Being Humble, Here, Means Being Aware Of How Difficult Your Instincts Can Make It To Get The Facts Right.

Being humble, here, means being aware of how difficult your instincts can make it to get the facts right. It means being realistic about the extent of your knowledge. It means being happy to say ‘I don’t know.’ It also means, when you do have an opinion, being prepared to change it when you discover new facts. It’s quite relaxing being humble, because it means you can stop feeling pressured to have a view about everything, and stop feeling you must be ready to defend your views all the time.

Hans Rosling’s Factfulness

“Life in this world,” Didactylos said, “is, as it were, a sojourn in a cave. What can we know of reality?

For all we see of the true nature of existence is, shall we say, no more than bewildering and amusing shadows cast upon the inner wall of the cave by the unseen blinding light of absolute truth, from which we may or may not deduce some glimmer of veracity, and we as troglodyte seekers of wisdom can only lift our voices to the unseen and say, humbly,

‘Go on, do Deformed Rabbit... it’s my favorite.’”

-Terry Pratchett’s Small Gods

Questioner: What are we going to do when you retire?

Brandon Sanderson: Retire? RETIRE?! I would NEVER! 

Brandon Sanderson: I will stop writing when they find me dead in my office and my face is on the keyboard and I type the word “k” seven thousand times.

(source)

You have to be a bit of a liar to tell a story the right way. Too much truth confuses the facts. Too much honesty makes you sound insincere.

-Patrick Rothfuss, The Name of the Wind

x

“‘[They’re] here. With you.’

‘I can’t see them!’

Death gathered up the reins.

‘Nevertheless,’ he said. His horse trotted forward a few steps.

‘I don’t understand!’ screamed Vorbis.

Death paused. ‘You have perhaps heard the phrase,’ he said, ‘that Hell is other people?’

‘Yes. Yes, of course.’

Death nodded. ‘In time,’ he said, ‘you will learn that it is wrong.’”

-Terry Pratchett’s Small Gods