Optimism is not inherently a superior way of viewing the world. Certainly doctors will say it might be better for one's physical health to be an optimist. But, morally speaking it may not be appropriate in certain circumstances.
I work with the options I have in front of me and my reasons for choosing a job can vary enormously depending on the circumstances. Sometimes I take a job because it's a group of people I'm dying to work with, and sometimes it can be a desire to shake things up a bit and not to take myself too seriously.
The happy combination of fortuitous circumstances.
I do not pretend to write much of a letter. You know under what circumstances I am writing.
No kid is seeking anything when he joins a gang; he's always fleeing something. He's not being pulled; he's being pushed by the circumstances in which he finds himself.
The constitution of the United States is a law for rulers and people, equally in war and in peace, and covers with the shield of its protection all classes of men, at all times, and under all circumstances.
Although I grew up in very modest and challenging circumstances, I consider my life to be immeasurably rich.
Happiness is an attitude of mind, born of the simple determination to be happy under all outward circumstances.
Youth is a quality, not a matter of circumstances.
As Plotinus tells us, we elected the body, the parents, the place, and the circumstances that suited the soul and that, as the myth says, belongs to its necessity.
I've learned from experience that the greater part of our happiness or misery depends on our dispositions and not on our circumstances.
We're living in a different world now in terms of employee needs, and companies have to offer alternative methods for getting the work done. Even under the most difficult circumstances you can have creative flexibility.
Having a parent live with you under the best of circumstances can be a terrible stressor.
Justice is a certain rectitude of mind whereby a man does what he ought to do in the circumstances confronting him.
I know that I came into the world with what I call 'big dharma' - with a blueprint to teach self-reliance and a positive loving approach to large numbers of people all over the globe. I am ever so grateful for the circumstances of my life that allowed me to be pretty much left alone and to develop as I was so intended in this incarnation.
Every policy officer is sworn to protect life, and, under the most extreme circumstances, to take life. It is a staggering responsibility that requires officers to make split second decisions.
A man's character never changes radically from youth to old age. What happens is that circumstances bring out characteristics which have not been obvious to the superficial observer.
War involves in its progress such a train of unforeseen circumstances that no human wisdom can calculate the end; it has but one thing certain, and that is to increase taxes.
We are responsible for actions performed in response to circumstances for which we are not responsible.
In specific circumstances the period of aging decline can set in earlier in a particular organ than in the organism as a whole which, in a certain general or theoretical sense, is left a cripple or invalid.
What's been happening in Iraq, what young Americans wearing flak jackets, helmets and flight suits have done is... created the circumstances under which Iraq can become our closest ally in that part of the world and still have a representative government. And that's going to be a very good thing considering what's going on in that neighborhood.
I cannot stand it when the French are asked in all circumstances to make sacrifices before the state cuts back on its own wasteful expenditures.
So I think in those circumstances, there's some potential that you could see a big pendulum swing like 1994, which people you thought weren't vulnerable all of the sudden get in trouble.
I love to sing and I do think that my strength as a singer is... I think I have a voice that is certainly sufficient under most any circumstances... but I think my strength is that I really am an actor and I really do have to own what I am saying.
I'm lucky I had signposts in my life. At important times, I got pointed in the right direction by particular circumstances.
There is something universal in the theme of a man trying to save his family in the midst of the most terrible circumstances. It is not limited to Sierra Leone. This story could apply to any number of places where ordinary people have been caught up in political events beyond their control.
The circumstances of human society are too complicated to be submitted to the rigor of mathematical calculation.
However much I dislike the idea of abortion, you should not criminalize a woman who, in very difficult circumstances, makes that choice.
Circumstances have rarely favored great men. A lowly beginning is no bar to a great career. The boy who works his way through college may have a hard time of it, but he will learn how to work his way in life, and will usually take higher rank in school and in after life than his classmate who is the son of a millionaire.
We are constantly being put to the test by trying circumstances and difficult people and problems not necessarily of our own making.
Meanwhile, our young men and women whose economic circumstances make military service a viable career choice are dying bravely in a war with no end in sight.
Whole communities are growing up without fathers or male role models. Bringing up a family in the best of circumstances is not easy. To try to do it by placing the entire burden on women - 91% of single-parent families in Britain are headed by the mother, according to census data - is practically absurd and morally indefensible.
We travellers are in very hard circumstances. If we say nothing but what has been said before us, we are dull and have observed nothing. If we tell anything new, we are laughed at as fabulous and romantic.
A change in external circumstances without inner renewal is a materialist's illusion, as though man were only a product of his social circumstance and nothing else.
My dear brothers and sisters, the joy we feel has little to do with the circumstances of our lives and everything to do with the focus of our lives.
It must inquire not merely about the circumstances of the time in general, but in particular about the writer's position with regard to these things, the interests and motives, the leading ideas of his literary activity.
