Enlightened teachers are not logical. They don't function from levels that are understandable to the human mind. They're not religious. Religions form around them, usually after they've died.
From our point of view, we're just curious, we're poking around and having fun. If it's science, if it's accurate, if it's not accurate, we did the best we can to keep things clean and understandable, but we're just having fun, so sue us if we got something wrong.
It's an odd thing but when you tell someone the true facts of a mythical tale they are indignant not with the teller but with you. They don't want to have their ideas upset. It rouses some vague uneasiness in them, I think, and they resent it. So they reject it and refuse to think about it. If they were merely indifferent it would be natural and understandable. But it is much stronger than that, much more positive. They are annoyed. Very odd, isn't it.
The key to making things understandable is to understand what it's like NOT to understand.
Those women who had gone out with Germans were grabbed and treated very badly, often shaved totally bald so that everyone could see who they were. Some were taken prisoners. There had been so much suffering during the war because of the betrayal of those collaborators, so many killed and hurt because of what they had done to families, that the mood for revenge against the traitors was very high. It was not right, but it was understandable.
I am probably afraid that some spectator will not understand my photography - therefore I proceed to make it really less understandable by writing defensibly about it.
A young woman, newly wed, may find herself in the delightful position of wanting to do nothing without the company of her darling husband. She may indeed discover that she spends all her waking hours with her fellow to the exclusion of every other friend or family member. This is understandable, but wholly unacceptable, to society.
Those who sell their liberty for security are understandable, if pitiable, creatures. Those who sell the liberty of others for wealth, power, or even a moments respite deserve only the end of a rope.
The problem with the Internet startup craze isn't that too many people are starting companies; it's that too many people aren't sticking with it. That's somewhat understandable, because there are many moments that are filled with despair and agony, when you have to fire people and cancel things and deal with very difficult situations. That's when you find out who you are and what your values are.
To most theistic believers, human life can have no meaning in a universe without God. Quite sincerely, and with understandable yearning for a meaning to their existence, they reject the possibility of no God. In their minds, only a purposeful universe based on God is possible and science can do nothing else but support thistruth.
Oh! to be loved by a man I respect, To bask in the glow of his perfectly understandable neglect.
The aim of science is to make difficult things understandable in a simpler way; the aim of poetry is to state simple things in an incomprehensible way. The two are incompatible.
. . . the deep experience of the lonely climb on the mountain of success brings a wealth beyond power to compute. To you all suffering is understandable and your heart opens wide in sympathy.
I learned why 'out riding alone' is an oxymoron: An equestrian is never alone, is always sensing the other being, the mysterious but also understandable living being that is the horse.
The whole idea of civilization as an understandable narrative is a bit nuts. It's the most problematic of delusions.
Lobbyists are in many cases expert technicians and capable of explaining complex and difficult subjects in a clear, understandable fashion. They engage in personal discussions with Members of Congress in which they can explain in detail the reasons for positions they advocate. Because our congressional representation is based on geographical boundaries, the lobbyists who speak for the various economic, commercial, and other functional interests of this country serve a very useful purpose and have assumed an important role in the legislative process.
Americans across our country are feeling a sense of helplessness, of uncertainty and of fear. These feelings are understandable and they are justified. But the answer must not be violence. The answer is never violence. Rather, the answer - our answer, all our answer - must be action. Calm, peaceful, collaborative and determined action. We must continue working to build trust between communities and law enforcement. We must continue working to guarantee every person in this country equal justice under the law.
Strange that the vanity which accompanies beauty - excusable, perhaps, when there is such great beauty, or at any rate understandable - should persist after the beauty is gone.
Moods are such an essential part of the substance of life, of one's notion of oneself, that even psychotic extremes in mood and behavior somehow can be seen as temporary, even understandable, reactions to what life has dealt.
The desire for hope and change is easily understandable. In many ways it's even more dramatic in Europe.
