Quotes & Sayings About Commonality

The hardcore drug addicts that I treat, are, without exception, people who have had extraordinarily difficult lives. The commonality is childhood abuse. These people all enter life under extremely adverse circumstances. Not only did they not get what they need for healthy development; they actually got negative circumstances of neglect. I don't have a single female patient in the Downtown Eastside of Vancouver who wasn't sexually abused, for example, as were many of the men, or abused, neglected and abandoned serially, over and over again. That's what sets up the brain biology of addiction. In other words, the addiction is related both psychologically, in terms of emotional pain relief, and neurobiological development to early adversity. — Gabor Mate

My husband didn't want the divorce, but I did. So there was a lot of bitterness initially. Once we got to the space where we understood that we have the most important thing in the world in common; no one else shared that commonality. Our son is priceless, and in order to give him the best, we have to be better to each other. Although we are still divorced, we still call each other "family." It was a journey to get there, but it's a beautiful place to be. — Regina King

The longer we listen to one another - with real attention - the more commonality we will find in all our lives. That is, if we are careful to exchange with one another life stories and not simply opinions. — Barbara Deming

The commonality in the human experience is the same. We have the same sorrows, and the same triumphs. Joy is joy is joy. — Oprah Winfrey

There's something profoundly intense and intoxicating about friendship found en route. It's the bond that arises from being thrust into uncomfortable circumstances, and the vulnerability of trusting others to navigate those situations. It's the exhilaration of meeting someone when we are our most alive selves, breathing new air, high on life-altering moments. It's the discovery of the commonality of the world's people and the attendant rejection of prejudices. It's the humbling experience of being suspicious of a stranger who then extends a great kindness. It's the astonishment of learning from those we set out to teach. It's the intimacy of sharing small spaces, the recognition of a kindred spirit across the globe.
It's the travel relationship, and it can only call itself family. — Lavinia Spalding

Grief has a ruthless commonality. — John Stewart Wynne

Mann and Joyce are very different, and yet their fiction often appeals to the same people: Harry Levin taught a famous course on Joyce, Proust, and Mann, and Joseph Campbell singled out Joyce and Mann as special favorites. To see them as offering "possibilities for living", as I do, isn't to identify any distinctive commonality. After all, many great authors would fall under that rubric. — Philip Kitcher

If you listen to your body and your intuition, they'll guide you well. There are countless ways to develop listening skills. Some helpful and classic practices include: dancing and drumming, sitting and walking meditations, t'ai chi or chi kung, painting or journal writing. It's important to find what works for you, and even the time of day or night that works best for you. Whatever you choose, the commonality is that they all offer an opportunity for quieting the mind, and slowing down enough to be
present and able to listen for inner guidance - and guidance from the plants themselves. — Robin Rose Bennett

You take your natural vices and call them virtues. Of which greed is the most despicable. That and betrayal of commonality. After all, whoever decided that competition is always and without exception a healthy attribute? Why that particular path to self-esteem? Your heel on the hand of the one below. This is worth something? Let me tell you, it's worth nothing. Nothing lasting. Every monument that exists beyond the moment - no matter which king, emperor or warrior lays claim to it - is actually a testament to the common, to co-operation, to the plural rather than the singular. — Steven Erikson

Storytelling is among the oldest forms of communication. Storytelling is the commonality of all human beings, in all
places, in all times. — Rives Collins

Some films clearly seem to divide people. And I do think there's something incredibly exciting about the commonality of us as human beings, which some films are lucky enough to tap into. — Tom Hooper

We must seek together to address the good aspirations of people everywhere, for we are bound together through great commonality. — Bryant McGill

We are your shadow uncles, your angel godfathers, your mother's or your grandmother's best friend from college, the author of that book you found in the gay section of the library. We are characters in a Tony Kushner play, or names on a quilt that rarely gets taken out anymore. We are the ghosts of the remaining older generation. You know some of our songs. We do not want to haunt you too somberly. We don't want our legacy to be gravitas. You wouldn't want to live your life like that, and you won't want to be remembered like that, either. Your mistake would be to find our commonality in our dying. The living part mattered more. We taught you how to dance. — David Levithan

