Everyone should read Atlas Shrugged. You may not fully agree with Ayn Rand’s philosophy (I certainly don’t), but none the less it’s an extremely refreshing read. Among the vast amount of thoughts expressed, anyone will find something to learn. Here’s what I found, and what caused me to think.
By what standard do you let people judge you? What framework of rules determines what rules you follow? Or break? It can be none but your own.
Do not say that you’re afraid to trust your mind because you know so little. Are you safer in surrendering to mystics and discarding the little that you know? Live and act within the limit of your knowledge and keep expanding it to the limit of your life.
Money and selfishness debunked, mostly. If all you do is first and foremost for your own winning, and the only payment you accept is money, no one will have to second guess your motives. It’s really nothing else than full transparency, in perfect accordance to ones own desires and values. While one probably should retain some level of scepticism here, this belief is what makes Atlas Shrugged so provoking.
A trader is a man who earns what he gets and does not give or take the undeserved.
There is no such thing as “the will of the people”. It’s merely the ruling power’s favourite argument; effective since it cannot be argued against while being disguised with such unselfish words. And remember, unselfishness equals goodness. Or does it?
Happiness through production, achievement and creation. Only the self-made man can be truly happy, and a good day’s work plays a large role in it.
Happiness is a state of non-contradictory joy–a joy without penalty or guilt, a joy that does not clash with any of your values and does not work for your own destruction, not the joy of escaping from your mind, but of using your mind’s fullest power, not the joy of faking reality, but of achieving values that are real, not the joy of a drunkard, but of a producer.
“Who am I to know?” is the lowest of thoughts, equal to as if to say “Who am I to live?” Herein lies the essence of the question “Who is John Galt?”
Don’t fear philospophy. All it does is to teach you how to think.