Perspective

"The happiest people are either very lucky or very flexible in their criteria for happiness."

-Matthew Y. Wong, Ph.D.

Sacrifice

"Passionate hatred can give meaning and purpose to an empty life.

Thus people haunted by the purposelessness of their lives try to find

a new content not only by dedicating themselves to a holy cause,

but also by nursing a fanatical grievance. A mass movement offers

them unlimited opportunities for both."

-Eric Hoffer, The True Believer (1951)

Balance

"To dispose a soul to action we must upset its equilibrium."

- Eric Hoffer, The Ordeal of Change (1963)

Strife

"Unlike the pattern which seems to prevail in the rest of life, in the human species the weak not only survive but often triumph over the strong. The self-hatred inherent in the weak unlocks energies far more formidable than those mobilized by an ordinary struggle for existence..."

"We need not only a purpose in life to give meaning to our existence but also something to give meaning to our suffering. We need as much something to suffer for as something to live for."

- Eric Hoffer, On Nature and Human Nature