learn_russian | Searching for a saying or aphorism

Searching for a saying or aphorism

Dear all,

I think I heard a good aphorism in Russian once that meant, essentially "Don't worry about trying to transform society, but just take care of your own personal situation and society will improve" -- maybe something about one's own огород or двор, but I'm not sure. Is there any aphorism or krylatoe vyrazhenie that means something like this?

Happy Holidays.

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I guess that is rather after Confucius: "The more man meditates upon good thoughts, the better will be his world and the world at large."

"Хочешь изменить мир? Начни с себя."
"Если ты не можешь изменить мир вокруг, измени хотя бы себя изнутри."

* * *

"Коль полоть, как в своем огороде."

Re: http://bibliotekar.ru/dal/80.htm

Wow! I guess,tou've nailed it!

And I've never knew such a proverb exists. This community helps to improve their Russian evenb to native speakers. XD

I don't think we did.

The first one is not a Russian proveb, but a quotation usually attributed (rather farsely) to Mohandas Gandhi. His actual quotation is "You must be the change you wish to see in the world," which obviously does not make such great Facebook "wise quotation" or Internet "demotivator."

The second one is usually, and again quite falsely, attributed to Kung Fuzi a.k.a. Confucius, although his real saying is again not as meaningless: it is "The more man meditates upon good thoughts, the better will be his world."

The third one at least looks like a genuine Russian proverb, and is attributed to Vladimir Dahl. Starts to smell Russian, right? However, if we check with the actual Explanatory Dictionary of the Great Russian Language by Dahl, there's only one entry for "полоть", and the example given by Dahl does not quite look like a proverb - it's smply "Поли в своём огороде".

Sorry for that ;-)

Edited 2014-12-23 17:24 (UTC)

Of course, I've meant only the last one. But I don't see why it doesn't look like a proverb to you. Just because it makes sence literally? So do many proverbs, i'd say.
Especially in the form it was given in the comment. I don't know the whole Dahl dictionary by heart, but the source given seems serious enough not to expect some fake made-up proverbs, ascribed to him. Maybe it was mentioned in a different article?

Anyway, it seems to fit upthera44 description perfectly, so, I guess, that's exectly what (s)he was looking for.

One does not have to know Dahl by heart, it is easily accessible and searchable online (https://slovari.yandex.ru/~%D0%BA%D0%BD%D0%B8%D0%B3%D0%B8/%D0%A2%D0%BE%D0%BB%D0%BA%D0%BE%D0%B2%D1%8B%D0%B9%20%D1%81%D0%BB%D0%BE%D0%B2%D0%B0%D1%80%D1%8C%20%D0%94%D0%B0%D0%BB%D1%8F/%D0%9F%D0%9E%D0%9B%D0%9E%D0%A2%D0%AC%20(%D0%BE%D0%B3%D0%BE%D1%80%D0%BE%D0%B4%D0%BD.)/) ;-)

And yes, if you can find a different article for полоть in Dahl's, please do so.

I don't see a need to find anything, since Dahl's "Пословицы русского народа" was quoted above. If you find the link unreliable, well, every over site with this which I could find gives the same text: http://hobbitaniya.ru/dal/dal118.php http://www.rodon.org/dvi/prn0.htm#a129 etc.

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Searching for a saying or aphorism

Confucius

Re: Confucius

Re: Confucius

Re: Confucius

Re: Confucius

Re: Confucius

Re: Confucius