When a person follows fashion, he is accepted in society. But once you get distracted and show the world your true thoughts and priorities, how others begin to bypass such a person. Not that such a member of society scared or caused antipathy, it simply cannot be understood. Man, following his ideals, and not the aspirations imposed by society, begins to cause rejection. It is impossible to predict, and this always makes you uncomfortable. Perhaps quotes about yourself and that you don’t need to imitate someone will help to understand: to be unique is good or bad.
“You have no place here”
Once Oscar Wilde said that you always need to remain yourself, since the rest of the places are occupied. If philosophers and writers could still divorce demagogy on this score, then science is 100% in agreement with this statement.
Not so long ago (in 2009), a neurophysiological study was conducted, as a result of which scientists came to the conclusion that each person perceives the world differently. If the minds of two people are interchanged, then none of them will recognize 70% of the objects surrounding it.
From this we can conclude that each person is unique, and in his own way sees the world around him. So be yourself! Quotes about it are not without meaning, even if you look at the question from the point of view of science.
What is it like?
What does it mean to be yourself? Quotations and aphorisms on this question give different answers. First of all, it is worth noting the statement of Mark Twain :
Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it's time to stop and think.
To understand the depth of the statement, you need to imagine a wide pasture on which a flock of sheep / cows / sheep is grazed (underline as necessary). Beyond the pasture there is a deep abyss. The sky is clear and clear, nothing portends trouble, but suddenly a deafening roar is heard from somewhere. Grouped, the herd begins to run away from the sound source. Hearing the roar of its hooves, it considers itself invincible, and rushes to certain death - into the abyss. Individually, each sheep knows that it is impossible to run there, but in the total mass no one hears the lonely voice of reason.
Perhaps the comparison is slightly exaggerated, but at all levels of human life you can find similar situations.
Perfect angle
I think the reward for conformism is that everyone likes you except yourself. (Rita May Brown)
In this quote, "to be yourself" means to like yourself. It is important to remember once and for all that ideals and perfections do not exist when it comes to man. That right angle is another matter. These 90 ° are perfect, no matter how you look, but this does not work with a person. People are different. Someone loves olivier with cranberries, someone is inspired by forgotten jazz compositions, and someone likes antique literature. Some violently enter into verbal polemics and controversy, others are too lazy to even make an offended look, and still others prefer loneliness. This is normal. But for some reason this is ashamed. Yes, modern fashion trends dictate their conditions. But, where does it say that they are indestructible rules?
Difficulties
To accept oneself is what it means to be oneself. A quote from Friedrich Nietzsche, however, warns that this activity is difficult:
Individuals always have to fight in order not to be crushed by the mass. If you try this, you will often be alone, and sometimes you will be scared. But no price is too high for the privilege of possessing oneself.
A simple example: a person has a goal that is not comparable with social norms of existence. That is, it is fundamentally different from the old dusty scenario "home-work". But a man burns with this, seeks to achieve the desired. Well, as is being conducted, the path to the cherished dream is full of dangers.
He falls, rises and falls again. Others stubbornly poke his nose into the dips and are “kindly” advised to be like everyone else. Man gives in. Discarding their attempts, begins to lead a normal life.
Routine
He gradually merges into society: work from 09:00 to 18:00, corporate parties, leave once a year and a bar on Fridays. The same as everyone, surrounded by people, with interests that do not cause bewilderment and ridicule, and an alarm clock, constantly wound up at 07:00. He is not alone, but also not happy. It is impossible to enjoy life when the heart wants to scream. Shouting about unfulfilled hopes, unfulfilled dreams, thrown into the trash of your favorite cacti and sold books by Aristotle. But you need to be silent, because it is not customary, you need to be ashamed of your emotions and be like everyone else. Thus hatred, despair, aggression is born.
At such moments, it comes to understanding that there is nothing to worry about either in solitude, in misunderstanding, or even in contempt. It is better to be yourself (quotes from great people do not lie) than to suffer from a silent cry of abandoned aspirations and hobbies all your life. And as Ralph Emerson said:
Remaining oneself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest achievement.
Be yourself: quotes from those who changed the world
A quick tip: to be yourself, you need to discard numbers and metric data. If a person can only be said when he was born, where he studied and by whom he worked, then it is difficult to call him a person. As Quentin Crisp said:
Fashion is what you accept when you don’t know who you are.
Fashion is changing - people are changing. The faceless human millipede swallows with admiration everything that the modern trend offers. It's hard to say something about such people: they are all the same. They differ only in names, professions and date of birth. The world will not even notice if one of these people disappears, another person will immediately come to his place. Another thing is a self-sufficient person. Others may not even know the name of such a person, but they will remember him for a long time. It just so happened that something that goes beyond the norm tightly eats into human memory.
If a person remained himself, those around him would know exactly what he was doing morning and evening, how he knew (or did not know how) to tell jokes and what he liked. It is impossible to describe such a person with metrics or numbers - they have no power over him. Therefore, as Judy Garland said:
Always be a first-class version of yourself, not a second-class version of someone else.
