Quotations Weblog

The first weblog I ever read was Real Live Preacher. I found out about him from Reverend Sean Parker Dennison, who is the minister at my UU church. Before that, I had never even conceived of weblogs, even though Mike and I basically wrote a weekly weblog for this site back in 1997.

If I found Real Live Preacher by happenstance, I kept reading because he’s an incredible writer. I have regularly added tidbits of wisdom from his writings to our quotations collections. Here are some of my favorites:

• Read all of the quotations from Real Live Preacher

• Buy Real Live Preacher’s Book at Amazon.com: Real Live Preacher

You can’t really tell by looking at it, but he just re-vamped his entire weblog, porting all his archives over to new software, adding logins for comments and a chat room. The chat room is very active and the community that has grown around this weblog has a new forum to play with.

I’m a Truth-Sayer, mostly because I have a hard enough time keeping reality straight in my head. I can’t add a pack of lies to the mix and have any hope of keeping things straight. Being a Truth-Sayer means that I accidentally offend people with what I say. I used to think this effect was a negative thing.

In this month’s O Magazine, there is an article about telling the truth. The author suggests asking yourself if it’s kind before you ask yourself if it’s true. I don’t have filters enough in my head to judge every word that I say, yet it made sense to me. Putting kindness above truth sounds like a noble thing.

If accidentally offending people is the negative effect of being a Truth-Sayer, earning a tight-knit group of friends that really love me is the benefit. I end up offending the kind of people who can’t have truth spouted at them often, so those kinds of people don’t end up in my group of confidants. I’ve always cursed my tongue that is unable to censor like others can; now it seems to be an asset.

Continuing the my favorite quotations series, here are a few of my favorites from our most popular subject, and the most general of all subjects: Life. We have lots of quotations on this topic and it’s hard to choose, but these are some that are meaningful to me—or at least funny.

• Read all of our “life” quotations

This guy has obviously never heard Jake Shimabukuro play a ukulele. Check out this fabulous video of him playing As My Guitar Gently Weeps.

• Jake Shimabukuro – As My Guitar Gently Weeps

Here is a link to Jake’s official website. I’m sure glad a record company signed him. He’s absolutely amazing.

:: Jake Shimabukuro Official Web Site ::

This advice is so hard for me to follow, especially when I’m starting something new. I am a Lecture Monkey. I will spew a lecture at you like a gorilla will throw vomit at the zoo. Preventing myself from lecturing innocent victims is very difficult for me to control. There is only one way I have learned to avoid it.

I lecture in private. I write down all the things that I think I should have said to someone in my journal every day. Writing them down keeps them from escaping involuntarily from my lips the next time I see that person. When I am tempted to lecture, I think to myself, “I have to write that down later.”

Ironically, this has been the best thing in the world for me. The truth of the matter is the lecture has nothing to do with the innocent victim. No matter what they did to spur my instinct to give them advice, my advice has nothing to do with them. What I feel like I need to tell them so desperately has more to do with me and my life than with them.

I’ve found that it helps me to write down the lectures that I spared others the joy of receiving. The good advice that I was going to give them is usually something that I need to hear. I’ve found that taking a few quiet moments with the computer keys clicking under my fingers is far more beneficial to me than it could ever be to the intended focus of the lecture.

Next time you feel like you need to help someone along in this world with some “friendly” advice, try my technique. Take a few moments and write the lecture down. Reread it as if you were receiving the advice. It will probably help you out in the strangest of ways.