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. . . IMPRESSIONABLE see: "GULLIBLE" [Of Lord Derby:] A very weak-minded fellow I am afraid, and, like the feather pillow, bears the marks of the last person who has sat on him! --Douglas Haig, 1st Earl Haig (18611928) British soldier and senior commander during World War I. Letter to Lady Haig [14 January 1918].  . . see: "APPEARANCE" see: "FEELINGS" see: "OBSERVATION" [Holly Reed (Mia Farrow) speaking:] My ex-husband and I fell in love at first sight. Maybe I should have taken a second look. --Woody Allen [Allen Stewart Konigsberg] (b. 1935) American actor, screenwriter, and director. "Crimes & Misdemeanors" [1989 film] Sometimes a neighbor whom we have disliked a lifetime for his arrogance and conceit lets fall a single commonplace remark that shows us another side, another man really; a man uncertain, puzzled and in the dark like ourselves. --Willa Silbert Cather (18731947) American novelist. _Shadows on the Rock_ [1931] Thou hast seen nothing yet. --Miguel de Cervantes (15471616) Spanish novelist. _Don Quixote de la Mancha_ pt. 1, bk. 3, ch. 9 [1605] First impressions are the most lasting. --Jonas Hanway (17121786) English traveller and philanthropist. _A Journal of Eight Days Journey_ [1756] As pines keep the shape of the wind even when the wind has fled and is no longer there, so words guard the shape of man even when the man has fled and is no longer there. --George Seferis [Giorgios Stylianou Seferiades] (19001971) Greek poet, essayist, and diplomat who won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1963. _On Stage_ [1966] ^ "How To Gain Status And Intimidate People" by Jeffrey Shaffer and Suzy Blackaby _The Wall Street Journal_ [26 November 1984] Are you losing the race to keep up with the Joneses? Or worse, do you feel as if it just isn't worth the effort anymore? Don't be discouraged. Confidence is the key to success in any endeavor, but achieving just the right balance of competitive desire and cool self-assurance can be tricky. So is projecting an image that will awe your subordinates and mystify your rivals. It's especially difficult when your personal budget demands that you exist on a diet of baked beans and generic cola. We think we've solved the problem with a list of tips that will get your confidence level back up to par, at minimum personal expense. Just remember that moxie can be as important as money when it comes to looking good. 1. Carry a foreign-language newspaper in your briefcase. When sitting at a bar, take out the paper and scan the pages with a serious expression. It's important to pick a difficult language for the gambit, something other than French, German or Spanish. Those could get you in trouble if some exchange student calls your bluff. 2. Keep an old telephone in your car under the front seat. When driving, hold the receiver up to your ear and act as if you were talking to someone on the other end. If stopped at a busy intersection, roll down your window so pedestrians can hear the conversation. Then, in a loud, demanding voice, say things such as, "Tell Harris we need that building! Tell him to offer 50 million, straight cash, whatever it takes!" 3. Use expensive containers to dispose of household trash. When you visit a store such as Neiman-Marcus (we buy all of our pencils there) pick up a couple of extra shopping bags. Several times a month you should fill one with garbage and place it on the curb with your other household rubbish. Make sure the name of the store is clearly visible from the street. 4. Wear T-shirts commemorating fantastic events of physical endurance. Most towns now have these stores where you can print messages on shirts. Simply order one up with the inscription, "Snow Madness Run, Butte-Great Falls December 1981." When people ask why they've never heard about such a grueling race, say, "Oh, we only ran it once, 12 of us got together and just went for it. Never could get any sane group to sanction it." 5. Mount extra clocks on your office walls. Label each one with the name of an international capital (Lima, Bonn, Canberra) and check them periodically when talking with a client. 6. Keep mysterious items in the glove compartment of your car. Instead of the usual mess of tissues, loose change and old sunglasses, you should have at least two of the following articles: a slide rule, a map of the London subway system, an English-Swahili dictionary, a small jar of litmus paper or a prism. When a passenger discovers the items, shrug and say something like, "Oh, just some things for this project I'm thinking about..." and then close the compartment smartly, to show the conversation is not going any further. 