Self-motivation

JOY

This morning! So sunny and dewy, undisturbed earth, unexplored sky! This morning, so solemn, no one is yet awake and the morning’s glory has not yet been witnessed! And you are the first to see it!

Nightingales are finishing their lovely spring songs. Some dandelions remain untouched in sheltered spots and a white lily appears in the dampness of a dark shadow in the valley. Brisk summer wrens complement the nightingales in song and the oriole’s note is particularly beautiful. Everywhere around is the busy crackling of thrushes.

Rise, my friend! Place your rays of happiness into a bundle. Be braver, begin your fight, help the sun! Here, listen! A cuckoo sets eyes on you. Look, a harrier hovers above the water. It is not just a simple mist. This morning it is the first and the only. Here too are the magpies, sparkling with dew, out on the path. Tomorrow they won’t sparkle for sure, and the day won’t be the same. These magpies will appear somewhere else. This morning is unique. No one in the whole world has ever seen it before. Only you see it! My unknown friend! People have lived on this earth for hundreds of thousands of years. They saved their joy, passing it on to each other for you to arrive, to lift it and place it into bundles like arrows. And rejoice! Come now, be brave!

My enemy! You cannot know at all! You will never understand what joy I created for other people. But if you do not understand my best intentions, why are you goading me for mistakes, for the insignificant? You are accusing me? Pass us by! Do not disturb us having joy!

And again the soul will broaden. The conifers and birches! I cannot take my eyes off the green candles’ on the pine-trees or the young red cones of the conifer tree. Conifers and birches, what a joy!

M.M. Prishvin

ADVICE TO A FRIEND

Know: that there is no salvation in inaction.

Even if your worlds collide,

Even if all life is unlucky,

Do not withdraw from the game.

Even though the chances are one in a million,

But you will become richer than you are now,

When you begin to believe that it is

Destiny by your own Fortune.

(Vadim Shefner).

THE RISK

He who doesn’t drink has very little chance of being hit by the bottle’. A girl staying at home doing her homework: of course there is a chance she will fall into the hands of a maniac or an abuser. Or she may get hooked on drugs. These chances are a hundred times smaller, however, than the girl who hangs around the streets, with make-up plastered on her face and goes clubbing all night long.

А man on a business trip risks being robbed on a train or in a cheap hotel. If, on a boring business trip, he wishes to spoil himself with love for money’, the risk grows significantly. The work of the suitcase’ trader! This is dangerous work. If they agree to hide several packs of heroin inside their striped sales satchels, their work then takes on greater danger.

The big businessman or politician differs from the suitcase trader or a drinker only in scale and scope. Choices are masked by treachery. It pretends to be a dunce! If you don’t steal, or lie, or blackmail your competitor, or befriend bandits – then you may say goodbye to your precious business, which brings you so much money, glory and satisfaction. It becomes more precious to you than anything in life.

A choice between life and death is very cunningly masked for a fascinating game. Nothing ventured, nothing gained. But the trick is that the risk should be bold and unselfish. Otherwise the triumphant champagne glass might be, in reality, a Mickey Finn or some other crap.

From Pitomnik’ by P. Dashkova

TROUBLE, JOY AND HAPPINESS

When a fierce wind blows and the pelting rain pours down, birds and animals are not at ease! When the sun shines brightly and a gentle wind blows, then trees and grasses breathe with vivacity. You have to understand, there will not be a single day when nature rests its power: there is no day when the human heart doesn’t fill with joy.

Lucky people do not reason how to be calm and happy. Even when they see ghosts in their dreams, they don’t lose self-control. Losers do not notice that their fingers are all thumbs! They even, jokingly, see this as a plot against them.

You can’t achieve happiness by trickery. Learn how to find joy in your life. This is the best way to attract happiness. Trouble can’t be avoided no matter how good your efforts. Drive away anger! It is the best way to keep out of trouble. Trouble and joy get accustomed to one another. And when they get absolutely accustomed, happiness is born. This happiness will be indestructible. Doubts and belief fix each other. When they have fully mended each other, only then will knowledge appear. This knowledge will be true.

Fishing is a light-hearted pass-time. But in your hands you have a tool which can take somebody’s life. Playing chess, on the other hand, is a harmless pass-time. However, it instils into somebody’s head the idea of a deadly duel. You cannot fail to see that doing nothing is most joyous and a simple naivety remains subtends subtleness.

(HUN TSZYCHEN (Hun Inmin), 16^th-17^th Century,
Chinese thinker, compiler of Taste of Roots’, book of aphorisms).