing a violin solo in public and learning the instrument as one goes along.”

NOTE: I purposely keep this blog to great quotes and interesting tidbits on self-education. However, I just sent this letter concerning US politics to my family and close friends, and thought it would be worth sharing with you as well. I do not plan on writing about politics often, but I care deeply about the cause of freedom and liberty in the world, and believe this information is important enough to share. If you’re not interested in US politics, please feel free to skip this post.

All,

I’m not sure if you’ve heard about Ron Paul, the congressman from Texas who’s running for president in the Republican party. I’m normally not one to get too excited about politics, but this guy is currently the only presidential candidate I’m remotely interested in supporting and I’ve been doing a lot of reading and research recently, so I thought I’d pass some information along. I hope you find it interesting and useful!
Ron Paul is a Republican presidential candidate who believes strongly and consistently in limiting the federal government’s power and spending to the powers defined in the Constitution, supports a non-interventionist foreign policy (including the current war in the Middle East), and deeply understands economics and the role government currently plays in distorting markets through tax, subsidy, and monetary inflation.

It’s really nice to finally see a politician (in either party) take a thoughtful and principled position on issues he understands, act consistently on those principles, and hold to those principles under massive pressure to compromise. Individuals like that are rare indeed, particularly in the political arena.

Ron Paul is very much a grassroots candidate at this point and has less campaign funding than his counterparts, but he’s getting a lot of attention from the media right now due to a disagreement he had with Giuliani during the first Republican debate. The issue was over whether or not the 9/11 terrorists were motivated to attack us due to our long-standing interventionist Middle East foreign policy. Giuliani, in response, immediately jumped down Paul’s throat and asked him to retract the statement.

As it turns out, Paul was completely right, and his position on foreign policy “blowback” is fully supported by both the 9/11 Commission Report and the CIA. Giuliani, on the other hand, was shown to be completely ignorant of an important and salient fact concerning one of the most important foreign policy situations concerning America. For a “leading” presidential candidate, that ignorance is disturbing. Here are a few videos that cover the exchange:

VIDEO: Exchange between Raul and Giuliani during the debate.

AUDIO: Interview with former head of CIA’s Osama bin Laden unit on Ron Paul’s position on “blowback” and Middle East foreign policy.

VIDEO: Speech by Ron Paul in New Hampshire regarding foreign policy.

Due to his contrary opinions, the traditional news media (first CNN, then MSNBC), as well as the GOP, attempted to remove him from the next few presidential debates. The outraged response from individual citizens has caused both media networks and the Republican party to retract their plans to remove Paul from future debates. Paul is currently being excluded from official media polls, but he’s currently leading the vast majority of online polls sponsored by the same media networks.

To get a good idea of what Ron Paul is advocating, here are a few videos and articles you can find online:

VIDEO: Compilation of Ron Paul quotes and video clips.

VIDEO: Ron Paul interview on CNN Late Edition.

ARTICLE: Ron Paul’s position on peace and freedom.

VIDEO: Ron Paul on economics.

During the last presidential election, I was incredibly disappointed to be forced to vote for what I thought to be the lesser of two evils. Hopefully, this election cycle we’ll be able to vote for someone who genuinely deserves respect and support.

Be well,

Josh

Benjamin Franklin, author, political theorist, politician, printer, scientist, inventor, civic activist, diplomat, and one of the best-known Founding Fathers of the United States of America:

“It is the first responsibility of every citizen to question authority.”

Thomas H. Huxley, English biologist and early proponent of evolution:

“Every great advance in natural knowledge has involved the absolute rejection of authority.”

LaVonn Schlegel, business strategy consultant:

“Indifference is a horrible, insidious disease that can destroy.”