7. Print your own wine labels. This is fairly risky and is a ploy that should only be used when you really want to play hardball. Grab a few bottles of your favorite generic vintage from the local Econo-Mart, soak the labels off and paste on your own. Getting them designed shouldn't be difficult. Chances are that you know of a graphic artist who's struggling to the same degree as yourself. For a small fee or a large lasagna, he or she can come up with a private reserve label just for you, from folksy wine cellar to expensive foreign vineyards, to suit any occasion.  IMPROVEMENT . . see: "CHANGE" see: "PROGRESS" see: "SELF-IMPROVEMENT" He that wrestles with us strengthens our nerves and sharpens our skill. Our antagonist is our helper. --Edmund Burke (17291797) Irish-born Whig politician and man of letters. _Reflections on the Revolution in France_ [1790] I'll turn over a new leaf. --Miguel de Cervantes (15471616) Spanish novelist. _Don Quixote de la Mancha_ pt. 2, bk. 3, ch. 13 [1615] It is better to light one candle than to curse the darkness. --Chinese proverb If man is not rising upwards to be an angel, depend on it, he is sinking downwards to be a devil. He cannot stop at the beast. --Samuel Taylor Coleridge (17721834) English poet, critic, and philosopher. _Table Talk_ [1835] "30 August 1833" Every day, in every way, I am getting better and better. --Ιmile Couι (18571926) French psychologist and pharmacist. _How to Practice Suggestion and Autosuggestion_ [1923] He's turned his life around. He used to be depressed and miserable. Now he's miserable and depressed. --attributed to Sir David Paradine Frost (b. 1939) British television host. Most people are mirrors, reflecting the moods and emotions of the times; few are windows, bringing light to bear on the dark corners where troubles fester. The whole purpose of education is to turn mirrors into windows. --attributed to Sydney J. Harris (19171986) American journalist. There are two kinds of fools: one says, "This is old, therefore it is good;" the other says, "This is new, therefore it is better." --William Ralph Inge (18601954) English writer and Dean of St. Paul's [19111934]. _More Lay Thoughts of a Dean_ [1931] [Of Lord Mansfield, born in Scotland but educated in England:] Much may be made of a Scotchman, if he be *caught* young. --Samuel Johnson (17091784) English poet, critic, and lexicographer. In James Boswell _The Life of Samuel Johnson_ (Entry for Spring 1772) [1791]. We're going to turn this team around 360 degrees. --Jason Kidd (b. 1973) American professional basketball player. Attributed remark after being drafted by the Dallas Mavericks. - God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; courage to change the things I can; and wisdom to know the difference. Living one day at a time; Enjoying one moment at a time; Accepting hardships as the pathway to peace; Taking, as He did, this sinful world as it is, not as I would have it; Trusting that He will make all things right if I surrender to His Will; That I may be reasonably happy in this life and supremely happy with Him Forever in the next. Amen. --Reinhold Niebuhr (18921971) American theologian. "The Serenity Prayer" [1936] With slightly different wording, the first four lines above were attributed to Niebuhr in the "New York Times" on 2 August 1942. - Waldo is one ot those people who would be enormously improved by death. --Saki [Hector Hugh Munro] (18701916) Scottish writer. _Beasts and Super-Beasts_ [1914] "The Feast of Nemesis" - Lucy: Do you think anybody ever really changes? Linus: I've changed a lot in the last year. Lucy: I mean for the better. --Charles Schulz (19222000) American cartoonist. ("Peanuts" comic strip.) - You see things; and you say, 'Why?' But I dream things that never were; and I say, 'Why not?'" --George Bernard Shaw (18561950) Irish dramatist and critic. "Back to Methuselah" [1921] No matter how far you have gone on the wrong road, turn back. --Turkish proverb ----- ameliorate [uh-MEEL-yuh-rayt], transitive verb: To make better; to improve. edification (noun) Intellectual, moral, or spiritual improvement; enlightenment. . . see: "HASTE" see: "IMMATURITY" see: "PASSION" see: "SPEED" see: "EMOTIONS & FEELINGS" for other related links Women are far more impulsive than men; this is because they are more influenced by the heart than the head. --Madame Dorothιe Deluzy (17471830) French actress. Quoted in Maturin M. Ballou _Notable Thoughts About Women_, p. 216 [1882]. Let reason, not impulse, be your guide. --Kahlil Gibran (18831931) Lebanese poet. Anthony Ferris (translator) _A Second Treasury of Kahlil Gibran_ [1962] Since the generality of persons act from impulse, much more than from principle, men are neither so good nor so bad as we are apt to think them. --Augustus William Hare (17921834) British biographer and compiler of travel books. _Guesses at Truth_ [1827] (Co-written with brother Julian) And once sent out a word takes wing beyond recall. --Horace [Quintus Horatius Flaccus] (658 BC) Roman poet. _Epistles_, bk. I, # 18, l. 71 ^ Walter Savage Landor (17751864) British poet, essayist, and critic. Landor's cook displeased his master