Boldness is genius
This is a little mantra I’ve been carrying around for years - it’s actually a summary of one of my favourite quotes. I write it down in notebooks and put it in places where it can surprise me and remind me to have the courage - bravery - or chutzpah, if you like your red on the sweet-side on Fridays, to be bold in this life. And so, it was curious to uncover a storm in a teacup about this exact quote a bunch of years back.
Most think Goethe said it (just ask Pinterest), but it was explorer William Hutchinson Murray who incorrectly attributed the words to Goethe at the end of a book about his Himalayan expedition. The Goethe Society of North America (fancy!) actually studied this attribution dilemma over a period of two years (long enough to grow some strokable chin hairs, I imagine) and came to the conclusion that the words William quoted were a loose paraphrase of something Goethe wrote in one of his dramas, but were actually a loose translation of Goethe’s words by another chap entirely. It was decided the words in question (the last couplet of the quote) were too far from anything Goethe wrote to be a translation, although they did share a similar idea. And so, Mr Murray, posthumously, is the final author of the damn thing.
And that is why it’s important to check your sources and attributions. So now you know. Onto the quote, hope it inspires your boldness too.
“Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back, always ineffectiveness. Concerning all acts of initiative and creation, there is one elementary truth the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and 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 favour all manner of unforeseen incidents, meetings and 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.” ~ William Hutchison Murray
Bold strides,
Holly Jade
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