• sunaurus@lemm.ee
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    65
    ·
    edit-2
    7 months ago

    I’m a simple man:

    “What day is it?” asked Pooh.

    “It’s today,” squeaked Piglet.

    “My favorite day,” said Pooh.

  • electric_nan@lemmy.ml
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    41
    ·
    7 months ago

    The law, in its majestic equality, forbids the rich as well as the poor to sleep under bridges, to beg in the streets, and to steal bread.

    Anatole France

  • ImplyingImplications@lemmy.ca
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    37
    arrow-down
    1
    ·
    7 months ago

    The willow knows what the storm does not: that the power to endure harm outlives the power to inflict it.

    From the Magic: The Gathering card “Blood of the Martyr”

  • TTH4P@lemm.ee
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    34
    arrow-down
    3
    ·
    7 months ago

    The power of accurate observation is commonly called cynicism by those who have not got it.

    • FederatedSaint@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      12
      arrow-down
      1
      ·
      7 months ago

      When working on an office, it’s great and all that you have “the power of accurate observation” but god our Debbie downer is insufferable.

        • intensely_human@lemm.ee
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          3
          arrow-down
          2
          ·
          7 months ago

          When I was in high school, a friend of mine came from a Republican family. He once told me “You think that if it would be nice that a thing were true, that means it is true”.

          It took me a long time to understand what he meant, but I finally do, and he was spot on with how my philosophy worked.

  • Unmapped@lemmy.ml
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    25
    ·
    7 months ago

    “Every time I see an adult on a bicycle, I no longer despair for the future of the human race.”

    • H.G. Wells
  • molave@reddthat.com
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    24
    arrow-down
    1
    ·
    7 months ago

    “The problem with internet quotes is that you cannot always depend on their accuracy.”

    ― Abraham Lincoln 1864

  • slazer2au@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    24
    arrow-down
    2
    ·
    7 months ago

    This too shall pass.

    No matter how good or bad your life is, there will ways be change.

      • slazer2au@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        3
        ·
        7 months ago

        I’m paraphrasing but it was something along the lines of

        ‘Something that will make me sad when I am happy and happy when I am sad’

        • starman2112@sh.itjust.works
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          3
          ·
          7 months ago

          The story goes, or the way that I was told, there was a king that always felt too high and then he felt too low. And so he called all his wise men to the hall, and he begged them for a gift to end the rises and the falls. But here’s the thing—they came back with a ring. It was simple, and was plainly unbefitting of a king, and engraved in black—well it had no front or back, but there were words around the band that said “just know this too shall pass.”

  • fjordbasa@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    20
    ·
    7 months ago

    ”A person who thinks all the time has nothing to think about except thoughts.” Alan Watts

    I think it’s just a reminder of the pointlessness of overthinking. I find it poignant because I spend a lot of time lost in rumination, myself

    • intensely_human@lemm.ee
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      6
      ·
      7 months ago

      Alan Watts is so fun. He used words like that monk lady in the marvel movies that slaps people out of their bodies.

      He’s masterful with words. So masterful he makes it look easy.

      So many teachers like “beyond this point words fail”, and they’ve got a good point, but Watts goes “let me give it a shot” and then conveys things in words that can take years to grasp through the brute force method of direct perception.

      People shit on words, and with very good reason, but they are the chutes and ladders that make enlightenment in a single lifetime possible if one’s lucky enough to have a teacher like Watts.

      • uhmbah@lemmy.ca
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        3
        ·
        7 months ago

        Yes!

        “Problems that remain persistently insoluble should always be suspected as questions asked in the wrong way.” Alan Watts

  • Melllvar
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    18
    ·
    7 months ago

    What is better: to be born good, or to overcome your evil nature through great effort?

    -Paarthurnax

  • boatswain@infosec.pub
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    18
    ·
    7 months ago

    “To know which questions are unanswerable, and to not answer them: this is the skill that is most needful in times of stress and darkness.”

    • Ursula K. LeGuin, The Left Hand of Darkness
  • SanguinePar@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    19
    arrow-down
    1
    ·
    edit-2
    7 months ago

    David Foster Wallace: You’ll stop worrying* what others think about you when you realize how seldom they do.

    * It might ‘caring’ rather than ‘worrying’, I’m not sure, and can’t be bothered finding the book to check it.

    It’s also possible that DFW didn’t coin this phrase.

  • Ashu@lemmy.zip
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    18
    arrow-down
    1
    ·
    7 months ago

    Change your perspective… and the reality changes!

    That’s what a daycare npc told me in Pokemon Black. Although I haven’t really found much use for the quote, it has stuck with me for long.

    • call_me_xale@lemmy.zip
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      4
      ·
      edit-2
      5 months ago

      Or, if you like it more pithy: “The difference between theory and practice is larger in practice than it is in theory.”

  • root@aussie.zone
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    17
    ·
    7 months ago

    If a problem is fixable, if a situation is such that you can do something about it, then there is no need to worry. If it’s not fixable, then there is no help in worrying. There is no benefit in worrying whatsoever.

    • H. H. Dalai Lama
    • intensely_human@lemm.ee
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      8
      ·
      7 months ago

      I totally agree. Worrying, as an action, is useless. Worry as a feeling, an emotional signal, is useful.

      Worry is like a messenger from your subconscious. It’s a signal there’s a gap between your opportunity and your action. As soon as you see the worry, you can turn it off by getting back in line with your conscience.

      Worry is part of “the wisdom to know the difference”. It indicates you haven’t yet determined which of those two it is: a thing you can change, or a thing you can’t.

      So worrying is useless, in the same way sitting there listening to an alarm bell is useless. The alarm is a useful signal. Indulging in it is not.

      Shut off the alarm and address the problem. In this case the problem is not “something I value is gonna get hurt”. It’s “something I value is gonna get hurt, and I don’t yet know whether I should be doing something about it or not”.

      The best way out the is:

      worry -> map out the problem -> [branch] (help how you can OR accept it)

      You can pluck the worry out of your mind if you’re a skillful meditator. Just kill it like a computer process. But it will come up again until you remove its root, which is vagueness about the line between “the courage to change things I can” and “the serenity to accept yhe things I cannot”.

      So, like I said, worry is a component of “the wisdom to know the difference”. It is that wisdom’s triggering mechanism.

      In my opinion, at least.