However much we guard against it, we tend to shape ourselves in the image others have of us.
Interpretation
We often conform to the perceptions others have of us, despite our best efforts to resist.
This quote reflects the idea that our identities are significantly influenced by how others perceive us. No matter how much we attempt to maintain our individuality, the views and judgments of those around us can mold our behaviors and self-image, suggesting a profound interplay between personal identity and societal expectations.
In practice
This quote could be used in a discussion about self-perception in psychology classes.
Language was invented to ask questions. Answers may be given by grunts and gestures, but questions must be spoken. Humanness came of age when man asked the first question. Social stagnation results not from a lack of answers but from the absence of the impulse to ask questions.
Faith in humanity, in posterity, in the destiny of one's religion, nation, race, party or family-what is it but the visualization of that eternal something to which we attach the self that is about to be annihilated?
You can discover what your enemy fears most by observing the means he uses to frighten you.
Our frustration is greater when we have much and want more than when we have nothing and want some. We are less dissatisfied when we lack many things than when we seem to lack but one thing.
Our credulity is greatest concerning the things we know least about.
Perhaps a modern society can remain stable only by eliminating adolescence, by giving its young, from the age of ten, the skills, responsibilities, and rewards of grownups, and opportunities for action in all spheres of life. Adolescence should be a time of useful action, while book learning and scholarship should be a preoccupation of adults.
People see you as an object, not as a person, and they project a set of expectations onto you. People who don't have it think beauty is a blessing, but actually it sets you apart.
But how to do feelings? All very well to write "She felt sad", or describe what a sad person might do, but what of sadness itself, how was that put across so it could be felt in all its lowering immediacy? Even harder was the threat, or the confusion of feeling contradictory things.
Complete possession is proved only by giving. All you are unable to give possesses you.
Idleness is the parent of psychology.
But yet I'll make assurance double sure, and take a bond of fate: thou shalt not live.
Since trifles make the sum of human things, And half our misery from our foibles springs.
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