My Experiments in the Practice of Everyday Life

Want to get the "Moment of Happiness"? A daily happiness quotation in your inbox.   Sign up here close daily quote

July 14, 2007
4 Comment

This Saturday: a happiness quotation from Leonardo da Vinci.

Leonardo2“It is easier to resist at the beginning than at the end.” –Leonardo da Vinci

*
If you’re new to the Happiness Project, you may want to consider subscribing to my RSS feed: Subscribe to this blog’s feed. Or sign up to get email updates in the box at the top righthand corner.

Tags:

Other posts you might be interested in...

  1. A quotation from Leonardo da Vinci.
  2. This Saturday: a happiness quotation from Mencius.
  3. This Saturday: a happiness quotation from Samuel Butler.
  4. This Saturday: a happiness quotation from Viktor Frankl.
  5. This Saturday: a happiness quotation from William Hazlitt.
  • http://profile.typekey.com/davidbbohl/ David B. Bohl

    Gretchen,
    This reminds me of what Bob Sutton said in his book “The No A**Hole Rule.” He called it the da Vinci Rule.
    Bob says “the more time and effort that people put into anything — no matter how useless, dysfunctional, or downright stupid it might be — the harder it is for them to walk away.”
    He continues: “Although most people know that sunk costs shouldn’t be considered in making a decision, the ‘too-much-invested-to-quit syndrome’ is a powerful driver of human behavior.”
    It’s a reminder for me to always check my pride. The fact of the matter is that I never have to reach the point of no return. No matter how deep I feel I’ve gotten myself, no matter how much time I’ve invested, no matter how long and winding the tunnel looks to get to the other side, I always have a chance to make a fresh start.

