Quotes About Individuality

Learn to tolerate your own different-ness from other people and learn to navigate your own waters

As our children turn even five or six degrees away from us, we have to be aware of our fear and our excitement and our hope for them. And as that five or sex degrees turns into ten or twenty degrees, even ninety degrees, we have to monitor those feelings every step of the way-and ultimately realize that our child is another human being and not necessarily and extension of us.

being different is not a problem. It's just being different. but feeling different is a problem. When you feel different, the feeling can actually change the way you see the world.

Your differentness and my different-ness are just facts. Sometimes what we do with our minds turn those facts into pain, and sometimes we can just treat them as facts, acknowledging them but not feeling them. But the more you feel your different-ness, the more lonely you will feel.

The problem is that our corporate, government, and education cultures are configured for the 75 or 80 percent of people who are larks or third birds. Owls are like left-handers in a right-handed world—forced to use scissors and writing desks and catcher's mitts designed for others. How they respond is the final piece of the puzzle in divining the rhythms of the day.

We are all expressions of our own minds, projected onto the world.

I'd rather be weird and know it than be a stupid ass.

They say the nail that sticks out gets hammered down

The vast majority of sportsmen are left with little choice as regards how to play, serfs to their talent, but the very best are able to do so as they want, impressing personality upon ability.

It is in the imperceptible space between that which touches and that which is touched that one body can be felt, no matter how closely, to be different from another.

We try to make our celebrities stand in for the heroes we no longer have, or for those who have been pushed out of our view... Yet the celebrity is usually nothing greater than a more-publicized version of us. In imitating him, in trying to dress like him, talk like him, look like him, think like him, we are simply imitating ourselves.

What do you mean you don't sing?! You talk!" Jim told me later, "It was as odd to them as if I told them that I couldn't walk or dance, even though I have both my legs.

All of this applies to our kids as well. They have their own little canoes, and they float down their own river of well-being. Many of the challenges we face as parents result from the times when our kids aren't in the flow, when

emotionally autonomous existence.

Integration in this way is not the same as blending or making all the same and homogenous. Integration has the essential feature of retaining the differences and establishing connections that don't obliterate those differences.

So don't think of discipline as a one-size-fits-all solution. Instead, remember how important it is to discipline this one child in this one moment.

In each situation, make decisions about what's best for this unique child in this particular moment, and what will lead to growth and an expansion of what they believe they can do. That's resilience.

I am viewed as the Negro who has gone outside of the categories assigned to me.

But you are alone. Yet I never tell what you are. And if your face lights up my world as no other can - well, this feeling too, when viewed as the mere psychologist has to view it, appears to be simply what all the other friends report about their friends.

I've never been the guy to go for the celebrity girl. I've always liked regular girls, regular people, because I've always viewed myself as a regular person who just happens to be gifted in music.

At first, I felt like I was put into this box because I played hockey. I thought that I was viewed a certain way, and I shouldn't wear certain clothes. Finally, I stepped aside and said, 'That's someone else's creation of me. I can be feminine and be strong.'

I've never viewed myself as above anybody else or anything like that. I'm a regular guy at the end of the day. I like Cinnamon Toast Crunch and The Powerpuff Girls.

I've never viewed myself as 'just' a musician or singer.

Comparing every black male politician on the scene to Obama is a bit lazy - just because I'm from a similar background and profession, it's such an easy comparison to make. It's also quite annoying being viewed through the prism of someone else's personality and identity, rather than your own.