"If we listened to our intellect, we'd never have a love affair. We'd never have a friendship. We'd never go into business, because we'd be cynical. Well, that's nonsense. You've got to jump off cliffs all the time and build your wings on the way down"
About this Quote
The real target isn’t intelligence; it’s cynicism dressed up as intelligence. “If we listened to our intellect” is a sly misdirection, suggesting that the mind has one voice when it actually has competing ones: curiosity, fear, pride, control. Cynicism is the voice that calls itself “realism” so it doesn’t have to admit it’s afraid. Bradbury punctures that posture with “Well, that’s nonsense,” a blunt reset that reads like a storyteller refusing to let the plot die of overanalysis.
Then comes the metaphor that reveals his context as a writer of speculative worlds: jump off cliffs, build wings on the way down. It’s not a sermon about recklessness; it’s an argument for iterative courage. You commit first, you improvise second. That’s how books get written, relationships deepen, careers happen. Bradbury’s subtext is practical: creation is always a delayed proof. You can’t think your way into certainty because certainty is usually the prize you get after you’ve already leapt.
Quote Details
| Topic | Motivational |
|---|---|
| Source | Verified source: Spartanburg Herald-Journal: Learning is solitary pursuit ... (Ray Bradbury, 1990)
Evidence: “If we listened to our intellect, we’d never have a love affair. We’d never have a friendship. We’d never go in business because we’d be cynical: ‘It’s gonna go wrong.’ Or ‘She’s going to hurt me.’ Or ‘I had a couple of bad love affairs so therefore . . .’ “Well, that’s nonsense. You’re going to miss life. You’ve got to jump off the cliff all the time and build your wings on the way down.” (October 17, 1990 newspaper interview article; exact page not verified). The strongest traceable primary-source attribution I found points to a newspaper interview titled “Learning is solitary pursuit for Bradbury,” by Luaine Lee, published October 17, 1990 in the Spartanburg Herald-Journal and distributed by New York Times News Service. A later Brown Daily Herald attribution dated March 24, 1995 also circulates widely, but evidence suggests that is a later reprint/reuse of the same quotation, not the first appearance. I could not directly access the original 1990 newspaper page image in this search session, so the exact page number remains unverified. Other candidates (1) The Journey Called You (Julie Fuimano, 2005) compilation88.6% ... If we listened to our intellect , we'd never have a love affair . We'd never have a friendship . We'd never go in... |
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Citation Formats
APA Style (7th ed.)
Bradbury, Ray. (2026, March 9). If we listened to our intellect, we'd never have a love affair. We'd never have a friendship. We'd never go into business, because we'd be cynical. Well, that's nonsense. You've got to jump off cliffs all the time and build your wings on the way down. FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/if-we-listened-to-our-intellect-wed-never-have-a-153073/
Chicago Style
Bradbury, Ray. "If we listened to our intellect, we'd never have a love affair. We'd never have a friendship. We'd never go into business, because we'd be cynical. Well, that's nonsense. You've got to jump off cliffs all the time and build your wings on the way down." FixQuotes. March 9, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/if-we-listened-to-our-intellect-wed-never-have-a-153073/.
MLA Style (9th ed.)
"If we listened to our intellect, we'd never have a love affair. We'd never have a friendship. We'd never go into business, because we'd be cynical. Well, that's nonsense. You've got to jump off cliffs all the time and build your wings on the way down." FixQuotes, 9 Mar. 2026, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/if-we-listened-to-our-intellect-wed-never-have-a-153073/. Accessed 12 Mar. 2026.
