Low self-esteem is like driving through life with your hand-brake on.
Maxwell MaltzRead
Of all the traps and pitfalls in life, self-disesteem is the deadliest, and the hardest to overcome: for it is a pit designed and dug by our own hands, summed up in the phrase, 'It's no use - I can't do it.'
Interpretation
What this quote means
Self-doubt is the most destructive obstacle we create for ourselves, making it difficult to achieve our goals.
This quote by Maxwell Maltz emphasizes that the worst setbacks we face in life often stem from our own negative self-perception. Self-disesteem acts as a trap that we construct for ourselves, leading us to believe that we are unable to succeed, which ultimately hinders our personal growth and achievement.
Themes
Self-EsteemSelf-DoubtObstaclesGrowthMindset
In practice
Example use cases
In a motivational speech addressing young adults, one might say, 'Remember that self-disesteem is the deadliest trap you can fall into.'
More from Maxwell Maltz
All quotes →Your nervous system cannot tell the difference between an imagined experience and a 'real' experience. In either case, it reacts automatically to information which you give to it from your forebrain. Your nervous system reacts appropriately to what you THINK or IMAGINE to be 'true.
Maxwell MaltzRead
The 'self-image' is the key to human personality and human behavior. Change the self image and you change the personality and the behavior.
Maxwell MaltzRead
Our self image, strongly held, essentially determines what we become.
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Within you right now is the power to do things you never dreamed possible.
Maxwell MaltzRead
What is opportunity, and when does it knock? It never knocks. You can wait a whole lifetime, listening, hoping, and you will hear no knocking. None at all. You are opportunity, and you must knock on the door leading to your destiny. You prepare yourself to recognize opportunity, to pursue and seize opportunity as you develop the strength of your personality, and build a self-image with which you are able to live - with your self-respect alive and growing.
Maxwell MaltzRead
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