Deep Proverbs Quotes

Plants are more courageous than almost all human beings: an orange tree would rather die than produce lemons, whereas instead of dying the average person would rather be someone they are not.

You cannot be truly humble, unless you truly believe that life can and will go on without you.

Most people write me off when they see me. They do not know my story. They say I am just an African. They judge me before they get to know me. What they do not know is The pride I have in the blood that runs through my veins; The pride I have in my rich culture and the history of my people; The pride I have in my strong family ties and the deep connection to my community; The pride I have in the African music, African art, and African dance; The pride I have in my name and the meaning behind it. Just as my name has meaning, I too will live my life with meaning. So you think I am nothing? Don’t worry about what I am now, For what I will be, I am gradually becoming. I will raise my head high wherever I go Because of my African pride, And nobody will take that away from me.

A relationship is likely to last way longer, if each partner convinces or has convinced themselves that they do not deserve their partner, even if that is not true.

Some people avoid thinking deeply in public, only because they are afraid of coming across as suicidal.

Some of us were brought into this troubled world primarily or only to increase our fathers’ chances of not being left by our mothers, or vice versa.

Life sometimes reminds us that it is sometimes heartless by giving something or someone we really need to someone who does not need or even want them or it.

A premature death does not only rob one of the countless instances where one would have experienced pleasure, it also saves one from the innumerable instances where one would have experienced pain.

The most upsetting thing about Society’s attitude towards disabled people is that many millions of disabled people became disabled while trying to please Society, the very same bitch that secretly regards them as subhuman.

Life is a process during which one initially gets less and less dependent, independent, and then more and more dependent.

We are loved way more by some of the people who have not contacted us in the last twelve or so months than we are loved by some of those who contact us every twelve or so days … or hours.

Some people will hate you for not loving them.

We are way less likely to love someone just because they love us than we are to hate someone just because they hate us.

Most sane human beings who are over the age of six usually act or react not as per what they genuinely feel or really think but in accordance with the expectations of those around them.

Some people hate people who are overconfident, only because their overconfidence reminds them of their underconfidence.

An expensive coffin does not decrease the deceased’s chances of going to hell.

The death of a billionaire is worth more to the media than the lives of a billion poor people.

Patriotism is the narcissism of countries.

The kind of lies that someone tells us gives us an idea of how stupid, knowledgeable, intelligent, or ignorant they are … or they think we are.

Being bored is the price we pay for not being insane.

Not everyone who talks less or keeps quiet whenever they are with or around you does that because they find you interesting or knowledgeable; some people do that because they find you boring or ignorant.

Most sane human beings’ chances of being alive in a thousand years’ time are a hundred times higher than their chances of being sincerely happy for at least ten consecutive days.

Adults who use big words in order to seem intelligent are annoying, especially those who are not intelligent.

The world economy would collapse if a significant number of people were to realize and then act on the realization that it is possible to enjoy many if not most of the things that they enjoy without first having to own them.

Most men would no longer enjoy conversing with most women if they stopped bringing their vaginas along.

The fact that the person who you are sleeping with is also sleeping with another person or other people does not necessarily mean that he or she does not love you. And the fact that you are the only person who someone is sleeping with does not necessarily mean that he or she loves you.

The human population would probably be way less than a thousand, if ejaculation were not usually accompanied by an orgasm.

We all have problems. Or rather, everyone has at least one thing that they regard as a problem.

In some cases, you can tell how somebody is being treated by their own boss from the way they are treating someone to whom they are a boss.

Among other possibilities, money was invented to make it possible for a foolish man to control wise men; a weak man, strong men; a child, old men; an ignorant man, knowledgeable men; and for a dwarf to control giants.

A truly compassionate man gives a poor woman a portion of his meal before he eats, not after he has eaten.

Death devours not only those who have been cooked by old age; it also feasts on those who are half-cooked and even those who are raw.

In reality most human beings are not, to most human beings, more important than money.

If we were not impressed by job titles, suits, and jargon, we would demand that financial advisors show us their personal bank statements before they tell us what we could or should do with our own money.

