In 1986 while wandering through Seattle’s Bumpershoot Festival, a friend looked around and told me, “There are only two types of people in the world. Those whose jeans determine the shape of their butts. And those whose butts determine the shape of their jeans.” I remember that moment because of that truism. What truisms do you carry with you?
I believe I’ve said it here already but it bears repeating. I once took care of a wonderful old codger whose name I can’t repeat because you know, hippa. But they said, “no one is thinking about you. They’re too busy thinking about themselves.” I only remember it because I was fretting over my first date with my now husband. I said I was too old to be going to gay bars and night clubs for meetups and dates. This person gave the best advice and I’ll always remember them cause they died shortly thereafter.
Ah! Good morning. What a truism. The sweetest truism I've ever heard was about love and I don't know what movie it came from. A boy was telling his friend about the love of his life and how she moved. The boy never told her about his feelings and how he truly felt. His friend said "Isn't that sad? Aren't you sad that you never told her your feelings." The boy said "No. Absolutely not. It's great. My love for her was none of her business. The love I felt for her made me so happy and that was enough." I have others I will post as I remember them!
Of all the scripture and lore I have encountered, some gleanings may have equaled but none has surpassed the concrete statement
“Nothing fucks like crazy.”
I still remember where I was, clear as the summer’s day we stood in, when my friend Jesse Smith revealed this veil lifting pearl. Perhaps it’s countered in a Taoist sense by the ensuing lesson learned hard, which in the old country is a lesson learned well,
"Never trust someone who spends more on their hair than on their music collection" has always been one of mine. Even more so in the era of streaming and 'everything is free now'.
My parents lived in terror that us four kids would break something in a shop. Thus, "You break it, you bought it" and "Lovely to look at, delightful to hold, but if you should break it consider it SOLD."
The iChing is not mystical or magical. It just forces you to view a problem from 64 different perspectives. Idealogues have one perspective and they try to use that to fix every problem.
"I'd rather be hated for what I am than loved for what I am not" - Cobain
"Socialists don't love the poor, they hate the rich" - Orwell
"The only people I can be with now are artists and people who have suffered; those who know what beauty is, and those who know what sorrow is: nobody else interests me: - Wilde
"Time is no healer. The patient is no longer here" - T.S. Elliot
"Make no mistake: Irony tyrannizes us" - DF Wallace
"You can shake it, you can squeeze it, you can whack it against the wall, but your prick must be back in your trousers for the last drop to fall." -- Lord Byron (Probably. Maybe. I don't know)
When I was a teen about to become voting age, I asked my dad his political party. He nonchalantly said "If you play with shit you're gonna get it on you." Then he went on about his business with no further explanation.
Every year since has proven that one of the greatest truisms about politics ever, imo!
Jordon Peterson just posted another great one this morning! "You should be a monster, an absolute monster, and then you should learn how to control it. It's better to be a warrior in a garden than a gardener in a war." I love it! This man is just wonderful.
oh man, so many... the one my wife finds most insufferable is probably, "what bothers you most in others is your most annoying trait." The context I discovered it (I think!) was when I worked retail one summer at a National Park, on days off I would hike (naturally) and I was relaxing on a cliff overlook and reading Thomas a Kempis' Imitation of Christ. At the time, my supervisor really annoyed me. He saw the flaw in everything and could never be happy!
Anyhow, it's one of those truisms that's good for you personally (and imagine how great society would be if every time anyone was annoyed with another's actions or attitude was a moment for reflection on personal improvement), but I've found it tends to backfire when you try to share it as advice to someone who is expressing frustration about someone else. Ends up, that person you hoped to encourage tends to just find themselves frustrated with an additional person.
My partner and I have a saying we use whilst driving:
"You never see a Shit Truck from the front."
A Shit Truck essentially being any vehicle rhat blocks our path on the road. I want to think that there is some deeper meaning to that phrase. Probably not though.
I'll start with one I really liked from the book Damned '' Don't make a date with a heart attack''.
'' Always remember that you have a choice, so choose to be calm and choose to not give a damn''
'' Stay true to yourself, and if everyone hates you? that's fine''.
'' Accept no free gifts, expect nothing and give nothing''.
'' Put two humans in a scale, there's always one who's dominating and exploiting the other, once you're aware of the dynamics, you can shift the balance to your liking''
From Life Of Brian cause it's funny '' always look on the bright side of life...(Whistle) ''
My favorite 'only two people in the world,' truism is from C.S. Lewis, "I begin to suspect that the world is divided not only into the happy and the unhappy, but into those who like happiness and those who, odd as it seems, really don’t.”
if we're quoting Chuck back to himself, I've always been fond of the Lullaby era, "Still, with a plan, you only get the best you can imagine. I'd always hoped for something better than that.”
