Expressing Gratitude for Words of Wisdom

Along with the bounteous food, families and friends gathered at Thanksgiving often speak about what they are grateful for, with each individual taking a turn. This year, consider tweaking that tradition by asking everyone to share a specific quote that inspires or motivates them.

Sometimes, the right words at the right time serve as reminders that we can modify our own behavior, initiate change and do better, and a sentence or two that inspires one person at the table may resonate with another.

"Motivation is not so much about being strong as it's about being wise and willing to learn," Ayelet Fishbach 56, told Next Avenue. She is the author of "Get It Done: Surprising Lessons From the Science of Motivation" and a professor of behavioral science and marketing at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business.

Fishbach added that inspirational quotes serve several purposes. "Some express principles that can guide us in setting our goals, some are about moving past obstacles and others can remind us how to overcome setbacks, to keep going when it's tough," she said. "A good quote that rings true, one that is easy to remember, can be retrieved from your toolbox whenever you need it."

An informal survey of friends, friends of friends and a few strangers reaped a sweet stack of motivational quotes. A retired restaurant owner sticks to the basics: "Carpe diem, from the Roman poet Horace, reminds me to live each day to the fullest," she said.

Some individuals automatically turn to theologian Reinhold Niebuhr's words: "God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference."

Dan Browning, 69, knows he can't change the past, but one particular experience changed how he lives now. "Years ago, my wife wanted to go to Hawaii, and I kept putting it off, for a variety of reasons. Then she got sick, and taking her on a trip was untenable," he said.

In 2012, Liz Cummings Browning was diagnosed with frontotemporal dementia — a fatal brain-wasting disease — and she died two years later. (Dan chronicled his family's journey for Next Avenue.) "I will never forgive myself, and I decided that in the future, if I were asked to do something and didn't have a darn good reason not to, I will say yes."

Browning, a retired newspaper reporter who lives in a suburb of St. Paul, Minnesota, has said "yes" to ballroom dancing classes, taken part in ballroom competitions around the country, worked in a camera store and started a photography business.

"Now I'm into tango," Browning said, who traveled last year to Buenos Aires to see the dance performed there. "We tend to get in ruts. Saying yes, doing things I never thought I would do, helps get me out."

Timely words from a friend and mentor helped a Texas resident move forward and "…maybe saved my life in a dark time," she said. The phrase that motivated her was this: "Just because it's hard doesn't mean it's impossible."

Long ago, Jo Mannies learned about the power of possibilities from her "crusty, tight-fisted grandmother." Days before Mannies, then a young woman, was to leave for a study program in Germany, her grandmother surprised her with a check for $50 and words of wisdom worth far more.

"She said, 'Go everywhere there is to go and do everything there is to do, because I'm 70, and haven't done a damn thing.'" Mannies, now 72, added, "Those words have propelled much of my life."

One woman's father advised her not to fear making decisions. "If you discover it's the wrong one, that's OK; then you make a new decision," he told her. The woman said, "This gave me power and confidence to always keep moving forward in my life."

Whether they result from "wrong" decisions or another kind, prolific author and San Francisco bon vivant Allen Klein, 86, offered his thoughts on disappointments: "I've learned to be grateful for the not-so-great-stuff in my life," he said, "for often, it has been my greatest teacher."

The co-owner of three outdoor retail shops in Missouri and a fourth in Kansas found inspiration in a most unexpected spot — a fortune cookie. The words on the paper tucked inside read: "In nature there are no rewards or punishments, only consequences." Reading that motivated the woman to take control of her health.

When her daughter was just over a year old, Emily Petkewich Kohring needed encouragement to take control of her career. "I thought my job was my forever job, and my life revolved around it," said Kohring, 53. "Still, I wasn't sure what my future there was, and I was burnt out. In that time of great angst, a friend told me that though I might love my job, no job can love you back — and so I moved on."

(Full disclosure: Kohring says I passed along those words of wisdom, back when we both lived in a suburb of  St. Louis, Missouri. If so — and it may well be — I must give credit to an editor at the newspaper where I worked. He put it this way: "Don't love anything that can't love you back.")

Now executive director of Bread and Roses Missouri, a nonprofit that is a platform for the voices of working people through the arts, Kohring added, "I've also learned that in any role in any job, we all are replaceable, and that if we leave, the organization will go on. Even though it may be different, it will be fine."

In spite of our best intentions, sometimes the opinions of others affect us. One woman's mother prepared her for just that. "I told my mother something was not in vogue," the woman said. "She told me, 'Make your own vogue,' and she also told me to not let people waste my time or derail me.

She was very tough and very smart."

At a job where the management style often tried to make many good employees feel bad about themselves, Eleanor Roosevelt's words helped me cope. She said, "No one can make you feel inferior without your consent." Also, on days when my mind vacillates wildly between an ideal situation and the worst possible outcome, I stop to question whether my reeling thoughts are true.

One respondent has held onto advice she learned decades ago, when she was a student teacher. "My supervising teacher told us to first think of the kind way to do something — and then do it." Another, who rejects the idea of an afterlife, says living for today reminds her "to appreciate this life, and be determined to make the most of it."

Fishbach gets the last word. "Antonio Gramsci, an Italian political scientist, said that history teaches, but has no pupils. In other words, life offers many lessons. We can choose to learn or choose to ignore them and keep making the same mistakes," she said.

"We need to pay attention to the lessons we're offered — and inspirational quotes that capture something true can help us."

Patricia Corrigan is a professional journalist, with decades of experience as a reporter and columnist at a metropolitan daily newspaper, and also a book author. She has written for Next Avenue since February 2015. Read more from Patricia at latetothehaight.blogspot.com. Read More