Collection of quotes I like or that have resonated with me.
Random
“Always demand a deadline. A deadline weeds out the extraneous and the ordinary. It prevents you from trying to make it perfect, so you have to make it different. Different is better.”
“Always demand a deadline. A deadline weeds out the extraneous and the ordinary. It prevents you from trying to make it perfect, so you have to make it different. Different is better.”
“Better done than perfect.” Perfectionism is nothing but fear. Conquer it.
“Clarity requires thinking. Thinking requires writing.”
“Action is not just the effect of motivation, but also the cause of motivation.”
“They don’t have to know that it’s haunted.”
Ajahn Chah
“Dhamma is in your mind, not in the forest. You don’t have to go and look anywhere else.” — Ajahn Chah
Alexander Solzhenitsyn
“Man has set for himself the goal of conquering the world, but in the process he loses his soul.” — Alexander Solzhenitsyn
Aristotle (unconfirmed)
“The purpose of knowledge is action, not knowledge.” — Aristotle
Ashtavakra Gita
“The wise man knows the Self, And he plays the game of life. But the fool lives in the world Like a beast of burden.”
Big Mouth
“I only wrote that poem to test my printer!”
Donny Osmond
“I never smile unless I mean it.”
Dwight D. Eisenhower
“I have two kinds of problems: the urgent and the important. The urgent are not important, and the important are never urgent.”
G. K. Chesterton
It is really not so repulsive to see the poor asking for money as to see the rich asking for more money. And advertisement is the rich asking for more money.
A man would be annoyed if he found himself in a mob of millionaires, all holding out their silk hats for a penny; or all shouting with one voice, “Give me money.” Yet advertisement does really assault the eye very much as such a shout would assault the ear. “Budge’s Boots are the Best” simply means “Give me money”; “Use Seraphic Soap” simply means “Give me money.”
It is a complete mistake to suppose that common people make our towns commonplace, with unsightly things like advertisements. Most of those whose wares are thus placarded everywhere are very wealthy gentlemen with coronets and country seats, men who are probably very particular about the artistic adornment of their own homes. They disfigure their towns in order to decorate their houses.
Dean Bokhari (unconfirmed)
“Be regular and orderly in your life, so that you may be violent and original in your work.”
Duke Ellington
“I felt the music wash over me. It had me, right then and there.” — Ghost of Duke Ellington
Gustave Flaubert (unconfirmed)
“Be regular and orderly in your life, so that you may be violent and original in your work.”
Jereld Hanson
“Their level is always half a bubble off.”
John Siracusa
“Don’t chase your dreams! Humans are persistence predators. Follow your dreams at a sustainable pace until they get tired and lay down.”
u/kaidomac On ADHD
“I wish I had the ability to instantly internalize this comic for neuro-typical people. “Just try harder” doesn’t fully illuminate the ridiculous, daily, momentary inner struggle we fight ALL the time. And it also helps SO MUCH to explain it to ourselves this way!
I was visiting an elderly family member the other day and they were like, “Well I definitely don’t have ADHD, when I decide to focus on something, I can just do it!” I definitely had a momentary inner twinge that that’s not the norm for me…simply deciding to do it & not having the “Mentos & Coke” effect of mental diffusion kick in to over-think the task & then feel all of the other things I have to do start swirling around, and then feel the emotional barriers of the weight of the task & the mental energy loss from the pre-requisite requirements like having to clean up or find stuff kick in…things that aren’t on anybody’s normal radar at all!
It’s a silly, nonsensical situation to deal with in life…I’m very grateful towards this artist for illustration the reality of the situation!”
Pascal
“All of humanity’s problems stem from man’s inability to sit quietly in a room alone.”
Richard Feynman
“Knowledge isn’t free. You have to pay attention.”
Robert A. Heinlein
“A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.”
Robert McKee
“True character is revealed in the choices a human being makes under pressure - the greater the pressure, the deeper the revelation, the truer the choice to the character’s essential nature.”
