Morning Briefings

We must have courage to face life’s inevitables: pain, suffering and sorrow. When trouble comes, the coward says, ‘Run away.’ The hero says, ‘Stay and master it.’ Courage is not an instinct. Fear is an instinct. Courage is something that you acquire.

– James Milton McKnight from
Strength for Service to God and Country

Fear can be the single biggest obstacle a person faces when trying to accomplish a goal. Unfortunately, it seems that modern society has developed into a fear-worshipping machine. Fear, more than any other emotion, is what drives people to do what they do. And most of that fear is irrational.

– Levi Brackman and Sam Jaffe
Jewish Wisdom for Business Success

God gave us the power to imagine. Without imagination I suspect that Thomas Edison would have been a common laborer. He could not have invented anything unless it was first born in his imagination.

– Reverend James O’Leary
I Think I Am Happier Than I Think I Am

Without emotion we are unable to sense risk; with emotion, we can’t control the fear that risk generates. Welcome to the human race!

– James Montier
Just One Thing

Doing what’s right is hard, and speaking the truth is dangerous. Many have been abhorred for it, some killed, one crucified.

– Andrew Klavan
The Wall Street Journal

If working a room is so much fun and so profitable, why do our hearts thump, our palms sweat and our eyes glaze over when we think about it? One reason is that 88 percent of us think of ourselves as shy.

– Susan RoAne
How to Work a Room: Your Essential Guide to Savvy Socializing

It’s easy to be a decent person and to do good as long as it doesn’t cost you anything. It’s when it costs you everything that you have a story that’s inspirational.

– Screenwriter Steve Zaillian (Schindler’s List, Searching for Bobby Fischer)
AFI’s 100 Years…100 Cheers

Human courage and internal fortitude take us only so far without a stronger wind to our backs.

– Robert J. Morgan
The Promise: How God Works All Things Together for Good

As a teenager, I felt immeasurable wiser and savvier than my dad. But as I grew older, I saw my dad as more of a man because he let me share in some of his fears and regrets. Because of that courage in showing me that he was just another guy, I saw him even more as godlike and supremely lovable.

– Vincent Staniforth
Questions for My Father: Finding the Man Behind Your Dad

We are coming to the end of the age of employer and employee. Employers can’t guarantee jobs anymore because they don’t know what their companies will look like next year. Everyone is on their way to becoming an independent contractor. The new workforce contract will be: Show up at my office five days a week and do what I want, but handle your own insurance, benefits and health care. This used to happen only with highly educated professionals. Now it is happening at the level of the factory floor worker.

– Herbert Meyer
What in the World is Going On?

If you’re waiting to have a good idea before you have any ideas, you won’t have many ideas.

– David Allen
Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity

There are people out there who want to keep science in a little box where it can’t possibly touch God. Scientists are not allowed to even think thoughts that involve an intelligent creator.

– Ben Stein regarding his movie
Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed

In the famous final scene from the movie Casablanca, Humphrey Bogart sends the beautiful Ingrid Bergman away with another man so he can stay behind and fight the Nazis. He ends up sacrificing everything–the woman he loves, a prosperous nightclub, respect and status–all because he knows there something more important in life: the need to fight evil. Ultimately, that’s why we need to pray for courage. All the things in life we want to hold on to –our possessions, pleasures and feelings of security–as well as the fears about losing them, are secondary to our struggle with evil.

– Anthony DeStefano
Ten Prayers God Always Says Yes To

Where courage is lacking, no other virtue can survive, accept by accident.

– Samuel Johnson