My personal motto is Eyes for the future, Fists for the past. This phrase has resonated in me since I was a kid. I don't know why. It does, however, capture my feeling on most things. I'm a big picture thinker who is always looking ahead. I think I would use it in a tattoo if I were a tattoo kind of guy. Better Living through Software Personaly, I try to improve the world with my code. I have been reticent to create systems that eliminate jobs, focusing instead on making rote tasks easier while providing additional tools for the users to add value to their tasks. Quality and Innovation are best found as products of ones' passions. This, I think, is really the basis of the open source movement. The point being that people who are doing what they like, will do it well, be happy ot do it, and keep doing it. Consider DaVinci, Wright, Bell, Gates (!), etc. They got where they did because the loved what they did and could thus dedicate the energy to master what they did.