Democracy is about the conditions that make it possible for ordinary people to better their lives by becoming political beings and by making power responsive to their hopes and needs. What is at stake in democratic politics is whether ordinary men and women can recognize that their concerns are best protected and cultivated under a regime whose actions are governed by principles of commonality, equality, and fairness, a regime in which taking part in politics becomes a way of staking out and sharing in a common life and its forms of self-fulfillment. Democracy is not about bowling together but about managing together those powers that immediately and significantly affect the lives and circumstances of others and one's self. — Sheldon S. Wolin

What is shared in common is infinitely more significant than what apparently divides. — Dave Mearns

There are commonalities among all the pandemics that occur, and we can learn from them. One commonality is that they all come from animals. And the other commonality is that we wait too long. — Nathan Wolfe

Genuine compassion is based on the rationale that just as I do, others also have this innate desire to be happy and overcome suffering; just as I do, they have the natural right to fulfill this fundamental aspiration. Based on that recognition of this fundamental equality and commonality, one develops a sense of affinity and closeness, and based on that, one will generate love and compassion. That is genuine compassion. — Dalai Lama XIV

Celebrities are our heroes and heroines now, discussed the next day over latte or lunch. We have such a strong need to talk to each other, to have some commonality of story, that we're finding it in celebrities. In effect, we're turning reality into fiction. Using actors and actresses, just off duty. And how is this working for us? Not great. It leaves us with a perennially empty feeling. We find the celebrities empty, and at some level, we find ourselves empty for paying them so much attention. We've become reluctant voyeurs, and at some level, we know they're just people trying to live their lives. Our culture begins to lack content, depth, and substance. We miss the richness of human experience that story embodies, reflects, and carries forward. We might have to go back to reading books. Yay! — Lisa Scottoline

There are so many issues that this country [the U.S.] has, and that the world faces, that it's important that we sit down and recognize our commonality. When we do that, we can actually work together to overcome some of the problems that we have. That, to me, is just a good starting place. — Paul Blackthorne

Observations," he says.
"Four imperial Unseelie guards were the only commonality I was able to isolate endemic to both scenes." They'd been standing, armed, at the dock doors, overseeing the delivery.
He gives me a sidewise look. "Wow. That was, like, a whole sentence. With nouns and verbs and connective tissue. Endemic. Fancy word. — Karen Marie Moning

I realized that an artist seeking to tell the truth in her art takes great courage. I recognize the courage required to bring children together from Israeli and Palestinian communities to find commonality in music as a very powerful and effective beginning towards Peace. — Yoko Ono

I want to break into the acting industry. It's something I have a great deal of respect for; it's a passion of mine. It's so amazing, the differences between acting and being an athlete, but the one commonality is they both evoke emotion in the viewer. And those emotions are real. So I think that's pretty cool. — Apolo Ohno

From the tiniest grain of sand to the brain of an Einstein, all existence, animate and inanimate, is the product of the same ninety-two elements that are themselves the harvest of the energy of the creation. At every turn an underlying commonality, a unity, emerges from within the diversity. — Gerald Schroeder

I see people getting so caught up in celebrating diversity that they are neglecting their commonality. — Richard Paul Evans

All of the characters in my films, they share one commonality. It doesn't matter whether they are good or bad, it doesn't matter whether they are smart or stupid, these characters all take responsibility for their own behavior. I'm much the same. — Park Chan-wook

Certainly I'm a Christian first and foremost. But I do believe in religious tolerance and finding the commonality between all of us. I think that's how we're all going to come together. — Dennis Quaid

In India we celebrate the commonality of major differences; we are a land of belonging rather than of blood. — Shashi Tharoor

To Bruce Lee, philosophy was not the professional playground of academics, but every human being's gateway to the greatest adventure of the human spirit. It illuminated the frontiers of human possibility and obliterated the shadows of doubt and insecurity. Unlike others, content to follow, Bruce Lee insisted upon charting his own course toward truth, and he encouraged those who wished to share his insights to do likewise. While Lee was a champion of individual rights and individual development, both of which stress the sovereignty of the individual as an end in himself, he also spoke to something deeper - the commonality of all human beings and the removal of such artificial barriers to true brotherhood as nationality, ethnicity, and class structure, so that human beings could live together peaceably as independent equals. Bruce Lee rejected blind obedience to — Bruce Lee

