Skip to content
quotesby

About this quote

What does it mean?
Intense desires often stem from wanting to be someone else.
In plain terms
Fame-seeking is a rejection of the real self.
What can you take from it?
Understand that wanting fame means rejecting your true self.

Where it applies

  • seeking fame
  • feeling unhappy
  • defining goals

Putting it to work

  • accept your real self
  • check your motives
  • seek internal goals

Questions to consider

  • What do you want to be?
  • Are you trying to escape yourself?

Another view

Some desires are healthy.

More from Eric Hoffer

  1. Every era has a currency that buys souls. In some the currency is pride, in others it is hope, in still others it is a holy cause. There are of course times wh…

    Permalink to quote #165
  2. Freedom means freedom from forces and circumstances which would turn man into a thing, which would impose on man the passivity and predictability of matter. By…

    Permalink to quote #167
  3. Both the revolutionary and the creative individual are perpetual juveniles. The revolutionary does not grow up because he cannot grow, while the creative indiv…

    Permalink to quote #164

Related quotes

  1. The thing we long for, that we are For one transcendent moment.

    James Russell LowellJames Russell Lowell quote #7
  2. Somewhere there must be Something that's different from everything. All that I've never thought of - think of me!

    Randall JarrellRandall Jarrell quote #18
  3. I don't believe in Elvis I don't believe in Zimmerman I don't believe in Beatles. I just believe in me Yoko and me And that's reality.

    John LennonJohn Lennon quote #51