Skip to content
quotesby

About this quote

What does it mean?
We define ourselves by the interpretations we give to events, not the events themselves.
In plain terms
Your meanings shape who you are.
What can you take from it?
Choose meanings that define you.

Where it applies

  • therapy
  • daily life
  • conflict resolution

Putting it to work

  • reframe negative events
  • practice mindful interpretation

Questions to consider

  • How do you interpret events?
  • Who controls your meaning?

Another view

External events do constrain us regardless of meaning.

More from Alfred Adler

  1. To be human means to feel inferior.

    Permalink to quote #2
  2. Man knows much more than he understands.

    Permalink to quote #4
  3. The striving for significance, this sense of yearning, always points out to us that all psychological phenomena contain a movement that starts from a feeling o…

    Permalink to quote #1

Related quotes

  1. ...I have described the human dilemma as the capacity of man to view himself as object and as subject. My point is that both are necessary -- necessary for psy…

    Rollo MayRollo May quote #15
  2. Tell me, when you are alone with him [ Max Beerbohm ] Sphinx, does he take off his face and reveal his mask?

    Oscar WildeOscar Wilde quote #26
  3. We hypostasize information into objects. Rearrangement of objects is change in the content of the information; the message has changed. This is a language whic…

    Philip Kindred DickPhilip Kindred Dick quote #56