⚡ Bold

Waste no more time arguing about what a good man should be. Be one.

To live is the rarest thing in the world. Most people exist, that is all.

It is not that we have a short time to live, but that we waste a great deal of it.

The best revenge is not to be like that.

If it is not right do not do it; if it is not true do not say it.

He who is brave is free.

Don't explain your philosophy. Embody it.

No man is free who is not master of himself.

That which does not kill us makes us stronger.

You must have chaos within you to give birth to a dancing star.

To find yourself, think for yourself.

The measure of a man is what he does with power.

The only way to deal with an unfree world is to become so absolutely free that your very existence is an act of rebellion.

Freedom is what you do with what's been done to you.

Commitment is an act, not a word.

To conquer fear is the beginning of wisdom.

When we are hindered, or disturbed, or grieved, let us never attribute it to others, but to ourselves; that is, to our own principles.

Sickness is a hindrance to the body, but not to your will, unless itself wills it.

You may be unconquerable, if you enter into no combat in which it is not in your own power to conquer.

For this is your business: to act well the character assigned you; to choose it belongs to another.

If you desire philosophy, prepare yourself from the very first to be ridiculed and mocked by the multitude.

If you wish your children, and your wife, and your friends to live for ever, you are stupid; for you wish to be in control of things which you cannot.

Whoever would be free, let him wish for nothing, have aversion to nothing, which depends on others; else he must necessarily be a slave.

He who has gained freedom by the faculty of reason may go where he wills and say: 'No one has power over me; I have been set free by God.'

What is the first business of one who practices philosophy? To throw away self-conceit. For it is impossible for anyone to begin to learn that which he thinks he already knows.

Any person capable of angering you becomes your master; he can anger you only when you permit yourself to be disturbed by him.

I must die. But must I die groaning? I must be imprisoned. But must I whine as well?

'Tell the secret.' I refuse, for this is in my power. 'But I will chain you.' What are you saying? You may chain my leg, but not my will; not even Zeus can conquer that.

God has entrusted me with myself. No man is my master, for God has made me free.

To this God you ought to swear an oath, such as the soldiers swear to Caesar. They swear to prefer the safety of Caesar before all things; and will you not swear to prefer your own safety?

He is free who lives as he chooses; who is neither subject to compulsion, nor hindrance, nor violence.

No bad man, then, lives as he wishes; and therefore no bad man is free.

How long are you going to wait before you demand the best for yourself, and in no instance bypass the discriminations of reason?

You have been given the principles that you ought to endorse, and you have endorsed them. What kind of teacher, then, are you still waiting for?

Let whatever appears to you to be best be to you an inviolable law.

The condition and characteristic of a philosopher is that he looks to himself for all help or harm.

In one word, he keeps watch over himself as over an enemy and an intriguer.

Do you not know that a good man does nothing for the sake of appearance, but solely for the sake of doing right?

Care about what other people think and you will always be their prisoner.

When a raven croaks in an inauspicious manner, let not the impression carry you away, but immediately distinguish in your mind and say: 'None of these omens is for me; but either for my body, or my property, or my reputation, or my children.'

Care about people's approval and you will be their prisoner.

If you don't trust the people, you make them untrustworthy.

Give up learning, and you will be free from all your worries.

What is the difference between yes and no? What is the difference between good and evil? Must I fear what others fear? What nonsense!

If you want to be given everything, give everything up.

Because he does not compete, no one can compete with him.

He who conquers himself is the mightiest warrior.

Why should the lord of ten thousand chariots act lightly in public? If you act lightly, you lose your root. If you are restless, you lose your power.

Do you want to improve the world? I don't think it can be done. The world is sacred. It can't be improved.

His victory is not a cause for rejoicing. To rejoice in a conquest is to rejoice in the slaughter of men.

To see what is right and not do it is a lack of courage.

The softest thing in the world dashes against and overcomes the hardest; that which has no substance enters where there is no crevice.

