Quotes from Nathaniel Branden

No one is incapable of expanding his or her consciousness.

Most of the issues of integrity we face are not big issues but small ones, yet the accumulated weight of our choices has an impact on our sense of self.

What determines the level of self-esteem is what the individual does, within the context of his or her knowledge and values.

The thing I want you to understand," Ayn was saying, "is that no matter how hard the battle, it can be won. You can break through.

The practice of living consciously is the first pillar of self-esteem.

Our motive is not to prove our worth, but to live our possibilities

That is why the first steps of building self-esteem can be difficult: We are challenged to raise the level of our consciousness in the face of emotional resistance.

we can be drawn not to the most logical explanation of our behavior but to the most damaging, to that which puts us in the worst light morally.

The tragic irony of people's lives (this point can hardly be stressed enough) is that the very attempt to deny aloneness results in denying love. Without an 'I' who loves, what is the meaning of love?

If our liabilities pose the problem of inadequacy, our assets pose the challenge of responsibility

Consciousness does not "reflexively" expand in the face of the new and unfamiliar; sometimes we contract it instead.

If low self-esteem dreads the unknown and unfamiliar, high self-esteem seeks new frontiers. If low self-esteem avoids challenges, high self-esteem desires and needs them. If low self-esteem looks for a chance to be absolved, high self-esteem looks for an opportunity to admire.

Doing what I am doing while I am doing it.

the healing that is needed is not between self and others but between adult-self and child-self.

The tragedy of many people's lives is that they look for self-esteem in every direction except within, and so they fail in their search. In

Certain religious teachings implicitly or explicitly damn sex, damn pleasure, damn the body, damn ambition, damn material success, damn (for all practical purposes) the enjoyment of life on Earth. If children are indoctrinated with these teachings, what will the practice of integrity mean in their lives? Some elements of hypocrisy may be all that keeps them alive

Whether you achieve what you want in life matters. Whether you are happy matters. Honor and fight for your highest potential. Self-realization - the realization of the best within you - is the noblest goal of your existence.

The lower our self-esteem, the more urgent the need to "prove" ourselves—or to forget ourselves by living mechanically and unconsciously.

It is generally recognized by clinical psychologists and psychiatrists that pathological anxiety is the central and basic problem with which they must deal in psychotherapy—the symptom underlying the patient's other symptoms

But to look to others as a primary source of our self-value is dangerous: first, because it doesn't work; and second, because it exposes us to the danger of becoming approval addicts.

In therapy I have found that one of the most powerful ways to help men and women become more effective in love relationships is to work with them on their relationship to their opposite-gender-self

The power of the method is that it generates shifts in the consciousness and orientation of the individual without lengthy "discussions" or "analyses." The solution is largely generated from within. If you keep a journal and over time write six to ten endings for each of these incomplete sentences, not only will you learn a great deal but it will be almost impossible not to grow in the practice of self-responsibility.

When we feel visible, we feel that the other person and I are in the same reality, the same universe, metaphorically speaking

Conversely, the elimination of irrational fears causes self-esteem to rise. This is one of the basic tasks of therapy.