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I hope you like these Kurt Vonnegut quotes from my collection of quotes about life.
We are what we pretend to be,
so we must be careful what we pretend to be.
- Kurt Vonnegut
Related topics: Positive Inspirational Motivational Life Human-Nature Psychology Self
We should not pretend to understand
the world only by the intellect;
we apprehend it just as much by feeling.
Therefore, the judgment of the intellect is,
at best, only the half of truth, and must, if it be honest,
also come to an understanding of its inadequacy.
- Carl Jung
We should not pretend to understand the world
only by the intellect.
The judgment of the intellect
is only part of the truth.
- Carl Jung
The greatest way to live with honor in this world
is to be what we pretend to be.
- Socrates
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Thank You,
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie
I cannot pretend to be impartial about the colors.
I rejoice with the brilliant ones, and
am genuinely sorry for the poor browns.
- Winston Churchill
I feel exuberant. I don't pretend.
- Bono
Perspective:
Do you always look at life from the same point-of-view?
Consider viewing a situation as another might view it.
Look from behind, underneath, from the distant heavens.
View the situation as someone of a different religion,
race, or nationality might view it.
Pretend you are an alien from a distant galaxy -
that should be good for a laugh.
Troubles only appear troubling to those close to them.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie
Laugh when you can,
apologize when you should,
and let go of what you can't change.
Life's too short to be anything... but happy.
- Anonymous 
The truth. It is a beautiful and terrible thing,
and should be treated with caution.
- J. K. Rowling
Two things a man should never be angry at:
what he can help,
and what he cannot help.
- Thomas Fuller
The best remedy for those who are afraid, lonely or unhappy
is to go outside, somewhere where they can be quiet,
alone with the heavens, nature and God.
Because only then does one feel that all is as it should be.
- Anne Frank
If a man is called to be a street sweeper,
he should sweep streets even as Michelangelo painted,
or Beethoven composed music, or Shakespeare wrote poetry.
He should sweep streets so well that all the hosts
of heaven and earth will pause to say,
here lived a great street sweeper who did his job well.
- Martin Luther King, Jr.
Could we change our attitude,
we should not only see life differently,
but life itself would be different.
- Katherine Mansfield
We should take care not to make the intellect our god;
it has, of course, powerful muscles, but no personality.
- Albert Einstein
Life should not be a journey to the grave
with the intention of arriving safely
in a pretty and well preserved body,
but rather to skid in broadside in a cloud of smoke,
thoroughly used up, totally worn out,
and loudly proclaiming, "Wow! What a Ride!"
- Hunter S. Thompson
Knowledge of what is, does not open
the door directly to what should be.
- Albert Einstein
Old age has deformities enough of its own.
It should never add to them the deformity of vice.
- Eleanor Roosevelt
Everyone should carefully observe
which way his heart draws him,
and then choose that way with all his strength.
- Hasidic Proverb
No idea is so outlandish that it should not be considered
with a searching but at the same time a steady eye.
- Winston Churchill
We should distrust any enterprise that requires new clothes.
- Henry David Thoreau
The formula for achieving a successful relationship is simple:
you should treat all disasters as if they were trivialities
but never treat a triviality as if it were a disaster.
- Quentin Crisp
Whatever words we utter should be chosen with care
for people will hear them and be influenced
by them for good or ill.
- The Buddha
While the laughter of joy is in
full harmony with our deeper life,
the laughter of amusement
should be kept apart from it.
The danger is too great of thus learning
to look at solemn things in a spirit of mockery,
and to seek in them opportunities for exercising wit.
- Lewis Carroll
If the stars should appear
but one night every thousand years
how man would marvel and stare.
- Ralph Waldo Emerson
If you have built castles in the air,
your work need not be lost;
that is where they should be.
Now put foundations under them.
- Henry David Thoreau
We should be too big to take offense
and too noble to give it.
- Abraham Lincoln
We should not let our response to
the people who disagree with us
be dictated by what they say about us
or even how they treat people we care for.
There has to be a chance that we can find love.
- William J. Clinton
Since you get more joy out of giving joy to others,
you should put a good deal of thought
into the happiness that you are able to give.
- Eleanor Roosevelt
Man should forget his anger before he lies down to sleep.
- Mohandas (Mahatma) Gandhi
Whatever your life's work is, do it well.
A man should do his job so well that the living,
the dead, and the unborn could do it no better.
- Martin Luther King, Jr.
The value of a man should be seen in what he gives
and not in what he is able to receive.
- Albert Einstein
We may have our private opinions
but why should they be a bar to the meeting of hearts?
- Mohandas (Mahatma) Gandhi
People should think things out fresh
and not just accept conventional terms
and the conventional way of doing things.
