Words worth understanding
Start with the thought in plain English. Then explore the imagery, a practical example, when to use it, and what the saying does not mean.
4,000 entries with editorial explanations. The wider collection also contains entries still awaiting an individual interpretation.
proverb · Traditional
Respect for the wise even when advice is unsuitable separates regard for a person from accepting a particular recommendation. The saying allows counsel and respect to differ.
Read the explanation and example ↗proverb · Traditional
The saying assigns learning to the young and understanding to the old. It gives experience an interpretive value through an age contrast.
Read the explanation and example ↗proverb · Traditional
Someone unwilling to consider a message can be harder to reach than someone who simply missed it. Notice whether the obstacle is missing information or a refusal to engage with it.
Read the explanation and example ↗proverb · Traditional
Ignorance compared with blindness uses a disability metaphor to describe a limit of understanding. The saying gives lack of knowledge a severe image.
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Understanding changing circumstances can require sustained observation. The world’s pulse pictures a pattern that cannot be judged from a single instant.
Read the explanation and example ↗proverb · Traditional
The saying treats an older fool as especially foolish. It judges a mistake more harshly through the expectation that age should have brought learning.
Read the explanation and example ↗proverb · Traditional
Repeating a harmful experience can invite reflection on what could be learned from it. The shipwreck comparison asks about a second exposure, but it unfairly assumes control if used to blame people for danger, coercion or circumstances they could not avoid.
Read the explanation and example ↗proverb · Traditional
Condemning what is not understood links judgment with a failure to learn. The saying questions rejection made before fair examination.
Read the explanation and example ↗proverb · Traditional
Your own mistakes can teach caution, but another person’s experience may offer the same lesson without the same cost. Listen for relevant lessons before repeating an avoidable error.
Read the explanation and example ↗proverb · Traditional (Spanish-language collection)
Prudence and age do not remove the value of listening to counsel. The address to an experienced person keeps room for another perspective without requiring every suggestion to be followed.
Read the explanation and example ↗proverb · Traditional
Experience over time can temper youthful confidence. The rider image presents youth as being trained, but needs limits on its assumption that age must subdue people.
Read the explanation and example ↗proverb · Traditional
The saying makes a small garden seem like a forest to someone who does not know it. It links unfamiliarity with an exaggerated sense of scale or complexity.
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Speaking as sowing and listening as reaping give communication two complementary roles. The saying pictures sharing words as planting and receiving them as gathering a benefit.
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Trying and failing distinguished from laziness separates an unsuccessful outcome from a lack of effort. The saying resists judging a person only by the result.
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Repeated practice can make an action feel natural. The saying describes familiarity becoming habitual rather than establishing that a habit is fixed or right.
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The saying calls wanting to be someone else a waste of the person one already is. It opposes replacement through comparison to making use of one’s own possibilities.
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Learning by teaching presents explanation to others as an opportunity to deepen one’s understanding. The saying values reflection involved in making knowledge clear.
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The saying presents mistakes as opportunities to learn. It values examining an unsuccessful judgment or action rather than merely repeating it.
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Principles passed to children through what is tolerated gives adult responses a teaching role. The saying asks what accepted conduct communicates.
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People may ask for advice and readily offer it while being less willing to follow it. Consider whether guidance fits the situation, rather than assuming that asking means agreeing to act on every suggestion.
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Unclear speech attributed to unclear thought connects expression with understanding. The saying questions whether an explanation’s difficulty reflects an unresolved idea.
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The saying claims that what one fool can do another can do. It uses a disparaging comparison to make a task seem within reach.
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The saying has a farmer avoid eating what is unfamiliar. It depicts reluctance to try something not already known.
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Looking at a pointing finger rather than the moon contrasts an indicator with what it indicates. The saying warns about attention stopping at a means of explanation.
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