Quotes About Foresight

Avoid making irrevocable decisions while tired or hungry. N.B.: Circumstances can force your hand. So think ahead!

if you don't worry ahead of time, you'll regret it later.

But like they say at the Pentagon, you have to plan for the enemy's capacity, not his intentions.

But little Mouse, you are not alone, In proving foresight may be vain: The best laid schemes of mice and men Go often askew, And leave us nothing but grief and pain, For promised joy! Still you are blest, compared with me!

Archie believed in always doing the smart thing. Not the thing you ached to do, not the impulsive act, but the thing that would pay off later.

Related lessons: Don't go hunting ghosts, and don't get too deep into a situation where your civilizational advantage is of little help.

People like us can't afford to be surprised, Sarah. We don't have the luxury of making mistakes or being caught unaware. We have to sense who's on the other side of the door before they knock, and we have to know if they're a friend or an enemy.

12--Lose Battles, But Win The War: Grand Strategy Grand strategy is the art of looking beyond the present battle and calculating ahead. Focus on your ultimate goal and plot to reach it.

Fools say that they learn by experience. I prefer to profit by others' experience.

Chance favors only the prepared mind.

Never pick a fight with someone you're not sure you can defeat.

There are very few men—and they are the exceptions—who are able to think and feel beyond the present moment.   CARL VON CLAUSEWITZ, 1780-1831

But improvisation will only bring you as far as the next crisis, and is never a substitute for thinking several steps ahead and planning to the end.

Instead of spending your time dreaming of your plan's happy ending, you must work on calculating every possible permutation and pitfall that might emerge in it.

Your wealth vanishes, the latest gadgetry suddenly becomes passé, your allies desert you. But if your mind is armed with the art of war, there is no power that can take that away.

So much of power is not what you do but what you do not do—the rash and foolish actions that you refrain from before they get you into trouble. Plan in detail before you act—do not let vague plans lead you into trouble.

This means that you yourself are largely the agent of anything bad that happens to you. With more prudence, wiser policies, and greater vision, you could have avoided the danger. So when something goes wrong, look deep into yourself—not in an emotional way, to blame yourself or indulge your feelings of guilt, but to make sure that you start your next campaign with a firmer step and greater vision.

All of us know history repeats itself, but mighty few of us recognize the repetition until too late.

It's stupid because it makes the assumption that your enemies are weaker than you, and will do what you want if you murder a few of them. But people aren't like that. I mean, think about how it will fall out. You go down that canyon and kill a bunch of people doing their jobs, and later other people come along and find the bodies. They'll hate you forever. Even if you do take over Mars someday they'll still hate you, and do anything they can to screw things up.

tragedy of the time horizon. Meaning we can't imagine the suffering of the people of the future, so nothing much

we can't imagine the suffering of the people of the future, so nothing much gets done on their behalf. What we do now creates damage that hits decades later, so we don't charge ourselves for it, and the standard approach has been that future generations will be richer and stronger than us, and they'll find solutions to their problems. But by the time they get here, these problems will have become too big to solve. That's the tragedy of the time horizon

If you want to finish the evening with your usual number of fingers, do any cutting-up, peel-slicing and the like before you have had more than a couple of drinks, preferably before your first.

Other males saw Nïx as exceedingly comely; all Bowe saw was a powerful being made mad as a hatter from her foresight. Nïx lay on her side, bending her elbow to casually prop her head in her hand. With a sigh she said, "Bowen, I took you on as my pet project because I like to ogle you. Due to your rowr factor." Her distracted gaze flickered over his face and the bandaged end of his arm. If you're not going to keep yourself up, well--

Indeed, no one should see too much of their own history or future.