Quotes About Discernment

Right around 2004 when 'Ray' came out, I made a conscious decision to be more discerning because I thought to myself, 'After something like this, I really have to try to be strong enough to turn stuff down.'

A mind should not be so open that the brains fall out; however, it should not be so closed that whatever gray matter which does reside may not be reached.

Everyone is your friend if you say yes, but say no and watch how they react. It's been a huge life lesson for me.

I learned quickly in the NBA that you keep one eye open at all times and one ear closed. You can't react to everything you hear or see.

The best way to test whether you are saying the truth or not - if you say something and people don't react then it's not the real truth. But if people start reacting then what you are saying has got an element of truth.

I tell you I can't read a book, but I can read de people.

People know accuracy when they read it; they can feel it.

You don't want to believe everything you read on the Internet.

An experienced slush-pile reader doesn't need more than a few seconds to see if a story has potential. You don't need to eat all of a rotten egg to determine that it's rotten.

Some readers allow their prejudices to blind them. A good reader knows how to disregard inappropriate responses.

Readers let me know that they like books that have more to them than meets the eye. Had they not let me know that, I never would have written 'The View From Saturday.'

The art of reading between the lines is as old as manipulated information.

I'm good at reading people.

When I'm deciding to read a book, I never open to the first chapter, because that's been revised and worked over 88 times. I'll just turn to the middle of the book, to the middle of a chapter, and just read a random page and I'll know right away whether this is the real deal or not.

The biggest hurdle is figuring out who your friends are. Your real friends.

I can tell very early on, reading a script, within six or seven pages, whether I'm looking at real people, and whether I can see and hear real people.

A lot of people judge others too quickly without actually knowing the full facts or the actual real person.

Sometimes the hardest decision is to say no to something, and I think when you're less confident or when you're younger, you say yes to everything, and as you get older, you realise you don't need to.

Commonsense is the realised sense of proportion.

Seeing reality for what it is is what we call discernment. The work of discernment is very hard.

Distinctions drawn by the mind are not necessarily equivalent to distinctions in reality.

Like you have seven people with their hands up. I gotta make a choice. Y'know, that's tough. Sometimes I gotta go with someone that has an idea and make several calls in a row, because they got an idea.

Men are more particular, and they're not going to grab something with a bodice-ripper cover on it.

I can't grab anything that comes my way just because it's from a big banner.