James Richardson: Trending quotes

“Happiness is the readiness to be happy.”

James Richardson

Aphorism #33
Interglacial (2004)

Happy , Birthday , Peaceful , Goodbye

“To me the great divide is between the talkative and the quiet. Do they just say everything that’s on their minds, even before it’s on their minds? Sometimes I think I could just turn up my head like a walkman so what’s going on there could be heard by others. But there would still be a difference. For inside the head they are talking to people like them, and I am talking to someone like me: he is quiet and doesn’t much like being talked at; he can’t conceal how easily he gets bored.”

James Richardson

#127
Vectors: Aphorisms and Ten Second Essays (2001)

People , Thinking

“Often you only have to ask What would I do if I were not afraid?”

James Richardson

#121
Vectors: Aphorisms and Ten Second Essays (2001)

“Books serve us simply by opening a window on all we wanted to say and feel and think about. We may not even notice that they have not said it themselves till we go back to them years later and do not find what we loved in them. You cannot keep the view by taking the window with you.”

James Richardson

#92
Vectors: Aphorisms and Ten Second Essays (2001)

Love , Books , Feeling , Thinking

“It is less important to escape pain than to avoid exceptionless rules.”

James Richardson

#326
Vectors: Aphorisms and Ten Second Essays (2001)

Pain

“Bitterness is a greater failure than failure.”

James Richardson

#440
Vectors: Aphorisms and Ten Second Essays (2001)

Failure

“Water deepens where it has to wait.”

James Richardson

#224
Vectors: Aphorisms and Ten Second Essays (2001)

Water , Waiting

“First he gathered what he needed. Then he needed to keep gathering what he used to need.”

James Richardson

#314
Vectors: Aphorisms and Ten Second Essays (2001)

“A belief is a question we have put aside so we can get on with what we believe we have to do.”

James Richardson

#100
Vectors: Aphorisms and Ten Second Essays (2001)

Question

“Beware of knowing your virtues; you may lose them. Beware of knowing your vices; you may forgive them.”

James Richardson

#166
Vectors: Aphorisms and Ten Second Essays (2001)

Forgiveness

“Think of all the smart people made stupid by flaws of character. The finest watch isn’t fine long when used as a hammer.”

James Richardson

#108
Vectors: Aphorisms and Ten Second Essays (2001)

People , Stupidity , Thinking

“The procrastinator dreads beginning, the workaholic, ending.”

James Richardson

#147
Vectors: Aphorisms and Ten Second Essays (2001)

“Those who are too slow to be intelligent deserve our patience, those who are too quick, our pity.”

James Richardson

#107
Vectors: Aphorisms and Ten Second Essays (2001)

Intelligence , Patience

“The great consolation of righteousness is never having to worry whether you’re a bore.”

James Richardson

#85
Vectors: Aphorisms and Ten Second Essays (2001)

“How often feelings are circular. How embarrassing to be embarrassed. How annoying to be annoyed.”

James Richardson

Aphorism #27
Interglacial (2004)

Feeling

“That others know: science. That others choose: politics.”

James Richardson

Aphorism #112
Interglacial (2004)

Science

“The drives were nature’s first provision: thinking was added later, to get us around the world’s obstacles to them.”

James Richardson

#126
Vectors: Aphorisms and Ten Second Essays (2001)

World , Nature , Thinking

“Your choices: spend, and believe in things; save, and believe in money.”

James Richardson

#157
Vectors: Aphorisms and Ten Second Essays (2001)

Money

“It’s amazing that I sit at my job all day and no one sees me clearly enough to say What is that boy doing behind a desk?”

James Richardson

#247
Vectors: Aphorisms and Ten Second Essays (2001)

Boy

“Easier to keep changing your life than to live it.”

James Richardson

#55
Vectors: Aphorisms and Ten Second Essays (2001)

Life , Change