🎉 Happy New Year 🍾

Life is whatever we make it. The traveller

is the journey. What we see is not

what we see but who we are.

Fernando Pessoa

Pursuing self-esteem can be motivating,

but other sources of motivation, such as

goals that are good for the self and others,

can provide the same motivation

without the costs.

Jennifer Crocker & Lora Park

Rich Roll

Pursue what's in your heart, and

the universe will conspire to support you.

Rich Roll

You must be ready to burn yourself in your

own flame; how could you rise anew

if you have not first become ashes?

Friedrich Nietzsche

Smart people learn from everything

and everyone, average people from

their experiences, stupid people

already have all the answers.

Socrates

The greatest gift you have to give

is that of your own self-transformation.

Lao Tzu

You are in danger of living a life so comfortable

and soft, that you will die without ever

realizing your true potential.

David Goggins

If we begin with ourselves and do the things

that we need to do and become the best person

we can be, we have a much better chance

of changing the world for the better.

Aleksandr Solzjenitsyn

Raise Your Standards

The person you will be depends largely on

the information you feed your mind today.

Be picky about the books you read,

the people you spend your time with,

and the conversations you engage in.

Ruben Chavez

1. Get a steamer.

2. Get therapy.

3. Define your lifestyle goals.

4. Prioritize your skin and hair.

5. Use your nicest things at all times.

6. Analyze how to improve your details.

7. Set boundaries.

Don't save anything for a special occasion.

Being alive is a special occasion.

Mary Engelbreit

A nation without borders is no nation at all.

Ronald Reagan

#1 - Doomed relationships.

#2 - Talking about men.

# 3 - Unrealistic expectations.

# 4 - Social media.

# 5 - Mental health issues.

# 6 - Psychologically illiterate.

# 7 - Financial illiteracy.

Simplicity is the keynote of all true elegance.

Coco Chanel

1. Life upgrade - Glow up - Inner work.

2. Procrastination.

3. Support system.

You teach people how to treat you by what you

allow, what you stop and what you reinforce.

Tony Gaskins

I cannot control other people,

but I can control if they are in my life or not.

Mastin Kipp

We can't connect with someone unless we're

clear about where we end and they begin. 

If there's no autonomy between people,

then there's no compassion or empathy,

just enmeshment.

Brené Brown

Be civil to all;

serviceable to many;

familiar with few;

friend to one;

enemy with noone.

Benjamin Franklin

Friends

True friends are families which you can select.

Audrey Hepburn

Right now you may not be where you intended

to be, but it's where you need to be in order

to get where you want to go.

Steven Aitchison

The most we can hope for is to create

the best possible conditions for success,

then let go of the outcome.

The ride is a lot more fun that way.

Phil Jackson

We are disturbed not by what happens to us,

but by our thoughts about what happens to us.

Epictetus

What you want is deliberately placed

out of reach so that you can become

the person it takes to obtain it.

 

Mastin Kipp

The same wall that keeps out your

disappointment also keeps out the sunlight

of enriching experiences. So let life touch you.

Jim Rohn

The longer you wait, the bigger the prize.

George Bernard Shaw

People grow when they are loved well.

If you want to help others heal,

love them without an agenda.

Mike McHargue

You may never know what results come

of your actions, but if you do nothing,

there will be no results.

Mahatma Gandhi

All rivers and some people are crooked

because they follow the path of least resistence.

Napoleon Hill

The only constant in life is change.

Heraclitus

Success is not final, failure is not fatal:

it is the courage to continue that counts.

Winston Churchill

Sex and the City

The most important relationship is

the one you have with yourself.

Diane Von Furstenberg

Two roads diverged in a road, and I,

I took the one less traveled by,

And that has made all the difference.

Robert Frost

There is a crack in everything,

that's how the light gets in.

Leonard Cohen

Your task is not to seek for love,

but merely to seek and find all the barriers

within yourself that you have built against it.

Rumi

Tell me what a person finds sexually attractive

and I will tell you their entire philosophy of life.

Show me the person they sleep with and I will

tell you their valuation of themselves.

Ayn Rand

Style is a way to say who you are

without having to speak.

Rachel Zoe

There are only two tragedies in life:

one is not getting what one wants,

and the other is getting it.

Oscar Wilde

One has to choose between living one's own

life, fully, entirely, completely - or

dragging out some false, shallow,

degrading existence that the world

in its hypocrisy demands.

Oscar Wilde

🎅 A Christmas Carol 🎄

Don't talk of love and peace when

you have a dead animal on your plate.

