every great philosopher actually wrote ‘a kind of involuntary and unconscious memoir’

‘Anxiety is the dizziness of freedom’, wrote Kierkegaard.

Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit

the Flore, the Deux Magots and the Bar Napoléon, all clustered around the corner of the boulevard Saint-Germain and the rue Bonaparte.

Nothing stops us but our own free choosing.

he exhorted his readers to decide what kind of world they wanted, and make it happen.

There is no traced-out path to lead man to his salvation; he must constantly invent his own path. But, to invent it, he is free, responsible, without excuse, and every hope lies within him.

what you do really matters. You should make your choices as though you were choosing on behalf of the whole of humanity, taking the entire burden of responsibility for how the human race behaves.

you are still free to decide what to make of it in mind and deed. Starting from where you are now, you choose. And in choosing, you also choose who you will be.