  • http://www.lionardofromvinci.com Michael W. Domoretsky

    The DaVinci project has been under way since 2005 with hundreds of “Pictures within Pictures.”. We are in the process of building a comprehensive documentary presenting these extraordinary findings.
    Leonardo da Vinci, ” Pictures Within Pictures ”
    Outside the box, outside the frame
    An intimate and divine truth hidden for centuries at last unveiled in the Mona Lisa, and yes, in other of Leonardo’s works including his first recorded drawing, the Landscape of the Arno Valley and his masterpiece, The Virgin and Child with St. Anne and the infant St. John the Baptist, “the last supper” and others as well.
    Anew never before recognized perspective hidden for five hundred years in plain sight, Emerges! Leonardo’s message, Pictures Within Picturthes outside the box, outside the frame,, initially discovered and documented in 2005 by Michael Domoretsky of Ipswich Massachusetts.
    Five hundred years after Leonardo’s lifetime, his genius and message come to light in mirrors and optical illusions. His ” secret code” have been hidden in plain sight to be deciphered outside the original borders of the painting using a ” perpendicular reverse mirror image process.” Leonardo, (actually Lionardo ) was a man of formidable intellect, talent, craft and most importantly a man of curiosity who observed ” truth ” in the world in all its forms…Physical, Philosophical, and Religious. He was hundreds of years ahead of his time, constrained by the religious tenets and politics of his day. As a result he was unable to express reality, as he perceived it, and so devised a means by which to conceal his truths from all those whom he did not want to understand them for fear of persecution. Being a man of science and art as well as one of the most inventive men of all time, he appears to have imbued his art with multiple levels of meaning; at one level beautiful works of art…On a second and un-deciphered level, until Michael W. Domoretsky discovered the images and processes invented by Leonardo da Vinci, in 2005, appears to challenge the dogma of his day and pass on his beliefs, observations and truths using a process that only one who perceived the world outside the accepted realm, a scientist or mathematician might discover.
    The more in-dept and familiar one becomes with Leonardo the man, the more these unique finds make sense. Unlike other artist that are painters first, painting what they see or the impression of what they see, Leonardo appears to have been a scientist and inventor first, then artist, using his sharp powers of observation and reason to create both timeless works of art and as yet not fully deciphered messages for those not limited by traditional thinking.
    The more carefully his words, deeds, apparent opinions and interest are studied,
    the more credence can be given to his seeking to preserve his thoughts and observations by unorthodox means.
    Leonardo left clues… He was credited with having said; the eye, ” Who would believe that so small a space could contain the images of all the universe.” Leonardo believed that the perception by the eye; light, dark, shadow, and perspective held the secrets of the world. Hence, when you include Leonardo’s life long fascination with mirrors and writing backward it appears likely that he would choose to use constructs and concepts familiar and unique to him to transmit and yet hide from a restrictive and turbulent society, his most treasured messages.
    For hundreds of years scholars have continued to study Leonardo’s priceless works of art using the most cutting edge technologies available. In recent times millions of dollars have been allocated to perform all types of scientific studies seeking to determine if Leonardo hid anything underneath his finished works…all within the frame of his artworks. The plain and obvious truth is that he did hide things… however Leonardo was forced to work within the limitations and utilized the technologies of his day. His meanings are in plain sight but only for those able to think outside the box and frame. All of the writings and documents relating to Leonardo, point to his being deliberate and patient in everything he did, both in his creations and his art; so it would appear all but inconceivable that in his major and personally treasured works, that every detail would have been a deliberate act of thought, and not an inadvertent inclusion. A minor anomaly in a masterpiece might happen, though unlikely in multiple of masterpieces by such a perfectionist. Clearly recognizable, perfectly formed symmetrical symbols on both sides of his best masterpieces, utilizing mirrors, a technique Leonardo was well know to have used, make it being anything but intentional, all but impossible. You be the judge.
    We welcome comments by all interested parties and will post appropriate comments.
    All rights reserved, no unauthorized copying or republishing without express written permission by owner.
    Copyright; Michael W. Domoretsky / http://www.lionardofromvinci.com / 2005~2007~
    Da Vinci and the Secret of the Mona Lisa, article by: ThothWeb, http://www.thothweb.com/article-4011–0-0
    The da Vinci Project
    Managing Director: Michael W. Domoretsky Director: M. Graham Noll
    My response to the article by ANSA.it
    The Secret image ‘found’ in Last Supper
    My Response: Dated 7-27-07 below:
    Madonna, Templar hidden in masterpiece, says expert.
    Pesci Slavisa has indeed found one of the many “Pictures in Pictures” outside the box, outside the frame, encrypted by Leonardo da Vinci in his various paintings found originally by Michael Domoretsy and the DaVinci project in 2005. We congratulate Mr. Slavisa on independently duplicating our discoveries, if indeed, they are the same process we discovered. We welcome independent corroboration and recognition of images that use the “perpendicular reverse mirror imaging process” and the “optical illusion “Leonardo da Vinci invented to encrypt, “Pictures With Pictures” a technique first discovered, understood, and documented in 2005 by Mr. Michael W. Domoretsky of Ipswich Massachusetts u.s.a.
    As usual, as is our experience repeated time and time again, renowned art critics and professed art experts, such Vittorio Scarbi and many others, base their opinions on accepted art world and art education precepts looking at DaVinci’s works as artists not scientists, inventors and very likely a member of the Mason’s guild (though unproven). Few if any of these “accepted” experts have read his notes in detail or studied the man himself and thus fail to understand and make the connection that he worked outside the box. DaVinci was known to have used mirrors extensively in his writings. It is therefore highly likely and to be expected that he would do something similar in his paintings if he sought to hide ideas, concepts or opinions.
    We submit that only someone “as ignorant as a goat” could fail even to consider that a man of DaVinci’s genius and propensity for innovation might possibly think and communicate outside the box, with hidden images, or hide his, what might possibly be considered, heretic or dangerous free thinking ideas by encrypting them in his works of art.
    As always it is difficult to persuade experts professing established thought in any field to consider new, alternate or previously un accepted ideas…. But then the experts thought the world was flat for centuries…
    The da Vinci Project
    Managing Director,
    Michael W. Domoretsky

