(no subject)

[arethinn]

Y'all are perhaps familiar with the quote, "The first sign of being sane is questioning whether you are sane. The truly insane never question; they just live the insanity." It occurs to me that other things can be plugged into this and it still works well. For example, "The first sign of lacking power is questioning whether you are powerful. The truly powerful never question; they just live the power." (note that I am talking about personal power here, although I suppose it applies as well to temporal power)

This comes up because three times in the past 24 hours or so I have been called brilliant/insightful/wise, with strong phrasing, by people who I myself consider to be in that company. It's starting to go to my head. *crooked smile*

Comments

[ellyssian.livejournal.com]

An absolutely brilliant observation! Quite insightful, really. One might even say it shows great wisdom on your part. =)

My favorite (self-made)(somewhat related) quote: "The Difference between an uncommon Hero and a common Human, is that the Human tries to be a Hero, whilst the Hero simply tries to be Humane."

[jarandhel.livejournal.com]

I believe your reformulation is in error.

You've reversed the positives and negatives in the two statements.

In the first statement, insanity (a negative state) is that which is just lived. In the second, Power (a positive state) is.

I submit that perhaps "The first sign of being powerful is questioning whether you are powerful. The truly weak never question, they just live the weakness." is a more accurate reformulation than yours.

Few are usually more convinced of their own power than those who actually have very little. Just as few are usually more convinced of their own sanity than those who are actually quite insane.

[starlightforest.livejournal.com]

insanity (a negative state)

An assumption. My personal symbol-set has several positive associations for insanity, including inspired/divine madness and seeing different (perhaps truer) levels of reality. Here nor there, I understand there is some change in meaning between the two statements, but that's what I was intending to do. I wasn't trying to make a literal translation, so there is no error.

[defiler-wyrm.livejournal.com]