Many if not most slaves would have each readily jumped, and many if not most slaves would each readily jump, at the opportunity to be a master, if such an opportunity presents or had presented itself.

A seemingly simple task like taking a bath or wearing a condom feels like multitasking to someone who suffers from hemiplegia or has only one hand.

Bigheadedness is usually a symptom of small-mindedness.

To some believers, being on the pill or using a condom is a nonverbal way of telling God to go to hell.

Being rich or famous is the only profound thing that some people have ever said.

Some people masturbate to temporarily replace their partners when they are absent, whereas some people do that to temporarily live in the present.

With regard to things such as independence, mental capabilities, and sexuality, a very old man is nothing but a gigantic infant with white hair and wrinkles.

The last time everyone loved or at least liked everyone was when the world had a population of about 4.

The average adult has had sex innumerable times more than they have formed an opinion of their own.

Some women’s greatest achievement is sleeping with a man who is rich, famous, and/or wanted by many women, whereas some women’s greatest achievement is refusing to sleep with such a man.

Not a few millions of parents strongly hope that their own children will step in by instantly becoming their own parents’ foster parents, if and when the parents reach their second childhood.

Many a survivor of a plane crash who is or was against cannibalism and had never eaten human flesh once found themselves in a situation where they had to either eat human flesh, or go the way of all flesh.

Millions of business people are each constantly forced to choose between their desire to not be a bad person and their desire to be a good business person, that is to say, to make as much money as they possibly can by maximizing their revenue while minimizing the cost of producing whatever it is that they sell.

Most human beings strongly believe that money is way less important than the life of a human being, but in reality five hundred, fifty, or even five dollars are way more important to the lives of most human beings than the lives of most human beings.

Most poor people do not really aspire to end poverty; they merely aspire to escape it.

One of the main functions of a push-up bra is to lower the number of mothers who seem like mothers.

Many a death was precipitated by the food, the job, or the medication whose main function was to postpone it.

Greed is a contagious mental illness without which civilization as we know it would not have been possible.

There is nothing morally wrong with buying stolen goods, unless you know that they were stolen.

Many a parent, sad to say, has used their child as an opportunity for them, the parent, to do, through their child, something or some of the things that they, the parent, did not do or did not do successfully.

For their never-ending endeavours to obtain or retain wealth, countries desperately need companies, because they—unlike most human beings—have the means of production, and human beings, because they—unlike all companies—have the means of reproduction.

Some people are each holding on to a lover of theirs who no longer loves them and/or who they no longer love, only because they do not want to have a reason or another reason to be jealous of the person who would eventually be their lover if they let go of them.

We, in the interest of the so-called progress, have been persuaded to leave the production and at times the cooking of our food to companies whose owners and employees make a living by exploiting our busyness or laziness and our innate hunger to continue living.

Some of the people who hate me love some of the sentences that I have written, until they get to the name of the person to whom the sentences are attributed.

Some people who have been working out regularly for months or even years are still out of shape because the number of cheat days they have in a week exceeds six.

Most human beings would have never been pained by the death of a human being if they had never seen a human being or pretending to be pained by that.

Some social ills are preserved by the common misbelief that things such as ignorance, greed, and stupidity do not have the stamina required to reach old age.

Most of us cling to life as if our existence were a result of our deed or choice.

Although they probably know that some children were used and some children are used as miners, most adults are ignorant of the chocolate industry’s use of minors.

We are all visitors to this time, this place. We are just passing through. Our purpose here is to observe, to learn, to grow, to love… and then we return home.” —Australian Aboriginal proverb

Loneliness tortures many if not most of the elderly more intensely and more frequently than it torments many if not most of us who will never be or have not yet been pushed or pulled into old age.

Most sane human beings who have managed to attain and retain fame each uses it to dramatically increase their name’s chances of being remembered until Jesus comes back, since their heart cannot do what they consciously or unconsciously lust for, that is to say, for it to beat until Jesus returns.

