Nathaniel Branden Quotes

68 Sourced Quotes

Individualism is at once an ethical-psychological concept and an ethical-political one. As an ethical-psychological concept, individualism holds that a human being should think and judge independently, respecting nothing more than the sovereignty of his or her mind; thus, it is intimately connected with the concept of autonomy. As an ethical-political concept, individualism upholds the supremacy of individual rights

Nathaniel Branden
Integrity is congruence between what you know, what you profess, and what you do.

Nathaniel Branden
The highest compliment one can be paid by another human being is to be told: 'Because of what you are, you are essential to my happiness.'

Nathaniel Branden
If you are an adult, you are responsible for your life and well-being. No one owes you the fulfillment of your needs or wants; no one is here on earth to serve you. If you respect the principle of self-ownership, you understand that no one else owns you and that you do not own anyone else. Only on this understanding can there be peace on earth and good will among human beings.

Nathaniel Branden
In the nature of our existence, we must act to achieve values. And in order to act appropriately, we need to value the beneficiary of our actions. In order to seek values, we must consider ourselves worthy of enjoying them. In order to fight for our happiness, we must consider ourselves worthy of happiness.

Nathaniel Branden
The reputation you have with yourself - your self-esteem - is the single most important factor for a fulfilling life.

Nathaniel Branden
Capitalism, by its nature, entails a constant process of motion, growth and progress.

Nathaniel Branden
If you choose not to live self-responsibly, you count on others to make up your default. No one abjures self-responsibility on a desert island.

Nathaniel Branden
To love is to see myself in you and to wish to celebrate myself with you. What I love is the embodiment of my values in another person. Love is an act of self-assertion, self-expression and a celebration of being alive.

Nathaniel Branden
Your choices have psychological consequences. The way you choose to deal with reality, truth, facts - your choice to honor or dishonor your own perceptions - registers in your mind, for good or for bad, and either confirms and strengthens your self-esteem or undermines and weakens it.

Nathaniel Branden
The desire for self-esteem without integrity is like the desire for wealth without effort-a longing for the unearned.

Nathaniel Branden
There is only one reality — the reality knowable to reason. And if man does not choose to perceive it, there is nothing else for him to perceive; if it is not of this world that he is conscious, then he is not conscious at all.

Nathaniel Branden
Self-esteem is not a luxury; it is a profound spiritual need.

Nathaniel Branden
Pride is the emotional reward of achievement. It is not a vice to be overcome but a virtue to be attained.

Nathaniel Branden
Rand always says, Never pass up an opportunity to pass moral judgment. Well I say: Look for an opportunity to do something more useful instead. Nobody was led to virtue by being told he was a scoundrel.

Nathaniel Branden
You are not likely to bring out the best in people or nurture their creativity if every time you hear about their problems you instantly offer a solution Encourage people to look for their own solutions-and project the knowledge that they are capable of doing so.

Nathaniel Branden
Romantic love is a passionate spiritual-emotional-sexual attachment between a man and a woman that reflects a high regard for the value of each other's person.

Nathaniel Branden
Faith is the commitment of one's consciousness to beliefs for which one has no sensory evidence or rational proof. When man rejects reason as his standard of judgement, only one alternative standard remains to him: his feelings. A mystic is a man who treats his feelings as tools of cognition. Faith is the equation of feelings with knowledge.

Nathaniel Branden
To preserve an unclouded capacity for the enjoyment of life is an unusual moral and psychological achievement. Contrary to popular belief, it is not the prerogative of mindlessness, but the exact opposite: It is the reward of self-esteem.

Nathaniel Branden
The greatest barrier to achievement and success is not lack of talent or ability but rather the feeling that achievement and success, above a certain level, are outside our self-concept-our image of who we are and what is appropriate to us.

Nathaniel Branden
It would be hard to name a more certain sign of poor self-esteem than the need to perceive some other group as inferior.

Nathaniel Branden
It is painful to face the self we know we have never had the integrity to honor and assert.

Nathaniel Branden
Self-acceptance is my refusal to be in an adversarial relationship to myself.

Nathaniel Branden
It is naive to think that self-assertiveness is easy. To live self-assertively—which means to live authentically—is an act of high courage. That is why so many people spend the better part of their lives in hiding—from others and also from themselves.

Nathaniel Branden
Of all the judgments we pass in life, none is more important than the judgment we pass on ourselves.

Nathaniel Branden
One of the mistakes that Rand makes is that after she condemns a belief or an action, she goes on to tell you the psychology of the person who did it, as if she knows. I focus my judgment on the action and not on the person. My primary interest is: do I admire or dislike this behavior? And there, judgment is important for me. People often attribute all kinds of things to another person, without ever knowing where that person's coming from. Most of the time, I regard the judgment of people as a waste of time. I regard the judgment of behavior as imperative.

Nathaniel Branden
One of the characteristics of love relationships that flower is a relatively high degree of mutual self-disclosure - a willingness to let our partner enter into the interior of our private world and a genuine interest in the private world of that partner. Couples in love tend to show more of themselves to each other than to any other person....

Nathaniel Branden
If you are terrified of making mistakes, you will be reluctant to acknowledge them when you do make them-and therefore you will not correct them.

Nathaniel Branden
Suppose you feel you cannot accept some fact about yourself. Then own your refusal to accept. Own the block. Embrace it fully. And watch it begin to disappear. The principal is this: Begin where you are-accept that. Then change and growth become possible.

Nathaniel Branden
The higher our self-esteem, the stronger the drive to express ourselves, reflecting the sense of richness within. The lower our self-esteem, the more urgent the need to "prove" ourselves or to forget ourselves by living mechanically and unconsciously.

Nathaniel Branden