Hardness and rigidity are companions of death. Softness and flexibility are companions of life.

The hard and strong will fall. The soft and weak will overcome.

One must still have chaos in oneself to be able to give birth to a dancing star. I say unto you: you still have chaos in you.

I love those who do not know how to live unless by going under, for they are the ones who cross over.

You must be ready to burn yourself in your own flame; how could you rise anew if you have not first become ashes?

Of all that is written, I love only what a person hath written with his blood. Write with blood, and thou wilt find that blood is spirit.

Not by wrath, but by laughter, do we slay. Come, let us slay the spirit of gravity!

You have your way. I have my way. As for the right way, the correct way, and the only way, it does not exist.

Flee, my friend, into your solitude! I see you stung by poisonous flies. Flee where a rough, strong breeze blows!

Are you a new strength and a new right? A first movement? A self-rolling wheel? Can you also compel stars to revolve around you?

Can you give yourself your own evil and your own good and hang your will above yourself like a law?

He who cannot command himself should obey. And many a one can command himself, but still lacks much of self-obedience!

Only where there is life is there also will: not will to live, but—so I teach you—will to power!

Set your life on fire. Seek those who fan your flames.

The sick are the greatest danger for the healthy; it is not from the strongest that harm comes to the strong, but from the weakest.

To live alone one must be a beast or a god, says Aristotle. Leaving out the third case: one must be both—a philosopher.

Stop acting so small. You are the universe in ecstatic motion.

Is man one of God's blunders? Or is God one of man's blunders?

Out of life's school of war: What does not destroy me, makes me stronger.

Formula for my happiness: A Yes, a No, a straight line, a goal.

The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself.

Not merely bear what is necessary, still less conceal it—all idealism is mendacity in the face of what is necessary—but love it.

For believe me, the secret for harvesting from existence the greatest fruitfulness and the greatest enjoyment is: to live dangerously!

Live in conflict with your equals and with yourselves! Be robbers and conquerors as long as you cannot be rulers and possessors, you seekers of knowledge!

He who has a firm will molds the world to himself.

Convictions are more dangerous enemies of truth than lies.

The tree that would grow to heaven must send its roots to hell.

I want to have my lions and my eagles about me, that I may always have hints and premonitions to know whether my strength increaseth or decreaseth.

To endure my solitude I was in need of war; I had to force myself into the open, to defend myself.

How much truth does a spirit endure, how much truth does it dare? More and more that became for me the real measure of value.

The surest way to corrupt a youth is to instruct him to hold in higher esteem those who think alike than those who think differently.

Remain faithful to the earth, and do not believe those who speak to you of other-worldly hopes!

One must be a sea, to receive a polluted stream without becoming impure.

No amount of anxiety makes any difference to anything that is going to happen.

When you get the message, hang up the phone. For spiritual practices are just tools, not the living truth itself.

Insecurity is the very condition of life. To resist it is to resist life itself.

To be afraid of life is to be afraid of death. And to be afraid of death is to be unable to live.

The menu is not the meal. The map is not the territory.

Hospitals should be arranged like night clubs: places where people go to celebrate life and heal with joy, rather than grim temples of fear.

The only Zen you find on the tops of mountains is the Zen you bring there.

The more you give up control, the more power you have. Real power is the power of yielding, like water.

He simply pursues his vision of excellence through whatever he is doing, and leaves others to determine whether he is working or playing.

The most terrifying thing is to accept oneself completely.

I'd rather be whole than good.

We cannot change anything unless we accept it. Condemnation does not liberate, it oppresses.

If you have nothing at all to create, then perhaps you create yourself.

No tree, it is said, can grow to heaven unless its roots reach down to hell.

Find out what you fear most; that is where you will find your next growth.

A man who has not passed through the inferno of his passions has never overcome them.

To live what you think is good and not what other people think is good is the highest form of courage.

