Proverbs that contradict
Folk wisdom refers to the decentralised body of anecdotes, quotes, proverbs, adages, mantras ect. deployed in everyday conversation. When your friend is upset about getting fired you might pacify her by saying that “everything happens for a reason.” When the same friend gets annoyed at the trite advice you’ve been giving her you might say that “he who angers you controls you.” Folk wisdom is learned implicitly, dispensed frequently, and often straight-up wrong.
We all need a hand figuring out where to steer ourselves from time to time, and folk wisdom provides generally true, generally helpful advice. It’s helpful to be reminded of the importance of commitment to whatever you’re doing (“work hard, play hard”) or the correct way to behave (“two wrongs don’t make a right”). But folk wisdom is flawed in that it is incoherent. It is vague, blatant, and contradictory1. In the contradictions of folk wisdom we see divergences in how we believe we should live and act. Proverbs make cases for living seriously and jovially; working hard and hardly working; accepting fate and challenging fate. Which proverbs do we take heed of, and which do we disregard?
“Anything worth doing is worth doing right.”
“Don’t let perfect be the enemy of good.”
Is it better to pursue perfection at the cost of time or accept flawed work? Should you lower your output to raise your standards? This is the ancient argument between perfectionists and pragmatists, and I’m still not sure which side to take.
“Don’t take it too seriously.”
“The seeds you plant today become the garden you walk in tomorrow.”
How seriously should you live your life? Is it better to trade work for play?
“The pen is mightier than the sword.”
“Actions speak louder than words.”
When should we act and when should we speak? The first statement has always interested me as a superficially false proverb which contains a general truth: words occasionally accomplish a lot more than actions ever could2. I believe that ultimately an individual is the sum of their actions, lending support to the second proverb. But this is complicated by the fact that speaking and writing are actions - and incredibly important ones at that.
“Good things come to those who wait.”
“Fortune favours the bold.”
I don’t really believe that good things come to those who wait. Patience is a virtue, but cowardice is a vice.
I think advice can be helpful. But advice is just others’ shared truths, and the real valuable form of truth is won, not given. You learn more by making notes than by reading them. I believe that by making mistakes and living authentically you slowly discover and sear into yourself convictions almost unutterable - truths that are felt more than they are said, truths that are known more than they are understood. And by living these convictions, whatever they may be, you gradually transcend who you were to become who you really are - day after day after day.
Of course, that’s all just my two cents.