Not a saying, but a truism nonetheless… When you have a kid, a million people chime in with a million unsolicited tips. But the one you can *take to the bank* is this: Enjoy them every minute, from when they are young. Before you know it, you’ll be sending them off to college (or whatever), and it goes by fast. Word.
There are three types of people in the world: those who know from an early age what they want to do with their lives and they do it; those who take a long time finding out what their vocation is; and those who spend their whole lives trying unsuccessfully to find fulfillment.
“He who smelt it dealt it.” Just something funny I’ll never forget. It was said to me the first time by my mother on a long car ride to northern Maine. Funny. It was just her and I in the car to Caribou. I hadn’t farted.
Ah a professor at Davis has a "Dirty Show" where he tells dirty stories and in one of them he states "People say 'Sex should be sweet and beautiful and something special.' People who say sex shouldn't be dirty has never had sex with me!" lolol
A math teacher at my vocational school said “figures don’t lie but liars figure.”. That phrase has stuck with me and been proven true time and again in my life.
I am failing to recall any truisms, but will share a couple redneckisms instead.
I once asked an old man how he was doing and he replied "If I were doin any better, I believe I'd quit." Best answer ever.
My favorite redneckism is something my Great Uncle said constantly when I was a kid, but I didn't consider its meaning until years later. "That's crazier'n owl shit." They don't shit, they regurgitate.
"A bad dancer blames his testicles." The literal translations of Russian proverbs are wonderful. Of course, to us in the west it means "a bad workmen blames his tools." So whenever I see a shoddy job … and whenever I see a bad dancer (very much like myself) I think ‘it’s not his fault.
Everyone -- Please note how sticky these quips are. This is about writing. And a clear demonstration of how Big Voice can state something baldly and make a lasting impression. This is the kind of "crowd seeding" exercise that builds that Big Voice muscle.
If you'd like me to define Big Voice, sing out. I didn't here, because it's in Consider This and I don't want to risk repeating myself. Okay? Okay.
On how many levels of irony would the quote “True genius comes when you quit quoting other people” from your book ‘Pygmy’ be operating on if posted in this thread?
Well there are two truisms (I'll let you be the judge on whether or not they're trite) that are rolling around a lot in my mind lately.
One is an internet that says - "there's two ways to look at "no one gives a shit!" - one is a yellow, smiley happy guy jumping for joy, the other is a glum blue guy with a dejected look on his face.
The other is a quote from Nietzsche - "I hate who steals my solitude without, in exchange, offering me true company."
I find these two inter-related. I really, really hate having my solitude stolen. Why? Because it is never, ever exchanged for true company. It's exchanged for someone wanting an audience to chatter endlessly about some trivial, insignificant thing that no one else could possibly care about.
A man wiser than myself once said "our great depression is our lives." I think that's true for many of us, but Christ, please offer a guy a little give-and-take, and at least offer the pretense that you give a shit about him.
But then again, I think this problem is part of the root of our great depression as a society - no one gives a shit.
Oh, and by the way, just FYI for anyone reading, I'm a therapist. I'm going to start telling people I'm a plumber, or an accountant.
When I was thirteen and my father was on his death bed; dying of a rare esophageal cancer, he was barely ever awake. The last time he woke up he said, “I guess it’s like that line is Casablanca,’Do you know how to whistle? You just pucker up and blow.’” That line is not in Casablanca, ha! It’s in a Cagney film.
I believe I’ve said it here already but it bears repeating. I once took care of a wonderful old codger whose name I can’t repeat because you know, hippa. But they said, “no one is thinking about you. They’re too busy thinking about themselves.” I only remember it because I was fretting over my first date with my now husband. I said I was too old to be going to gay bars and night clubs for meetups and dates. This person gave the best advice and I’ll always remember them cause they died shortly thereafter.
Ah! Good morning. What a truism. The sweetest truism I've ever heard was about love and I don't know what movie it came from. A boy was telling his friend about the love of his life and how she moved. The boy never told her about his feelings and how he truly felt. His friend said "Isn't that sad? Aren't you sad that you never told her your feelings." The boy said "No. Absolutely not. It's great. My love for her was none of her business. The love I felt for her made me so happy and that was enough." I have others I will post as I remember them!
Failure is the portal into discovery
"People have more money than brains" - my Dad
Of all the scripture and lore I have encountered, some gleanings may have equaled but none has surpassed the concrete statement
“Nothing fucks like crazy.”
