My influence came from Mahatma Gandhi, who said, that 'we need to be the change we want to see in the world'.
My life, and also what I post in this forum, is influenced by the view of a more tolerant, nonviolent world I wish we lived in.
Just to give an example, someone on here remarked to me why I bothered to post a link to my homepage, and whether I was just trying to advertise myself. Instead of getting mad at that person, I wrote back to the person gently explaining why there was a link, namely in order to make my postings more real - and not just a cybershadow. That person then wrote back saying he was just being a nut, and that he was sorry for writing in somewhat agressively. I am glad we could resolve our misconceptions without much aggro.