If I cannot brag of knowing something, then I brag of not knowing it; at any rate, brag.
Interpretation
The quote emphasizes the importance of self-awareness and humility in knowledge.
Ralph Waldo Emerson suggests that if one cannot take pride in the knowledge they possess, then they should take pride in their acknowledgment of ignorance. This idea promotes the value of humility and self-awareness, recognizing that there is wisdom in understanding one's limitations and that acknowledging what we do not know can be just as significant as knowing.
In practice
This quote can inspire students to embrace their learning journey rather than their current knowledge.
It is plain that there is no separate essence called courage, no cup or cell in the brain, no vessel in the heart containing drops or atoms that make or give this virtue; but it is the right or healthy state of every man, when he is free to do that which is constitutional to him to do.
Few people have any next, they live from hand to mouth without a plan, and are always at the end of their line.
Men cease to interest us when we find their limitations
Tis the good reader that makes the good book; a good head cannot read amiss: in every book he finds passages which seem confidences or asides hidden from all else and unmistakeably meant for his ear.
The world belongs to the energetic.
Hast thou named all the birds without a gun?
Meditation is like the breeze that comes in when you leave the window open; but if you deliberately keep it open, deliberately invite it to come, it will never appear.
Instead of 'watching the thinker,' you can also create a gap in the mind stream simply by directing the focus of your attention into the Now. Just become intensely conscious of the present moment. This is a deeply satisfying thing to do. In this way, you draw consciousness away from mind activity and create a gap of no-mind in which you are highly alert and aware but not thinking. This is the essence of meditation.
It is far more difficult to be simple than to be complicated; far more difficult to sacrifice skill and easy execution in the proper place, than to expand both indiscriminately.
Misery don't call ahead. That's why you have to stay awake - otherwise it just walks on in your door.
Some critics will write 'Maya Angelou is a natural writer' - which is right after being a natural heart surgeon.
In deep self acceptance, grows a compassionate understanding.
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.