Quote

If you choose not to live self-responsibly, you count on others to make up your default. No one abjures self-responsibility on a desert island.

Nathaniel Branden

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Nathaniel Branden
Age: 84 †
Born: 1930
Born: April 9
Died: 2014
Died: December 3
Academic
Non-Fiction Writer
Psychologist
Psychotherapist
Desert
Choose
Responsibility
Others
Responsibly
Live
Default
Self
Island
Make
Islands
Count

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If my aim is to prove I am 'enough,' the project goes on to infinity-because the battle was already lost on the day I conceded the issue was debatable.
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The first love affair you must consummate is the love affair with yourself. Only then are you ready for a romantic relationship.
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The greater a child’s terror, and the earlier it is experienced, the harder it becomes to develop a strong and healthy sense of self.
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Capitalism, by its nature, entails a constant process of motion, growth and progress.
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We tend to feel most comfortable, most at home, with people whose self esteem level resembles our own.
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Sometimes pain is easier to bear alone than happiness.
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Most of us are taught from an early age to pay far more attention to signals coming from other people than from within. We are encouraged to ignore our own needs and wants and to concentrate on living up to others expectations.
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The higher our self-esteem, the stronger the drive to express ourselves, reflecting the sense of richness within. The lower our self-esteem, the more urgent the need to prove ourselves or to forget ourselves by living mechanically and unconsciously.
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The ultimate test of our integrity is not how we deal with those whom we agree but how we deal with those who we do not agree.
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A commitment to lifelong learning is a natural expression of the practice of living consciously.
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If we do not believe in ourselves- neither in our efficacy nor in our goodness- the universe is a frightening place.
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You have a right to your feelings. Your feelings are there to tell you something, but they are not infallible guides to behavior.
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What is guilt? It is moral self-reproach-I did wrong when it was possible to have done otherwise.
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There is no value-judgment more important to a man--no factor more decisive in his psychological development and motivation--than the estimate he passes on himself.
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Freedom is still the most radical idea of all.
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The stability we cannot find in the world, we must create within our own persons.
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The highest compliment one can be paid by another human being is to be told: 'Because of what you are, you are essential to my happiness.'
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A woman in love will do almost anything for a man, except give up the desire to improve him.
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There is only one reality - the reality knowable to reason. And if man does not choose to perceive it, there is nothing else for him to perceive if it is not of this world that he is conscious, then he is not conscious at all
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It is painful to face the self we know we have never had the integrity to honor and assert.
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