Words worth understanding
Start with the thought in plain English. Then examine its imagery, practical application and limitations.
2,058 selected entries have editorial explanations. An explanation is not independent authentication of an attribution. Start with the individually source-checked classics ↗
proverb · Traditional
The saying expresses how difficulties can feel clustered or create further problems. It is not a statistical rule or a prediction that another setback must follow the one you have experienced.
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The saying links much meat with many maladies. It turns an abundance of food into an equally abundant burden of illness.
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The saying expects marriage to loosen a son’s tie to his parents while a daughter’s tie endures. It expresses an unequal assumption about family loyalty and gender.
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Accept ordinary nourishment without embarrassment. The saying challenges the idea that attending to a basic need is shameful, while leaving room for considerate manners and another person’s comfort.
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Be cautious about giving up something dependable for an uncertain expectation. Consider what is actually secured and what is only hoped for before treating a possible improvement as an available replacement.
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An unwelcome experience can sharpen appreciation of something better. The proverb describes learning through contrast, without making suffering necessary for understanding or giving those who have suffered an automatic authority over everyone else.
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A restriction can remain unwelcome even when it comes with valuable benefits. Material rewards do not automatically make a loss of freedom acceptable to the person experiencing it.
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You may not fully understand the difficulties another person carries. Avoid deciding how easy their situation should be from what is visible to you, and make room to hear their account.
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The person living with a difficulty often understands its particular effects best. Ask where the problem is felt rather than assuming an outside view reveals everything that needs to change.
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Something attractive or worthwhile may also have a disadvantage. The rose and thorn invite a person to consider both sides of an appealing choice, without proving that every benefit must carry harm.
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A welcome circumstance may still contain difficulties or limits. The sunshine and shadow picture mixed conditions, without making every success suspect or proving that disappointment must follow it.
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You cannot fully judge another person’s difficulties from what is visible. Listen before assuming that their task or situation is easy to bear.
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Death is named as a certainty against which other expectations seem less secure. The saying invites perspective on finite life, but it gives no information about anyone’s timing or circumstances and should not dismiss fear, grief or the value of present care.
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The saying compares old men with children for a second time. Its image may concern renewed dependence, but it risks denying older adults their distinct experience and agency.
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The saying makes old young precede old long. It associates an old-like quality appearing early with a lasting later period, without explaining either condition.
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The saying assigns sailing to the sea and settling to land. Its balanced instruction puts different actions in the settings imagined to suit them.
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The saying expresses enthusiasm for something valued, as though more of it must always be welcome. Its exaggeration should be tested: even a good activity or resource can become excessive, poorly timed or unsuitable in a larger amount.
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People can be surprisingly unaware of others’ daily conditions. Looking beyond your familiar circle can challenge assumptions about how life is organised or what is easy.
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An attempt to escape one difficulty can lead into a worse one. The frying-pan and fire contrast warns about an unexamined alternative, without implying that staying in the first situation is always the safest or best choice.
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Immediate needs can affect how satisfied or agreeable someone feels. A full stomach stands for a need met, while fasting stands for going without.
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The saying calls poverty the mother of health. It makes deprivation appear to produce wellbeing through a parental metaphor.
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Material hardship can bring someone into unfamiliar arrangements or company. Strange bed-fellows picture connections shaped by need rather than ordinary preference.
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Success may attract companions, while difficulty reveals how dependable those relationships are. Notice who offers fair and considerate support when circumstances become less rewarding.
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Wealth accompanies a person’s changing circumstances but can also be something to carry and manage. The baggage image invites a sense of proportion, rather than making possessions the whole meaning or worth of a life.
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