  • http://www.clintonherald.com/entertainment/cnhinsart_story_009230145 maureen

    Cracking the real da Vinci code: Hidden in plain sight
    By Gail McCarthy
    GLOUCESTER DAILY TIMES (GLOUCESTER, Mass.)
    http://www.clintonherald.com/entertainment/cnhinsart_story_009230145
    GLOUCESTER, Mass. — Michael Domoretsky has spent the past four years studying the works of Leonardo da Vinci to uncover the secrets of the original Renaissance man.
    Now he’s sharing those secrets with the world.
    What Domoretsky has found, he says, is a “legacy of hidden messages” carefully concealed in some of the world’s most famous paintings and decipherable only to those who know how to read them.
    Domoretsky, an Ipswich resident, gave his first public presentation on his research before a roomful of North Shore Masons at their lodge on Eastern Avenue in Gloucester on Tuesday night.
    The venue was appropriate because Domoretsky believes the 15th century artist was a Mason who incorporated Masonic symbols, like the compass and square, into his works.
    “The best place to hide something is in plain sight,” said Domoretsky, who is a Mason himself and works with stone as a self-employed installer of marble and granite countertops.
    Domoretsky has had a lifelong interest in da Vinci. But his obsession with the master’s secrets was kindled when he came across an image of the “Mona Lisa” on a Web site about the movie “The Da Vinci Code.”
    He’s quick to add, however, that he didn’t see the movie until long after he began his research, has never read the book and his work has no connection to the ideas presented by “Code” author Dan Brown.
    Domoretsky said da Vinci was a master of optical illusion who created pictures within pictures within pictures — many of them designed to be visible only with the use of mirrors.
    In the darkened hall, Domoretsky projected images of two paintings, “Mona Lisa” and “The Virgin and Child with St. Anne and the Infant Saint John the Baptist,” as they appear when mirrors are positioned to the right and left of the original artwork.
    The resulting twinned images reveal hidden faces and objects and forms that include several chalices and what Domoretsky sees as a high priest of the Knights Templar, a Templar shield and cross and a sarcophagus.
    The Knights Templar came into existence after the First Crusade of 1096 to protect European pilgrims en route to sacred sites in Jerusalem. The order was suppressed about 200 years later but, some believe, went underground and survived as a secret society.
    Domoretsky believes da Vinci was “heavily involved in Freemasonry and the Knights Templar.”
    Graham Noll of Groveland, who is part of Domoretsky’s da Vinci Project Research Group and assisted at Tuesday’s presentation, said the messages that the artist embedded in his work were intended for other initiates of the secret societies in which da Vinci was involved.
    “The membership of craft and professional associations were given knowledge and ritual to protect, and da Vinci was obliged to pass on the information,” Noll said.
    Domoretsky said to his knowledge, he is the first to use the mirror imaging to study Da Vinci’s work.
    Scholars are skeptical of his findings — one critic, for example, questions why da Vinci would conceal the word “Mary” in the folds of the Mona Lisa’s clothing when the Italian for Mary is “Maria.”
    “Anyone who claims to find something new is dismissed by the experts,” Domoretsky said. “We are misrepresented because some people don’t like what we say.”
    Domoretsky remains undaunted and continues his research to decode da Vinci’s secrets and the meaning of messages he encrypted in his paintings. He plans to hit the road with the show he presented in Gloucester.
    Domoretsky, who also plans a book, has previously detailed some of his findings on his Web site, http://www.lionardofromvinci.com. (He believes the artist’s real first name was Lionardo, not Leonardo.)
    Dana Andrus, master of the Tyrian-Ashler-Acacia Masonic Lodge in Gloucester, said Masons he talked with after the presentation were intrigued by Domoretsky’s work.
    “I think he is somewhat of a visionary,” Andrus said. “He used da Vinci’s own insight to look at the paintings. That’s someone who has taken a great deal of time and thought, and not listened to the conventional wisdom, and come up with a new idea on how to approach something.”
    Gail McCarthy writes for the Gloucester Daily Times of Gloucester, Mass. E-mail her at gmcarthy@ecnnews.com