I still remember where I was, clear as the summer’s day we stood in, when my friend Jesse Smith revealed this veil lifting pearl. Perhaps it’s countered in a Taoist sense by the ensuing lesson learned hard, which in the old country is a lesson learned well,
“But you don’t wanna marry it.”
"Never trust someone who spends more on their hair than on their music collection" has always been one of mine. Even more so in the era of streaming and 'everything is free now'.
"The four letter word beginning with "L" that brings most people together is lust, not love."
My parents lived in terror that us four kids would break something in a shop. Thus, "You break it, you bought it" and "Lovely to look at, delightful to hold, but if you should break it consider it SOLD."
One I tell my kids all the time: if you're the only one laughing, it isn't funny.
There are two types of people in the world, and they're both preposterous but the most preposterous are the ones that don't know they are.
An ancient Tibetan Monk's saying on shaving certain parts of the body--"One who tidies their living quarters is one who expects company there."
The iChing is not mystical or magical. It just forces you to view a problem from 64 different perspectives. Idealogues have one perspective and they try to use that to fix every problem.
It’s an Aqualung lyric, but it sticks with me. “Be careful what you hope and you pray for. You know you only get what you pay for.”
If we're including famous quotes:
"I'd rather be hated for what I am than loved for what I am not" - Cobain
"Socialists don't love the poor, they hate the rich" - Orwell
"The only people I can be with now are artists and people who have suffered; those who know what beauty is, and those who know what sorrow is: nobody else interests me: - Wilde
"Time is no healer. The patient is no longer here" - T.S. Elliot
"Make no mistake: Irony tyrannizes us" - DF Wallace
"The damaged love the damaged" - Palahniuk
Oh! "God is my co-pilot but I ran into a mountain and I had to eat him." :/ My bad.
"You can shake it, you can squeeze it, you can whack it against the wall, but your prick must be back in your trousers for the last drop to fall." -- Lord Byron (Probably. Maybe. I don't know)
I've said it here before but "If You Want To Tell People the Truth, You’d Better Make Them Laugh or They’ll Kill You"
When I was a teen about to become voting age, I asked my dad his political party. He nonchalantly said "If you play with shit you're gonna get it on you." Then he went on about his business with no further explanation.
Every year since has proven that one of the greatest truisms about politics ever, imo!
From my favorite 80s band, The Waitresses: “When you finally get a bone to throw, there’s no dog around to catch it.”
Jordon Peterson just posted another great one this morning! "You should be a monster, an absolute monster, and then you should learn how to control it. It's better to be a warrior in a garden than a gardener in a war." I love it! This man is just wonderful.
oh man, so many... the one my wife finds most insufferable is probably, "what bothers you most in others is your most annoying trait." The context I discovered it (I think!) was when I worked retail one summer at a National Park, on days off I would hike (naturally) and I was relaxing on a cliff overlook and reading Thomas a Kempis' Imitation of Christ. At the time, my supervisor really annoyed me. He saw the flaw in everything and could never be happy!
Anyhow, it's one of those truisms that's good for you personally (and imagine how great society would be if every time anyone was annoyed with another's actions or attitude was a moment for reflection on personal improvement), but I've found it tends to backfire when you try to share it as advice to someone who is expressing frustration about someone else. Ends up, that person you hoped to encourage tends to just find themselves frustrated with an additional person.
My partner and I have a saying we use whilst driving:
"You never see a Shit Truck from the front."
A Shit Truck essentially being any vehicle rhat blocks our path on the road. I want to think that there is some deeper meaning to that phrase. Probably not though.
I'll start with one I really liked from the book Damned '' Don't make a date with a heart attack''.
'' Always remember that you have a choice, so choose to be calm and choose to not give a damn''
'' Stay true to yourself, and if everyone hates you? that's fine''.
'' Accept no free gifts, expect nothing and give nothing''.
'' Put two humans in a scale, there's always one who's dominating and exploiting the other, once you're aware of the dynamics, you can shift the balance to your liking''
From Life Of Brian cause it's funny '' always look on the bright side of life...(Whistle) ''
My favorite 'only two people in the world,' truism is from C.S. Lewis, "I begin to suspect that the world is divided not only into the happy and the unhappy, but into those who like happiness and those who, odd as it seems, really don’t.”
“If wishes were fishes we’d all swim in riches.” - Stilgar probably.
OH John Waters! Stephen King has heard this one before too..: “If you go home with somebody and they don’t have books, don’t fuck ‘em.”
if we're quoting Chuck back to himself, I've always been fond of the Lullaby era, "Still, with a plan, you only get the best you can imagine. I'd always hoped for something better than that.”
