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Attractions are things we all should be good at saying no to, because our Department of Attraction is arguably the least reliable and productive office in our entire brain.

Carolyn Hax

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Carolyn Hax
Age: 57
Born: 1966
Born: December 5
Columnist
Journalist
Writer
Bridgeport
Connecticut
Carolyn Hanley Hax
Entire
Office
Saying
Attractions
Least
Arguably
Brain
Reliable
Good
Attraction
Things
Productive
Department

More quotes by Carolyn Hax

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I think a person who arranges the event and orders the food also picks up the check - even the birthday person, even when people at the table insist on paying for the birthday person.
Carolyn Hax
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A lot of support gets withheld out of fear of awkwardness and misspeaking.
Carolyn Hax
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Your job is to be you, which includes being the chief beneficiary of all things you do right, the chief victim of all you do wrong, and the one person on Earth who has to live with every choice you make. As gatekeeper to your life, you’re it.
Carolyn Hax
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When in doubt, respond to what you witness, not what you hear secondhand.
Carolyn Hax
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The sudden death of a partner while expecting a child is so universally understood as awful that I don't think anyone with any other weight to carry is going to get to same kind of sympathy - except perhaps people who lose a child.
Carolyn Hax
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Live in the moment, this moment, your moment. That is by far and without meaningful rival The Best Position to put yourself in to discover and delight in who your children turn out to be, whoever they turn out to be.
Carolyn Hax
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Make sure you have legal cover for what you're doing.
Carolyn Hax
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We all make deals with ourselves when it comes to the difficult people in our lives.
Carolyn Hax
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Sometimes the pain outweighs the good things.
Carolyn Hax
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Waiting for someone to propose to you only passes the Really, it's tradition! sniff test when both of you think it's the man's job to propose and both of you think that's awesome.
Carolyn Hax
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Plan your own vacations when you want to, and plan a suitable combined vacation with this other family when you want to. If they freak out at your planning your own vacations as you see fit, then let them. Bowing to unreasonable demands because someone will make you pay emotionally if you don't is not a healthy option.
Carolyn Hax
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For me, the greatest source of frustration was trying to work with a willful child when there was something else I wanted - say, to get the child to go to bed so I could have my own time. Just the promise of the time, and feeling that promise slip away, was enough to introduce a whole other element of stress into the encounter.
Carolyn Hax
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One helpful thing to keep in mind as a retort-stopper is that you won't win, you won't change anyone's mind, you won't change any votes, you won't make the atmosphere in the room any better, YOU won't feel any better.
Carolyn Hax
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If you take the time to listen to an upset child's story with empathy, and guide the child toward figuring out the root of the problem, then the result is often that the child not only calms down, but also in the future is less likely to get so upset.
Carolyn Hax
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It's probably good for your body and brain to get moving occasionally.
Carolyn Hax
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I have no quarrel with people who lack the skill or temperament to care for small children.
Carolyn Hax
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The topic of sexual education makes me nuts, because kids are certainly not now and have rarely ever been clueless about what adults do and delude themselves about keeping from their kids. Especially now that so many of them are carrying the entire internet around in their pockets.
Carolyn Hax
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I believe in innocence until there's proof of guilt and all that.
Carolyn Hax
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Separating is not divorcing. Please keep that in mind. It is, instead, the second step in seeing if there's a better way to manage your family.
Carolyn Hax
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Instead of talking at each other about the non-business-related contact, talk to each other about your concerns about marriage. Listen a lot, too.
Carolyn Hax