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Difficulty Quotes

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Difficulty Quotes

“The greatest difficulty in the world is not for people to accept new ideas, but to make them forget old ideas.”

People World Ideas Forget Accepting Difficulty New Ideas Old Ideas

Book:The Circle of Innovation: You Can't Shrink Your Way to Greatness

Source: The Circle of Innovation: You Can't Shrink Your Way to Greatness

“The harder you chase something, the faster you go and the less you're able to let life meet life. If you're having difficulty coming up with new ideas, then slow down.”

Ifs Ideas Able Difficulty Harder Faster New Ideas Slow Down

Author:Natalie Goldberg

“The difficulty in working with someone on a show like Idol or X Factor is they have an idea of what they think is cool in their heads, and it's important as a producer to maintain control of the session and not let it get side-tracked or chase too many rabbits. But it's also important to let the artist feel like their opinion matters, so that balance is difficult.”

Thinking Feels Important Ideas Matter Shows Artist Difficult Sides Opinion Balance Difficulty Factors Producers Idols Session Rabbits

Author:Ryan Tedder

“The simplest way of understanding justice is giving people what they deserve. This idea goes back to Aristotle. The real difficulty begins with figuring out who deserves what and why.”

People Way Giving Ideas Real Understanding Justice Deserve Difficulty Simplest

Author:Michael Sandel

“Our conceptions of morality, as all our other ideas, pass through a course of development; the difficulty comes in adjusting our conduct, which has become hardened into customs and habits, to these changing moral conceptions. When this adjustment is not made, we suffer from the strain and indecision of believing one hypothesis and acting upon another.”

Believe Made Ideas Suffering Courses Acting Moral Development Habit Morality Difficulty Customs Conception Strain Hypothesis Adjustment Indecision Hardened Adjusting

Book:Democracy and Social Ethics

Source: Democracy and Social Ethics

“The difficulty in our education up till now lies, for the most part, in the fact that knowledge did not refine itself into will, to application of itself, to pure practice. The realists felt the need and supplied it, though in a most miserable way, by cultivating idea-less and fettered "practical men." Most college students are living examples of this sad turn of events. Trained in the most excellent manner, they go on training; drilled they continue drilling.”

Source: The False Principle of Our Education: Or, Humanism and Realism

“The discovery of radioactivity created a momentary chaos in chemistry and physics; but it soon led to a fuller interpretation of the old ideas. It dispersed many difficulties, harmonized many discords, and yea, more! It shewed the substance of Universe as a simplicity of Light and Life, manners to compose atoms, themselves capable of deeper self-realization through fresh complexities and organizations, each with its own peculiar powers and pleasures, each pursuing its path through the world where all things are possible.”

“Know that the difficulties which lead to confusion in the question what is the purpose of the Universe or of any of its parts, arise from two causes: first, man has an erroneous idea of himself, and believes that the whole world exists only for his sake; secondly, he is ignorant both about the nature of the sublunary world, and about the Creator's intention to give existence to all beings whose existence is possible, because existence is undoubtedly good.”

Knows Men World Giving Firsts Believe Two Ideas Whole Purpose Universe Causes Existence Difficulty Intention Sake Creator Arise Whole World Ignorant Confusion

Book:The Guide for the Perplexed

Source: The Guide for the Perplexed

“Consultation and compliance can conduce little to the perfection of any literary performance; for whoever is so doubtful of his own abilities as to encourage the remarks of others, will find himself every day embarrassed with new difficulties, and will harass his mind, in vain, with the hopeless labour of uniting heterogeneous ideas, digesting independent hints, and collecting into one point the several rays of borrowed light, emitted often with contrary directions.”

Source: Samuel Johnson: Selected Writings

“If we imagine that God is somehow punishing us, then we will live our lives in desperation and in fear that we are somehow avoiding displeasing God. The difficulty with that is as many ideas about how to displease and how to please God, as there are hairs on your head.”