The one I made up in my head is great too :P "I realized today that quilts are a Grandma's version of a mixed tape."
Not a saying, but a truism nonetheless… When you have a kid, a million people chime in with a million unsolicited tips. But the one you can *take to the bank* is this: Enjoy them every minute, from when they are young. Before you know it, you’ll be sending them off to college (or whatever), and it goes by fast. Word.
There are three types of people in the world: those who know from an early age what they want to do with their lives and they do it; those who take a long time finding out what their vocation is; and those who spend their whole lives trying unsuccessfully to find fulfillment.
“He who smelt it dealt it.” Just something funny I’ll never forget. It was said to me the first time by my mother on a long car ride to northern Maine. Funny. It was just her and I in the car to Caribou. I hadn’t farted.
Ah a professor at Davis has a "Dirty Show" where he tells dirty stories and in one of them he states "People say 'Sex should be sweet and beautiful and something special.' People who say sex shouldn't be dirty has never had sex with me!" lolol
A math teacher at my vocational school said “figures don’t lie but liars figure.”. That phrase has stuck with me and been proven true time and again in my life.
I think Murphy said it best. Anything that can go wrong will go wrong
“Never let someone drive you crazy, it’s nearby anyway and the walk is good for you.” – M. Engelbriet
That half the world is more conservative than the other half.
“You can have all the friends in the world, just don’t have a single opinion.”- Words of wisdom from my father.
I am failing to recall any truisms, but will share a couple redneckisms instead.
I once asked an old man how he was doing and he replied "If I were doin any better, I believe I'd quit." Best answer ever.
My favorite redneckism is something my Great Uncle said constantly when I was a kid, but I didn't consider its meaning until years later. "That's crazier'n owl shit." They don't shit, they regurgitate.
Oh! “It is better to be looked over than overlooked.”― Mae West
This Kurt Vonnegut nugget has stuck with me, likely to my detriment: “we are here on earth to fart around and don’t let anybody tell you different.”
"A bad dancer blames his testicles." The literal translations of Russian proverbs are wonderful. Of course, to us in the west it means "a bad workmen blames his tools." So whenever I see a shoddy job … and whenever I see a bad dancer (very much like myself) I think ‘it’s not his fault.
Everyone -- Please note how sticky these quips are. This is about writing. And a clear demonstration of how Big Voice can state something baldly and make a lasting impression. This is the kind of "crowd seeding" exercise that builds that Big Voice muscle.
If you'd like me to define Big Voice, sing out. I didn't here, because it's in Consider This and I don't want to risk repeating myself. Okay? Okay.
Never eat hooker pussy.
Never step over a dollar to pickup a dime. Don’t trust anyone that can’t drive a car either.
On how many levels of irony would the quote “True genius comes when you quit quoting other people” from your book ‘Pygmy’ be operating on if posted in this thread?
Well there are two truisms (I'll let you be the judge on whether or not they're trite) that are rolling around a lot in my mind lately.
One is an internet that says - "there's two ways to look at "no one gives a shit!" - one is a yellow, smiley happy guy jumping for joy, the other is a glum blue guy with a dejected look on his face.
The other is a quote from Nietzsche - "I hate who steals my solitude without, in exchange, offering me true company."
I find these two inter-related. I really, really hate having my solitude stolen. Why? Because it is never, ever exchanged for true company. It's exchanged for someone wanting an audience to chatter endlessly about some trivial, insignificant thing that no one else could possibly care about.
A man wiser than myself once said "our great depression is our lives." I think that's true for many of us, but Christ, please offer a guy a little give-and-take, and at least offer the pretense that you give a shit about him.
But then again, I think this problem is part of the root of our great depression as a society - no one gives a shit.
Oh, and by the way, just FYI for anyone reading, I'm a therapist. I'm going to start telling people I'm a plumber, or an accountant.
When I was thirteen and my father was on his death bed; dying of a rare esophageal cancer, he was barely ever awake. The last time he woke up he said, “I guess it’s like that line is Casablanca,’Do you know how to whistle? You just pucker up and blow.’” That line is not in Casablanca, ha! It’s in a Cagney film.
“Smooth seas don’t make good sailors.” I assume it has an older origin, but I discovered it through the pop-punk band Neck Deep.
You might as well ask for something as "A closed mouth doesn't get fed."
“While money can't buy happiness, it certainly lets you choose your own form of misery.”
― Groucho Marx
If you can smell yourself, it's bad.