Gambling can turn into a dangerous two-way street when you least expect it. Weird things happen suddenly, and your life can go all to pieces.
1) Never trust a cop in a raincoat. 2) Beware of enthusiasm and of love, both are temporary and quick to sway. 3) If asked if you care about the world's problems, look deep into the eyes of he who asks, he will never ask you again. 4) Never give your real name. 5) If ever asked to look at yourself, don't look. 6) Never do anything the person standing in front of you can't understand. 7) Never create anything, it will be misinterpreted, it will chain you and follow you for the rest of your life.
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote advises caution against trust, temporary emotions, and self-examination, highlighting the complexities of existence.
Hunter S. Thompson's reflections suggest a skeptical view of authority, relationships, and creativity. He warns that trust in figures of authority, such as police, may be misplaced, and that emotional states like love and enthusiasm can be fleeting. Furthermore, he advises against revealing oneself too openly, cautioning that self-exploration can lead to uncomfortable truths. His statement implies that the act of creating can result in perpetual scrutiny and misinterpretation, leading to a lifelong burden of expectations and misunderstandings. Ultimately, the quote encourages a guarded, introspective approach to life.
Themes
In practice
Example use cases
In a discussion about the complexities of human relationships at a seminar.
More from Hunter S. Thompson
All quotes →As things stand now, I am going to be a writer. I'm not sure that I'm going to be a good one or even a self-supporting one, but until the dark thumb of fate presses me to the dust and says 'you are nothing', I will be a writer.
Fiction is a bridge to the truth that journalism can't reach.
There is nothing in the world more helpless and irresponsible and depraved than a man in the depths of an ether binge.
Objective journalism is one of the main reasons that American politics has been allowed to be so corrupt for so long.
When you write for a living and you can't do anything else, you know that sooner or later that the deadline is going to come screaming down on you like a goddamn banshee. There's no avoiding it...So one day you just don't appear at the El Adobe bar anymore; you shut the door, paint the windows black, rent an electric typewriter and become the monster you always were - the writer.
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The lessons of the First Amendment are as urgent in the modern world as the 18th Century when it was written. One timeless lesson is that if citizens are subjected to state-sponsored religious exercises, the State disavows its own duty to guard and respect that sphere of inviolable conscience and belief which is the mark of a free people.
A conception not reducible to the small change of daily experience is like a currency not exchangeable for articles of consumption; it is not a symbol, but a fraud.
The mask was a thing on it's own, behind which Jack hid, liberated from shame and self-conciousness.
No man who knows aught, can be so stupid to deny that all men naturally were born free.
Chess holds deep wisdoms of the people. It is truly an image of life, the reflection of human fate that has shown us the earthly way of suffering in darkness and permanent shortage of time. Like in chess, we encounter all kinds of traps, mistakes, settlements, sacrifices, kings, and queens, doubled pawns, and extraordinary moves while we are on the board ourselves.
The good of the people is the greatest law.