Ifs Ideas Our Lives Imagine Hair Please Difficulty Imagine That Avoiding Desperation

Author:Neale Donald Walsch

“It strikes me as very strange that whereas Tennyson could support most of Mr. Buckley's propositions about free trade, and the private sector, and private enterprise, Tennyson found no difficulty also in lending intellectual support to the idea of Women's Liberation.”

Ideas Found Support Strange Intellectual Difficulty Trade Strikes Liberation Enterprise Propositions Private Sector Free Trade Lending Private Enterprise Tennyson

Author:Germaine Greer

“Think beyond the pain. Think beyond the difficulty. Commit to having one good idea every day. What new idea will you claim today?”

Thinking Ideas Today Pain Claims Difficulty Commit Good Ideas New Ideas

Author:Mary Morrissey

“When we learn to deal directly with our complaints and difficulties, romanticized ideas about the spiritual path are no longer meaningful. We see that what is important is to take responsibility for ourselves, and to always be aware of our thoughts, feelings, and actions.”

Important Ideas Feelings Action Spiritual Deals Responsibility Path Difficulty Meaningful Our Thoughts Complaints Taking Responsibility Spiritual Path

Book:Gesture of Balance: A Guide to Awareness, Self-healing, and Meditation

Source: Gesture of Balance: A Guide to Awareness, Self-healing, and Meditation

“Whenever I attempt to frame a simple idea of time, abstracted from the succession of ideas in my mind, which flows uniformly, and is participated by all beings, I am lost and embrangled in inextricable difficulties.”

Mind Ideas Lost Simple Flow Difficulty Succession Simple Ideas

Book:Berkeley: Philosophical Writings

Source: Berkeley: Philosophical Writings

“The basic idea is to shove all fundamental difficulties onto the neutron and to do quantum mechanics in the nucleus.”

Ideas Difficulty Fundamentals Physics Quantum Mechanic Quantum Physics Quantum Mechanics Nucleus Neutrons

Author:Werner Heisenberg

“Irving Wallace wrote a bestselling novel, The Man, in the 1960s about a black man becoming president of the United States. We thought that such a possibility was thousands of years in the future. Some people may still have some difficulty with the idea, but that's a major cultural meme shift.”

People Men Years May Stills Ideas States Black President United United States Novel Possibility He Man Becoming Majors Difficulty 1960s Memes Becoming President

Author:Wayne Dyer

“It was an interesting thing to do. Why did I write any of my books, after all? For the sake of the pleasure, for the sake of the difficulty. I have no social purpose, no moral message; I've no general ideas to exploit, I just like composing riddles with elegant solutions.”

Writing Book Ideas Purpose Social Pleasure Interesting Moral Messages Solutions Difficulty Sake Things To Do Elegant Exploits Interesting Things Riddle Composing Elegant Solutions

Book:Strong opinions

Source: Strong opinions

“The difficulty, then, is when you create a church, an institution, and you create a dogma. When you create an ideology, that's the danger. Communism, too, is a beautiful idea, but millions of people died when communism became an ideology.”

People Ideas Beautiful Church Millions Danger Difficulty Died Institutions Ideology Communism Dogma

Author:Michael Haneke

“I want my audience to leave the theatre with positive emotions through this sensorial journey in the world of precious and fragile teenage beauty. And also the idea that the difficulties that we have to go through help us reveal who we really are.”

World Want Ideas Helping Emotion Audience Journey Difficulty Theatre Fragile Teenage Positive Emotions

Author:Alante Kavaite

“In the peace process, the partner doesn't just sit and allow things to deteriorate to the point of disaster. The United States is needed with thoughts and with ideas, not only with the attitude of a messenger between parties, but - when things get rough - to come in and help with what is just and what is right, to overcome difficulty.”

