You Talkin' To Me?

How are your holidays going so far? All's well here. I had a little spare time--like ten minutes--so I decided to gather up a few guest writers to give us some words of wisdom to begin 2012. Apparently, they all have a different idea of what kind of advice to give to begin a brand new year, but each of them seems to have a valid point, in my opinion. 

We'll start with Mark Twain's comment on New Year's Day:

Now is the accepted time to make your regular annual good resolutions.  Next week you can begin paving hell with them as usual.

Thank you, Mr. Clemens.

Next we'll hear from poet Edgar Guest who has a much different take.

A happy New Year! Grant that I
May bring no tear to any eye
When this New Year in time shall end
Let it be said I've played the friend,
Have lived and loved and labored here,
And made of it a happy year.

Very pretty and filled with good advice, don't you think? I'm going to remember that one for sure in the new year, about which writer Charles Lamb says:

New Year's Day is every man's birthday.

Which gets one thinking about life, change, and growth. Several of our guests have something to say about that.

You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete.

That was Buckminster Fuller, who knows about such things.

Eleanor Roosevelt said

The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams.

I like this one from Ralph Waldo Emerson, too.

All life is an experiment. The more experiments you make the better.

And this one from Michelangelo.

I am still learning.

That reminds me of a great sign I saw one time behind the bar at the Pastime Tavern in Ritzville, Washington:

It's what you learn after you know it all that counts.

Ain't it the truth?

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Seems like a lot of our advisors this week want to talk about time, which I guess is a good topic for the beginning of a year, huh? Out with the old and in with the new, and all that?

Albert Einstein, not surprisingly, has some wise things to say about time:

When you are courting a nice girl an hour seems like a second. When you sit on a red-hot cinder a second seems like an hour. That's relativity.

And, The only reason for time is so that everything doesn't happen at once.

Similar, really, to what good old Abe Lincoln had to say.

The best thing about the future is that it comes one day at a time.

Here's what Benjamin Franklin says in Poor Richard's Almanac:

Dost thou love life? Then do not squander time, for that's the stuff life is made of.

T.S. Eliot has the opposite opinion.

Time you enjoyed wasting is not wasted time.

Which reminds me of this one by George Carlin.

When someone is impatient and says, "I haven't got all day," I always wonder, How can that be? How can you not have all day?

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Bertand Russell says

To realize the unimportance of time is the gate to wisdom.

Maybe...but one of my favorite contemporary philosophers, Steven Wright, replies

I went to a restaurant that serves "breakfast at any time". So I ordered French Toast during the Renaissance.

(Yeah, I know. He always cracks me up, too...)

Now let's have some general wise thoughts to ponder as we celebrate the stroke of midnight, New Year's Eve:

When  you do things from your soul, you feel a river moving in you, a joy. That's from the poet Rumi.

There is no pleasure in having nothing to do; the fun is having lots to do and not doing it. Andrew Jackson said that.

Here's Katherine Hepburn:

If you obey all the rules you miss all the fun.

What would a new year be without a few wise words from the great Dr. Seuss?

If you never did, you should. These things are fun, and fun is good.

W.C. Fields offers this idea:

Always carry a flagon of whiskey in case of snakebite and furthermore always carry a small snake.

And what about A.A. Milne? I like this one for obvious reasons.

Be sure to put the knocker fairly low on your door in case a very small friend drops by.

But here, I think, is the best advice for Twenty Twelve from Ellen DeGeneres. I say we all do it and just see what the heck happens!

Just go up to somebody on the street and say "You're it!" and then run away.

Happy New Year, my friends!

Tag! You're it!

 

Comments

[Matt]

Really right on post from your guests.
You have me in tears.
Matt

[Diedre]

My new Mantra for 2012 (in addition to "Tell Me something Good"): Keep The Faith, Always, Keep The Faith.

Feliz Anos Nuevos my dear friend and kindred spirit

[Robin]

Hey Candice, great blog, as usual. Love the sentiments. Here's another:

"I must govern the clock, not be governed by it."
--Golda Meir

Hope you have a happy, healthy and FUN 2012!!

Robin and Rick

[Gretchen Goodliffe]

I take your hand and I follow.... so that I too can lead the way...