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Opposites Quotes

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Opposites Quotes

“I don't think he (Joseph Albers, fh) ever realized that it was his discipline that I came for. Besides, my response to what I learned from him was just the opposite of what he intended.. ..I was very hesitant about arbitrarily designing forms and selecting colors that would achieve some predetermined result, because I didn't have any ideas to support that sort of thing - I didn't want color to serve me, in other words.”

Thinking Want Ideas Form Results Support Achieve Design Color Discipline Opposites Response Predetermined Hesitant

Author:Robert Rauschenberg

“Power properly understood is nothing but the ability to achieve purpose... one of the great problems of history is that the concepts of love and power have usually been contrasted as opposites --- polar opposites --- so that love is identified with a resignation of power, and power with a denial of love... What is needed is a realization that power without love is reckless and abusive, and love without power is sentimental and anemic. Power at its best is love implementing the demands of justice, and justice at its best is power correcting everything that stands against love.”

“Psychologically, when you've been overweight you want to achieve the polar opposite.”

Want Achieve Opposites Overweight Polar Opposites

Author:Craig David

“Most people think leadership is about being in charge. Most people think leadership is about having all the answers and being the most intelligent person or the most qualified person in the room. The irony is that it is the complete opposite. Leadership is about empowering others to achieve things they did not think possible. Leadership is about pointing in the direction, articulating a vision of the world that does not yet exist. Then asking help from others to insure that vision happens.”

“Perhaps basketball and poetry have just a few things in common, but the most important is the possibility of transcendence. The opposite is labor. In writing, every writer knows when he or she is laboring to achieve an effect. You want to get from here to there, but find yourself willing it, forcing it. The equivalent in basketball is aiming your shot, a kind of strained and usually ineffective purposefulness. What you want is to be in some kind of flow, each next moment a discovery.”

“A word about 'plain English.' The phrase certainly shouldn't connote drab and dreary language. Actually, plain English is typically quite interesting to read. It's robust and direct-the opposite of gaudy, pretentious language. You achieve plain English when you use the simplest, most straightforward way of expressing an idea. You can still choose interesting words. But you'll avoid fancy ones that have everyday replacements meaning precisely the same thing.”

Source: Legal Writing in Plain English, Second Edition: A Text with Exercises

“The opposite of success is not failure. Unsuccessful efforts are not failures unless they so discourage you that you abandon further efforts to achieve your goal. Even then, the venture or effort may be a failure but you are not. Failure is an event not a character trait.”

May Character Goal Effort Achieve Events Opposites Abandon Traits Venture Discouraging Unsuccessful Achieving Your Goals Character Trait

Author:Michael Josephson

“When I started acting, I was asked said, 'What's your dream?' 'What would you like to achieve?' I would say, 'Oh, I'd like to sit opposite DeNiro and hold my own.' But, you never think it's gonna happen.”

Thinking Said Dream Happens My Own Acting Achieve Opposites Your Dreams

Author:Sharon Stone

“It is our responsibility as the stronger party [Israel], as the occupying power, to convince the Palestinians that they can achieve their basic national aims, their just national aspirations, without violence. Unfortunately, the behavior of the Sharon administration, and before this of the Barak administration, has shown the Palestinians the opposite: namely, that they will achieve nothing without violence.”

Party Responsibility Violence Achieve Behavior Opposites Stronger Aim Israel Administration Aspiration Convince Palestinian Sharon

Author:Uri Avnery

“Do not depend on the hope of results. You may have to face the fact that your work will be apparently worthless and even achieve no result at all, if not perhaps results opposite to what you expect. As you get used to this idea, you start more and more to concentrate not on the results, but on the value, the rightness, the truth of the work itself. You gradually struggle less and less for an idea and more and more for specific people. In the end, it is the reality of personal relationship that saves everything.”

People Ifs May Ideas Ends Facts Wisdom Reality Faces Used Values Results Struggle Achieve Depends Opposites Worthless Personal Relationships

Author:Thomas Merton

“The necessary consequence of man's right to life is his right to self-defense. In a civilized society, force may be used only in retaliation and only against those who initiate its use. All the reasons which make the initiation of physical force an evil, make the retaliatory use of physical force a moral imperative. If some "pacifist" society renounced the retaliatory use of force, it would be left helplessly at the mercy of the first thug who decided to be immoral. Such a society would achieve the opposite of its intention: instead of abolishing evil, it would encourage and reward it.”

“There are some things one can only achieve by a deliberate leap in the opposite direction.”

Action Inspiring Acting Achieve Spring Opposites Leap New Beginnings Deliberate Starting Over Inspirational New Beginning Endings Being New Beginnings New Beginning Life New Chapter In Life

Author:Franz Kafka

“Harmonizing opposites by going back to their source is the distinctive quality of the Zen attitude, the Middle Way: embracing contradictions, making a synthesis of them, achieving balance.”

Way Attitude Quality Middle Achieve Source Balance Opposites Buddhist Contradiction Distinctive Synthesis Middle Way

Author:Taisen Deshimaru

“Pugsley's First Law of Government: All government programs accomplish the opposite of what they are designed to achieve.”

Firsts Government Law Liberty Achieve Program Opposites Accomplish Libertarian Libertarianism Government Programs

Author:John Pugsley

“A note of caution: We can never achieve goals that envy sets for us. Looking at your friends and wishing you had what they had is a waste of precious energy. Because we are all unique, what makes another happy may do the opposite for you. That's why advice is nice but often disappointing when heeded.”