{"id":10224,"date":"2025-03-11T14:59:32","date_gmt":"2025-03-11T18:59:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/parmaks.com\/Resources\/aphorisms-and-the-power-of-big-truths-in-small-packages\/"},"modified":"2025-03-11T14:59:32","modified_gmt":"2025-03-11T18:59:32","slug":"aphorisms-and-the-power-of-big-truths-in-small-packages","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/parmaks.com\/Resources\/aphorisms-and-the-power-of-big-truths-in-small-packages\/","title":{"rendered":"Aphorisms and the Power of Big Truths in Small Packages"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Profit<\/a>
\n<\/p>\n

\n

My next book, Secrets of Adulthood: Simple Truths for Our Complex Lives<\/em><\/a>,<\/em> will be published on April 1. In this book, I\u2019ve distilled the lessons I\u2019ve learned (and often re-learned) the hard way. To express these \u201csecrets,\u201d I\u2019ve written more than two hundred aphorisms.\u00a0<\/p>\n

People have asked me, \u201cWhy write in aphorisms?\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

For my whole life, I\u2019ve loved the literary form of the aphorism. An aphorism is a concise statement that contains an expansive truth. Unlike the folk wisdom of proverbs\u2014\u201cA stumble may prevent a fall\u201d or \u201cYou can\u2019t push a rope\u201d\u2014aphorisms can be attributed to a partic\u00adular person.<\/p>\n

Brief and sharp, aphorisms distill big ideas into few words; by saying little, they manage to suggest more. The clarity of their language promotes the clarity of our thinking.<\/p>\n

As a child, I collected aphorisms in my \u201cblank books\u201d\u2014books with blank pages that I filled with quo\u00adtations illustrated by magazine cuttings. Once I be\u00adcame a writer exploring human nature, my admiration for the form grew, because the greatest aphorists grapple with the same fundamental questions I explore in my own work: How can we live happier, healthier, more productive, and creative lives?<\/p>\n

The right aphorism, recalled at the right time, can shift our perspective instantly. When my family debated whether to get a dog, I was stuck in an endless pro\/con analysis\u2014until I remembered, \u201cChoose the bigger life.\u201d Decision made. We got the dog.<\/p>\n

My bookshelves overflow with works by great aphorists: La Rochefoucauld (\u201cIt is much easier to stifle a first desire than to gratify all those that follow it\u201d), Samuel Johnson (\u201cAll severity that does not tend to increase good, or prevent evil, is idle\u201d), and Sarah Manguso (\u201cFailure is good preparation for success, which comes as a pleasant surprise, but success is poor preparation for failure.\u201d) Fiction, too, is an unexpected source of aphorisms, such as Iris Murdoch\u2019s \u201cCuriosity is not the same thing as a thirst for knowledge.\u201d<\/p>\n

These days, the aphorism is a mostly neglected art\u2014though sometimes it pops up in its lesser forms, like the self-improvement clich\u00e9 on social media or the office poster\u2019s reminder about the value of teamwork.<\/p>\n

This ancient discipline, however, still has tremendous power to communicate.<\/p>\n

Because we must decide whether we agree or dis\u00adagree, aphorisms provoke our reflection. We can also compare how different aphorists express a similar idea, as they often do, or contemplate how they contradict each other. For instance, Publilius Syrus observed, \u201cNo man is happy who does not think himself so,\u201d while Vauvenargues wrote, \u201cThere are men who are happy without knowing it.\u201d<\/p>\n

The discipline of the aphorism forces precision of thinking. In my own writing, I\u2019ve found that I can ex\u00adpress a big idea in a few words only if I truly under\u00adstand what I\u2019m trying to say.<\/p>\n

And, as demonstrated by the haiku, the sonnet, and the thirty-minute sitcom, imagination is often better served by constraint than by freedom.<\/p>\n

For years, I\u2019ve refined my own aphorisms, weeding out observations that lack broader truth (such as \u201cThe tulip is an empty flower\u201d). My book Secrets of Adulthood<\/em> gathers my best aphorisms\u2014guidance for those just entering adulthood and those still grappling with its challenges. Some aphorisms stand alone, others benefit from brief stories.<\/p>\n

At the end, I also include practical hacks that, while not deeply philosophical, improve everyday life (for instance, \u201cIf you can\u2019t find something, clean up\u201d).<\/p>\n

What a joy it has been to work on my Secrets of Adulthood, to distill my observations and experi\u00adences into general truths! After all, work is the play of adulthood.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Profit<\/a>
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

My next book, Secrets of Adulthood: Simple Truths for Our Complex Lives, will be published on April 1. In this book, I\u2019ve distilled the lessons […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":10225,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10224","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-habits"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/parmaks.com\/Resources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10224","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/parmaks.com\/Resources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/parmaks.com\/Resources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/parmaks.com\/Resources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/parmaks.com\/Resources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10224"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/parmaks.com\/Resources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10224\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/parmaks.com\/Resources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10225"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/parmaks.com\/Resources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10224"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/parmaks.com\/Resources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10224"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/parmaks.com\/Resources\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10224"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}