Just like how most if not all poor boys look up to and aspire to someday be rich men, most if not all underdeveloped and developing countries look up to and aspire to someday be developed countries.

Many millions of pregnancies—many if not most of which have each led to the birth of at least one child—were each used as nothing but a conspicuous means to a secret end called the evasion of abortion.

When selecting a one-night stand, a heterosexual woman who is materialistic is a trillion times more likely to choose a sexually unattractive poor man who seems rich over a sexually attractive rich man who seems poor.

To ask a man whether or not he has a girlfriend is to talk about his sex life. If you disagree with that, then how in the name of God do you differentiate between a man’s girlfriend and a girl that is a friend to the man?

As we all know, as if forever exploiting or attempting to exploit each other were not enough, a group of sane human beings who have just reached the end of a war against a common enemy of theirs will sooner or later start or continue killing and/or fighting against each other.

Boredom is probably more frequent and more tormenting if you do not have sight or hands.

Many of the boys and men who are regarded as immature by some females are so deemed merely because they do not want to get married someday … or soon.

When in court, the primary role of lawyers is not to prove or disprove innocence; unbeknown to almost all lawyers and their clients, it is to save the court time.

For a sane person to sincerely be happy that someone has succeeded, they have to either be profiting or likely to profit from that person’s success, or be that person.

Famine sometimes increases the number of people who are overweight.

Unless they are off duty, no matter how wide it is, and even when it is sincere, a smile seems fake if the job description of the person who is smiling includes smiling.

More often than not, expecting to lose weight without first losing the diet that made the weight loss necessary is like expecting a pig to be spotless after hosing it down while it was still rolling in mud.

A fight is like the perfect storm. It is risky and dangerous. But, as the African proverb goes, Smooth seas do not make skillful sailors. Fights are often learning opportunities—if we’re willing to dig deep enough past our own egos.

I'm learning what it means to focus less on me and more on God, because when I focus my attention on him, he enables me to focus my love and my patience on those who matter most to me. If there's anything I have learned from going through this experiment--which really became much more a challenge of the heart than any kind of domestic diva contest--is that as a wife, as a mom, as a woman, and ultimately as a daughter of Christ, I have much influence. And I can use it for good and for blessing, or I can use it for harm and for cursing. I want to be the wife who is a blessing to her family, who is praised and remembered, not for the activities or projects I checked off, but for the smiles I wore, the peace I shared, and the deep love of God I hope I instilled wherever I went....

What is in the marrow is hard to take out of the bone.--Irish Proverb

A maid’s yard, house, wardrobe, fridge, etc. sometimes also serve as her master’s dustbin or dumpsite.

Some people would have killed themselves and/or someone else if they were single; and some people would not have done that.

It goes without saying that even those of us who are going to hell will get eternal life—if that territory really exists outside religious books and the minds of believers, that is. Having said that, given the choice, instead of being grilled until hell freezes over, the average sane human being would, needless to say, rather spend forever idling in an extremely fertile garden, next to a lamb or a chicken or a parrot, which they do not secretly want to eat, and a lion or a tiger or a crocodile, which does not secretly want to eat them.

If the food that one ate the night before were somehow able to be seen and identified through one’s clothes throughout the day, millions of employees would each fast ten or so days before their payday.

More often than not, an inspirational or motivational speaker is someone who makes money from telling us that we can do all of the things that we can do … and pretty much all of the things that we cannot do.

A leaf is a silent proverb. Did you ever consider that? When it buds on the tree, people rejoice. Throughout is prime, they love it for the shade it provides. But only when it reaches the end of its time on the tree does its brilliance come through. Sometimes yellow, sometimes orange, sometimes deep red. Dazzling in its artistry, like a drop of sunset you can see at all house of the day." Clara smiled. "A leaf has the most extraordinary death. There is so much beauty to it." Mrs. Kip

In his book Human Universals, Donald E. Brown lists traits that people in all places share. The list goes on and on. All children fear strangers and prefer sugar solutions to plain water from birth. All humans enjoy stories, myths, and proverbs. In all societies men engage in more group violence and travel farther from home than women. In all societies, husbands are on average older than their wives. People everywhere rank one another according to prestige. People everywhere divide the world between those inside their group and those outside their group. These tendencies are all stored deep below awareness.

