This is a newsletter where you get three perception-altering ideas every Saturday that help you become a better person.
And these insights don’t come from random “deep quotes” searches on the Web, mind you, but from (mostly) books, podcasts, articles, videos. And I share only what I find helpful. So, please share with your loved ones, if you find this stuff valuable.
Here are this week’s insights:
1. Toleration
If it were ever the case that you all agreed about some issue — which will never happen — and if there were only one person who held a different view, you ought to forgive them
—Voltaire, Treatise on Toleration
We all probably disagree on more points than we agree on. Disagreement is no reason to hate each other. As you are entitled to your views, others are to theirs. Correct them if you can when you think they are wrong, but always be kind.
2. Born Free
For [children] are born men; they are born free; their liberty belongs to them; no one but they themselves has the right to dispose of it. Before they reach the years of discretion, their father may, in their name, make certain rules for their protection and their welfare, but he cannot give away their liberty irrevocably and unconditionally, for such a gift would be contrary to the ends of nature and an abuse of paternal right.
—Jean-Jacques Rousseau, The Social Contract
Rousseau is talking about government here, but this is a point to consider in itself. Parents do abuse their rights by binding their children into chains that are never broken. And neither of them realizes the situation.
A person should be free to and even sometimes be forced to make their life’s decisions on their own.
3. Negligible Entity
This little globe, which is merely a dot, revolves in space just like so many other globes, in the vast extent of which we are all lost. A human being, who is about five feet high, is certainly a negligible entity in this creation.
—Voltaire, Treatise on Toleration
Is that not enough to make us realize how futile many things in our lives are? We live as if we have all the time in the world, and all the while time is running out.
We fear and doubt and let opportunities pass us by because of it. When the better option is to attempt even the impossible because then you will at least be working on something you enjoy.
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