"I have come to the frightening conclusion that I am the decisive element. It is my personal approach that creates the climate. It is my daily mood that makes the weather. I possess tremendous power to make life miserable or joyous. I can be a tool of torture or an instrument of inspiration, I can humiliate or humor, hurt or heal. In all situations, it is my response that decides whether a crisis is escalated or de-escalated, and a person is humanized or de-humanized. If we treat people as they are, we make them worse. If we treat people as they ought to be, we help them become what they are capable of becoming."
--- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832)
Who knew that Goethe was a Buddhist? Great quote via Swiss Miss.
Note: The painting of Goethe shown here is Goethe in the Roman Campagna (1786) by Johann Heinrich Wilhelm Tischbein, in the collection of the Städelsches Kunstinstitut, Frankfurt.