QuoteProject
The biggest mistake we make is trying to square the way we feel about something today with the way we felt about it yesterday. You shouldn’t even bother doing it. You should just figure out the way you feel today and if it happens to comply with what you thought before, fine. If it contradicts it, whatever. Life goes on.
Malcolm Gladwell
ShareWTF𝕏

Interpretation

What this quote means

We often struggle to reconcile our current feelings with past ones, which can be unnecessary and counterproductive.

This quote by Malcolm Gladwell emphasizes the importance of acknowledging and accepting our present feelings without the burden of comparing them to our past emotions. It encourages individuals to embrace change and acknowledge that feelings can evolve over time; what mattered yesterday may not hold the same significance today, and that's perfectly acceptable.

Themes

FeelingsChangeLifeEmotionAcceptance

In practice

Example use cases

A therapist might use this quote to help a client understand their evolving feelings about a past relationship.

More from Malcolm Gladwell

No one who can rise before dawn three hundred sixty days a year fails to make his family rich.
Malcolm GladwellRead
People are in one of two states in a relationship,” Gottman went on. “The first is what I call positive sentiment override, where positive emotion overrides irritability. It’s like a buffer. Their spouse will do something bad, and they’ll say, ‘Oh, he’s just in a crummy mood.’ Or they can be in negative sentiment override, so that even a relatively neutral thing that a partner says gets perceived as negative.
Malcolm GladwellRead
The people at the top don't work just harder or even much harder than everyone else. They work much, much harder.
Malcolm GladwellRead
Achievement is talent plus preparation. The problem with this view is that the closer psychologists look at the careers of the gifted, the smaller the role innate talent seems to play and the bigger the role preparation seems to play.
Malcolm GladwellRead
When I go to my health club, and it's in the basement, you have to take the elevator down. And this drives me crazy. Why can't there be a stairway? At least make it as easy to exercise as it is to not exercise. It's in society's interest for me to take the stairs.
Malcolm GladwellRead
Hard work is a prison sentence only if it does not have meaning.
Malcolm GladwellRead

Similar quotes

The names are the first things to go, after the breath has gone, and the beating of the heart. We keep our memories longer than our names.
Neil GaimanRead
Our time here is magic! It's the only space you have to realize whatever it is that is beautiful, whatever is true, whatever is great, whatever is potential, whatever is rare, whatever is unique, in. It's the only space.
Ben OkriRead
Almost everyone is obsessed with leaving a mark upon the world. Bequeathing a legacy. Outlasting death. We all want to be remembered. I do, too. That’s what bothers me most, is being another unremembered casualty in the ancient and inglorious war against disease.
John GreenRead
I have watched patients stand and gaze longingly toward the city they in all likelihood will never enter again. It means liberty and life; it seems so near, and yet heaven is not further from hell
Nellie BlyRead
I have lived through many wars and have lost everything many times Yet, life is beautiful, and I have so much to learn and enjoy. I have no space nor time for pessimism and hate.
Alice Herz-SommerRead
I spent thirty-three years in another man's shadow. I went everywhere he went, I helped him with everything he did. I was in a sense a part of him. When you live like that for a long time, you gradually lose track of what it is you yourself really want out of life
Haruki MurakamiRead

A little wisdom, now and then

Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.

Quote by Malcolm Gladwell | QuoteProject