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"Then in 1969, I spent the spring term at Cornell University in New York. The invasion of August 1968 had already happened, but the hardline regime took several months to crack down on dissidents."
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"It is so hard to leave-until you leave. And then it is the easiest goddamned thing in the world."
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Personal Development
"Clever nations are the ones who keep changing their governments! Because power must change hands otherwise it will get spoiled and rot!"
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Personal Development
"But in the meantime I became accustomed to the writing life and it would be hard to change now - partly because of the salary cut if I went to my other love, teaching; and partly because I still have stories to tell, even though it isn't all that fun doing the work anymore."
Author Name
Personal Development
"We fear change because it insists we discard long held structures that no longer function suitably."
Author Name
Personal Development
"What you're supposed to do when you don't like a thing is change it. If you can't change it, change the way you think about it. Don't complain."
Author Name
Personal Development
"It is a great danger for everyone when what is shocking changes."
Author Name
Personal Development
"If you don't like how things are, change it! You're not a tree."
Author Name
Personal Development
"When things break, it's not the actual breaking that prevents them from getting back together again. It's because a little piece gets lost - the two remaining ends couldn't fit together even if they wanted to. The whole shape has changed."
Author Name
Personal Development
"When our environment changes we change, and this combination of transformative deeds create a synergistic effect. Seemingly, insignificant and imperceptible quantitative changes can eventfully lead to fundamental qualitative changes in the way a group of people function as a society."
Author Name
Personal Development
"Being happy where you are does not mean that you must unquestioningly accept parts of your environment that don't serve you. Where you are is inside of this amazing body, this beautiful moment, this capable mind. Where you are is inside of an eternal opportunity. And sometimes you need to change your environment to remember that."
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Personal Development
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"To pursue a so-called Third Way is foolish. We had our experience with this in the 1960s when we looked for a socialism with a human face. It did not work, and we must be explicit that we are not aiming for a more efficient version of a system that has failed."
Experience
"By the time I returned to Czechoslovakia, I had an understanding of the principles of the market."
Time
"I was paid to read Western economic texts. In a way, the regime paid for their own undermining."
Reading
"It is what makes the reform process an art, not just a science. You have to develop a strategy that tells you what reform measures you should follow and in what sequence."
Art
"I also helped write the five-page statement of principles that Civic Forum issued in late November. That was the first public expression of what the new government wanted to do."
Government
"We must have the time to create strict rules so that property is not sold by Communist managers for a low price. They often get payments under the table to sell to the first bidder. This does not build public support for a market economy."
Time
"We will also allow state companies to sell shares to their workers and will pass a law allowing citizens to start companies of their own with no limits on the number of employees or on the firm's output."
Business
"That means following a very restrictive fiscal and monetary policy which will squeeze the monopolies and cut their subsidies. On the micro level we will allow other economic agents, both domestic and foreign, to compete with them."
Policy
"I never intended to be a politician or office-seeker."
Office
"People like me who were engaging in brinkmanship with the party economic bosses and the open dissidents who were being arrested were pursuing a common goal in different ways."
People
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