The word 'belief' is a difficult thing for me. I don't believe. I must have a reason for a certain hypothesis. I know. I don't need to believe.

Children are educated by what the grown-up is and not by his talk.

In the midst of chaos, there is also opportunity.

Bizarre as it may sound, there are times when it is better to be unfaithful to one's principles than to one's soul.

The greatest danger to mankind is not nature, but man himself, because we are the origin of all coming evil.

We need more psychology, we need more understanding of human nature, because the only real danger that exists is man himself.

The highest, most decisive moments of life are often accompanied by fear.

To be normal is the ideal aim of the unsuccessful.

I cannot teach anybody anything; I can only make them think.

Do not value the applause of the crowd above the quiet verdict of reason.

The god appointed me to the duty of leading the philosophical life, examining myself and examining others.

I would rather die having spoken after my manner, than speak in your manner and live.

The first and greatest victory is to conquer oneself; to be conquered by one's own weakness is of all things most shameful.

Do not let the unexamined opinions of the multitude dictate the health of your soul.

I spend my whole life in going about, persuading you not to care for your bodies or your wealth, but first and foremost to care about the greatest improvement of the soul.

Are you not ashamed of heaping up the greatest amount of money and honor, while caring so little about wisdom and truth and the greatest improvement of the soul?

A man who is good for anything ought not to calculate the chance of living or dying; he ought only to consider whether what he is doing is right or wrong.

When the debate is lost, slander becomes the tool of the loser.

The greatest honor you can pay to virtue is to practice it when no one is watching and no reward is promised.

Wisdom begins with self-discipline; an undisciplined mind is blown about by every passing wind of appetite.

The shortest and surest way to live with honor in the world is to be in reality what we would appear to be.

Better to stumble while running toward the truth than to sit contentedly in the lap of error.

One must never do wrong in return, nor mistreat any human being, no matter what one has suffered at their hands.

It is better to suffer an injustice than to commit one, for suffering an injustice harms only the body, but committing one ruins the soul.

If I were forced either to do wrong or to suffer wrong, I would choose to suffer rather than to do wrong.

Do not be angry with me for speaking the truth; for no man will preserve his life who genuinely opposes the multitude and prevents many unjust deeds from taking place.

Neither in war nor in the courts of law ought any man to use every craft to escape death.

Wherever a man has taken a position that he believes to be best, there he must remain and face danger, taking into account neither death nor anything else before dishonor.

The difficult thing, my friends, is not to flee from death, but much rather to flee from wickedness, for it runs swifter than death.

Not life, but a good life, is to be chiefly valued; and a good life is equivalent to a just and honorable life.

No citizen has a right to be an amateur in the matter of physical and mental training; what a disgrace it is for a man to grow old without seeing the strength and beauty of which his body and mind are capable.

Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms - to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances.

God has attached me to this city as to a great and noble horse which is sluggish by reason of its size and needs to be stirred by a gadfly.

You can do no harm to me; for it is not permitted that a better man be harmed by a worse.

You may bury my body however you please, if only you can catch me, and I do not slip away from you.

The gods give nothing that is really good and noble without labor and careful attention.

We shall be better and braver and less helpless if we believe that one must search for what one does not know, than if we believe it impossible to find.

I am not only now but always a man who obeys nothing in me except the reason that seems best to me upon reflection.

Men of Athens, I honor and love you; but I will obey the god rather than you, and as long as I have breath and strength I will never cease from philosophy.

The truly good and prudent man bears all the chances of life with dignity and always does the best with what is available to him.

A life of mere sensual indulgence makes human beings slavish in their tastes, preferring the life of grazing cattle.

We become just by performing just acts, temperate by performing temperate acts, and brave by performing brave acts.

Man, when perfected, is the best of animals, but when separated from law and justice, he is the worst of all.

Courage is the first of human qualities because it is the quality which guarantees all others.

The brave man is not he who feels no fear, but he who noble-mindedly faces that which is terrible.

I never lose. I either win or learn.