Albert Ellis quotes - page 3

It is only in your mind that you have to excel, at anything or everything. Of course, it would be very nice to excel at most things. Indeed, we recommend that you try and do your best. But realistically, you are entitled to do the bare minimum to get by. All your accomplishments are just a bonus, something to enjoy, not requirements. You don't have to do anything to prove that you are worthy of existing. (Albert Ellis)
Life is indeed difficult, partly because of the real difficulties we must overcome in order to survive, and partly because of our own innate desire to always do better, to overcome new challenges, to self-actualize. Happiness is experienced largely in striving towards a goal, not in having attained things, because our nature is always to want to go on to the next endeavor. View quote
Albert Ellis
Being assertive does not mean attacking or ignoring others feelings. It means that you are willing to hold up for yourself fairly-without attacking others. View quote
Albert Ellis
To err is human; to forgive people and yourself for poor behavior is to be sensible and realistic. View quote
Albert Ellis
By not caring too much about what people think, I'm able to think for myself and propagate ideas which are very often unpopular. And I succeed with them because, again, I don't care too much what other people think. View quote
Albert Ellis
If people stopped looking on their emotions as ethereal, almost inhuman processes, and realistically viewed them as being largely composed of perceptions, thoughts, evaluations, and internalized sentences, they would find it quite possible to work calmly and concertedly at changing them. View quote
Albert Ellis
Failure doesn't have anything to do with your intrinsic value as a person. View quote
Albert Ellis
When I started to get disillusioned with psychoanalysis I reread philosophy and was reminded of the constructivist notion that Epictetus had proposed 2,000 years ago: "People are disturbed not by events that happen to them, but by their view of them." I could see how that applied to many of my clients. View quote
Albert Ellis
The attitude of unconditional self-acceptance is probably the most important variable in their long-term recovery. View quote
Albert Ellis
When people change their irrational beliefs to undogmatic flexible preferences, they become less disturbed. View quote
Albert Ellis
Thinking rationally is often different from "positive thinking," in that it is a realistic assessment of the situation, with a view towards rectifying the problem if possible. (Albert Ellis)
Neurosis is just a high-class word for whining. View quote
Albert Ellis
Happiness is experienced largely in striving towards a goal, not in having attained things, because our nature is always to want to go on to the next endeavor. View quote
Albert Ellis
We can actually put the essence of neurosis in a single word: blaming - or damning. View quote
Albert Ellis
Worrying about dying will hardly help you live. View quote
Albert Ellis
You have only to exist as you do and to live your life as best you can. View quote
Albert Ellis
The goal...is not to change your desires and wishes but to persuade you to stop demanding that you absolutely must have what you wish-from yourself, from others, and from the world. You can by all means keep your wishes, preferences, and desires, but unless you prefer to remain needlessly anxious, not your grandiose demands. View quote
Albert Ellis
Whatever may be, I am still largely the creator and ruler of my emotional destiny. View quote
Albert Ellis
Even when people act nastily to you, don't condemn them or retaliate. View quote
Albert Ellis
Religious creeds encourage some of the craziest kinds of thoughts, emotions, and behaviors and favor severe manifestations of neurosis, borderline personality states, and sometimes even psychosis. View quote
Albert Ellis
We can't change the past, so we change how people are thinking, feeling and behaving today. (Albert Ellis)
The emotionally sound person should be able to take risks, to ask himself what he really would like to do in life, and then to try to do this, even though he has to risk defeat or failure. He should be adventurous (though not necessarily foolhardy); be willing to try almost anything once, just to see how he likes it; and look forward to some breaks in his usual life routines. View quote
Albert Ellis
And just as two wrongs don't make a right, rage against offenders is probably the worst way to try to correct them. View quote
Albert Ellis
Much of what we call emotion is nothing more or less than a certain kind - a biased, prejudiced, or strongly evaluative kind - of thought. View quote
Albert Ellis
Most things worth having require some sacrifice, usually more than you expect. View quote
Albert Ellis