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Instant Wisdom


You want to be wise, the pride of your family or at the workplace.  So do I.  How to do this is a good question, but one that has a ready answer. You simply invent it.  Here we give methods with examples, all cooked up at home, none from the literature. We call it…

Do-it-yourself wisdom.  You, too, can be wise with words. Recipes are available, and we take up a couple here.  For words, just pick two of them and mix in a counterbalance.  Or use one phrase to amplify another and then reverse.  Alliteration helps. Assiduity is not the goal.  Loose construction is better.  How the mind fills in what the words leave out is remarkable - and to your advantage. Think of a poem with just one line.  For example, let’s use “love” and “liberty,” and a few others.
  • “Love is far less without liberty, and liberty is far less without love.”
  • “The spirit enriches reason just as reason enriches the spirit.”
  • “Knowledge needs intuition even more than intuition needs knowledge.”
  • “Prayers are answered more often than lotto tickets win.” (Note the embedded self-reflection.)


Perhaps, you’re thinking these wisdom-bytes are not museum quality. No doubt true. The nature of wisdom rests with its individual resonance.  Yet, we can all crank these out by the dozens per day. Keep at it. Eventually, your home-spun wisdom could win the wisdom-lotto and probably sooner than your lotto tickets will win the grand prize. Other wisdom-esque expressions come from connecting or inverting incongruent objects. Metaphors are also effective.

  • “Those without education live in a winter of ignorance.”
  • “Taking refuge in the popular protects no more than thin transparent film.”
  • “When the mind is a servant, the body is a slave.”
  • “Strength comes from failures - but not too many.”
  • “Youth is easily deceived by the impracticable.”
  • “Wherever I go, I feel I have been there already.”
  • “Wisdom is to knowledge as knowledge is to information.”
  • “Wisdom is like a master key; it opens many doors.”
  • “We have reached the inflection* point, and seek enhanced improvement.” (Totally meaningless)


You goal is to craft words to wash over the reader giving an almost mystical meaning, even if not yielding to analysis. 

*All politicians are using this term. I’ve not heard even one of them using it correctly.  Sounds good though. Right?


Caution!  It takes some practice, but not too much. You can do this.
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