Whoever curses his father or his mother, his lamp will be put out in deep darkness” (Proverbs 20:20).

Millions of sane people would each be sexually attracted to their own parent or child if they were not related to them.

Some people have contracted HIV during their separate endeavours to give someone or some people a curable STD.

Most people do kiss and tell; most of them just don’t tell many people.

The purpose in a man’s mind is like a deep water. Proverbs 20:5

A leaf is a silent proverb. Did you ever consider that? When it buds on the tree, people rejoice. Throughout its prime, they love it for the shade it provides. But only when it reaches the end of its time on the tree does its brilliance come through. Sometimes yellow, sometimes orange, sometimes deep red. Dazzling in its artistry, like a drop of sunset you can see at all hours of the day.” Clara smiled. “A leaf has the most extraordinary death. There is so much beauty to it.

To say I woke up one day and reached a point where I no longer cared about the pains to befall me would be a lie. Nor can I say that I have ever fully forgiven those who willfully did me harm. On a deep, internal battlefield, I wrestle with the thought that I have been robbed of any chance of normalcy by the losses suffered. Therapists and gurus alike tell us to, “Let go or be dragged,” as Zen proverb urges—to forgive for our own sake. But, in my experience, there is no letting go and forgiveness is transient. My inability to be free of it all isn’t for lack of an evolved consciousness on my part. I’ve “done the work” to process it all; rather, it is my irreconcilable, inescapable humanity that causes to clutch the pain close to me.

The reader of Plato joins Socrates in inquiry, as Sancho Panza joined Don Quixote, for adventures of the mind. And although there is a deep consent, like a fire kindled deep in the mind, there is always a tension between the squire and the knight-errant, the little man with proverbs for wisdom riding on a donkey and the knight with the piercing eye riding on a horse, those two parts of each human soul. The intellectual destiny that each of us has depends upon who gets the upper hand, knight or squire.

talk is for communicating need-to-know information; quiet and introspection are signs of deep thought and higher truth. Words are potentially dangerous weapons that reveal things better left unsaid. They hurt other people; they can get their speaker into trouble. Consider, for example, these proverbs from the East: The wind howls, but the mountain remains still. —JAPANESE PROVERB

A leaf is a silent proverb. Did you ever consider that? When it buds on the tree, people rejoice. Throughout its prime, they love it for the shade it provides. But only when it reaches its time on the tree does its brilliance come through. Sometimes yellow, sometimes orange, sometimes deep red. Dazzling in its artistry, like a drop of sunset you can see at all hours of the day. A leaf has the most extraordinary death. There is so much beauty in it.

There's one thing you ought to know about old people," Alberto Terégo told me on our early morning walk on the beach. "Like what?" I asked my friend in reply. "Like old people don't mind if you kill them," Terégo said. "Just don't give them any more crap while you're doing it." "Are you talking about yourself?" I said. "You're telling me you'd rather have someone kill you than give you a hard time?” My head was starting to hurt. It usually did when I talked with Terégo, but never so soon into our daily conservation. He was grinning now, knowing he had me again. I just stared at him. He has this uncanny knack of making me feel he's laid a booby trap of punji sticks on which I'm about to impale myself. “That's ridiculous," I said finally, feeling like a kid for not being able to come up with a better response to his bizarre suggestion. “No, it's life,” Terégo said, his grin growing larger. “What's life?” I said. “Taking crap,” he said. "Taking crap is life?" I said. The grin hung ear to ear now. “It's what nice people do,” Terégo said. “There's an 18th century proverb that says we all have to eat a peck of dirt before we die. We do it from an early age, so old people have been doing it for a very long time, way beyond the proverbial amount that broke the camel's back.” “Eating dirt is life?” I said, feeling the pain grow under my arched eyebrows. "That's right," he said. "Eating dirt?" I repeated dully. "We do it to be team players, so we don’t rock the boat, to go with the flow," Terégo said. "We put up, shut up, get along--no matter what--with people even the Dalai Lama would slap silly. We defer to their foolishness, stupidity, biases, racism, ego, telling them what they want to hear, keeping quiet when we ought to be speaking up loud and clear. We put a sock in it even though it chokes us. We do it so we won’t offend, to fit in, be neighborly, sociable, kind. We do it so people will like us, love and reward and hire and promote us. We do it to be successful, secure, happy." "We eat dirt to be happy," I said, my eyes starting to glaze over like frost on window panes in deep winter. "You see the supreme irony in that," Terégo said, the triumph in his voice almost palpable, galling me no end.

