Quote

If we attach more importance to what other people believe than to what we know to be true - if we value belonging over being - we will not attain authenticity.

Nathaniel Branden

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Nathaniel Branden
Age: 84 †
Born: 1930
Born: April 9
Died: 2014
Died: December 3
Academic
Non-Fiction Writer
Psychologist
Psychotherapist
Belonging
Attain
Importance
Value
Values
True
Believe
Attach
People
Authenticity

More quotes by Nathaniel Branden

Image
A productive purpose to which you give yourself fully and joyfully is one of the great adventures of life. It is a uniquely human source of happiness.
Nathaniel Branden
Image
It's not that achievements prove our worth but rather that the process of achieving is the means by which we develop our effectiveness, our competence at living.
Nathaniel Branden
Image
Out of fear, out of the desire for approval, out of the misguided notions of duty, people surrender themselves-their convictions and their aspirations-every day. There is nothing noble about it. It takes far more courage to fight for your values than to relinquish them.
Nathaniel Branden
Image
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.
Nathaniel Branden
Image
It would be hard to name a more certain sign of poor self-esteem than the need to perceive some other group as inferior.
Nathaniel Branden
Image
... there is an irrational, cultish tendency in many intellectual movements, and Objectivism, alas, is no exception. Ayn Rand's personal obsession with loyalty did little to discourage this trend.... Rand had often protested, 'Protect me from my followers!'
Nathaniel Branden
Image
There is overwhelming evidence that the higher the level of self-esteem, the more likely one will be to treat others with respect, kindness, and generosity.
Nathaniel Branden
Image
A woman in love will do almost anything for a man, except give up the desire to improve him.
Nathaniel Branden
Image
To live consciously means to seek to be aware of everything that bears on our actions, purposes, values, and goals—to the best of our ability, whatever that ability may be—and to behave in accordance with that which we see and know.
Nathaniel Branden
Image
I have to respect other's opinions even if I don't agree with them.
Nathaniel Branden
Image
For I to become we and yet remain I, is one of the great challenges of marriage.
Nathaniel Branden
Image
Self-esteem is not a luxury it is a profound spiritual need.
Nathaniel Branden
Image
A depression is a large-scale decline in production and trade...there is nothing in the nature of a free-market economy to cause such an event.
Nathaniel Branden
Image
If you overcome your fear to ask someone for a date, a raise, or help with a project, that is an act of self-assertiveness. You are moving out into life rather than contracting and withdrawing.
Nathaniel Branden
Image
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.
Nathaniel Branden
Image
You have a right to your feelings. Your feelings are there to tell you something, but they are not infallible guides to behavior.
Nathaniel Branden
Image
High self esteem people can surely be knocked down by an excess of troubles, but they are quickerto pick themselves up again.
Nathaniel Branden
Image
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.
Nathaniel Branden
Image
Your choices have psychological consequences. The way you choose to deal with reality, truth, facts - your choice to honor or dishonor your own perceptions - registers in your mind, for good or for bad, and either confirms and strengthens your self-esteem or undermines and weakens it.
Nathaniel Branden
Image
It is painful to face the self we know we have never had the integrity to honor and assert.
Nathaniel Branden