"Self-Reliance" by Ralph Waldo Emerson

Journal #9
Posted by Melissa Veum
10-20-09
Engl 48A

"There is a time in every man's education when he arrives at the conviction that envy is ignorance; that imitation is suicide; that he must take himself for better, for worse, as his portion; that though the wide universe is full of good, no kernel of nourishing corn can come to him but through his toil bestowed on that plot of ground which is given to him to till (Emerson, 1164)."

"The louder he talked of his honor, the faster we counted our spoons (Emerson, quotationspage.com)."

Throughout Emerson's essay, Self-Reliance, he talks a lot about relying on yourself and never second-guessing yourself over any matter. This passage struck me as very witty in terms of how you should be yourself and realize that the grass is not always greener. I like how Emerson says "...in every man's education..." because it shows that everyone does gain education in their lives and that that will be the time when you actually come to some self- realization that things are not as they seem. When you have envy for someone or something, which we all have had, there comes this time when you realize that it is stupid and that you only end up hurting yourself and not feeling good about yourself. Imitation again as Emerson says, "... is suicide..." and when you realize this, you'll be better off. It can ruin you to take someone else's ideas and claim them as your own. Emerson clearly states that you must trust yourself and take everything you have for face value, don't try to turn yourself into something your not.

Emerson also states that although the world is full of good, and sometimes we may want to take advantage of this, nothing is better than we bestow upon ourselves. If we all trust in ourselves and in our hearts, the good and the bad, we too will be able to have all the good inside of ourselves. We are all given a "plot of ground" in which is inside each of us to make good and have forever, it's when you start looking on to what others have that you don't, that we sometimes get insecure. I think that Emerson is just trying to tell us to look deeper inside ourselves and we will see what we've always wanted, we've had.