Edward de Bono Quotes

Happiness depends more on how life strikes you than on what happens.

How you feel is not the result of what is happening in your life-it is your interpretation of what is happening.

Positive thinkers think and talk continually about solutions, and negative thinkers continually talk and think about problems. Keep your mind solution-focuse d rather than problem- focused.

Your problem isn't the problem, it's your attitude about the problem.

Pleasure and pain spring not so much from the nature of things, as from our manner of considering them. Pleasure, especially, is never an invariable effect of particular circumstances.

People bring to what they see and feel, the inner weather of their souls and complexion of their minds.

What we feel is not based on our experience, but on our INTERPRETATION of experiences.

No matter what happens to us in life, we tend to think of it as 'good' or 'bad.' And most of us tend to use the 'bad' label three to 10 times as often as the 'good' label. And when we say something is bad, the odds grow overwhelming that we will experience it as such.

A picture is the expression of an impression. If the beautiful were not in us, how would we ever recognize it?

Pessimism only describes an attitude, and not facts, and hence is entirely subjective.

It is the mind which creates the world around us, and even though we stand side by side in the same meadow, my eyes will never see what is beheld by yours, my heart will never stir to the emotions with which yours is touched.

Complete objectivity is not an option. We are all subjective about the way we respond to 'what is,' whether it's the people we encounter, the circumstances in our lives, or ourselves. What we can do is reduce our subjectivity - what I call 'I see, therefore it is.'

Something that's a hilarious comedy, for someone else might be a drama.

Torture is torture and humiliation is humiliation only when you choose to suffer.

The difference is as great between The optics seeing as the objects seen. All manners take a tincture from our own; Or come discolor'd through out passions shown; Or fancy's beam enlarges, multiplies, Contracts, inverts, and gives ten thousand dyes.

Happiness is an abstraction, it is a product of the imagination, it is a way of being moved, which depends entirely on our way of seeing and feeling.

We don't all see the same way at all. Even if I'm sitting looking at you, there is always the memory of you as well. And a memory is now. So someone who's never met you before is seeing a different person. That's bound to be the case. We all see something different. I assume most people don't look very hard at anything.

Things themselves don't hurt or hinder us. Things simply are what they are. How we view these things is another matter.People think what they will think; it is of no concern to us.

Understand that a problem is only a problem if you choose to view it as a problem (vs. an opportunity).

Is your problem really your problem, or is it your attitude towards the problem that's your problem?

The painter should paint not only what he has in front of him, but also what he sees inside himself. If he sees nothing within, then he should stop painting what is in front of him.

But when reflexion begins to play upon these objects... like some trick of magic each object is loosed into a group of impressions - colour, odour, texture... And if we continue to dwell in thought on this world... the whole scope of observation is dwarfed into the narrow chamber of the individual mind.

Art begins . . . when someone interprets, when someone sees the world through his own eyes. Art happens when what is seen becomes mixed with the inside of the person who is seeing it.

My work is never intellectual. I never make a negative unless emotionally moved by my subject.

One person's magical thinking is another person's cynicism.