The Camel Club

There is ample historical precedent
for the powerless overcoming the powerful.

Yeah, but in real life, Goliath kicks the shit
out of David nine times out of ten.

David Baldacci

Dead Tree w/Fungus

Strength

Strength is built through action. It is also built with restraint.

Strength is confidant. And it is, at the same time, humble.

Strength is ambitious, and patient too.

Strength is focused, and it is honest.

Strength is persistent, continuing forward

through the difficult challenges.

Strength is flexible, adjusting to a changing environment

without compromising its original intent.

Strength has no need to be showy or boastful.

For true strength is quiet, calm, and intensely effective.

Strength is balance, and love and truth.

Strength is when you choose to live as the authentic person you are.

Learn

Learn something from everyone you meet.

the Every in your Day

Enemies

They are everywhere.

Allies

As vital in business as in war.

Because business is war.

Conflict

Nation vs. Nation

Neighbor vs. Neighbor

And the most destructive conflict of all -

Self vs. Self

The fuse of all evil.

Routines

Most of us are creatures of habit,

more comfortable with order than anarchy.

By maintaining a routine,

we avoid original thought.

We make it easier on ourselves.

But routines can also create opportunity for the enemy.

Choices

Sometimes there are no good ones.

Sometimes, because of our own actions,

we create situations where any choice is awful.

Then it comes down to making the one that's simply the least bad.

The Urge to Trust

Even the most skeptical and cynical among us are,

at times, vulnerable to deception.

In the same way that we struggle to keep secrets to ourselves,

we want to believe that those we've chosen

to associate or partner with will not hurt us.

Perhaps because we want to believe

our ability to assess character is superior.

Because we want to believe that we are so endearing

that others would hate to take advantage of us.

Or because we desperately want to believe people are inherently good.

For whatever reason, even the most experienced and savvy

have their moments of vulnerability.

Talk

Oh brother I can't, I can't get through
I've been trying hard to reach you, cause I don't know what to do
Oh brother I can't believe it's true
I'm so scared about the future and I wanna talk to you
Oh I wanna talk to you

You can take a picture of something you see
In the future where will I be?
You can climb a ladder up to the sun
Or write a song nobody has sung or do
Something that's never been done

Are you lost or incomplete?
Do you feel like a puzzle, you can't find your missing piece?
Tell me how do you feel?
Well I feel like they're talking in a language I don't speak
And they're talking it to me

So you take a picture of something you see
In the future where will I be?
You can climb a ladder up to the sun
Or write a song nobody has sung or do
Something that's never been done, do
Something that's never been done

So you don't know where you're going, and you wanna talk?
And you feel like you're going where you've been before
You tell anyone who'll listen but you feel ignored
Nothing's really making any sense at all
Let's talk, let's talk
Let's talk, let's, talk

I'm sad

Is it possible to be betrayed in your dreams
by someone you've never met,
Or for your heart to break again?
Maybe what is left of it shatters to dust ...

Misperceptions

He just had such a different way of looking at the world. Once, while hiking along the rim of the gorge, they'd been overtaken by a passing rain shower. When it was gone, she'd look at what she thought of as a gray and brown desert and noted how barren it remained. He'd told her to look again. "Think small", he said. That's when she noticed the tiny flowers that seemed to have magically appeared with the rain. White ones, yellow, purple, and pink - most so little, hardly the size of her pinkie fingernail, that she hadn't noticed them against the immensity of the rest of the landscape. Yet now that she knew they were there, she saw how they carpeted the ground in soft colors for miles in every direction. "They're so delicate", she said with delight. "Think so?", he answered again. "Pick one."
Marlene stooped to do as told, but carefully drew her fingers back when pricked by the plant's thorns. "Another Indian trick," she grumped, sucking on the injured digit.
Jojola laughed. "The price we pay for misperceptions," he said.
"Sometimes we don't see beauty because it's not slapping us in the face and demanding that we pay attention. And sometimes, those things we find beautiful, or think of as fragile, may not be as harmless as they look."
"Couldn't you just have told me that, " she sulked, "my finger hurts."
"Some lessons are best learned the hard way," he replied with a smile.
"The point is that each person creates their own reality for the world."

NIN

I hurt myself today
To see if I still feel
I focus on the pain
The only thing that's real

Cesar

Hi Cabezon!
:-p

Lord Polonius

This above all: to thine own self be true,
and it must follow, as the night the day,
thou canst not then be false to any man.

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