The german language is great. It allows all kind of combinations of words, enabling to create precise terms for particular things. Since I’ve decided to continue my blog in english, there’s some translation work necessary. Some more, some less effective or correct. Anyways, let’s start with a term, that’s hard to translate:
Das Phrasenschwein is defined by der Duden as
1) Piggy bank where someone who uses corny phrases has to put his or her coin in.
2) Person who likes to use phrases
The thing is, I love phrases and I love quotes! So a phrase-piggy is what I am. Sometimes I tend to overuse them and people around me accuse me of being superficial. For me they have the exact opposite meaning and effect. I believe when you truely understand something you can make and explain it as simple as possible.
For me
Phrases and Quotes are the distillate of great ideas. Broken down to the very minimum.
Quotes in addition attribute the author of the idea or the person pushing this idea. I strongly believe in reusing great ideas by all the great thinkers out there! So Phrases, Quotes, Analogies, Parables, Metaphors etc… are the shit!
However I do understand that it’s sometimes hard to grasp. If you use a quote you have a set of ideas and pictures associated with that and not everyone shares this associations. So a certain degree of translation is necessary.
Always try to understand what’s behind the quote, the phrase. Try to find the real meaning of it.
In that sense, let’s
Stand on the shoulder of giants. – Many great thinkers
An Owl's Perspective 
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