Friday, June 3, 2011

A Bit of Truth from Og Mandino

Since I'm still suffering from a case of brain freeze, mostly likely brought on by my focus on manuscript revisions, I'm recycling this post from December, 2009.

I saw this quote today . . . my apologies to whoever posted it because I failed to jot down the site's url so I could link back to it later:

"Beginning today, treat everyone you meet as if they were going to be dead by midnight. Extend to them all the care, kindness and understanding you can muster, and do it with no thought of any reward. Your life will never be the same again."
--------------------Og Mandino

This struck me as a great truth.

I didn't recognize Og Mandino's name, so I looked him up.

Augustine Mandino was an Italian immigrant (whose mother was Irish) who became an American author of books about success. He was born in 1923 and died in 1996. His personal story is fascinating. You can listen to it as well as read it at Og's Story.

Twenty-two books are listed on the author website, among them titles such as The Greatest Salesman in the World, The Greatest Secret in the World, and Secrets for Success and Happiness. You can even get a daily dose of Og if you want.

I couldn't help popping over to brainyquotes.com to see if there was any writerly advice from Og Mandino I could post. Here's what I found:

"To be always intending to make a new and better life but never to find time to set about it is as to put off eating and drinking and sleeping from one day to the next until you're dead."

"To do anything truly worth doing, I must not stand back shivering and thinking of the cold and danger, but jump in with gusto and scramble through as well as I can."


There seems to be a theme running through the quotes that speak directly to those of us who are victims of too many interests and a lack of focus:

"It is those who concentrate on but one thing at a time who advance in this world. The great man or woman is the one who never steps outside his or her specialty or foolishly dissipates his or her individuality."


I can't really argue with Og's words. When we read interviews with the greatest athletes, musicians, dancers, writers -- whatever the specialty -- we see a common thread. These folks knew what they wanted at a young age and they made a commitment in time and energy to succeed. That's what we need to do, you know, no matter where we are or how old we are. Recognize what we want to do and commit the time and energy to do it. Og Mandino figured it out. So can we.

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

Pat - Thanks for reminding us of the real value there is in every moment and every person...

Grammy said...

Hi, Patricia, Thank you for the reminder of life's value in living each moment to the fullest. I appreciate you, friend. :)
Ruby

L. Diane Wolfe said...

I started reading him over ten years ago. Love his books! Mission: Success was my favorite.

Alex J. Cavanaugh said...

That first quote is so meaningful!

Patricia Stoltey said...

I'm inspired to read all of his books now, and I found the three most famous are in one volume available through my extended library system. Now if I can just squeeze a few more hours into my day!

Talli Roland said...

I love that quote - if only we could just keep that in mind on all our interactions!

Hope the revisions are going well!

Edna Pontillo said...

Thanks for these great quotes. I look forward to finding his books. I wonder exactly what he had in mind with the last quote you shared. Certainly whatever we would do well to advance the good in our world, we will need focus. However, bravo to those who also think and act outside the box - we need them too.

Anonymous said...

Wow, very cool. I'm going to check out more of his quotes.