Golden Rule: Do unto others as you would have done unto yourself. Every major world religion has this rule in common and a God they should love. — Darrell Mowat

The point of marriage is not to create a quick commonality by tearing down all boundaries; on the contrary, a good marriage is one in which each partner appoints the other to be the guardian of his solitude, and thus they show each other the greatest possible trust. A merging of two people is an impossibility, and where it seems to exist, it is a hemming-in, a mutual consent that robs one party or both parties of their fullest freedom and development. But once the realization is accepted that even between the closest people infinite distances exist, a marvelous living side-by-side can grow up for them, if they succeed in loving the expanse between them, which gives them the possibility of always seeing each other as a whole and before an immense sky. — Rainer Maria Rilke

Hopefully, someday we will both realize that despite our sharp differences, you and I have more in common than we think. — Ray Bourhis

I may be wrong, but it seems that there may be some unraveling of the American tapestry. I see people getting so caught up in celebrating diversity that they are neglecting their commonality. I don't see this as a good thing". — Richard Paul Evans

There is something desperately lonely about Barack Obama's universe. One gets the overwhelming sense of someone yearning for connection, for something that binds human beings together, for community and commonality, for what he repeatedly calls "the common good". This is hardly news. — Simon Critchley

Contemporary political theorists continue this type of thinking about democracy by arguing that the development of "public judgment" among regular citizens should be made the central concern of modern politics. Public judgment, in the words of Benjamin Barber, is a function of commonality that can be exercised only by citizens interacting with one another in the context of mutual deliberation and decision. — Kevin Mattson

Writing is a conduit. It opens up a passageway into the past. Not just for the writer, but for the reader too. Both readers and writer are linked by the commonality of human experience. — Lang Leav

The commonality between science and art is in trying to see profoundly - to develop strategies of seeing and showing. — Edward Tufte

It makes me sad that so many people feel they're only allowed to show their best face, while their humanity and vulnerabilities are forbidden and hidden. How else do we connect, but by commonality, by mutual understanding and truth in life's experiences? Whether it makes you smile or cringe, a truth spoken is a healing thing. — Jennifer DeLucy

Commonality as a shared estate is an essential paradox; one calling dynamics within dynamics. It invokes the standard of not having standards. — Dew Platt

There is something exciting about this. Peter still doesn't want to have sex with Mizzy, but there is something thrilling about downing a shot of vodka with another man who happens to be naked. There's the covert brotherliness of it, a locker-room aspect, the low, masculine, eroticized love-hum that's not so much about the flesh as it is about the commonality. You, Peter, as devoted as you are to your wife, as completely as you understand her very real worries on Mizzy's behalf, also understand Mizzy's desire to make his own way, to avoid that maelstrom of womanly ardor, that distinctly feminine sense that you will be healed, whether you want to be or not.
Men are united in their commonness, maybe it's as simple as that. — Michael Cunningham

Sometimes he wondered if most people experienced the world around them a little bit differently from their fellows, if the assumption of commonality was simply an illusion. — C.S. Harris

How do we negotiate between my history and yours? How would it be possible for us to recover our commonality, not the ambiguous imperial-humanist myth of those shard human (and indeed also most divine) attributes that are supposed to distinguish us absolutely from animals but, more significant, the imbrications of our various pasts and presents, the ineluctable relationships of shred and contested meanings, values, and material resources? It is necessary to assert our dense particularities, our lived and imagined differences; but can we afford to leave untheorized the question of how our differences are intertwined and, indeed, hierarchically organized? Could we, in other words, afford to have entirely different histories, to see ourselves living - and having lived - in entirely heterogenous and discrete spaces? — Satya P. Mohanty

Common sense will only get you a common life. — Bryant McGill

Creativity is a challenge. It requires us to be fully human
autonomous yet engaged, independent yet interdependent. Creativity bridges the conflict between our individualistic and our sociality. It celebrates the commonality of our species while simultaneously setting us apart as unique individuals. — Greg Graffin

We are way more powerful when we turn to each other and not on each other, when we celebrate our diversity, focus on our commonality, and together tear down the mighty walls of injustice. — Cynthia McKinney

