Opinions Are Like Belly-Buttons, Everyone's Got One

My opinions are strongly held and expressed (not so much on my blog, I try to keep it neutral). I've come to realize that when I am being forthright with my beliefs, I am often perceived as being opinionated or divisive. I like to debate. Some people take that to mean argumentative. I had to learn who I could get into that kind of conversation with and who I couldn't. People like me don't mean to step on toes. We like to throw around ideas and to hear new ideas.

Here are a few of my favorite quotes on the topic of opinions and ideas:

Man's mind, once stretched by a new idea, never regains its original dimensions. -Oliver Wendell Holmes

Every man takes the limits of his own field of vision for the limits of the world. -Arthur Schopenhauer

It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it. -Aristotle

To repeat what others have said, requires education; to challenge it requires brains. -Mary Pettibone Poole

Personally I'm always ready to learn, although I do not always like being taught. -Sir Winston Churchill

A fanatic is one who can't change his mind and won't change the subject. -Sir Winston Churchill

I prefer tongue-tied knowledge to ignorant loquacity. -Cicero

Great discoveries and achievements invariably involve the cooperation of many minds. -Alexander Graham Bell

Ideas are like children; your own are always wonderful. -Anonymous

I don't think everyone has to think like me...but I am surprised sometimes by what people believe.