I am looking for the human who admits his flaws Who shocks the adversary By being kinder not stronger What would that be like? We don't even know
Interpretation
Acknowledging our flaws and showing kindness can be more powerful than strength.
This quote emphasizes the strength found in vulnerability and kindness. It suggests that true courage lies not in being the strongest or most powerful, but in admitting our shortcomings and responding to challenges with compassion instead of aggression. It challenges conventional notions of strength and highlights the importance of empathy in our interactions with others.
In practice
In a speech about personal growth, one could use this quote to illustrate the importance of acknowledging our mistakes.
It is really hard to be lonely very long in a world of words. Even if you don't have friends somewhere, you still have language, and it will find you and wrap its little syllables around you and suddenly there will be a story to live in.
I love the solitude of reading. I love the deep dive into someone else's story, the delicious ache of a last page.
A boy told me if he roller-skated fast enough his loneliness couldn't catch up to him, the best reason I ever heard for trying to be a champion. What I wonder tonight pedaling hard down King William Street is if it translates to bicycles. A victory! To leave your loneliness panting behind you on some street corner while you float free into a cloud of sudden azaleas, pink petals that have never felt loneliness, no matter how slowly they fell.
I think whenever you love something or somebody it means that you have to extend yourself, you have to grow - get a little larger. You can't stay in your little comfortable - spot.
As a direct line to human feeling, empathic experience, genuine language and detail, poetry is everything that headline news is not. It takes us inside situations, helps us imagine life from more than one perspective, honors imagery and metaphor - those great tools of thought - and deepens our confidence in a meaningful world.
I support all people on earth who have bodies like and unlike my body.
A man's enjoyment of all good things is in exact proportion to the pains he has undergone to gain them.
Never, in peace or war, commit your virtue or your happiness to the future. Happy work is best done by the man who takes his long-term plans somewhat lightly and works from moment to moment 'as to the Lord.' It is only our daily bread that we are encouraged to ask for. The present is the only time in which any duty can be done or any grace received.
I had always been impressed by the fact that there are surprisingly many individuals who never use their minds if they can avoid it, and yet are not stupid, and an equal number who obviously do use their minds but in an amazingly stupid way.
The one important thing I have learned over the years is the difference between taking one's work seriously and taking one's self seriously. The first is imperative and the second is disastrous.
When you get to be my age, baby, you have to pay time more respect.
Man cannot live upon words, however he may try.
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