He knew exactly what it was like to lose a child. And that fact wouldn't matter in the least in this circumstance. There could be no commiseration among such people despite the seeming commonality of loss, because it was actually each parent's totally unique hell. — David Baldacci

It should not be strange that the values cherished by all the three major religions are the same, since they originate from a common source. For example, Islam, the predominant religion in the Middle East, accepts as an integral part of its religious teachings both the Old and the New Testaments. If this commonality of moral traditions among the world's major religions does not say something about the universality of religion, it does say something about the universality of mankind ... — King Hussein I

While reading, we can leave our own consciousness, and pass over into the consciousness of another person, another age, another culture. "Passing over," a term used by the theologian John Dunne, describes the process through which reading enables us to try on, identify with, and ultimately enter for a brief time the wholly different perspective of another person's consciousness. When we pass over into how a knight thinks, how a slave feels, how a heroine behaves, and how an evildoer can regret or deny wrongdoing, we never come back quite the same; sometimes we're inspired, sometimes saddened, but we are always enriched. Through this exposure we learn both the commonality and the uniqueness of our own thoughts -- that we are individuals, but not alone. — Maryanne Wolf

The only way my life makes sense is if, regardless of culture, race, religion, tribe, there is this commonality, these essential human truths and passions and hopes and moral precepts that are universal. And that we can reach out beyond our differences. If that is not the case, then it is pretty hard for me to make sense of my life. — Barack Obama

A good nationalism has to depend on a principle of the common people, on myths of a struggling commonality. — Andrew O'Hagan

If you ask what the people here are like, I must tell you, "Like people everywhere!" Uniformity marks the human race. — Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

I don't want to think too much about how I'm carving and what I'm carving - you are just carving away the excess clay and there's a piece underneath there. And it's kind of like getting out of the way. Maybe that's what the commonality is: It's getting out of the way so that the art can speak. — Erykah Badu

I don't understand racism. We are all the same and I have the perfect hypothesis to prove it. I play to all those countries and they cry in all the same places in my show. They laugh in the same places. They become hysterical in the same places. They faint in the same places and that's the perfect hypothesis. There is a commonality that we are all the same. — Michael Jackson

Some friendships are formed by a commonality of interests and ideas: you both love judo or camping or making your own sausage. Other friendships are forged in alliance against a common enemy. — David Sedaris

Appriciating that this oneness is the divine creative power and life of the universe, moving and breathing in the people we meet and the objects we encounter, we will spontaneouly treat everyone and everything with respect, and what Buddhists call "loving kindness." based on the acceptance and acknowledgement of this ultimate commonality, compassion will arise naturally. — Ilchi Lee

Among the most striking things that I have learned is how much we have in common. I've sat down with people everywhere, discussing what was in their hearts and on their minds. And it doesn't take long to find commonality, which is often overlooked, ignored, dismissed, and rejected otherwise. — Hillary Clinton

I love work. I love putting together a group of people who are all doing the same thing. The commonality of purpose. — Scott Rudin

We need to have a paradigm shift in our consciousness. If we don't get our act together and come in commonality and understanding with the organisms that sustain us today, not only will we destroy those organisms, but we will destroy ourselves. — Paul Stamets

Finding beauty in the common is the sign of a gifted mind. — Bryant McGill

It is this, at its most basic, that makes science a humane pursuit; it acknowledges the commonality of people's experience. — John Charles Polanyi

Technological measures are important, but equally important is ... a consciousness of the commonality of all living beings and an emphasis on shared responsibility. — Vaclav Havel

Everything is integral and interacts with everything else. This means that nothing is itself without everything else. There is a commonality, an integrity, an intimacy of the universe with itself. — Thomas Berry

I continue to experience my faith in God as a personal relationship between the two of us. However, having admitted my commonality with the human race, I find that my faith does not flourish in isolation. As much as I hate to admit it, my faith is enhanced and enlarged when in relationship to other less-than-perfect human beings. Even though at times other Christians can be quite annoying, I feel very fortunate to have found my way back to a spiritual community that puts up with me even when I'm a bit annoying myself. — Carmen Renee Berry

A belief in a policy of kindness, and a sense of commonality among all living creatures. — Dalai Lama XIV

