Quote

The faculty of voluntarily bringing back a wandering attention, over and over again, is the very root of judgment, character, and will... An education which should improve this faculty would be the education par excellence.

William James

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William James
Age: 68 †
Born: 1842
Born: January 11
Died: 1910
Died: August 26
Philosopher
Physician
Psychologist
University Teacher
W. James
Education
Root
Attention
Faculty
Character
Bringing
Back
Wander
Would
Improve
Excellence
Roots
Voluntarily
Judgment
Wandering

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Positive images of the future are a powerful and magnetic force... They draw us on and energize us, give us courage and will to take on important initiatives. Negative images of the future also have a magnetism. They pull the spirit downward in the path of despair.
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Man alone of all the creatures of earth can change his own pattern. Man alone is the architect of his own destiny.
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Each of us is in fact what he is almost exclusively by virtue of his imitative-ness.
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The most any one can do is to confess as candidly as he can the grounds for the faith that is in him, and leave his example to work on others as it may.
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Religion must be considered vindicated in a certain way from the attacks of her critics.
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The discovery of the power of our thoughts will prove to be the most important discovery of our time
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But facts are facts, and if we only get enough of them theyare sure to combine.
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All the daily routine of life, our dressing and undressing, the coming and going from our work or carrying through of its various operations, is utterly without mental reference to pleasure and pain, except under rarely realized conditions.
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Beyond the very extreme of fatigue and distress, we may find amounts of ease and power we never dreamed ourselves to own sources of strength never taxed at all because we never push through the obstruction
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The desire to gain wealth and the fear to lose it are our chief breeders of cowardice and propagators of corruption.
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If an unusual necessity forces us onward, a surprising thing occurs. The fatigue gets worse up to a certain point, when, gradually or suddenly, it passes away and we are fresher than before!
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Our beliefs are really rules for action.
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It is only by risking our persons from one hour to another that we live at all.
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Earnestness means willingness to live with energy, though energy bring pain.
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Faith is synonymous with working hypothesis.
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The 'I think' which Kant said must be able to accompany all my objects, is the 'I breathe' which actually does accompany them.
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Habit is thus the enormous fly-wheel of society, its most precious conservative agent. It alone is what keeps us all within the bounds of ordinance, and saves the children of fortune from the envious uprisings of the poor. It alone prevents the hardest and most repulsive walks of life from being deserted by those brought up to tread therein.
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So to feel brave, act as if we were brave, use all our will to that end...and a courage-fit will very likely replace the fit of fear.
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You do not sing because you're happy, you're happy because you sing.
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Lets take full advantage of this discovery
William James