Back of every mistaken venture and defeat is the laughter of wisdom, if you listen.
Listen
Education is the ability to listen to almost anything without losing your temper or your self-confidence.
I am too weary to listen, too angry to hear.
‘God’ – as revealed in his book of edicts and narratives is practically an idiot. He has nothing to say that any sensible person should want to listen to.
I think that there’s something in the American psyche, it’s almost this kind of right or privilege, this sense of entitlement, to resolve our conflicts with violence. There’s an arrogance to that concept if you think about it. To actually have to sit down and talk, to listen, to compromise, that’s hard work.
Growing up, my grandmother did not want worldly music in the house. Then when I went out to California, I started listening to Spanish music, mostly Mexican music. But were I in Egypt, I would listen to the music of the people, or if I was in Italy, I’d listen to Italian music.
Listen carefully to yourself. Listen to what you dislike, and you will find most of the imagery is what you have received and registered from other people. We ingest labels from others.
It gets quite difficult for me when I listen to pop music. I don’t often understand the words, but when someone translates them to me, I think, ‘What is this song representing? That women are just there to be treated like objects?’
If you want to make films, you’ll watch Kurosawa. If you want to play a violin, you listen to Seghetti. Same with somebody who has the ambition to play in the NBA. I watch a basketball game; I enjoy it. Somebody who really wants to learn to play is studying whatever is most magnificent that’s going on out there.
To mourn and bewail your ill-fortune, when you will gain a tear from those who listen, this is worth the trouble.