We tend to seek easy, single-factor explanations of success. For most important things, though, success actually requires avoiding many separate causes of failure. -- Jared Diamond

To follow the path: look to the master, follow the master, walk with the master, see through the master, become the master. -- Modern zen Poem

Lisp programmers know the value of everything but the cost of nothing. -- Alan J. Perlis

A guideline in the process of stepwise refinement should be the principle to decompose decisions as much as possible, to untangle aspects which are only seemingly interdependent, and to defer those decisions which concern details of representation as long as possible. -- Niklaus Wirth

Whatever is worth doing at all, is worth doing well. -- Earl of Chesterfield

To the optimist, the glass is half full. To the pessimist, the glass is half empty. To the engineer, the glass is twice as big as it needs to be. -- author unknown (quoted in `Robust Systems', Gerald Jay Suseman)

There is only one way to avoid criticism: do nothing, say nothing, and be nothing. –Aristotle

Real difficulties can be overcome; it is only the imaginary ones that are unconquerable. ~Theodore N. Vail

I am not a product of my circumstances. I am a product of my decisions. –Stephen Covey

Don’t raise your voice, improve your argument. ~Anonymous