The Official Website of Michael Corthell

We're all learners, all the time. It's just we're a different kind each day. We think, 'I'm not student today. I've learned my lesson. I was a learner yesterday but not this morning'. Then tomorrow we find out that, yes, we were a learner today too. I think the only way we can grow and get on in this world is to accept the fact we're not perfect and live accordingly...don't you? “Yesterday is but a dream, Tomorrow is only a vision.  But today well lived makes every yesterday a dream of happiness,  and every tomorrow a vision of hope.” ― Kālidāsa

  The morning that started out as a complete mess was turned around by....a SMILE. We can’t always control what happens to us, but slapping a smile on our mugs can definitely change our internal and external experiences. "Sometimes your joy is the source of your smile,  but sometimes your smile can be the source of your joy." — Thich Nhat Hanh

Let's try this: If you have  never  changed your mind about some fundamental thing in your belief system, if you have never  questioned  it's basics, and if you have  no wish  to do so, then you are very likely ignorant. How about going out and finding someone who,  in your opinion , believes, assumes, or considers certain things very strongly and very differently from what you believe. Then just have a basic honest conversation. That is how we can all build positive tolerance and unify.  

  If you are positive, positive things will find you.  I submit to you again that all futures are created by thoughts. And that the foundation of all happiness is faith. A happy life is also a healthy life. None of us will ever be perfectly healthy, but we can seek our personal  optimal level of health.  If we can accept the premise that our minds can create illness, it would naturally follow that we can also create wellness. And therein lies a most powerful truth about healing.  Have faith, be positive about your future and create it.

We can't escape the idea that, in general, people commonly use false moral standards judge their own behavior. Most people seek success and wealth for themselves and admire them in others, but at the same time,  to be wealthy and honored in an unjust society is a moral disgrace.

Yearning to do good, to do better starts with an inspired vision.  When people can see it in their mind’s eye and hold a vision before them of what is possible for the future, it inspires them to take action. It gives them a goal to work towards. It gives meaning to their daily actions. It helps them stay the course, especially when they need it most.  Inspiring a shared vision requires our leaders to be thoughtful visionaries who engage others in creating a shared future. 

Book except from Madeleine K. Albright's Fascism: A Warning We cannot, of course, expect every leader to possess the wisdom of Lincoln or Mandela’s largeness of soul. But when we think about what questions might be most useful to ask, perhaps we should begin by discerning what our prospective leaders believe it worthwhile for us to hear. Do they cater to our prejudices by suggesting that we treat people outside our ethnicity, race, creed or party as unworthy of dignity and respect? Do they want us to nurture our anger toward those who we believe have done us wrong, rub raw our grievances and set our sights on revenge? Do they encourage us to have contempt for our governing institutions and the electoral process? Do they seek to destroy our faith in essential contributors to democracy, such as an independent press, and a professional judiciary? Do they exploit the symbols of patriotism, the flag, the pledge in a conscious effort to turn us against one another? If defeated at the pol

All of us need just three things in life to be truly happy:  Someone to love Something to do  Something to hope for.... let's just do this, shall we?

If you want to achieve your dreams and take steps to achieve your life goals, then commitment is the key to help you get there. If you believe you can reach your goals and have the commitment and self-confidence to expand that belief, anything is possible.

So, you don't like the way your life is going, or you love it so far? Our lives seem to be a series of events and accidents. But if you look back you will see a pattern. Find out what that pattern is, and you can change your future hopefully for the better [or maintain it].

  When considering the question of whether or not someone is an autocrat, dictator wannabe, it would be good to remember that Joseph Stalin , Benito Mussolini , and Adolf Hitler all took great care in always saying the opposite of what they did, and do the opposite of what they said. This is the mark of a psychopath who becomes head of a nation (or an organization). History is full of tales and stories to narrate how powerful men exploited their authority and power to inflict misery and suffering on others. While some leaders used ruthless ways to capture cities and gain control over states, others simply derived sadistic satisfaction in torturing and abusing people. As you read the accounts of the following people who abused their authority by abusing humankind, it might dawn on you why we must never accept a lying psychopath as head of state. Here's a list of psychopathic leaders who used the most dreaded and brutal methods in history to torture their people: Full Article  

We know that our enemies will mistreat us, acting in unkind ways. We guard against being disrespected and shield ourselves against hateful words that are thrown at us like rocks — that’s what our enemies do, they try to hurt us. We are sometimes caught off guard by the actions of our enemies, but these actions are never unexpected. Our enemies wouldn’t be enemies if they were nice and supportive...right? Friends on the other hand, and by friends I mean all good people, are a different story all together. We expect them to do right, to have our backs. Otherwise good people often enable bullies and even seditionists to thrive by remaining silent in the face of the bad person's actions. It's either fear or apathy but the result is the same — silence is consent. Never forget that or this: “Silence in the face of evil is itself evil: God will not hold us guiltless. Not to speak is to speak. Not to act is to act.” ― Dietrich Bonhoeffer * *  Dietrich Bonhoeffer   was arrested in Apri

Conspiracy theories resist falsification and are reinforced by circular reasoning: both evidence against the conspiracy and an absence of evidence for it are re-interpreted as evidence of its truth, whereby the conspiracy becomes a matter of faith rather than something that can be proved or disproved.  Research suggests that conspiracist ideation—belief in conspiracy theories—can be psychologically harmful or pathological and that it is correlated with psychological projection , paranoia and Machiavellianism .  Psychologists attribute finding a conspiracy where there is none to a mental illness called illusory pattern perception .Conspiracy theories once limited to fringe audiences have become commonplace in mass media , emerging as a cultural phenomenon of the late 20th and early 21st centuries.