Biography Of Ralph Waldo Emerson

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One of the greatest American men to ever have been born, Ralph Waldo Emerson, once wrote, "What I must do is all that concerns me, not what the people think" (231). I think this quote should feel true in identifying us all. We must restrain from giving in to society, becoming one of its robots with no opinions or interests of our own creation. "For nonconformity the world whips you with its displeasure" (232). Instead, we must become people who live for themselves, and can interact with others without worrying what they’ll think of the confrontation afterwards. For if we could all be comfortable with our own thoughts and beliefs, we would not judge one another the way we do, nor fear judgement from the general public. What point is there in …show more content…
I hope to know that I have spent this life I was granted well, putting myself out into the world and knowing my identity. Wouldn't it be awful to know that life was wasted away, spent worrying over how to please others, your time now running out with no way to gain it all back? We must live for ourselves, starting today, and forget about the cruelness of the society which has taught us otherwise.
As Thoreau once said, "The nation itself, with all its so-called internal improvements, which, by the way are all external and superficial, is just such an unwieldy and overgrown establishment, cluttered with furniture and tripped up by its own traps, ruined by luxury and heedless expense, by want of calculation and a worthy aim, as the million households in the land" (257). We live in a country that hides behind a mask to the rest of the world, making it seemingly the epitome of perfection. But in reality, we too are struggling to find peace amongst ourselves. Part of the problem is not necessarily education in this country, but a lack of it. For we spend the first quarter of our lives reading textbooks, and having our creativity and individuality …show more content…
None of us is above the rest, regardless of education, race, gender, sex, sexual orientation, or age. As Whitman once said, "And these one and all tend inward to me, and I tend outward to them; And such as it is to be of these, more or less, I am" (150). A fundamental part of our constitution is that we are all created equal, yet it is human nature for us to forget this, and be in constant battle against one another. For humans, "They measure their esteem of each other by what each has, and not by what each is" (242). We are extremely materialistic, and lift the rich man with poor spirits above the poor man who is rich in spirit. So if one were to question of which of the two possess the greater wealth, I would easily tell you that it is the destitute man. For he may not have the material possessions that the world seeks to obtain, but he has happiness, something that the affluent man is in seek
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