  • http://www.clintonherald.com/entertainment/cnhinsart_story_009230145 maureen

    Cracking the real da Vinci code: Hidden in plain sight
    By Gail McCarthy
    GLOUCESTER DAILY TIMES (GLOUCESTER, Mass.)
    http://www.clintonherald.com/entertainment/cnhinsart_story_009230145
    GLOUCESTER, Mass. — Michael Domoretsky has spent the past four years studying the works of Leonardo da Vinci to uncover the secrets of the original Renaissance man.
    Now he’s sharing those secrets with the world.
    What Domoretsky has found, he says, is a “legacy of hidden messages” carefully concealed in some of the world’s most famous paintings and decipherable only to those who know how to read them.
    Domoretsky, an Ipswich resident, gave his first public presentation on his research before a roomful of North Shore Masons at their lodge on Eastern Avenue in Gloucester on Tuesday night.
    The venue was appropriate because Domoretsky believes the 15th century artist was a Mason who incorporated Masonic symbols, like the compass and square, into his works.
    “The best place to hide something is in plain sight,” said Domoretsky, who is a Mason himself and works with stone as a self-employed installer of marble and granite countertops.
    Domoretsky has had a lifelong interest in da Vinci. But his obsession with the master’s secrets was kindled when he came across an image of the “Mona Lisa” on a Web site about the movie “The Da Vinci Code.”
    He’s quick to add, however, that he didn’t see the movie until long after he began his research, has never read the book and his work has no connection to the ideas presented by “Code” author Dan Brown.
    Domoretsky said da Vinci was a master of optical illusion who created pictures within pictures within pictures — many of them designed to be visible only with the use of mirrors.
    In the darkened hall, Domoretsky projected images of two paintings, “Mona Lisa” and “The Virgin and Child with St. Anne and the Infant Saint John the Baptist,” as they appear when mirrors are positioned to the right and left of the original artwork.
    The resulting twinned images reveal hidden faces and objects and forms that include several chalices and what Domoretsky sees as a high priest of the Knights Templar, a Templar shield and cross and a sarcophagus.
    The Knights Templar came into existence after the First Crusade of 1096 to protect European pilgrims en route to sacred sites in Jerusalem. The order was suppressed about 200 years later but, some believe, went underground and survived as a secret society.
    Domoretsky believes da Vinci was “heavily involved in Freemasonry and the Knights Templar.”
    Graham Noll of Groveland, who is part of Domoretsky’s da Vinci Project Research Group and assisted at Tuesday’s presentation, said the messages that the artist embedded in his work were intended for other initiates of the secret societies in which da Vinci was involved.
    “The membership of craft and professional associations were given knowledge and ritual to protect, and da Vinci was obliged to pass on the information,” Noll said.
    Domoretsky said to his knowledge, he is the first to use the mirror imaging to study Da Vinci’s work.
    Scholars are skeptical of his findings — one critic, for example, questions why da Vinci would conceal the word “Mary” in the folds of the Mona Lisa’s clothing when the Italian for Mary is “Maria.”
    “Anyone who claims to find something new is dismissed by the experts,” Domoretsky said. “We are misrepresented because some people don’t like what we say.”
    Domoretsky remains undaunted and continues his research to decode da Vinci’s secrets and the meaning of messages he encrypted in his paintings. He plans to hit the road with the show he presented in Gloucester.
    Domoretsky, who also plans a book, has previously detailed some of his findings on his Web site, http://www.lionardofromvinci.com. (He believes the artist’s real first name was Lionardo, not Leonardo.)
    Dana Andrus, master of the Tyrian-Ashler-Acacia Masonic Lodge in Gloucester, said Masons he talked with after the presentation were intrigued by Domoretsky’s work.
    “I think he is somewhat of a visionary,” Andrus said. “He used da Vinci’s own insight to look at the paintings. That’s someone who has taken a great deal of time and thought, and not listened to the conventional wisdom, and come up with a new idea on how to approach something.”
    Gail McCarthy writes for the Gloucester Daily Times of Gloucester, Mass. E-mail her at gmcarthy@ecnnews.com

« Previous Next »