999 Quotes About Individuality

The authority of society is imposed not arbitrarily or officially, but naturally. And it is because of this fact that its effect on the individual is incomparably much more powerful than that of the State. It creates and molds all individuals in its midst. It passes on to them, slowly, from the day of birth to death, all its material, intellectual, and moral characteristics. Society, so to speak, individualizes itself in every individual.

One is born an individual; one becomes a statistic.

...at some indiscernible moment he sees all of us clearly — every face distinct, like immiscible droplets of water, all of us individuals constituting an interconnected sea of beings.

She lives fearlessly in the light of her own truth.

We're unique in ways that can't be imagined, but you'll never know until you rid yourself of comparison.

We need some controversy every now and then. Without it, we would never know where we stand as individuals: with the crowd or by yourself.

Then perhaps we should carve a world one day where the strength lies in who you are, rather than in what they expect you to be.

I propose a conspiracy of orphans. We exchange winks. We reject hierarchies. All hierarchies. We take the shit of the world for granted and we exchange stories about how we nevertheless get by. We are impertinent. More than half the stars in the universe are orphan-stars belonging to no constellation. And they give off more light than all the constellation stars.

This is the age of the individual and there is no reason to believe that this focus of mankind is likely to change in the foreseeable future. Hence, the mission is to put individualism inside a wide context and to give it meaning and a sense of direction; to empower it – but authentically this time.