A rolling stone gathers no moss - means?

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And if the rock was rolling straight enough, shouldn't it be possible for moss to grow on it anyway, on the sides? Does moss need stable gravity to grow?

why would moss be something a rock would want?

I thought it meant Mick Jagger was not much of a gardener. Joke. But whenever I hear that I always think of the rolling stones.

I don't get most of these expressions.

And I believe this is the oldest known interpretation, which I favor. This is the first explanation I ever heard, referring mainly to responsibility of settling down and establishing roots. The rolling stone in this interpretation, is an irresponsible vagabond or wanderer.

http://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/a-ro ... -moss.html

Lol I pictured a rolling rock that didn't gather moss too, that aside, I tried to figure out what it meant based on that visual image and came up with the same as what has been said.

Hah, I got asked this question during my appointment for a dx. When asked what it meant, I just said the statement is true (yet I still knew what, "Don't count your chickens before they hatch" meant). Rofl, I should have asked, "Could you use that in a sentence?"

A loner gains no false friends.

unfortunately the response that i was going to post has already been posted:

obviously i have been taught what it really means, but what ambivalence said was how i falteringly perceived it before i was taught the true meaning.

my alternative analysis of the proverb when i was young was that moss "grows" and is not "gathered".
moss can only be gathered if it is already in existence.
if moss is already in existence somewhere, then it will have it's roots pointing downward into the medium in which it is growing, and it's topside foliage will be the surface upon which the rolling stone rolls.
since the moss is anchored into the medium it is growing in, then that anchoring force is far greater than the attraction between the foliage and the surface of the rolling stone.
in the event that the stone is very heavy, and it uproots the moss by an impact trauma, then that moss will be flung into the air and also have extremely low odds of somehow becoming married to the surface of the stone due to the fact that even if it did come into contact with the surface of the stone, that surface would be moving rapidly and not provide any stable platform for the moss to take root (in the unlikely scenario that the stone is covered in mud or soil).


it could also mean that kate moss is not attracted to mick jagger or who ever the other band members are which i could not be bothered to look up.

i am ashamed to be unable to prevent myself from clicking "submit" on this response
.

Oh! THIS is what has confused me all this time! Since the wording was "gathered no moss", I thought the stone had to gather the moss....i.e., I wondered how a stone could gather, or "collect" moss anyway? I imagined a stone rolling down a hill, "picking up" no moss, but I thought how would the stone collect moss on it anyway, as the moss is rooted into the ground? Totally confusing......but I guess what it REALLY means is, the stone that sits and doesn´t roll has moss growing on it.....okay.....I get it now.....




Well, this is my favorite explanation!

What is moss supposed to be a metaphor of?

It means that if a person goes on to change a profession one after the other she will not become authority in any of those just as for a stone to gather moss (for moss to grow on it) requires time. If it is rolling the moss cannot grow on it.
For more difficult parts of languages see http://www.wrongplanet.net/postt135648.html
whose subtlety, most of you will not believe.

I interpret it to mean that if you don't sit still and focus on your goal, you wont accomplish anything.

Funny, I guess I really missed the point all this time! You see, I thought it was preferable to be the "rolling stone". This is a stone of action, rather than a stone just sitting around waiting for things to happen: instead, this stone is free to do as it will, unencumbered by moss weighing it down and making it static. I therefore assumed, up until now, that it was a "happier" stone.

How could I have been so wrong about this? Why would a stone WANT to be covered with moss?