Second-hand life..

This is an excerpt from 'Fountain head by Ayn rand.. something which everyone knows is true but none wud ve the guts to accept it.. here it goes..

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"" Yes! And, Isn't that the root of every despicable action? Not selfishness, but precisely the absence of the self. Look at them. The man who cheats and lies, but preserves a respectable front. He knows himself to be dishonest, but others think he is honest and he derives his self-respect from that, second hand. The man who takes credit for an achievement which is not his own. He knows himself to be mediocre, but he is great in the eyes of others. The frustated wretch who professes love for the inferior and clings to those less endowed, in order to establish his own superiority by comparision. The man whose sole aim is to make money. Now, i don't see anything evil in the desire to make money. But, money is only a means to some end. If a man wants it for a personal purpose, to invest in his industry, to study, to create, to travel, he is completely moral. But, the men who place money first go much beyond that. Personal luxury is a limited endeavour. What they want is ostentation: to show, to stun, to entertain, to impress others. THEY are second-handers.Look at our so-called cultural endeavors. A Lecturer who spouts some borrowed rehash of nothing at all that means nothing at all to him - and the people who listen who don't give a damn, but sit there in order to tell their friends that they have attended a lecture by a famous name. Deriving the unknown meaning of life from others' definition. ALL SECOND-HANDERS.""

... "They have no concern for facts, ideas, work. They are concerned only with people. They dont ask: "Is this true?"" They ask: "Is this what others think is true?". Not to judge, but to repeat. Not to do, but to give the impression of doing. Not creation, but show. Not ability, but friendship. Not merit, but pull. What would happen to the world without those who would think, work, produce. Those are the egotists. You don't think through another's brain. You don't work through another's hand. When you suspend your faculty of independent judgement, you suspend consciousness. To stop consciosness is to stop LIFE. Second-handers have no sense of reality. Their reality is not within them, but around them. That is the emptiness that i couldn't understand in people.Men without an ego. Opinion without a rational process. Motion without brakes or motor. Power without responsibility. The second-handers acts, but the source of his action is scattered in every other living person. You can't speak to him. He can't hear. He won't hear..." (cuz he knows you are right but doesn't want to let go off others baseless and well-cast opinion)
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Many of us will be knowing all those things written above. We almost live our lives like this. Not almost,but actually. I have asked many.. why don't you think on your own.. including to some really close, family, others and myself. Some listen. Some hear. Even i sometimes won't listen to myself. Most of us listen to others. The others who live their life and not our's. Doesn't mean you have to be arrogant and listen to only you. Sometimes, during those really rare times, you have to listen only to you...I would say that we have a perfect system inside us which will tell us to do certain things and not to do some other. But, when we go against it in order to gain all fake "realities" in life, we are actually cheating ourselves.. The self which has to have the greatest importance and self-respect..without which others won't even care a damn about you. Life is short folks .. live it!! LIVE IT FOR THE REAL YOU!!

Do read fountain head.. !! Sometimes we find our thoughts in some books.. this is something like that.