“I must be willing to give up what I am in order to become what I will be.”

— Albert Einstein

Last update June 5, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "I must be willing to give up what I am in order to become what I will be." by Albert Einstein?

Albert Einstein 702

German-born physicist and founder of the theory of relativi… 1879–1955

Related quotes

“What I have done up to this is nothing. I am only at the beginning of the course I must run. Do you imagine that I triumph in Italy in order to aggrandise the pack of lawyers who form the Directory, and men like Carnot and Barras? What an idea!”

Napoleon I of France (1769–1821) French general, First Consul and later Emperor of the French

As quoted in Memoirs of Count Miot de Melito (1788 - 1815) as translated by Frances Cashel Hoey and John Lillie (1881), Vol. II, p. 94

“What I am seeing right now is a man who is so dominated by his mother that he is willing to throw away his marriage in order to protect her from the trauma of growing up and acting like an adult.”

Orson Scott Card book Lovelock

Lovelock (1994)

“I must stay alone and know that I am alone to contemplate and feel nature in full; I have to surrender myself to what encircles me, I have to merge with my clouds and rocks in order to be what I am. Solitude is indispensible for my dialogue with nature.”

Caspar David Friedrich (1774–1840) Swedish painter

Quote of Friedrich, 1821; as cited in Authenticity and Fiction in the Russian Literary Journey, 1790-1840 (2000) by Andreas Schönle, p. 108, from memoirs of Vasily Zhukovsky
Variant translation: I have to stay alone in order to fully contemplate and feel nature.
This answer of Friedrich is recorded by Vasily Zhukovsky who asked the painter in 1821 to travel together to Switzerland
1794 - 1840

“I think I need to face what I could have been in order to understand and accept what I am.”

Cecelia Ahern book Love, Rosie

Variant: I think I need to face
what I could have been in order to understand and accept what I am.
Source: Where Rainbows End

“I signed up for what? I thought I was just ordering cable.”

Jon Stewart (1962) American political satirist, writer, television host, actor, media critic and stand-up comedian

Chicago Tribune, August 12, 1998; on signing on as host of The Daily Show.

“The real struggle has been since Africans first set foot on the continent, an affirmation of the value of one’s self. And I think if, in order to participate in American society, in order to accomplish some of the things which the black middle class has accomplished, if you have had to give up that self in order to accomplish that, then you are not making an affirmation of the value of the African being. You are saying that in order to do that I must become someone else, I must become like someone else…”

August Wilson (1945–2005) American playwright

On the cultural sacrifices made by African Americans in higher classes in “Playwright August Wilson on Writing About Black America” https://billmoyers.com/story/august-wilson-on-writing-about-black-america/ (Bill Moyers, 1988)