Socrates

Man has made the Earth a hell for animals.

Arthur Schopenhauer

Jo Frederiks

We should be measured by how we treat

the most vulnerable and powerless

in our society.

Cory Booker

You have just dined, and however scrupulously

the slaughterhouse is concealed in the graceful

distance of miles, there is complicity.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Jo Frederiks

No man chooses evil because it is evil;

he only mistakes it for happiness,

the good he seeks.

Mary Wollstonecraft

The thinking person must oppose all

cruel customs, no matter how deeply rooted

in tradition and surrounded by a halo.

When we have a choice, we must avoid

bringing torment and injury

into the life of another.

Albert Schweitzer

Jo Frederiks

A good heart will refuse the happiness

built on misfortune of others.

Saadie

What an amount of suffering and cruel

punishment the poor creatures have to

endure in order to give a few moments

of pleasure to men devoid of thought.

Albert Schweitzer

Tradition will accustom people to any atrocity.

George Bernard Shaw

As long as people will shed the blood

of innocent creatures there can be no peace,

no liberty, no harmony between people.

Slaughter and justice cannot dwell together.

Isaac Bashevis Singer

It takes nothing away from a human

to be kind to an animal.

Joaquin Phoenix

If people understood that for two minutes

of pleasure, there is a lifetime of suffering.

Khaled bin Alwaleed

Think occasionally of the suffering

of which you spare yourself the sight.

Albert Schweitzer

The meat industry spends hundreds of millions of

dollars lying to the public about their product.

But no amount of false propaganda can

sanitise meat. The facts are absolutely clear.

Eating animals is bad for human health,

catastrophic for the environment and

a living nightmare for animals.

Chrissie Hynde

Jo Frederiks

Where there is love there is life.

Mahatma Gandhi

People who say they love animals sit down to

enjoy the flesh of creatures who have been

utterly deprived of everything that could

make their lives worth living and who

endured the awful suffering and

the terror of the abattoirs.

Jane Goodall

Thanksgiving dinner's sad and thankless

Christmas dinner's dark and blue

When you stop and try to see it

From the turkey's point of view

Sunday dinner isn't sunny

Easter feasts are just bad luck

When you see it from the view point

of a chicken or a duck

Oh how I once loved tuna salad

Pork and lobsters, lamb chops too

Till I stopped and looked at dinner

From the dinner's point of view

Shel Silverstein

As long as man continues to be the ruthless

destroyer of living beings he will never

know health or peace. For as long as men

massacre animals, they will kill each other.

Indeed, he who sows the seed of murder

and pain cannot reap joy and love.

Pythagoras

Do your little bit of good where you are;

it's those little bits of good put together

that overwhelm the world.

Desmond Tutu

Create all the happiness you are able to create;

remove all the misery you are able to remove.

Every day will allow you, will invite you to

add something to the pleasure of others,

or to diminish something of their pains.

Jeremy Bentham

The Best Arguments Against Veganism

To find yourself, think for yourself.

Socrates

Evil comes from a failure to think.

It defies thought for as soon as thought

tries to engage itself with evil

and examine the premises and principles

from which it originates,

it is frustrated because it finds nothing there.

That is the banality of evil.

Hannah Arendt

I try to encourage people to think for themselves,

to question standard assumptions... Don't take

assumptions for granted. Begin by taking a

skeptical attitude toward anything that is

conventional wisdom. Make it justify itself.

Be willing to ask questions about what

is taken for granted. Try to think

things through for yourself.

Noam Chomsky

It is impossible for a man to learn

what he thinks he already knows.

Epictetus

Many are destined  to reason wrongly; others,

not to reason at all; and others to persecute

those who do reason.

Voltaire

Those who will not reason, are bigots,

those who cannot, are fools,

and those who dare not, are slaves.

Lord Byron

The snake which cannot cast its skin has to die.

As well the minds which are prevented from

changing their opinions; they cease to be mind.

Friedrich Nietzsche

You were not made to live as brutes,

but to follow virtue and knowledge.

Dante Alighieri

Let me give you a definition of ethics:

it is good to maintain and further life

it is bad to damage and destroy life.

Albert Schweitzer

Two percent of the people think.

Three percent of the people think they think.

And ninty-five percent of the people

would rather die than think.

George Bernard Shaw

First, they ignore you, then they laugh at you,

then they fight you, then you win.

Mahatma Gandhi

Don't worry about siding for or against

the majority. Worry about taking up

any of their irrational beliefs.

Marcus Aurelius

It is difficult to get a man to understand

something when his salary depends on

his not understanding it.

