Malcolm Gladwell Quotes

Mimicry, they argue, is also one of the means by which we infect each other with our emotions. In other words, if I smile and you see me and smile in response — even a microsmile that takes no more than several milliseconds — it’s not just you imitating or empathizing with me. It may also be a way that I can pass on my happiness to you.

In Russian folklore there is an archetype called yurodivy, or the “Holy Fool.” The Holy Fool is a social misfit — eccentric, off-putting, sometimes even crazy — who nonetheless has access to the truth. Nonetheless is actually the wrong word. The Holy Fool is a truth-teller because he is an outcast. Those who are not part of existing social hierarchies are free to blurt out inconvenient truths or question things the rest of us take for granted. In one Russian fable, a Holy Fool looks at a famous icon of the Virgin Mary and declares it the work of the devil. It’s an outrageous, heretical claim. But then someone throws a stone at the image and the facade cracks, revealing the face of Satan.

He was maxed out. He had no
resources left to do anything else. That's what happens
when you're tired. Your decision-making skills erode. You
start missing things — things that you would pick up on
any other day.

Lesson Number One: The Importance of Being Jewish

Working really hard is what successful people do, and the genius of the culture formed in the rice paddies is that hard work gave those in the fields a way to find meaning in the midst of great uncertainty and poverty.

The values of the world we inhabit and the people we surround ourselves with have a profound effect on who we are.

It's those who lie outside ordinary experience who have the most to teach us.

potatoes, melons, and fruit trees in the long backyards behind their houses. He gave out seeds and bulbs. The town came to life. The Rosetans began raising pigs in their backyards and growing grapes for homemade wine. Schools, a park, a convent, and a cemetery were built. Small shops and bakeries and restaurants and bars opened along Garibaldi Avenue. More than a dozen factories sprang up making blouses for the garment trade. Neighboring Bangor was largely Welsh and English, and the next town over was overwhelmingly German, which meant — given

…You can’t separate race from police shooting cases, but you also can’t say that’s the whole story. There’s something out of whack with the way we’ve structured relationships—not just between police officers and civilians, but between strangers of all kinds.

We prematurely write off people as failures. We are too much in awe of those who succeed and far too dismissive of those who fail.

We have, I think, a very rigid and limited definition of what an advantage is. We think of things as helpful that actually aren’t and think of other things as unhelpful that in reality leave us stronger and wiser.

being able to act intelligently and instinctively in the moment is possible only after a long and rigorous of education and experience

Practice isn’t the thing you do once you’re good. It’s the thing you do that makes you good.

Defaulting to truth is a problem. It lets spies and con artists roam free.

The key to good decision making is not knowledge. It is understanding.