Haruki Murakami Quotes

… the third-rate mind is only happy when it is thinking with the majority, the second-rate mind is only happy when it is thinking with the minority, and the first-rate mind is only happy when it is thinking.

If you read all the time what other people have done, you will the think the way they thought.

I think it's very desirable to be an individual and a free thinker.

Human beings never think for themselves. For the most part, members of our species simply repeat what they are told - and become upset if they are exposed to any different view. The characteristic human trait is not awareness but conformity. We are stubborn, self-destructive conformists. Any other view of our species is just a self-congratulatory delusion.

My whole life is a contradiction on purpose - to make you think. I think people have forgetten how to have their own opinions. They're always waiting for someone to tell them what to do and what to wear - it's so boring.

I don't much mind being expelled from communities.

Think your own thoughts.

I've always been interested in the outsider.

To be intellectual does not require one to be alienated and oppositional.

The rare few, who, early in life have rid themselves of the friendship of the many.

Children who know how to think for themselves spoil the harmony of the collective society…

It kind of feels cool to be the outsider.

I have an interest in the outsider.

All of us, whether we are ignorant of philosophy or professors of philosophy, find it easier to follow dogma than to think.

One of the first things I think young people, especially nowadays, should learn is how to see for yourself and listen for yourself and think for yourself. Then you can come to an intelligent decision for yourself. If you form the habit of going by what you hear others say about someone, or going by what others think about someone, instead of searching that thing out for yourself and seeing for yourself, you will be walking west when you think you're going east, and you will be walking east when you think you're going west.

Whatever an education is, it should make you a unique individual, not a conformist.

I'm asking people to think critically and not to be lazy in their thinking.

To me, the thing that sets us apart from so many other animal species is our ability to ask questions, investigate, gather information, come to our own conclusions, and sometimes depart from the pack, sometimes move away from the tribe. And I'm not seeing a lot of that right now among a sizable portion of American politics and American voters. I'm not seeing that kind of use of critical thinking, and it really, really freaks me out.

Any man who is really a man must learn to be alone in the midst of others, to think alone for others, and, if necessary, against others.

The desire to be different from the people we live with is sometimes the result of our rejection- real or imagined- by them.

An image of thought called philosophy has been formed historically and it effectively stops people from thinking.

The world is a very puzzling place. If you're not willing to be puzzled, you just become a replica of someone else's mind.

Defy the crowd. The crowd isn’t always wise. It can also lead you down a path of silliness, sub-optimal choices, and downright destruction. Enchantment is as necessary for people to diverge from a crowd as it is to get people to join one.

I'm not the same as other people. I don't think the same. I don't do the same things. I just feel out of this world sometimes.

There's all of this stuff where we have so much debate over nonsense; it could be cured if we had a better educational system, if we trained people to really try and look into things on their own. That's a tough thing to do, particularly with the educational system staggering.