one day by serving an indifferent meal. Landor in a passion threw him through an open window. The cook landed awkwardly in the flower bed below and broke a limb. Landor cried out, 'Good God, I forgot the violets!' --_Bartlett's Book of Anecdotes_ edited by Clifton Fadiman and Andrι Bernard [2000 ed.] ^ I could never tell where inspiration begins and impulse leaves off. I suppose the answer is in the outcome. If your hunch proves a good one, you were inspired; if it proves bad, you are guilty of yielding to thoughtless impulse. --Beryl Markham (19021986) British-born Kenyan aviator. _West with the Night_ [1942] Das Alter wδgt, die Jugend wagt (Age considers, youth ventures.) --Ernst Benjamin Salomo Raupach (17841852) German dramatist. Quoted in James Wood _Dictionary of Quotations from Ancient and Modern_, p.53 [1893]. Don't throw away the old bucket until you know whether the new one holds water. --Swedish Proverb ----- impetuous (adj.) [im-'pech-oo-uh s] Acting on impulse, making arbitrary decisions, moving with force and violence. quixotic [kwik-SAH-tik], adjective: 1. Caught up in the romance of noble deeds and the pursuit of unreachable goals; foolishly impractical especially in the pursuit of ideals. 2. Capricious; impulsive; unpredictable. Quixotic refers to the eccentric, generous idealism of Don Quixote, the hero of a satiric romance by Miguel de Cervantes. ;void(0)) INACTION / INACTIVITY . . see: "IDLENESS" see: "INDIFFERENCE" see: "LAZINESS" see: "REST" People have the illusion that all over the world, all the time, all kinds of fantastic things are happening. When in fact, over most of the world, most of the time, nothing is happening. --David Brinkley (19202003) American television newscaster. Quoted in Sy Safransky (ed.) _Sunbeams: A Book of Quotations_ [1990]. The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing. --attributed to Edmund Burke (17291797) Irish-born Whig politician and man of letters. Throughout history, it has been the inaction of those who could have acted, the indifference of those who should have known better, the silence of the voice of justice when it mattered most, that has made it possible for evil to triumph. --Haile Selassie I [Tafari Makonnen] (18921975) Emperor of Ethiopia [19301974]. In an address to the General Assembly, United Nations, N.Y.C.. The gloomy and the resentful are always found among those who have nothing to do or who do nothing. --Samuel Johnson (17091784) English poet, critic, and lexicographer. _The Idler_ [1 September 1759] Iron rusts from disuse; stagnant water loses its purity and, in cold, water becomes frozen; even so does inaction sap the vigor of the mind. --Leonardo da Vinci (14521519) Florentine painter, sculptor, musician, and scientist. _The Notebooks_ [1508-1518], tr. Edward MacCurdy, vol 1, ch. 2 By too much sitting still, the body becomes unhealthy; and soon the mind. --Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (18071882) American poet. _Hyperion_ [1839] - A person may cause evil to others not only by his actions but by his inaction, and in either case he is justly accountable to them for the injury. --John Stuart Mill (18061873) English philosopher and social reformer. _On Liberty_, ch. I "Introductory" [1859] Bad men need nothing more to compass their ends than that good men should look on and do nothing. --John Stuart Mill (18061873) English philosopher and social reformer. "On Education," inaugural address on being installed as Rector, University of St. Andrews, Scotland [1 February 1867]. - It is not only what we do, but also what we do not do, for which we are accountable. --Jean Moliθre [Jean Baptiste Poquelin] (16221673) French comic dramatist. Quoted in Tryon Edwards _A Dictionary of Thoughts_, p. 528 [1908 ed.]. My doctrine is this, that if we see cruelty or wrong that we have the power to stop, and do nothing, we make ourselves sharers in the guilt. --Anna Sewell (18201878) English author. _Black Beauty_, ch. XXXVIII [1877] TOPICAL [Of European indifference and inaction:] [T]heir own decades-long indifference to the plight of the oppressed peoples of the Middle East, borne of a convenient mix of knee-jerk pacifism and deep-seated economic interests, represents a true moral catastrophe. European foreign ministers and leaders comfortably sipping tea and brokering multi-billion dollar business deals with dictators in expensive palaces and then criticizing the US for its dealings in the Middle East is hypocrisy of the highest degree. Above all, European indifference and inaction in the face of mass murder and genocide represent the greatest "moral catastrophe" of recent times in the democratic West. Nothing, not historic pacifism nor economic interests can justify the collective inaction on the part of Europe's elites when confronted with mass graves and genocide in Iraq, Rwanda, the Balkans or Sudan. Until Europeans come to terms with the very real consequences of their own stifling indifference and inaction, it will be difficult for Americans to take seriously the endless litany of protest, derision and criticism echoing from across the Atlantic. --Claus Christian Malzahn, "Terminator? Demokrator!" in _Der Spiegel_ [March 2005] ----- abeyance (noun) [κ-'bey-κnts] Suspension, temporary inactivity. gongoozler (noun) ['gahng-guz-lκ(r)] An idle on-looker, a kibbitzer; someone who stares protractedly at anything. moribund [MOR-uh-bund], adjective: 1. In a dying state; dying; at the point of death. 