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Man’s unique agony as a species consists in his perpetual conflict between the desire to stand out and the need to blend in.

Sydney J. Harris

If you’re not part of the solution, you’re part of the problem, but the perpetual human predicament is that the answer soon poses its own problems.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Answers Predicaments Problem
You may be sure that when a man begins to call himself a realist he is preparing to do something that he is secretly ashamed of doing.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Cynical May Men
The severest test of character is not so much the ability to keep a secret as it is, when the secret is finally out, to refrain from disclosing that you knew it all along.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Character Refrain Secret Several Tests
And most of the failures in parent-child relationships, from my observation, begin when the child begins to acquire a mind and a will of its own, to make independent decisions and to question the omnipotence or the wisdom of the parent.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Children Independent
The main discomfort in being a middle-of-the-roader is that you get sideswiped by partisans going in both directions.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Discomfort Middle Partisan
The loner may be respected, but he is always resented by his colleagues, for he seems to be passing a critical judgment on them, when he may be simply making a limiting statement about himself.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Loner May Solitude
Never let your fears be the boundaries of your dreams. Happiness is a direction, not a place.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Boundaries Dream Dreams Follow
The most important thing in an argument, next to being right, is to leave an escape hatch for your opponent, so that he can gracefully swing over to your side without too much apparent loss of face.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Appreciation Loss Swing
Nobody can be so amusingly arrogant as a young man who has just discovered an old idea and thinks it is his own.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Ideas Men Thinking
A cynic is not merely one who reads bitter lessons from the past, his is also one who is permanently disappointed in the future.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Fear Lessons Past
Knowledge fills a large brain; it merely inflates a small one.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Brain Knowledge One Small
Many people feel “guilty” about things they shouldn’t feel guilty about, in order to shut out feelings of guilt about things they should feel guilty about.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Feelings Order People
Many married couples separate because they quarrel incessantly, but just as many separate because they were never honest enough or courageous enough to quarrel when they should have.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Couple Couples Divorce Quarrel Separate
What is much harder to handle is the sense that you have to live up to the mark someone else has set for you. The grades become too important, the competition too frantic, the fear of disappointing those who believe in you turns into an overwhelming nightmare.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Believe Boys Parent
Good teaching must be slow enough so that it is not confusing, and fast enough so that it is not boring.
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Confusing Teacher Teaching
If a small thing has the power to make you angry, does that not indicate something about your size?
SYDNEY J. HARRIS

Anger Power Wisdom

Man’s unique agony as a species consists in his perpetual conflict between the desire to stand out and the need to blend in.

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Man’s unique agony as a species consists in his perpetual conflict between the desire to stand out and the need to blend in.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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