"The world's greatest thinkers have often been amateurs; for high thinking is the outcome of fine and independent living, and for that a professional chair offers no special opportunities," said Havelock Ellis. 

Thought processes are broad and varied.  All too often, they are characterized by a lack of ability to take action - the "paralysis by analysis" syndrome.  The major cause of this syndrome is lack of vision for the big picture - of how your life will look, once you have arrived…what will be expected…how others will view you.  Fear of your ability to truly connect with your friends and family, once you have "arrived."

"There are many who find a good alibi far more attractive than an achievement. For an achievement does not settle anything permanently. We still have to prove our worth anew each day: we have to prove that we are as good today as we were yesterday," wrote Eric Hoffer, a self-educated longshoreman who came to fame in the 1950's with the publication of his first book, "The True Believer."  He authored ten more books, and gave caustic analysis of the nature of mass movements.

The greatest thing you can do for the universe, and for yourself, is to achieve, create, and innovate.  To move the earth!

Ayn Rand, Russian novelist and philosopher wrote, "Men have been taught that the highest virtue is not to achieve, but to give. Yet one cannot give that which has not been created. Creation comes before distribution- or there will be nothing to distribute. The need of the creator comes before the need of any possible beneficiary. Yet we are taught to admire the second-hander who dispenses gifts he has not produced above the man who made the gifts possible. We praise an act of charity. We shrug at an act of achievement."