Miscellaneous Quotes
297 quotes
"[W]e only become what we are by the radical and deep-seated refusal of that which others have made of us."
"The difference between false memories and true ones is the same as for jewels: it is always the false ones that look the most real, the most brilliant."
"[...] right now, when the Japs are planting their hatchets in our skulls, it seems like a hell of a time for us to smile and warble: “Brothers!” It is a rather flabby battle cry. If we want to win, we've got to kill Japs, whether it depresses John Haynes Holmes or not. We can get palsy-walsy afterward with those that are left."
"Behold now, Bhikkhus, I exhort you: All compounded things are subject to decay. Strive with diligence!"
"Let my skin and sinews and bones dry up, together with all the flesh and blood of my body! I welcome it! But I will not move from this spot until I have attained the supreme and final wisdom."
"Thousands of candles can be lit from a single candle, And the life of the candle will not be shortened. Happiness never decreases by being shared."
"I will not take final Nirvana until I have nuns and female disciples who are accomplished... until I have laywomen followers...who will.... teach the Dhamma"
"In all things, there is neither male nor female."
"Monks, these two extremes ought not to be practiced by one who has gone forth from the household life. (What are the two?) There is addiction to indulgence of sense-pleasures, which is low, coarse, the way of ordinary people, unworthy, and unprofitable; and there is addiction to self-mortification, which is painful, unworthy, and unprofitable. Avoiding both these extremes, the Tathagata (the Perfect One) has realized the Middle Path; it gives vision, gives knowledge, and leads to calm, to insight, to enlightenment and to Nibbana. And what is that Middle Path realized by the Tathagata? ... It is the Noble Eightfold Path, and nothing else, namely: right understanding, right thought, right speech, right action, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness and right concentration."
"Seclusion is happiness for the content one, one who sees the Dhamma that was heard;<br/>No ill-will is happiness in the world, restraint to living beings."
"Things are not what they appear to be: nor are they otherwise."
"The basic concept of the Dilbert Principle is that the most ineffective workers are systematically moved to the place where they can do the least damage: management. This has not proved to be the winning strategy that you might think."
"The reality is that women are treated differently by society for exactly the same reason that children and the mentally handicapped are treated differently. It's just easier this way for everyone. You don't argue with a four-year old about why he shouldn't eat candy for dinner. You don't punch a mentally handicapped guy even if he punches you first. And you don't argue when a women tells you she's only making 80 cents to your dollar. It's the path of least resistance. You save your energy for more important battles."
"Years later, when "Dilbert" was in thousands of newspapers, people often asked me if I ever imagined being so lucky. I usually said no, because that's the answer people expected. The truth is that I imagined every bit of good fortune that has come my way. But in my imagination I also invented a belt that would allow me to fly and had special permission from Congress to urinate like a bird wherever I wanted. I wake up every morning disappointed that I have to wear pants and walk. Imagination has a way of breeding disappointment."
"But history has turned on a few people—like the Founding Fathers and Jesus Christ come to mind—who used the same tricks: They describe to people a better vision of themselves. And Trump fits into that [model] in the most direct way you could possibly do. He’s saying, "You're an American, I'm going to make you feel great"."
"I am saying: I see a flame thrower. I think the flame thrower guy wins in the stick fight."
"When you understand persuasion ... the truth is not as useful as it should be ..."
"I think New Yorkers are more provocative in every way."
"If Biden is elected, there's a good chance you will be dead within the year. Republicans will be hunted. Police will stand down."
"Much of politics is about hating imaginary people."
"[P]olitics is about winning the definitions of words."
"When a young male (let’s say 14 to 19) is a danger to himself and others, society gives the supporting family two options [...] 1. Watch people die. 2. Kill your own son. Those are your only options. I chose #1 and watched my stepson die. I was relieved he took no one else with him."
"If one more person hallucinates to me about some "program" where teens are kidnapped and "fixed" and returned to their happy parents, I might explode. No such thing exists. You have two options. Only two. No help is coming. Only death and suffering."
"If I were to invent a solution to the dangerous young man problem, I think it would involve putting them all in one place so they could only hurt each other, not necessarily in jail, just away from society. Once they are separated from society (and drugs) maybe help is possible."
"If nearly half of all Blacks are not okay with white people—according to this poll, not according to me, according to this poll—that's a hate group. I would say, based on the current way things are going, the best advice I would give to white people is to get the hell away from Black people. Just get the fuck away. Wherever you have to go, just get away. Because there's no fixing this. This can't be fixed."
"You should absolutely be racist whenever it's to your advantage. Every one of you should be open to making a racist personal career decision."
"Most of my income will be gone by next week [...] My reputation for the rest of my life is destroyed. You can't come back from this, am I right? There's no way you can come back from this."
"In a way I think [Trump] may have brought it on himself. His very first statement about Hillary Clinton should be in jail. I feel like when he started talking real jail then politics changed. And [the Democrats] said "If you're going to talk real jail for us, we're actually going to put you in jail." And it looks like that's what's happening."
"Every single one of our large entities, we've seen, is corrupt. From the FBI to the DOJ. I'm not talking about every person, but at least leadership elements. We've seen that our congress can be corrupt. We've seen that the CDC, basically everybody's corrupt once you find out what's really going on. The exception, we're told, is all 50 separate elections for a national election, all 50... All 50 of them are all good, but everything else is corrupt? But not those 50 things?"
"[About the 2024 US presidential election:] It feels like not an election to find your best guy, or woman. [...] It screams two sides trying to stay out of jail."
"There is no such thing as as news about public figures that's true."
"The way that most political hoaxes are done is that the person who gets cancelled did a real thing, lets say it's on video or they wrote it in this email, but nobody can imagine how that could be out of context. [...] You look at it and you go 'You know, I don't know the whole story, but how in the world could I be wrong about this? I'm looking right at it. It's really clear.' And that's how the trick is done, because there are ways to manipulate it to its actual opposite."
"If your job is to look for that stuff, any offense, well you're gonna find it because that's your job. And the more you find, the more you're worth I guess, because you found a lot of it."
"If you could reframe race relations, that would be the biggest win in America. And so here's my reframe: Every time somebody says 'The average of this group is not doing as well as the average of this group', they're fucking you. They are not your friend."
"I could not have been luckier. I have the luckiest cancellation of anybody who's ever been cancelled. [...] It just couldn't have been better. It just absolutely could not have been better."
"The Guards are tools of the Queen. All suits are dolts, but dangerous."
"The Guards lack imagination; don't play with them, unless you're ready to deal."
"That savage shriek is just the tip of the iceberg that is the Boojums' repulsive personality."
"Boojums have revolting table manners. They'll eat anything. Dispose of them or become a meal."
"Protective walls may impede you, but the walls most difficult to penetrate are those that surround our hearts."
"Cling closely to the path, Alice. A fall will dash your head along with all our hopes."
"Entering Skool requires a real leap of logic."
"Steps to enlightenment brighten the way; but the steps are steep. Take them one at a time."
"Countless generations of termites would only digest a mere fraction of the volumes here. And they wouldn't be one wit wiser."
"This Skool serves more than nasty lunches. The laboratories are especially fascinating, if you can stand the vile stench."
"Gardeners store rat poison and weed killer in sheds. Skools have laboratories for that purpose."
"Nature has ordained that certain seeds require assistance to fulfill their destiny."
"Unplanted seeds dry out and die."
"Every picture tells a story. Sometimes we don't like the ending. Sometimes we don't understand it."
"Annihilate what threatens to destroy you."
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