Nothing Can Resist Persistence

Nothing is softer or more flexible than water,
yet nothing can resist it.
- Lao Tzu

Choose your battles wisely.
While your core principles and your life goals are important,
most of what you let upset you is not worth an argument or lost sleep.
Take Lao Tzu's advice and become softer and more flexible.

When you encounter difficulties and contradictions,
do not try to break them, but bend them with gentleness and time.
- Saint Francis de Sales

The key to everything is patience.
You get the chicken by hatching the egg,
not by smashing it open.
- Arnold H. Glasgow

Patience can't be acquired overnight.
It is just like building up a muscle.
Every day you need to work on it.
- Eknath Easwaran

Patience, persistence, and perseverance.
A little more each day, a little better each day.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Further reading: Be Gentle with Yourself

The Oak and the Reeds - a fable by Aesop

Tread Lightly

Aesop: Gentleness and kind persuasion win where force and bluster fail
    

Harmony Leads to Happiness

Happiness is not something ready made.
It comes from your own actions.
- Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama

The key to happiness is not to have what you want
but to want what you have.
- Anonymous

Happiness is when what you think, what you say,
and what you do are in harmony.
- Mohandas (Mahatma) Gandhi

Resolve to keep happy, and your joy and you
shall form an invincible host against difficulties.
- Helen Keller

Happiness is the absence of the striving for happiness.
- Zhuangzi

You can not find happiness by chasing after it.
Happiness comes from doing what you love to do,
and from being who you truly are.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

Further reading: Ten Little Tips to Feel Happier Right Now

Simple Pleasures

The Secret of Happiness

How to be Happy in Life by Breaking the Cycle of Self-Inflicted Suffering

Choose To Be Happy
      

Inner Guidance

Trust your own inner guidance.
Have faith that your steps are
carrying you toward your dreams.
Keep your eyes on the heavens
and believe that your feet will carry you well.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

When I let go of what I am,
I become what I might be.
- Lao Tzu

Follow what you are genuinely passionate about
and let that guide you to your destination.
- Diane Sawyer

Fear is the cheapest room in the house.
I would like to see you living
In better conditions.
- Hafiz

Further reading: 7 Secrets of Happy Couples

How to Gain Self Confidence

How to be Successful in Business
       

YOU make a Difference

YOU make a difference to the world.
Act on your dreams today.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

It is not the easy or convenient life for which I search,
but life lived to the edge of all that I may be.
- Mary Anne Radmacher

The most difficult thing is the decision to act,
the rest is merely tenacity.
The fears are paper tigers.
You can do anything you decide to do.
You can act to change and control your life;
and the procedure, the process is its own reward.
- Amelia Earhart

Further reading: Your Legacy - Making a Difference

Fulfilling Your Dreams

Follow Your Bliss

Only Today
      

Enforce Your Personal Boundaries

Set and enforce your personal boundaries.
You and only YOU get to choose how much influence
you allow others to exert over your life.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie

A 'No' uttered from deepest conviction is better and greater
than a 'Yes' merely uttered to please,
or what is worse, to avoid trouble.
- Mohandas (Mahatma) Gandhi

"No" is a complete sentence, and so often we forget that.
When we don't want to do something, we can simply smile and say "No."
We don't have to explain ourselves, we can just say "No."
Love yourself enough to be able to say "Yes" or "No."
- Susan Gregg

Never be bullied into silence.
Never allow yourself to be made a victim.
Accept no one's definition of your life;
define yourself.
- Harvey Fierstein

Further reading: The Power of Saying NO to the Demands of Others

Appreciate Yourself

To Thine Own Self Be True