Humor & Insight
The future ain't what it used to be.
Yogi Berra
Synergy Dynamics has an extensive collection of articles, anecdotal stories,
quotes, editorial comments, and tasteful humor that is sure to offer insight to
the challenges you face regularly in your professional and personal life. We
will carefully scrutinize our collection and publish some of the best that we
find. We invite you to offer your own humor and insight, so that we can make it available to our visitors.
Quality of Life
An American investment banker was at the pier of a small coastal Mexican village when a small boat with just one fisherman docked. Inside the small boat were several large yellow fin tuna. The American complimented the Mexican on the quality of his fish and asked how long it took to catch them. The Mexican replied, "only a little while."
The American then asked why he didn't stay out longer and catch more fish. The Mexican said he had enough to support his family's immediate needs. The American then asked, "but what do you do with the rest of your time?" The Mexican fisherman said, "I sleep late, fish a little, play with my children, take siesta with my wife, Maria, stroll into the village each evening where I sip wine and play guitar with my amigos. I have a full and busy life."
The American scoffed, "I am a Harvard MBA and I could help you. You should spend more time fishing, and with the proceeds you could buy a bigger boat. With the proceeds from the bigger boat you could buy several boats, and eventually you would have a fleet of fishing boats. Instead of selling your catch to a middleman, you would sell directly to the processor, eventually opening your own cannery. You would control the product, processing and distribution. You would leave this small coastal fishing village and move to Mexico City, then LA, and eventually New York City, where you will run your expanding enterprise."
The Mexican fisherman asked, "But, how long will this all take?" to which the American replied, "15-20 years." "But what then?" The American laughed and said, "That's the best part. When the time is right, you would announce an IPO and sell your company stock to the public and become very rich. You would make millions!" The Mexican fisherman replied, "Millions... Then what?"
The American said, "Then you would retire, move to a small coastal fishing village, where you would sleep late, fish a little, play with your kids, take siesta with your wife, and stroll to the village in the evenings, where you could sip wine and play your guitar with your amigos."
Winning
A few years ago at the Seattle Special Olympics, nine contestants, all physically or mentally disabled, assembled at the starting line for the 100-yard dash. At the gun, they all started out, not exactly in a dash, but with a relish to run the race to the finish and win. All, that is, except one boy who stumbled on the asphalt, tumbled over a couple of times and began to cry.
The other eight heard the boy cry. They slowed down and looked back. Then they all turned around and went back – every one of them. One girl with Down's Syndrome bent down and kissed him and said, "This will make it better."
All nine linked arms and walked across the finish line together. Everyone in the stadium stood, and the cheering went on for several minutes. People who were there are still telling the story. Why?
Because deep down we know this one thing: What matters in this life is more than winning for ourselves. What truly matters is helping others win, even if it means slowing down and changing our course.
~ author unknown ~
An Unfilled Prescription
A woman accompanied her husband to the doctor's office. After his checkup, the doctor called the wife into his office alone.
He said, "Your husband is suffering from a very severe disease, combined with horrible stress. If you don't do the following, your husband will surely die:
If you can do this for the next 10 months to a year, I think your husband will regain his health completely." On the way home, the husband asked his wife, "What did the doctor say?"
"You're going to die," she replied.
Building Bridges
A man was walking along a California beach when he stumbled across an old lamp. He picked it up and rubbed it and out popped a genie. The genie said, "OK, so you released me from the lamp, blah, blah, blah, but this is the fourth time this week, and I'm getting a little sick of these wishes, so you can forget about three. You only get one wish."
The man sat and thought about it for a while and said, "I've always wanted to go to Hawaii, but I'm too scared to fly and I get very seasick. So could you build me a bridge to Hawaii so I can drive over there?"
The genie laughed and replied, "That's impossible. Think of the logistics of that. How would the supports ever reach the bottom of the Pacific? Think of how much concrete.... How much steel! No, think of another wish."
The man agreed and tried to think of a really good wish. Finally, he said, "I've been married and divorced four times. My wives have always said I don't care and that I'm insensitive. I wish that I could understand women. That is, I want to know what they're thinking when they give me the silent treatment, what I should do when they start crying, and what they want when they say ‘nothing...’"
The genie replied, "You want that bridge to have two lanes or four?"
Quotes
Spiritual force is stronger than material force; thoughts
rule the world.
Emerson
If you want others to be happy, practice compassion.
If you want to be happy, practice compassion.
The Dalai Lama
Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back,
always ineffectiveness. Concerning all acts of initiative (& creation),
there is one elementary truth – the ignorance of which kills countless ideas
& splendid plans: that the moment one definitely commits oneself, then
Providence moves, too.
All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occurred. A whole stream of events issues from the decision, raising in one’s favor all manner of unforeseen incidents & meetings & material assistance, which no man could have dreamed would have come his way.
Whatever you can do, or dream you can, begin it. Boldness has genius,
power and magic in it. Begin it now.
Goethe
I don't know what your destiny will be, but one thing I do
know: the only ones among you who will be really happy are those who have sought
and found how to serve.
Schweitzer
Good character is more to be praised than outstanding
talent. Most talents are, to some extent, a gift. Good character, by contrast, is
not given to us. We have to build it piece by piece – by thought, choice, courage,
and determination.
John Luther
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Musings
Classic English Language
Let's face it - English is a crazy language. There is no egg in eggplant, nor ham in hamburger; neither apple nor pine in pineapple. English muffins weren't invented in England or French fries in France. Sweetmeats are candies while sweetbreads, which aren't sweet, are meat.
We take English for granted. But if we explore its paradoxes, we find that quicksand can work slowly, boxing rings are square, and a guinea pig is neither from Guinea nor is it a pig. And why is it that writers write; but fingers don't fing, grocers don't groce, and hammers don't ham?
If the plural of tooth is teeth, why isn't the plural of booth beeth? One goose, 2 geese. So one moose, 2 meese? One index, 2 indices? Doesn't it seem crazy that you can make amends, but not one amend, that you comb through annals of history, but not a single annal? If you have a bunch of odds and ends and get rid of all but one of them, what do you call it?
If teachers have taught, have preachers praught? If a vegetarian eats vegetables, what does a humanitarian eat? If you wrote a letter, perhaps you bote your tongue?
Sometimes I think all the English speakers should be committed to an asylum for the verbally insane. In what language do people recite at a play and play at a recital? Ship by truck and send cargo by ship? Have noses that run and feet that smell? Park on driveways and drive on parkways?
How can a slim chance and a fat chance be the same, while a wise man and wise guy are opposites? How can overlook and oversee be opposites, while quite a lot and quite a few are alike? How can the weather be hot as hell one day and cold as hell another.
Have you noticed that we talk about certain things only when they are absent? Have you ever seen a horseful carriage or a strapful gown? Met a sung hero or experienced requited love? Have you ever run into someone who was combobulated, gruntled, ruly or peccable? And where are all those people who ARE Spring chickens, or those who actually WOULD hurt a fly?
You have to marvel at the unique lunacy of a language in which your house can burn up as it burns down, in which you fill in a form by filling it out and in which an alarm clock goes off by going on.
English was invented by people, not computers, and it reflects the creativity of the human race (which, of course, isn't a race at all). That is why, when the stars are out, they are visible, but when the lights are out, they are invisible. And why, when I wind up my watch, I start it, but when I wind up this essay, I end it.
Author Unknown