2. Becoming obsolete or inactive. otiose (adj.) ['o-tee-os or 'o-dee-os (US)] Serving no useful purpose; being at leisure or ease, idle, inactive, unemployed. torpor [AWR-per], noun: 1. Lacking in vitality or interest. 2. A state of mental or physical inactivity or insensibility. 3. Lethargy; apathy.  INDECISION . . see: "CHOICES" see: "DECISIONS" see: "PROCRASTINATION" The lobster, when left high and dry among the rocks, has not sense and energy enough to work his way back to the sea, but waits for the sea to come to him. If it does not come, he remains where he is and dies, although the slightest effort would enable him to reach the waves, which are perhaps tossing and tumbling within a yard of him. There is a tide in human affairs that casts men into "tight places", and leave them there, like stranded lobsters. If they choose to lie where the breakers have flung them, expecting some grand billow to take them on its big shoulders, and carry them to small water, the chances are that their hopes will never be realized. --Henry Ward Beecher (18131887) American Congregational minister; brother of Harriet Beecher Stowe, son of Lyman Beecher. Quoted in Rev. Elon Foster _New Cyclopaedia of Prose Illustrations_, p. 410 [1870]. People say I'm indecisive, but I don't know about that. --George H. W. Bush (b. 1924) American Republican statesman and President [19891993]. (Tongue-in-cheek remark before the Gridiron Club, Washington [1 April 1989]). [Of Lord Derby:] A very weak-minded fellow I am afraid, and, like the feather pillow, bears the marks of the last person who has sat on him! --Douglas Haig, 1st Earl Haig (18611928) British soldier and senior commander during World War I. Letter to Lady Haig [14 January 1918]. Hesitation increases in relation to risk in equal proportion to age. --Ernest Hemingway (18891961) American novelist. Quoted in A. E. Hotchner _Papa Hemingway: A Personal Memoir_, pt. I, ch. 3 [1966]. There is no more miserable human being than one in whom nothing is habitual but indecision. --William James (18421910) American philosopher. _The Principles of Psychology_ [1890] The man I worry about is the man who hasn't taken any position. --Ross Perot (b. 1930) American businessman, philanthropist, and independent candidate for U.S. president in 1992 and 1996. "Personality: The Odyssey of Ross Perot" in _Time_ [12 January 1970]. Nothing is so exhausting as indecision, and nothing is so futile. --Bertrand Russell (18721970) British philosopher, mathematician, and Nobel laureate. _The Conquest of Happiness_ [1930] Standing in the middle of the road is very dangerous; you get knocked down by traffic from both sides. --Margaret Thatcher (b. 1925) British conservative stateswoman and Prime Minister [19791990]. Quoted in Kenneth Harris _Thatcher_ [1988]. In matters of great concern, and which must be done, there is no surer argument of a weak mind than irresolution; to be undetermined, where the case is so plain, and the necessity so urgent; to be always intending to live a new life, but never to find time to set about it: this is as if a man should put off eating, and drinking, and sleeping, from one day and night to another, till he is starved and destroyed. --John Tillotson (16301694) Archbishop of Canterbury [1691-1694]. Quoted in S. Austin Allibone _Prose Quotations from Socrates to Macaulay_, p. 366 [1876]. I must have a prodigious quantity of mind; it takes me as much as a week, sometimes, to make it up. --Mark Twain [Samuel Langhorne Clemens] (18351910) American humorist, novelist, journalist, and river pilot. _The Innocents Abroad_ [1869] ----- quandary (noun) Dilemma: a state of uncertainty or indecision as to what to do in a particular situation. end page | IDAHO - IDIOTS | IDLENESS - ILLEGAL ALIENS | ILLNESS - IMMATURITY | IMMIGRATION & IMMORALITY | IMMORTALITY - IMPOSTORS | IMPRESSIONABLE - INDECISION | INDEPENDENCE - INDIANA | INDIFFERENCE - INDIVIDUALITY | INDOCTRINATION - INFORMATION | INGRATITUDE - INNOVATION | INNUENDO - INSPIRATION | INSULTS - INTEGRITY | INTELLECTUALS - INTENTIONS | INTERESTED(ING) - INTUITION | INVENTIONS - ITALY | IRAQ | ISLAM | JAIL - JOGGING | JOHNSON (LYNDON) - JOY | JOURNALISM | JUDGE (TO) - JUSTICE | | H | I - J | K - L | M | N - O | P - Q | | Return Home | The Credits | The Cast | Act 1 | Act 2 | Act 3 | The Reviews | |
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