Ideas States Helping Process United Party Attitude United States Needed Overcoming Difficulty Partners Disaster Rough Messengers

Author:King Hussein I

“Design: holding conflicting ideas in your head without difficulty”

Ideas Design Difficulty Conflicting Ideas

Author:Danny Hillis

“We tend to blame the physical media for most of our implementation difficulties; for the media are not "ours" in the way the ideas are, and our pride colors our judgement.”

Way Ideas Media Color Pride Difficulty Blame Judgement Implementation

Author:Fred Brooks

“I've been reading [Nikita] Khrushchev Remembers. I know he's a bit of a lad himself - but he seemed to think that making a religion out of an individual was bad; that doesn't seem to be part of the basic Communist idea. Still people are people, that's the difficulty.”

People Thinking Knows Stills Ideas Seems Remember Reading Individual Bits Difficulty Communist Lad

Author:John Lennon

“Well I started out on guitar, so it is still the mainstay of my music. But I have recently been working very hard on my piano, and it is coming along to the point where it is taking more of the spotlight. It has been my plan to be able to make music well into my old age, and sitting down seems like a good idea. Also, I don't have to carry the piano on the road. I haven't been playing the banjo much of late because of the difficulties of travelling with so much gear. But maybe I'll bring it to Japan. It adds a different color to the musical palette.”

“I write books and either people read them or they don't read them. The rise of Facebook or e-books doesn't change the difficulty level of writing sentences and thinking up new ideas.”

People Thinking Writing Book Ideas Levels Difficulty Sentences New Ideas

Author:Colson Whitehead

“The difficulty lies, not in the new ideas, but in escaping from the old ones.”

“Spiritual models for me are the communities of Tibetans living in exile in India, or the banjars of Bali, which exist in times of difficulty, oppression. Alternative spaces-perhaps this kind of communication can take place over the Net? Probably only up to a point as the Net's controlled by the military. But the idea is to live outside multi-national, monocultural, commodification prison, outside the grey areas of power-mad, monied collusion.”

“I used to write a monthly column for the 'New York Times' syndicate. But I stopped because I found it really hard to have one extreme opinion a month. I don't know how these columnists have two or three ideas a week; I was having difficulty having 12 things to say a year.”

Knows Writing Years Two Ideas Hard Used Three Found Opinion Know How Week New York Months Difficulty Extremes Columns New York Times Columnists Syndicate

Author:Salman Rushdie

“The great difficulty in education is to get experience out of ideas.”

Ideas Education Difficulty

Book:Little essays drawn from the writings of George Santayana

Source: Little essays drawn from the writings of George Santayana

“We were an ill-matched pair, my husband and I, from the very outset; he, with very high ideas of a husband's authority and a wife's submission, holding strongly to the 'master-in-my-own-house theory,' thinking much of the details of home arrangements, precise, methodical, easily angered and with difficulty appeased.”

Thinking Ideas Home House My Own Wife Masters Theory Husband Authority Difficulty Ill Details Pairs My Husband Arrangements Precise Submission Matched Methodical

Book:Annie Besant: An Autobiography

Source: Annie Besant: An Autobiography

“A man is a poet if difficulties inherent in his art provide him with ideas; he is not a poet if they deprive him of ideas.”

Ifs Men Art Ideas Poet Difficulty Inherent

Author:Paul Valery

“The difficulty for most of us in the modern world is that the old-fashioned idea of God has become incredible or implausible.”

World Ideas Modern Difficulty Incredibles Old Fashioned Modern World

Book:The essence of Alan Watts

Source: The essence of Alan Watts

“As a kid I quite fancied the romantic, Bohemian idea of being an artist. I expect I thought I could escape from the difficulties of maths and spelling. Maybe I thought I would avoid the judgement of the establishment.”

Ideas Kids Artist Romantic Difficulty Math Judgement Establishment Being An Artist Spelling Bohemian Bohemia

Author:Peter Wright

“If you're having difficulty coming up with new ideas, then slow down. For me, slowing down has been a tremendous source of creativity. It has allowed me to open up -- to know that there's life under the earth and that I have to let it come through me in a new way. Creativity exists in the present moment. You can't find it anywhere else.”