THE OBEDIENCE GAME DUGGAR KIDS GROW UP playing the Obedience Game. It’s sort of like Mother May I? except it has a few extra twists—and there’s no need to double-check with “Mother” because she (or Dad) is the one giving the orders. It’s one way Mom and Dad help the little kids in the family burn off extra energy some nights before we all put on our pajamas and gather for Bible time (more about that in chapter 8). To play the Obedience Game, the little kids all gather in the living room. After listening carefully to Mom’s or Dad’s instructions, they respond with “Yes, ma’am, I’d be happy to!” then run and quickly accomplish the tasks. For example, Mom might say, “Jennifer, go upstairs to the girls’ room, touch the foot of your bed, then come back downstairs and give Mom a high-five.” Jennifer answers with an energetic “Yes, ma’am, I’d be happy to!” and off she goes. Dad might say, “Johannah, run around the kitchen table three times, then touch the front doorknob and come back.” As Johannah stands up she says, “Yes, sir, I’d be happy to!” “Jackson, go touch the front door, then touch the back door, then touch the side door, and then come back.” Jackson, who loves to play army, stands at attention, then salutes and replies, “Yes, sir, I’d be happy to!” as he goes to complete his assignment at lightning speed. Sometimes spotters are sent along with the game player to make sure the directions are followed exactly. And of course, the faster the orders can be followed, the more applause the contestant gets when he or she slides back into the living room, out of breath and pleased with himself or herself for having complied flawlessly. All the younger Duggar kids love to play this game; it’s a way to make practicing obedience fun! THE FOUR POINTS OF OBEDIENCE THE GAME’S RULES (MADE up by our family) stem from our study of the four points of obedience, which Mom taught us when we were young. As a matter of fact, as we are writing this book she is currently teaching these points to our youngest siblings. Obedience must be: 1. Instant. We answer with an immediate, prompt “Yes ma’am!” or “Yes sir!” as we set out to obey. (This response is important to let the authority know you heard what he or she asked you to do and that you are going to get it done as soon as possible.) Delayed obedience is really disobedience. 2. Cheerful. No grumbling or complaining. Instead, we respond with a cheerful “I’d be happy to!” 3. Thorough. We do our best, complete the task as explained, and leave nothing out. No lazy shortcuts! 4. Unconditional. No excuses. No, “That’s not my job!” or “Can’t someone else do it? or “But . . .” THE HIDDEN GOAL WITH this fun, fast-paced game is that kids won’t need to be told more than once to do something. Mom would explain the deeper reason behind why she and Daddy desired for us to learn obedience. “Mom and Daddy won’t always be with you, but God will,” she says. “As we teach you to hear and obey our voice now, our prayer is that ultimately you will learn to hear and obey what God’s tells you to do through His Word.” In many families it seems that many of the goals of child training have been lost. Parents often expect their children to know what they should say and do, and then they’re shocked and react harshly when their sweet little two-year-old throws a tantrum in the middle of the grocery store. This parental attitude probably stems from the belief that we are all born basically good deep down inside, but the truth is, we are all born with a sin nature. Think about it: You don’t have to teach a child to hit, scream, whine, disobey, or be selfish. It comes naturally. The Bible says that parents are to “train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it” (Proverbs 22:6).