Upton Sinclair

Humans lack humanity, not protein.

Eddie Mah

Everyone "loves" animals until they hear

the word "vegan". Then they'll argue tooth

and nail why it's acceptable to abuse them.

Rob Zombie

Ultimately evil is done not so much by evil

people, but by good people who do not

know themselves and who do not

probe deeply.

Reinhold Niebuhr

The indifference, callousness and contempt

that so many people exhibit toward animals

is evil first because it results in great suffering

in animals, and second because it results in

an incalculably great impoverishment

of the human spirit.

Albert Einstein

Progress is impossible without change,

and those who cannot change their minds

cannot change anything.

George Bernard Shaw

All the arguments to prove man's superiority

cannot shatter this hard fact:

in suffering the animals are our equals.

Peter Singer

The worst sin towards our fellow creatures

is not to hate them, but to be indifferent to them:

that's the essence of inhumanity.

George Bernard Shaw

Ladies of the Night

The difference between a lady and a flower girl

is not how she behaves, but how she's treated.

George Bernard Shaw

💞 Dating 💓

The secret is not to chase butterflies,

but to take care of the garden

so they'll come to you.

- You teach people how to treat you.

- Look your best. Wear colors like red, pink or leopard. Wear jewelry, makeup, perfume and heels. Make sure that your hair and nails are done.

- If he brings you a gift, say "thank you" and smile.

- Allow him to open the door for you and help you with anything that you have in your hands, to walk on the side of the street that the cars are passing by, to give you his jacket if it's cold and to pull the chair out for you.

- Put the purse in your lap or over the chair. Not on the ground or the floor. Under every bar there's hooks to wrap your purse around.

- Smile, make eye contact and make sure that you're engaged. Put your phone on silent and keep it in your purse. Don't take pictures.

- You don't have to answer any question that you don't want to answer. Just smile or laugh and turn your head. Change the subject. Listen more than you talk. Don't try too hard. Stay away from topics that can be uncomfortable, unhygienic or unpleasant. Avoid topics like personal belifes, politics and religion.

- Allow your date to flag down the waiter. Don't order too much food and don't drink too much alcohol. Not more than one glass of wine or champagne. Order light food and don't overeat.

- Speak in a feminine, soft voice. Have a nice low tone.

- Give compliments but not too many.

- Let him take the lead. Allow it to be silent sometimes. Make eye contact and smile.

- Flirt. Learn from movies and other women. Lean in and tilt your head. Use your body.

- Observe his behaviour towards you, the waiter etc. Take in everything.

- Have manners and etiquette. Take your napkin and dab your face. Make sure that you're not spitting when you're talking or talking with food in your mouth. Be mindful of the noices that you make with your mouth. 

- Always say "excuse me" before you get up from any table. Go to the restroom and touch up your makeup. Make sure nothing is stuck in your teeth.

- Don't reach for the check or ask him what you're going to do with it. If he doesn't pay - it's not a date. 

- Don't complain about anything.

- Allow the man to lead, help and impress you.

- At the end of the date, let him know that you had a nice time, smile and thank him. Be genuine and grateful.

- Let him pursue you, ask you out on another date and start a conversation with you.

1. Positive energy.

2. Look your best.

3. Smell good.

4. Go with the flow. Be present.

5. Flirt - but don't get sexual.

The best way of killing a rose

is to force it open when it is still

only the promise of a bud.

José Saramago

1. Being a tease.

2. Focusing on money & accomplishments.

3. Playing hard to get.

4. Having an entitled mindset.

5. Holding him to standards you won't hold yourself to.

6. Wearing too much makeup.

7. Being too hard.

8. Making it all about God (or anything).

9. Being too independent.

Oh, the tiger will love you.

There is no sincerer love

than the love of food.

George Bernard Shaw

1. Shipped or no nail polish.

2. Being too much on your phone.

3. Too much makeup.

4. Slutty outfits in public.

5. Talking like a truck driver.

6. Asking for money or gifts.

1. Quality over quantity.

2. Set your standards.

3. Stand by your words.

4. Don't play games.

5. Reciprocate & appreciate.

6. Be confident and be yourself.

7. Never be afraid to lose.

You must find the courage to leave the table

if respect is no longer being served.

Tene Edwards

1. Positive attitude.

2. Physical attraction.

3. Transparency.

4. A willingness to listen.

5. Respect.

6. Loyalty and support.

7. Feminine energy.

Show up and let go.

Love them and let them decide.

Do not force anything, just be open.

Mastin Kipp