We are different races, nationalities, and ethnic groups. We are all Americans. Yes, we fuss, we have differences of opinions, but we are all Americans. The important commonality is the fact that we all bleed red. We are humankind. — James Morris Robinson

We have to have a commonality and purpose. We have to understand that each of us is dependent on the success of the others in the organization to reach the goals we're trying to accomplish. It's never an easy thing. — Rick Welts

Commonality can most easily be seen in the seven common traits that all explorers possessed: curiosity, hope, passion, courage, independence, self-discipline, and perseverance. Explorers — Martin Dugard

A powerful force drives the world toward a converging commonality, and that force is technology. ... Almost everyone everywhere wants all the things they have heard about, seen, or experienced via the new technologies. — Theodore Levitt

People trudge through most days with little excitement in their lives. But our digital age provides so many opportunities to give people an authentic view of who you are or what your company strives to be, thus creating touch points of commonality that draw you into closer friendship with others. — Dale Carnegie

I think there is a global commonality of understanding coming into being. And it is not necessarily fostered by institutions. — Terence McKenna

Accepting experiences is through the understanding that everybody was born equal, no labels, no social status, no preconceptions just born a little person preparing to grow-up on what ever path is grown from development, environment and/or otherwise everybody has the right to have a roof over their head, three meals a day, a wage/payment which can support themselves and their families, a benefit system that cares for the disabled and people with mental illnesses, a government that looks out for all it's people, wars quenched not and man made barriers be fallen so every person knows the commonality of being human is that everybody is all different and let people be novices to other peoples experiences so another person gains anew. People all deserve the right to be equal. — Paul Isaacs

What's important is to be able to see yourself, I think, as having commonality with other people and not determine, because of your good luck, that everybody is less significant, less interesting, less important than you are. — Harrison Ford

She looked out then, through the crowd, and saw Simon with the Lightwoods, looking at her across the empty space that separated them. It was the same way that Jace had looked at her at the manor. It was the one thread that bound these two boys that she loved so much, she thought, their one commonality: They both believed in her even when she didn't believe in herself. — Cassandra Clare

There are so many ways to help, by either sharing your skills or expertise, joining our board of directors or advisory boards, and donating. Regardless of what or how you share with ISF, we recognize that we don't have all the answers, and that solutions lie not in commonality but in diversity. Welcoming a broad range of thinkers, creators, and doers is what makes this organization thrive. — Ian Somerhalder

If you want to write something completely unique, you will probably fail or at best write something without redeeming value. The mind works in certain patterns: the mind organizes facts in story form; it is your commonality with that body of human thought that makes a good book, not its estrangement from the common values that humans share. — Janet Morris

A commonality among factitious disorder is a lack in bonding personal relationships, providing alternative supports. Mr. McIlroy a skilled patient would receive over 200 hospital admissions in Britain subjecting himself to hundreds of painful treatments and procedures (Pallis & Bamji, 1979). The strength of compulsion of being viewed in the patient role becomes ever more obvious through the individual's willingness to submit to such rigors. Munchausen's syndrome may be rare yet continues to be a consistent disorder at the same time. The characteristics of Munchausen syndrome include physiological complaints presented by a dramatic patient. The patient exaggerates the illness exhibiting Pseudologia Fantastica. To minimize communication a patient will make use of hospital networks within different geographical locations. — Steven G. Carley

Commonality doesn't inoculate against hurt. — Leslie Jamison

Art itself shuns commonality: while the scientist may seek the phenomenon that repeats itself, the artist seeks the exception. — Dore Ashton

By acknowledging and accepting the ultimate commonality, we can naturally and voluntarily develop the attitude of compassion and benevolence toward other people, other life-forms, and all beings. We will want to live for the good of all because we know that's the way we benefit ourselves, too. — Ilchi Lee

If you hold a beggarly attitude, towards life,
do not expect everyone you meet, to be a philanthropist, to you — Kamini Arichandran

If you're a song writer, it's a bit different because you are expressing your own words, feelings, perspective. As an actor, you are doing your best to interpret and express the root of the character's perspective which have been established by the writer. There are parallels of performing. Tapping into your own emotional piggy bank. The biggest commonality is if you are successful in either industry, you get free snacks all the time. — Candice Accola

