Quotes About Understanding

TF: There is a big difference between understanding something (what you want in a physician) and simply knowing its name or labeling it.

Map and Territory and How to Actually Change Your Mind by Eliezer Yudkowsky.

The only true voyage would be not to travel through a hundred different lands with the same pair of eyes, but to see the same land through a hundred different pairs of eyes." —MARCEL PROUST

If you only engage with people about problems, pretty soon, you'll become the problem for them," and I agree with that.

When we fail to reason honestly, we have lost our connection to the world and to one another.

If you want to help people, ask why they are in so much pain that they are driven (there's that word again) to escape from it through ultimately self-harming habits or substances.

A good general strategy is reasoning counterfactually: if someone tells you that X is true, ask yourself—(i) what would they say if X really is true, and (ii) what would they say if X is false? If the answer to (i) and (ii) is "they will say roughly what they just said now," then their words provided you with exactly zero information. In general, know when it's really important not to take people's words at 100 percent face value.

There are many things of which a wise man might wish to be ignorant. —RALPH WALDO EMERSON (1803–1882)

1—It doesn't matter how many people don't get it. What matters is how many people do.

Understanding Media by Marshall McLuhan.

Looking somebody in the eye . . . is often the antidote for what is ailing us.

El genio es solamente la facultad superior de ver.» JOHN RUSKIN, afamado artista y crítico social

Friendship is born at the moment when one person says to another: 'What? You too? I thought I was the only one.'"—C. S. Lewis

Two Words for Conflict Resolution "[My mentor's] life advice to me, when I'm going into a conflict or a difficult situation with my parents or an argument with Neil [Gaiman, her husband] is, 'Say less.' That's it. Just say less.

I learned that each character can be broken into components: far left, top, middle, etc. These LEGO pieces, referred to as radicals, form the building blocks from which all kanji are made.

never forget that underneath all the math and the MBA bullshit talk, we are all still emotionally driven human

NVC has a magical way of instantly defusing potential conflicts with anyone, from a partner to a server to a friend to someone at work. One of its many great premises is that no two people's needs are ever in conflict. It's only the strategies for getting those needs met that are in conflict.

cuando juzgas a los demás sólo es una manera de no mirarnos a nosotros mismos;

No matter what the situation may be, the right course of action is always compassion and love." (paraphrased from one of his teachers, Barbara McNally)

Ricardo Semler, CEO and majority owner of the Brazil-based Semco Partners, practices asking "Why?" three times. This is true when questioning his own motives, or when tackling big projects. The rationale is identical to Derek's.

Notice how often he reframes the question (examines whether the question is the right question) before answering. In several cases, how he dissects wording is as interesting as his answers.

Los libros no están para mostrar lo inteligente y cultivado que eres.

while the world is a gold mine, you need to go digging in other people's heads to unearth riches.

It doesn't matter how many people don't get it. What matters is how many people do.