There is nothing in the world more difficult than candor, and nothing easier than flattery. If there is a hundredth of a fraction of a false note to candor, it immediately produces dissonance, and as a result, exposure. But in flattery, even if everything is false down to the last note, it is still pleasant, and people will listen not without pleasure; with coarse pleasure, perhaps, but pleasure nevertheless.
And people get all fouled up because they want the world to have meaning as if it were words... As if you had a meaning, as if you were a mere word, as if you were something that could be looked up in a dictionary. You are meaning.
To act intelligently in human affairs is only possible if an attempt is made to understand the thoughts, motives, and apprehension of one's opponent so fully that one can see the world through their eyes.
I would that there was nothing in the world
But my beloved that night and day had perished,
And all that is and all that is to be,
All that is not the meeting of our lips.