"Anyone who has actually had to take..." - Quote by Thomas Sowell
Anyone who has actually had to take responsibility for consequences by running any kind of enterprise whether economic or academic, or even just managing a sports team is likely at some point to be chastened by either the setbacks brought on by his own mistakes or by seeing his successes followed by negative consequences that he never anticipated.
More by Thomas Sowell
“The promotion of "self-esteem" in our schools has been so successful that people feel free to spout off about all sorts of things - and see no reason why their opinions should not be taken as seriously as the views of people who actually know what they are talking about.”
“If the truth is boring, civilization is irksome. The constraints inherent in civilized living are frustrating in innumerable ways. Yet those with the vision of the anointed often see these constraints as only arbitrary impositions, things from which they-and we all-can be 'liberated.' The social disintegration which has followed in the wake of such liberation has seldom provoked any serious reconsideration of the whole set of assumptions-the vision-which led to such disasters. That vision is too well insulated from feedback.”
“Politics is the art of making your selfish desires seem like the national interest.”
More on Responsibility
“Our future is in our hands. Our lives are what we choose to make them.”
“If you are not in alignment with the moment, life is a struggle. Really, all you have to do is take responsibility for your inner alignment with now.”
“Slowly, and in spite of anything we Americans do or do not do, it looks a little as if you and some other good people are going to have to answer the old question of whether you want to keep your country unshackled by taking even more definite steps to do so”
More on Consequences
“A youth of sensuality and intemperance delivers over to old age a worn-out body.”
“Policies are judged by their consequences but crusades are judged by how good they make the crusaders feel.”
“One's days were too brief to take the burden of another's errors on one's shoulders. Each man lived his own life and paid his own price for living it.”