Ifs Knows Way Has Beens Art Ideas Moments Earth Creativity Source Difficulty Present Moment New Ways New Ideas Slow Down Slowing

Author:Natalie Goldberg

“(...) being right all the time acquires a huge importance in education, and there is this terror of being wrong. The ego is so tied to being right that later on in life you are reluctant to accept that you are ever wrong, because you are defending not the idea but your self-esteem. (...) this terror of being wrong means that people have enormous difficulties in changing ideas.”

People Mean Ideas Real Self Accepting Self Esteem Huge Ego Importance Difficulty Terror Real Life Enormous Esteem Acquire Tied Reluctant Being Wrong

Book:PO: a device for successful thinking

Source: PO: a device for successful thinking

“To get the right word in the right place is a rare achievement. To condense the diffused light of a page of thought into the luminous flash of a single sentence, is worthy to rank as a prize composition just by itself...Anybody can have ideas--the difficulty is to express them without squandering a quire of paper on an idea that ought to be reduced to one glittering paragraph.”

“At first, when an idea, a poem, or the desire to write takes hold of you, work is a pleasure, a delight, and your enthusiasm knows no bounds. But later on you work with difficulty, doggedly, desperately. For once you have committed yourself to a particular work, inspiration changes its form and becomes an obsession, like a love-affair… which haunts you night and day! Once at grips with a work, we must master it completely before we can recover our idleness.”

Knows Writing Firsts Ideas Inspiration Form Desire Night Pleasure Particular Masters Difficulty Bounds Affair Committed Delight Obsession Enthusiasm Idleness Love Affair

Author:Natalie Clifford Barney

“The more Lord Maccon considered it, the more he grew to like the idea. Certainly his imagination was full of pictures of what he and Alexia might do together once he got her home in a properly wedded state, but now those lusty images were mixing with others: waking up next to her, seeing her across the dining table, discussing science and politics, having her advice on points of pack controversy and BUR difficulties. No doubt she would be useful in verbal frays and social machinations, as long as she was on his side.”

“Are not the thoughts of the dying often turned towards the practical, painful, obscure, visceral aspect, towards the "seamy side" of death which is, as it happens, the side that death actually presents to them and forces them to feel, and which far more closely resembles a crushing burden, a difficulty in breathing, a destroying thirst, than the abstract idea to which we are accustomed to give the name of Death?”

Source: In Search Of Lost Time Vol 1: Swann's Way

“The difficulty lies, not in the new ideas, but in escaping the old ones, which ramify, for those brought up as most of us have been, into every corner of our minds.”

Mind Has Beens Ideas Lying Fear Education Atheism Difficulty Corners Rage New Ideas Escaping

Book:General Theory Of Employment , Interest And Money

Source: General Theory Of Employment , Interest And Money

“Workers must root out the idea that by keeping the results of their labors to themselves a fortune will be assured to them. Patent fees are so much wasted money. The flying machine of the future will not be born fully fledged and capable of a flight for 1,000 miles or so. Like everything else it must be evolved gradually. The first difficulty is to get a thing that will fly at all. When this is made, a full description should be published as an aid to others. Excellence of design and workmanship will always defy competition.”

“It is very remarkable that while the words Eternal, Eternity, Forever, are constantly in our mouths, and applied without hesitation, we yet experience considerable difficulty in contemplating any definite term which bears a very large proportion to the brief cycles of our petty chronicles. There are many minds that would not for an instant doubt the God of Nature to have existed from all Eternity, and would yet reject as preposterous the idea of going back a million of years in the History of His Works. Yet what is a million, or a million million, of solar revolutions to an Eternity?”