When I say that there's commonality, I mean more in terms of the sort of techniques by which we perceive Baroque and minimalist music rather than the techniques used to compose them. I know that's being sort of overly complicated. — Mahan Esfahani

Stop trying to explore what is different about yourselves and explore the commonality you have instead. — Rene Gaudette

As I looked down, I saw a large river meandering slowly along for miles, passing from one country to another without stopping. I also saw huge forests, extending along several borders. And I watched the extent of one ocean touch the shores of separate continents. Two words leaped to mind as I looked down on all this: commonality and interdependence. We are one world. — John-David F. Bartoe

The essence of diversity is the individual's experience of it. Diversity is about personalised shades of experience emanating from universal colours of humanity, but each person takes from the universal what is relevant to them and alters it by their own interpersonal experience. — Camila Batmanghelidjh

The real difference is that with fantasy - and by that I mean fantasy which can simultaneously tap into a cosmopolitan commonality at the same time as it springs from an individual and unique perspective. In this sort of fantasy, a mythic resonance lingers on - an harmonious vibration that builds in potency the longer one considers it, rather than fading away when the final page is read and the book is put away. Characters discovered in such writing are pulled from our own inner landscapes... and then set out upon the stories' various stages so that as we learn to understand them a little better, both the monsters and the angels, we come to understand ourselves a little better as well. — Charles De Lint

Well, I'm not a method actress by any stretch of the imagination so the best thing that I can do is be as real as possible and find whatever commonality in that character that I can see myself. — Rashida Jones

As sensory experience junkies, we have been blinded to the majesty in the common. — Bryant McGill

Can you maintain the awareness of ultimate commonality while you are fully engaged in your life as a functional ego or a character? I believe you can, and this can be a powerful spiritual practice for anyone. This practice will continue until the gap between those two, your true nature and your characte, is filled, and your character manifests your true nature completely. My guess is that you will find the gap to be very enjoyable to fill. — Ilchi Lee

None of us are any better than anyone else and none of us are any worse than anyone else, and we're all equal and whatever we can do to celebrate our commonality rather than our differences, which is what religion does, to me ... religion just compartmentalizes people and makes everybody into a box. — Ron Perlman

Each man is an island unto himself. But though a sea of difference may divide us, an entire world of commonality lies beneath. — James Rozoff

There can be no universal without diversity: the quest for the ultimate commonality would be pointless if we did not recognize the initial differences that explain just why we have to go in search of the universal. — Tariq Ramadan

What's great about art is that if you can reach people, if they hear or see what you do and it moves them, there's a commonality. — Shawn Colvin

That which you or I think is most unique about ourselves we hide. In ordinary discourse, in the normal state, we share our common self, our superficial self. Yet what is most unique about us is what has the greatest potential for bonding us. When we share our uniqueness, we discover the commonality in greatness that defines everyone on the planet. — Robert E. Quinn

I wanted to do something different. Therefore, the first person I thought would have been too exclusionary. It would have said me, me, me, me, me. I, I, I, I, I. As if I were pushing away my experiences from the experiences of others. Because basically what I was trying to do was show our commonality. I mean to say, in the very ordinariness of what I recount I think perhaps the reader will find resonances with his or her own life. — Paul Auster

What I love about 'The Chew' is that we have these celebrities come on, and you get to see them in a different light, cooking or enjoying food, when we usually don't see them in that setting. So it's a lot of fun for their fans to see them be normal people and having that commonality of food. — Carla Hall

Planetary democracy does not yet exist but our global civilization is already preparing a place for it. It is the very Earth we inhabit linked with Heaven above us. Only in this setting can the mutuality and the commonality of the human race be newly created with reverence and gratitude for that which transcends each of us and all of us together. — Vaclav Havel

The only thing she and Tilly had in common was their carbon base. — James S.A. Corey

No two wars are ever the same. Some are just, some are unjust, but the basic commonality shared between them all is that young men and women heeded a call to service, overcame their fear, and fought for their side. — Bob Riley

There is no time and space limitation for public accountability on the Internet. Creative commonality is standard and does not resemble the authoritarian style of the dead communist experience. It seems that it is no longer society's obligation to understand legislation; it is a duty for governments to be understood by their people. — Eduardo Paes