The self is not something ready-made, but something in continuous formation through choice of action.
Interpretation
The self is an evolving construct shaped by our actions and decisions.
John Dewey's quote emphasizes that our identity is not a fixed entity but rather a dynamic process that develops over time based on the choices we make and the actions we take. This perspective encourages reflection on how personal growth and self-understanding are continuously influenced by our experiences and decisions, suggesting that we have the power to shape who we are.
In practice
In a motivational speech about personal growth.
Every teacher should realize he is a social servant set apart for the maintenance of the proper social order and the securing of the right social growth. In this way, the teacher always is the prophet of the true God and the usherer-in of the true Kingdom of God.
Democracy has to be born anew every generation, and education is its midwife.
It science involves an intelligent and persistent endeavor to revise current beliefs so as to weed out what is erroneous, to add to their accuracy, and, above all, to give them such shape that the dependencies of the various facts upon one another may be as obvious as possible.
For in spite of itself any movement that thinks and acts in terms of an βism becomes so involved in reaction against other βisms that it is unwittingly controlled by them. For it then forms its principles by reaction against them instead of by a comprehensive, constructive survey of actual needs, problems, and possibilities.
Any genuine teaching will result, if successful, in someone's knowing how to bring about a better condition of things than existed earlier.
The reactionaries are in possession of force, in not only the army and police, but in the press and the schools
To practice virtue is to selflessly offer assistance to others, giving without limitation one's time, abilities, and possessions in service, whenever and wherever needed, without prejudice concerning the identity of those in need.
Far off, men swell, bully, and threaten; bring them hand to hand, and they are feeble folk.
One of the most salient features of our culture is that there is so much bullshit.
Men of the world who value the Way all turn to books. But books are nothing more than words. Words have value; what is of value in words is meaning. Meaning has something it is pursuing, but the thing that it is pursuing cannot be put into words and handed down. The world values words and hands down books but, though the world values them, I do not think them worth valuing. What the world takes to be values is not real value.
We're terrible animals. I think that the Earth's immune system is trying to get rid of us, as well it should.
Liberty may be endangered by the abuse of liberty, but also by the abuse of power.
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