“The real difficulty is that people have no idea of what education truly is. We assess the value of education in the same manner as we assess the value of land or of shares in the stock-exchange market. We want to provide only such education as would enable the student to earn more. We hardly give any thought to the improvement of the character of the educated. The girls, we say, do not have to earn; so why should they be educated? As long as such ideas persist there is no hope of our ever knowing the true value of education.”

Source: True Education

“One [idea] was that the Universe started its life a finite time ago in a single huge explosion, and that the present expansion is a relic of the violence of this explosion. This big bang idea seemed to me to be unsatisfactory even before detailed examination showed that it leads to serious difficulties.”

Life Ideas Bigs Science Universe Violence Serious Huge Difficulty Expansion Finite Bangs Explosions Examination Relics Nomenclature

Book:The nature of the universe

Source: The nature of the universe

“Mere numbers cannot bring out ... the intimate essence of the experiment. This conviction comes naturally when one watches a subject at work. ... What things can happen! What reflections, what remarks, what feelings, or, on the other hand, what blind automatism, what absence of ideas! ... The experimenter judges what may be going on in [the subject's] mind, and certainly feels difficulty in expressing all the oscillations of a thought in a simple, brutal number, which can have only a deceptive precision. How, in fact, could it sum up what would need several pages of description!”

“One of the principal obstacles to the rapid diffusion of a new idea lies in the difficulty of finding suitable expression to convey its essential point to other minds. Words may have to be strained into a new sense, and scientific controversies constantly resolve themselves into differences about the meaning of words. On the other hand, a happy nomenclature has sometimes been more powerful than rigorous logic in allowing a new train of thought to be quickly and generally accepted.”

“Anybody can have ideas-the difficulty is to express them without squandering a quire of paper on an idea that ought to be reduced to one glittering paragraph.”

Writing Ideas Written Ought Paper Difficulty Composition Paragraph Writers Reading Written Language Squandering Plain Language Difficulty Of Writing

Book:Mark Twain's Letters, Volume 2: 1867-1868

Source: Mark Twain's Letters, Volume 2: 1867-1868

“I should have been glad to acquire some sort of idea of Hindu theology, ... but the difficulties were too great.”

Should Has Beens Ideas Should Have Difficulty Glad Theology Acquire Hinduism Should Have Been

Book:The Writings of Mark Twain [pseud.]

Source: The Writings of Mark Twain [pseud.]

“The only idea man can affix to the name of God, is that of a first cause, the cause of all things. And, incomprehensibly difficult as it is for a man to conceive what a first cause is, he arrives at the belief of it, from the tenfold greater difficulty of disbelieving it. It is difficult beyond description to conceive that space can have no end; but it is more difficult to conceive an end. It is difficult beyond the power of man to conceive an eternal duration of what we call time; but it is more impossible to conceive a time when there shall be no time.”

Men Firsts Ideas Ends Names Belief Causes Difficult Space Greater Impossible Eternal All Things Difficulty All Time Description Duration

Book:Paine's Age of Reason, with Remarks, Containing a Vindication of the Doctrines of Christianity from the Aspersions of that Author. By a Citizen of the World [i.e. James Tytler]

Source: Paine's Age of Reason, with Remarks, Containing a Vindication of the Doctrines of Christianity from the Aspersions of that Author. By a Citizen of the World [i.e. James Tytler]

“In passing, we should here recognize the difficulties presented by the idea of 'fit' and 'unfit.' Who is to decide this question? The grosser, the more obvious, the undeniably feeble-minded should, indeed, not only be discouraged but prevented from propagating their kind. But among the writings of the representative Eugenists [sic], one cannot ignore the distinct middle-class bias that prevails.”

Should Writing Kind Ideas Class Middle Fit Difficulty Obvious Passing Passings Middle Class Representatives Bias Discouraged Planned Parenthood

Book:The Pivot of Civilization in Historical Perspective: The Birth Control Classic

Source: The Pivot of Civilization in Historical Perspective: The Birth Control Classic