“But we all must be true to our own nature. Acting as anyone other than yourself merely brings you pain and makes you appear ashamed of who and what you are. Others will feed off that shame, and soon it will be all that you are.”

“Anything or anyone that asks you to be other than yourself is not holy, but is trying only to fill its own need.”

Mark Nepo (1951) American writer

“There comes a point when you either embrace who and what you are, or condemn yourself to be miserable all your days. Other people will try to make you miserable; don't help them by doing the job yourself.”

Laurell K. Hamilton (1963) Novelist

“We all have to be responsible for ourselves. I accept the concept that respect for yourself must be the foundation of respect for others. It is only if you respect yourself as a human being and you have faith in your ability to achieve what should be achieved that you will be able to help others.”

Aung San Suu Kyi (1945) State Counsellor of Myanmar and Leader of the National League for Democracy

“Life isn't about how popular you are… What girl or boy you are dating or who you know.Life is about always being true to who you are or what you believe in. Never let anyone convince you that their way is better than your way. In the end all we have is our hearts… and our minds. This is the reason we sing… this is the reason we cry… this is why we live.”

Andrew Biersack (1990) American singer-songwriter

“Don’t listen to what people tell you because they’ll try to bring you down. And don’t listen to yourself, either, because yourself will try to bring you down even more so than anyone else. As long as you just put all your energy into one thing, it can happen.”

Chris Colfer (1990) actor, singer, book author

“Whatever moral rules you have deliberately proposed to yourself abide by them as they were laws, and as if you would be guilty of impiety by violating any of them. Don't regard what anyone says of you, for this, after all, is no concern of yours. How long, then, will you put off thinking yourself worthy of the highest improvements and follow the distinctions of reason? You have received the philosophical theorems, with which you ought to be familiar, and you have been familiar with them. What other master, then, do you wait for, to throw upon that the delay of reforming yourself?… Let whatever appears to be the best be to you an inviolable law.”

Epictetus (50–138) philosopher from Ancient Greece

“We must first bring others to see their own true interests better than they do today.”

John F. Kennedy (1917–1963) 35th president of the United States of America

“And what is it to act upon others as you would that others would act upon you? It is to put yourself in the place of others. It is consideration of others as ardent as consideration of self. It is the balancing of abilities, supplementation, the social ideal.”

J. Howard Moore (1862–1916)

“If you try to be anyone but yourself, you will fail; if you are not true to your own heart, you will fail. Then again, there's no success like failure”

Bob Dylan (1941) American singer-songwriter, musician, author, and artist