Children love and want to be loved and they very much prefer the joy of accomplishment to the triumph of hateful failure. Do not mistake a child for his symptom.
Erik EriksonRead
Men have always shown a dim knowledge of their better potentialities by paying homage to those purest leaders who taught the simplest and most inclusive rules for an undivided mankind.
Interpretation
Leaders who teach simple, inclusive principles inspire humanity to realize its true potential.
This quote emphasizes that throughout history, men have acknowledged their own potential by showing respect to the leaders who advocate for simplicity and inclusivity in guiding humanity. Erik Erikson suggests that these leaders illuminate the path towards a unified and better society by articulating basic yet profound principles that foster connection and understanding among people.
In practice
During a leadership seminar, to emphasize the importance of inclusive leadership.
Children love and want to be loved and they very much prefer the joy of accomplishment to the triumph of hateful failure. Do not mistake a child for his symptom.
Nobody likes to be found out, not even one who has made ruthless confession a part of his profession. Any autobiographer, therefore, at least between the lines, spars with his reader and potential judge.
You've got to learn to accept the law of life, and face the fact that we disintegrate slowly.
You see a child play, and it is so close to seeing an artist paint, for in play a child says things without uttering a word. You can see how he solves his problems. You can also see what's wrong. Young children, especially, have enormous creativity, and whatever's in them rises to the surface in free play.
In the social jungle of human existence, there is no feeling of being alive without a sense of identity.
Parents must not only have certain ways of guiding by prohibition and permission, they must also be able to represent to the child a deep, almost somatic conviction that there is meaning in what they are doing.
Christmas is God lighting a candle; and you don't light a candle in a room that's already full of sunlight. You light a candle in a room that's so murky that the candle, when lit, reveals just how bad things really are.
It takes a great deal of character strength to apologize quickly out of one's heart rather than out of pity. A person must possess himself and have a deep sense of security in fundamental principles and values in order to genuinely apologize.
If we have no mercy toward others, that is one proof that we have never experienced God's mercy.
When a person becomes a legend, the very thing that makes them human and knowable is killed off, so it's like being killed over and over and over again, for all eternity.
Instantaneous and mass communication is the mother of mass naivety. Should we then lose hope? Is there any hope? But to lose hope is as dangerous as to nurture false hope. Where then can we find hope that is responsible?
It's a very sobering feeling to be up in space and realize that one's safety factor was determined by the lowest bidder on a government contract.
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