The Wisdom of the Ages

Finding value in meaningless platitudes.

In her book, You Learn By Living, Eleanor Roosevelt quotes from another book called South Wind written by Norman Douglas.  Here is the quote.

“What is all wisdom save a collection of platitudes? Take fifty of our current proverbial sayings – they are so trite, so threadbare, that we can hardly bring our lips to utter them. None the less they embody the concentrated experience of the race, and the man who orders his life according to their teaching cannot go far wrong. How easy that seems! Has anyone ever done so? Never. Has any man ever attained to inner harmony by pondering the experience of others? Not since the world began! He must pass through the fire.”

The problem with platitudes is that they are so simple they are useless in real life. Reality requires a more nuanced approach.  This is why Humanists embrace situational ethics.  We recognize that in certain situations, our normal rules of conduct may not apply.

But that doesn’t mean they never apply.  Because most of the time they do.  It’s just that in the real world we need to be prepared for the exceptions.

I think the key to understanding the value of a platitude is to understand why the adage or platitude for how to live was devised in the first place.  That way you understand the intent of the platitude so that you can adjust your behavior when the situation requires, thus getting the benefit of this “ancient wisdom” without falling prey to the inane meaningless simplicity of it all.

What do you think? What is your favorite platitude and why?  And which ones should never be uttered ever again?

Eleanor Roosevelt on Humanistic Business Management.

Treating employees as human isn’t new. The humanistic business management principles Eleanor Roosevelt used in her life and work.

Ok, so Eleanor Roosevelt wasn’t a Humanist, though she may have been. The problem is that the term didn’t come into popularity until recently. She was, however, active during the time that Humanist ideas were coalescing into a movement and she certainly would have been aware of the efforts of prominent people of her time to establish a better more humane and human approach to ethics.


I have been reading her book You Learn from Living, which I highly recommend (Get book here! ) Here is what she had to say about managing staff. It is totally consistent which the principles of humanistic business management. I am paraphrasing her here:

It is more effective to get staff to volunteer to contribute rather than demanding compliance. One is ordering, one is getting buy in. Ordering is easier but the work produced is not as good. Therefore it is a good rule of thumb to treat your employees as if they are volunteers.

Having been a volunteer manager myself, I agree with this. If you can learn how to manage volunteers well, those same skills work wonderfully with paid staff. They key to it all is recognizing that people are autonomous individuals. They can choose to do what you need them to do or they can choose not to. Even if you are paying them. So it is best to convince them of the need and get their buy in. That way you get a more engaged staff who does better work and who acts as if they are part of the team. And isn’t that so much better than managing people who are just punching the clock?