Those who have achieved something in life and inscribed their name on the pages of world history have always said that you need to remain yourself. Under no circumstances should one give up oneself for the sake of society. Let there be a lot of mistakes, let everything go not according to plan, let everything look strange, ridiculous and abnormal. Here is what they said:
I will not allow anyone to go through my mind with my dirty feet. (Mahatma Gandhi)
The desire to be someone else is a loss of oneself. (attributed to Kurt Cobain)
Imperfection is beautiful, madness is brilliant, and it is better to be absolutely ridiculous than absolutely boring. (Marilyn Monroe)
I feel that the simplicity of life is to be yourself. (Bobby Brown)
Your time is limited, do not waste it, living someone else's life. (Steve Jobs)
I am the one who will have to die when his time comes. So let me live my life the way I want. (Jimmy Hendricks)
Who is it?
To become yourself, you need to understand yourself. Quotations about this are not so many, but even among existing ones, you can find those that will help to understand this issue. First of all, it is worth noting one statement by Jim Morrison. Although, this is rather a question that he once asked the interlocutor:
Where is your desire to be strange? (Jim Morrison)
As mentioned above, a self-sufficient person is always a person incomprehensible to others. This is what you need to strive for. The main thing is not to confuse virtuous strangeness with stupid frenzy with which a person is simply trying to attract attention. The author of the statement had in mind those oddities that make a person happy, and do not turn him into a traveling entertainment event with a deep depression behind the curtains.
If you choose the path of a soldier, be you a general, if you want to be a monk, you will become a dad, my mother told me. But I chose the path of the artist and became Picasso. (Pablo Picasso)
A quote to oneself from a great artist may seem too arrogant to someone, only there is one undeniable truth in it: if a person chooses his own path, he will surely become himself.
And a few more sayings about yourself:
If you can't love yourself, how the hell are you going to love someone else? (Ru Paul)
Even in early childhood, I acquired the vicious habit of considering myself not like everyone else and behaving differently from other mortals. As it turned out, this is a gold mine! (Salvador Dali)
I think all people are strange. We should honor our personality, not be ashamed or embarrassed by it. (Johnny Depp)
I do not have to be the way others want to see me, and I'm not afraid to be the way I would like to see myself. (Mohammed Ali)
I want to stay crazy, live the way I dream, and not the way others want. (Paulo Coelho)
Create yourself
It seems that it could be simpler: if a person wants to be a self-sufficient person, he must make himself. Quotations speak of precisely this, because under the influence of someone else's opinion, a person will forever remain a captive and weak-willed slave of conformism. As one singer said:
Your self-esteem is determined only by you. You should not depend on what someone tells you who you are. (Beyonce)
By the way, not only she thinks so:
Worry about what other people think about you, and you will forever remain their captive. (Lao Tzu)
Believe that you know how to fly, overcome your indecision. (Kanye West)
Decide to be yourself - and know that one who finds himself gets rid of his hardships. (Arnold Matthew)
You are free to be yourself, to be your true Self here and now. And nothing can stop you. (Richard D. Bach)
There is a saying: "The salvation of drowning people is the work of the drowning people themselves." Only a person can turn himself into a self-sufficient person. It is a pity that many do not even know what they are capable of. Man is surprisingly strong, even when it comes to fighting himself, he can do anything, and willpower does not play a special role here.
What matters is not even the incentive or the pursuit of high ideals, but the inner fire - a simple desire to be happy. That’s the whole secret. And what is happiness? This is self-realization, freedom of choice and the ability to do what a particular person wants, and not someone else.
Deadly battle
But happiness is simply not given. You need to fight for him, and first of all with yourself. Quotes about the struggle of this kind warn that it is difficult, but hardest to quench from inaction.
An unfulfilled vocation sucks all the juices out of a person’s existence. (Balzac)
Like the worldview, each person has an individual vocation and the first step on the path to becoming oneself is its manifestation. True, different situations happen in life and not always, the manifestation of talent is an easy thing. Religion, racial and class affiliation, traditions, distorted views on morality - this is only the tip of the iceberg. Living in a particular society, a person has to reckon with his rules and norms.
But sometimes they contradict his desires, and then you have to engage in a deadly battle. On the one hand - self-manifestation, on the other - not justified hopes of the immediate environment and violation of all written and unwritten norms.
Great souls always encounter violent opposition from mediocre minds. The mediocre mind is incapable of understanding a person who refuses to blindly worship prejudice, and instead courageously and honestly expresses his opinion. (Albert Einstein)
Being yourself is not easy. But, as Stendhal once said, this is the only way to be successful. Sometimes you have to give up a lot, doubt, fear and give up in order to start over again. There seems to be no point in this venture, and why not be so zealous. But once you prove yourself, you no longer want to be someone else.