Inspirational Quotes 54

Learn chess, lose friends

We all know confidence comes from within – don't we? Don't try to be interesting, be interesTED, and learn one subject of conversation really well! And be spontaneous, spontaneous, spontaneous...
Some people just have lasting social inhibition due to confidence-destroying experience in childhood. (jezebel.com commenter)

Wholly self-taught, his interests covered chemistry, science in general, philosophy, chess, music, and literature – interests that… tended to cut him off from those among whom he lived and worked. (doyouwriteunderyourownname.blogspot.co.uk/)

When deciding between two equally strong candidates, an employer will almost certainly pick the one who appears the strongest socially… Practise your elevator pitch in the mirror, film your answers to make sure you are using eye contact, ensure you get rid of any nervous twitches. "On the day, give yourself a few minutes to use the bathroom, have a drink and take a few deep breaths. When you sit down, relax your shoulders, remember to maintain eye-contact, make a conscious effort not to fiddle and fidget. Sit forward to give the impression of confidence." Guardian, Dec 2013


I am not strong on my own. When I have the support of people around me I am fine. I have a great team. (Singer Susan Boyle on discovering she has Asperger’s)

The more Ethel Smyth took umbrage, the more she exhibited her hurt feelings, the more she was likely to alienate. (Alison Light, Mrs Woolf and the Servants)

Boarding children, despite their prestigious schools, have to grow up amongst their peers and never really come home again. (Nick Duffell)

You know that useless phrase 'There's no such word as 'CAN'T'.' I bet that's written in 72-point Comic Sans in the DWP foyer. (Justin Lewis ‏@Mumbler3)

Positive thinking and hard work are not enough when there is a steel ceiling just above your head. [But] if you win, no amount of prejudice can pretend otherwise. (Matthew Syed)

Puritanism: The haunting fear that someone, somewhere, may be happy. (H L Mencken)

Was it General Melchett in Blackadder Goes Forth who always embarked on the same strategy, despite it having failed every time before? (Brian Lawton)

England. There is nothing to be "learned" from losing a match other than you tried to win but didn't know how. Everything else is bullshit. (Danny Baker ‏@prodnose)

I don't have to, personally, have an entire alternative system all ready to go, in order to identify this one as broken. (Alex Andreou ‏@sturdyAlex)

TACOMA, WA—Local woman Jillian Lauretta confirmed to reporters Friday that she was thinking of doing that thing where she acts incredibly cold and unfriendly toward other women she has just met for absolutely no earthly reason whatsoever. “You know, I think I might just go ahead and make a couple women whom I don’t know and whom I have absolutely no reason to dislike feel very uncomfortable and insecure by greeting them with a tight-lipped smile and then silently judging them,” said the 32-year-old accounts manager, adding that she might even tack on the whole bit where she reacts to every perfectly pleasant thing another woman says with chilly near-silence and then, when said woman leaves the room, say something mildly cutting about her in a way that opens the conversation up to outright trash talk if anyone else is so inclined. “While I’m at it, I’ll probably feel threatened by her based on nothing at all and then make little passive-aggressive asides about her—whereas she’ll just be really friendly to me, which will only make me feel small and petty, and my self-loathing will drive me to irrationally despise her all the more.” At press time, reports indicate that Lauretta was not laughing at a humorous remark another woman was making. (The Onion)

More here, and links to the rest.