Rumi
“If I were the plaything of every thought, I would be a fool, not a wise man.”
Shield Anvil Itkovian, Memories of Ice, Malazan Series Book 3
“We humans do not understand compassion. In each moment of our lives, we betray it. Aye, we know of its worth, yet in knowing we then attach to it a value, we guard the giving of it, believing it must be earned. Compassion is priceless in the truest sense of the word. It must be given freely. In abundance.”
Stephen Roberts
“I contend that we are both atheists. I just believe in one fewer god than you do. When you understand why you dismiss all the other possible gods, you will understand why I dismiss yours.”
Taylor Swift
“Happiness and Confidence are the prettiest things you can wear.”
Thomas Merton
“We must be true inside, true to ourselves, before we can know a truth that is outside us.”
Unknown
“Saying yes frequently is an additive strategy. Saying no is a subtractive strategy. Keep saying no to a lot of things - the negative and unimportant ones - and once in awhile, you will be left with an idea which is so compelling that it would be a screaming no-brainer ‘yes’.”
“I’ve been called worse, and I’m disappointed you couldn’t think of something better.”
“This is not regular stupid. This is advanced stupid.”
Waymond Wang
“When I choose to see the good side of things, I’m not being naïve. It is strategic and necessary. It’s how I’ve learned to survive through everything.
I don’t know. The only thing I do know… is that we have to be kind.
Please. Be kind… especially when we don’t know what’s going on. I know you see yourself as a fighter. Well, I see myself as one too. This is how I fight.”
Yuval Noah Harari
“Information is not truth.” — Yuval Noah Harari
XKCD Book
From XKCD Book
Throwing is hard.
“In order to deliver a baseball to a batter, a pitcher has to release the ball at exactly the right point in the throw. A timing error of half a millisecond in either direction is enough to cause the ball to miss the strike zone.
To put that in perspective, it takes about five milliseconds for the fastest nerve impulse to travel the length of the arm. That means that when your arm is still rotating toward the correct position, the signal to release the ball is already at your wrist.
In terms of timing, this is like a drummer dropping a drumstick from the tenth story and hitting a drum on the ground on the correct beat.”
Throwing is hard.
“In order to deliver a baseball to a batter, a pitcher has to release the ball at exactly the right point in the throw. A timing error of half a millisecond in either direction is enough to cause the ball to miss the strike zone.
To put that in perspective, it takes about five milliseconds for the fastest nerve impulse to travel the length of the arm. That means that when your arm is still rotating toward the correct position, the signal to release the ball is already at your wrist.
In terms of timing, this is like a drummer dropping a drumstick from the tenth story and hitting a drum on the ground on the correct beat.”
On Proxy Killing – Going Postal by Terry Pratchett
“Do you understand what I’m saying?” shouted Moist. “You can’t just go around killing people!”
“Why Not? You Do.” The golem lowered his arm.
“What?” snapped Moist. “I do not! Who told you that?”
“I Worked It Out. You Have Killed Two Point Three Three Eight People,” said the golem calmly.
“I have never laid a finger on anyone in my life, Mr Pump. I may be––all the things you know I am, but I am not a killer! I have never so much as drawn a sword!” “No, You Have Not. But You Have Stolen, Embezzled, Defrauded And Swindled Without Discrimination, Mr Lipvig. You Have Ruined Businesses And Destroyed Jobs. When Banks Fail, It Is Seldom Bankers Who Starve. Your Actions Have Taken Money From Those Who Had Little Enough To Begin With. In A Myriad Small Ways You Have Hastened The Deaths Of Many. You Do Not Know Them. You Did Not See Them Bleed. But You Snatched Bread From Their Mouths And Tore Clothes From Their Backs. For Sport, Mr Lipvig. For Sport. For The Joy Of The Game.” ~ Going Postal by Terry Pratchett