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Vincent Van Gogh identified patterns in Mental Models that most people miss. This collection reveals those insights, each quote preserved with full attribution and context. Use it to sharpen your thinking, spot leverage points, and avoid common mistakes. When Mental Models gets complicated, return here for the mental clarity Vincent Van Gogh would bring to the situation.
"The fishermen know that the sea is dangerous and the storm terrible, but they have never found these dangers sufficient reason for remaining ashore."
"I see drawings and pictures in the poorest huts and the dirtiest corners. And my mind is drawn to these things with irresistible force."
"The heart of man is very much like the sea, it has its storms, it has its tides and in its depths it has its pearls too."
"There is no blue without yellow and without orange."
"I have a more or less irresistible passion for books."
"I would rather die of passion than of boredom."
"I keep on painting... it is my only way of living."
"The way to know God is to love many things."
"Even the knowledge of my own fallibility cannot keep me from making mistakes."
"Normality is a paved road: It is comfortable to walk, but no flowers grow on it."
"Great things are done by a series of small things brought together."
"I am still far from being what I want to be, but with God's help I shall succeed."
"I have a period of frightening clarity in those moments when nature is so beautiful. I am no longer sure of myself, and the paintings appear as in a dream."
"It is not the language of painters but the language of nature which one should listen to."
"Success is sometimes the outcome of a whole string of failures."
"I try more and more to be myself, caring relatively little whether people approve or disapprove."
"I am seeking, I am striving, I am in it with all my heart."
"If you hear a voice within you say 'you cannot paint,' then by all means paint, and that voice will be silenced."
"The world only concerns me in so far as I feel a certain debt and duty towards it, because I have walked on this earth for thirty years."
"It is good to love many things, for therein lies the true strength, and whosoever loves much performs much, and can accomplish much."
"What is done in love is done well."
"One must keep a little fire burning; however small, however hidden."
"One must work as long and as hard as a laborer if one wants to produce something good."
"Art is to console those who are broken by life."
"I am always doing what I cannot do yet, in order to learn how to do it."
"Exaggerate the essential and leave the obvious vague."
"I put my heart and my soul into my work, and have lost my mind in the process."
"I dream my painting and I paint my dream."
"In spite of everything, I shall rise again; I will take up my pencil, which I have forsaken in my great discouragement, and I will go on with my drawing."
"I feel that there is nothing more truly artistic than to love people."
"If you truly love nature, you will find beauty everywhere."
"I am a man of passions, capable of and subject to doing more or less foolish things, which I happen to repent, more or less, afterwards."
"I want to touch people with my art. I want them to say 'he feels deeply, he feels tenderly'."
"The beginning is perhaps more difficult than anything else, but keep heart, it will turn out all right."
Seeing how Vincent Van Gogh approaches Mental Models helps you apply the idea with more precision.
Pick one quote to guide a decision today, then return for deeper perspective.
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"Use this collection whenever you need Vincent Van Gogh's lens on Mental Models."