Welcome to Third-Friday—or is it Sunday? These rare four-day weekends really throw off my sense of time. Is this what retirement feels like? Happy Friday, digital neighbors! I hope that yesterday, as you celebrated, it was truly a time of thanksgiving for you. I thought we’d take a break from quotes about reflection, thought, and memory and look instead at contentment—especially since the irony of “Black Friday” is that the day after we’ve all acknowledged we have more than enough, we dive headfirst into excessive spending in preparation for Christmas.
I’m not here to knock rabid consumerism; I’ve fueled it plenty with my own spending habits in the past. But while things are good, life isn’t about all the stuff that adorns it. It’s easy to forget that people matter more than things—especially because things usually give us fewer headaches than people do. Yet for all the challenges and complications others bring into our lives, good relationships—healthy relationships—bring far greater joy than all the gadgets and conveniences that make living easier.
It’s especially hard to keep people first when someone has recently pissed you off or hurt you. Reconciliation, forgiveness, and a return to mutual respect and understanding require trust, patience, and humility. You have to actually want to grow in those virtues; otherwise, they’ll be absent from your life and your relationships will suffer for it. Well, enough babbling from me. On to a few quotes! Happy Black Friday, shoppers! 🛍
“I am content with what I have, little be it or much.” — John Bunyan
“Content makes poor men rich; discontent makes rich men poor.” — Benjamin Franklin
“Nine requisites for contented living:
1. Health enough to make work a pleasure.
2. Wealth enough to support your needs.
3. Strength to battle with difficulties and overcome them.
4. Grace enough to confess your sins and forsake them.
5. Patience enough to toil until some good is accomplished.
6. Charity enough to see some good in your neighbor.
7. Love enough to move you to be useful and helpful to others.
8. Faith enough to make real the things of God.
9. Hope enough to remove all anxious fears concerning the future.” — Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Today marks the three hundred and thirtieth birthday of the Frenchman François-Marie Arouet, better known by his nom de plume, Voltaire (1694-1778).
Born into a bourgeois family during the reign of Louis XIV, the “Sun King” (r. 1643-1715), Voltaire suffered tragedy at a young age when his mother died. Never close with his father or brother, Voltaire exhibited a rebellious attitude toward authority from his youth. His brilliant mind was fostered in the care of the Society of Jesus, who introduced him to the joys of literature and theater. Despite his later criticisms against the Church, Voltaire, throughout his life, fondly recalled his dedicated Jesuit teachers.
Although he spent time as a civil servant in the French embassy to the Hague, Voltaire’s main love was writing—an endeavor where he excelled in various genres, including poetry, which led to his appointment as the royal court poet for King Louis XV. Widely recognized as one of the greatest French writers, and even hyperbolically referred to by ...
Padre - Tom Miller invites you to a Coffee Talk, Speakeasies, Schmoozes, Tea Times, Afterhours and other gatherings.
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2026 Coffee Talk with the ADD Irregulars
Thursday, January 1, 2026
6:00 AM - 8:00 AM (CST)
Occurs every day starting 1/1 until 12/31/2027
Coffee Talk - Daily beginning at 6:00 AM Central Time Zone - USA
White Pilled Wednesday - A break from the heaviness of news and current events to focus upon things more personal & positive for the first hour of Coffee Talk.
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Other chats as posted in the community.
