Ideas are like rabbits. You get a couple and learn how to handle them, and pretty soon you have a dozen.
John SteinbeckRead
What a frightening thing is the human, a mass of gauges and dials and registers, and we can only read a few and those perhaps not accurately.
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote reflects the complexity of human nature and the limitations of our understanding of ourselves and others.
John Steinbeck's quote highlights the intricate and often incomprehensible nature of humanity. He suggests that each person is like a complex machine with many gauges and indicators, but we can only perceive and interpret a fraction of these signals. This observation points to the challenges of truly knowing ourselves and others, and the potential for misinterpretation in our judgments. The inherent complexity of human behavior and emotions makes understanding oneself and others a daunting task.
Themes
Human NatureUnderstandingComplexitySelf-AwarenessPerception
In practice
Example use cases
In a discussion about personal growth during a workshop.
More from John Steinbeck
All quotes βAt one point, as Samuel urges Adam to raise his boys well regardless of the blood that might be in them, Adam tells him, "You can't make a race horse of a pig." Samuel replies, "No, but you can make a very fast pig.
John SteinbeckRead
And when that crop grew, and was harvested, no man had crumbled a hot clod in his fingers and let the earth sift past his fingertips. No man had touched the seed, or lusted for the growth. Men ate what they had not raised, had no connection with the bread. The land bore under iron, and under iron gradually died; for it was not loved or hated, it had no prayers or curses.
John SteinbeckRead
The comfortable people in tight houses felt pity at first, and then distaste, and finally hatred for the migrant people.
John SteinbeckRead
People do not want advice - they want corroboration.
John SteinbeckRead
It is one of the triumphs of the human that he can know a thing and still not believe it.
John SteinbeckRead
Similar quotes
If psychedelics are exopheromones that dissolve the dominant ego, then they are also enzymes that synergize the human imagination and empower language. They cause us to connect and reconnect the contents of the collective mind in ever more implausible, beautiful, and self-fulfilling ways.
Terence MckennaRead
The world doesn't want to be punished. It wants to remain in darkness. It doesn't want to be told that what it believes is false. If you also don't want to be corrected, then you might as well leave the church and spend your time at the bar and brothel. But if you want to be saved-and remember that there's another life after this one-you must accept correction.
Martin LutherRead
Bad facts make bad law, and people who write bad laws are in my opinion more dangerous than songwriters who celebrate sexuality. Freedom of speech, freedom of religious thought, and the right to due process for composers, performers and retailers are imperiled if the PMRC and the major labels consummate this nasty bargain.
Frank ZappaRead
When the state intervenes to insure the indoctrination of some doctrine, it does so because there is no conclusive evidence in favor of that doctrine.
Bertrand RussellRead
Democracy, as I understand it, requires me to sacrifice myself for the masses, not to them. Who knows not that if you would save the people, you must often oppose them?
John C. CalhounRead
Dominique as Gail looks at her "... there is a stage of worship which makes the worshiper himself an object of reverence."
Ayn RandRead