- R. Buckminster Fuller
Neither should a ship rely on one small anchor,
nor should life rest on a single hope.
- Epictetus
Intellectual growth should commence at birth
and cease only at death.
- Albert Einstein
When you are in any contest,
you should work as if there were -
to the very last minute - a chance to lose it.
This is battle, this is politics, this is anything.
- Dwight D. Eisenhower
You either do it completely and utterly,
or you should stop doing it.
- Bono (paraphrase)
A man should look for what is,
and not for what he thinks should be.
- Albert Einstein
If I were to wish for anything,
I should not wish for wealth and power,
but for the passionate sense of potential -
for the eye which, ever young and ardent, sees the possible.
Pleasure disappoints; possibility never.
- Soren Kierkegaard
To sin by silence when they should protest makes cowards of men.
- Abraham Lincoln
It is one thing to say that something should be done,
but quite a different matter to do it.
- Aesop
No statement should be believed because it is made by an authority.
- Robert A. Heinlein
Life is a great big canvas,
and you should throw all the paint you can on it.
- Danny Kaye
If a man is proud of his wealth,
he should not be praised until it is known how he employs it.
- Socrates
Failure does not exist.
Failure is simply someone else's opinion of how
a certain act should have been completed.
Once you believe that no act must be performed
in any specific other-directed way,
then failing becomes impossible.
- Wayne Dyer
Why should we be in such desperate haste to succeed,
and in such desperate enterprises?
If a man does not keep pace with his companions,
perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer.
- Henry David Thoreau
The essence of philosophy is that a man should so live
that his happiness shall depend
as little as possible on external things.
- Epictetus
You should not confuse your career with your life.
- Dave Barry
We should not moor a ship with one anchor,
or our life with one hope.
- Epictetus
We should meet abuse by forbearance.
Human nature is so constituted that
if we take absolutely no notice of anger or abuse,
the person indulging in it will soon weary of it and stop.
- Mohandas (Mahatma) Gandhi
Many people excuse their own faults
but judge other persons harshly.
We should reverse this attitude
by excusing others' shortcomings
and by harshly examining our own.
- Paramahansa Yogananda
Instead of comparing our lot with that
of those who are more fortunate than we are,
we should compare it with the lot
of the great majority of our fellow men.
It then appears that we are among the privileged.
- Helen Keller
What people often mean by getting rid of conflict
is getting rid of diversity,
and it is of the utmost importance
that these should not be considered the same.
- M. P. Follett
There is NOTHING that I "must",
"have to", or "should" do today.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie
I surrender to life as it is, not as it should be.
- Richard Carlson
You should never be content with so little,
when you can reach out for something big.
- Charles L. Allen
(This quote is about making a big difference
in the world - not about greed)
All major religious traditions
carry basically the same message,
that is love, compassion and forgiveness.
The important thing is they should
be part of our daily lives.
- Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama
Understand the difference between "failing,"
which each of us does often,
and "being a failure,"
which is a state of mind no one should
ever allow themself to fall into.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie
If there is anything that we wish to change in the child,
we should first examine it and see whether it is
not something that could better be changed in ourselves.
- Carl Jung
A benevolent man should allow a few faults in himself,
to keep his friends in countenance.
- Benjamin Franklin
While you can and should keep your composure and happiness
regardless of circumstances - regardless of your friends,
family and co-workers - regardless of gossip, sarcasm, and negativity.
Nonetheless, life is much easier and more pleasant
when you spend as much time as possible
in the company of enthusiastic positive people -
not necessarily those who agree with you,
but those who respect your right to your point of view.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie
If a man does not make new acquaintances
as he advances through life,
he will soon find himself alone.
A man, sir, should keep his friendships in constant repair.
- Samuel Johnson
I've learned that you should always
leave loved ones with loving words.
It may be the last time you see them.
- Anonymous
NO ONE has been granted the authority to tell me
how my life should be lived.
I answer only to myself and to Spirit.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie
Each contact with a human being is so rare, so precious,
one should preserve it.
- Anais Nin
I soothe my conscience now with the thought that
it is better for hard words to be on paper
than that Mummy should carry them in her heart.
- Anne Frank
All discarded lovers should be given a second chance,
but with somebody else.
- Mae West
No house should ever be on a hill or on anything.
It should be of the hill. Belonging to it.
Hill and house should live together
each the happier for the other.
- Frank Lloyd Wright
A friend should be a master at guessing and keeping still.
- Friedrich Nietzsche
The physician can bury his mistakes,
but the architect can only advise his client to plant vines -
so they should go as far as possible from home
to build their first buildings.
- Frank Lloyd Wright
Books and friends should be few but good.
- Anonymous
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May the world be kind to you,
and may your own thoughts be gentle upon yourself.
- Jonathan Lockwood Huie
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